Unwavering Determination: Embracing Challenges and Thriving with Andrew Brady

Episode Transcript
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(00:21):
Hey, Welcome to another episode ofStrive three sixty five, the podcast dedicated
helping you push through challenges and thriveevery day no matter the odds. We
are here to help guide you andto live a better life, whether it
be mentally, physically, emotionally,or even spiritually. And I'm your host,
Justin Rot here in the amazing RockFox studio. Now today we have
Andrew Brady on the show. Andfor the locals, you might know who

(00:43):
he is. We've been Facebook friendsfor a while now, we've chatted here
and there. But I was like, man, I gotta have this sick
guy in the show. If youfollow him, you can see that he's
a remarkable individual who embraces life challengeswith unwavering determination and a passion for personal
growth. As a president and ChiefEvolutionary Officer, which I love that title
of all Right, Butcher, thisthe x l R eight team to accelerate,

(01:04):
There we go, So there wego. He has been at the
forefront of guiding organizations towards transformative growthand conscious leadership. Andrew's journey has been
diverse, from being featured or beingfeatured in a muscle and fitness competition.
For his dedication to health and fitness. That's more recently to showcasing his knowledge
on the kind of game showed Jeopardy, which was really cool to see while
actively participating in triathlons and engaging incommunity endeavors. Is proven that a purpose

(01:29):
driven approach can lead to a morefulfilling life. So Andrew, welcome to
the show. Anything else you'd liketo add there to He's going to have
to do my best live up tothat intro. I appreciate it. Yeah,
no problem. Like I said,I've been following you for a while
and it was only a matter oftime, but I was like, man,
he's in the self and fitness.And one of the things you gravitated
me towards you is just like yourpositivity on Facebook, even all the things

(01:53):
that it seems like you've been throughin challenges and the things you've even put
yourself through as far as competition.And one of the things you said when
we first started chatting about possibly beingon here is like you really this is
new to you, like exposing yourselfto health and fitness. So why is

(02:13):
that? Yeah? Interesting questions.So you know, I run a leadership
development company, so oftentimes I'm beinghired by an organization. Really, what
we try to do with the Accelerateteam is to help organizations create a corporate
culture that becomes a competitive advantage forthe organization, you know, the way
that it helps them attract better talent, keep them around longer, engage them

(02:34):
at a higher level, those sortsof things. And so, you know,
oftentimes if you're you know, goingthrough a work training program or whatever
the case may be. Personally,I believe and after getting to know you
a little bit, following you onlineand everything, I think it seems like
you do as well. That youknow, health and fitness is certainly a
part of a holistic level of howyou're going to lead your life, whether

(02:55):
whether you know you're leading an organizationor just trying to lead yourself or your
fan family. Uh, you know, all of that is intertwined. But
you know, sometimes if you're ifyou're going through a training program for your
leadership, you know, I justshied away, I guess necessarily from from
directly bringing health and fitness into thatbecause I think that a lot of you

(03:17):
know, a lot of people arestruggling with that, but also organizations kind
of like unfortunately, I in myview have a oh, here's our training
and development side of our organization,and there's another element that's maybe more here's
where we do for our you know, our fitness or or our different elements
like that, So they kind ofseparate it. And so I always try

(03:39):
to live a healthy and fit life, and if clients would ask me about,
you know, what my practices were, I was happy to share.
But it was a struggle to maintainthe right balance to to not push them
too far because I'm hired by theircompany to do leadership development, not necessarily

(04:00):
to do the health and fitness stuff, so you don't start sorting them out
with like a minute of burpies andlet's yeah, yeah, not not always.
It's it's sometimes even a struggle justto although now it's it's more more
so kind of mainstream to be ableto talk about you know, meditation or
centering or those sorts of things,but that was even kind of uh woo
woo for a long time still.I mean, you say it's mainstream,

(04:23):
and I'd like to believe so,but maybe you and I have gotten so
into the health and world. Buteven when I venture out and still talk
about medivitation at least in men's groups. When I go to those, it's
it's still very it's still very tough. It's it's I definitely believe it's grown,
but I still believe that probably thepeople that need it the most are
probably the still ones. I'm withyou there, I think, same same

(04:44):
thing. Yeah, you're probably right. You know, the organizations that I
work with are typically those types oforganizations who are really focused on, you
know, their their organizational culture andwellness and those sorts of things, so
they might be more more open toit, or at least have have heard
of it or or at least opento trying. Right, And there's different
ways to introduce it, but yeah, it's same same thing in organizations.

(05:05):
The ones that need some of thosepractices the most are the ones that aren't
necessarily ready for it or aren't opento it. So so is health and
fitness and wellness and all those thingsunder brea that has that always been a
party of life, like it's justa natural thing, or you've been playing
sports or what. Yeah, youknow, I grew up playing sports,
but was never I played soccer andin tennis were kind of my two main

(05:27):
sports growing up, but I neverreally I don't know, went into the
gym or did those sorts of thingsand wasn't really into you know, running
or endurance sorts of things. LikeI always you would joke, you know,
I don't want to run unless I'mchasing after a ball in the soccer
match or whatever, right, thosesorts of things. But then I actually
it was my junior year of highschool and I got cut from the soccer

(05:54):
team, and that was like,that was probably one of the best in
you know, in retrospect, oneof the best things that ever happened,
maybe because that's what made me startto take fitness more seriously. I trained
a ton over the course of thatyear preparing for my senior year to be
able to be probably the one ofthe most most fit people on the team.

(06:15):
And so like that was one ofthe things that the coach said said
to me at the tryouts the nextyear when I when I made the team
my senior year, was wow,like you are you know, every every
tryout you're the first one, youknow, sweating through your shirt and you're
never stop running and you're you're alwaysalways going after it. And so that
was one one thing for me.And then actually It's funny how it kind
of ties together, because then Istarted to think a little bit more about

(06:41):
the nutrition aspect. Also from that. Once I was on the soccer team
my senior year and I think mymom had like packed me a Snickers bar
or something that I was I waseating on the bus on the bus to
they turned it into food exactly.They turned a protein card pre workouts,
huh. And so in my coachlike just kind of made like an offhanded

(07:03):
comment that he probably doesn't even remember, but for me, it was like
the first time that it clicked forme, like, oh, maybe I
should think a little bit more aboutwhat I'm feeling my body with. And
so that was really the beginning ofit, and the beginning of a pretty
long journey, and like a slowjourney too. I think sometimes when people
try to psych themselves up for anykind of transformation, they try to make

(07:27):
too many changes at once, andthat's disruptive to routines. But it's also
you know, sometimes if you maketen changes and then maybe maybe it's two
or three of them that are gettingyou the most bang for your buck,
But if you make them all allat once, you're not really sure which
ones are getting you the most leverage. So if you make you know,
small changes, kind of treat yourselflike a like an experiment of one and

(07:50):
see what makes the most different.So for me, it was kind of
a long journey that I think madeit more sustainable for me because I was
over time figuring out what worked andwhat didn't for me. Yeah, and
you said, this is all likejunior senior year in high school, right,
Yeah, yeah, that was.I mean that was the beginning.
I guess, you know, earlyon then maybe you know, so so

(08:11):
cutting out you know, snickers barsand and processed foods and things like that.
But but then trying to figure outI think it's important too not I
mean, that's certainly important to getrid of some of the some of the
toxic stuff, But then what areyou going to add in that's gonna be
nutritious and and be you know,feeling you in the right way. So
what year was this? I'm tryingto get a painted picture, so I

(08:35):
was. I graduated high school intwo thousand and six, so this was
I guess like two thousand and five. Probably, Okay, yeah, I
mean that's still like the I thinkthat's pretty I was trying to. So
I mean thinking about weight room.For example, I played soccer too.
Yeah, I did track in wrestling, and it was actually frowned upon in
the nineties. So I graduated ninetynine to use weights like in running sports

(08:58):
and soccer like they thought it wouldslow you down. Yeah it's still in
the nineties. I'm like blown away, like and so free. And then
I started just exploring it because I'vealways enjoyed movement. And so it's just
interesting that you in two thousand andsix, which wasn't too much longer,
that you're I think it's pretty wiseand just very self aware that you in

(09:18):
high school were like instead of youknow, some people be like I got
cut my sommer year of high school, which motivated me. But I found
a lot of people got cut fromsomething just quick. Yeah, never so
back. So yeah, I thinkthat's awesome there. And then the nutrition
I didn't start really. I mean, I've always cared about food and nutrition,
and I knew it was healthy,but it wasn't until I lost my
appendix that I was like, I'mgonna start really diving in and then it

(09:41):
became a nutrition So it's just reallycool that sixteen seventeen, eighteen years old.
That where do you think that comesfrom? You know, so a
lot a lot of things tie backto my dad. Yeah. Yeah,
so in a lot of different ways. It depends. We'll see which ways
we go here. But so,Mike, it's all positive, man,

(10:01):
Yeah, it's all growth. They'relearning or built fun or whatever. So
the company that I'm running now,the Accelerate Team, was actually started by
my dad in ninety five, andhe had a twenty five plus year career.
Started as a as a social workerin a local hospital system here and
worked his way up to a seniorVP role, like over a pretty successful

(10:22):
career, and then walked into aperformance review one day. His boss was
the president of the hospital and hewas like, my dad's name is Tom.
He's like, Tom, I cantell you lost a little bit of
your passion. What's going on.My dad was like, you know what,
I just don't want to work hereanymore. And he up and quit.
And so he was forty one atthe time. I had two older

(10:43):
sisters who were, you know,in high school, you know, so
college bills looming and all of that. I was seven years old at the
time, so forty one you're gonnahave a midlife crisis. Yeah, quit.
So it was. It was amidlife crisis for sure. And and
so I always joked like, Ihave no idea how he explained himself off
to my mom when he came homethat day, But the way that he

(11:03):
described it to me kind of translatedinto seven year old terms is there are
certain things I liked about my joband certain things that I didn't, and
I want to do more of thethings that I liked. And so to
a seven year old, you're like, all right, way to go,
dad, it makes all the sensein the world. And and and so
it turned out that the things thathe liked were always as he was growing
in his in the organization, wasalways building his team, developing the team

(11:24):
around him, helping them to learnand grow, kind of being that that
coach and mentor to them. Andthat's what he decided to go do full
time. Now. Shortly after thatthat conversation with him, my mom and
he both sat down and we're kindof like, all right, you know,
we might have to take it easyon some birthdays and Christmases for a
couple of years, Like like gaveme that kind of kind of mindy to

(11:46):
get rid of one of you.But yeah, but but it was I
mean, I guess, I guesstestament to really following your passion, in
aligning with your purpose that never reallymaterialized. He just, you know,
from from almost the get go,really was was successful in taking this approach
that he had developed kind of inhis role at the hospital system and working

(12:09):
with other clients to create again thatkind of organization that's really focused on culture
and leadership and how you're growing andempowering the people in your organization to live
fulfilled lives but also to be contributingand engaged in their organization. And so
that was something for him, andthen you know, just for me sitting

(12:33):
around the dinner table growing up learningabout leadership, thinking about what is your
purpose, going through being kind ofthe guinea pig for some of the different
tools and assessments and methodologies that he'dbe doing. And then my mom actually
she had had a twenty year careerat Xerox and human resources and ended up
when my dad started growing the businessreally quickly, he actually convinced her to

(12:58):
leave her job and enjoin them.So then it was really that the family
dinner table conversations having both of themkind of in this leadership development realm.
So, I mean from a youngage, I was always interested in being
a leader, in developing those skills, in you know, being the captain
of whatever team that I was on, and in those sorts of things.

(13:20):
I joined Boy Scouts at a prettyyoung age with like the intent express purpose
of wanting to become an Eagle Scoutand get that like leadership opportunity and everything.
So it was something that definitely waswas deeply deeply ingrained and something that
I guess to tie back to thepodcast, something that I was always striving
for was this kind of alignment withmy purpose and what I wanted to achieve

(13:45):
kind of in the long term.This isn't jeopardy. You don't have to
use the word strive for bonus Pencer, and no, I appreciate it.
No, But yeah, I meanthat's a cool story. While we're here
for you, I believe you witnessingthat helped shape you. I mean it
wasn't like one of these stories enoughto say those aren't great too, but
where your dad was just you know, you woke up and you experience,
uh like a success financially professionally fromthe day you were born. It's like

(14:11):
you got to see him and quit. That's scary. But there's he believed
in himself that he was meant formore, and he's like, I don't
like this anymore. And it goesback to what we were chatting on one
of the stickers on the back ofmy computer, like fun is the point
you're you should enjoy to a pointlike I love what I do? Is
there some things that I have todo that maybe I don't like, you

(14:31):
know, come tax season and keepingmy books and all that for sure,
but they're they're they're motivated by yourbig why so, I mean you you
shared a little bit, but man, I want to hear more, Like
what was that? Like? Uhso I want to again, I love
I visualize so he was forty one. How old were you when I was
seven? So yeah you may havesaid that. Yeah, so man,

(14:52):
that's so what was that? Like? Share more that. I want to
hear more of that story, justlike witnessing that, because that's not an
opportunity a lot of you'll get.And I feel like that's why you are
where you're at, why you believein all these different successes. From your
health professionally, personally, why youhave, why you why you would probably
wake up every morning maybe even ifyou're like a little groggy, at least

(15:13):
inspired because of what you witness.If your dad could do this at age
forty one, why can't I atage totally? Yeah, so totally yeah,
So so he you know, hewas, I guess always and sometimes
you know happens to happened to meas well. I guess I get it
from it sometimes. But but youknow, kind of kind of impulsive in
a lot of ways. So Imean, that's a pretty impulsive decision to

(15:35):
do that, but it had beenbrewing in his in his mind for for
quite a while, but it profoundlyshaped my world to you. I mean
that that as you're mentioning, yes, there's the some things that you don't
like about about doing your taxes orwhatever, but ultimately that work should be
a source of meaning and fulfillment andeven fun and and so how many parents

(15:56):
tell you, you know, followyour dreams and those sorts of things.
But here's the guy who is gonnado it and also going to take a
big risk to do it, andI'm sure for you as well, right,
like I got to meet and chatyour chat with your kids as we
were walking in today, right,And I'm sure as everything that I've even
just getting to know you through Facebookand seeing the things that you know you

(16:18):
you all are up to the waysthat you are leading by example in terms
of health and fitness and putting familyfirst. And I think that all of
those things leading by example goes somuch farther than the words that you say
or of what they should do.You know, Yeah, something I and
you probably heard it, but assomething I don't even know where it came
from. It wasn't my parents,and because my parents were and this isn't

(16:42):
a diss on them, this isjust fact. My parents did the best
job they could. But it wasthere doing because I said, so,
you know, and I'm the bigyou know, brat, and to this
day I'm I always ask why,you know, like I did when I
was an adult working for people,when I was in restaurants during college,
why like why do this? So? Anyways? Something? And my kids
is I learned that like just bywitnessing, because I'm just always been this

(17:04):
curious like little George, like thiscurious kid, and I love to watch
I'm a people watcher, but notin any judgment, just like I'm curious.
So I'm like, I'm curious withmy kids. I'm curious about their
movement, about what they say.And from earlier on, I noticed like
whatever I said was like they woulddo the opposite. And I'm like,
oh, that was like me,So that's not weird. It's frustrating as
a parent. But then when Istarted doing things good or bad, that

(17:27):
I saw like they would mirror it. And it seems so obvious, right,
like you know these things and you'veheard maybe even if you've never read
a book. And then I juststarted reading I'm like started diving into like
parents psychology books and I was like, okay, I know this, but
like you want to keep reiterating andreforming. So it's just I always every
day I wake up, even ifI make a mistake, Like even if

(17:48):
I lose my temper. Let's behonest, if you're a parent and you've
never lost your temper, you're arobot. But no, like and learning
to even apologize because one thing,my one thing I learned growing up,
like we put these parents on Ifeel like parents put themselves on this like
Superhero perfection, pistol, a lotof peas there, and I've never done

(18:11):
that that I can remember, Andit was always, you know, even
though you gotta, I had to. I realized that I had to drop
an ego. Like you know,I have a lot more better days,
for sure, but I've had moments. And so when I have those moments,
I go to my son or mychild or whatever happened to Hey,
you know your behavior. You shouldn'thave done this behavior. I shouldn't have
acted either this way. I apologizefor that, but does and negate what

(18:33):
you did either. We need toboth learn from this. So and I'm
doing this. I even say I'mteaching you to I'm apologizing because I also
want you to know that you're goingto make mistakes too when you're an adult.
So it's like one I was thaying. So I learned early on that
that like they're basically trying to mirrorme. And so like the fitness thing
my son like right now is setof goal. I didn't. I don't
push them. People think I likepressure them, force them to do right
now. It's just mirroring and theypick up. You know, if there's

(18:56):
behaviors that your kids are doing andyou realize they're just like years and you
don't like them. Just realize that, like, you know, there's things
that I've done. So my son'slike got a goal to do like twenty
five polls by the end of summer. So he's like, oh yeah,
like right, like he's ten,Like I was climbing trees. What do
you think of that? Like?And he wants to get better at like
rotational movements because he plays hockey andbaseball and all these things. So anyways,
back to all that I'm sure youwitnessing and how beneficial that I So

(19:19):
even though you're not a parent,right, I have not. I'm a
four time uncle. I've hoped tohave kids on my own one day,
but for now I'm getting practice withmy sister's kids. Well they're mirroring you
too, because I'll tell you oneof my uncles this is a funny story.
Literally, this is the only tipI can remember he gave me to

(19:40):
get. He's a good dude,I think, but the only tip He's
like it was in the middle ofwinter and I lived in the Midwest,
and then this was uh, Iwas uh. We would spend our summers.
I grew up in the sub Chicago. We sent our summers in western
Illinois and farm country. And thebest tip my uncle ever gave me was
in the middle of winter and itwas a snowstorm. He's like, I'm

(20:02):
gonna give you Like I forget hiswords, but it was like, this
is the best life tip or somethinglike that, like never forget this,
and he's like, if you wantto drink the best beer after a snowfall,
put it in the back of yourtruck and let it sit there.
It's not frozen, but it's justcold enough. And then I was like

(20:22):
twelve when he gave me my firstbad so there you go. But he
was right. You know, Ihated beer then, but like I don't
really drink it much now, butwhen I do, I be honest,
I think I got spoiled with that, Like snow frost cores picture of a
beer right right then. Talking aboutoff topic there, but it's just those
things are probable. But it remindedme of another story too, So purpose

(20:45):
I don't want people think they gotto go be a rock star, b
CEO of a company, run apodcast. I know a guy who is
working on Rall Street making multi millionswho became a janitor of a school.
I just remember this. I knowthis guy personally and became a janitary school
and his life's never been better.And guess what he does. He teaches
financial advice on the side to someof these high school kids, like saving
and things like that. So like, but he loves that there's purpose in

(21:07):
his floors and creating communication and havingbond with the students and teachers. So
I just wanted to go on that. So health and fitness, let's get
back to that a little bit.Okay, So you know, you got
your professional, you got your yougot the has your journey in the fitness
world, like influence, approach,personal growth and overcoming challenges and like others
your life you've briefly talked. Yeah, yeah, so you know, as

(21:29):
you're mentioning earlier for me, definitelywith with soccer, when I was trying
to, you know, get morefit, the only thing that I could
think of to do was to practicerunning and get you know that cardiovascular fitness.
But I really never you know,as with football, you know,
I think teams get together, theygo to the weight room, those sorts
of things. I had never setfoot inside a weight room. Until I

(21:53):
went to college. Uh, AndI had one friend that was lived on
lived in my dorm hallway. Thatwas actually two that were that were really
into working out. One one hadbeen a wrestler and the other I don't
know how we got into it,but they were both really knew there,
knew their stuff, and so that'show I got into it. Was freshman

(22:15):
year at college was the first timethat I ever set foot inside a gym,
and it was you know, Ithink for anybody, and I'm sure
you find this with clients, rightlike people, if you don't necessarily know
what to do, it becomes asticking point that's keeping you from setting foot
inside the gym because you don't wantto look silly system or you know,
you don't want a lot of resistancehas put up for a lot of people
because they don't know what to do, and so they just don't do with

(22:37):
anything right starting a business, growinga business, learning technology. I'd mentioned
earlier about going online, So yeah, for sure, yeah, and so
you know it was probably something thatwithout them to kind of show me the
ropes and get me into it,I don't know what I would have done.
Maybe maybe I wouldn't have you know, gone gone along along this journey.
But that was so that was thefirst time, you know, like

(22:59):
I said, I played soccer,done done, movement and that sort of
stuff, done a little bit ofrunning only for the sake of getting better
at soccer, but didn't really thinkmore into it, do it into fitness
until until then. And and sowhen I was kind of getting into into
all of that, I'd say,so, I guess, I guess another

(23:21):
part of my story was and andthis was this was kind of the other
the other thing that I was goingto mention along the lines of my dad
was So my dad was he Ithink I mentioned when he started his career,
he was in social work and wasin what they call family systems therapy.
So so thinking a lot about notjust the individual though that's important,

(23:42):
but who are who are you surroundedwith? And what are the kinds of
things that are whether positive or negative, but what are some of the dynamics
there. And it's really interesting forhim the way that he kind of thought
about that then transforming that into howa business runs, right, because a
a organization has similar dynamics of theways that people are interacting in a positive

(24:03):
or a negative way. But thereason that he got into that was because
he grew up in an alcoholic family. His his father was an alcoholic.
And and actually he has been Mydad found after after going through this and
kind of being a functioning, youknow, high level executive and everything,

(24:26):
but but kind of recognized that hehad become an alcoholic as well. And
so he's been sober for thirty yearsnowty longer than that, because it was
a couple of years before I wasborn. So, and that's your dad,
my dad. Yeah, And andso I actually I never really you
know, a couple of times,but never really got into into drinking or
anything in high school. And thenyou know, in college kind of did

(24:49):
the college thing and the college thing. Yeah, yeah, leaves that leaves
room for a lot. Well,well, you know, I think you've
talked a lot. I think everybodytalks about it a lot and kind of
the the personal growth and development.But you've talked about it a lot with
some of your past guests of theyou know, you're the average of the

(25:10):
five people you spend the most timewith and that sort of a thing.
And so, for for better orworse, the norms in college or were
kind of like, oh, everybody'sdrinking, everybody's doing these these sorts of
things. And I, in myI basically I had had some what was
was doing it too much? Andnot only you know, it was like

(25:30):
a bottle of tequila night or whatare we looking? I mean to the
to the point of well, therewas there was like there was a couple
of times where you know, gettinggetting blackout drunk and uh and you know,
not not doing doing things. Thenyou know, getting getting lost trying

(25:51):
to get home, all these differentsorts of things and and anyways you're okay,
yeah, well I get it.I've been there. Yeah, And
so uh the first the first timeI it was kind of like a like
a three strikes thing because the firsttime I did something dumb, and it
was because I had been drinking toomuch hard liquor. So I was like,

(26:11):
I'm not gonna drink hard licker anymore. And then actually on my twenty
first birthday getting way too drunk.And then there was a third thing that
was, uh, the night beforeThanksgiving. Uh, you know, everybody
came home from from college and gottogether with a bunch of high school friends
and and uh that was not agreat uh not a great night for me

(26:34):
either. And so from that pointon again kind of recognizing that alcoholism runs
my family, uh that from thenon I didn't go fully sober, but
I basically said I'll never have morethan one drink and a night. And
and even then, I mean,to what it is now, it's probably
probably that one with that one ina night is maybe half a glass of

(26:57):
wine, like with a fancy dinneror something. And that's that's as much
as I'll do. And so youknow that, I guess, uh,
with a lot of people, youknow, kind of have this addictive personality
and and there is I guess somesome genetic component to it, but but
also I think there's you know,what you see and what you what you

(27:18):
grew up with, and that thatit can pass on that way anyways.
But I think that is when Ireally dove head on. I mean,
long, long story to get backto where we were, but that's where
I dove head in, headlong intofitness. Was I guess, replacing one
addiction with another in some ways,but hopefully hopefully a healthier addiction in terms

(27:38):
of really really doubling down on fitness. And so a little bit moving forward
from there. I had a girlfriendthat always had wanted to run a marathon,
and so she I kind of startedtraining with her just to support her,
and you were like, I wantto run this. Yeah, no,
no, I was. I wasdoing it because the sound that you

(28:00):
weren't like this triath on it somepeople are just borne their way, and
it blows my mind. Yeah,it sounds like you're just supporting a girlfriend.
Yeah yeah, I was just thankyou. I'm glad to hear that.
I really am. No, no, I was. I wasn't even
really into it at first, andand then it turns out she after I
don't know, maybe like a monthof training, was kind of like,
yeah, this isn't really for me, and I wasn't yet in love with

(28:25):
it at that point, but Iwas like, I said, I'm going
to do this, and I'm goingto do it. There's I'm competitive.
I'm also you know, I seta goal and I and I don't want
to let myself down. Uh,And so I ended up running a running
that marathon, and then from thereI was like, I did kind of
get this this addiction. But butpart of it was one of the books

(28:48):
that I read while I was trainingfor this marathon. It was something along
the lines of like the The NonRunner's Guide to Running a marathon or something
something along those lines. And maybea quarter of the book was about like
the training plan and here's what youshould do, and here's how you should
run and here's whatever. But threequarters of it was the mental aspects of

(29:08):
you were going to say that,yeah, of like how what, what
to think about? What? Where? Where to where to go in your
mind when you're doubting yourself, allthese different sorts of things. And so
that's the part probably actually definitely morethan the actual running and the and the
the health benefits, I guess werelike almost a happy side effect to the

(29:29):
ways that I was training my brain. And so from there I was like,
all right, what's next. Andso the next summer I was like,
Oh, I'm going to sign upfor a triathlon. This this looks
cool. Why don't we do that? And I was terrified, you know,
especially the night the night before,uh like probably your strong area in
a triathlon, Yeah, well yeah, I mean trying to okay, figuring

(29:49):
out how to how to swim.You know, I knew how to swim,
but like, you know, doingopen water not you know, so
you know, you could start swimming, but then you got to figure out
how to do it and open waterand everything. And I was nervous,
Oh, I just hope I don'tcome in last or like make a fool
out of myself. And it turnedout that I did pretty good. I

(30:10):
think in like I don't know,got second in my age group or whatever.
I was like, Oh, thisis, you know, at least
something something that again training your bodyand your mind at the same time was
a pretty cool thing. And thenfiguring out which I'll get back to,
but figuring out how to then takesome of that that discipline that you build

(30:30):
and bring it into other aspects ofyour life. So after that that year
of an Olympic distance triathlon, whichis about a mile swim, a twenty
five mile bike, and a sixmile run. It's a ten k run.
The next time I was like,oh, well, what else is
there? And so I went upto do a half iron Man that the
next year, and then the yearafter that did a full iron Man.

(30:53):
And so the full iron Man isa two point four mile swim, one
hundred and twelve mile bike, andthen a full marathon. And I will
say that when I when I checkedthat box, I was very very happy
to have to be able to saythat I did it. But I did
kind of fall out of love withthe with the training aspects of how much
there was to do for that.There was a lot like like i'd you

(31:15):
know, wake up on a Saturdayand be like, oh, I got
to go for a six mile biketoday, Like that's my that's my weekend.
Yeah, go ahead. So Iwas just going to say soft.
Since then, I've just refocused onjust doing Olympic distance triathlons because that's enough
to at least keep me training andfit and and all of that. But

(31:36):
without kind of it became a secondfull time job. It was like all
I did that summer training was Iyou know, worked, I slept and
I trained, and so that thatbecame a little bit too much for you
know, just balance. But itwas kind of cool to say that you
did it. No, I thinkit is. I think there's things and
it's a learning lesson. Right,you might realize, Okay, I did
it, great, awesome, DoI want to do it again? You

(31:56):
man? Since like it seems likethose days in soccer, you've had some
just good self analyzation self awareness andyeah. We interviewed Eric Hinman on here.
He's a good friend of mine,lives out in Colorado, who used
to be from this area. He'sdone like five yeah, oh yeah,
that episode. He and he helives some breeds training and he loves it
though, like you gotta really loveit. And and that's what I say.

(32:20):
That's why I tell all my clients, like there's things you have to
do, like we talked earlier,you know, like if you got goals
like my son. I think Isaid that before the podcast. He wants
to do twenty five pollups. That'shis goal. I didn't put that in
his head. He wants to doit, so I know it's gonna take
work. And there's the things thathe's gonna he's enjoying. There's things he's
not enjoying, but he's doing it. And it goes with anything like and

(32:40):
I always tell people, you've gotto enjoy at least the main chunk of
your health and wellness, like yourfitness. If you're just doing it to
beat yourself up, punish yourself,there's you're not going to commit a life
term process. You're gonna hate it. It's gonna be punishment for the things.
You wait, it's to be punishedfor yourself. It needs to be
a joy in there, you know, like and then you said it yourself
there you started to not, youknow, realize here is a time to

(33:04):
ship so earlier you said in themental aspect, and I agree all of
it. The majority of everything Imade a post about is in social media,
Like you know, I even gavelike my daily routine, like you
could do all these things that youjust find on the day. If nothing
is good up and up and hereup in the mind, then you're never
going to really reach results to thecapacity you could. The sustainability isn't going

(33:24):
to be there. And you saidwhere so you said, so, I'm
curious where did you go in yourmind? You said, you said you
had to go somewhere in your mind. So I'm sure it varied, like
maybe maybe we're listening to a PearlJam album or singing songs in your head,
or maybe a favorite musical, ormaybe it was just like darn Gritton,
you know, self motivation. Yeah, I mean there's my neural beats.

(33:46):
I don't know, there's different aspectsof it. And even the book
kind of talked a little bit aboutthis, uh, you know, but
but there's certainly sometimes distracting is isa piece of it, right like,
because part of it is is whenyou're running a marathon, sometimes the hardest
part is just to be on likemile one and be like, I have
how many miles ahead of me?You know? So so that's that's it's

(34:09):
And oftentimes when we set big audaciousgoals, right like, if we don't
have kind of checkpoints along the wayor small successes along the way that can
kind of keep us motivated, we'relikely to We're likely to give up.
Whereas you know, at mile twentysix, nobody's going to give up on
that last you know, point twomiles because you're almost there. So it's
a lot of times being able tomaybe maybe early on is you know,

(34:31):
distraction and not to think about itwas part of the part of the mental
aspect. But you know, ultimatelyit's it's connecting with the purpose of of
why you're doing this. It's connectingto maybe some having some of the gratitude
for some of the people that arethere cheering you on, whether whether just
you know the people along the routeor else your family and the ways that

(34:52):
they've supported you and encouraged you throughthis, or even just the ways that
they've supported encourage you in life ingeneral, to to get the And one
of the things too, that Idon't think was directly from this book,
but I think you mentioned in oneof your podcasts that you've done a little
bit of reading on stoicism and andso there's one one stoic technique that that

(35:15):
really for me, is really powerful, the negative visualization. So you know,
for for relationships, they talk aboutsometimes even even if it sounds kind
of morbid, but if you've readstoics, you know that they can be
a little bit more morbid. Butyou know you think about, well,
knowing that you're all going to die, Yeah, we're all going to die.
Knowing that we're all going to die, or or knowing that you know
that. And this is outside ofrunning aspect, but you know, one

(35:37):
of the examples that they might talkabout would be like knowing that you know,
think thinking about, gosh, whenmy parent or my parent might die
or whatever, and and how thatcan bring you to be more present with
them in that moment. And I'vealways found that to be again maybe a
little bit morbid, but thinking about, yes, they're all going to die,

(35:58):
Yes they're going to die in you. Of course, thinking about your
own death can also help clarify things, help help clarify what's most important,
and in those sorts of aspects.But in terms of bringing it how I
kind of applied that in running,was you know, if I'm thinking about
how my legs are burning or mylungs are burning or whatever, thinking about

(36:19):
man when I am I don't know, hopefully I get to be seventy eighty
ninety, who knows how old,But when I'm fifty, yeah, yeah,
but think thinking about man when I'mseventy, I would I would kill
to be able to be on milethirteen of a marathon right now, sort
of things. So, so thinkingabout some of the ways where how lucky
I am to have a or evenyou know, for some people who have

(36:42):
whether injuries or or things that theyare born with or whatever, where they
where they can't do something like that. So thinking about how grateful I am
that I can do that and Ican push myself. And that is is
one that I when I when Ineed to need to dig deep for some
of those things can be really helpful. I love that you're already payting that
picture. More people need to dothat. That's what I really work with

(37:04):
my clients to do because you don'trealize how maybe you do. But for
those that are listening, the reasonI wanted to talk about this for a
little bit is most people that Italk to in their initial don't even know
why they come into the gym otherthan I want to be healthy and I
don't want to lose weight, whichis great, but that's surface level stuff
for me. You just painted whatyou wanted to be able to do when

(37:27):
your seventies eighties. You know,I have a lot of goals. My
son, who's sitting outside this room, Yeah, my kids are with me.
By the way, never set limits. You know we're going to record.
This is the third time we rescheduledthis, and it's summer. AnyWho,
like my son, wants me tolive one hundred and fifty by through
that number out, Hey, maybeI will. I'm not going to set
lifestyle limits on it. But here'sthe thing. I know one of my

(37:51):
mini goals I see it. I'vealways I just want to be able to
still move pretty much how a movienow, be able to crawl and play
with my grand children and not justsit there and watch like a lot of
grandparents do. And and for somethey can't help it. And I get
it, and I feel sympathy forthat. But the thing is her empathy
for that, and and the thingis, like I want that's my goal,

(38:15):
so my movement practice. So doI still lift? Yes? Am
I putting up five hundred pounds sixhundred pound deadlifts like I used to?
No? Because that doesn't reach mygoal of crawling. Do I still live
flights? For sure? Because Ilove lifting, But like that's what I
want to paint a picture, likewhy are you here? Like that has
to line like people do a lotof bodybuilding, but they have no goals
of being on stage, So whyare you doing bodybuilding? Not to say

(38:36):
I won't get you there, butthere's better ways if you want to climb
trees, if you want to dothese things. And I love that you're
doing that, So you're probably liningyour goals with that, Like you're not
here to be a five time ironman, right you realize that? Yeah?
Yeah, yeah, that's one ofthe reasons that I actually I stuck
with triathlons even when I didn't stickwith and not that maybe maybe one day
I'll run another marathon or something.Again, I don't know, but the

(39:00):
the triathlon was so much more sustainablein terms of being able to cross train
and do different things that weren't soyou know, pounding on your pounding on
your knees. If I know alot of runners who, if running is
their only thing, they you know, everybody is on their own journey,
do it, do it? Dowhat? What do to you? Do

(39:21):
you exactly? But but I knowa lot of runners who spend more time
injured and nursing injuries than actually beingable to train and run. And so
for me, for a while,that was like seventy five percent of my
clients when I was working at theY was runners coming back from injury.
It's a lot of them just thatI was, don't string train, don't
work on muscle development, and thenwe work on their gate. I could

(39:42):
go down a rabbit hole in thisone, but yeah, you're right,
and so so for me, Imean, I people it surprises people like
if I go into my actual trainingplan, how running I do very little
of because I'm you know, alwaysI do a lot more biking and swimming
that's still cardiovascular kind of fitness,and you'd be surprised how much the cross
training makes makes the running part nottoo bad. So I don't run that

(40:06):
often because I am thinking longer term. I want to be able to do
this as long as possible. Soand you you mentioned I don't know if
you listen at all to Peter Atia, but he is a longevity expert doctor
has has a great podcast and hecalls it the Centenarian Olympics. So what
do I want to be able toachieve at one hundred? And that's what

(40:28):
he works with a with a clientor with anybody. He just wrote a
book. I haven't read read thebook yet, but I've been listening to
his podcast for for eight years later. Yeah, and and so that's but
that's what he will talk about,is what do you want to be able
to do when you're one hundred andand so just like you're saying, you
know, you know, maybe thatmeans you don't run marathons every every year,

(40:51):
because that means that by forty you'regoing to need a new replacement or
whatever, right, or maybe thatmeans you know, thinking about what goals,
what do you want to be ableto do? And for some that
might be I want to be ableto, you know, walk my dog
when I'm one hundred and and youknow, for for you or I,
you know, lucky to be relativelyyoung, i'l say, and healthy.

(41:13):
You know that that we're able toYou don't even think about like that's that's
not that's not even a that's barelyfitness, right, I'm just walking the
dog. But if you think aboutit, for somebody of that age,
the frailty being able to like holdonto the dog if they you know,
see something, and trying to runin all of that and so needing core
strength, all that sort of stuff. So he talks a lot about,
you know, really thinking about thoselong term goals and what you want to

(41:35):
do. And it turns out aswell that you know, just having a
decent amount of muscle mass is oneof the greatest predictors of longevity because we
lose it as we age. Yeah, I mean these are all like within
my wheelhouse, but like strength,grip, strength, especially longevity having muscle
mass, Like you know, welose muscle, But more and more studies

(41:57):
are showing the benefits of having musclenot only live longer, to feel better,
the endorfment effect, be happier,less mental issues span, but health
span, yeah, hormonal balances womenlifting more. In fact, more research
is coming out that women benefit morefrom lifting heavy weights per men. Men
can do the CrossFit stuff. Imean not to say don't lift heavy and

(42:17):
you're not gonna benefit, but man, for the a lot of things you're
searching for, it's really doing likelike cardios type lifting, like cross training,
you know, and where women likedoing you know, heavy per se
for them. Now if you don'tlike, we find it. But you're
right, like finding your deep reasonwhy you're doing a lot of this and
knowing your big why, like youknow, you'll see me do a lot

(42:39):
of different crawling, rotational stuff likeI do some funky stuff. I even
I've been doing this a long time. I'm even always trying to explore and
perfect the way the body's meant tomove, not how we are moving,
if that makes sense for sure.So I love that there even the running
things. So for me, Istarted running with my daughter. I didn't

(43:00):
like running. I used to run, so I share this story. I
started running with her and it waslike I was committed to it, and
I fell in love with the feelingof competitive. Had a back injury last
year, which I've talked about onhere before, so I won't go too
deep down in that. So Icouldn't run anymore. We couldn't sun up
for these five k's. My daughter'sbeen upset. So I just committed to

(43:20):
running at least a mile a dayat the beginning of this year. And
it just came to me, likeif I like every time I get to
two or three it hurt, Nowit's just like a normal thing. So
that's actually on my list. Iwant to be able to be able to
get up and run. No,I can't. I never could, like
mentally and physically, but now it'slike I could. Just if I wake
up and crawl out of bed,I can go run a mile and I
feel great like before, after theice bath after Yeah, okay, my

(43:44):
morning starts out with it. I'mjealous. I know, come on over,
man, jealous. I've been thinkingabout it for a long time because
same sort of thing all the podcast, all the people I listened to be
like a I would be I don'tknow how like whatever promotion, like I
would promote cold bathing. I starteddoing it for the mental ass all spooks

(44:07):
I was reading and I still doit, but I found major physicals.
Now that I'm playing hockey pretty regularly, there's some soreness there, but I'll
pop in that I'm good. Butliterally, we talked about temper like I
don't like my kids were surprised.Not that I lose it, but I'm
a dad with testosterone and I'm fortytwo, so there's moments and I'm very

(44:28):
passionate, so mine's more of apassion type thing. And so like anyways,
like I'm just able to like callmyself, I'm able to be in
stressful moments most times and just andanalyze that wasn't always me. I was
a lot like my dad. Mydad is a recovering alcoholic, so I
could relate to that story. Hismotivation was my mom was basically gonna leave

(44:50):
him and take the kids, andthen he stopped and he's been sober for
what fifty years And we'll get backto because I have a question about that,
but I love that. And wetalked about death, and another thing
I want to ge back on was, you know, you said we're all
going to die And I'm reading thisbook and it interviewed people in the latter
stages of the life, and andone of their biggest regrets was not taking

(45:12):
more chances. So we talked aboutthat, right, like take more chances,
explore more, like when you playit safe. I'm not saying you
got to go jump out of anairplane or or do some of this crazy
TikTok Instagram stunts where people are likealmost like I just saw one on the
other day where people are like deathdiving. Don't do that if that's not
on your list, Like you don't. But what is taking a chance?

(45:34):
Maybe it's your dad at forty onequitting this job that he's doing really really
well at making a good salary todo something different, you know, So
take chance. In the other thisis from a different book that I read
like a decade ago, and theyinterview people again in the latter stage of
your life, and one of theother things is like not spending enough time
with love ones sure not once peoplelike I wish I worked more and made

(45:57):
more money, And we hear this, but we still fall into the path
of society, like, you know, and this is the life I live.
I enjoy life, I take chances, I explore, Like this podcast
was an exploration that's going really reallywell, but I wanted to go into
a little bit more like you know, having I feel a lot of people
can relate, Like it's interesting howlike some people went down that path of
alcoholism you started to starry to seethe effects at such an early age.

(46:22):
For me, you know, I'dhad a few moments. But even now
that I have no appendix, likeit just bothers me, like it doesn't
serve me and it doesn't alive withmy goal. So it's easier. Do
I have occasional yeah, but Ialways like, even after one drink,
it's like it tears apart my gut. So I'm blessed to not have like
people think, oh I'm so sorry. Now I'm blessed to have no appendix

(46:42):
because it serves me well. Butyou know, you look at these things
and if if it's not serving you, it doesn't mean don't ever do these
things. If you enjoy glass winewith or after dinner, like you know,
there's people in my life that Iknow that do do it. But
if you're seeing it cause you notto make progress in areas or slow,
and it's cool that you're able todo that, and it's cool that you
had your dad to witness that.So, is there any things you'd like

(47:06):
to share on that for listeners?Viewers give us some tips that maybe live
that lifestyle or we're currently living thatlifestyle that have a hard like they feel
they need that m and how youwere able to like disassociate and move on
from that. Yeah, I mean, so one thing and I don't know
how much science there is behind this, but I do know I read something
that that was helpful for me interms of kind of behavior change, is

(47:30):
that there's somebody who's talking about there'sthere's moderators, and there's abstainers. And
so for some people, and mymom would be in this category, for
some people, it's really easy toto moderate and be like, oh,
I'm you know, I'm only goingto have, you know, one bite
of dessert or something. And forfor others, if they have the one

(47:51):
bite, they're going to have likelike the whole tray of cookies. Right.
So for those people, they're oftentimesbetter as abstainers, where they just
create hard and fast rules and sayI'm, you know, this is what
I'm gonna do and this is whatI'm not going to do. And so
for me just creating that rule ofnever in my life. I mean,
so it's been i don't know fifteenyears now that since I've had more than

(48:16):
one drink in a day, inan evening or whatever. And so like
creating that hard and fast rule forme was important, and I feel like
I've also found that in other aspectsof you know, some of the more
positive things that I'm trying to doright, Like I don't necessarily have to
go lift weights every day, butI do. I need to do something

(48:37):
fitness related every every day, eventhough probably you know, it'd be better
in some ways to do a restday or whatever, but for me,
like I'll go do yoga or somethingbecause I need to be able to.
I need to be able to checkthat box because otherwise, for me,
I know that if I take aday off, then it's going to be
a whole lot easier the next dayto be able to justify taking another day

(49:00):
off. Well, it's the mentalhealth and you talk about, you know,
is it a healthy addiction. Ithink if you're addicted to anything,
if you can't put it down.But I believe movements one of those things
where like you know, I wasaddicted to like chasing pain and lifting weight.
So and now that I'm forty two, I realized that wasn't always serving
me so, but yes, Ichecked the box of movement. And for
the parents listening out there, Iwas give a stip like, don't think
you got to go to the weightroom to get near your goals. Sometimes

(49:21):
it is playing baseball or the sportwith dude your kid, Like like I
asked my kid they wanted ice creamlast night? I was like, well,
you also want uh you said youwant to play hockey and the drive
with your dad, Like what wouldyou rather do? Like, I don't
care. I'm not gonna be hurtif you want to choose ice cream.
A totally cool. It's like,man, that's the easy one. And
they chose playing with me every daylike every day. Like so you just
got to move every joint every dayis what I tell my clients, And

(49:43):
mentally you're gonna be closer your goalsand it'd be more motivated. Like say
you didn't get your lifting so youcouldn't make the jym say every single offic
he'll say, you're a single parentwith three kids and you're struggling here.
And that's why I like say wakeup early, but say that didn't happen.
Say your life is like say everythingwas against you. Could you go
play with your child? Could yougo walk the Could you just pick five
minutes to crawl on the ground,like you'll feel better even if it's a

(50:05):
five minute plank, yeah than doingzero. Yeah, this is what I
always say. Yeah. Well,and and I guess some of that ties
back. So you mentioned in oneof your episodes like kind of being against
or at least you know, havingpeople think about about goals, right,
and and how sometimes thinking more aboutthe system that is creating the goals instead
of instead of sometimes sometimes the goalsthat we create can be limiting. And

(50:27):
so being flexible that you're you're mentioningand so we kind I appreciate you taking
that time, by the way,Yeah, no, absolutely to go watch
and listen for my own test.We you know, I think so one
of the things that we do itaccelerate with with my clients that that I've
you know, was lucky enough froma very young age to to do just
because my dad was you know,this was his company, you know,

(50:50):
so I was doing some of thesethings from an early age. Was what
we call your inner compass. Sothere's there's four points of your of your
inner compass. It's your mission,your your passions, your values, and
your your unique ability. Like this, this unique ability is like the the
superpower that you have that sometimes youmight not even appreciate about yourself, but
that other people really appreciate about you. And so we help clients to uh

(51:15):
to create this, to really writedown and spend some time reflecting and create
with their what is their inner compass. But the reason it's called compass is
because, uh, you know,you are hopefully trying to be you and
live your own life. And anda map is great if you're going over
territory like charted territory where somebody hasalready been. But if you're trying to

(51:36):
navigate something brand new and set yourown path, you need a compass.
And and so rather than create somekind of some kind of a goal that
might be might be limiting, ormaybe maybe it might constrain you in some
ways, instead it's it can bebetter if you have this compass. And
just like a compass, you know, you get off track your walk for

(51:59):
a while, you kind of checkyour compass and reorient towards that true north
and then head in that direction andyou're likely to get off off track again,
but then you got to reorient.And so having this spent time to
really create this compass and to usethat as basically every decision that you make

(52:19):
is a vote for the person youwant to become, and so being able
to check in with your compass andevery decision can either create more alignment or
less alignment with who you're trying tobe. And there's this cool thing that
I heard that the Apollo astronauts ontheir way to the Moon they were off
course like ninety seven percent of thetime or something because it was the first

(52:44):
time doing this right, and sothey were off course and then they'd have
to reorient. And they had thisvery clear goal of where they're trying to
go. They're trying to go tothe Moon, and so it would be
easy for them to reorient. Andthat's what I think. The same sort
of a thing is you're inevitably goingto get whether it's your health journey,
whether it says you're mentioning, youknow, losing your temper with with a

(53:04):
friend or with family or with kidsor whatever, you're inevitably going to do
things that you're that you're not proudof, or that maybe you were just
being mindless and you weren't thinking aboutthat that longer term purpose. But if
you've taken the time to really getclear on that, on that true north
for you, being able to reorientand and get connected to that. So
we, you know, are workingwith leaders of organizations and sometimes they're surprised

(53:29):
at how much time we spend juston them, and it's that that's part
of our philosophy is that you firsthave to learn to lead yourself before you
can lead others, before you canlead an organization, before you can lead
in the in you know, inthe world. And so being able to
have that clear purpose and then partof what we try to do is to
you know, of course help themalign better with that purpose, but also

(53:51):
hopefully help their other people in theirorganization find their own purpose and connect that
purpose to the purpose of the organization. And I think all that is really
import or not. I like aton of what you said there, but
what I'm going to bring up is, I like what you said, you
have to learn to lead yourself beforeyou can lead others, before you can
leave the world, lead the worldand I believe that in so many Like
you know, I tell them mykids since forever. You know, you

(54:15):
got to be able to love yourselfbefore you can truly love others, before
you can truly love the world.And then also tell like people I've coached
professionally, you have to learn tofollow before you can lead. So it's
it's interesting how all these things.I just wanted to point out that,
and then the alignment true north.Yeah, I mean, while I'm a

(54:35):
picture guy, like I just I'mabout to publish a second book and most
of my stuff was literally I wassitting in the mag so props to them
picture you posted. Well, Iput them in my book and I give
them props as a thank you becauseI they let me. They don't really
bring it much. And I justsaid, I'm writing this book and I
can't do libraries. I like nature, and I like art like and art

(54:57):
is nature and natures art. Anyways, can I come in here? So
uh, yeah, I just postedthat picture because it's like I needed I
needed a muse but like not everything. So while you're talking about saying it's
like I painted this picture, youknow, being an entrepreneur or whatever,
like there's that true north. Youknow where the north is, but it's
not a straight line, you know, like you basically were pointing out,
and so I'm picturing this line andwhile people are listening basically of going up,

(55:21):
then down, then even going backwardsand around in a circle like this
was what's going on in my mind. And that is for those that think
it has to be a straight lineand never go like you know, there's
gonna the line's gonna be like alike a three year old who just scribbled,
but they eventually got to the endof the page. Like that's that's
what it can be. It maynot always. That's been my story,
and people don't always see that.You see the facebooks and the social medias,

(55:42):
but you know, it's kind ofgoes in line with your health and
wellness from the triathlons to to toto these marathons and which I'm glad when
you think of another story that Iread in a book of like I'm glad
you trained for it. I readthe story of the guy just did with
his friend and never trained, nevereven around. He was he couldn't walk
for two weeks, but he finished. But anyways, like how like yeah,

(56:06):
you know what I was going tosay was, you know, how
have these just inspired you to likeyou know you, like you said,
you just started sharing on social media, and like how have these just how
do you maintain the discipline through likethe training of those and like still your
other passions of your personal and professionalLike how are you able to do that?

(56:27):
How do you continue to do that? Yeah, So one of the
things that you made me think ofas you were talking, you know,
and kind of getting back to maybebeing being flexible on a goal like like
you know, cause you might havea you might be running a marathon or
triathlon, and you I think it'shealthy to have like a target time if
there's something that you're you're aiming forthat that you want to achieve in terms

(56:50):
of your finishing time or whatever.But you know there's going to be like,
for example, last year, thetriathlon that I that I signed up
for, it started pouring on thebike portion, So you know, you
know right off the bat that you'renot going to hit your goal time.
You're not going to you know,have a PR or anything like that.
But there's still a whole lot ofmental resilience in riding your bike through a

(57:15):
through a rainstorm and trying to tryingto get through that. And and so
one of the other things that I'vealways had in all my marathons, all
my triathlons, all my all myiron Man, my like baseline level goal
is never stop running, you know. So it kind of gets back to
your your that the thing is solike I've never in in my marathon,

(57:38):
I never stopped to walk. Inmy Iron Man, I never stopped to
walk, even if that means thatI'm you know, crawling and along the
way that it barely looks like runningand I'm, you know, barely putting
one foot in front of the other, and it's not as fast as I
would want it to be or whatever, or I'm hurting. That's one thing
that I feel like I can control. And so I'm I'm never going to

(57:59):
stop in some you know, maybemaybe one day, knock on what it
doesn't happen, but maybe one dayI get so hurt that I can't run.
But even if I can't run,it's going to take a whole lot
for me to stop at least walkingto the finish line, you know.
So kind of having that, havingthat mentality, but one of the other
things that you mentioned that I wantedto circle back to, was, you

(58:20):
know, talking about the ways thatwe move versus the ways that we're meant
to move, right, And andthat was one of the things that you
mentioned. And you also in thein the intro, I think mentioned that
I'm the I call myself the chiefevolutionary officer and uh, and so being
able how I tie that back isis thinking a lot of ways, you
know, we're not moved. Wedon't move the way that we you know,

(58:44):
evolved to move. We don't wedon't eat the way that we evolved
to eat. And a lot ofthose things are what they call evolutionary mismatches.
Right. So, like we arebecause we came up in an environment
where it was hard to find youknow, sugar and fat, we have
this taste for it that makes uswant want to have that. But now

(59:04):
we're in an environment that's totally different, and so we are, you know,
addicted to a lot of those thoseflavors because we're in this evolutionary mismatch.
And it turns out that there's somany different aspects. Basically, almost
all of the the maladies, whetherwhether individually or collectively, is a society
or like due to these evolutionary mismatches. A lot of it is the kind

(59:25):
of isolation that we've created for ourselveswhere we're living in you know, living
alone or or you know, notsurrounding ourselves with people, whereas we you
know, came up living in thesecommunities right where we were a part of
something that was that was larger thanourselves. Whether that was for for many
it it might have been religion.For many it it may have been you

(59:46):
know, other aspects of things thateven just I don't know if you've you've
ever read, but one of thebooks that really got me into into kind
of psychology was Robert Putnam wrote thisbook called Bowling Alone, which was the
the he looked at how civic organizationshad declined over time. Basically, fewer
and fewer people are a part ofthe Uh. Well, it's called bowling

(01:00:09):
alone because he started off looking atbowling leagues here and fewer people part of
bowling leagues. And you know,so now we're instead of being in a
bowling league or a rotary club oryou know, any number of civic organizations,
we do more and more alone.Like we don't even go to the
movie theater as much anymore. We'lljust watch it streaming, you know,
sitting alone on our couch and thosesorts of things. And so there's all

(01:00:30):
these evolutionary mismatches and so being ableto think about the ways that oftentimes the
ways that were meant to move,the ways that we're meant to be around
other people, the ways that we'remeant to eat, and realigning with some
of that is is huge. Andso a little bit more of of kind
of my story in terms of wherehow how I went from? Uh,

(01:00:53):
I guess like college is the lastthing I mentioned to just a really quick
version to get where we are today, was that I always wanted to join
my father. So I went tofrom a very young age, thought that
that's what I wanted to do,went and got a business degree. They
called it Applied Economics and management.Uh. Then I wanted to go get

(01:01:14):
some outside experience before joining my dad'sbusiness. And so one of his clients
for a very long time Wegman's FoodMarkets. You know, again, we
work with organizations to make culture partof their competitive advantage, and so Wegman's,
you know, certainly part of theirsecret sauce is their culture and so
what they call Wegman's Leadership University hecreated twenty five years ago and we've been

(01:01:37):
you know, part of bringing threehundred plus of their senior leaders through this
eighteen month training program that he created. And so we basically when we were
when we were trying to you know, work with work with these organizations,
I'm like, oh, well,it would be good to get some outside
experience. What if I went.I went and worked for Wegmans to kind

(01:01:59):
of see from the client side whatit's like to create culture in an organization,
and actually went moved out to theBoston area when they were open up
stores out there to basically how doyou start from scratch, you know,
in a brand new store start thisculture. And then I was home for
Christmas about twelve years ago now,and my dad, almost to a fault,

(01:02:22):
never wanted to push me into joiningthe business. But he was like,
you know, there's no reason youcan't start your own consulting company somewhere
down the line when you're ready.But if you want to learn it from
me, it's now or never,and I'll give you like a five year
transissure. And so I that broughtme back to Rochester pretty quickly, and
in along that five year transition oftaking over for him. Actually I was

(01:02:43):
thinking about getting an MBA, butwhile I was looking at MBA programs,
instead found this program in what theycall Applied Positive Psychology at the University of
Pennsylvania, which is really just thescience of well being and resilience. And
so I was able to take someof these learnings and the latest science of
all a lot of the things thatmy dad had been you know, reading

(01:03:04):
books on and putting together over theyears, but kind of take it to
a new level and with this program. And so really at the intersection of
business and psychology is where I doa lot of my work. You are
even mentioning, you know, thepsychology of being a parent, the psychology
like all these different aspects, andso being able to take that and uh
and apply that and so based onthat work, I'm also writing a book.

(01:03:30):
So I'm a little bit behind you, but I'm about I'm on the
ways behind to writing. We allstart to race at a different line.
So writing for the evolution of businesson how do how do we you know,
look at those evolutionary mismatches that we'vecreated to create organizations and leaders and
individuals that are contributing positive to society. Well, I'm glad you're writing a

(01:03:51):
book because because we got to wrapup this episode, and I would love
to have you on because there's questionsabout business I didn't get to get into,
and how about this, And I'msaying this on this episode, so
everyone holds to me accountable. Whenthat book is getting close, reach out
to me. We'll have you backon here. Sound absolutely. I appreciate
it. Man, you had toand I want tough. You brought up
evolutionary mismatch. I could have awhole episode on that, but I won't

(01:04:16):
go down a rout hole because againRubin running out of time. But yes,
you are so right. We're inartificial environments. I just have to
say a couple things. We arein artificial environments and we can't get rid
of them. But I'll continually bringup the idea of community and finding it
even if it's five people tribes aroundthe world, indigenous people that still exist.

(01:04:36):
They heard decade long studies to showno issues of back pain, no
issues of mental health, no Alzheimer's. Like everybody's kid is everybody's kid.
If a kid is wandering all hatsof the lake or the river or the
alligator they're saving. They're like,Oh, that's not my problem. I
hear that every day. That's notmy problem. That breaks my heart because

(01:04:58):
it is my problem. And thisis where I get an emotional especially want
to see that somebody says that abouta kid. It's not my problem.
This world is hurting and they don'tknow why. This world is highly medicated
on antidepresence, and sometimes it's rightfullyso. This world is confused at why
we're breaking apart mentally, and theydon't know why, and they are confused.

(01:05:20):
It's pretty obvious. Now I'm gonnabe sensitive here, but I have
my mental breaks I talk about inmy second book. But I have tools
to offer and things we talk about. But at the core of it is
the mismatch. We need to getmore connected with the people. We need
to get out in nature more.We need to move our bodies. We
don't have to do bodybuilding, wedon't even need a gym. We need

(01:05:42):
to talk, we need to smile. We need to do this. We
need to be around people of energy. You got me on a topic and
I had at least say because Iwould it's like nails on a chocolate.
If I don't reach it, Iwill shift to a less sensitive I'll ask
two more questions of my producer willkill me, and then there will be
solume this match, but the oneis jeopardy. I have to ask you.

(01:06:03):
That's awesome. I just want toknow what was the most valuable lesson
you took away from that, becausethat's not an opportunity everybody gets. Oh
boy, biggest lesson. So,in full disclosure, I got absolutely crushed
by a seven day champion. Whoare you going to say, year old
Noah? He you know, eventhe answers that I knew he had the

(01:06:24):
buzzer timing down real real well,so even the answers that I knew I
couldn't necessarily ring in for. ButI learned a lot about again, this
could be a whole episode in andof itself, but about having a having
a growth mindset. You know,that's a big aspect of positive psychology of
you know, whether you have agrowth mindset believing that you can get better

(01:06:45):
with effort and skill and practice versusthe fixed mindset of you know, the
the limiting beliefs that we put onon ourselves and man that was. I
feel like I've always had a growthmindset, you know, but being able
to take that to another level becausewhen you are on a show that's,
you know, supposed to be measuringhow smart you are, right and it's

(01:07:06):
going to be broadcast all around thecountry and I guess the world, you
know, to some respects, thatreally will will test your ability to uh
to believe that you can that thisisn't the ultimate measure of who I am
and how smart I am and inany of those sorts of things. But
I know you mentioned on one ofthe episodes that you have an orr ring.

(01:07:28):
I also have an orr ring.So want to become addicted? Yeah,
obsessed? Well, one one funnything is that my so sometimes I'll
when I'm training, I'll like geton a on an exercise bike and you
know, do do indoor cycling.And when I was on the Jeopardy stage
taping the episode afterwards, I sawthat my rr ring and my my phone

(01:07:48):
asked me if I had been cyclingbecause that's how how fast my heart was.
Yeah, that's pretty incredible. Ibet. It's just a cool experience.
Is one of my brother's favorite show. It was my at my second,
honestly, I love Miamis. Idon't know why. Oh yeah,
I love I don't know. Butanyways, so in last question, I
could ask a dozen more because Iwanted to get into like conscious capitalism,

(01:08:11):
positive psychology, touch this again?Any Yeah, but I want to You're
you're inspiring me to restart my podcast, so maybe I'll have you on that.
Let's maybe you have me. Andwe talked about this evolution in your
mismatchic because like I was talking aboutlike fake food, fake environments all alone
while doing this and we're wondering why, you know, we should dive into
that. But final mess or finalthing is that you know, is there
anything else or what message do youhave for hope or you want to leave

(01:08:34):
this audience of Strive three sixty fiveas far as you know your story of
inspiring others or how what's one thingthat maybe you didn't get to talk about.
I think it's kind of we mentionedit a little bit. But one
of the things that I think isreally important is to always lead with with

(01:08:54):
curiosity and and be running experiments onyourself. I call it being a scientist
and the subject where you are thescientist. You know you're going to run
an experiment, but you're the subjectof that experiment, and just always trying
to try these things on yourself.Maybe you you know, heard something in
a podcast or heard something that Italked about that I do, or something
that Justin mentioned that he does,and you try that and and know that

(01:09:16):
it may work for you and itmay not, but ultimately reconnect to what
the goal, what the ultimate purposeis that you're that you're trying to achieve,
and and you know kind of checkwhether or not you officially do the
inner compass that that we have withaccelerator, or you just kind of have
your own purpose written in some otherway, but you just check with is

(01:09:36):
this aligning me, you know,creating more alignment or less alignment with that
ultimate purpose that I want to create, and just you know, be be
in constant state of tweaking that interms of running those experiments, but also
making sure that you're taking the timeto reflect on whether or not this is
this is aligning with that purpose.Yeah, I love that. I'm just

(01:09:59):
going to ad like two things,you know, alignment and for those that
aren't sure, like you know,you like your values, your morals,
you know what you want to do, like if you have hockey on Thursday,
you want to keep that whatever itmight be, if it's community group
or church. But also I'll saythis because I've been doing this for a
long long time, is write thingsdown. Like we got a phone.
I don't want to ever hear it, you know I hear my thirteen year

(01:10:20):
like, oh well, I didn'thave any pen and papers. You have
an iPhone with a notepad. Iforgot about that. So anyways, write
things down. I write stuff evenif it's in the shower. I'll like
pop out like that's who I am. Like ideas for my book, ideas
for whatever, it's the business idea, if it's the wildest things, like
I got some wild ideas right nowthat look like that actually might happen when
the next five years it's crazy.Write things down, and then don't be

(01:10:41):
afraid ask for help, whether itbe a business coach, a life coach,
a friend, somebody to support youbecause those two things are going to
be super huge. Write things downand don't be afraid to ask for help.
And like him said, alignment,like if you do those three things
and you just you move that circle, that thing that zigzag three year old
drawing that I talked about, andyou just keep going true North. You
can do incredible things and then youlook back in your life is like,
maybe I didn't do everything, butI did a lot and I'm really proud.

(01:11:03):
That's what we want. Absolutely awesome. We thank you again. Yeah
yeah, well, thank you forbeing on here. This is a real
pleasure. This was fun, man, this is really cool. I definitely
want to hang out with you outsideof this. Man, I'm glad I
got to know you more. Thanksagain for being on here, and thank
you for all the wonderful listeners andviewers of Strive three sixty five. You
are the reason behind this non forprofit product that we were doing to help

(01:11:24):
people strive every day. Thank youagain and again, like share, subscribe,
because that is one simple thing thatyou can do to contribute to help
other people. Like Andrews already foundvalue in some of our past episodes.
There may be you didn't, butothers can, and just by simply commenting
or doing your part and giving usfive star reviews on various platforms can help
get the message out that we're sharinghere on Strive three sixty five. So

(01:11:45):
do your part. Thank you,again thanks you to go Ash

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