Core Transformation Principles for Fitness and Leadership with Andrew Simpson

Episode Transcript
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Alex Judd (00:00):
Andrew, tell me the story about why you started your
business.

Andrew Simpson (00:04):
Well, it was an accident for sure. I was
convinced that I was going towork for this guy. I was 19
years old when I started in thefitness industry, and training
young athletes, mentoring them,coaching them, helping them get
bigger, faster, stronger, I wasconvinced I was going to work
with work for this guy and helphim open up all these locations.
And then fast forward a fewyears, and I came into my

(00:26):
relationship with the Lord gavemyself to Christ. And I started
to see things in this businessthat were just not aligned with
my new direction in life and mymorals and values.
And I realized pretty quickly Ineeded to make a pivot and not
work in this business anymore.And being a 23 or a 20, I guess,
two at the time, I didn't havemuch fear about what's going to

(00:47):
happen if I just quit this jobtoday. And I literally just did
that. As soon as I had therealization this is not aligned
with where God wants me, Igoogled, you know, how do you
write a resignation letter andand and quit the business. And
then I was like, oh, man.
I gotta figure out what to donext. And so I I reached out to
a couple of my clients, and Iwas like, hey. I'm I'm leaving.
I'm sorry. And they were like,you know, can we please, you

(01:08):
know, go where you're going?
I'm like, yes. But I don't knowwhere I'm going. They're like,
you don't have a plan? And so,man, I I started training some
clients. I rented space from afight club in our area.
And you know what we do at PFP.We mentor and coach young
athletes, life lessons, physicalfitness. And so a bunch of guys

(01:29):
punching each other in the facein a boxing ring while I'm
trying to, you know, develop andmentor a young nine ten year old
kid was not the most mostconducive environment. And man,
God started to, I don't know ifit was God or what, doors
started to shut. And thisbusiness that I was renting
space from, they called me attwo in the morning and said,

(01:51):
Andrew, we're moving to a newlocation.
You're gonna have to call yourclients and tell them we're in a
new spot tomorrow. I said, It'stwo in the morning. Is this
normally how people do business?Okay, well, that's fine. And so
went to a new spot the next day,started training my clients
there.
Three months later, it happenedagain. Got a call the day before
there. And so I realized theywere just filing bankruptcy.

(02:12):
They kept going under and thenhaving to open a new spot. So it
was very sketchy.
It got to the point it happenedthree times. And I finally said,
Okay, I'm either supposed to dosomething different with my
life, or I need to open up myown spot. And decided, I'm going
to look for some warehousespace. I signed a one year lease
in an 1,800 square footwarehouse, we had, you know, 10

(02:35):
to 15 clients, I say we it wasjust me 10 to 15 clients. And
that's where you know, that'sthe the starting story of what
happened.
And man, in that first year, Idid not have plans for it to
turn into what it is today. Andwe went from 10 clients to 100
clients in a year. God just blewthe doors off that place,
because we had somethinguniquely different, as Andy

(02:56):
Stanley would say. And so wedidn't realize it. But by having
customer service focus, having abeginning and end to your
workout experience, making itmore than just a gym, more than
just a workout, that's whatpeople were craving.
And and so we grew prettyquickly.

Alex Judd (03:12):
Thank you for sharing that. I like to pay attention to
what I think of as LCEs. Right?Life changing events. And
obviously, surrendering yourlife to Christ in your early
twenties is a life changingevent.
Quitting your job to start yourown business accidentally is
also a life changing event. Howdo you think it impacted you
that those two things almosthappened in lockstep with each

(03:35):
other? Like, how are thingsdifferent because those two
things were so closely tiedtogether?

That I mean, you know, like, I've never been
asked that question before. Butthat is probably why we take
this business as a ministryconcept so seriously at PFP is
because that that that might bepart of the reason why I leaned
into that concept so stronglyonce I realized like, hey, it's
one thing to have Bible versesup on your wall in your gym, but

(04:03):
how do you actually make this aministry? I think that might be
why is because of the way thatit all started. Great question.
Thanks for asking that one.

Alex Judd (04:09):
Oh, yeah, of course. So like, your decision, and you
can share what you would like toshare, but your decision to
surrender your life to Christ,like, what factored into that
decision? Had you never beenexposed to church, the Bible,
the the story of who God isbefore? Or, like, what led to
that surrender moment in yourearly twenties?

Well, from age 15 to 19, I was going down a
really bad path. I was far fromthe Lord. I was making all sorts
of really destructive decisionswith my life, and really just
getting lucky. The Lordpreserved me through that time
now looking back, but I just gotlucky that I didn't end up in
jail or end up with some othernegative impact of my decisions.

(04:51):
And so at 19 years old is whenmy first mentor that I can
remember came into my life.
And it happened to be this guythat I was working for,
interestingly enough, the onethat was not aligned with my
values and morals, But he, Godused him to get me on the path
away from hanging out withfriends who were not doing
anything with their lives. Andhe used, that guy to get me to

(05:13):
focus on personal development,business, leadership, a very
secular view of it all. And thenthat led me to church
eventually. And then that led meto give my life to Christ.

Alex Judd (05:24):
What were you hungry for at that time that at first,
the business development,leadership development, like,
scratched the itch of, do youthink?

Being significant. Mhmm. Being seen as
successful. I really admiredthis guy that was that came into
my life, probably not for theright reasons. Right?
I admired him because he hadmoney and he had influence and
charisma. And I again, I lookedat the past four years of my
life and and how I was living mylife, and I'm like, well, this
looks a lot better than that. SoI'm gonna go for that. So that

(05:56):
was yeah.

Alex Judd (05:57):
It's amazing to me how accelerated your journey is
in that, like, some peoplepursue the business the secular
business leadership, personalgrowth approach to significance,
and they'll do that for fortyyears until they realize, oh,
this mountain is ultimatelygonna be empty and I need to
give my life to Jesus. It's veryin alignment with your personal

(06:19):
brand, Andrew, that you just putit on overdrive and did it in
like, what sounds like under twoyears. What was it that caused
you to see maybe the flaw in thesecular approach to significance
so quickly?

Well, before I share that, I will say, I mean,
it's very easy to slip back intothat, right? I'm far from over
that, right? I'm far from pastthat. I have to obviously have
rhythms and people in my lifelike yourself and Path4Growth
community that help keep mecentered. But it was actually
Ken Blanchard who I'll neverforget reading his book, Lead

(06:53):
Like Jesus.
And it just called me out rightwhere I was. He said, a lot of
people aim for success first.And that's partially where I
was, but I had reallytransitioned to like level two,
what he talks about, which issignificance. And they think
that being significant is thething, right? It's like, that's
what I'm aiming for.
I want to be significant inpeople's lives. But he talks

(07:14):
about in this book, he's like,ultimately, like, that's still
kind of focused on you, right?It's pointing back at you and
how can I be significant? And sohe says level three is self
surrendering service andobedience to build God's kingdom
ultimately. And so that just hitme like a ton of bricks.
I'm like, well, I need to I needto make some changes here as
well.

Alex Judd (07:33):
Yeah. Yeah. Man, thanks for sharing that. Is it
fair to say that there's, like,early years operating out of the
bankrupt fight club and allthese other, like, wild things
that you were doing, is scrappythe right word, or what's the
word you would use to describethe early years of business?

Scrappy is a word. Free and fun is are are
some words. Right? Not that wedon't have that now. It's just
different.
We also have structure. Sure.Thank god, literally. But yeah.
Just like free and fun and dowhatever you want.
And, yeah, I mean, the earlyyears, we're very fond of those
years. But Proverbs also talksabout how, you know, do not be

(08:16):
fixated on those past years andthink that, oh, I wish things
were that way, and I wish thingswere the way they used to be,
right? Because the future ismuch brighter always. But, you
know, I think that the earlieris scrappy is a good word. Yeah.
Scrappy and fun and free andchaotic, as Joe would tell you.

Alex Judd (08:32):
My business partner. That's right. It's so was Joe
was Joe with the business atthat time?

Yeah, he was hired in the first four to six
months of opening the doors.

Alex Judd (08:41):
Wow, I don't know that I realized he had been with
you that close to the beginning.That's amazing. That's kind of
what I was gonna hit home onthough is like, I mean, it was
chaos and it just sounds likeyour experience of chaos is free
and fun. Is that like acharacter trait of yours? Or
like maybe we should ask Danielathis question, I don't know.

(09:02):
But like, how do you explainthat, that you were able to
experience that as fun? Becauseit sounds like for most people
or many people, that would be anightmare, Andrew.

That's true. I get asked similar questions
sometimes and I tell peoplelike, think that I'm grateful
that God has not given me, Idon't really have much fear
about taking risks and about,again, the early days of
business. I was never scared ofnot making it and not being
successful. Not that I alwaysthought we were just going to
crush it and do so great, but Ijust didn't ever have really

(09:35):
fear around it. And so that'sone element of it.
But the other part of it too isthat was probably not a great
thing for the first five yearsof our business that I had that
view of it because, like yousaid, most people don't. So not
knowing our team, right, 80percent of our team was probably
like, this is not fun. I don'tfeel free. This is this is not

(09:55):
okay. Right?
And I'm over here like, just,hey. Let's do stuff and make
stuff happen. Right? And yeah.

Alex Judd (10:00):
I get the image almost of, like, you see
sometimes two people in a rollercoaster, and one person's having
the time of their life while theother person's about to have
about to have a seizure. Andit's like, that was PFP for the
first five years, it soundslike.

That's right. That's right.

Alex Judd (10:16):
What were the character traits that God
developed in you in those firstfive years that you look at now
and say, man, those thingsreally impact the way that I
lead today so many years removedfrom that time?

Yeah. I mean, the one biggest one that sticks
out, honestly, and it's a workin progress, it's probably the
hardest character quality todevelop and maintain personally
is humility. And I say thatbecause, you know, I think that
those early years of thebusiness, I thought that I was
so much better than I was as aleader and as a business owner.

(10:54):
And, you know, I think it's JimCollins that talks about being a
genius with a thousand helpers.Like, I thought I was a genius,
but all like, now I realize,like, I wasn't the smartest
person on my team.
I just didn't honestly, like,this is such a big flaw of mine
in those early days. I didn'tseek out my team's opinions on
anything. I would go toconferences, go to learn stuff,
and then bring back all thesolutions and be like, guys,

(11:16):
this is what we're doing. And loand behold, we had a team full
of people, three of them arestill with us today that started
with us, who just had gold intheir minds. They could have
helped us in the business.
And so I always think back tothose first five years, and it
humbles me because I know we wecould have done so much more,
been been so much better if Iwould have engaged my team

(11:37):
earlier on and and led ledbetter at the end of the day.
Mhmm.

Alex Judd (11:41):
How did you eventually learn that lesson?

I think it was multiple things. I think,
honestly, Joe coming in, notcoming in, because he was with
us since the beginning. But ashe started to step up in his
role as a leader in the company,and his voice started to grow,
and he started to learn anddevelop, he helped me recognize
that, man, like we have acompany filled with red

(12:06):
language, right? David Marquetteturned the ship around, red
language, blue language. We havea company filled with red
language, and and that's whywe're we're not getting our
team's buy in on things.
We're not getting enoughmomentum because, know, we're
not engaging our team with theright questions. We're just
giving them all the answers. Andby him saying that, it was his
nice way of saying, Andrew, thisis actually you. This is on you,

(12:26):
man. Like, you need to you needto lead this team better.
And so that was one, gettinganother mentor in business who
interviewed each of my teammembers that are were on my
leadership team at the time andasked them questions about me.
Oh, man. That was that was hardand and revealing. Right? Like,
he asked the right questions andgot their honest, open answers

(12:48):
about what Andrew does well, butwhat Andrew needs to change as
well.
I would recommend everybody doesthat sometime, actually, often.
I need to do it again probablyhere soon. But yeah, I mean,
that was that was another thingthat helped me recognize I need
to change as a leader.

Alex Judd (13:01):
Man, really powerful. Can you give people a little bit
insight into your relationshipwith Joe? Because you've used
that name a couple times now, Iknow it's kind of an integral
part of the PFP story.

Yeah. So Joe, in his interview as a 19 year old
kid who just dropped out ofcollege to work at the front
desk of a startup gym, asked meif he could buy into the company
someday ten years ago.

Alex Judd (13:26):
I was like He's go getter is what you're saying.

He is a go getter, right? I was like, I
don't even know what that means,man, but sure. And so anyway, he
is my business partner and he isour integrator. So we we have
the visionary integrator model,CEO, COO model. And he is great
at everything that I am bad at.
He is an incredible leader,incredible at organizational

(13:50):
structure and operations. And wesee the world like, I never knew
you could see the world sodifferently from somebody else.
Our values are aligned. Right?Our value that's the most
important thing.
We believe in the same thing. Welove the Lord, and and he's a
great man of God. But man, wesee things so differently. And
over the last three years of usreally having this visionary

(14:12):
integrated relationship, I stillfeel like we're just getting
started in our relationship.We're still learning how to work
with each other and how eachother thinks and operates.
But man, if I don't tell youthat every single night, every
single morning I wake everysingle night I go to bed, every
single morning I wake up and Iam thankful for that guy and
grateful for him that God puthim in my life because PFP
wouldn't be what it is todaywithout him. I mean, I probably

(14:34):
would have burned myself out andran the business off a cliff
with all my crazy ideas. Andthen he has a way of leadership,
a way of communication andlanguage, and and just his his
integrity through and through.So that's Joe.

Alex Judd (14:48):
And really, y'all have engaged in the the
visionary integrator, CEO, COOmodel just in the past, what has
it been, three or four years.Correct?

Yeah. About three.

Alex Judd (14:58):
What had to change in you individually as a leader to
be ready for that model to gowell? Or do you think you could
have done it eight years ago andit would have gone just as well?
What had to change in you andmaybe even what had to change in
Joe from your perspective?

Well, I'm glad we don't have foresight and I'm
glad we can't see the futurebecause I would probably not
have done it if I would havebeen able to see the future.
That that might have been enoughfear for me to pull back on it.
But, no, I'm basically, like, Ihad to give up so much control,
at least perceived control ofwhat I thought I could control
about the business. I had togive up so many of my tendencies

(15:35):
and my, quote, unquote, freedom,my fun and freedom. I had to
give that up for the benefit ofthe mission, right, and knowing
that this thing is not gonna beable to to to accomplish what
God wants to accomplish throughus if we don't have structure.
And so, you know, I had tochange those things. And then I
had to become an employee in thebusiness. Right? I I am the
visionary CEO, but I'm also inthe marketing seat. And when I'm

(16:00):
in that seat, I report to Joe.
I have one on one accountabilitymeetings with Joe. And that's
just it's still a work inprogress. Right? But it's we've
made a lot of progress. And,again, talk about humbling you.
And so, you know, that'ssomething that had to change.
Yeah. Those are those are someof the biggest things.

Alex Judd (16:15):
What's been the biggest benefit to the business
as a whole of you and Joeworking together in this
capacity over the course of thepast three years now?

I think we're I I still think we're early in the
process, but I think we'relearning how to defer to one
another for our strengths andwhat we're great at. I think
that two is better than one,right? So it's a relationship.
It's at the end of the day, andwhen two people come together
and have ideas together that cancreate, you know, better
decisions, better growth.

Alex Judd (16:45):
If you think back, we kind of have looked at the first
five years a little bit. If youthink about the story of PFP as
a whole, I mean, you and Ilearned from some of the same
men, right? Tony Robbins, DaveRamsey, John Maxwell, right? We
could list the names. One of thethings I love about them is they
kind of teach and think aboutbusiness as a series of seasons

(17:06):
and stages.
So if you were kind of going tohigh level look at the story of
PFP, how do you categorize thestages, if that's possible? How
do you think of the story interms of chapters? And where are
you at right now?

It is so unique, I feel like for us, because for
the first seven or eight years,I was dead set on the vision of
having one big facility inFrederick, Maryland, and then
writing books, speaking,creating online programs. And
that's how we were going toexpand our message and our
mission. And so like for sevenor eight years, that is my one

(17:44):
track focus. That's what I toldtold the team we were going to
do. And so you know, so that hadits own seasons and chapters,
right?
When when that's your vision,just one location, that's very
different than what our newvision is. Everything's
different about that. And so02/2021, after we had expanded
to this big facility that we'rein now in Frederick, I was on a

(18:05):
run, and I was listening to apodcast by the woman who had
expanded Soul Cycle, a cyclingstudio, and she was sharing how
what they do in their cyclingstudio is so much more than just
fitness. They build communities.They change lives.
And I was like, I said out loud,I was like, my goodness. Like,

(18:25):
we do that on a whole anotherlevel, in my opinion, right,
with humility. Right? Like, weare doing that, and we're but
but I I believe so strongly inraising up the next generation
of leaders through middleschool, high school students,
college students. And it's like,they're the ones that are gonna
change the world in the future.
And that's what we do. Right?We're raising up the next
generation. And I paused thepodcast, and this is the only

(18:47):
time in my life. Well, there'sbeen two times, but the only

(20:30):
time in my life that I heard theaudible voice of God.
Like, I heard him say, my lightand my love will shine through
PFPs all over. He said, my lightand my love will shine through
PFPs all over. And I was like,well, that's pretty clear, but
is there a way I could spin thatto say, well, technically having
books and coaching and all thoseother things is doing No. No.

(20:51):
What we do really well is wecreate a safe place, an
inspiring place where kids andadults can come to after work,
after school, after sports, tobe poured into to receive the
love of God.
We're very intentional aboutloving all people, and they come
in in different ways. And that'swhat we do better than anyone
that I know, right? Like, that'sour secret sauce. And we can do

(21:13):
all those other things too, butwe you know, so that's what God
said to me. And so now, youknow, that was 2021.
I went to the team. I said,Guys, I think that well, I know
what God said to me. And theywere like and Joe and the rest
of the team, they were like,let's do it. Like, that makes
sense. I was expecting to have alittle like, no.
I don't think I don't if weshould do that. Like, they were

(21:33):
all like, let's do it. And andso that's on honestly, like,
feel like the start of almost anew book.

Alex Judd (21:40):
It's not even a new chapter in that way.

No. It's like a new book with a whole different
set of rules, whole differentset of, you know, challenges.
And so it's almost like, in away, we started over, I feel
like sometimes in 2021, '20 '20'2. And I say that because I
have to give myself the thegrace to say, hey, it's okay
that we haven't figured all thisout yet. Right?
We've got three locations nowthat are open, we're still

(22:03):
learning how to scale, how tomanage our finances, how to
scale our leadership, right? Joeand I went for from seven years
of working in the business in alocation as the coaches as the
leaders, to now we've got siteleaders over each location,
we've got layers of leadershipin between us. How do you lead
through people instead of beingthe one that makes all the

(22:25):
decisions? And we've got 30miles between locations, we're
trying to keep them somewhatclose. But you know, it's, it's
a whole different ballgame.
And so, yeah, I just feel likewe're just now we're just
getting started on this newvision, and I'm excited about
it.

Alex Judd (22:38):
Yeah. It's also interesting that it's like,
well, actually, walk me throughthis. Say, number one, you you
say like, man, I audibly heardthe voice of God on my run.
Yeah? Yeah.
And what was the phrase that hetold you again?

My light and my love will shine through PFPs all
over. And and it wasn't outloud. It was Sure. In it was it
was in my mind. It was in myheart.
It was in my spirit. It was theholy spirit was speaking to me
for sure.

Alex Judd (23:02):
Yeah, and it's a sense of intuition and
direction, and it sounds likeout of that, there was a deep
seated sense of conviction anddecisiveness that almost it's is
it fair to say like you neededthat sense of decisiveness to
call such a tremendous audiblebecause this was basically a
different entirely differentbusiness strategy than what you

(23:24):
had previously pursued for sevenyears?

So different. Yep. So different. And I kind of
knew what we were gettingourselves into. I knew it would
be a huge pivot and a hugeundertaking.
But yeah, it it was like, I Iknew that that was God's voice,
and I knew that that was theright thing. Right? If I get
myself out of the way and I justlooked at PFP as a vehicle to
change lives, like, dude, likeour vision is a fitness

(23:49):
lighthouse in every communitytransforming lives for the glory
of God. Like that needs to existin every place. And if a place
already has a place that'stransforming lives for the glory
of God, then we don't need toput a PFP there.
Yeah. Our vision is not to be inevery county and take over the
world. It's like, whereverthere's a place that is needed
like ours, and they don't haveone already, we should go there.

Alex Judd (24:10):
Man, that's so powerful. And you know, we've
been having actually a lot ofconversations around this topic
recently because I don't know ifyou listened to it or not but we
did an interview recently withthe author of a book called
Decision Making and the Will ofGod. That interview and that
accompanying book has just, Imean, been so radically
impactful for me. But as aresult of that interview, which

(24:32):
we'll link in the show notes ifpeople wanna listen, I've had a
lot of conversations inparticular with young men that
are trying to wrestle throughlike making decisions and does
God speak audibly versus do wehave Holy Spirit driven
intuition. One of the thingsthat I think is practically
helpful about that book is itgives us a theology of decision
making that's really, reallyhelpful, but it also kind of

(24:54):
makes the claim towards the endthat it would be immortal and
unwise to operate against yourconscience of what you believe
the Holy Spirit is telling youto do.
So as long as it's within God'smorality and within God's
wisdom, if your heart is tellingyou, man, I'm supposed to do
this, for you to do anythingdifferent than that, well, would

(25:15):
really unwise for you to do. Andso it sounds like that's what
happened in that moment waslike, man, you got a level of
conviction that you said, we'regoing all chips to the center of
this table, and that's what yourconscience was telling you, man,
I have to pursue this thing. Isthere anything else you'd add on
that in terms of like how thattype of moment can speak into

(25:36):
your decision making?

I don't know about into my decision making,
but I also think that when whenI first heard God say that and
then acted on it and said, we'regonna do this, I also knew,
like, I've got a at the time, Ihad a two year old son. We were
planning on having more kids. SoI'm like, I know that I I don't
think God's calling me to, like,build this thing on my own back.

(26:00):
Right? Like, I think that weneed to actually assemble a team
and have, a structure and anorganization.
And I didn't realize how big ofa sacrifice that would be in the
moment. But I think that waspart of the part of that early
on decision making is, like, ifwe're gonna do this, we have to
do it in a way that keeps all ofour team healthy. Me, Joe,
leadership team. Because the waythat the rest of our industry

(26:22):
operates, it's like if you'regonna run two or three
locations, you're gonna drivefrom location to location, be
the guy in each of them. And andthat's just not sustainable,
it's not wise, so I knew that wewouldn't be able to do it that
way.

Alex Judd (26:34):
Man, that's so good. There's a principle that I often
think about that's like, youcan't experience God's promises
outside of God's boundaries. Andso it's like, okay, like God is
calling you to make PFP a lightin multiple locations, right?
But he certainly would neverever call you to abandon your

(26:55):
wife and young children in theprocess of doing that. And so in
some ways, think it's actually agift of God that he gives us
limitations and constraints thatwe are called to operate within.
And it kind of sounds likethat's what you've been
experiencing since 2021. Doesthat feel right?

That's right, That's right.

Alex Judd (27:15):
Okay, so he says the phrase, and then how do you take
the line of like that phrase to,okay, we're gonna pivot strategy
and start focusing on multiplelocations? Because I mean, that
could potentially be interpretedmultiple different ways. Right?
How did you land on like, no,this is what we're called to do?

(27:38):
How'd you get there?

With the team, and I brought it to the team and
it was actually right at thetime where we were adopting EOS
a as our business operatingsystem. And since we've pivoted
to actually your all path forgrowth, your all's model, but it
was at that time. And so, youknow, I brought to them the
concept, but then reallymassaged it out and worked
through the details. And wedidn't even have it all figured

(28:01):
out in the first year or twoyears, right? Like we had to
then get around some other gymsthat were doing it the right or
the quote unquote right way,right?
In a healthier, sustainable wayand learn from them, okay, what
are mistakes you've made in theprocess? How would you go back
and do this differently? Sodefinitely having some people
who have walked that path beforeus helped us massage that out.

Alex Judd (28:22):
Yeah. And so does that feel like it's the season
that you're in right now? Or doyou feel like you've opened a
new chapter since that decisionin 2021?

No. It definitely feels like we have a
lot better direction on thescalability of our business,
Right? We know that it's notgonna be these massive 17,000
square foot locations that oneof our locate we've it's funny.
We've got a large, medium, andsmall sized location now. We've
got a 17,000 square foot, a5,000 square foot, and a 3,000
square foot location.
And the smaller, the better forso many reasons. The smaller,

(28:55):
there's a tighter relationship.Everyone knows each other.
There's just that closeness. Andfinancially, you could take care
of the team a lot better.
There's a lot more margin in thesmaller facilities. And so we
know that those smallerlocations are checking the box
on where we need to be. So nowwe feel like we've got clear
vision, clearer vision, and nowit's all about execution and,

(29:16):
patience, which your podcastrecently was very timely because
that is exactly the season we'rein right now.

Alex Judd (29:22):
And so good. I was having a conversation with a
friend recently and he was kindof sharing with me something
that he learned on the topic ofredemptive leadership. And he
was saying that a tenet ofredemption leadership is a
willingness to re risk inservice of others. So it's like,
there's some leaders, and Iwould put you in this category,

(29:44):
Andrew, where it's like you'veestablished a model, you've
established your first location,it's a 17,000 foot location,
it's impacting people. You'vewritten like what, five books.
After four, you're considered aprolific author, Andrew, right?
Like you're doing good, yourfamily's growing, like all these
things are going well. Andmeanwhile, you're saying, no, I

(30:04):
feel called to re risk inservice of others. What gives
you the courage to re risk, toput some of your personal
resources, but also your time,your energy, your brand on the
line to say, we're not justgonna get complacent where we
are, but actually we're gonnakeep doing new things.

Man, part of it is my, and now I've got better
checks and balances in my life,but I still get away with it
sometimes. Part of it goes backto the, I don't think, I just do
sometimes, right? And so I justmake decisions, which isn't
always a good thing. But man,like the other I think it's the
mission. Like when I get tostand up in front of the company

(30:44):
every quarter and share five,ten stories of lives that have
been transformed in our doors,that is what gives me that
encouragement to keep movingforward.
Because man, like the lastcouple of years since opening up
multiple locations and notknowing what that was gonna do
financially and bringing on abusiness partner, like, it's
been pretty hard, like,personally and financially,

(31:07):
like, there's been challengingtimes, and you're right, it has
been a whole, a big sacrifice,but like, honestly, two things.
It's the mission, but then it'sknowing what Jesus did for me
and that sacrifice and justtrying to like take on some of
that just in my quiet time andwhen I'm in prayer, it's like,
okay, like this is good. Like,and the other part too, man, is
like, haven't had a bad day inten years. Literally haven't had

(31:28):
a bad day in ten years. So Ijust have this philosophy, only
bad moments, never a bad day.
And so each day I wake up and Igenuinely can look back and see,
oh my gosh, yesterday was sogreat. Like the things that
happened yesterday. And so I saythat like the sacrifices have
been hard, financially it's beenhard, and that's true. But the

(31:48):
blessings have so outweighed allof those challenges. And so I
think that's the other part thatkeeps me going is like
genuinely, like focusing on allthe good things that are
happening around me and whatGod's doing through us.
And then yeah, that allows us totake risks with a little bit
more positivity, if you will.

Alex Judd (32:06):
Is there a story of transformation that's occurred
in the gym that you're mostinspired by?

Well, man, there so last year for the first time
ever, we had a it was called agenerational transformation
award, you helped us create ourmission statement for our
company. And so our mission isto provide a love powered
coaching experience that createsresults, deep rooted
relationships, and generationaltransformation. And so for the
first time last year at ourChristmas party, we announced

(32:35):
the generational transformationaward winner, which was it goes
to a location. So each locationsubmitted their best
transformation story thathappened in their facility. And,
you know, the award goes to thegym location doesn't necessarily
go to the client that wasimpacted.
And there was this guy namedNelson, who eighteen months ago

(32:57):
comes into our gym, was burntout from his job was not the
greatest husband was just, Imean, was not very present and
was not healthy. And this guywas really physically unhealthy,
probably mentally, emotionallyunhealthy from what I know. And
it was it was trickling downinto his family. This guy
started working out one day aweek. So just dipped his toes in

(33:19):
probably to satisfy his wife,right?
Like, okay, I'll go work outfine. And the coaches met him
where he was at, loved on him,challenged him, pushed him, paid
attention to him. He startedcoming two days a week, then
three days a week. Last year, Igot a chance to coach the class
that he was in. And he came upto me afterwards with tears in

(33:40):
his eyes.
This man who was all tatted up,tattoos all over his body, super
strong, and came up to me withtears in his eyes and looked at
me and said, this place haschanged my life and your
coaches, if it weren't for them,I don't know where I would be
right now in my life. Myfamily's better for it. And then
man, get this, a couple monthsafter that, I take my kids to

(34:00):
the library and his wife is thelibrarian. I didn't even know
it. And she comes up to me andmakes me cry right afterwards.
Right? Like, two months later,she tells me how it's just
changed their family dynamic.And so, like, that one it that
one and now the dude is running50 mile races. He's gonna do a
ultra a hundred mile race. Youwould love him.
You would love this guy. Andhe's recruiting other, clients

(34:24):
of ours to, like, be part of itwith them and to do it with
them. And so, like, the rippleeffects of that one decision and
and us having a small the thePFP team and the coaches getting
to have that small part in thattransformation, the ripple
effects are so massive. And it'slike, that's why like, that's
what I live for, right? That'swhy I love what we do.

(34:44):
Because like, fitness,physically, it can help your
health, like in a moment'snotice, right? All the business
owners that listen to thispodcast, some of them probably
are fit and healthy, and some ofthem know that they need to work
out, right? They need to knowlike, hey, that's that's got to
be at the top of my list thisyear. And that can change a lot.
But then the other rippleeffects of how it changes you
mentally, emotionally,relationally, in every other

(35:06):
area of your life makes youbetter at your career.
It's like, that's prettyspecial. So that's the one that
comes to mind. Nelson. Shout outto Nelson.

Alex Judd (35:13):
Shout out to Nelson indeed. Holy cow. Praise God for
that story too. That's justincredible. I wanna call
attention to something because Iknow it's something that you
believe too and then if you haveanything conceptually or
principally to add to this, Iwanna hear it.
But I mean, it's one of thethings that you and I have both
learned from Tony Robbins that Iwant so bad for people to

(35:35):
experience and understand isjust this idea that
neurobiologically gratitude andanxiety can't coexist. But I
think so often we take that aslike, okay, well, I should do my
gratitude journal at night andwrite down the things that I'm
grateful for. But in myexperience, just doing the
little writing exercise isn'texperiencing gratitude. And what

(35:57):
I hear you saying is like, man,this is an incredibly stressful
season right now. Like there'scashflow challenges, there's
capacity challenges, I'm surethere's employee challenges
associated with multiplelocations, right?
There's so many problems thatbecause you've tripled the
number of locations yourbusiness is in, there's so many
problems that you now have tosolve that you didn't have to

(36:18):
solve four years ago, right? AndI would just imagine when you
not only just think about, butactually tell the story of
Nelson, probably like all ofthose like little things, like
they just shrink in importanceand probably don't have nearly
the power over your mind thatthey otherwise would have. And

(36:41):
you probably are a way betterleader when you reimburse
yourself in the story of Nelson.Any thoughts on that? I just
hear your energy even as youtalk about it, Andrew.
And I'm like, man, that's what Iwant people to experience is the
ability to be grateful for partsof their business in such a way
that it will reduce the anxietyassociated with the inevitable

(37:01):
struggle going on in their life.

Yeah. Yeah. Mean, it becomes it's got to
become a habit. And it hasbecome a habit in my life of
like, you know, I won't sayevery day. I don't think about
Nelson every day, of course.
But but multiple timesthroughout the week during my,
hour long quiet time in themorning devotional time, I write
down my WPGPs. So every singleday, it's wins, praises,

(37:25):
gratitudes, and prayers. And soI spend time writing those
things down. And then I allowlike, with my eyes closed, I
think about it and remember ithappening the day before or
whenever it was. And I allow itto to put a smile on my face.
I I can see Nelson walking intohis house with a smile on his
face, hugging his kids withenergy versus being drained and

(37:47):
yelling at his kids. Like, I canactually and I use the power of
my mind and imagination thatGod's given us to think about
those things and see them. Andso, yeah, man, that changes the
game when I call it experientialgratitude versus just regular
old gratitude. And you you saidit best the the way that works.
And so, yeah, that that makesthing that makes a world of
difference.

(38:08):
In 2018, my dad was diagnosedwith lung cancer, and he passed
away six months later. It was ait was a riveting time that came
out of nowhere. And it was abouta week later that I found myself
thinking about the night that hehad passed away, which was an
awful night. It was tragic andand terrible. And I was and then
I I felt like this was not mydad's voice or God's voice, but

(38:30):
I felt like I heard my dad,like, saying to me, like, why on
earth are you focused on thetimes that were so terrible and
the times where I didn't have myhair?
Like, why are you thinking aboutthat, bud? Like, think about the
times where we went fishingtogether. Think about the times
where we got to throw the balltogether. Think about the times
that we went to the gamestogether. Like, think about
those things.

(38:50):
And then I was reminded ofPhilippians four eight, right?
Whatever is true, lovely,praiseworthy, focus on such
things. Like God tells us, likefocus on the good, right? Think
about the things that arebeautiful and praiseworthy.
Don't ignore the other thingsand just, you know, pretend like
they're not there, but solvethem, right?
Figure out what the solutionsare partner with God in them.

(39:11):
But spend a lot of your energyand your focus, I say 90% of
your focus on the good. And thenkeep your mind, you know, 10% of
your brain open for what couldgo wrong, preparation, planning,
reality, that kind of stuff.

Alex Judd (39:24):
You just used the phrase partner with God on them.
What does that look likepractically?

Partnering with God on the challenges? Yeah.
Practically, it's actuallyhaving business meetings with
him where you're sitting downand asking him, God, what do you
think about this situation thatwe're going through right now?
How should I respond to it? Andwaiting and listening.
And if you don't get answersI've actually learned that God
speaks to me a lot through otherpeople. And so he'll use people

(39:53):
in my life, and they'll saysomething, and I'll be like,
man, like, that's exactly what Ineeded to hear. And so I think
partnering with him isdefinitely prayer, right? That's
direct communication to thefather. And so prayer, yeah,
that's that's the biggest thingthat comes to mind in terms of
partnering with God is is inprayer and in decisions.

Alex Judd (40:09):
I appreciate your kind of elaborating on the
superhero and celebrity that nowNelson is for this entire
podcast audience. And it soundslike not only has, rehearsing
gratitude and things that arepraiseworthy become a rhythm for
you, I've spent time around thePFP team. It seems as though

(40:30):
y'all have rhythms for sharingstories of transformation with
your team. Can you speak to whatthat is, how you do that and why
you do that from a businessstandpoint?

Yeah, so we one of the principles that we
operate with in our meetings isthe principle that the questions
you ask determine and show whatyou value most. And so the first
question that you ask at your atyour stand up meeting, or your
leadership team meeting, thatautomatically leads your team to
believe that that's what youvalue most. So if your first

(41:04):
question is, hey, what are thenumbers from last week? Then
your team will naturally startto believe that this is what
this is what my leader caresabout most. And so I'm gonna
start to look for those thingseach week.
I'm gonna start to influencethose things each week. And not
that that's bad by any means tofocus on numbers. But for for
me, when I learned thatprinciple, I was like, well,
what do we care about most? Atthe end of the day, like, what
is the most what what do I wantmy team to know that Andrew, CEO

(41:28):
and founder cares about most andnow all the other leaders as
well? It's what happened lastweek from a standpoint of
generational transformation.
So that's the first question wehave. All of our locations
during their all hands meetingeach week, they have a slide up
on their TVs, and it says, whathappened last week? Results,
relationships, transformationstories. And we spend ten,

(41:50):
fifteen minutes, if not more,right? If there's more, then we
share them, but ten to fifteenminutes just talking about what
happened last week.
And so that's how we've and Ifeel really great about that
part of our business. And that'swhy culture and the the buy in
from our team is so strongbecause they know that that's
what we care about most becausewe prioritize it in meetings, we
talk about it first, and we puta lot of emphasis there.

Alex Judd (42:12):
Man, that I I love that because that's just such a
pragmatic handle of, like, howyou put the mission first. And
and you're not just sayingyou're a mission driven
business, but you are a missiondriven business. Okay, so you
have this remarkable perspectivein that you have a front row
seat to transformation. And it'snot even just physical
transformation, it's total lifetransformation. And I mean,

(42:35):
you've had that front row seatfor years now.
If I were to assign you the taskof like Andrew, your next book
has to be a cookbook. And thecookbook is, the recipe is for
transformation, like total lifetransformation. And then I would
say, Andrew, what are theingredients? Like what is gonna
go into this recipe? What's theprocess for creating

(42:58):
transformation?
Like what have you learned?

So we've taken that and put it into what we
call our five step magicalexperience. Certain elements of
that align with your question,but I'll summarize the five step
experience a little bit morebroadly because it gets into the
nitty gritty of what we do inour gym. But, you know, first
thing is the first impression.Right? So the first impression
matters, right?
We treat people like VIPs whenthey walk in, put a smile on

(43:24):
their face. If it's a kid,right, we got to make it fun
right off the bat. And so firstimpression matters. And then
it's connect and build trust.Connect and build trust, build
bridges, right?
I don't care if you don't likevideo games, that kid does. And
so if during your one on oneconsultation with the kid, you
need to talk about video gamesand pull up video game examples
on YouTube and look at them withthe kid just to get him to buy

(43:45):
in a little bit. Because fitnessman, like fitness isn't
inherently fun for most people.And nor do they quote unquote
have to do it. You could arguethat it is essential, but you
don't have to, right?
So our business is actually apretty hard one to be in, People
don't need to do this. Theydon't like to do it either. It's
painful. And so as far as likebroader, though, what does it

(44:05):
take to transform a life?Obviously, first impression
matters.
Second, connect and build trust.Going along with that,
understand and appreciate theirworld, right? Because we
fortunately, thank God, peoplecome in this gym who aren't
Christians, who don't believewhat we believe. And it's
because I believe that our teamis really good at understanding

(44:25):
and appreciating other people'sworlds, even if it's very
different from yours. And so Idon't until until you do those
two things, first impression,connect and build trust, and
then really three things,understand and appreciate
someone else's world andworldview and and whatnot, I
don't think that the doorway iseven cracked open to be able to
transform their life throughknowledge, coaching, and

(44:46):
whatnot.
And so those are the first threethings. And then it's like,
okay, let's get into what doesthis person need right now
mentally, emotionally,physically? How can I challenge
them? How can I keep themaccountable, give them
direction? And then the lastpiece, I think is really hard to
really get to generationaltransformation, which for us, it

(45:08):
doesn't happen in three monthsor six months.
The people that we classify asas people whose lives are
transformed, and they're goingto go transform others lives.
They've been with us for twelveplus months a lot of the times.
And that requires consistency.Like, don't get comfortable with
these well, comfortable withthem from a friendship
standpoint. But man, like, everyday you need to show up and

(45:31):
treat them like you're trying towin them over as clients.
Because you never know. Like,sometimes people might be on the
fence. You never know whatpeople are showing up with or
they might be thinking when theycome in like, you know what?
Life's getting tough. I'm reallybusy.
Things are hard right now. Ithink today might be my last day
at PFP. And so we talk aboutthis as a team. Like you have to
kind of have that little bit ofproductive paranoia, right? To

(45:54):
like, I gotta show up strongtoday for this person and give
them an experience that I wouldbe giving to somebody if I was
trying to win them as a clientfor the first time.
That's not easy to do, but Ithink that's really important,
is consistency and followthrough.

Alex Judd (46:06):
How do you determine what people need?

Yeah, so we have a pretty extensive assessment
process, right? Our first hoursession with a person one on one
is gathering a lot ofinformation, putting them
through for like an athlete, ayoung athlete we work with, we
put them through a mindsetquestionnaire that helps us
understand mental game andmindset in life, where they at.

(46:29):
Again, we ask a lot ofquestions, get a lot of feedback
from them on that. Ask, if it'sa kid, again, we talk to their
parents, right? Get theirperspective on what does your
kid need most.
So it's a lot of, I think,information gathering to find
out what a person needs most.And then over time, I think when
you master your craft and youget really good at what you do
as a coach, then you just havelike some more intuition, right?

(46:51):
Like you can start to sense whatthey need because people
sometimes, you know this in yourbusiness, they say they need one
thing, right? I need to grow. Ineed to make money.
And you're like, no, you needhealth. You need to take care of
your family right now, right?And so I think that's the other
piece is just the intuition thatcomes with experience and being
in the game for long enough toget there.

Alex Judd (47:10):
Yeah. It's interesting because I feel like
the average gym, how they definewhat people need is they run an
individual through a battery ofphysical tests, right? Like
we're gonna have you run thetreadmill, we're gonna see what
your bench press is, we're gonnasee how many pull ups you can do
or if you can do a pull up, allof these things, what you weigh,
VO2 max, all of that And I'mintrigued by the fact that like

(47:33):
the first thing you mentioned islike, we're gonna look at their
mindset. We're gonna ask themquestions about their mindset.
Why start with the mind?

Well, wouldn't even say it's just the mind,
right? These questionnaires thatwe give them. Like, for example,
we had a young lady, she was 13years old when she came in our
gym, and she sat down and didher initial questionnaire. And
on the questionnaire, it's abunch of statements that you
would self identify with, right?Highlight this if it's true for
you, leave it blank if it's not.

(48:03):
And that, again, people, it'sshocking how honest they will be
if you are not in the room withthem and all they have to do is
self identify with things versusif I were to ask you the
question, Alex, do you strugglewith body image? No, you get
defensive, right? But when itsays it on a piece of paper, I
struggle with body image, Idon't like the way I look. This
girl, and then this has happeneda lot of times, right? This girl

(48:25):
highlighted it.
And I went into the room and Isat down with her and I asked
her about other elements of it.And then I said, know, is there
anything you want to talkthrough on this? And she didn't
say anything. I said, you know,the one about body image, tell
me about that. And she brokedown in tears.
This girl had been anorexic andbulimic for a period of time.
She was purging her food. Shewas crying every night that she

(48:48):
went into her room because shedidn't like the way she looked.
And her mom had no clue. Her momhad no clue that this was going
on.
And I asked her if she wanted toshare it with her mom or if she
wanted me to share it. And so weall came in a room together and
talked through it. And so thereason why we do it is because
it reveals so much, right? Thatthis assessment process can
reveal so much and it opensagain, the doorway for people to

(49:08):
talk about things that, youknow, maybe they wouldn't have
had the doorway open to talkabout with anybody else. So you
know, that maybe you could sayis rooted in something with
mindset, or it could be just herbelief, right?
It could be the thing that leadsher to know how much God loves
her and how God sees her, right?There's so many reasons why we
do this assessment process, andas I'm saying it out loud, I'm

(49:30):
like, I need to remind our teamwhy we do it.

Alex Judd (49:32):
Yeah. Do you sometimes feel like the business
you're in isn't really thebusiness you're in? Like, do
people come to you for forfitness and performance and
health and then you you butyou're like, you're basically
providing an above and beyondvalue from that? Or how do you
think about it, Andrew?

That's right. Yeah. Yeah. We're we're not in
the business of of fitness atall. We're in the people
business.
We're in the transformationbusiness. We're in the changing
lives business. %.

Alex Judd (50:00):
So what are you like, what is your process then for
like, people are like, no, like,dude, I wanna lose weight. And
then you're like, well, that'slike, because still externally,
you look like a gym, right? Andand Yeah. You know, technically
you are a gym, but you're, Imean, it sounds cheesy, but
you're so much more than a gym,right? And so how you run a

(50:21):
business that's bigger than yourperceived business, anything
you've learned on that?

We let these stories of transformation, and
we turn them into videos, andand we use that as part of our
marketing. We let the storiestalk about the the deeper parts
of what we do, but a lot of ourmarketing efforts, right, are
talking about the reasons whypeople come to the gym, right?
It's addressing their painpoints, addressing the things
that keep them up at night,their clothes don't fit well, or

(50:46):
their kid's not fast enough andis sitting on the bench and
head's always down, right? Weaddress those things in our
marketing efforts and whatnot.Because again, people come for
the workouts or the speedtraining or the the fitness, and
they stay for the community, thethe coaching, the
accountability.
They they stay for all the otherstuff. But yeah, I mean, we've

(51:07):
actually, at times of ourhistory as a business, we've
gotten too far away from thephysical results. And at the end
of the day, like people come forthat. Like, that's what they pay
for. They pay And so we've gotassessment machines for adults
that assess their body fat andtheir speed or their muscle
mass, we test them in theirphysical as well.

(51:28):
But man, our coaches areincredible. I mean, they've got
a lot on their plate to be ableto help a person transform in
all those areas of their life.Like we, our coaches are really
amazing to be able to do allthat.

Alex Judd (51:38):
Yeah, well, I agree with that. I mean, I've done a
workout at PFP and I'veexperienced the culture at PFP.
And it's interesting, it's kindof like if you go to Chick fil
A, it's like the customerservice could be world class and
if the chicken sucks, it doesn'treally matter. It's kind of like
PFP, it's like, I mean, I'llnever forget the first time that
I came and visited y'all, thegreeting was unbelievable.

(51:59):
People were so wildly friendly.
What was crazy to me is not evenjust the way I was treated by
your coaches, but the way I wastreated by your other members.
Like they were going out oftheir way to get connected to
me. And then the workout waslike really good. And the way
that it was led was really good.And I was, I think it was Joe

(52:20):
that led it.
I like simultaneously hated Joeand loved Joe at the same time,
which is exactly what you wannafeel about a coach. So it is so,
so, so good. So the question Ihave there then is like, y'all
are in an industry on thefitness and health side of
things that is rapidly changing.The dynamics of what are

(52:41):
considered good proper practiceare always being innovated,
grown, transformed Andsimultaneously, there's a lot of
fads too that you probably don'twanna get too embroiled in. How
do you make sure that yourcoaches stay relevant and
competent with the industry asit goes and as it grows?

(53:01):
And how do you do thatpersonally, Andrew?

Yeah. It's probably a weakness of ours, I
would say, as far as staying upto date with industry trends or,
yeah, like, the latest trainingmodalities and and and But I
think at the end of the day,I've always just been really
laser focused on the things thatwill never change in our
business. And that is the wayyou treat people, knowing about

(53:24):
them, individualizing theexperience, customizing things
as much as you can, keeping themaccountable, checking in with
them on off days, making surethey're taking care of their
other one hundred and sixty fivehours of the week, not just the
three that they're into the gym.I think a lot of young, and
maybe this probably crosses overto other industries as well and
coaches, but you know, it's notabout the with the workout or

(53:45):
the exercise that you do, youhave to be able to at the end of
the day, motivate them to changeoutside of just the time that
you're working with them. And soI've always put the emphasis
with our team on those things.
And, we do have some reallygreat coaches even recently that
have come on the team that aresuper passionate about the
exercises and and those things.And and that's always a great

(54:08):
infusion to the culture, and itlevels things up. But it's like,
that's the to me, that's thecherry on top. Right? The the
fancy exercises, the workouts,the the the fads, like, yeah,
let's do those things if they'rerelevant for our business, but
that's not the main thing.
Right? It's master thefundamentals, at the end of the
day. And so we try to keep itsimple.

Alex Judd (54:26):
You've studied mindset and performance. You've
written books on mindset andperformance. Are there things
that you've learned particularlyabout like mindset for athletes
that you think are a directparallel into mindset for
business owners?

So many. That's why I

Alex Judd (54:46):
love it. Good, yeah. And why are you so passionate
about this topic too?

Well, it started with a story. A girl who
actually ended up working for usfor a period of time, But when
she was in high school, I got aphone call from her mother. This
is 2016, and her mom was likefrantic on the other end of on
the other line. Andrew, youknow, it happened again in the
volleyball game last night.Megan, she made a mistake, then

(55:11):
coach pulled her out of thegame, and she put her head down
and started self sabotaging, andthen she just spiraled, she
didn't get put back in the game.
Andrew, you got to help her. AndI'm like, what? Like, I thought
we were helping her with thesethings. Right? And so I
realized, like, holy smokes.
Like, we could have the fit mostphysically talented, strong,
high vertical jump athlete. Butif they can't control between

(55:34):
the ears, what good is that? Andso that's what made me realize,
like, we need to understandmindset, the mental game, how to
apply it to athletes. And so Iwent on a multiyear journey of
reading every sports psychologybook I could, taking every
course I could, learning aboutit, and then transferring it to
our team, and then eventuallywriting, multiple books about
it. And so, yeah, it's it'skinda like I think it's it's the

(55:56):
the x factor, if you will.
It's the thing that most mostathletes and most people don't
focus on enough. Tony Robbinsthing is, you know, business is
80% psychology, twenty % skill.Like, that 20% skill is really
important. You know, you haveto, like, know the ins and outs
of the business or the sport andhave the skills. But first,

(56:18):
figure out the mindset piece.
And so, yeah, there's so manyprinciples that apply from
sports and crossover tobusiness. One of them is the
principle of focus. You know,what you focus on, you feel,
what you focus on, you movetowards, and what you focus on
expands. So that is very truefor an athlete. You know, if if
all you focus on as an athleteis what you're not doing well or

(56:40):
how far you fall short of yourbig dream of playing in college,
like, if all you focus on isthat, then you're not gonna feel
satisfied.
You're never gonna really enjoyyour sports journey. And, you
know, if you get to the end ofyour sports journey, and all you
ever feel is dissatisfied, thatsounds pretty miserable. And as
business owners, like, that'swhere I found myself, right? I
was never satisfied. I believethose lies that society tells

(57:02):
you that good is never goodenough.
Never rest. Never be satisfied.And it's like, wow. Like, never
being satisfied sounds, again,like a miserable business
journey. And so the wholeprinciple of focusing on what
you feel is like, okay.
Reflect on your gratitudes, yourwins. Think about how far your
teammates have come and howthey've grown. Don't just think
about where they need toimprove. So that's that's one.

Alex Judd (57:25):
Can I pause you right there real quick? Yeah. As you
walk through these, you and Iwere going back and forth
yesterday a little bit and youkind of shared like, it's in
maybe a little bit of anunexpected way. It's a little
bit of a challenging season foryou all just in terms of the
number of variables you all aremanaging for. Can you speak to
how, as we walk through thesemindset principles, and I'd love
for you to start with focus, howdo you as a business owner

(57:49):
personally apply theseprinciples to what you're
walking through in what is apretty stressful season right
now for your business wherethere's turbulence, there's
challenges, there's obstacles.
So start with focus.

Yeah, so I could very well focus on the fact that
we are like cash flow, as Brianmentioned on your podcast
recently, like cash flow crisisright now, I would say we're
just about there, right? Likelooking at the bank, wondering,
like, are we going to be able tomake payroll? I mean, this is a
stressor that we're dealing withevery couple weeks. And God is
providing through it. And it'sbecause we just made a
miscalculation of opening up ourthird facility, it cost us, a

(58:27):
lot more than we thought it wasgonna cost us.
And simultaneously, our biggestbusiness unit took a 40% hit in
revenues because they lost acouple of coaches unexpectedly.
And so it's like, did not planfor worst case scenario. And
that's where maybe mindset isnot a great thing to always use,
right, to focus on the positive.Like, we did not plan for worst
case scenario, and worst casescenario happened. And we're

(58:49):
we're still in it.
We're still in the challenge,but we see the again, what you
focus on, you feel, like we seewhere God is opening up things
for us and we see the futureahead and that things are going
get better. And we're not fakingthat. Like that's genuinely both
Joe and I. We're like, we cansee it. Like we know, we know
that God's mission for thisbusiness is big.

(59:10):
We know that he wants to impactpeople. So we never have fears
really of like, what if we goout of business? What if we run
out of money? Like, we don'tthink like that because I
genuinely don't believe that'son the table. I don't think God,
that's what he wants to do.
I mean, could he use that forsomething even better? %. We're
open for it. But I think thatthat's the whole, you know,
focus on what you can and evenlike solutions, Focus on what

(59:34):
you can do. That's why I wrotethis most recent book, we saw a
huge opportunity to create anactual revenue stream through
this new book that was a topicthat we knew we could we could
really reach a lot of peoplewith.
And so it's like, let's writethe book because it'll help
with, you know, cash flow. Andso, you know, focus on
solutions, not just problems isthe mindset principle.

Alex Judd (59:55):
Man, there's number one, thank you for your
vulnerability, authenticity andtransparency and service of
others. I think that's sopowerful. And I'm glad that
y'all are seeing a path forward.I think that's also really
encouraging to hear as well, butthere's something that you said
really quick in there that I, asyour friend, I personally

(01:00:17):
believe, Andrew, it's part ofyour secret sauce. You said,
could it all shut down, go awayand God decide to do something
even better?
And you just kind of casuallysaid, yes, of course it could.
And we're open for that. Andit's like, for me, I think that
the testament to your faith isnot just we think all these
things are going to work outwell. I think that that's really

(01:00:39):
good. But I also think thetestament to your faith is even
if it doesn't, God is biggerthan the success or failure of
this individual enterprise andyour pragmatic trust in all
things work together for thegood of those who love God and
are called according to theirpurposes, man, I just want to
call attention to that becausethat is inspiring for me and I

(01:01:00):
know it'll be helpful for ouraudience just that you've got
that attitude of like, God'swill is bigger than any
individual line graph associatedwith our business.
So thank you.

Andrew Simpson (01:01:10):
Well, that goes to the next principle, mindset
principle, which is self talk,right? We teach our athletes all
the time, You gotta have goodself talk. And even down to, if
you say, like, I am an athlete,I must be successful in my
sport. Like, that's dangerous.Right?
Because that's an identity. Andso we have I've got so many
stories. But, you know, I havean athlete named Carly that I

(01:01:34):
worked with who her whole sportscareer, she had identified
herself as a lacrosse player.She was dead set. I'm gonna play
lacrosse in college.
This is my dream. This iseverything. And so she ended up
having a rare condition,bilateral popliteal entrapment
syndrome, which is where thepopliteal artery that goes
through the back of her knee,essentially blood was not

(01:01:54):
flowing through it. And so shegets to college to Michigan to
play lacrosse at the highestlevel. And in her first
practice, she's running and herlegs went numb.
It's like, well, you can't runif your legs are numb. And man,
she tried to push through, pushthrough, push through. And we
had to like, I had to walk withher and work with her through
that journey to slowly changeher belief that I am a lacrosse

(01:02:18):
player to I have some gifts thatGod has given me. And I've just
happened to use lacrosse as myvehicle to use them. And if if
if I can't play lacrosse again,which she was not able to, she
ended up having to medicallyretire.
If this happens, he's going touse those gifts of mine for
something else. And so she builtthat belief that she was she had
other gifts. And then shestarted she became a coach, and

(01:02:41):
started coaching. She was ableto use everything she learned
from lacrosse to benefit othersand coach. So for me, man, it's
like I try to never identifymyself.
It's funny. Like, whenever Ifill out even your all's forms
to to attend your amazingworkshops, I'm like, do I wanna
identify as a gym owner? Like, Ikinda wanna put down, like, I'm
a child of God or like, I that'dbe too cheesy. Alex would reach

(01:03:01):
out to me

Alex Judd (01:03:01):
and be like, dude, are kidding me? Percent business
owners, we've got 35% managers,and we've got one child of God
is in this workshop. I lovethat. That's so good. Man, this
is so good because this is, Iactually think what you are
talking about right now iscountercultural in the business
leadership personal growthspace.

(01:03:22):
I mean, you and I have sat inconferences together where we
were told the thing that youhave to do is you have to make
your goal for your business intoa must. Like that's what you
have to do is you have to turnthis into a must. And I actually
think from a spiritualperspective, that can be
extremely damaging becausethere's not, in my experience,

(01:03:47):
there's not all that muchdifference between something
being a must and it being anidol. And the things in my life
that are actually musts arelike, I must preserve my
relationship with my heavenlyfather. I must invest in the
health of my marriage.
I must be a dad that disciplesLily and helps her grow up to be
the woman she was created to be.It's like, those are like three

(01:04:09):
of them, but must hit this$2,000,000 revenue goal by the
January. It's like, that's maybea preference and God encourages
us to have desires andpreferences. But I think what
you're hitting on is like, it'sactually really dangerous to
call things musts that shouldnever gain that status. That's

(01:04:30):
right.

I agree with you a %.

Alex Judd (01:04:32):
It's hard to guard and sustain and cultivate that
though. So I I really appreciateyou for sharing that. Is there
anything else you'd add on howto maintain a proper, like a
proper relationship with ourgoals before we move on to any
other mindset principles youhave?

Yeah, mean, be careful who you're following. I
mean, in in the business world,right? Like, are people that I
could listen to and learn from.And if I get too much of that,
then I I do not do everything Ijust said, right? I I shift.
And, again, luckily, having abusiness partner who equally we
can make sure that we keep eachother on track there, that's
important. But like, prior tobecoming part of the Path for

(01:05:12):
Growth community, we wereinvolved in a very secular
business mastermind group that,again, God used it for such good
things. Like he was able to helpsome things in our business that
needed to be changed. But if westayed in there much longer, we
were gonna start probably firingpeople to right, meet the bottom
line. And it's like, that's notwhat we believe.

(01:05:33):
Right? And so we knew we had toget out of that because it was
driving us towards the wrongthings. And so I think that
depending on, you know, who youfollow and how you let that
influence you, it's so easy toslip back into this, like, I am
my business and I am my numbersversus no, like, this isn't even
my business. This is God'sbusiness. Right?

(01:05:54):
And let's not forget that. Like,he gets to determine what
happens next, and he could shutit down tomorrow if he wanted
to. So that's the last thing Iwould add on that. Just be
careful who you follow.

Alex Judd (01:06:06):
Yeah. Any other mindset principles you wanna
make sure you share with people?

This is a fun one. We always say, mental
preparation precedes peakphysical performance. It's a
mouthful, but mental preparationprecedes peak physical
performance. And that's the ideaof visualization, right, of an
athlete, being able tovisualize, you know, before the
game, during the game, the playthe exact play that you wanna be

(01:06:32):
successful in, visualize howyou're gonna celebrate
afterwards, and then visualize,how you'll get better from it.
And so in business, though, likebeing able to pause before you
go into a meeting and visualize,how am I gonna show up for this
meeting?
If somebody disagrees with me,how am I gonna respond? How's my
body language gonna be? Theseare little things that obviously
create culture. And so I applythose from time to time in the

(01:06:55):
business as far as mentalpreparation, whether it's for a
meeting, a presentation, aworkshop I deliver, a coaching
session, visualization, andmental preparation is a great,
great tool.

Alex Judd (01:07:06):
Man, yeah, it's so good. Because of some of the
things that you and I have beento together, I feel like I've
applied some of that. And therewas one particular, I went to a
team training with a group of 30team members and I got there a
little bit early and this timethat I got there a little bit
early, I just said, I'm going tosit in the parking lot with my
eyes closed. Thankfully, I don'tthink anyone from the team

(01:07:26):
walked by in the morning becausethey're like, is this dude
sleeping before our session thatwe're about to do? But I sat
there and I closed my eyes and Iliterally just ran through the
stages of the day and I saidlike, what will these look like
when they are a grand slam?
And if that exercise that I didfor maybe five minutes didn't
change my behavior whenever Iwalked in that door. It's like

(01:07:48):
there were so many, it wasn'tthese massive things that there
were just so many small tweaksthat I found myself doing just
because I had vision for it fromthe five minutes before. And
it's one of the reasons why Ilove learning from people like
you Andrew because you exist ina world where you get to see the
physical ramifications of theseprinciples in relatively short

(01:08:12):
order. And I would love to hearif there's anything you'd
encourage business owners onwith this, I think the people
that win are the people that canapply the same level of
intensity as it relates to thesemindset principles to things
that may less be physicallytangible, but to things like
your strategic planning meeting,to things like the way you treat

(01:08:33):
that customer. If you can applythe same intensity that an
athlete would getting ready fora high intensity workout to the
things that we do every singleday, I think that's a pathway to
not only winning, but actuallyenjoying what you're doing.

And it's really hard to get there if you've got
too much on your plate or you'resaying yes to too many things.
That's the first thing that Ithought about when you were
sharing that is like, to be thatintentional about, different
moments throughout your businessday, it requires you to have
margin, right? Mental margin,time margin, and so you have to
have that. But something reallyfascinating, a study that was

(01:09:10):
done, and it was written aboutin the book, The Power of Full
Engagement. But a study was doneof the top 100 tennis players in
the world.
And they were trying to figureout what separated the top 50
from the second fifty in thepack because the top 50 were
getting wildly differentresults, wildly better results
than the second fifty. Like, itwas it wasn't even close. And

(01:09:31):
they found that the the top 50,they did five things very
differently than the the, youknow, 51 through a hundred, and
it was all in between thepoints. It wasn't during the
actual play, During the actualpoint, it was as they walked
back to the baseline.Fascinating.
They found there there was fivethings. One was their self talk.
They had a really intentionalself talk routine. The second

(01:09:53):
thing was their breathingfrequency. So if the player was
very sluggish in the match andthey just weren't like
energized, they would breathevery quickly and powerfully to
get themselves pumped up.
Or if they were too worked upand anxious, they would take
deep slow breaths to calmthemselves down. So the second
thing was breathing frequency.The third thing similar was

(01:10:14):
walking pace. They would walkslowly to slow themselves down
or quickly if they needed to getsped up. Fourth thing was eye
contact.
So the best players in theworld, as they walked back to
just fifteen seconds walkingback to the baseline, they would
always look to the same place,the best players in the world.
Some would look up to God, somewould look maybe to their spouse

(01:10:36):
in the stands where they wouldnormally sit. They would look
somewhere, but they would neverlook down. And then the last
principle or the last thing thatthey would do differently is
their posture, right? Alwaysmake sure their shoulders were
back, their head was tall.
They walked strong andconfident, even if they were
feeling defeated or unconfident.And so it's like that idea of in
between the points has alwaysstuck with me and I'm like, in

(01:10:59):
between meetings, how can Iapply this? Right, I've got
fifteen seconds in betweenmeetings. How can I visualize,
take a couple deep breaths, slowthings down, pray real quick,
thank God for what I'm about togo do, thank God for the person
that's that's in that room? Youknow, it's it's in between the
points or in between the eventsof your day that that's where I
think the the secret sauce is.

Alex Judd (01:11:18):
It's so critically important because as you're
saying that, I'm thinking like,what vies for that in between
time? What you're saying is likethat potentially could be the
most valuable time because ithas ramifications for every
other moment of your day. And ifI'm not careful, the in between
time will be filled with somecombination of social media

(01:11:41):
news, like mindless texting orscrolling. It's like, man, what
a tool of the enemy to say thething that could have the
greatest impact on every othermoment of this day, we're gonna
just distract it with mindless,I mean, quite frankly, crap,
right? That just isn't helpful.
So man, that's such a helpfulpractical takeaway on in between

(01:12:02):
time.

That's what exhausts your brain by the end
of the way too. Like I'vestudied this on myself. If I do
my transitions really well, whenI get home at night, it doesn't
matter how busy my day was. I'vegot energy and genuine joy for
my family. But if my transitionswere filled with social media or
check an email, I get home andI'm drained.
It's just your brain just getsexhausted throughout the day of

(01:12:24):
that kind of stuff. So it needsto have those mental
transitions. And there arethings that are much more
fulfilling that you can do withthose transitional times.

Alex Judd (01:12:31):
Man, Andrew, this conversation was a long time
coming. You and I have beenfriends for a long, long time.
You played as integral a role asanyone in the start of my
business. You were right therewith me as I left my full time
job to start this business. Andyeah, I'm just really, really
grateful that we had the chanceto bring some of our

(01:12:53):
conversations now to theaudience and just rooting for
you in PFP.
So what I would tell people isyou should follow Andrew on
social media for sure. He putsout great content on social
media that's really practicallyhelpful. And particularly if you
have a child that's in the ageof playing sports, holy cow, his

(01:13:14):
books and content on that stuff,it's just it is as good as it
gets because it hits thecompetency of athletics. And
Andrew and his team do a greatjob of relating to students. But
then also it's value based,which you can hear that embedded
in everything that Andrew talksand teaches about.
And then also, would say if youare ever in, I would even go

(01:13:38):
beyond, Fredrik, if you are everin the state of Maryland, or
let's even go broader than that.If you are in the Northeastern
United States, right, you needto go into PFB because if it's
anything like my experience, itwill be an experience, right?
Truly, their team is just doingsuch a great job of creating

(01:13:58):
moments, creating a culture,you're going to experience that
first impression, you're goingto get a killer workout and you
might even just experiencetransformation or even if
they're able to achieve theirmission, generational
transformation. So Andrew,anything else you'd point to
people to before we go to ourlast question?

No, all those are great. We would love to have
you guys here in PFP. If you'reever out in our neck of the
woods, come on by, and we willtake care of you as a Path for
Growth listener, for sure.

Alex Judd (01:14:26):
Final question, and this is a little bit of a
selfish question, but I I justwanna know, Andrew, like, what
are you excited about in termsof what God is doing either in
your life or in the businessright now?

So we're in a season of parenting where we
have a six year old, a threeyear old, and an almost one year
old. And it is chaos in thehouse all the time. And

Alex Judd (01:14:48):
Andrew just turned this question into a prayer
request is what he just did.Yeah. Please.

No, man. But I'm I'm really excited about this
season, the parenting that we'rein. Like I said, despite the
challenges that we're facing,I'm finding that Daniela and I
are growing way closer together.We are on a mission with our
family now. We are setting upour, really, family mission and
being really intentional aboutwhat we're parenting towards.

(01:15:13):
And we're just, we're learningand growing so much together,
and it is a really trying timefor many reasons right now with
one of our children who's goingthrough a pretty difficult time.
And I mean, we are just growingin our faith together. We're,
like I said, learning. And we'rejust like, I've never felt like
we're such a team as we areright now. And so I'm really,
really excited about thatbecause it just feels really,

(01:15:35):
really good.
Until you have kids, it's hardto, like, to feel what what I
feel right now with Daniella.And and, yeah, it's it's chaos,
like I said, but it's alsoreally fulfilling.

Alex Judd (01:15:45):
Man, praise God. Well, thanks for your
friendship, number one. Thanksfor your time today and your
perspective. Appreciate you,man.

Man, I am so excited to be on this podcast.
Thanks so much, brother.

Alex Judd (01:15:56):
Well, there you have it. Thanks so much for joining
us for this episode. If you wantany of the information or
resources that we mentioned,that's all in the show notes.
Hey, before you go, could I askyou for one quick favor? Could
you subscribe, rate, and reviewthis podcast episode?
Your feedback is what helps ourteam engage in a sequence of

(01:16:16):
never ending improvement. Wewanna amplify what's valuable to
you and obviously reduce or evenremove the things that aren't.
Also, you leaving a positivereview is what helps us connect
with, build trust with, andserve other leaders around the
country. So thanks in advancefor helping us out on that
front. Are you a leader thatwants to grow your business in a

(01:16:36):
healthy way, serve peopleexceptionally well, and glorify
God in the process?
Go to pathforgrowth.com to getmore information about our
community of impact drivenleaders and schedule a call with
our team. Hey. Thank you so muchto the Path for Growth team,
Kyle Cummings and the crew atPodCircle, and the remarkable

(01:16:56):
leaders that are activelyengaged in the Path for Growth
community. Y'all are the peoplethat make this podcast possible.
Y'all know this.
We're rooting for you. We'repraying for you. We wanna see
you win. Remember, my strengthis not for me. Your strength is
not for you.
Our strength is for service.Let's go. Let's go. Let's go.

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