#35 - From Soil to Soul: Paul Chek on Truly Holistic Health
Today’s guest is Paul Chek
Paul is tackling the problem that modern health, fitness, and medicine are overwhelmingly reductionist—treating bodies like isolated parts, food like inert calories, and symptoms like separate glitches—while the real issues lie in upstream root causes: depleted soil, processed food, dysfunctional breathing, chronic stress, and misaligned beliefs. His work in this episode is about helping people and practitioners shift from symptom-chasing to a truly holistic, “soil-to-soul” model of health that integrates body, mind, emotions, spirit, and environment.
In today’s conversation Paul Chek explores his journey from growing up on an organic sheep farm with a yogi mother to training the U.S. Army boxing team, rehabbing “medical failures,” and ultimately founding the CHEK Institute. He explains why understanding living soil, organic farming, and vitamin complexes is essential for real nutrition, and how commercial agriculture leaves both food and humans energetically depleted. Paul and Dr. Wells dive into breathing mechanics, “working in” versus “working out,” and how most people’s chest-dominant, rapid breath keeps them stuck in fight-or-flight. They finish by unpacking his 1-2-3-4 framework, the “Last 4 Doctors You’ll Ever Need,” and his Four Quadrant coaching model that links beliefs, relationships, body, and environment into one coherent map for healing and performance.
You will learn how Paul’s early life on a farm and deep study of soil science, mycorrhizae, and paramagnetism led him to see nutrition as starting in the microbiology and energetics of the earth, not in a supplement bottle. You will learn why he views commercial farming as producing “dead food,” why whole-food vitamin complexes differ radically from isolated vitamins, and how this changes the way we think about supplements and health claims. You will learn how dysfunctional breathing patterns—chest breathing, hyperventilation, chronically tight abs—lock people into sympathetic overdrive, impair digestion, and drive pain, and how diaphragmatic breathing and “working in” practices restore balance. You will learn the logic of his 1-2-3-4 system (Dream → Balance of forces → Three choices → Four Doctors) and his Four Quadrant model, which connects inner beliefs, social dynamics, physical findings, and environmental factors so that coaches and practitioners can finally address root causes instead of chasing symptoms.
You will discover that lasting health and performance don’t come from one magic diet, exercise, or pill, but from aligning a few fundamental forces: real food from living soil, coherent breathing and movement, clear dreams, and daily choices that support them. You will discover that when you respect the body as a system-of-systems—physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual—complex “mystery” problems often become surprisingly solvable.
Many people feel trapped in cycles of chronic pain, fatigue, gut issues, and anxiety despite seeing multiple specialists and trying endless protocols. Paul’s approach offers a way out by teaching listeners how to identify the true upstream drivers—nutrient-poor food, dysfunctional breathing, unresolved beliefs, and toxic environments—and then systematically address them using his 4 Doctors and Four Quadrant frameworks.
Key take aways:
If you don’t understand soil, you don’t understand nutrition.
Breathe with your belly first; exhale longer to calm the system.
Work in to build energy; work out to spend it.
Addiction is behaviour that doesn’t produce the results you want.
Health requires all four doctors: Happiness, Diet, Quiet, Movement.
“I define an addiction as any repeated behaviour that does not produce the results you want.”
Today’s Expert Guest - Paul Check
Paul Chek is a world-renowned expert in corrective and high-performance exercise kinesiology, stress management, and holistic wellness, and the founder of the CHEK Institute, which trains health and fitness professionals worldwide in his integrated system of assessment, coaching, and lifestyle design. Over more than three decades as a holistic health practitioner, neuromuscular and sports massage therapist, and educator, he has consulted for elite athletes, professional sports teams, and organizations around the world, and authored numerous books, courses, and multimedia programs, including How to Eat, Move & Be Healthy! and The Last 4 Doctors You’ll Ever Need – How to Get Healthy Now!
Paul’s work is distinct because it truly spans “soil to soul”: he combines exercise science, manual therapy, anatomy, and rehabilitation with soil science, nutrition anthropology, breathwork, archetypal psychology, and spiritual development. Rather than treating pain or illness in isolation, he teaches practitioners to look at the person’s dream, beliefs, relationships, environment, and biology together through his Four Quadrant model and 4 Doctors system, then build individualized programs that include corrective exercise, lifestyle change, and inner work. This integrative, mentorship-driven approach has allowed him and his students to help “medical failures” who didn’t respond to conventional care, and it has influenced a generation of coaches who want to blend science, spirituality, and practical results.
Identify one clear dream or objective—something you love enough to change for—and then run it through Paul’s 1-2-3-4 filter each day: ask whether your choices support that dream (1), restore balance between yin and yang in your life (2), reflect the optimal of the three possible choices (3), and honour your Four Doctors—Happiness, Diet, Quiet, and Movement (4). That simple daily check-in can turn scattered efforts into a coherent, holistic plan that steadily improves your energy, health, and performance.
Follow Paul Chek on Instagram & Linked In.
Check out his website.
How To Eat, Move And Be Healthy!:
Your Personalized 4-Step Guide to Looking and Feeling Great from the Inside Out
This book will help you identify your individual needs and explain how to address issues that may be preventing you from looking and feeling your best. Paul reveals fascinating research and airs controversial topics while providing practical suggestions for achieving peak vitality.
This podcast contains advice and information relating to health and wellness. It should be used to supplement rather than replace the advice of your doctor or another trained health professional. If you know or suspect that you have a health problem, seek your physician’s advice before embarking on any medical program or treatment. All efforts have been made to assure the accuracy of the information contained in this podcast / interview / article as of the date of publication. The author and publisher disclaim liability for any medical or other outcomes that may occur as a result of applying the methods suggested in this material.
