November 5, 2025 • 33 mins
TrulySignificant.com presents fitness and personal training pioneer Mark Brown.
Learn how Mark Brown sees people at vulnerable moments while respectfully honoring the person and encouraging growth.
Mark has shaped the culture of health in Austin and beyond. He has walked alongside people through personal challenges, emotional setbacks, and life transition.
Listen to Mark's advice on having a higher mindfulness especially as you hit the supposed mid life point.
Enjoy Mark's tribute to his parents, honoring their wisdom and common sense. Their values show up brilliantly in their son's persona.
For a breathe of fresh air, energy and shot of new life, contact the one and only Mark Brown- marbro23@gmail.com. Expect change.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/success-made-to-last-legends--4302039/support.
Learn how Mark Brown sees people at vulnerable moments while respectfully honoring the person and encouraging growth.
Mark has shaped the culture of health in Austin and beyond. He has walked alongside people through personal challenges, emotional setbacks, and life transition.
Listen to Mark's advice on having a higher mindfulness especially as you hit the supposed mid life point.
Enjoy Mark's tribute to his parents, honoring their wisdom and common sense. Their values show up brilliantly in their son's persona.
For a breathe of fresh air, energy and shot of new life, contact the one and only Mark Brown- marbro23@gmail.com. Expect change.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/success-made-to-last-legends--4302039/support.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
And welcome back to truly Significant dot com. I'm Rick Tokeeney.
Glad to have you all back on today and thanks
to our mutual friend Ron Resnik, we're connecting today with
Mark Brown, who is a teacher at Austin Community College.
Most of the trainer a lot of other things which
(00:29):
we're going to unpack on today's show. Mark, it's great
to have you on.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Welcome, Thank you for having me. Rick.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Absolutely so tell us your backstory, including where are you
from originally.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
I'm native Austin, nite so born, born and raised here
in Austin, one of the one of the few from there,
and grew up as a basketball player and all my
life and growing up going to games at the Erwin
Center and sneaking into Gregory Gym and you know, we
(01:03):
will fight over your T shirt that you're wearing right there.
But actually did my undergrad work at Saint Edwards University
and then got a master's degree in exercise science at
what was then Southwest Texas State so we can do
the math there, and was lucky enough to fall into
(01:23):
personal training as a career in Austin in the mid
nineties at a local local club that anyone that was
around Austin long enough has probably visited body business at
least once or twice, but locally owned and operated at
a time when that was rare, And I started there
for about four and a quarter an hour when I
was finishing graduate school and managed to sit on kind
(01:47):
of the front wave of personal training becoming a career
and fitness in general becoming a career as opposed to
just something that people did on the side and would
come in out after work and teach classes. So very
fortunate time and place to get started that way.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
Right time, right place. Yeah, one can easily call you
one of the pioneers in the industry. Every trainer sees
people at a variety of moments when they're actively trying
to change something about themselves. You probably have seen that
in Ron Resnick. We'd love for you to comment on
how do you honor that particular individual moment respectfully while
(02:33):
encouraging growth.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
It's a great question and it's big too, and as
you said, the emotional and the vulnerability that one of
my jobs for many years has been training trainers and
training group fitness instructors, and we talk a great deal
on when we first meet with individuals and they come
to see us and yes, I want to lose weight,
(02:56):
Yes I want to get stronger. I may want to
improve this or that. But as you're saying, the emotion,
emotional vulnerability sometimes doesn't come in until after I've worked
with these individuals for a period of weeks, months, where
then you start to hear the stories of yes, we
want to lose weight, but you know what happened? Why
did you Why did you want to lose weight? You know,
(03:18):
I can tell my own stories as being a basketball
player starting college in nineteen eighty nine, but in those
days we didn't lift weights for basketball, and my senior
year in high school, I was five nine, one hundred
and thirty five pounds and my coach called me, you know,
the slow, little fat kid. You know, so perspectives change,
(03:40):
but we get into you know, where those places are
and what's caused people to want to make that change.
And most of us have been there in this day
and time with the idea that we know we need
to get fitter, we know we need to become more active,
we know we need to do things, and that's well
and good, but for better or worse, sometimes it takes
that proverbial gut punch to really get that motivation. What
(04:03):
health scare did you have or mother or father or
somebody close to you that that finally did that. And
so it comes down almost like somebody in your role
of listening and fitness. We unfortunately, we do a lot
of telling, and we have this many features, and we
have this many treadmills, and we have this many weights,
(04:24):
where really we're the only industry that really does that.
When I say, my hotels, don't tell me they have
this many beds, that's to be expected. You know, what
can we do for this individual? And so a lot
of times it's you know, be quiet, listen, you know,
where are they coming from at this place in time.
Speaker 1 (04:42):
It's almost if Mark, you are not a trainer, you
are a personal therapist.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
It's there are professional professional lines that technically we are
not supposed to cross. But you know, ck in a
big picture, we always say that with people that in
a personal training session, if I'm with somebody one on
one for an hour, and then you add up the
remaining hours of their day with family and kids and
(05:11):
work responsibilities. Yeah, honestly, there's not a lot of other
cases where maybe they do have someone's undivided attention for
that hour. So yeah, we do hear those things and
we want to affect them in the way that we
can without crossing boundaries into psychological training and realms that
we're not professionally trained for. And it can happen, but
(05:33):
you know, we definitely hear some stories.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
It seems to me that your career and where you
are today, you are peaking. You're better than you were
yesterday even, and that this is a crowning moment for you.
What would you advise our listening audience in terms of
putting yourself, putting themselves in the right place at the
(06:02):
right time, in having this higher mindfulness of where are
you really going in life with your intention?
Speaker 2 (06:10):
I love that because again I will always fall back to, hey,
I'm just this. I'm the simple gym guy, so I
see things maybe through just the lens of the gym.
But to build on what you're saying that for myself
being fifty six and many of my clients, particularly prior
to COVID, I began with them when I was twenty
five and they were forty five and fifty five, and
(06:33):
they stayed with me for twenty thirty years. So we
got to kind of evolve together. And quite often, even
when somebody starts an exercise program, if they're not in
their twenties, they're quick to fall back to the word, well,
what are your goals? What do you want to do?
When they'll say, oh, I just want to maintain, And
that's one of the words that I strike from my
(06:54):
client's vocabulary and big picture, yes, we backtrack. If I
maintain what I had when I was twenty, thirty, forty,
and I'm doing the same thing when I'm sixty or seventy,
that's actually, hey, that's great. But from the verbiage always
telling people, if you're using the word maintain in the gym,
then I have always seen it trickle down and then
you start maintaining in the rest of your life and
(07:16):
your relationships, in your work, whatever it might be. And
so again through the simple gym lens for me, the
beauty of having something to do in a workout, in
an exercise session to where we can always find something
to improve on, and then we want to see that
and we want to take that motivation into the rest
of somebody else's life, like, hey, if you decided you
(07:40):
can do this and you accomplish whatever it might be,
and it's individual to everybody and everybody's on a very
different fitness path. But just taking that one step, if
you can do that here, can you do that away
from the gym and beyond the psychological aspect from a
physical standpoint For those of us that are in the
age range of the forty fifty sixty seventy where sitting
(08:02):
becomes more appealing or a fact of life at the
nine to five, if I can help this person have
more energy when they're not in the gym, then that's
hopefully going to help them accomplish those goals and continue
to continue to move forward, because there's always something we
can improve on. It doesn't have to be hey we're
lifting more weight today, you know, are you moving better,
(08:25):
are you moving with greater ease? Are you getting up
and down from the floor, whatever it might be. But
we always want to find something and I hope that
that trickles down into the rest of their life. As
you know you're suggesting.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
I would hope so too. Yeah, I maintain my two
thousand and.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Two ta bird. Hey, that's a good thing.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
There's there's a great car analogy there. Okay, So about
twenty five years ago, I thought that I was in
the middle of a midlife crisis, and now I'll look
back on it and go, that was silly. I would
love your perspective on why are people still picking on
(09:09):
themselves and having midlife crises and what the heck does
that mean chronologically.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
It's a great question on that because just by thinking
about that, when you said that the term midlife has
obviously changed in all of our life spans that I
was born in sixty nine, and so I think we're
kind of the first generation where we will have people
who had some longitudinal you know, continuation of exercise, where
(09:37):
prior to that time it was only the football players,
only the outlying bodybuilders. And so, you know, the midlife
from a chronological physiological standpoint, you know, we do run
into things that change hormonally, and then the way that
the diet and everything is affected there, and the indecrine
system and the hormonal system that is thankfully if physician's
(10:00):
pay grade and not mine, because it's an amazingly complex
system that plays into that. But what I see again
through my lens, a lot of the midlife, even with
people who are doing their best to come and see
me and come into the gym. The visual aspect of
the fitness industry is another thing that I would have
(10:22):
to say I lovent hate because chickli. With social media,
it's exposed so many people to different kinds of exercise,
which can be fantastic, but what everyone sees becomes the
comparison shopping. And we all know this from other aspects
that yes, everybody is. You know, in my day it
was airbrushed and spray tand and I think you probably
(10:44):
saw some of that in me, you know, kickboxing in
the video. But now with the AI and the filters
that you're seeing people with unattainable physiques or physical outcomes
that ultimately really came more for mom and dad. And
there's a lot of genetic factors that we could delve
(11:04):
into and dive into that those ultimately have a lot
to do with how somebody's going to look when they exercise.
And so for me, with somebody in that midlife, what
I'm looking for is, yeah, we're let's be honest, we
all want to look better, we want to improve what
we see in the mirror. But at certain ages it's like, man,
can we feel better? Can you have more energy? At five?
(11:25):
In the afternoon, can you walk even fluidly gracefully. We
lose a lot of that and you know, part of
that midlife. If I can get somebody in an exercise
program or even with other people where we think about
the times in life where if the stereotypical midlife crisis ex.
(11:46):
High school jot guy right for better or worse sports
the team that was this great part of his life.
When we get them into the gym or the fitness facility,
and you have mentioned something about community, you know, with
Austin and fitness and things like that, if we get
these people remembering what it was like to be part
(12:06):
of a team, even if it wasn't a sports team
but a marching band or the military, whatever it was,
that maybe those those are the best times in their life.
And I can have that happen in the gym through
group fitness classes or people working together, then hopefully that
you know, that carries over and on that team a
community aspect, we have certain people who through years that
(12:31):
they were born, where they were born, gender they were born.
You know, when I began in the late nineties or
mid late nineties and would work with a seventy year old,
particularly female nobody ever told them to exercise, nobody told
them to be part of a team. And that's one
of the very first people I met with. And I'm
(12:51):
fresh out of grad school and giving her all the
big words about how she can improve bone density and
things like that, and I'll never forget that. She started
crying in my office with how come nobody ever told
me this? And to me at that point, it's like,
how come nobody ever told my mom to do these
things right that could help in longevity and help in independence.
(13:13):
And so from a physical standpoint, with that midlife, you know,
we've got research now that shows you can improve strength
and you can improve bone density sixty seventy eighty years
old for people that haven't been doing anything. If they
just raise the ladder just a little bit with some overload,
we can improve. And so that's when you have that midlife.
(13:33):
That's what I'm going to go back to in those aspects,
what can they improve, what can they feel at the
end of the day.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
That is so well stated. You are almost like a
compass and you know you're true north and you speak
behind it so well.
Speaker 2 (13:51):
I wonder.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
About the individuals coming out of COVID and this loneliness
epidemic that's been uncovered, as if loneliness didn't exist before COVID,
but now that the elephant is being discussed in the room,
(14:14):
give us your perspective on loneliness relative to exercise relative
to community, because it seems like from our perspective that
you could solve part of your loneliness issue if you
were exercising in community.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Correct. Oh, that's and most of the company that I
work with, that's one of our biggest things that and
we know group exercise you know, existed for some of
us that were around in the leg warmer era and
further back onto the eighties. That's always always been a thing.
And then we tied it into COVID, where you were thinking,
and everybody in the gym business thought, oh my goodness,
(14:54):
let's all go to streaming services and everybody's going to
be working out at home, and much smarter than me
were fond of saying, we've always had home workouts, they
were just on VHS tapes and DVDs and people didn't
use them. And you know, certain companies that went all in,
you know, on the streaming and the home exercise that
(15:15):
then just saw once people had a chance to get
back out. Those numbers dropped and we were able to
pull people back into the gym. And it's not the equipment,
you know, It's not the equipment. It's the people and
it is the chance. And I think tying in with
you for the loneliness where I try to fit in
our part of the world with fitness, with personal training,
(15:37):
and even more so with group fitness. Where my day
today I before seven, before seven thirty in the morning,
I had about fifty people in group fitness classes. And
the greatest thing, even though I teach people how to
teach these classes, and part of that is, hey, give
this smashing introduction to let everybody know what's going on
(15:58):
and this is happening. But then in the reaction you
get to the point of hey, everybody, I'm up here,
We're about to start class. Turn around because they're all
sitting and chatting like middle school kids. We tell our people,
you know what you actually you've done your job because
you've created that community within your class. I think where
we fall short often in fitness is if we think
(16:20):
about what most people are doing during the day is
they're sitting and the majority of these people who are sitting,
they're looking at screens and they're doing their work on
their computer. And then when they're not doing their work
on their computer, they're doing their work here and they're
sitting in their screen driven and they're sitting in their
screen driven, have had very minimal outside communication. And then
(16:43):
they come see us at a fitness facility, and if
they're new to exercise or have the least bit of
gray hair, which if I grew mine out, you would
see it. The first thing we do is we sit
them on an exercise bike, which now they've been sitting
all day, and now we're asking them to sit some more.
And instead of communicating with somebody, Hey, on this bike,
(17:04):
you can sit here and you can watch TV the
entire time. And now they've had headphones in and they've
come to visit us in the gym and they haven't
connected or communicated with anybody and grand scheme of things. Hey,
if they're doing something, I love them for doing it
because a lot of people don't. But even in fitness,
we're missing that boat, as you said, for the connection.
(17:26):
So if I've got everybody in one spot with a
general goal, we've all got different goals. But it's somewhat
common purpose as we know from other things, from church services,
from rock concerts, whatever it is, it's that shared energy.
And if we can create that in a fitness facility,
you know, that's helping them and from a business side,
it's helping your gym as well. So community is one
(17:50):
of the biggest things. So I could talk to you
about that all day when it comes to fitness.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
Thank you for that. We're going to take a quick
commercial break. I'm going to throw it to you for
tell people where they can contact you.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
They can contact me locally through my email at M A. R.
B R O two three at gmail dot com. Marlboro
twenty three at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1 (18:17):
Great, that's we will be right back with Mark in
just the second.
Speaker 3 (18:27):
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Speaker 1 (20:07):
On this the back half of every show Mark we
always get, sometimes more deeper and philosophical, and Ron knows this.
It's getting it's becoming increasingly difficult to get on our
show because we're only talking to people of significance. Now,
I'd love to get your perspective at age fifty six
(20:31):
of what does success mean versus significance?
Speaker 2 (20:35):
Interesting? I like that we can play with that. I
think another one, if you want, I probably could have
rolled it into the intro your first question that you
had sent me with, you know, kind of what got
you into that? And I don't know if it fits
that or not, but my backstory a given from being
a basketball player. I was literally in my first year
of grad school in history to be a teacher and
(20:57):
a coach because I was the oh hey, you right
well for a jock, and I had some influential history teachers,
but and had some coaching offers after undergrad and after
having gone through the process of myself as minor as
it was, getting into playing at a small college kind
of level and all that where we eventually every kid
playing sports gets told, Okay, you're not good enough, you know,
(21:19):
unless you're Michael Jordan or what have you. Yep, And
that's what got me into the fitness was you know what,
I don't have to tell people they're not good enough,
that I can help everybody so very good.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
They say that health can be a sacred journey of
returning to one's true self. How do you actually help
clients rediscover the joy that they may have or the
identity and the confidence and focus on the tr the
(21:55):
time remaining.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Oh great one on that again without you know, without
going into the and we can go and I can
do some quick not even physiology physiology standpoints. But there's
there's Harvard studies that looked at everything almost coming down
to what you've done in the last five years for
a lot of people, you know, and it's not exact,
(22:17):
but the idea of that, hey, get out and do something,
you know, balance training, you know, being able to be better,
to have better balance not falling. We can go that
direction or you know, the mental you know, more of
the psychological side, you know, if you want to, you know,
guide into those you know, but that's you know, to me,
(22:38):
the aspect, the biggest picture, and maybe it ties into
even in the conclusions that I, you know, towards the
end of me working for people would probably annoy my
bosses as a training manager more than anything else. The
fact that my general job description ultimately for people that
work for me, it was like, you know, if your guys,
if you guys and gals, if they feel better when
(22:59):
they leave your facility, then when they walked in, you
know you did your job. You know, we're splitting hairs,
you know, unless somebody's training for a seriously competitive event
for fifty six, sixty six, seventy six. If you know,
we walk out of the door and you feel better,
and then it's the well I tell people, it's always
the ripple ripple effect, you know, And that's where I
become kind of the exercise evangelical where I tell people
(23:23):
that all the time you go grab somebody, you feel
better when you left here, Go get your friend, go
get your take them for a walk. You don't have
to bring them here, but you know, notice how much
better you feel. And then your interaction, you know, with
the rest of the world when that happens. So that's
the that's the tie in, and you know, that's the
that's the positive on all that that we try to
(23:43):
We try to get with people and sometimes it happens,
sometimes it doesn't because people love that negative self gym talk.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
I want you to take this next two part question
and tell me who has been your favorite mentor in
life For starters.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
Okay, so for me it sounds maybe it doesn't sound cliche,
but first and foremost, I am so fortunate to have
had both parents and still do. They're still healthy in
their eighties. And my mom was a public school teacher
who branched out and started her own private elementary school
(24:27):
in the mid eighties. So I grew up being surrounded
by great teachers. And my father started energy conservation consulting
firm here in Austin in the late seventies, eighties, nineties.
And so we don't know it when we're young how
busy they were. But I was an only child, and
(24:48):
there was never never a time when they were not
there for me and not leading by example, which they
still do to this day. With their retired in the
hill country and food banks and church work, and my
dad has retired on some land and anyone that has
(25:09):
a son or grandkid that wanted to come out and
learn how to fish, you know, they would still do that.
So I saw the value of hard work without neglecting
people around you. So and that balance which is super difficult,
but my parents, I can strongly say they walked that
(25:32):
and lived that and demonstrated that and still do to
this day. And so I'm, you know, one of the
fortunate ones that have them here still with me in
only an hour away.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
You're very lucky, extremely blessed. So this next question, I'd
love for you to provide a living eulogy to your
mom and dad and righted as if it's a billboard
that would land on I thirty five. And let's say
(26:07):
we're going to take down all the Buckey signs on
I thirty five, And so what's going to be on
the on those billboards for your mom and dad?
Speaker 2 (26:17):
Bullet bullet point billboard. Yes, you will. You will feel
better after being around them. You will feel better about yourself.
I will always laugh. It's probably probably not even a joke,
but I think growing up any anytime any relationship ended
on my part, I would pretty much laugh. I think
(26:39):
that they're mad they lost my parents, and not mad,
not me so mad they didn't want to break up
with my parents. But yeah, everybody that they're around is
going to feel better and going to feel listened to. Well,
we need to.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Get make sure and get this show to them so
they can they can hear that and be celebrated. Way
to go, mom and dad, that's a job well done.
I want you to address as a part of a
final question, the notion of fear. And we study just
(27:16):
several things here at our network. We study significance epiphanies, fear,
how to get the most out of every life, and
it seems like that fear is the underpinning for too
many people today.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
That's a great question, and I can take it from
a fitness standpoint and others as well, because I think
fitness and even certain forms of fitness give people a
chance to face their fears, to actually face their fears.
And for myself, prior to what you were watching me
(27:55):
kickboxing to music and video after and from college and
then about twenty five years on, I spent a lot
of time in boxing and martial arts and kickboxing. And
one of the expressions they always have in combat sports
are nobody boxes who doesn't need to? And traditionally that
was a socioeconomic kind of statement, right that only only
(28:19):
somebody that had to make money with their fists, Those
are only people that were going to box. But then
realizing for a lot of us the need to was Okay,
we're fort you know, so many ways, fortunate that we
grew up in a spot where I'm not having to
chase my food and wrestle my food and you know,
fend off whatever whatever I may have to fight against,
you know, so the need to can I walk in
(28:40):
there even in a sports setting with another individual who
may or may not be trying to knock me out
and face that and come through it at the end
of the day. That's the sort of thing that then
I would take with me personally. Well, I can give
I can give this speech in front of three hundred people,
because they're not going to run up, hopefully and try
to punch me in the head. For our other for
(29:04):
our clients are forty fifty year olds, all of those,
the same thing can happen. I've got an eighty four
year old right now who hangs from a chin up bar,
and she gets up there and she swings, and I'm
physiologically that would be very hard for an eighty four
year old woman who has never never done a chin
up to actually do a chin up. But the fact
(29:25):
that she has gotten brave enough to hold onto a bar,
lift her feet off the ground and swing all of
these things, if they can take that with them again,
that's one of the one of the things that we
hope to give them. But I think fear that you
would understand too. I sometimes equate fear of people coming
into the gym very similarly to people who fear maybe
(29:48):
attending a new church service or something like that for
the first time. Oh, I'm not going to have the
right clothes, right do I? You know? Am I dressed
appropriately for the gym or this social setting or whatever
it may be. I'm not going to know when to
sit down. I'm not going to know when to stand up.
People are going to judge me. And it ties in
(30:12):
very well in that way, and that's what we try
to get across coming into the gym. If you're in
the right spot, it should be one of the least
judgmental places in the world because once again, it's that
community and we've got people coming in that are all
trying to better themselves. And one of the things that
I try to leave people with at the end of
(30:33):
the day is you know the path on the back
that sometimes people need. That. In the United States right now,
maybe twenty percent of our population exercises regularly, and that's
a generous twenty percent. And so to me, anybody that
does anything and you don't have to come see me.
It doesn't have to be in a gym. You're walking,
(30:55):
you're moving with your friends, whatever it is, you should
already be patting yourself on the back because you're in
this very small percentile of people that have made that
big step, maybe overcome that fear of walking into the
gym or honestly walking around the neighborhood in shorts that
you're not sure you want people to see you in
because it's been a while since you exercise. So all
(31:16):
of those in again through my gym lens, are ways
that hopefully we can, you know, try to overcome that fear.
But I think all of us with enough experience under
our belt, right, we all look back and we talk
to each other. What are the things that we remember
and those are the things that scared us the most?
Speaker 4 (31:35):
Right?
Speaker 2 (31:36):
What did we have to overcome? And that's why, no
matter where it is, right, if it's the gym, if
it's the hike, you know, find that challenge, find something
that you do have to overcome and then take that
with you into everything else that you that you do
from there.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Excellent, Well, you have inspired us and we appreciate you
so much. And one more time, how do our listeners
contact you?
Speaker 2 (32:02):
They can reach me directly through my email at Marlboro
twenty three M A R B R O two three
at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
Excellent, We thank you so much, Mark remarkable, inspirational and
we needed to hear what you had to say.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
Today, I'll leave it thank you so much for having me. No,
happy to be here, happy to help.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
Yes, sir, and we, as usual folks, will leave you
with We wish you success on your way to significance,
but consider that journey along the way, as Mark just
inspired you to perhaps exercise, exercise with each other, and
eat the right foods.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
Has a great week
And welcome back to truly Significant dot com. I'm Rick Tokeeney.
Glad to have you all back on today and thanks
to our mutual friend Ron Resnik, we're connecting today with
Mark Brown, who is a teacher at Austin Community College.
Most of the trainer a lot of other things which
(00:29):
we're going to unpack on today's show. Mark, it's great
to have you on.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Welcome, Thank you for having me. Rick.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Absolutely so tell us your backstory, including where are you
from originally.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
I'm native Austin, nite so born, born and raised here
in Austin, one of the one of the few from there,
and grew up as a basketball player and all my
life and growing up going to games at the Erwin
Center and sneaking into Gregory Gym and you know, we
(01:03):
will fight over your T shirt that you're wearing right there.
But actually did my undergrad work at Saint Edwards University
and then got a master's degree in exercise science at
what was then Southwest Texas State so we can do
the math there, and was lucky enough to fall into
(01:23):
personal training as a career in Austin in the mid
nineties at a local local club that anyone that was
around Austin long enough has probably visited body business at
least once or twice, but locally owned and operated at
a time when that was rare, And I started there
for about four and a quarter an hour when I
was finishing graduate school and managed to sit on kind
(01:47):
of the front wave of personal training becoming a career
and fitness in general becoming a career as opposed to
just something that people did on the side and would
come in out after work and teach classes. So very
fortunate time and place to get started that way.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
Right time, right place. Yeah, one can easily call you
one of the pioneers in the industry. Every trainer sees
people at a variety of moments when they're actively trying
to change something about themselves. You probably have seen that
in Ron Resnick. We'd love for you to comment on
how do you honor that particular individual moment respectfully while
(02:33):
encouraging growth.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
It's a great question and it's big too, and as
you said, the emotional and the vulnerability that one of
my jobs for many years has been training trainers and
training group fitness instructors, and we talk a great deal
on when we first meet with individuals and they come
to see us and yes, I want to lose weight,
(02:56):
Yes I want to get stronger. I may want to
improve this or that. But as you're saying, the emotion,
emotional vulnerability sometimes doesn't come in until after I've worked
with these individuals for a period of weeks, months, where
then you start to hear the stories of yes, we
want to lose weight, but you know what happened? Why
did you Why did you want to lose weight? You know,
(03:18):
I can tell my own stories as being a basketball
player starting college in nineteen eighty nine, but in those
days we didn't lift weights for basketball, and my senior
year in high school, I was five nine, one hundred
and thirty five pounds and my coach called me, you know,
the slow, little fat kid. You know, so perspectives change,
(03:40):
but we get into you know, where those places are
and what's caused people to want to make that change.
And most of us have been there in this day
and time with the idea that we know we need
to get fitter, we know we need to become more active,
we know we need to do things, and that's well
and good, but for better or worse, sometimes it takes
that proverbial gut punch to really get that motivation. What
(04:03):
health scare did you have or mother or father or
somebody close to you that that finally did that. And
so it comes down almost like somebody in your role
of listening and fitness. We unfortunately, we do a lot
of telling, and we have this many features, and we
have this many treadmills, and we have this many weights,
(04:24):
where really we're the only industry that really does that.
When I say, my hotels, don't tell me they have
this many beds, that's to be expected. You know, what
can we do for this individual? And so a lot
of times it's you know, be quiet, listen, you know,
where are they coming from at this place in time.
Speaker 1 (04:42):
It's almost if Mark, you are not a trainer, you
are a personal therapist.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
It's there are professional professional lines that technically we are
not supposed to cross. But you know, ck in a
big picture, we always say that with people that in
a personal training session, if I'm with somebody one on
one for an hour, and then you add up the
remaining hours of their day with family and kids and
(05:11):
work responsibilities. Yeah, honestly, there's not a lot of other
cases where maybe they do have someone's undivided attention for
that hour. So yeah, we do hear those things and
we want to affect them in the way that we
can without crossing boundaries into psychological training and realms that
we're not professionally trained for. And it can happen, but
(05:33):
you know, we definitely hear some stories.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
It seems to me that your career and where you
are today, you are peaking. You're better than you were
yesterday even, and that this is a crowning moment for you.
What would you advise our listening audience in terms of
putting yourself, putting themselves in the right place at the
(06:02):
right time, in having this higher mindfulness of where are
you really going in life with your intention?
Speaker 2 (06:10):
I love that because again I will always fall back to, hey,
I'm just this. I'm the simple gym guy, so I
see things maybe through just the lens of the gym.
But to build on what you're saying that for myself
being fifty six and many of my clients, particularly prior
to COVID, I began with them when I was twenty
five and they were forty five and fifty five, and
(06:33):
they stayed with me for twenty thirty years. So we
got to kind of evolve together. And quite often, even
when somebody starts an exercise program, if they're not in
their twenties, they're quick to fall back to the word, well,
what are your goals? What do you want to do?
When they'll say, oh, I just want to maintain, And
that's one of the words that I strike from my
(06:54):
client's vocabulary and big picture, yes, we backtrack. If I
maintain what I had when I was twenty, thirty, forty,
and I'm doing the same thing when I'm sixty or seventy,
that's actually, hey, that's great. But from the verbiage always
telling people, if you're using the word maintain in the gym,
then I have always seen it trickle down and then
you start maintaining in the rest of your life and
(07:16):
your relationships, in your work, whatever it might be. And
so again through the simple gym lens for me, the
beauty of having something to do in a workout, in
an exercise session to where we can always find something
to improve on, and then we want to see that
and we want to take that motivation into the rest
of somebody else's life, like, hey, if you decided you
(07:40):
can do this and you accomplish whatever it might be,
and it's individual to everybody and everybody's on a very
different fitness path. But just taking that one step, if
you can do that here, can you do that away
from the gym and beyond the psychological aspect from a
physical standpoint For those of us that are in the
age range of the forty fifty sixty seventy where sitting
(08:02):
becomes more appealing or a fact of life at the
nine to five, if I can help this person have
more energy when they're not in the gym, then that's
hopefully going to help them accomplish those goals and continue
to continue to move forward, because there's always something we
can improve on. It doesn't have to be hey we're
lifting more weight today, you know, are you moving better,
(08:25):
are you moving with greater ease? Are you getting up
and down from the floor, whatever it might be. But
we always want to find something and I hope that
that trickles down into the rest of their life. As
you know you're suggesting.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
I would hope so too. Yeah, I maintain my two
thousand and.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Two ta bird. Hey, that's a good thing.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
There's there's a great car analogy there. Okay, So about
twenty five years ago, I thought that I was in
the middle of a midlife crisis, and now I'll look
back on it and go, that was silly. I would
love your perspective on why are people still picking on
(09:09):
themselves and having midlife crises and what the heck does
that mean chronologically.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
It's a great question on that because just by thinking
about that, when you said that the term midlife has
obviously changed in all of our life spans that I
was born in sixty nine, and so I think we're
kind of the first generation where we will have people
who had some longitudinal you know, continuation of exercise, where
(09:37):
prior to that time it was only the football players,
only the outlying bodybuilders. And so, you know, the midlife
from a chronological physiological standpoint, you know, we do run
into things that change hormonally, and then the way that
the diet and everything is affected there, and the indecrine
system and the hormonal system that is thankfully if physician's
(10:00):
pay grade and not mine, because it's an amazingly complex
system that plays into that. But what I see again
through my lens, a lot of the midlife, even with
people who are doing their best to come and see
me and come into the gym. The visual aspect of
the fitness industry is another thing that I would have
(10:22):
to say I lovent hate because chickli. With social media,
it's exposed so many people to different kinds of exercise,
which can be fantastic, but what everyone sees becomes the
comparison shopping. And we all know this from other aspects
that yes, everybody is. You know, in my day it
was airbrushed and spray tand and I think you probably
(10:44):
saw some of that in me, you know, kickboxing in
the video. But now with the AI and the filters
that you're seeing people with unattainable physiques or physical outcomes
that ultimately really came more for mom and dad. And
there's a lot of genetic factors that we could delve
(11:04):
into and dive into that those ultimately have a lot
to do with how somebody's going to look when they exercise.
And so for me, with somebody in that midlife, what
I'm looking for is, yeah, we're let's be honest, we
all want to look better, we want to improve what
we see in the mirror. But at certain ages it's like, man,
can we feel better? Can you have more energy? At five?
(11:25):
In the afternoon, can you walk even fluidly gracefully. We
lose a lot of that and you know, part of
that midlife. If I can get somebody in an exercise
program or even with other people where we think about
the times in life where if the stereotypical midlife crisis ex.
(11:46):
High school jot guy right for better or worse sports
the team that was this great part of his life.
When we get them into the gym or the fitness facility,
and you have mentioned something about community, you know, with
Austin and fitness and things like that, if we get
these people remembering what it was like to be part
(12:06):
of a team, even if it wasn't a sports team
but a marching band or the military, whatever it was,
that maybe those those are the best times in their life.
And I can have that happen in the gym through
group fitness classes or people working together, then hopefully that
you know, that carries over and on that team a
community aspect, we have certain people who through years that
(12:31):
they were born, where they were born, gender they were born.
You know, when I began in the late nineties or
mid late nineties and would work with a seventy year old,
particularly female nobody ever told them to exercise, nobody told
them to be part of a team. And that's one
of the very first people I met with. And I'm
(12:51):
fresh out of grad school and giving her all the
big words about how she can improve bone density and
things like that, and I'll never forget that. She started
crying in my office with how come nobody ever told
me this? And to me at that point, it's like,
how come nobody ever told my mom to do these
things right that could help in longevity and help in independence.
(13:13):
And so from a physical standpoint, with that midlife, you know,
we've got research now that shows you can improve strength
and you can improve bone density sixty seventy eighty years
old for people that haven't been doing anything. If they
just raise the ladder just a little bit with some overload,
we can improve. And so that's when you have that midlife.
(13:33):
That's what I'm going to go back to in those aspects,
what can they improve, what can they feel at the
end of the day.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
That is so well stated. You are almost like a
compass and you know you're true north and you speak
behind it so well.
Speaker 2 (13:51):
I wonder.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
About the individuals coming out of COVID and this loneliness
epidemic that's been uncovered, as if loneliness didn't exist before COVID,
but now that the elephant is being discussed in the room,
(14:14):
give us your perspective on loneliness relative to exercise relative
to community, because it seems like from our perspective that
you could solve part of your loneliness issue if you
were exercising in community.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Correct. Oh, that's and most of the company that I
work with, that's one of our biggest things that and
we know group exercise you know, existed for some of
us that were around in the leg warmer era and
further back onto the eighties. That's always always been a thing.
And then we tied it into COVID, where you were thinking,
and everybody in the gym business thought, oh my goodness,
(14:54):
let's all go to streaming services and everybody's going to
be working out at home, and much smarter than me
were fond of saying, we've always had home workouts, they
were just on VHS tapes and DVDs and people didn't
use them. And you know, certain companies that went all in,
you know, on the streaming and the home exercise that
(15:15):
then just saw once people had a chance to get
back out. Those numbers dropped and we were able to
pull people back into the gym. And it's not the equipment,
you know, It's not the equipment. It's the people and
it is the chance. And I think tying in with
you for the loneliness where I try to fit in
our part of the world with fitness, with personal training,
(15:37):
and even more so with group fitness. Where my day
today I before seven, before seven thirty in the morning,
I had about fifty people in group fitness classes. And
the greatest thing, even though I teach people how to
teach these classes, and part of that is, hey, give
this smashing introduction to let everybody know what's going on
(15:58):
and this is happening. But then in the reaction you
get to the point of hey, everybody, I'm up here,
We're about to start class. Turn around because they're all
sitting and chatting like middle school kids. We tell our people,
you know what you actually you've done your job because
you've created that community within your class. I think where
we fall short often in fitness is if we think
(16:20):
about what most people are doing during the day is
they're sitting and the majority of these people who are sitting,
they're looking at screens and they're doing their work on
their computer. And then when they're not doing their work
on their computer, they're doing their work here and they're
sitting in their screen driven and they're sitting in their
screen driven, have had very minimal outside communication. And then
(16:43):
they come see us at a fitness facility, and if
they're new to exercise or have the least bit of
gray hair, which if I grew mine out, you would
see it. The first thing we do is we sit
them on an exercise bike, which now they've been sitting
all day, and now we're asking them to sit some more.
And instead of communicating with somebody, Hey, on this bike,
(17:04):
you can sit here and you can watch TV the
entire time. And now they've had headphones in and they've
come to visit us in the gym and they haven't
connected or communicated with anybody and grand scheme of things. Hey,
if they're doing something, I love them for doing it
because a lot of people don't. But even in fitness,
we're missing that boat, as you said, for the connection.
(17:26):
So if I've got everybody in one spot with a
general goal, we've all got different goals. But it's somewhat
common purpose as we know from other things, from church services,
from rock concerts, whatever it is, it's that shared energy.
And if we can create that in a fitness facility,
you know, that's helping them and from a business side,
it's helping your gym as well. So community is one
(17:50):
of the biggest things. So I could talk to you
about that all day when it comes to fitness.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
Thank you for that. We're going to take a quick
commercial break. I'm going to throw it to you for
tell people where they can contact you.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
They can contact me locally through my email at M A. R.
B R O two three at gmail dot com. Marlboro
twenty three at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1 (18:17):
Great, that's we will be right back with Mark in
just the second.
Speaker 3 (18:27):
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Speaker 1 (20:07):
On this the back half of every show Mark we
always get, sometimes more deeper and philosophical, and Ron knows this.
It's getting it's becoming increasingly difficult to get on our
show because we're only talking to people of significance. Now,
I'd love to get your perspective at age fifty six
(20:31):
of what does success mean versus significance?
Speaker 2 (20:35):
Interesting? I like that we can play with that. I
think another one, if you want, I probably could have
rolled it into the intro your first question that you
had sent me with, you know, kind of what got
you into that? And I don't know if it fits
that or not, but my backstory a given from being
a basketball player. I was literally in my first year
of grad school in history to be a teacher and
(20:57):
a coach because I was the oh hey, you right
well for a jock, and I had some influential history teachers,
but and had some coaching offers after undergrad and after
having gone through the process of myself as minor as
it was, getting into playing at a small college kind
of level and all that where we eventually every kid
playing sports gets told, Okay, you're not good enough, you know,
(21:19):
unless you're Michael Jordan or what have you. Yep, And
that's what got me into the fitness was you know what,
I don't have to tell people they're not good enough,
that I can help everybody so very good.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
They say that health can be a sacred journey of
returning to one's true self. How do you actually help
clients rediscover the joy that they may have or the
identity and the confidence and focus on the tr the
(21:55):
time remaining.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Oh great one on that again without you know, without
going into the and we can go and I can
do some quick not even physiology physiology standpoints. But there's
there's Harvard studies that looked at everything almost coming down
to what you've done in the last five years for
a lot of people, you know, and it's not exact,
(22:17):
but the idea of that, hey, get out and do something,
you know, balance training, you know, being able to be better,
to have better balance not falling. We can go that
direction or you know, the mental you know, more of
the psychological side, you know, if you want to, you know,
guide into those you know, but that's you know, to me,
(22:38):
the aspect, the biggest picture, and maybe it ties into
even in the conclusions that I, you know, towards the
end of me working for people would probably annoy my
bosses as a training manager more than anything else. The
fact that my general job description ultimately for people that
work for me, it was like, you know, if your guys,
if you guys and gals, if they feel better when
(22:59):
they leave your facility, then when they walked in, you
know you did your job. You know, we're splitting hairs,
you know, unless somebody's training for a seriously competitive event
for fifty six, sixty six, seventy six. If you know,
we walk out of the door and you feel better,
and then it's the well I tell people, it's always
the ripple ripple effect, you know, And that's where I
become kind of the exercise evangelical where I tell people
(23:23):
that all the time you go grab somebody, you feel
better when you left here, Go get your friend, go
get your take them for a walk. You don't have
to bring them here, but you know, notice how much
better you feel. And then your interaction, you know, with
the rest of the world when that happens. So that's
the that's the tie in, and you know, that's the
that's the positive on all that that we try to
(23:43):
We try to get with people and sometimes it happens,
sometimes it doesn't because people love that negative self gym talk.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
I want you to take this next two part question
and tell me who has been your favorite mentor in
life For starters.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
Okay, so for me it sounds maybe it doesn't sound cliche,
but first and foremost, I am so fortunate to have
had both parents and still do. They're still healthy in
their eighties. And my mom was a public school teacher
who branched out and started her own private elementary school
(24:27):
in the mid eighties. So I grew up being surrounded
by great teachers. And my father started energy conservation consulting
firm here in Austin in the late seventies, eighties, nineties.
And so we don't know it when we're young how
busy they were. But I was an only child, and
(24:48):
there was never never a time when they were not
there for me and not leading by example, which they
still do to this day. With their retired in the
hill country and food banks and church work, and my
dad has retired on some land and anyone that has
(25:09):
a son or grandkid that wanted to come out and
learn how to fish, you know, they would still do that.
So I saw the value of hard work without neglecting
people around you. So and that balance which is super difficult,
but my parents, I can strongly say they walked that
(25:32):
and lived that and demonstrated that and still do to
this day. And so I'm, you know, one of the
fortunate ones that have them here still with me in
only an hour away.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
You're very lucky, extremely blessed. So this next question, I'd
love for you to provide a living eulogy to your
mom and dad and righted as if it's a billboard
that would land on I thirty five. And let's say
(26:07):
we're going to take down all the Buckey signs on
I thirty five, And so what's going to be on
the on those billboards for your mom and dad?
Speaker 2 (26:17):
Bullet bullet point billboard. Yes, you will. You will feel
better after being around them. You will feel better about yourself.
I will always laugh. It's probably probably not even a joke,
but I think growing up any anytime any relationship ended
on my part, I would pretty much laugh. I think
(26:39):
that they're mad they lost my parents, and not mad,
not me so mad they didn't want to break up
with my parents. But yeah, everybody that they're around is
going to feel better and going to feel listened to. Well,
we need to.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Get make sure and get this show to them so
they can they can hear that and be celebrated. Way
to go, mom and dad, that's a job well done.
I want you to address as a part of a
final question, the notion of fear. And we study just
(27:16):
several things here at our network. We study significance epiphanies, fear,
how to get the most out of every life, and
it seems like that fear is the underpinning for too
many people today.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
That's a great question, and I can take it from
a fitness standpoint and others as well, because I think
fitness and even certain forms of fitness give people a
chance to face their fears, to actually face their fears.
And for myself, prior to what you were watching me
(27:55):
kickboxing to music and video after and from college and
then about twenty five years on, I spent a lot
of time in boxing and martial arts and kickboxing. And
one of the expressions they always have in combat sports
are nobody boxes who doesn't need to? And traditionally that
was a socioeconomic kind of statement, right that only only
(28:19):
somebody that had to make money with their fists, Those
are only people that were going to box. But then
realizing for a lot of us the need to was Okay,
we're fort you know, so many ways, fortunate that we
grew up in a spot where I'm not having to
chase my food and wrestle my food and you know,
fend off whatever whatever I may have to fight against,
you know, so the need to can I walk in
(28:40):
there even in a sports setting with another individual who
may or may not be trying to knock me out
and face that and come through it at the end
of the day. That's the sort of thing that then
I would take with me personally. Well, I can give
I can give this speech in front of three hundred people,
because they're not going to run up, hopefully and try
to punch me in the head. For our other for
(29:04):
our clients are forty fifty year olds, all of those,
the same thing can happen. I've got an eighty four
year old right now who hangs from a chin up bar,
and she gets up there and she swings, and I'm
physiologically that would be very hard for an eighty four
year old woman who has never never done a chin
up to actually do a chin up. But the fact
(29:25):
that she has gotten brave enough to hold onto a bar,
lift her feet off the ground and swing all of
these things, if they can take that with them again,
that's one of the one of the things that we
hope to give them. But I think fear that you
would understand too. I sometimes equate fear of people coming
into the gym very similarly to people who fear maybe
(29:48):
attending a new church service or something like that for
the first time. Oh, I'm not going to have the
right clothes, right do I? You know? Am I dressed
appropriately for the gym or this social setting or whatever
it may be. I'm not going to know when to
sit down. I'm not going to know when to stand up.
People are going to judge me. And it ties in
(30:12):
very well in that way, and that's what we try
to get across coming into the gym. If you're in
the right spot, it should be one of the least
judgmental places in the world because once again, it's that
community and we've got people coming in that are all
trying to better themselves. And one of the things that
I try to leave people with at the end of
(30:33):
the day is you know the path on the back
that sometimes people need. That. In the United States right now,
maybe twenty percent of our population exercises regularly, and that's
a generous twenty percent. And so to me, anybody that
does anything and you don't have to come see me.
It doesn't have to be in a gym. You're walking,
(30:55):
you're moving with your friends, whatever it is, you should
already be patting yourself on the back because you're in
this very small percentile of people that have made that
big step, maybe overcome that fear of walking into the
gym or honestly walking around the neighborhood in shorts that
you're not sure you want people to see you in
because it's been a while since you exercise. So all
(31:16):
of those in again through my gym lens, are ways
that hopefully we can, you know, try to overcome that fear.
But I think all of us with enough experience under
our belt, right, we all look back and we talk
to each other. What are the things that we remember
and those are the things that scared us the most?
Speaker 4 (31:35):
Right?
Speaker 2 (31:36):
What did we have to overcome? And that's why, no
matter where it is, right, if it's the gym, if
it's the hike, you know, find that challenge, find something
that you do have to overcome and then take that
with you into everything else that you that you do
from there.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Excellent, Well, you have inspired us and we appreciate you
so much. And one more time, how do our listeners
contact you?
Speaker 2 (32:02):
They can reach me directly through my email at Marlboro
twenty three M A R B R O two three
at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
Excellent, We thank you so much, Mark remarkable, inspirational and
we needed to hear what you had to say.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
Today, I'll leave it thank you so much for having me. No,
happy to be here, happy to help.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
Yes, sir, and we, as usual folks, will leave you
with We wish you success on your way to significance,
but consider that journey along the way, as Mark just
inspired you to perhaps exercise, exercise with each other, and
eat the right foods.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
Has a great week
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