The Circuit of Success Podcast with Brett Gilliland

Bob Burg shares how a subtle shift in focus is not only a more uplifting and fulfilling way of conducting business but the most financially profitable way, as well. For 30 years he’s helped companies, sales leaders, and their teams to communicate their value, sells at higher prices with less resistance, and grow their businesses based on Endless Referrals.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoMAL9ITeZk

Brett Gilliland

Welcome to The Circuit of Success. I am your host, Brett Gilliland and I’m fired up today because I’ve got Bob Burg with me. Bob, how you doing?

Bob Burg

Great. I’m fired up to be with you. Thank you for having me.

Brett Gilliland

Awesome. Hey, we got great taste already. I can tell. We got the same microphones.

Bob Burg

That’s right, . There’s nothing but the best here, right?

Brett Gilliland

I mean, these are great mics. Great mics, but, uh, well, you have, you’ve probably seen this book before. For those of you watching, you can see it. For those of you not watching, you’re listening. I’m, I’m holding up the book, the Go Giver, A little story about a powerful business idea, uh, that Bob wrote and was co-author of, and it’s a phenomenal book. I read this, I’m not just saying that because you’re on the show. That’s why I reached out to you to have you on the show, because I read the book . Loved it. And, uh, highly recommend it to those, uh, to those avid readers like you obviously are. So, uh, Bob, before we dive into all that stuff, you’re obviously a thought leader, a speaker, an author, uh, but if you can just give us a little lay of the land, what’s made you the man you are today and, and what’s cutting you under this, uh, under this, uh, the, the level of your success.

Bob Burg

Well, I was very fortunate to be brought up by fantastic parents, so I think that’s always a, uh, an, an amazing advantage when you have that. And, uh, you know, I got into sales at a, a pretty young age, mid twenties, and, uh, began to grow from there. I learned and studied sales, which led to studying personal development because that’s such an important part of it. You know, we, we know that. Uh, you know, success is built from the inside out, right? We build ourselves and then it, and it sort of manifests itself outwardly. So I, I really love that. And after, you know, after some time of working my way up, eventually to sales manager of a company, I began teaching others, or I was asked to, to, to come in and speak to some other sales groups. I thought, wow, this is pretty cool. You know, maybe I could kind of do a business, uh, like that. And, and, uh, learned how to do that. Joined National Speakers Association and learned how to, to have a professional speaking practice. And from there I’ve just, you know, I’ve been very, very fortunate to do this for quite a while now.

Brett Gilliland

That’s great. So what, what made you write the book? Like were you, what, what stage of your career were you in, uh, when you wrote this ? Well, I know you’ve written multiple books, but specifically, you know, the Go Giver.

Bob Burg

Yeah, so, so it, it kind of starts back in the, the mid nineties when I had a book out called Endless Referrals and the subtitle was, Network Your Everyday Contacts Into Sales. And it was a, it was a how to book, um, on really showing entrepeneurs and sales people who knew they had a great product or service, they believed in what they did. They know they brought phenomenal value to those they serve, but they maybe didn’t feel confident or comfortable going out into their, their local areas and developing the kinds of relationships with people where people would want to do business with them directly and or refer them to others. So endless referrals was a system. Um, what is a system? Well, it’s, it’s basically the process of predictably achieving a goal based on a logical and specific set of how to principles, right? Uh, if it’s been proven that by doing a you’ll get the desired result of B, then you know that all you need to do is A, and continue to do A, and you’ll get the desired result of B. That’s what endless referrals was. It’s basic premise was that all things being equal people will do business with and refer business to those people they know, like, and trust. And so that was sort of my first big book.

Now, Through the years though, I’d always read business parables and whether it was a long form one such as OG Mandino’s Greatest Salesman in the World, or Class’s Richest Man in Babylon, or you know, all the, the Great Par Blanchard and Johnson’s one Minute series and throughout the years, and they were always so many fantastic ones and I always loved reading them because stories I think we all know connect on a, an even deeper level, right. And I thought, wouldn’t it be great if we could take that basic premise to know, like, and trust and turn that into a story? And, uh, so I was lucky enough that I, that my editor in chief at a magazine I used to write for, uh, John David Mann was, had already had a reputation within his niche as a brilliant, brilliant writer, author, storyteller. And, uh, and I asked him if he would get together with me on this idea that I had. And I, it was a roughly sketched out idea for the Go Giver. It certainly had not been developed, but he’s a great writer. I’m, you know, I’m, I’m a how to guy. I’m step step three. John’s a magnificent storyteller. So, you know, we collaborated on, and that’s really how the Go Giver started that.

Brett Gilliland

That’s great.

Bob Burg

You know, at the end of the very end of 2007, so effectively 2000. From there. Love it.

Brett Gilliland

So let, let’s talk about the, kinda the concept of the Go Giver. You know, I think most of the times, especially on, you know, in the world we live in today, it’s all about the go-getter. And, uh, but in your, in your book, in this book, um, you, you paint a better picture of being the Go Giver as your first priority. So instead of the go-getter, let’s be the Go Giver, hence the name of the book. Um, so let’s kind of set the, the stage for that. What’s that mean?

Bob Burg

So let’s, let’s take it even a little deeper if we can.

Brett Gilliland

Okay.

Bob Burg

You know, it always comes back to how we define terms of course, right?

Brett Gilliland

Absolutely.

Bob Burg

If you look at a go-getter as someone who’s just focused on the getting, yeah, the go-getter wouldn’t be, but what if we look at a go-getter as just someone who takes action right now? We love that. We love people who take action, right? Because, you know, you are, you’ve built a, a huge financial services investment practice. And, and yeah, you know that you can have the greatest ideas, the best thoughts, the greatest of intent. But unless action’s put into the mix, nothing’s gonna happen. So we, we want people to be go getters, people of action and go givers. Now a go giver is simply someone who understands that shifting their focus. And this is where this is the key. Shifting their focus from getting to giving is, uh, and in this case, when we say giving, we simply mean constantly and consistently providing immense value to others. Understanding that doing so is not only a more pleasant way of conducting.

It’s actually the most financially profitable way as well. Not for some kind of way out there, woo, woo, magical, mystical reasons. Not at all. It’s actually very logical, very rational. When you are that person, Brett, who can take your focus off yourself and instead place it on serving others, discovering what they need, what they want, what they desire when you can move off of yourself and focus on helping people solve their challenges, helping to bring them closer to happiness. People feel good about it, they feel great about you. They wanna get to know you. They like you, they trust you. They want to be in relationship with with you. So, so it just is very natural now. So we would say this, be a go-getter and a go-giver, but don’t be a go taker

Brett Gilliland

. That’s strong.

Bob Burg

The go taker, that’s the person whose focus is just on the take. Right? And it’s, it’s, you know, take, take, take without having to add val- without thinking. They have to add value to the person, to the process, to the the situation. And. They, they go takers tend to be very frustrated because they rarely achieve the kind of real massive success that they believe they deserve. But even when they do, and they do sometimes, uh, it tends to not be very sustainable.

Brett Gilliland

Mm-hmm.

Bob Burg

Built on a foundation that that is very, you know, practical. Not that they can’t keep doing it, but boy, isn’t it a tough way to make a living

Brett Gilliland

. Yeah.

Bob Burg

Competing that Brett. Right. And so, uh, so yeah, so we would say, you know, when you combine go getter and go giver, stay away from go taker. Now you’ve got, now you’ve really got a situation where you’re, where you are in a, where you’re in a position to bring some immense value to others. And remember, and I think this is so key, I I often say this when I’m, I’m speaking at a sales conference, it’s the first thing I’ll say, and that is, nobody’s gonna buy it from you because you have a quota to me.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah. No kidding. Right.

Bob Burg

Right. They’re not gonna buy from you cause you need the money or even because you’re really a nice person.

Brett Gilliland

Nor are they really gonna give a rep.

Bob Burg

Right, exactly. They’re gonna buy from you only because they believe that they will be better off by doing so than by not doing so. And that’s great.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

Because. It means if you have a heart for serving others, you very naturally wanna bring the best you can to another human being. And, and that, you know, creates that environment for that know, like, and trust to occur and the business to take place.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah, I love that. And I love the fact that you mentioned the action part. That’s one of the circuits of the Circuit of Success is action, right? People are like, you know, you can sit around. You know, think about it, pray for it, it’s gonna happen. But you know, you still take action. You still gotta go do it. And I love the fact that you don’t skip out on that point of just saying, oh, give, give, give, give, give. Um, because you do even to give, right? Whether it’s your, your time, your talent, your treasures, you still have to take action, right? I still gotta show up to that event.

Bob Burg

Right.

Brett Gilliland

I still gotta have it in my heart to write that check. So my question for you on this go-giver part, cause I, I gave a speech, uh, maybe two or three weeks ago, and there was a group of young professionals there and this, this guy in his low twenties asked me, you know, what advice would you have now looking back after two decades for somebody in a, in a position like his?

And I said, take the meeting. Take the meeting. I think so many times now in our world, people are like, well, what am I gonna get paid for this? Or what am I gonna get paid for that? And well, my time is worth X, I’ve spent a whole career, I’ve gone and done a million things for free, right? It doesn’t mean you don’t wanna get paid for your time, but I also believe go trust, have faith that good things can happen when you get out there. And my belief is that’s probably what you mean by those endless referrals. And that’s what’s happened for me over two decades is to get referrals and build a business like that because you just go and you give and you have no concept of what’s coming back for you.

Bob Burg

Uh, a lot of times you don’t, I say giving without attachment to the results, and because I expect good things all the time, you know?

Brett Gilliland

Yeah, yeah.

Bob Burg

But, but, but you have to do it without attachment. And, and it doesn’t mean we’re not strategic. It doesn’t mean we certainly don’t have a, you know, maybe a niche market that we’re, uh, pursuing and that we’re creating those relationships and so forth. It just means you leave yourself open. And, um, now I, I do wanna say one thing cause this, this brings up a question with a lot of people. Only I think because of the name Go Giver or, or title. And that is, well, can you be taken advantage of if you do that? And, and it’s a good question and, and it’s a human question to ask. And the answer is yes, anyone can be taken advantage of.

Brett Gilliland

Sure.

Bob Burg

Cause that happens in life sometimes. But if you do, if you find yourself. Not you, but I mean, if a person finds out,

Brett Gilliland

Yeah, collectively.

Bob Burg

In a pattern of being taken advantage of by others, and I don’t mean once or twice or every so often, it’s gonna happen if you’re human, right? Unless you stay in the home and never leave. But I’m talking about a pattern of being taken advantage of. It’s not because you’re nice or because you’re a giving person. It’s because you’re doing things in a certain way that creates the environment for you to be taken advantage of.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

And, and, you know, and, and if that’s, if that’s you, my, my response is, congratulations for realizing it and acknowledging it. Okay. Because you can go a whole life having things happen. And if you never give it the conscious thought and ask why, well, you keep repeating the same patterns.

Brett Gilliland

Yep.

Bob Burg

So if someone understands that this happens, then it’s a matter of asking. Okay. What is it that I’m doing or how do I feel about myself or you know, what is this reason that this thing keeps happening? Whereas other people do all these great things and go out there and put themselves out, and not only do they not get taken advantage of, great things seem to come back to them all the time.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

So we always have to go deeper and check our premises and, and understand why these things are happening and, and it’s always unconscious. It’s always something we’re setting ourselves up for, whether it’s worthiness issues, whether it’s not having the tools to know how to say no when it’s appropriate to do so, and how to do it tactfully and kindly. Whether it’s, uh, uh, getting a payoff of, of being the victim and having people feel sorry for, you know, different people have different reasons for doing different things. You know, if you ever read the 1960s book, uh, was published in 1960, written by Maxwell Malts called Psycho Cybernetics. Beautiful book, and he talked about how our belief system, which is unconscious by, by its very nature, our unconscious belief system absolutely drives our thoughts, our words, our actions, and we’re not even aware of it until we make the con, the unconscious conscious.

Brett Gilliland

Conscious. Yeah. And it’s so true. I mean, it’s where I was actually gonna go next, so you lead me right into it is, is so there’s attitude, your belief system, your actions ultimately get you the results. That’s, that’s the circuits of success I’ve talked about for so long.

Bob Burg

Sure.

Brett Gilliland

Um, but I think the, to the, your point is the beliefs conscious or unconscious, they do lead you in that direction. So my question would be, For that man or woman listening this now that may be younger in their career and they say, yeah, it’s easy to say go give now Brett, or go give now Bob because you guys have become successful and you’ve done it. But what? What did you do early in your career or for the person that may still not be young, young in age, but they’re young in their new business, they’ve started and they’re like, gosh, I need this sale, right? I need to sell that widget so I can pay my mortgage next month. What advice do you have for them?

Bob Burg

Wonderful question and. Basically the, the, the question comes down to, yeah, this go giver stuff sounds really nice and, you know, once I have the money and don’t really need the business that much, then I’ll focus on others and do all that.

Brett Gilliland

Right?

Bob Burg

You know, that great stuff. So there’s a false premise at work here, and that false premise is that you’re actually going to, to sell more, that you’re gonna sell better, that you’re gonna have more people wanting to do business with you because you’re thinking about yourself and.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

And it’s just not right. It’s just not true. Okay. So I, you know, so I would take a person through this exercise. Let’s say you are the prospect and I’m the salesperson, and I need the money, or I’m just starting out.

Brett Gilliland

Gotta have it. Yep.

Bob Burg

Gotta have that money. I need that money. I get, okay, so I’m gonna go in there and, and, and, and that’s my goal is to, to, to transfer your, the money from your pocket to mine is basically what it comes down to.

Brett Gilliland

Yep.

Bob Burg

Which I think comes across on a, on some level to that person is doing it. And that when I was younger, we used to call that commission breath.

Brett Gilliland

That’s literally what I was getting ready to say. We called it that same thing. We probably got it from you.

Bob Burg

And so, but, uh, so I’m gonna go in there, I’m gonna ask some questions, which I’ve been trained to ask because that’s how, how you, you do it. But I’m not really listening to understand what Brett needs, wants and desires. I’m listening so that I can have enough information to sharp angle you into a close. And get your money. Okay. Um, I’m going to, I, I’m, when you have an objection, um, I’m gonna be a little defensive about it probably because that your objection standing in the way of this money that I need. So yeah, I’m gonna go through the standard answers of the objections and again, try to sharp angle you and, and overcome the objection. Right. But you know, that’s, there’s sort of that attitude to it. I’m gonna be closing early and I’m gonna be closing often because I need money.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

And, and, and so at the end of this sales conversation, I would ask the question, are you gonna be more likely, all things being equal, more likely or less likely to buy from me right now? And I would say probably less likely. So now let’s take another situation. I’m the same person. I need the money. Okay. But, but here’s what I’m gonna do now. First, I’m not gonna deny self-interest because successful people live in truths. They don’t deny what’s true.

Brett Gilliland

Yep.

Bob Burg

Uh, they don’t get stuck on it. They utilize it in order to propel forward, but they acknowledge truths. And by the way, we’re all self-interested because that’s how our cave person ancestors created more generations to, you know, to

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

Right. So, so we’re self interest, but what I’m gonna do, Brett, is rather than act on this self-interest, I am going to to temporarily suspend my self-interest so that I can put my focus totally on you. All right, so now I’m gonna ask questions, but I’m not just asking questions. I’m now really listening. I’m listening with my entire posture, my body. I’m, uh, and when you answer, I’m not assuming I know what you mean, cause I realize we come from different belief systems. I realize I’m not my customer and what I find to be of value may not be what they find to be of value. So I gently and tactfully ask clarifying questions to make sure that I understand exactly what you need, what you want, what you desire. That I can provide insights. It’s gonna help you strengthen areas. Where you’re weak that you might not even know about, and and, and be able to leverage strong areas that you may not even know about. Once, only once I totally know that I know your desires. Am I gonna connect the benefits of my product or service with? What you are looking to accomplish. When you have an objection, I’m gonna welcome that objection and rather than give some standard answer, we’re going to together work within the, the context of the objection in order to understand the root of it and where it’s really coming from, and we’re gonna work through it together to advance the sale.

Brett Gilliland

Yep.

Bob Burg

And Brett, by the time I ask you to take action, You’re, you’re simply choosing to take action on something you’ve already told me that you want to do.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

Mainly you know that I have your wellbeing at heart. Now the question again, all things being equal, are you more likely or less likely to buy from me than you were from the other?

Brett Gilliland

Yeah, a hundred percent more likely. And I think the key there is I would say ADT ask don’t tell. It’s you asking great questions versus tell, well, if you tell me I need this thing, you need this ink pen, Bob, you need this ink pen. Versus asking me why I would need an ink pen and what that would do. I think that’s a key concept right there.

Bob Burg

And when you’re desperate, you tell.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah, you’re right.

Bob Burg

And so that’s, that’s what I would say to that person that understand that by focusing on the money, you are much less likely for that sale to take to take place. John David Mann, and I say this, okay, money is simply an echo of value. Money is an echo of value. It’s the funder, if you will, to the value of lightning. John said that he’s much more poetic than I am. Right? And what it really means, what it comes down to, Brett, is this. That the, the, your focus must be on the value you’re providing that person, the money you receive is simply a natural result of the value you provided.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah. Yeah. Couldn’t agree more. Couldn’t agree more. Bob. So let’s, let’s talk about, um, Your craft, right? I mean, you, you’ve done this for a long time and, and whether it’s writing books, speaking, coaching, whatever you’re doing, how much time are you spending working on your craft, so working on you versus necessarily being in the weeds, working on a, a certain project for maybe a client. How much work are you doing on yourself?

Bob Burg

Much more on myself because there’s so much I have to still work. I, you know, I’m 64. I’ll be 65 pretty soon, Brent.

Brett Gilliland

Okay.

Bob Burg

I’ll tell you, the older I get, the more I know how much I still need to, to work on.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

You know, and I, and I, I just think it, it, it’s so important.

Brett Gilliland

Um, but isn’t that amazing? Cause most would think you’ve got it figured out, right? I’m 64 years old, I’m successful, I’m this and that. This guy’s got it figured out, but we’re all still working on it together.

Bob Burg

Yeah, exactly. And, and I, I think it’s, you know, I think, and this was the best thing that happened to me when I got in sales. It wasn’t just the sales teaching. I started studied, you know, I got books by, and this is again, back in. Mid eighties I think, and I, I got books by Tom Hopkins and Zig Ziglar and I started out Brian Trade, you know, all these icons. I mean just wonderful, fantastic teachers and amazing. And that was great and it helped me a lot. But the best things they told me also was that I had to read other books. And I had to read the How to Win Friends and Influence People. I had to read The Magic of Thinking Big. I had to read Thinking Grow Rich. I had to re, you know, um,

Brett Gilliland

Let me interrupt for those listing right there. Go rewind this 15 seconds and, and write down every book you just mentioned. They’re all phenomenal.

Bob Burg

Thank you. I’ll tell you another one too, please. I just, for those watching on the screen, I just moved my microphone and reach for another book, uh, one of the greatest books too. And another one that I just think is a must read. I didn’t learn about this one until maybe 2003 or something. Um, but the, uh, the Science of Getting Rich by Wallace D. Wattles, uh, it was written in 1910. Um, they just did a, a retro version, they call it, and this is actually his original writing. So a a lot of people have, because the copyright ran out, a lot of people redid the book and put their own things, which is okay. Okay. But I always like the original. And so this retro version that you can see on at Amazon, uh, is, is the best one to get written in 1910. And yeah, while his focus, when he, where he does talk about getting rich in terms of financial, it’s, it’s all areas of life.

You, you can’t really excel in one without it carrying over in a, in a sense, when they’re principle based universal laws. So when we talk about success, we’re talking about sure financial, but also physical, spiritual, mentally, emotional, relational, social, you know, what have you. And this is a, I probably read this book 35, 40 times. It’s very, it’s very short, And it just has such magnificent information, you know, but, but you have, uh, um, you know, books like, um, gosh, uh, one of the best of all is a book written in, in, uh, I think this is written in 1906. It’s called Peace, Power, and Plenty by Morrison Sweat Martin, he was actually the founder of Success Magazine. And, and many people, uh, consider him the father of the modern day personal development movement. Uh, not, you know, I couldn’t even, this is a original edition. I couldn’t even write it. I, I had to just do the, you know, write on the, uh, uh, little yellow sticky notes. But, you know, you, you think about it, the title piece, and he’s talking about inner peace, power, which is the power over oneself, not over others. Okay, but power over one’s self, the ability to master one’s emotions. Yeah. And, and it is just so, and then plenty, which is what prosperity you’ve got

Brett Gilliland

That’s solid.

Bob Burg

On every page is a gem. And it has. So, you know, I, I think when we, when we look at, at, at continuing to develop ourselves, uh, you know, we can never go wrong. Right.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

Because there’s so much fantastic information out there.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah. That’s incredible. So let’s talk about that. I, I, you hear that all the time, the chicken or the egg, right? Which is it the chicken or the egg? And, and which comes first, but you know, in your book you talk about the, typically the more successful people, and I’m reading this from the book, I can’t remember what page it’s on, but it says, typically the more successful people are, the more they’re willing to share their secrets with others. Right. And I used quotes over secrets. Cause really there is no secret. There’s no secret. Right.

Bob Burg

That was, that was for, uh, what do you call it when you take writers? Uh, you know, when you’re being more, uh, I can’t even think of the, the where, but we, there’s no secret.

Brett Gilliland

It’s no, absolutely. But, but again, my chicken, the egg concept is, is because it is, is the person that’s willing to share.

Bob Burg

Yeah.

Brett Gilliland

Are they successful because they’re willing to share or are they successful, therefore they’re willing to share? I, I have my philosophy, so I’d love to know yours.

Bob Burg

Yeah. My mine is, and I’m not sure which is the chicken or which is the egg part, but

Brett Gilliland

exactly

Bob Burg

how a person is that that dictates what they do. So, you know, when we talk about somebody who, uh, let’s say somebody gives a lot to charity, okay. Typically, they were giving to charity when they were making almost nothing.

Brett Gilliland

Yep. Okay.

Bob Burg

Very rarely is there somebody who, who’s not charitable, uh, all of a sudden has a successful business and they’re making millions and millions, and then all of a sudden they become very charitable. You know, and very rarely, unless they’re doing this show offer for some ulterior,

Brett Gilliland

right.

Bob Burg

No. Typically, you know, money just makes us more of what we already are. And so, um, yeah, so someone who has a giving spirit and a giving name, that’s how they built their business. And, and, and so it’s that person who, and this goes back to that young person you’re talking about, who’s or that person even who’s young in their, their new career who says, well, I’ve gotta get something going. I’ve gotta get something started. Okay, good. Find a way to bring value to others. Yeah. Both your direct marketplace, but also everyone else. Okay. And because everything connects in some way. Yeah. And so find ways, discover and also understand that what you believe to be of value isn’t necessarily what they believe to be. Value is value, you know, which is different than price, right? Price is a dollar amount. So, but value is the relative work or desirability of a thing, of something to the end user or beholden. Yeah. Uh, what is it about this thing, this product, this service, this concept, this idea. That brings so much work to someone that they will willingly exchange their, whether it’s money, time, energy, friendship, what you know, what have you for this, right?

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

Both people come out way ahead.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

But it’s always, the value’s always in the eyes of the behold. So it’s not what we think is the value or what we think they should think of about, and that’s why it’s so important, as you talked about earlier, to ask questions and listen.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

We can’t know cause we’re not them.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah. And I think there’s just something about giving back. I mean, I’ve been around tons of people that are like, eh, I’m not gonna tell this part of my process or this part, you know, the, the scarcity mentality of I know this one thing on how I sell this widget. Right? But then they don’t share it. And I just, I don’t think that’s the, the abundance mentalitywe’re looking for. Just a few more things here, um, for you. Uh, you know, I think we all, we all know this, right? What we focus on, we get what we focus on, expands all those things, no matter how you say it. What, when I, if I were to follow you around every day, what am I, what am I watching Bob focus on daily without miss?

Bob Burg

Um, I think that generally, Brett, what I try to do is make people feel encouraged, make people feel genuinely good about themselves. I, I picked that up from my dad. I, I consider myself carrying on my dad’s legacy. That’s what he did so well. Right? And, um, and so I, I think that’s kind of where, you know, where, where I am. Um, you know, but again, when I do something like that, I’m doing it for selfish reasons and that reason is I feel good about myself.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

Right? So, you know, I have a this, this saying, you know, when I define happiness, right? And you know, happiness by dictionary definition is the mental feeling of wellbeing. And I think that works. It’s a good definition, but I go a little deep. I say that happiness is a genuine and ongoing feeling of joy and peace of mind. The result of living congruently with one’s values. So if you value a certain thing, so you know, you, you helped a lot of people invest and, and, and you’ve done very well by helping people do that. But when you help someone and you know that you have really helped them to take care of their financial future, to be able to leave a legacy for their kids or for charities or to, to have a life where they don’t have to be in worry all the time and you do those Yeah, you feel good, you’re, that’s selfish. Not the money you’re making.

Brett Gilliland

Right.

Bob Burg

Okay. That’s a great thing, but that’s not why you do it. You do it cause it’s congruent with your values.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

You feel good about yourself when you do that.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah.

Bob Burg

That’s what it’s all about.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah, you’re right. I mean, we talk about that here at our firm, Visionary Wealth Advisors, that that vision aligned and values aligned. If, if those two things aren’t congruent, even if it was, if I was trying to hire you. Right? As a, as an advisor at Visionary, if our vision and values are not aligned, it’s never gonna work. Right? It’s gonna be oil and water. I, I always say our vision and our values are like a magnet. I, I remember my kids trains when they were little, right? The magnet either connects, or it repels, right? You try to connect it and it just won’t do it. And if our vision and values are connected and aligned, they’re gonna connect and they’re gonna do very well. We’re gonna have an interdependent relationship. That’s what works in life, in anything. Right. Um, what, what would you tell yourself if you, what you know now to be true, but maybe you didn’t know it on the climb, right? That journey, whether you were in your thirties, your forties, whatever. What do you know now to be true that you didn’t know at the time?

Bob Burg

I’d probably go back to my early twenties and I, I and older, more mature Burg would tell young Burg first, shut up. Stop talking because you don’t know anything near what you think, you know. And then to paraphrase that, great saying that it’s, it’s credited to Mark Twain. I don’t know that Mark Twain actually said it, but it’s brilliant. So it sounds pointy and you know, we credit things to Mark Twain. But the, the apparently he said it ain’t, it ain’t what you, what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you’re absolutely sure you do know that just ain’t so. That was me. I absolutely thought I had it figured out. I absolutely thought I understand human, I understand how things work. I get this world. I know it. I, there was so much I, I did.

Brett Gilliland

Yeah. What, what are you doing to be a student of the game? Like for me, I, I jokingly call this, but I’m really serious too, is this is my weekly therapy. I get to learn from, you know, experts all over the world, uh, like yourself. But what do you do to be a student of the game, uh, to keep working on your craft?

Bob Burg

Uh, I constantly read, constantly discuss, uh, you know, it’s funny, we have a a, a, um, a online, uh, Go Giver community, and part of that is a Master Mind group called the Go Giver Success Alliance and we’ve got these really successful people that, that, you know, take part in this every, every Wednesday at Rachel’s famous coffee cafe with Rachel’s from the book, right?

Brett Gilliland

Yeah. Right.

Bob Burg

There’s so many great people on there, and people think I’m, you know, no, it’s not, it’s not me teaching, it’s everybody learning from one another. And I mean, it just charges my batteries. I come away from that thing and it’s like, holy cow. That was great because I learned this from Jeff West who was like one of the leading Aflac leaders in the, you know, in the world. And I learned this from, you know, this person who was a great realtor at this that, and I learned this from so and so, you know, and so that, that to me, uh, I get to just learn from all these, these other people.

Brett Gilliland

That’s awesome. Great. So who you surround yourself with matters. Right? Um, so Bob where can our listeners find more of you? I know you’ve got a website, uh, you wanna share that?

Bob Burg

Yeah. You know, I’m, I’m a pretty simple guy and my, my name is spelled b u r g and that’s actually my website, burg.com

Brett Gilliland

burg.com. B u r g.com. Are you on social media at all?

Bob Burg

Oh, yeah. I’m, you know, I’m, I was gonna say everywhere, but that’s not true because there’s now it’s like all these different things.

Brett Gilliland

Right.

Bob Burg

It’s probably, you know, LinkedIn, Twitter, but LinkedIn is probably the best place to.

Brett Gilliland

Awesome. We’ll put all the stuff in the show notes for our listeners. Uh, tons of takeaways for me. We didn’t even get to the five Laws of Stratospheric Success, but the law of value. The law of compensation, the law of influence, authenticity, and receptivity. Right. Those are five amazing things. If you’re watching, go pick up this little red book right here called The Go Giver. It’s phenomenal. You’ll love it. And Bob, it’s been great having you on the Circuit of Success.

Bob Burg

Ah, it’s been a pleasure. Thanks so much for having me.

Holly’s heavy involvement in numerous sports over the years, combined with a strong interest in health and wellbeing and extensive research in the field of nutritional sciences, has lead her to extend her skill set to the fitness industry where she educates others as well as actively coaching fitness/physique athletes and body building.

Brett Gilliand

Welcome to the Circuit of Success. I’m your host, Brett Gilliland. Today I’ve got Holly Baxter with me. Holly, how you doing?

Holly Baxter

I am doing fantastic. Thank you for asking.

Brett Gilliand

Awesome. And you are in beautiful Tampa, Florida.

Holly Baxter

Mm-hmm. Yes. It has actually just gotten a little bit cool here. And when I say cool still in the sixties, but everyone’s got like 15 layers on. You know how the [inaudible]

Brett Gilliand

? Oh yeah. That’s funny. Yeah, it’s uh, it was 25 degrees when I woke up this morning here, so, I’m not feeling bad for anybody down in Tampa, Florida, 60 degrees. You know?

Holly Baxter

I, I wouldn’t either, I wouldn’t believe that.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah. But I’m, uh, supposed to be like 55 to 58 degrees on Wednesday, so that’s a big deal for us here, so we’re excited about that. So. Well, if you can, Holly, we will, uh, we’ll dive in. But you are a, a clinical dietician, a fitness coach, a trainer, an author. All sorts of stuff you’re doing. It’s amazing what you’ve built, um, in, in a, in a bodybuilder. You’ve won like lots of, uh, tournaments with body building, which is amazing. We’ll talk about that, but if you can maybe give us a little lay of the land on what’s made you the person you are today and, and, uh, gotten to this level.

Holly Baxter

Yeah, so I guess my role right now is, uh, somebody that’s in like the nutrition, exercise, science space. So I would call myself, uh, like a nutrition or an exercise educator. So, um, my day-to-day role, um, is extremely diverse. There’s a lot of things, um, that are going on. Um, Oh my gosh, my phone is just blowing up. Sorry. It’s mentally insult. Let me start that again. Um, so my role at the moment is, uh, extremely diverse. So I still do a couple of days where I’m practicing. Um, then there are going to be other days where I’m working on writing content, I’m putting together seminars and presentations, all that kind of thing.

Um, and then also working on, uh, I. Coaching team. We have a nutrition app, we’ve got a whole host of things going on, so.

Brett Gilliand

That’s amazing.

Holly Baxter

Um, I guess the way that I got there, um, is quite interesting actually. So I grew up in Tasmania, Australia, so it’s a pretty small town. Um, and I would say small mindset. And I think, you know, from a really young age actually, I just never felt like I fit in there.

And, you know, everyone was kind of like, stay on the safe side. You know, don’t, don’t stand out. You know, you don’t wanna draw attention to yourself. You just wanna blend in. You wanna fit in with the form, fit in with the status quo. And I remember kind of thinking like, But that’s not me. Like, that’s my authentic self is so different to like the mindset of all the people that are around me.

And I think I knew then that I wouldn’t be in Tasmania at least. So at the first opportunity I got, um, I, I jumped at, you know, getting the acceptance into, um, Deakin University, which is, it was like an hour and a half flight, but you go over water. So there’s separation from me and my family at this point.

So, um, yeah, I took the academic route. I went into an undergraduate of food science and nutrition, so I did my B.S. in food science, nutrition, uh, and then I got done with that and was like, I still need to learn a lot more. Uh, went back and got my master’s in dietetics and that kind of, uh, exposed me to a lot of like athletes and, you know, elite fitness professionals.

So, Um, how I got into body building was actually through the work that I was doing with clients. So, uh, you know, I was coaching them and helping with their nutrition and putting together their training. Um, and then, you know, someone said to me, Hey, you know, have you considered, uh, competing yourself? You know, you’re pretty athletic. Um, I know you used to do athletics and you grew up very sporty. Why not do it? So, Yeah, I kind of, I set my sights on that. I knew that the world championships that particular year was gonna be held in Dubai, so I’d always wanted to travel to Dubai. So that was actually my motivator. It was very extrinsic.

There was nothing internal about body building that I really resonated with at the time. Um, so yeah, I had to go on and win as state and then a national championships in order to get to the worlds, which I did in my first year, which was awesome. Uh, and then I went and won the World Championships in Vice, so I’ve kind of stuck at it since then.

Um, however, I will say it wasn’t a pretty, it wasn’t a pretty journey. It was not a glamorous one. I think behind the scenes. Um, you know, there was a lot of, um, like deep rooted insecurity, a lot of internal struggle. You know, I actually suffered from an eating disorder for about 15 years. Yeah. Um, and that was, uh, I guess related to just some of my upbringing, you know, the way that. Um, you know, I was raised and then some unfortunate, you know, traumatic experiences that I had as a, a young teenager. So, you know, there’s, there’s been the glamorous side that I think a lot of people saw for many years. You know, I appeared to be this extremely successful, you know, athlete. I’ve got, you know, my own business.

I, on the surface it looked all cool, but I like underneath there was like a very hurt, very broken young woman and it actually took me about 15 years to really like step into my shoes and, you know, start working and healing through some of that trauma. And I think the work that I do now, um, in the online space is very much, um, you know, female focused.

I really enjoy and I connect with women. Um, and a lot of it is to do with body positivity. It’s to do with um, you know, changing your mindset, working on your dysfunctional beliefs, dysfunctional thoughts.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

Um, and how that impacts your day-to-day behavior and how that impacts your habits and who you are as a person.

So, yeah, there’s a lot of, you know, diet and exercise information that I can give because of my, you know, experience. Um, but then there’s also a lot of like psychology that I bring to the table, because you can’t, you can’t separate those things. Like

Brett Gilliand

. No.

Holly Baxter

We’re, we’re interconnected in a, a complex way with so many different things, um, that you can’t ignore, like the environmental influence that that has on our food choices and our day to day.

You can’t ignore the social influences, the emotional influence, you know, so it’s, I really enjoy working with people and looking at them as a whole. And then, you know, kind of getting to the root problems that they’re limiting beliefs and then helping them to succeed. And it’s not just in their fitness.

I really enjoy empowering people to achieve their best sense of self, and whether that’s in their business, in their relationships, in their, you know, family, life, finances, you know, I’m always looking to like, how can we help change your mindset so that you can succeed.

Brett Gilliand

I love that. I love that. So how, how do you get out of the 15 years of this, uh, trauma as you called it? I mean, how, how did you, just, what was the awareness for you to say, you know what, I gotta make a change and I gotta step out of that and get outta my comfort zone?

Holly Baxter

Yeah, again, I’m gonna say, uh, it wasn’t, uh, it’s not a pretty story. Um, I actually was, um, like clinically depressed. Um, I was at rock bottom.

I had many suicidal thoughts. So this was only five years ago. Um, and I think. You know, I, I’d been there as a, as a teenager, I had actually, again, very like, traumatic. I had, you know, attempted suicide when I was very young. Um, so I’d always, you know, kind of lived with these memories and I think I’d gone through enough of my adulthood kind of masking, like, or detaching or distracting myself with, you know, hobbies or, you know, influence or. You know, I would try to do things that would bring me up, you know, that would make me feel better. But I, I, I never really tackled the root cause and, you know, I think by the time I got to my late twenties, I really had, I’d started to identify the, the behavior and it was like, okay, this is, this is a deep rooted problem within me that I need to fix.

So, you know, I kind of had a bit of a, I don’t wanna say an epiphany, but I definitely had a come to Jesus moment and was like, you have a choice to make a change right now. You, you can either choose to be unhappy for the rest of your life and you’re gonna let all of these you know, historical events, clout your, your potential and who you are born and put on this earth to be.

Or you can go and do something about it. And from that day on, I have had therapy, like mental, mental health counseling myself. Um, pretty consistently, I’d say for three and a half, four years now, I’ve probably missed like five sessions in a year. And it’s every week. And you know, now it’s not really getting myself out of that slump.

It’s about preventative. Um, you know, I’m doing things that are proactively keeping me in this really positive state of mind. So lots of therapy, lots of reading, and obviously my science background. Yeah, I’m reading all the papers, I’m going to all the journals.

Brett Gilliand

Right.

Holly Baxter

Like, what works? How can I better myself?

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

So it, it had to come from within. Yeah.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah, I think that, I mean, that’s amazing. So one, I appreciate you sharing. Again, I always talk about transparency and vulnerability, and I think you’ve obviously been very transparent and very vulnerable here already in the first few minutes, and so I appreciate that.

But what, what do you continually do now? Um, I, and I’m a guy that’s always dealt with anxiety, and so I don’t know if I can ever just say it’s gone like, right. It’s, it’s, Put to, it’s put in a box, taped up, put on a shelf, it’ll never come back. I would assume maybe you would agree with that is what, what will you continue to do? Uh, is it, is it the therapy? Is it stuff like that that you will continue to do throughout probably life?

Holly Baxter

Yeah. Absolutely. I, I would encourage anybody to get a therapist. It’s just so nice to have somebody with a non-bias. Um, you know, view that can look at your lifestyle. They can look at your, you know, your troubles or your, your, your wins without any kind of judgment or, you know, they’re not kind of, they’re not looking at it from a, like, emotional standpoint.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

So I would definitely continue to seek professional help, and that’s even as somebody that feels like very competent in knowing how to do things. It’s just nice to have that accountability. Um, and, you know, everybody needs to be checked at some point. You know, I think we can all divert and, uh, deviate off our, our path. So, you know, we, we’ve gotta kind of correct that every now and then. And I think that’s exactly what the role of, you know, good therapists can do. But I think also, um, you know, I’ve really made a conscious, very intentional effort to surround myself with positive influences. Um, I’ve made a very conscious decision to let go of friends in my life that were limiting me, that were holding me back, um, or that didn’t, that didn’t support me.

So, you know, I think I know the person that I wanna be. So I, I’ve kind of written it down. I do a lot of journaling and a lot of like deep thought process. To whom do I want to be? What does she, what does she look like? How does she carry herself? How, how does she act around, you know, her kids? How does she act around her friends?

And, you know, I really strive to do that on a daily basis. There’s always, there’s not a day that goes by where I’m not looking at some kind of positive affirmation. I’m not reading another chapter of a book that I’m interested in, and it’s usually all mental health, you know, neuroplasticity of the brain or you know, um, you know, breaking bad habits or, you know, letting go of. I guess your fear mindset or you name it. So I really try to be intentional with putting those thoughts in my mind and keeping the people that are a good influence in my life. Very close, very close. So.

Brett Gilliand

I don’t, I don’t think, uh, people spend enough time, in my opinion, in what I call strategic think time or what you probably call your journal time. Um, I don’t, don’t you agree? Like I don’t think people spend enough time doing that. And I know for me over the last 20 years, that’s what’s helped me uh, well really, I guess since July of 2005 when I started writing down in my black journal, I carry with me everywhere I go. Um, that’s, that was a game changer for me. Right. And it continues to be a game changer for me, but I just don’t think people spend enough time thinking about their own lives and where they want to go.

Holly Baxter

Yeah, absolutely. I think so many people, um, live in what I will call like their default state. It’s like they’re living on autopilot. I, I’d say most people, um, or many people have at some point in their life, probably experienced some, something unpleasant, something extremely, uh, difficult. Uh, whether we wanna call it trauma or, you know, they’ve just had a bad experience. Um, you know, those things, they impact us at a very deep level and they shape the way that we react, you know, to new stimulus. Like you can carry a, uh, a historical view or a perception of, like a relationship that you might have been in, and maybe somebody, you know, said a certain thing to you and that made you feel really insecure or it made you feel upset or unheard or whatever it was.

But, you know, and that experience stays with you. So when we are, you know, experiencing those types of comments in our new, new life, new relationships, it’s really difficult to like let go of those past, um, I guess, narratives that we create for ourself and like truly be receptive and like aware of how that’s actually being portrayed now.

And I think, you know, we spend a lot of time in our like subconscious state, which is what I’m referring to when I say like your default setting, your autopilot, you know, people, and that’s the body’s way of coping with a lot of things too. If you’re somebody that’s extremely successful and you’ve got your, you know, finger on the pulse for like 10 different companies and you’re trying to do a lot, it makes sense from an evolutionary standpoint as to why the human brain wants to be able to put things on default because you’re trying to deal with the new information. But I think that comes with a risk in that you’re not always present, you’re not always, you know, aware and self-awareness. Oh my gosh.

Brett Gilliand

It’s huge.

Holly Baxter

It’s huge. And you’re right, so many people do not spend enough time. Thinking about, thinking about anything. It’s like they’re just responding, responding, responding. There’s no no point at which they stop to slow down and just, you know, sit with their thoughts.

Brett Gilliand

Right.

Holly Baxter

And, you know, allow those thoughts to kind of, you know, move in and out and without judgment, without criticism, um, you know, that that’s a really unique skill. And I think it’s probably one that a lot of successful people do really well. They’re very, they’re very self aware.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah. Yeah. I couldn’t agree more. So let’s talk about you, you, you mentioned earlier, people you surround yourself with. That does matter. Right? And so I listened to, um, Peter Atia on Joe Rogan’s podcast.

And then I, during my research, I saw you were on Peter Attia podcast. I mean, that guy’s doing stuff. It’s amazing. I actually have, uh, what’s he called it? The Centenarian Olympics or something, you know, so I’ve got this passion and I wanna live well into my nineties and play golf on my hundredth birthday.

And, and so, When you think about the Peter Attias of the world, the people you’re surrounding yourself with, like what are you learning from them that you can share with our listeners to take it to that next level? No matter where you’re at, whatever stage of life you’re at, what do we need to do to take it to that next level?

Holly Baxter

Oh, I think, look, if there’s one thing that I will say, uh, and it’s because I’ve made this mistake many times and I’ve continued to make it over and over. Um, but I think you get a little better at this, and that is, um, having self-care. I, I think that our culture today, Prides and like aggrandizes. Um, you know, the person who basically does it all that does that works 24 hours a day.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

That doesn’t sleep. You know, they’re mentally headstrong, you know, they, they do, they go over and above like it’s that, you know, mental toughness, like to me, society really like, kind of aggrandizes that. But I think that that also comes with a lot of like, there’s a lot of downsides as well because you, you stop caring about, you know, the things that are really important that, you know, you’ve only got this one vessel that’s gonna take you through your entire life.

So I think, you know, being able to slow down, um, and to prioritize are the things that are most important to you. I would say are like two of the things that I did terribly I wanted to do everything when I was, uh, a lot younger and I still have lots of goals. I’m gonna say they’re all still floating around on a list somewhere.

But you know, I think as I’ve gotten a little older, I’ve become more of a realist. I’ve recognized that, you know, you can’t do it all. You need to be able to delegate and you need to be able to um, I guess take things at a, a pace that, that allows you to have like good health. And I know for many years I just burned the candle at both ends.

You know, I was trying to do bodybuilding competitions and, you know, that’s, that’s a, that’s a part-time job as it is. Uh, and then, you know, I was trying to scale three companies and try and be a parent and, you know, try and be a good wife and move countries and look after my friends. So I’m like, oh, actually, this is impossible.

Brett Gilliand

This is impossible.

Holly Baxter

Yeah, and that, that was probably right around that time. Like I said earlier, when I hit rock bottom, I, I kind of had this, you know, realization where I was like, wow. You know, you’re, you’re about to take your own life and it’s your own doing. Like you can undo this. You have a choice. You’ve just gotta change a few of these, you know, perceptions, which I know for me was uh, people pleaser, perfectionist, um, you know, always, I was always, um, I guess given praise when I was a teenager and a kid as well.

Brett Gilliand

Mm-hmm.

Holly Baxter

um, that from my performance, it was like if I was getting good praise, if I was, you know, winning all of my sporting events. If I did the best job at the recitals and like if I was doing all these things, that’s where I found I was getting like love.

But what I, what I realized was like the way that I was parents or my, the way that I was raised by my parents, it was almost like it was conditional love and it’s taken me a lot of time to kind of reflect back on that, kind of dig into that and understand where my current like perception of life has come from.

To be able to go, you know what, I, I forgive yourself. You know, I, forgive me, you’re that you were wired this way, but it’s not the, it’s not the right way. You don’t have to be everything to everyone all the time. You know? So I think having very high goals and ambition, that’s amazing. But I think being realistic with, you know, the timeframe that you get things done and being gracious and compassionate in those moments of stress and struggle, that’s really helped me continue to like chip a way without like just falling off altogether.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah. But I think that you probably don’t know that or won’t realize that unless you are slowing down. Right. I always say slow down to speed up. So unless you’re slowing down, unless you’re kind of grading yourself, if you will. Uh, and, and journaling and thinking about it.

I mean, I know for me that I was the same way and I, I ended up coming up with this thing called Focus 90. And it’s 90 minutes. It’s, it’s for 90 days. For 90 minutes. It’s these three or four or five really important things for me that I need to get done. Because what I found was I would, I’d come home at five o’clock and go to basketball or baseball games, whatever it was, whatever season we’re in with our children, and yet I was, I was tired and I was quote, unquote, busy all day, but yet I wasn’t really getting the things I needed to get done, done, but yet I was busy. And so for me to slow down and speed up and say, okay, if I can do these three or four or five things a day, that’s a, that’s, that’s a victory. And then if I can do ’em in the first 90 minutes, I’ve won the morning, and I know if I win the morning, I will win the day. Right. So when you hear me say that for, for you, what’s your quote unquote focus 90 like, I have mine. What are your no miss items that helps you win the day.

Holly Baxter

I think starting off the morning with like 30 minutes of, uh, I guess reading and 30 minutes of gratitude or 15 minutes of each. So 15 reading, 15 minutes of gratitude. So yeah, that has become my staple. So I’ve got a couple of really great books that I will read. Um, some of them are biblical, some of them are just, you know, psych- psychology, but they’re always like very positive. They get me thinking, they get me into that like conscious state of mind, like really doing some self-assessment.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

And then I’ll reflect on that and okay, what am I gonna do today that, you know, is gonna progress me to, you know, tomorrow? So that’s kind of one of my non-negotiables. Um, and then I’ll always exercise. Uh, I don’t always get the full amount of time in, like today. I think I cut my exercise a little bit short. Um, but, you know, exercise, I think it just sets you up for, you know, open thinking, a clear mind, um, and that’s when you can really get into some of your deep work.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

So yeah, I think that that’s how I start my day and I always have my priorities list running in the background. Um, you know, I’ve got my big five year goals, but then I’ve also got like my, I have to break it down into my short, you know, week to week goals, month to month goals.

Brett Gilliand

What does that look like? Is that on a piece of paper that you carry with you or is it like in a journal? Like, where’s that at?

Holly Baxter

So I actually have it on a spreadsheet.

Brett Gilliand

Okay.

Holly Baxter

So, uh, one of the tasks that I actually did to help me better, like become more effective and efficient with my time, um, believe it or not, was time blocking. So I think you, you just mentioned you felt like you were extremely busy all the time, but you weren’t quite getting ahead with where you wanted to be. Um, so I was in a very similar situation. So I had to work out, first off, what am I doing with my time? Because I, I had an idea up in my mind, but I had to start putting it on paper to really… to believe what I thought I was doing. So that first task or that first step to, to making some positive changes was time blocking, and it was 15 minute intervals. So every 15 minutes on my calendar, just my good old Google Calendar, I would go in and put in what I was doing. So I did that for two weeks straight. It was the most painful, annoying thing , that I’ve ever done.

Brett Gilliand

That’s right.

Holly Baxter

And I see like people kind of get push, like they don’t wanna do it, but it really helped me realize, okay, here’s the time that it actually takes me to do, write a caption for social media. Oh, you know what? I’m actually missing out the fact that I’ve gotta go and spend an hour researching and reading three different you know, studies or then I find a meta-analysis and I, you know, okay, this is actually a study and then I have to write it. So I was not being realistic with the time that it would take me for certain tasks. And then I also had to decide, okay, out of all the things that I’m doing and we calculated it all up, I think I had a column for what I do in a day, what I do in a week, and then quarterly and then, uh, annually. And it worked out to be about 16 hours of work per day. Cause I put a time bracket on everything. So I was like, wow. No wonder, I feel so busy, so what here is not important and what can I delegate?

So I went through that big list of all the things that I was doing, and I’m like, okay, well that’s not good use of my time. I’m not really that competent in that skill. So I need to hire somebody for this.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

So that was the slowing down for me, putting the brakes on a little bit and finding the right team to help support me with, you know, that building process. Otherwise, I was constantly gonna be spinning my wheels.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah. So I don’t wanna, I don’t want to gloss right over that. So, I mean, that, that’s, that right there is worth the, uh, the price, which is free for people to listen to this podcast. Right. But that’s worth the price of admission right there. That whole process that you just went through. What do I do in a day? What do I do in a week? What I do in a month? What I do in a quarter? Right? Listing all those things out and then either do it and schedule it in your time blocking, right. Or delete it or delegate it. Right. I mean, that’s a huge, I mean, that is absolutely huge for people to take that into their lives and do it during their think time.

So I appreciate you sharing that. That’s awesome. Yeah. Um, so let’s talk, you talked about your workout today. Let’s spend some time on, uh, those of us that aren’t trying to win a body building contest. I’m, I’m clearly not. Um, and so, uh, but for those listeners that we just want to exercise, we wanna be healthy, we want to be flexible and mobile into our nineties or whatever, right? Whatever’s people goals are. How much time do we spend on cardio versus strength versus maybe flexibility, mobility, stretching, whatever you want to call it.

Holly Baxter

Yeah, look, I think all of those, um, are extremely important. I don’t think that you would want to completely like, uh, not do any of those. They’re, they’re great. Um, but it probably depends on what your goals are. Um, I think for most of us, and I’m probably generalizing a little bit here, but I’ll, I’ll go with the, the stereotype of human, which is.

Brett Gilliand

Okay.

Holly Baxter

Usually wanna lose a little bit of body fat. Um, and that might be for health reasons. You know, we’re trying to improve some of your blood biomarkers. Or it might be to, uh, I guess for the aesthetic, you know, everybody wants to look, look a little bit better, a little bit, you know, leaner. Um, and I, I, either of those is perfectly good reasons to, to exercise. So my old mindset prior to learning what I know now is that, you know, I, I really enjoyed cardio, so I was like, well, I just need to do a lot more of that in order to get to this physique that I really like.

I recall in my early twenties, there was a period where I was probably exercising six days a week. Uh, I was taking boot camps and participating in them, and then I was also doing my own training and I can guess it was probably about 15 hours of cardio. Um.

Brett Gilliand

Wow.

Holly Baxter

A week. That was high intensity cardio. And I did a significantly lower amount of resistance training. I think, uh, when I was doing track athletics we did once every other week we’d go in and do 30 minutes in the weights room and it was, you know, explosive kind of, you know, leg pressing for, for power. It was interesting. So, you know, I was doing all this work and I was also trying to restrict my calories. I was very, you know, had a lot of rules, you know, forbidden foods restrictions.

Again, this is back when I was really struggling with my eating disorder. So, um, yeah, I was doing all this work and I just couldn’t get to where I wanted to go. It made no sense to me at the time. So, you know, the more I started following, you know, some of the evidence-based researchers, and this is po, this is post like me having my my degree. So there’s…

Brett Gilliand

So, you know, hey, you know what you’re talking about.

Holly Baxter

Hmm. So, like, I already had six years of like college education under my belt at this point. Um, but there just wasn’t a whole lot of, um, like that research integrated into my, like for what I did. So I guess I happened to stumble across some of the like leaders in the nutrition and exercise science field, and they really opened my eyes to the benefits of resistance training.

So what has happened over time, and I’m, I promise I’m getting to a point here, what happened over was that I started to build lean body mass. Through that resistance training, um, I followed the evidence-based approaches, which enabled me to see some radical improvements in my lean body mass in a very short… and

Brett Gilliand

Can I interrupt real quick? I’m sorry. I hate interrupting, but when you say resistance training, can you define that just kind of so we’re all on the same page. What does that mean to you?

Holly Baxter

Yep. So, uh, lifting weights in a gym or any kind of, uh, load-bearing exercise that is going to challenge your muscles and, uh, lead to, uh, positive like hypertrophy adaptation.

Brett Gilliand

Perfect.

Holly Baxter

So anything that can build muscle, we need, we need to have a certain amount of stimulus and resistance. Um, in order to do that.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

That’s what I mean. So just hitting the gym.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

Um, so yeah, I guess when that started to happen, I also noticed that my, uh, daily calorie in intake was also a little bit higher. I could actually eat more, you know, food. And the reason for that is like your lean body mass um, is one of the driving factors that will boost your basal metabolic rate, which is essentially your metabolism. So the more muscle you have, um, the more you get to eat. It’s wonderful. So, um, you know, I think for everybody that is wanting to, you know, lose body fat, If you can do the work in acquiring more muscle, and that does take time. Um, if we look at like natural, like drug free athletes, like I’m a natural athlete, so this, the process is always a little bit slower than some of the, you know, people in the, you know, the untested federations.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

But it, it’s the, the research shows for females, I’ll speak specifically to, so it’s about half, uh, half of a kilogram per month is about the most lean body mass you can build when you’re following, you know, uh, re resist, uh, evidence-based resistance training protocol. Now there’s going to be some variability there. Like that’s taking, you know, randomized control trials and meta-analysis and looking at the average muscle gain. I actually are on the, the higher side of that, based on the time that I was putting into the gym.

Like I really focused on it. So, you know, you, you can do that math, you know, six months, you know, we’re really looking at like three kilograms of, of lean body mass is the most that you could put on. So, and that, that, that would then make a significant increase to your calorie intake. So I think the benefits of resistance training beyond, you know, the, the way that that can positively impact like our longevity, um, I think, you know, that to me was the biggest game changer of everything.

And I slowly started to taper down the amount of cardio that I was doing. And basically replaced all of that with, uh, resistance training. And then I found I had to only do half as much exercise in order to maintain my weight because now I’ve got this more muscular physique that on a day-to-day basis, it requires a lot more energy to, to fuel and to operate.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

So I didn’t have to do as much training as I used to to be able to maintain a better physique and one that I liked a lot more that had shape. Um, you know, it was contributing positively to my long-term health.

Brett Gilliand

I like it. So let me, I’m gonna share this with you if I can. This is my workout here. I’ve got it written down to paper now, because again, I’m a, I’m a believer in that. And so for years, I mean, until, like, you know, a month ago I didn’t have all this written out, and so I would be the guy, I’d show up in my gym, I have one in my basement, and it’s like, okay, I don’t know what to do. I’ll just make stuff up as I go. Right? And, and so what I’ve done is, and this is through lots of research, is so Monday, All resistant training weight, right? Um, Tuesdays I’m actually doing that, um, zone five training that Peter Tia talks about. So I’m basically running really fast for, you know, a while or run a three minute run, one minute sprint, three minute run, one minute sprint, so on and so forth. Repeat that for 30 minutes. You know, a stretching and some meditation. Wednesday, back to some weights. Thursday um, I do this thing, it’s like a golf workout, like the for flexibility mobility, uh, Friday, either the Peloton or the Peloton tread for 30 minutes, and then the weekend is back to some weights. So when you hear that, where am I messing up or am I on point?

Holly Baxter

No, I think you’ve, you’ve just described like a really balanced approach to your, your health and fitness. Like you’ve got your endurance in there. You’ve got, um, I guess your a, you’re training your anaerobic system, you’re training your aerobic system. You’ve got mobility flexibility. You’ve got something in there that sounds like a hobby, like you’ve got your golf stuff. That sounds great. Now, if you said to me, Hey, Holly, I really would like to be a lot more muscular, um, for aesthetic, let’s say it’s for aesthetic reasons.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

Then I would probably say to you, alright, well how many hours in the day do you have to contribute to activity? And if you said to me, well, I haven’t got any more, like this is the only amount of time that I can I can use to set aside for my exercise. And then I’d say to you, let’s, let’s get rid of some of the cardio, because you don’t need that if you wanna be muscular.

Brett Gilliand

Okay.

Holly Baxter

So, you know, everything’s a trade off. You’ve gotta be able to make sacrifices here and there. Like my sacrifices, I can’t tell you the last time I watched tv, uh, because that’s my reading time and that allows me to do my training, you know, so, um, everything’s a trade off. But if your goal is to move into, like an old age, With, um, you know, all, all facets of health, uh, it sounds like you’re looking after your mental health by choosing things that you enjoy. You’ve got to do that, that otherwise, if you can’t enjoy what you’re doing, you’re not gonna stick to it. So, and then you’re looking after your cardiovascular health by doing some of the running. Absolutely. And that sounds really rough, by the way. uh, then you’re looking after your joints and you’re doing your flexibility, your mobility. Yeah.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

You, you’ve got a good balance there.

Brett Gilliand

All right, perfect. Well, if anybody wants a copy of it, I can send it to ’em. Just send me an email or a text and I’ll be happy to share it. Um, share it with us a little bit about, you’ve got an app and you’ve got workout programs, and you’ve got books and all that kind of stuff. And, and so maybe share with us where people can, uh, find more about that if they want help with this.

Holly Baxter

Yeah, absolutely. So I think, um, one of the things that I really wanted to do when I moved to the US was make sure that we can cater to a wide range of people. So, um, and specifically when it comes to cost, so I offer personally one-on-one coaching and I have a great team of, uh, I guess girls, females who also offer coaching for a range of different, uh, fields.

Um, but, you know, one on one, it’s, it’s gonna be pricey, right? So, uh, in addition to that, we also have, uh, a nutrition coaching app, which is called Carbon Diet Coach. So, um, my husband and I.

Brett Gilliand

Say that again.

Holly Baxter

It’s called Carbon Diet Coach. Yeah.

Brett Gilliand

Okay.

Holly Baxter

Sorry. This is an advanced, uh, nutrition coaching program. It basically, we wrote an algorithm that adapts to the individual. So we can have two people, let’s say they’re genetically, they’re twins, they’re exactly the same, um, but they’ve got slightly different lifestyles. Um, they’re within 12 weeks of that program, I can tell you now, they would not be on the same nutrition targets or goals.

Um, you know, the coach adapts to that individual. It makes adjustments based on the changes that we see for that person. So, uh, it’s really cool. It coaches for fat loss, it coaches for reverse dieting, uh, which is basically the concept of metabolic restoration. Like we wanna help um, induce some positive metabolic adaptation.

So if you felt like you are eating nothing and training like a Trojan and you’re not getting anywhere, there’s the very possibility that you’ve just got a lot of negative metabolic adaptation. It’s like the body adapts to these lower calorie amounts. It’s like you become more efficient. Um, and again, from an evolutionary standpoint, your body is trying to protect you from starvation. It’s a great thing from an evolutionary perspective. It sucks if you wanna lose some body fat. Um, but you know this, we have this setting called the reverse dieting setting that will help you slowly reintroduce calories back into your diet, which will facilitate just some adaptation. It’s like the body doesn’t quite realize that anything’s changing and all of a sudden you’re eating more calories.

So, and that has a muscle building setting as well. So that’s, um, that’s our app. It’s, uh, super cool and it’s $9.99. Uh, it’s available on Android and iOS, so we’ve..

Brett Gilliand

That’s a one time $9.99 or $9.99 a month?

Holly Baxter

Per month. Yeah. There’s annual fees, there are six monthly fees and you, it’s slightly cheaper, I guess, if you look at what the weekly cost is. So, um, but yeah, I mean, that, that has just under 50,000 subscribers.

Brett Gilliand

Wow.

Holly Baxter

Um, or it’s, it’s, it’s really a great product and my goal with that product is to, uh, over time implement some of the work that I enjoy doing as well, which is adding that coaching psychology aspect, which, you know, they are so important together because I can give you all my knowledge, like I can say to you today hey, all right. So we know that when protein and calories are equated, you can have any combination of carbohydrates and fats in your diet. You will, you’ll have a successful fat loss phase. I can teach you everything and if you have, uh, a bad behavior or bad habit. Like, you know, I actually really just like going out with boys on the weekend fishing and that that’s ruining your second and third training session every week.

You know, like, it doesn’t, no amount of knowledge or experience is gonna help you. Like you need to work on some of the fundamental like mindset changes. So I wanna be, be able to integrate that into this app, which it’s definitely on our radar. We just have to get some more, uh, dev support to do that. Um, And then we have a, a really cool workout platform too.

So, um, you can go in and use our workout builder. It is, there’s over 60 or 70 programs, something of that nature. It’s catered to beginners through to advanced professional athletes like I use these programs. Um, and it’s really flexible in that if you are working out from home, there is a program for you. If you’re working out in the gym, there’s a program for you If you don’t have access to you know, 10 pieces of equipment, like people often will get a single program from a trainer and they’re like, well, I don’t have that. Now what do I do with this program that I’ve just spent money? So we have a cool toggle feature where I’ve basically gone through and picked every single exercise that I can possibly think of that targets that same muscle group. And you can choose another exercise. So if you don’t have, uh, a reverse hack spot in your gym, you’re like meh, you can go and choose from this list. And there’s about 10 other exercises more there, 20 other exercises that you can choose. So that’s a really cool program.

Brett Gilliand

That’s amazing. And that’s through the same app or is that a different spot?

Holly Baxter

That’s a different company of mine. So, uh, That’s a, that’s on our website. Um.

Brett Gilliand

Okay.

Holly Baxter

It’s, uh, biolayne.com. Um, and that’s part of our subscription-based service on our web-based platform, so.

Brett Gilliand

Okay.

Holly Baxter

Yeah, we have, we have a lot of cool stuff.

Brett Gilliand

So let’s talk from a business side real quick. We’ve been talking about, you know, the mindset we’ve been talking about, uh, fitness and, and all those things. So from a business standpoint, how, what makes you different, um, than all the other thousand people out there, more than that probably, that have this app or this next great thing to where now I think you said 50,000 people are on the platform monthly. That doesn’t just happen, right? So give us some business 101 on what you think you focus on and how you build that.

Holly Baxter

So I think, um, we’ve kind of done things in reverse than how most businesses would approach things. So usually you’d take a product and you market it. You go, here’s this amazing product. The product sells itself. So I think what we did was a little different. So we had myself, uh, and another, uh, influencer.

So my husband, uh, Dr. Lane Norton. So he, uh, he and I basically, Marketed this product, um, to our audience. And it was just so fortunate that both of us have a really loyal, um, following on social media.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

That, you know, that really helped to grow it. And then of course, Once you know they’re using it, then they’re talking and introducing it to their friends. So, you know, a lot of the referrals will then come from word of mouth, but that’s because it’s also then a great product. So we’ve got not only, you know, two people that have, you know, really great reputation in the evidence-based, um, community. Um, I guess we’re big personalities. Um, You know, we’ve also got the, we walk the walk, we talk the talk. We have the degrees, like he’s got the PhD. Um, you know, I’ve got the masters in dietetics and both of us are competitive athletes. So, you know, he’s a world champion, uh, power lifter. I have done body building and power lifting, you know, for many years. So I think we do have..

Brett Gilliand

Results.

Holly Baxter

Pardon?

Brett Gilliand

So the results matter.

Holly Baxter

Yeah. Like you’re gonna, you’re getting people that know what they’re talking about because they’re scientists, but they also are like applying it practically.

Brett Gilliand

Yeah.

Holly Baxter

To their sports. So yeah, it took us two years to, to kind of build out this app. Um, but it, it does a really great, it really does a great job, so.

Brett Gilliand

That’s awesome. So where do our listeners find more of Holly Baxter?

Holly Baxter

Look, I would say go and, uh, check me out on Instagram and YouTube. So on both platforms, my handle is Holly T. Baxter. Um, and you can get access to all of those things on my pages. You can find a carbon diet coach, you can find the workout builder, you can get access to me for what I’m coaching or, um, my team of coaches as well.

Brett Gilliand

That’s awesome. Well, we’ll put all this in the show notes, Holly, and uh, it’s been awesome having you. I love talking, uh, everything we’ve talked about today. It’s been great. Tons of notes, lots of takeaways for me, and I hope you have a great rest of the weekend. A good Thanksgiving.

Holly Baxter

Yeah, you as well. Thank you.

Brett Gilliland outlines the many lessons he has learned from his guests on the Circuit of Success.

With a variety of industries and professions, each guest has brought new habits, insights, and motivation to those who listen to the podcast. Brett goes over the lessons that have made an impact in his daily life and overall great advice for those wanting to achieve a future greater than their past!

Brett Gilliland 0:00

And, you know, what do you learn every week from this. And so what I thought I would do today is just share this, I think fourteen things, fourteen guests that I want to share some of my learnings from my perspectives on those and what it's meant for me throughout the year. And so let's all start, you know, with one of our first guests back in January 2022, it was Daniel Descalso. Daniel, for those that don't know, played with the St. Louis Cardinals among some other teams, but known here locally, as a 2011, world series champion for our St. Louis Cardinals, which was, which was phenomenal.

But we talked about a lot of things. And one of the things he talked about was the game will humble you, and it will humble you very quickly, you can go for it over. And I apply this a lot of things in sports to business. Because we can go through and over and over fifteen In baseball, maybe the 0-for acts in, in presentations to clients, if you're in sales, it may be the just random stuff that you have to do as a lawyer or a police officer. And you're just kind of what you would call in a slump. And I think what I liked the most is, he said, it's the work you put in when no one's watching, even when things are going well with your quote unquote, swing. That doesn't mean you get the results and we have to stay committed.

So what I think about there is going over fifteen In baseball, but still showing up every day and doing the work. Still showing up. And being committed to your craft, being a student of the game, doing whatever it is that you got to do, even when you don't want to do it. I know for me personally, there's plenty of days, right where you just you don't wake up and you're like, oh, running through a brick wall and you want to show up and go conquer your day and do all that. I think we're all guilty of that. Whether it's it's things going on in our life, it's maybe you were up, you know, traveling crazy for work. Maybe you were up late with kids sporting events. Whatever it may be, not every day, you're up and Adam and I think that what matters is when you show up, even when you don't want to. And that's what I took away from Daniel Descalso.

I remember him talking vividly about, you know, hitting line drives and hitting a ball that you think's gonna go over the fence and they rob it, hitting line drives right at the shortstop or the centerfielder. And they're not going the way you want them to go. But at the same time, it doesn't mean you've hit a bad ball, or you could have ripped one, it just happened to be right at him.

So we don't need to get so focused on the things that we're not doing well, focus on that good swing. But when no one's watching, you can work on your craft every single time and try to get a little bit better. So that was Daniel Descalso.

Next one is Trey Hardee. Now Trey was a great guest. Actually had him on along with Amy Coons, who I'll talk about next. And they did a joint podcast with my son, Drew Gilliland and Addison Baltus. And so it's another thing that I take away is these people, you know, are amazing. You know, I never would have imagined 5, 10, 15, 20 years ago, five years ago, the podcast was started about 10 or 15 years ago, that I would have the opportunity to meet these people. To just pick up the phone and call these people. It's amazing to me how many people at the top of their game are willing to give back to others, to help us all get better.

And so that's just a little sidebar note, but Trey Hardee, two time Olympian, also a silver medalist, is an amazing person. And here's what he said is you have to play the long game with your health. And I apply that to investments. You know, what I do every day Visionary Wealth Advisors for a living is you don't just put $1 away today, and it doubles and becomes $2 tomorrow. No different than I can't just go out and lift weights today, and expect to be stronger tomorrow, or expect to be healthier tomorrow.

And so when you said that is you have to play the long game with your health, it made a ton of sense to me made a ton of sense with my own choices with eating habits made a ton of sense with my own choices. I'm never a you know, a five times a week guy to work out. But I can tell you is I said here in November, middle of November of 2022. And I've been at it four or five days a week, every week with exercise since beginning of August 2022. For me, that's probably the longest spell I've gone in my life with exercise. And for me that hit home when he says you have to play the long game.

I don't like delayed gratification. I want the gratification now. Right? And I think a lot of us do especially in the world that we live in today. But playing that long game in my health was really important for me to hear to stop expecting to feel different tomorrow. Stop expecting to get the result tomorrow. Play the long game, show up again every day even when I don't want to. And it's amazing the benefits that you'll start to feel and actually how you'll start to like it, which is where I've gotten. So that was my takeaway from Trey Hardee.

Amy Kuhns. Same thing, an Olympic athlete, just an amazing human being. And I was shocked, you know, again, when I asked these questions, sometimes you put your mind of things that you think you may hear, and I said to her, what's the no miss item? Like if I followed you around the camera, Amy? What would I see that you do every single day? And her answer to me was kind of like, you know, very simple, but yet doing it every day having the discipline, and it was meditation, and gratitude.

Never did I think what I'd hear coming out of an Olympic athlete's mouth would be my meditation, and my gratitude. What are the three things I'm thankful for every single day? And you've listened this podcast, you hear that quite a bit, actually, it's a common theme that you hear is people focusing on gratitude. But for me to hear it from an Olympic athlete, that what got her to that next level, was her meditations and her gratitude. And she also said, emotions are liars. And I'll talk a little bit more about our emotions from somebody else. But, but that's true, right? So many times we can feel an emotion.

And it's not true. And I overheard a conversation on an airplane ride, I was just on that I'm conquering my fear of flying again, if people listen to this, I'm over that fear, because I faced it, and I did it. And I've done it numerous times. Now, I digress. I apologize. But this one flight attendant said to another flight attendant, it was a male and female talking and he was in the Army for years. And he said he was scared on all these flights and all the things he had to go do. And the other flight attendant said, Why did you do that? Why did you do with that fear? And he said, You know what fears are right. And we've all said this, we've all heard this, but it's false evidence appearing real.

And I think that so many times in our lives, we do have fears that hold us back. We have fears that tell us, hey, this voice saying I can't do this. This voice that says, Who do you think you are? Those emotions are liars of what I have found over doing what I do for the last two decades. We got to hear him, we gotta we gotta embrace our emotions, we got to feel our emotions. But we also have to understand that those emotions can be liars, and with the trust our gut, with the trust our instincts, trust our history of what we've done to be successful, and go out and make things happen.

So the next one was by Brooke Weinstein. It was a simple comment she made, but a very profound comment. And she said, I am doing enough. You know, if I had to ask him to listen to this right now, raise your hand if you ever feel like you're not doing enough. And again, I think a lot of us can feel that way.

But what she said is give yourself permission to know that you're doing enough. On a day, even though I just said show up and when you don't want to. But she said sometimes you just don't show up, you know, when she went through a very hard battle you can listen to on the full podcast, and it was her way to not beat herself up over not doing enough sometimes. Just just It's okay. Sometimes it's gonna be okay.

And for me, what I have found is throughout the year to give myself permission to feel that way. If I wasn't as productive as I was, sometimes I used to go home, I'd be upset, or maybe be mad at myself, whatever it may be. Just telling myself that I'm doing enough. And that's okay. So thanks to Brooke Weinstein for that.

The next one is Matt Adams, big city, World Series champ, again with the St. Louis Cardinals, I'm sorry, with the Nationals. But on a lot of playoff runs with the St. Louis Cardinals. An amazing guy. Gotten to know him. He's just a great person.

But he said it's mindset and preparation. So two different things, right, your mindset and your preparation. He said, When I go up to bat, and again, I'll apply that to the business room, I go into client meeting, I go into some presentation, whatever it may be. It's knowing I can beat you, knowing that this is my day, right? But it all starts with preparation he talked about. So I've got to be watching film. So again, using air quotes, if you're just listening, I gotta be watching film. I've got a practice. I got to think about what I need to say in this moment. I got to think about all the things that will come up in this client meeting. Whatever your at bat is. Your preparation has to be there, first and foremost. But then your mindset has to be there to say you know what, this is my day. This is my day and saying it'd be your day. This is my day, and I can beat you.

Next is Alex, Alex Melvin CEO Rural King. This is based out of my hometown, Mattoon, Illinois. And I remember, growing up as a kid, and he always went there and you get the popcorn, right mom and dad needed to go in the store for something. There's the popcorn, you would run over, you would get it. It was always free. It was always phenomenal. And I asked him a question around the popcorn. He said, you know, Brett, we spend $2 million on popcorn. Like, I'm kind of blown away by that. $2 million spent on popcorn. And I asked him, you know, why would you ever do that? No CFO is ever gonna think that's a good idea to spend $2 million of the bottom line on popcorn. And his responses were this. We don't want our popcorn to be half. I'm sorry, we don't want our popcorn to be halfway. We want it to be all the way. Why? Well, because others don't. So how are we going to figure out a way to say yes to the popcorn. So what others don't.

So go above and beyond right? That's what I learned as running a company, whatever it may be run an organization Swing for Hope, our charity for cancer. I mean, go above and beyond figure a way out to say yes. We don't want to be halfway, right? Nothing we do. If you're listening to these types of podcasts, you don't want to be halfway. You don't want to be a second rate version of yourself. You want to be the best version of yourself. And so when we think about that, think about the popcorn, $2 million on popcorn. What are we doing for our clients to come in and remember the moment? Here I am now, 45 years old, still can remember going back as a 15 year old or a 10 year old and remembering the popcorn. But what I wasn't thinking about as a 10 year old or a 15 year old Brett wasn't thinking $2 million a year for popcorn. But that's the experience t hey are creating at Rural King and that one really stuck with me. So thank you, Alex.

Now the next one is Jay Papasan. Jay is the author of "The One Thing," one of my favorite books. And on page 162 of that book, we spend some time talking about that in the podcast, is time blocking. You know how important is that? If I grabbed my calendar right now, I've got most of my things I do every week, pre-booked into my calendar. And so I've been doing this for years. And what I found was what gets scheduled gets done, right? Even if it's as simple as, are you playing a lot of golf? Well, if I don't get a golf thing scheduled, it's not going to get done. My week will get filled with other things. If I want to spend time with advisors or clients or friends on a golf course on a late Friday afternoon, if it doesn't get scheduled it doesn't get done.

My strategic think time. When I think about my time with my black journal right here. My time when I think about my dreams, my aspirations, my goals, especially now this time of the year, when we're planning for 2023. If I don't put it on my calendar, it doesn't get done. So I'd ask yourself the same question. Are you planning the most important things in your life? Are they going on your calendar and everything else fits in around it? Jay Papasan was also talking about you put a boulder into the stream, the water figures away to go around it.

So what are those boulders, if you will, that need to go on your calendar? In my opinion, it's your family vacations, right? It's your time off. It's the things that you need to do to impact your community and have an abundance mentality. An abundance of thinking when it thinks about your calendar, and don't have a time scarce. If you have an abundance of time, you can get things done. If I gave you a project and I said here, you have 14 hours to do it. I'm also a big believer within reason. If I give you the same exact project instead of 14 hours, you have eight hours to get it done. I think you'll hit either one of them in that timeframe.

And so again, think about time blocking. What are you doing? What are you putting on your calendar? Put the most important things on there, get them scheduled and make and make them happen?

Brian miles. Brian Miles is the mental performance coach for the Cleveland Guardians. Another great guest that I had the privilege of talking to this year. But Brian Miles talks about purpose wins against pleasure every time. And that's so true, right? We have so many things we've done in our lives where it was gonna feel good in the moment. So you do it. But it doesn't give you long term sustainable success. So what is that thing that you're doing every day that you almost feels like time just flies by, right? You get done doing it? You're like, oh my gosh, there went three hours. It didn't feel like it versus there's things that we can do that it feels like it takes forever, right? It takes all day. If we're not working in our purpose and we're only working in our pleasure, you're not going to have long term sustainable success. I know for me, I know for our firm. Our mission statement is to help people achieve a future greater than your past. And when I'm getting to do that, with our clients, with our community, with our advisors, whoever it may be or I'm on a podcast and doing this right now. Time stands still. It's just one of those things I enjoy doing. So my purpose wins against pleasure. Every time.

Dr. John Delaney is one of the few guys we've had on a couple times, Jay Papasan was one of those as well. But just a phenomenal guest. And in that in in this episode, we talked about a choice I had that day. I actually happened to go to a restaurant, I didn't eat the best in so I was just asking questions on how do we do that, like, I know if I eat better, or I know if I exercise or I know if I save money, whatever it may be. I know if I do those things, but sometimes we still choose just not to do it. Right. And so when I choose that with Dr. John Maloney, he talks about let's create a new identity.

I think so many times we focus on a new goal. But then a goal, you actually stay that same person. A new identity is a new person. So we use the food example, instead of me getting crappy food that day. How am I talking to myself? And he talks about, I'm a guy who is a good steward of his body. I'm a guy who doesn't eat trash. I'm a guy that does this. I'm a guy that does that. And so when we think about that, for me, again, it was really an eye opener for me is to create a new identity. And that's what I've done this year from, I still got my opportunities from eating. But from an exercise standpoint, at 45, I'm thinking about, again, that long road, right, that 65 year old Brett, well, I've got to make the changes today, for my health to get where I want to go at 65 and 75.

And people know that around me a lot. My goal is to play golf on my 100th birthday. But I can't just wake up on my 100th birthday after having 30 or 40 or 50 years of bad stuff going on, and just wake up and play golf. Right, I have to get up do the things now that I want to do. And that was one of my learnings from John Delaney was create a new identity, and then reverse engineer into the actions on what I get to do. So for me, that's accountability. My accountability is my future greater than your past. My mission. The workout group 6am, on Tuesdays and Thursdays. 13 guys get the text message, whoever shows up shows up. As the weather gets cold, we don't want to work outside, it's now send a text message at 6am with a picture of yourself in your gym, wherever you go at your home, wherever you work out, send the picture at 6am for accountability, I need it. Maybe they need it, maybe they don't. But the end of the day, guess what? I'm working out more. I've reverse engineered like John Delaney said, back into my life, the things that I want to do for my own new identity, not my new goal. Okay, hopefully that was very helpful. There with John Delaney.

Brian, Brian Bradley, the Egoscue method. Some great exercises, check out their website, they do some phenomenal things as well. But I love this quote, he said your mind will quit far before your body ever will. How true. Right. And again, I keep talking about exercise and working out or going to a client meeting. But no matter what, no matter where you're at, your mind will quit far before your body ever will. And I find myself doing that on a treadmill. I find myself doing that maybe later in the day at work. Right? That's my mind. That's my mind telling me that I'm going to quit. But but but I don't need to my body will keep going. I can handle it. I can keep going. I can go to that next level. And for me, again, simple quote. But a very profound quote.

Lauren Johnson, former performance coach for the New York Yankees. I love this question. She says like, if you're in a moment, right, you're having something bad go on in your life, personally, professionally, whatever it may be. What typically helps in moments like this? What typically helps in moments like this. So slow down and think, slow down and think. So if you're having a bad problem, something's going on in your life. Grab a journal, grab a piece of paper, write it down. And ask yourself what typically helps in moments like this? Slow down, think, make it happen.

Last few. Travis Thomas, man, this was a great guest came into the office. He is the mental performance coach and culture coach for the United States men's national team, along with the St. Louis Billikens, men's soccer team. But Travis Thomas said your feelings aren't an indicator of performance. Again, hah, I got an aha moment. As a guy that plays sports, love sports. Your feelings aren't an indicator of your performance. What does that mean? Well, how are you feeling right. If the coach asks how you feeling? I feel great. You can go out so a terrible game. How you feel? And I'm nervous. I think these guys are bigger, faster, stronger, and you got to have the best game in your life, the best round of your life. Right? Your feelings are not an indicator of your performance. What you can focus on is what you can get.

So what can I focus on if I'm at a soccer game, and I just kicked one over the goal, or I made a really bad play, or you get a red card? When you shouldn't have gotten a red card and you're out of the game? What can we do to adapt to make a difference in our lives? A nd he talks about Travis Thomas does live Yes. And so yes, this bad thing happened. And here's what I'm gonna do about it. Yes, I kicked that ball out of bounds. Yes, I made that bad, you know, presentation. I don't think I'm gonna get the client. And here's what I learned. Here's what I'm gonna do about it. Here's what I'm gonna do differently next time, here's how I'm going to use my mind and prepare. So when that opportunity comes up again, I don't make the same mistake twice. Things are going to happen, bad stuff is going to happen. It's really how we respond to it. That matters.

Helen Appleby. She talked about this. And for me, this is so important. She said, the number one reason she is where she is, is because her dad said to her women can do anything. And I wrote that down, I thought to myself, What are you saying to others? Right, what am I saying to people at home? What am I saying to people in the hallways here at work? Right? What am I saying? Little things that you don't know, are being heard go a long way. What am I saying to others, her dad said to her women can do anything. So I thought that was pretty amazing.

And last, and certainly not least, this was just last week. Windy Sherwin Swire she talked about our energy is as contagious as the flu. Kind of a head scratcher, right? And I think about that it's so true. You ever walk in a room with somebody with bad energy. You're walking with somebody don't know what the energy is like in a room, and you brought the energy. Your energy is just as contagious as the flu. And so my challenge to everybody would be bring the energy that you know, the room needs. It takes just as much energy to be in a good mood as it does a bad mood.

And again, I'm not trying to sit around and act like we don't have things that put us in bad moods, we do. But those things are also choices. Do we spend time and some breath work? Do we spend time going over our notes? Do we spend time going over our goals, things that are important to us, things that can bring the energy back into our body. So then we can in turn bring that energy back to others.

So anyway, this is a little bit of a different episode. You know, always happy to share. If you have more comments, questions, write them in and send us emails, talk to us on social media. These things are always very helpful helps us create more and more content. Also share this stuff. These algorithms are built these days. The more shares we get, comments, likes, all that stuff. I hate asking for that stuff. But it's true. The bigger impact we can make, a future greater than your past right, and more content, the bigger impact that we can continue to make. So share it as much as you'd like. Let us know what you'd like to hear more of. Here's to an awesome end to 2022 and to a great 2023.

Ryan Duey calls a head on motorcycle accident in Thailand his "greatest gift".

This near death experience catapulted Ryan into a journey of self inquiry, leading him to the jungles of the Amazon, the inside of a float tank, and a commitment to entrepreneurship in the Health and Wellness industry.

He is the owner of Capitol Floats and Co-founder of Plunge. He shares a common passion for cold plunging,

Their mission is to make cold plunging as common as coffee.

Brett Gilliland 0:52

Ryan Duey 1:00

Man, I think we were doing some of our first like, quote unquote, celebrity drop offs.

You know, from, from a facility standpoint, we've moved into, like three different facilities since then, just like scaling up in size wise. So it's like, I'm like, wow, we were in this, you know, little 3000 square foot facility back then.

Companies really

grown up a lot in a lot of different ways. We were still very young. But yeah, really, in that last year and a half. It's been it's been a wild ride. And we you know, went on Shark Tank since then. I mean, it's been a lot.

Brett Gilliland 2:07

Ryan Duey 2:36

You know, just start building a few emails some of our other customer base we started delivering those hand units in Northern California and then the company's just kind of grown like I was talking about earlier. We we build assemble, manufacture cold plunges. We ship them all over the world, mostly servicing in the United States.

But yeah, man, Cold is having its moment. Like it's, you know, Wim Hof definitely paved the way in making this a much more credible thing, not just some crazy person thing.

And what's cool is like, this isn't that radical of it's like, people will get in cold water for millennia. You know, this is like a very, like, human, human thing. And now it's just technologies met some kind of ancient, it's like a new, you know, ancient ancient modality with a new technology. And that's what we put together. And it's so cold to have and it's mobile, where people are people are using it, people are checking it out.

And I think what's happening is, it's hit a point where, yes, you have the Dr. Andrew Haberman, it's the Rhonda Patrick's that are doing, you know, have done and done some studies, some research is coming out obviously what Wims done, but now more people are doing it and the actual like, like benefits are coming out firsthand.

Like people aren't seeing the documentary of some one person doing it, their neighbors done it and their neighbor saying dude, I'm doing this thing. And they're sharing their benefits and that you know, it's radical. The benefits that happen. I go through our reviews all the time. It's like we get these reviews every day. And I'm like they blow my mind. They literally blow my mind into like, the impact that cold water is having on people's lives of, you know, whether it's disease or ailments they're facing or just more of like a mental health like, making people be a better human like a more happier, vibrant human.

Brett Gilliland 4:31

us through I'm getting, I'm getting an A, in your example a tub a cold plunge waters can be anywhere from what 33-60 degrees, whatever it is people like and prefer, you're gonna, I'd probably recommend starting a little warmer and back in your way and i'm assuming you agree with that.

So I would say so imagine yourself getting in his bathtub full of ice or just really, really cold water, and not being able to breathe for a while walk us through that, because I will tell you, not to name drop here, but this is a pretty well known name.

I was talking to Joe Buck. And he said of all the things that he has, getting into an ice bath like this, is the one thing he does that he actually feels different. When he gets out of it.

Right, which I think is that's a pretty big testimonial is to say that I feel different.

Because you may not feel different after you work out you may not feel different if you take that vitamin or whatever it may be. But he said I feel different.

So what do you, what do you, what do you think about that?

Ryan Duey 5:57

mood, energetic, hormonal, chemical change in two to three minutes. You know, it's like, you could do deep breath work, you know, if you want to go in and do some heavy breath work, you could feel different after but you're exerting a lot of energy.

That's a totally, not everyone's doing that, you know, workout. I feel better after a workout, if I go do a hard workout for 45 minutes to an hour.

But again, I'm 45 minutes to an hour, I'm actively moving my body, it's like, uh, you know, there's a lot of work that goes into it, a cold plunge is one of those I gotta do is get in it.

Like you said, it's hard, it's uncomfortable, and you have to be uncomfortable for the period of time that you're doing it.

But you just got to get at it. You know, I'm not asking you to swing a kettlebell, I'm not asking you to go boxing, I'm not asking you to do the craziest breathwork you've ever done. It's just you just got to get in there and find some level of, of comfort in the discomfort.

And I think that's so I think, to your original question. I think it's such a quick shift, you go from one state to the other. You're getting this massive dump of adrenaline into the body. But you're learning to kind of control it, you're getting like, you're it's, you know, when adrenaline fires up, your body fires up, you you all your circuits turn on like you, you were in a fight you would turn on. And that's how it is.

But this is like in a very controlled environment. So you get this complete light up of the whole circuitry in your body. And your dopamine is just rushing in, and you go in and then but you just lay there and you get it and then you come out and every single time you get this, you are on a euphoric mountain like that's, that doesn't stop I've been doing I've been cold plunging every day for two years.

Brett Gilliland 7:48

Ryan Duey 7:50

Brett Gilliland 7:52

Ryan Duey 7:53

My, my excuses. I still make excuses every day. And they are just a little less strong. You know, I can see the I can see through them a little bit more. So

you know, in the temp, I still adjust the temp here and there like I was down to 43 and I actually just updated about a week ago to 45 and I'm kind of, I play with my temps a little and kind of where I'm at, I feel a little, a lot on the plate right now, a little stressed out.

And so I'm like, kind of play with my stress levels because it is a stressor. It is something you want to be mindful of what's your, but it's one of those healthy stressors again, you know, like Huberman talks about and some of these,

it's like adrenaline's actually, like if we can control our adrenaline that's actually like really, the major input for a high immune system. But it's like, you know, you get a lot of people that are running on high red all the time, and then they go on to vacation and they get sick, it's like well, they don't have really have a balance of the parasympathetic and the sympathetic, it's ultimately a nervous system that their body is in one or the other, but you kind of need a dance between the two and cold plunging is that activation that allows you to get a really intense get in that sympathetic state.

But it will teach you to breathe and calm your breath down lower your heart rate in a very intense environment. And you do that enough the body starts to adapt to stressful situations.

Brett Gilliland 9:23

Ryan Duey 9:55

Get in a cold shower, you know, and turn your turn your shower cold and get that

that's going to that's going to be a type you, like you said the trough and filling up with ice, you probably can't do it as consistent but on a one-off getting in there, getting into cold water or you know, you get a plunge-type with a filtration system, and you can do it more often.

Science, I mean, really what, to me, the one of the big things that it's showing is its rate, it's lowering inflammation like that at the core thing. So everything that comes off of the lowered inflammation is, that's more optimized people.

But the other cool stuff that it is showing is that it's raising it's actually raising our baseline dopamine levels.

So you know, dopamine into a you know, dopamine can we can receive dopamine from all different activities. It's the activities that are truly beneficial to us, is when dopamine can actually play a factor and be and be a positive, be a positive chemical for us.

So that's going to be like your focus your motivation. So when people come out of a cold plunge, it's like you get to hear these comments all the time. Like I feel okay, not even just coming out. This is sustained. If you're doing this consistency, it's like I feel capable, I feel more confident, I feel more clear, like that, that's, that's dopamine talking in your body. So that to me, is like a massive benefit for people. Um, you know, for me as a guy.

Two years ago, right when I was starting to company really kind of in the it was a very stressful time in my life. That was covid. You know, we were six months into the COVID, COVID world.

I had my all my, bloodwork done, my testosterone levels were in the dump, like really, really low. Only thing I changed, I did cut out stress, but then I cold plunged, I had a cold plunge in my life, I cold plunge every day.

Raised that by 70%. So

Brett Gilliland 11:46

Ryan Duey 11:46

Brett Gilliland 11:46

Ryan Duey 11:51

You know, I had my true age, I'm 36. My immune system within my body with the, through the testing was at 30 years old. So that to me was like another another sign of like having a really healthy robust immune system.

You know, another cool one, I did a video recently on Instagram about this, but there's a study out of Sweden that came out. And it was using cold exposure for as a cancer treatment.

And this study was basically looking at, and had been kind of interesting, and no one had really studied it for a while. But they were saying, basically cancer lives off of glucose, so lives off of sugar, you know, the high sugar diet is, you know, the big cause of cancer, if you have cancer don't want to be taking sugar, and that feeds, that's what feeds the cancer cells.

Anyways, by activating the brown fat one of the fastest ways to activate our brown fat which is like the, it's babies have, it gives us our big energy. By activating the brown fat within our body, it's strictly, cold water is one of the fastest ways to turn that on within our body. A lot of this, a lot of us have that suppressed.

Well anyways, when you turn on the brown fat within our body, that just starts sucking up glucose. So they found it actually as a suppression, they were testing, they started in mice, and they tested mice and cold conditions and non cold conditions with cancer. They had like a 70, was like a 70% reduction in tumors in the cold mice, to the non and then they brought it into humans.

And they saw the very similar thing. And you know, and asterisk with this is that was with a sugar free diet.

So again, you know, it's sucking up the glucose in the system, but you also don't want to be putting sugar back into your body. So with that again, but that study just came out and they were like, we are actually at a spot where we would recommend this as a treatment for cancer. Like

Brett Gilliland 13:54

Ryan Duey 13:54

So I look at this as a great, like, it's a great way of prevention in its own way. Whether you have cancer, you're not like diagnosed with it or not. It's a great way in our body to you know, have healthy, healthy, healthy cellular levels.

Brett Gilliland 14:14

Ryan Duey 14:20

You know that's this is stress is, western world, we have a lot of stress. We have a lot of things coming into us and inputs. And you know, you've been in the cold plunge, you kind of said I'm not great at it, but it's like, you do it you start to learn how to just okay, what,

I call it a jungle gym, or a gym, for your nervous system.

We go to the gym to get our muscles strong, when you get in a cold plunge to get your nervous system regulated, and learn how to control that and get back into more of a, you know, a homeostasis that between those what they call the parasympathetic and sympathetic systems.

Brett Gilliland 15:18

Ryan Duey 15:27

It is, there is an interesting conversation here, though, of like, people cold plunging. Like, do you do this right after your workout?

And I think that's, that's an interesting, it's kind of the one subject matter, it's a little debatable right now of like, do you do it right after because you do want that inflammatory response, after lifting weights, you want your muscles to have a reaction to that.

It's kind of what you're doing, you're tearing them down, and then they grow back stronger. So there is this talk that getting in cold water immediately after, could reduce that could recruit, reduce some of the gains that are out there.

So anyone listening, if you're like, super into working out, like strength gains, I would, you know, try and go maybe two hours after a workout,

Brett Gilliland 16:25

Ryan Duey 16:25

And my caveat with that, and I would put myself in this category I like, like to work out. I'm a kind of, you know, self proclaimed athlete, but not training for anything special.

My goal is to get up and work out again tomorrow. So, you know, I'm not as concerned of maximizing every day, and I want to feel good, yes, I want to build strength. But I also want to recover and be ready for tomorrow. So that's not an area that I'm concerned. That's more of like, let's say bodybuilders, or maybe even pro athletes into what they're trying to, I would say pro athletes not in season. I don't think it's as big of a deal but pro athletes out of season. They're trying to maximize. They want, I dont know, want to put in a couple hours between a workout in cold plunge.

Brett Gilliland 17:07

Ryan Duey 17:24

We have a sauna, at our facility here at headquarters, and it's become this like ritual, everyone to get off work. And everyone gets in the sun. It's like the greatest thing like sitting there and you're sweating. And it's like, you have really good talk.

So it's like,

Brett Gilliland 17:53

Ryan Duey 17:53

Like your body is going through kind of a intensity. So I want people to know, it's like, that's a calorie crunch. That's like, that's a there's an intensity to that. So it's a great way to do it on a recovery day.

But I mean, I think he is you know, there's there's a plethora of benefits. I think Rob Patrick's probably the leader in that space. Yeah,

Brett Gilliland 18:44

But again, that same euphoric feeling, kind of came about the after that. So I went from there, straight to a stream, steam room straight to a sauna.

And it was a phenomenal recovery day. My wife and I did it together on her anniversary, and it's kind of like a little Day-date. And it was incredible. So same kind of thing with cryotherapy.

Ryan Duey 19:23

Brett Gilliland 19:26

Ryan Duey 19:26

Brett Gilliland 19:30

was man. We like had lunch. So again, a crowd therapy steam rooms and an infrared sauna. And then we did this launch at this place we're at I'm like, oh my god, this is unbelievable. This feels, you know? Then eat healthy. I'm like, I'm feeling good about myself.

But we can talk about this stuff all day, man and I, on my research, you know, I saw that you called a head on motorcycle accident, your greatest gift. Talk about that man.

Ryan Duey 19:56

And anyways, it was, it was just one of those moments that like as soon as it soon as I came back,

Brett Gilliland 20:30

Ryan Duey 20:31

And it was just one of those moments of like, I don't really know why I said that at that time. But I sensed that this was going to be this major opportunity to, you know, just go to like a deeper look into my life, what do I want out of life, like kind of, wasn't in a bad place, I enjoyed my work that I was doing.

I like, I was happy with who I was as a person. But it just accelerated some things that I wanted to do in life that were kind of set off into the future. And it just it shook me and put me on a, on a course that was kind of where my life's at today.

Brett Gilliland 21:10

You think about it. 24/7 365.

And so was that a catalyst for you to start these things like you're the founder of capital floats, which again, we didn't even talk about, but as the floating you know, you're sitting in a in a pod, it's got the, and you would explain it better than I.

But you've started that and then you were the co founder of Plunge, for these cold plunges. And so is, was that the journey? That thing that made you go do that? Or what was it?

Ryan Duey 21:47

Anyways, I came out, I had really wanted to go down to the jungles of Peru. This was like this big adventure that I had wanted to do to actually sit and work with Ayahuasca's psychedelic medicine, that's probably been heard of these days, a little more common, but back then it was a very, very kind of taboo, like not many people were talking about it, it was really weird.

I could it, was really uncomfortable, even bring it up to a lot of people in my circle. Anyways, this that was an experience that I had really been wanting to do. But I just like, Oh, you'll do that later in life. And anyways, this accident was like, No, you're gonna go do that, like that was it. And I started to a float tank to kind of heal my body from some of the injuries that I had faced from that accident, when I got back to the US.

Like they had to kind of work through that to go into my recovery mode. So I started floating, but I was also going to float for more of an introspection, kind of connect to myself, like I'm gonna go down to the jungle, do this very kind of like intrapersonal work down there. And I was like, I need to spend some time in a float tank.

And so that was the start. And then very quickly, in the float tank, it was like, Oh, my God, like I love being around this facility. And this environment. It started less as like a, like a great, awesome business idea and more of, I would just love to create this environment and be in it all the time and be around these people. I really was like, I wanted to build this community.

And so that was that, you know, very early doing that it came to me I wanted to start this company, but I didn't I didn't I didn't act on it for about a year and a half I went down to the jungle, had a, you know, to say the least, mind blowing experience and just really learned a lot about myself and you know, coming back and yeah, I thought I was gonna go down there quit my job and go start a float center.

Well, I got down to the jungle and it was like, no, no, you got, your job is the least of our worries right now we're going to do some other things to work on.

So anyways, I came back, stuck around with the quakes are about and then I started cap float, six months later moved to Sacramento. And that was kind of the beginning of the entrepreneurial journey.

And that that was that was a crazy road because that's how I met Mike. Mike's the co founder with me on plunge. He's the inventor of the product. He owns reboot float & cryo, and he has a very similar story.

It's very wild. And, you know, he opened exactly one year before me in the Bay Area. And I was in Sacramento, we just became these float brothers, like, you know, not many floats around and we start hanging out and then we become best buds.

And then he just happened to move to Sacramento in April of 2020. And he starts like, you know, we got some time businesses are shut down, this is California. It's like, you know, this is

Brett Gilliland 24:41

Ryan Duey 24:42

Taking it back there, It was, it was definitely, it's just interesting how these experiences can you have no clue how it's gonna play out? Right? But you, you make these declarations, you make these commitments that and just changed the whole trajectory.

And I sit here now and it still blows me away sharing the story of like, Wow, all the kinds of synchronistic things that happened along the way.

Brett Gilliland 25:20

But to trust your gut, leave that go to the uncertain and build something and maybe it works. Maybe you sell a ton of it. Maybe you don't.

Ryan Duey 25:45

Like you know what you're getting right now. Like, I know what my life is right now. Like, right. So that's kind of what I've, I think that's the biggest thing I've learned. But yes, I think there is.

I think it's really difficult, you know, you know, you could be in a job you make 100k. And it's like, you got health insurance. It's like, Man, that's a good life. That is that and there's nothing wrong, like, you know, that's great if you're, if that works, and there's there but there's always sometimes people with that other edge of like, but it's scary when you kind of have those, you know, it's things are comfortable and things are stable.

But I you know, I think as I've gone it's like that's such a, it's such, that's just not true. Like there's you know, like, we adapt to the next thing it doesn't, you don't just go here then 10 steps down the road. You just take the next step of the direction you want to go and life will, you'll adapt. We all adapted what we're really good at as humans.

Brett Gilliland 26:50

Speaking of soccer. I'm going to, St. Louis has an MLS team starting in here and next season and so they have a first game ever, their MLS St. Louis City II, like, I guess I call it their minor league team is playing tonight. So, it'll be about 29 degrees at about game time. And it'll be outdoors, nice and cold plungey for about an hour and a half, two hours tonight. But

Ryan Duey 27:15

Brett Gilliland 27:20

Ryan Duey 27:20

Brett Gilliland 27:27

That's what I want to wake up and do every single day is help people have a future greater than their past. I think that's what you're doing through cold plunge.

But your mission is to make cold plunging as common as coffee. How are you doing that? So let's kind of get in the weeds a bit from the business standpoint. If I follow you around from a business standpoint, what am I seeing you do day in and day out to follow your mission?

Ryan Duey 27:59

Brett Gilliland 28:04

Ryan Duey 28:20

So you know, when I say that, it's like influencers? Like who are the people out there that we think are putting really good content out there that are impacting people they're connected to?

And I think we've done, we've done well. And that's just a big part of what we do. Like how do we get how do we tell a story?

I think that's, that's the other piece to it is like, we are shifting a bit as a company like everything, everything's very focused on the two to three minute punch experience. It's cool, it looks good. It's it's it works and but we're really focused on like, Why do you cold plunge?

Like, what? Why would you get in that bath and feel uncomfortable for three minutes? And it's like, well, maybe you want more energy with your kids. Maybe you want to be a better father, maybe you want to, you know, you know more intimacy with your wife. So testosterone, like all it's like, what are the stories we're trying to tell?

Like, maybe you have, mental anxiety is a massive thing. You know, we just did a piece with a woman that got off prescription medication, and because she just she wanted to and she started plunging and she plunges two times a day. And this is what she does.

And so it's like,

Brett Gilliland 29:33

Ryan Duey 29:34

Brett Gilliland 29:51

Ryan Duey 30:08

And what's really cool is like, we get people that purchase. And yes, that is a big purchase you save for it, or whatever it is to you in your life. It's rare, I mean, almost non existent where that is. It's like, we get the we get the testimonies of like, I can't believe I didn't do this sooner. I can't believe I did, I was questioning this.

Like, like, the stories are, and that's what fuels me. I mean, every day, it's like, you know, running a business. You know, it's like, there's challenges. There's all sorts of things that come and then, you know, I go check our reviews. Literally, that's what I do. And it's like, okay, this is cool. This is why we got into this. Yeah.

Brett Gilliland 31:06

Ryan Duey 31:13

His name's Michael, he's to come onto our team really recent. Anyways, he has multiple sclerosis and he has MS.

So he, major autoimmune disorder. And he started cold punching has completely got it under control. Come to find out he's locally with us. He was like blown away that the company was in his backyard, he got a job with us. He's been on with a couple months. And he's like a rock star.

And it's like this. And he's like, on a mission of his life. And it's like, to me, that's just one of the coolest. It's just, I see it every day. I see him in here every day. You know, I did that cancer post, I did that thing on Instagram at a number of people make comments on there of like, like, it was almost like we've been doing this, like not knowing, like we've been getting in cold water and my cancers went into remission.

Like that was a cool one, we had a guy. You know, we've had a number of like, COVID, long haulers that like really are struggling, like really having some long term issues, like, you know, no medication, in studies, they've come out of it into, you know, I've never just having my cold plunge for the short window of time, I've seen these results that I hadn't, I hadn't gotten from my whoop scores, my whoop scores are now in the green.

You know that that's a massive one.

We're doing a study right now with about 30 people were getting all their levels tested prior and then they're plunging for 90 straight days. And then they're getting every, all their bloodwork done again.

We're just starting to get some some of the first group coming through. So we'll have more of a release of what's going on there. But life changing, like life changing testimonies of what these people are sharing of, you know, things that are happening for them, but I mean,

Brett Gilliland 33:15

Ryan Duey 33:26

You know, it's great for metabolism and fat loss. You know, and it just, you Your days are different when you cold plunge so it's going to set you want a little different trajectory of maybe saying no to the thing that you've been struggling with or you know, it's not a cure all.

Definitely don't want to sell is as that but it does, It is, yes, it is a great I'd see it as you know, the story I want to tell is like this is a great starting point for people on a fitness journey.

Not someone that's already kicking ass on on fitness.

Brett Gilliland 34:17

yeah, so last few questions here. And you know, so if I followed Ryan Dewey around what am I seeing on your habits from a personal development side?

From a maybe a personal growth side like personal development, but also exercise and business habits?

What am I seeing kind of no-miss items that happen every day for you?

Ryan Duey 34:38

Brett Gilliland 34:50

get a different plan for – You're gonna do this way, you're gonna do this cardio thing, you're gonna do that movement type deal.

Ryan Duey 34:56

Brett Gilliland 35:20

Ryan Duey 35:31

Well, it's just like, I'm accelerated, I'm accountable, I have a trainer that's there I got to get out of bed. The plunge, you know, three minutes in there boom, I'm ready to go like. So, that, those two things are essential.

You know, business like groups I just joined like an executive coaching group that was yeah, I'm really excited on and kind of some other founders in E-comm, health and wellness space.

So that's kind of a spot for me. Mike and I really work hand, you know, it's nice to have a co founder so I could really bounce you know, we co CEO, the company so bounce a lot of stuff off of him.

And then yeah, I mean, outside of that, like the days can fluctuate you know, I'd say we're looking at an actual calendar Tuesday, Wednesday. These days are packed, you know from basically 9am I don't I don't attribute, me, I don't look at anything before nine, it's like a big thing for me kind of like my time that I work and then.

But nine, to nine to five is I'm locked in and then I like to leave like Mondays and Fridays more for creative days. That's what I'm working more on the storytelling I'm talking about partnership conversations. So it's kind of how the current flow of the week is and I'm always adapting and trying to try to evolve it a bit more

Brett Gilliland 37:01

Ryan Duey 37:10

t's an interesting thing the company's called plunge we're actually going through a bit of a rebrand right now to kind of really bring clarity on that because we've been cut, you know, it's like a cold plunge, cold plunge or plunge so company name Plunge but typing cold plunge we'll show up.

And then you know, we have for me personally, Ryan, Ryan Duey on Instagram. It's k ind of where I'm most active have a podcast called the journey with Ryan Duey. So that's, that's going, you can find that on, you know, Spotify, Apple, wherever that's at. So yeah, those are the spots and yeah,

Brett Gilliland 38:02

What do you tell them? That person that you maybe you wish you knew 10 years ago? What advice are you telling them on how to bet on themselves? And in areas like that?

Ryan Duey 38:24

And whatever you think you have to lose, it's never it's never quite what you think like, you know, if you got a family, you got to like, the biggest thing with struggle is if your kids didn't see you go after something like that's something I always think about, like with my family that I grew up in.

And the last piece that I say to anyone that like is questioning like, do I know enough? Am I there? Do it!

It's like having been talking to some very high level. It's like nobody knows what the hell's going on. Like, and, you're, everyone's just figuring out the person you admire, the person you think has it all figured out.

They're just figuring it out as they go. Like, they might think they have this incredible plan but nobody actually knows what's going on. And anyone that thinks they have the best plan. They're just adapting as they go.

So I say that more is an encouragement to not get like caught up into this perfectionism place like that's just the game you're gonna go figure it out. You can go figure it out!

Brett Gilliland 39:39

Ryan Duey 39:49

Brett Gilliland 39:50

Ryan Duey 39:51

Brett Gilliland 39:55

Having you on the Circuit of Success brother

Ryan Duey 40:02

Brett Gilliland 40:12

Wendy Swire is an author, speaker, professor, and leadership consultant who is best known as the “Brain Geek” Executive Coach to her C-Suite clients. As founder of the DC Neuroleadership Group and Certified Mental Fitness Coach, she has helped thousands better understand their brains to create laser-focused results by moving from their “Saboteur” to the “Sage Brain.”

EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION

Brett Gilliland  00:01

Welcome to the Circuit of Success. I’m your host Brett Gilliland and today I’ve got Wendy Sherwin Swire with me, Wendy, how you doing?

Wendy Swire  00:08

Awesome. I’m so glad to be here. Thank you for having me.

Brett Gilliland  00:12

Good to be with you. You’re calling in from Bethesda, Maryland. How’s it going out in Bethesda, Maryland today?

Wendy Swire  00:19

Yes, Maryland is doing just fine. It’s, we got a late fall, warm fall going on. I think a lot of parts of the country so, 

Brett Gilliland  00:27

Amazing, isn’t it?

Wendy Swire  00:28

Yeah, it’s pretty wild. So people are in fine spirits.

Brett Gilliland  00:32

So a guy I connected to on Instagram this morning, he was put on there that he was working outside in his back deck in shorts and a T-shirt. He’s like in November in New York, if I’m getting shorts and T-shirt, I’m doing it. 

Wendy Swire  00:44

Yeah, it’s pretty good. It’s nice. So thank you for asking.

Brett Gilliland  00:47

Absolutely. Well, you are, everyone knows you as the health benefits. Everybody knows, I should say the health benefits of staying in shape physically, right. But there’s also this little thing here, if you’re watching on point, if you’re listening, I’m pointing to my brain here. There’s a lot that goes on right up in here. And so you are an expert on what I would say all things brain is the way I’m going to word it. But I think it’s gonna be awesome to have a conversation with you today about that stuff. But if you could Wendy, you know, you’ve been a global executive and leadership coach, you’re an author, a speaker, an applied neuroscience consultant, I mean, what’s the backstory? Right, what’s made you the woman you are today?

Wendy Swire  01:24

Yeah, I love that question, as a coach, it’s a wonderful question. And I hope what people ask it of each other. So I think there’s three things, Brett, that I want to emphasize. The first is I’m a really big proponent of the energy, emotional energy and positive contagion really. And I really lucked out, I had a father, who was, you know, rags, and just poor as dirt grew up, but he really had positive energy. He was a successful entrepreneur, and just had a lot of joy in his life. So I want your listeners to really know there is neuroscience behind this, but your positive emotions are contagious, like, like the flu, like COVID. So super important. And I had that growing up. So I had a very much a role model of what that can do. 

Brett Gilliland  02:13

Right. 

Wendy Swire  02:14

Yield to success. The other thing I would say there’s a couple others. The other is, you know, my story is I really, really wanted to be a diplomat and economic diplomat and work on a lot of issues about poverty. And when I was young, I was in high school and college and I really thought I really thought I was going to solve poverty, like particularly in Latin American poverty and debt, I was really into it. And I actually trained, I did a stint on Wall Street to prepare me and I actually got a master’s degree in, to train as a diplomat as a diplomat in diplomacy. Yeah. And, you know, I’m getting ready. I got a good job in the State Department of the World Bank, and my father, this beloved patriarch that I just spoke of, he got diagnosed with like stage three cancer. And I’m in my mid 20s. And it was a real point, it was a crossroads. I think we all you know, I’m sure you have your listeners have you reach a crossroads? Like, do I do this or don’t I, and a door in my life had to shut down that I wasn’t going to live overseas, I decided my family being close to my sisters, and my, my parents was important to me. Well, let’s fast forward. 15-20 years later, I now work with those diplomats as a coach, trainer. So you just never know in life, you got to pivot. You got to you know, right now we call it where it’s like adaptability, flexibility. But I can’t just tell you a door shuts down, you sort of catch your breath, and just like, “Okay, what’s going to open up?” And the work I’m doing now opened up because I’m not a diplomat. And the last thing is what makes me sort of the woman I am today is obviously my family, faith’s important, values. But I think for me, because, you know, the podcast, Follow Curiosity. I’m insanely curious, and just that there’s a lot of really cool neuroscience on that. But if you’re curious, you know, listeners, if you’re curious about something, listen to that whisper, because that’s what led me to, you know, I left the field of wanting to be a diplomat, I studied hardcore science in economics and finance. It led me to the field more of business management leadership. And now as a coach, it also led me to neuroscience. Someone mentioned something to me and someone gave me a book. And I, yeah, I just got so interested in the brain. So you just never ever know what tidbit, you’re going to pick up in this podcast or a book or if I’m talking to someone on a plane, you just never know. Follow your curiosity, Brett. So I hope.

Brett Gilliland  04:45

 I love that and I think that’s that’s one of the reasons I continue to do a podcast you know, five and a half years later and you’re the 300 and eighth person I’ve interviewed and had the privilege to interview and you’ll learn a lot, right? And but, but you do have to be curious because I find little the little nugget, right, that I can take up from everybody is a big deal. I mean, even as you saying, I know this, your positive energy is contagious. I’ve said that a ton of times, but when you really slow down and look at as contagious as getting COVID or the flu, right, we worry about that stuff. But we don’t worry about our energy do we? We don’t think about that as our negative energy is just as bad as our as spreading the COVID or, or the flu, right?

Wendy Swire  05:26

100%. And there’s really cool science on it and research on it that if you’re negative, even if you think I’m keeping it to myself, I hide my emotions. No one can tell, people can pick it up even on Zoom. People can pick it up, in person. Yeah, it’s pretty wild.

Brett Gilliland  05:40

Yeah, that’s crazy. So you’re also known for techniques to train and rewire the brain to be more positive. So I think in today’s world, right, we’ve got these cell phones that want to give us all the notifications and all the crap that goes on in the world and all the negativity and, and it just, it just gets to be a lot and you turn on the TV, whatever it is. So what are some steps, some real like the meat and potatoes type stuff that our listeners can take from this podcast that can help rewire the brain to be more positive?

Wendy Swire  06:11

Yeah, that’s a great question. Thank you so much for asking. That’s, that’s my favorite thing to talk about. I think there’s a couple really, really practical neuro hacks that anyone, anyone can use. Okay. The first is, I think we’ve all heard it, but gratitude, rewires your brain. Gratitude. So, if you are a person, if something good happens in your day, a tiny little thing, like you get a really nice text from a friend or, you know, your child or friend smiles at you or you know, says something funny, or like today, you look outside and everyone look, look outside your window, is it a nice day Sunny, whatever it is, if you take that positive moment and hold on to it. This is called a fancy term I’ll throw out here self directed positive neuroplasticity. But what that means is, you know, your brain has a built in negativity bias, let me rephrase that you are built in to be negative, that is your wiring that you had that we’ve had for hundreds of 1000s of years. So you have to lay new neuronal tracks. So any little thing you do this, like, hey, you know what I’m talking right now to Brett, and it’s fun, I’m having a good time. Or I just have this really nice cup of coffee. And I’m taking a sip from Starbucks, and I’m just going to take 30 seconds and enjoy the coffee, you are laying tracks to be more positive. The other thing is, and this is another practice, I give almost all of my coach, my executives who are my coaching clients is at night, take a piece of paper, write down the three or four things that you are grateful for. If you can get to do 10, great, I encourage you to write because you’ll use a part of your brain you’ll activate the creative part of your brain that keyboard it. But even if you don’t have time to write it, you don’t have a journal, keep a journal by your bed stand. But if you don’t have time, even think about it. That act itself, the research has shown helps. It just helps in so many different ways. And you’re literally starting to rewire your brain. Try that for 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, every day. I call it an appreciation audit. Audit your audit your day, before you go to bed. What would you what do you appreciate? And for my parents, grandparents, family members, try doing that at the dinner table or as you’re taking your kid to a soccer game. Hey, what do we appreciate about today? Excellent practice. So think of that one as a practical.

Brett Gilliland  08:39

I love that. And it’s I use a daily planner that I’ve created. This is 20 years in the making in my career. And I’ve finally got it all in one booklet of things that I do but but it is it’s it says three here today I’m grateful for right and I start dispersing I do when I get in the office, I write down three or four things that I’m grateful for. And it’s hard, right? Because sometimes like well, I mean, it’s as silly as it sounds, but I’m thankful for clean water. Right? 

Wendy Swire  09:06

Right. Yeah. 

Brett Gilliland  09:07

I’m thankful to be able to breathe, take a deep breath, clean air and but like then there’s part of me, it’s like God, am I just like, am I not deep enough to think like, all these things, but I think that stuff matters. But here’s my pushback on that. So one, I’m 100% believer in it. Okay. I also have an exercise I do at the end of every calendar quarter, I look at every single picture I’ve taken on my phone, and I write down exactly what I did and who I experienced it with in a brown journal that I have over here. So I’m again, I’m a big believer in that but what about the times you don’t feel like that? You’re like, I don’t want to write down what I’m thankful for. I’m just pissed off and in a bad mood. I don’t want to do this right. What advice do you have there?

Wendy Swire  09:47

Yeah, so what happens is, this is even more important when you’re feeling crappy. Okay? When you’re tired when you’re fatigued when you are worried about your finances or or politics or whatever it is, right? So or the state of the world. So I think what happens is when you are in a negative place, you’re stressed about work, you’re working hard, you know, this and that’s going on, you never feel you have enough time, you’re producing a very powerful chemical in your brain called cortisol. Very, very powerful. By just taking a moment and doing something positive, you’re actually creating a different neurochemical, okay, it doesn’t override that. You can’t have the cortisol and the norepinephrine, or the dopamine or the serotonin, you can have the feel good chemicals.

Brett Gilliland  10:38

They can’t coexist.

Wendy Swire  10:39

They can’t coexist, they can go one right after each other. So you are literally playing with powerful, powerful chemicals in your brain. So that’s why the practices work. So it’s not just kumbaya, and let’s light candles, and feel gratitude stuff is literally changing chemicals in your brain. So I would encourage people just one thing, you know, and it could be “Yeah, you know what, I got out of bed today,” you know, my favorite quote is from Pitbull, the rapper, you know, “every day above ground is a good day.”

Brett Gilliland  11:07

It’s right.

Wendy Swire  11:08

Could be that it could be you know, the fresh air, or you know what, I had a bed to sleep on or I had a meal tonight. So any little thing doesn’t have to be beat deep, deep, big, you know, I’m grateful it can be the same thing every day. The idea is that you literally are laying new neuronal tracks in your brain, that’s the power of this stuff.

Brett Gilliland  11:28

Wow. So it’s literally like a slow drip. I mean, it’s like a drip of actual chemical that comes out and seeps out of our body or out of our brain into our bodies, and, and so on. So that’s amazing. So gratitude. Okay, so that’s one what’s what’s the second one?

Wendy Swire  11:41

I think another neuro hack is, the brain has multiple different regions, it’s got that primitive, we’ve called it the lizard brain, it’s really not accurately, they know that’s not 100% accurate, but doesn’t matter. It’s a great metaphor, you can use and then you have an emotional brain, which is a little higher up. And then you have your, if all the listeners take your hand and put on your forehead, that right behind your forehead, that’s your executive functioning, I call that your C-suite brain, right? So even by asking yourself a question, you need 30 milliseconds, milliseconds, that’s like 1,000th of a second to move from that reactive, primitive fight or flight brain to more of your executive thinking brain. So when I’m in a really stressful situation, so I had a situation a couple years ago, on a business trip, my  aptop got stolen, I was in a panic. And I just remember sitting down, I was at the hotel when I realized it, and I’m like, “Okay, what part of my brain am I in?” What part of the brain Am I in? Am I in my reptile reactive brain? Or I’m in my thinking, calmer brain? 

Brett Gilliland  12:54

Yeah. 

Wendy Swire  12:54

And just ask yourself a question. And the key takeaway is to buy time, you want to buy time from moving from the lizard, to the C-suite.

Brett Gilliland  13:07

So that’s that lizard is tell me more about that.

Wendy Swire  13:11

So your lizard brain. And again, it’s just an analogy, we do share this parts of the brain, the lower the lower deep stuff. So if listeners take your neck and go to that part between your neck where your head is kind of attached to your body, right back there, that’s way deep stuff back there, brainstem, it is the part of your brain that controls all autonomic functions, everything you do, your brain is like breathing and closing your eyes. And you don’t have to worry about your heart beating, do you? 

Brett Gilliland  13:43

No. 

Wendy Swire  13:43

That part of your brain takes care of it, all these functions, that and it’s also the part that you know, will kind of take care of the fact that your heart pumps, your blood pumps, you know it, that’s the part of the brain if you’re thirsty, what do you do? 

Brett Gilliland  14:00

Take a drink of water. 

Wendy Swire  14:01

100%, great, perfect answer. If you’re hot, you know, you take your sweater off that kind of stuff. So that’s the part of the brain that when you are totally triggered and stressed out, and like kind of it’s right, it’s linked to the emotional part of your brain, which sits on top of it. But that’s the part of your brain that’s going to react to protect you. So you’ve got a 24-hour ADT alarm system in your brain to protect you. That’s the part. So you just got to kind of move away from it. And to move to your thinking brain and that’s what the question does. What part of the brain am I in? Okay, let me just catch a deep breath. It’s gonna be okay.

Brett Gilliland  14:37

It’s kind of just rewiring, recalibrating, if you will saying, “Okay, I know I’m in the wrong department,” if you will. “Now it’s time to get in the right department.”

Wendy Swire  14:44

Love it! Yep, I’m in the wrong part of the store. I got to get to the right part of the store. That’s right.

Brett Gilliland  14:49

What are some things that we can do, you know, personally at home or at work that to trigger Brain Stuff? I mean, whether that’s reading whether it’s you know, I play Wordle for I find that if I can kind of do the Wordle thing before I go to bed, I don’t know if it’s actually working or not, but seems like I get a pretty decent night’s sleep. And it’s not just because of Wordle. But, you know, so those things if it’s sitting in a sauna for 20 minutes, I mean, what are some things that we can do to help stimulate the brain from a positive standpoint?

Wendy Swire  15:17

Yeah, so I love that. Okay, a couple tips. One is your brain is something like 70% water, maybe even more, drink a ton, a ton, a ton of water. 

Brett Gilliland  15:28

Yeah.

Wendy Swire  15:28

More water than you think. Okay, more water than you think. And I encourage my coaching clients, I’m like, “Are you drinking water?” And they’re like, “I drink a lot.” I’m like, I want you to double listeners, I want you to double the amount of water you’re drinking, that’s gonna––

Brett Gilliland  15:41

to interrupt that. And so I love that. So again, my journal water intake is–– 

Wendy Swire  15:45

100 percent, 100 percent. 

Brett Gilliland  15:47

––drinks. And so what’s funny is I wear this thing called a whoop, if you’ve ever heard of that, but it’s, it’s about the fight or flight type deal on your body, you and you’re stressed, you’re in, water intake to sleep, and anything, everything really your fitness. But I found it’s crazy. I have worse sleep. If I have seven to 12 glasses of water a day, I have better sleep than if I have less than seven. But if I have greater than 12 glasses of water today, my sleep is actually worse.

Wendy Swire  16:13

Yeah. Well, you’re calibrating to your body, probably you may have to get up in the middle of the night and do a little bio break there. But I think I think for me, you want to flush out some of those nasty mean cortisol, those chemicals, those that, that when you’re triggered that, that chemical we just talked about the water will flush it out. And that’s really important. I am a huge, I’m glad you talked about sleep, if you want to increase positivity of the brain, you know, we could do a whole rest of the session on sleep, sleep hygiene. Sleep is a superpower. It’s not it is it is just like it is literally like taking kryptonite or whatever you know, it’s like a super, it’s a super you want to supercharge your emotions, your work performance, your cognitive performance. Sleep is critical. Which means about you know, half an hour, let I love the fact of doing Wordle or you’re reading you’ve got to get off your screens at everyone knows this. We’ve heard this. But there’s science behind it. You got to start to quiet your brain, our brains are so active, they’re so bombarded. So a lot of it is in the third is daydreaming, taking a break looking out the window, taking a walk with the dog on plug it is not a waste of time, you are not being inefficient, you’re actually taking great care of your brain. And letting certain networks in the brain just give you your best thoughts. So where do you do your best thinking, Brett?

Brett Gilliland  17:43

I do mine in the morning, when it’s maybe before everybody’s up and I can just sit in a quiet room and just chill by myself. I’m a big believer now on these saunas just got a sauna. And it’s been incredible and in the time in there, because you don’t there’s nothing to do right, you just sitting there. And so I find that those are my two spots.

Wendy Swire  18:05

And not that a lot of my senior executives do their best thinking in the shower. When your body is relaxed. It is not a coincidence. When your body’s relaxed, your brain can relax, you’ll have your highs, you’ll have creative insights. So the sauna, anything, you can do hot water or cold in a hot bath, anything that you can do just to start to feel more relaxation and your body will allow your brain to make connections and relax. It’s not a coincidence. A lot of people get their energy, you get our best insights sitting in front of a computer doing an email. Well most people I know don’t.

Brett Gilliland  18:41

Yeah, and I call that a strategic thing time. For me it’s stts if you look at my calendar, every Wednesday, it’s gonna be on there from 1-2:30 and it’s me, the black journal, and an ink pen, and no technology. And I’ve even found that it’s hard. I always felt like I was failing early on when I was doing this. I’ve been doing it since July of ’05, so long time but you can still feel like you’re failing because oh, I need to be doing this or I need to doing that. Or I got to make that call. I gotta send that email. But I’m telling you, it’s been the best use of time and the people I coach and then my clients or whoever. I mean, those are the things we always go back to how much alone time are you spending just thinking with an ink pen and a piece of paper?

Wendy Swire  19:20

Yeah, I love that. And if you can’t if that seems hard for you if you need to take a walk, take a walk, nature getting outside fresh air for exhausted and anything where you’re just letting yourself unplug, and allowing yourself that freedom, huge, huge spikes in productivity. So those are great practice best practices. I think just to get back to your question. The other thing is really monitor who you hang out with and the new, your news intake. Because remember, the brain has that prewired negativity bias. So you know what are you consuming? Are you consuming like junk food we know not great for your body? Well junk junk inputs, junk people who are negative, who are bringing it down. Always, you know, are you Doom scrolling? That stuff will take an effect on your brain? You’ve got to be a really, you know, on the listeners of your podcast are, they’re listening for a reason. They’re success-oriented. They’re motivated. They want to get better at their game. Yeah, really monitor what you’re what you’re feeding your brain.

Brett Gilliland  20:21

Yep. So I’m hearing gratitude, water intake, sleep, Daydream monitor who you hang out with in your news intake. These are phenomenal, right? You can stop the podcast right here and say there’s five takeaways and listeners, go do a test and see how you’re doing on that. Right. So speaking of tests, I’m going to give you a test right now. That’s okay. Like, Oh, nobody I love it makes the circuits of success or your attitudes, your belief system, your actions that you take to ultimately get results in your life. So what’s one thing that you would say from an attitude? And maybe it’s everything we’ve just talked about? Can you scale yourself from a scale of one to 10? How you’re doing right now? Currently? How are you doing right now, is Wendy Sherwin Swire doing on your attitude?

Wendy Swire  21:09

I’m really lucky. I don’t want to say a 10. Because I don’t know that I’m in the high nines. Yeah, I have, you know, the things that I’m recommending are things I have personally used. You know, I love my parents at a young age, I wasn’t like this, if you had talked to me 10 or 15 years ago, I have trained myself to have a positive attitude, to rewire my brain to do all of these practices. So I live I live in like a state for me in a state of gratitude. My goal is to live in a state of have to be in service to others and be in a state of joy and gratitude as much of the day as I can. So that’s amazing. I met but I had to go through I had to train myself to do this. I did not it wasn’t like oh, you know, this woman, Castile Pollyanna and she woke up was like this as a child? And the answer is no, I wasn’t.

Brett Gilliland  22:00

I see. I love that. And that’s why I want to peel the onion layer back there. Because I think there are people that believe that right, there’s Oh, Wendy’s just always been positive. Brett’s always been positive? Well, maybe. But I think there’s a lot of training and a lot of work I’ve done to get to that point. And it sounds like you have as well.

Wendy Swire  22:17

Yeah. You know, I really leaned in heavily at the start of the pandemic on this field and mental resiliency, mental fitness. really double down on it. How do you make sure the ratio of are you in positive emotions or negative emotions? Which percentage are you in throughout the day? And really, really up that game? So I would say I’m pretty high in attitude. I don’t want to say 10. That’s a little arrogant, but I’m in the nines, probably.

Brett Gilliland  22:43

You’re feeling good! So the next one is your belief system. And let me let me kind of pre-give you some prework on this one. And so so your belief says, I am convinced that doing the professional world for two plus decades now, I know my belief systems, and I know that I can get into a debate, not an argument but a debate with people on things that I know work, that maybe somebody else doesn’t believe, if I were to ask you one or two things that you believe, to your core that will make you successful, what what are those things?

Wendy Swire  23:13

Okay, my belief system. One is you don’t have to be the sharpest tool in the shed, you can outwork everybody. Yep. And you can, you can, you know, I, I’m really smart. I mean, I work hard, there are people way smarter than I am. But I have a really strong work ethic. So go back to your fundamental skills. And we’re gonna, we know so many of you so many of your guests that you’ve listened to just you just keep at it, and you keep at it. So for me, I think that’s a really big belief. I think the other key belief is really get aligned to your values and what’s most important to you. And you know, what, what are you going after in life? For some people, it’s power money, others, it’s learning, making a difference, impact family, whatever it is, get clarity on that and stick to your True North because everyone else might have a different one, it doesn’t mean that they’re better or worse, they’re just different as when you’ve got your feet on the ground, and you know, your true north and you can get there. But if you’re in a rally, is it this? And I’m agnostic, it can be I as a coach, I have absolutely no value judgment. Yeah, who wants this or that good for them? As long as people know.

Brett Gilliland  24:25

Yeah. So the third one is action. So we got to take action. I’m a big big big believer in that that I can sit here and have the best business plan known to man I can be the best whatever. I can know more about stocks, bonds, mutual funds, investments and anybody in the world but if I don’t take action, it doesn’t freakin matter. Right? It’s like I always say people, you know, hockey people. I’m not a huge hockey guy, but if I had the best slap shot in the world, but I couldn’t ice skate. I’m a terrible hockey player. Right? So if we don’t take action so when you when you hear that word action, one or two things, what comes to mind? And then if I I followed you around every single day. What is again one or two things that I would see day in and day out that Wendy’s doing?

Wendy Swire  25:07

Yeah, well, let’s let’s pick up with your sports metaphor because I’m a big sports fan. I have two kids, two boys and a husband. We do a lot of sports talk here. I think there’s one is not only can you take action, but let’s go to the famous. Not sure. I’m not sure which hockey player said this, but you got to take the shot on goal. 

Brett Gilliland  25:26

Yeah. 

Wendy Swire  25:27

Okay, you got to get the shot on goal. So are you taking shots on goal? You got to try.

Brett Gilliland  25:31

Yeah, Wayne Gretzky, right? You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.

Wendy Swire  25:34

100%. So you know, are you taking a shot? And so go back to that quote, which is, are you taking a shot, and if it fails, it fails, you’re going to learn more and failure, I think that’s the first and get uncomfortable. The most successful people fail, and they learn from it and they grow from it. I am not as successful as I am, because of all of my successes is because all the things that I didn’t do, I didn’t learn. So please start taking those shots on goal. And realizing the fear is coming from that limbic reptile brain. So that’s, you know, you’re wired to do that. So you’ve got to overcome that. I think the second what would you see day in day out, I take my morning, my morning rituals really, really seriously. Whether that be morning, you know, meditation, a little bit of prayer, my gratitude, practice working out getting some exercise, I get outside, take the dogs out. So that’s why to do that I gotta go to bed early, which means I really, really prioritize sleep. I sleep a lot more people can’t believe I get a lot done. I’m super productive. And because of those two things.

Brett Gilliland  26:33

What time you go to bed at night?

26:35

I’m winding down, I’m trying to wind down by nine and read. Yeah, I lights out at 10. If I want to get up at 5:30-6. And not, I want, I need a lot of sleep because I know the brain science. And I and I am a fanatic about sleep particularly for you know, folks, your listeners who have kids, you know, you gotta get your kids off devices so they can learn the next day. So I might even my kids are in their 20s they know they’re like, “Oh, I sleep more than a lot of our peers.” So––

Brett Gilliland  27:04

Okay, I was gonna ask you that I was gonna ask how old your kids are and how that’s going. So I’ve got I’ve got four boys, I got a 17, 15, 12, and eight. You know, without naming names, some are better than others at sleeping and getting to bed. Right? So how do we do that help us parents right now. They’ve got this device, they want this dang device, right? Other than just obviously being the parent, we just got to take the device and put it away into another room. Other thoughts on that type of stuff? And how do we help our kids sleep more and get off these devices?

27:34

Oh, yeah. Well, I’m sure you’ve had guests or experts on this, like from parenting, but my experiences was teach them the brain science early. They’re like, yeah, you want to be good. You’re on the hockey team or the soccer team or you want to be good at school, you don’t get sleepy, you’re dumbed down. Period. Okay, so let them know. I mean, kids are smart and savvy today. The second thing you say you know that that device of yours is addictive. It’s as addictive as any, we don’t want our kids doing bad drugs do we? Or drinking too, no different. So just say, “Hey, you’re addicting your brain,” you know, Tik Tok videos they are designed to be I mean, they’re fun. They’re designed to addict you. So you got to let kids know you are fighting upstream by not you know, texting all night long. And again, I always link into what’s important to you. What’s important, these kids are very sophisticated. Is it and a lot of kids it’s being social. Okay. So again, you know, some of this, I think a parent’s duty to just say, hey, you know, but a lot of it is when you’re with your family. I mean, my best tip is as a parent is we did not have devices when we had mealtime. Even if you’re grabbing a car, even if we’re grabbing something from Starbucks, you got to drop some off to a soccer game was like, No, duh. I mean, there’s certain periods of the day. If and even if all you can do is like a Saturday night family or dinner, and I’m telling you, when eating pizza, no devices, and your kids won’t like it, but they’ll get used to it. And they’re gonna fight you it but it’s like, that’s just our rules. And you have to not do it. Okay, folks, you have to not be well who is that? Like? Who is the hockey player who said that, “you just don’t go on” or what it brought say what’s this about? You know, you don’t get on the screen to check a fact. You just don’t do it.

Brett Gilliland  29:15

Yeah, that’s great. That’s great advice. And it’s hard because you’re right, they are addictive and yeah, you even find yourself I don’t know about you, but like sometimes you do just want to just veg on the brain and scroll and look at some of those funny videos and but it man, it can suck you right it in, can’t it?

Wendy Swire  29:30

Yeah. Oh, yeah. No, the science is real on that. I mean, look, it’s fun, but just put a timer so I got 10 minutes to do it. And I always just say you’ll never get that 10 minutes back in your life. But okay, if you want to do it, I’m not you know, again, don’t judge yourself to say I’m going to let myself enjoy it. But it’s, understand that you are competing. Your little self will is competing against billions of dollars from very, very sophisticated technology firms trying to draw you in. Okay, you’re in competition. Yeah, you’re in competition. And I love by the way, I am not a Luddite. Like, I have social media and I, but I monitor, everything is off my phone note. And I just am really, really conscious. I’m a consumer of how I use it. So when I do Facebook, or I’m going to update LinkedIn, and you know, tell people how much I love, being on the podcast, I just do it in blocks, and I’m intentional. And then I stop. You gotta train your brain, man, you got to train your brain.

Brett Gilliland  30:31

That’s great. So the last one is results. So we’ve got a great attitude, we’ve got a belief system, we’re taking action every single day, now we have results. So when you think about that, how do you think I know the answer this, but might as well ask the question anyways: How do you focus on results for you personally, or for your clients?

Wendy Swire  30:52

Okay, that’s a really, you know, that actually, to me, is a pretty deep question, because we’re all going to define results differently. Absolutely. For some people results is I do a good day at work, I finish a fight, and I’m with my family, others, it’s like, no, I want to achieve this promotion or milestones. So I think it’s getting really clear, what does success look like with your results? What are your benchmarks? What are your measures? What aspect of the result is going to make you feel successful? So for many people, I find that a lot of clients are very successful executives. And they’re starting to wonder. So then I just got to keep chasing, going to the next thing. And I’ll say what, in that result, what is success? Like, what is it? What are you going after? That gets back to your question about I mean, for me know, your values know, what’s, what you’re going after. So I think for results, I will my mind is pretty simple. Because I just want to make a positive impact in the world, I want to I want to ignite positive change in the world, through my clients, you know, in my organization’s for individuals I work with, so I know I’m achieving results. If I know I’m helping people. And I’m in a field where I get to do that. So again, the more that you can tie into at the end of this day, you know, let’s go fat go forward, to go backwards, right. At the end of the day, you know, I wanted the client, it’s a very powerful coaching exercise. And for your listeners, you know, write your obituary now. Yeah. And a lot of coaches may if you if you work, they’ll I don’t deal with everybody. I won’t do with all my clients because they don’t want to think about death or mortality. But write your obituary, like, what do you want to be remembered for? Well, those are the results, then make sure that that’s that you’re doing it. So it’s just really get clarity on what you want to achieve. And once you have clarity, a lot of stuff falls into place.

Brett Gilliland  32:43

Like that. I like it a lot. This is all been great. So a couple fun questions. I don’t know do they have in Maryland? Did they do the Powerball lottery thing?

Wendy Swire  32:50

They do. They do.

Brett Gilliland  32:52

Well I, I have never I’ve never been a lottery person. I’ve never done it. We’re in a gas station. Where can my took my three older boys, we went to the Notre Dame football game this past week. We get to rush the field, which was pretty cool us and our, you know, 2000 closest friends and I thought we’re gonna die when during, you know, everybody’s trying to get off the field. But anyway, we’re on the way home and there’s a sign it says $1.9 billion, right for the Powerball. So I mean, the boys pick some numbers and we’re gonna you know, we’re we keep telling ourselves, we’re going to wake up billionaires tomorrow morning. But anyway, we just–– what’s that?

Wendy Swire  33:25

I’m rooting for you and your boys.

Brett Gilliland  33:27

Thank you. And so I just played the game with my wife this morning. And then some guys at work. We went to lunch today if you win the $1.9 billion lottery tonight. What’s what’s the first two or three things you would do?

Wendy Swire  33:40

Oh, I love that question. I’m gonna give I look I have a really lucky life, what’s the first couple things I’m doing? I’m gonna give a heck of a lot of it away and I’m gonna start a foundation, for sure. What am I going to do? I’m probably going to buy a really nice house on the lake for my husband. Adirondacks. And I’m going to buy him a beautiful sailboat and kayak. I’ll probably do so I’m probably going to do some stuff to like spoil. spoil my loved ones, but I do so my husband is great. I’d probably––

Brett Gilliland  34:06

It’s a lot of fun though, isn’t it? I mean, the thing about okay, I said today a little bit larger. So I think I’m gonna take 100 million and I’m gonna go I’m gonna pay everybody’s house off in the firm. And I’m gonna better be careful this now right I’m gonna hear all this and it’s on record. We’re gonna pay everybody’s house on the firm off pay all my family’s houses off. And, and then, you know, give a ton of it away, go buy a house, the beach house in Watercolored, Florida.

Wendy Swire  34:32

Oh, I’m getting a house for those listeners up in the Adirondacks.

Brett Gilliland  34:36

Like, like, if I steal your cell phone from you, what’s the one thing that I cannot delete the you need to continue the life that you’re living right now?

Wendy Swire  34:46

Oh gosh, my virtual admins. Nation. Shout out to Katie. What do I need? I need my calendar. I do need my emails, I probably well for productivity I need those things, I think for just pure joy and to make sure I get all of that gratitude is old photos.

Brett Gilliland  35:06

Yeah, I’m a big photo person myself. And what is it you wish you had more time to do but right now in the season of life you’re in, there’s just not enough hours in the day?

Wendy Swire  35:16

Oh gosh, I love I love to move. I’d love to to spend a little bit more time I haven’t ever ever worked out but there’s always more you can add if you had more time. And I’m an avid, avid avid reader, and there’s just way too many books. I probably have 10 books. I read multiple books at a time. I probably have 10 there. I would just I spent a lot of time reading so I can never ever not read. I would do more of that.

Brett Gilliland  35:39

I love it. I love it. Well, thank you so much. Wendy Sherwin Swire, we will send people your way. I know you’ve also set up a link. I think I have to get glasses here, but it’s the Swiresolutions.com/circuit-of-success-podcast/ again. So yeah, put that in the show links. So thanks so much for setting that up. And we’ll send people there. Where else can our listeners find more of you? 

Wendy Swire  36:04

Yeah, well, I would encourage Yeah, this is a special page we created for listeners of Brett show. It’s HTTPS/swiresolutions.com/circuit-of-success-podcast. So there I have some questions and things just for podcast listeners. But you can always go to Swiresolutions.com and awesome. Thank you so much. Wow, what fun! Felt like two minutes. It was great.

Brett Gilliland  36:28

Great conversation. Appreciate you being on the show, Wendy. And if you have anything in the future, please let us know.

Wendy Swire  36:34

Thank you. Thank you to all the listeners. It was a real privilege.

Chuck Hogan is the managing partner at Your Best Life, an organization helping people to elevate finance, family, fitness, and faith to maximize their best life through mentor strategizing, community and exclusive once in a lifetime experiences. Hogan's unique background of sales, business, and relationship building gives him a rare perspective that enables him to successfully guide entrepreneurs, CEOs, and other top executives to new heights.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION

Brett Gilliland  00:02

Welcome to The Circuit of Success. I am your host Brett Gilliland, and today I've got Chuck Hogan, Chuck how you doing, man? 

Chuck Hogan  00:08

Wonderful brother. Great to be here today. 

Brett Gilliland  00:09

Great to have you. How's beautiful Dallas, Texas? 

Chuck Hogan  00:12

It is absolutely gorgeous. It is, I mean, it looked–– fall setting in. 

Brett Gilliland  00:16

It is!

Chuck Hogan  00:17

High 50s, low 70s and it is freakishly gorgeous out. 

Brett Gilliland  00:21

That's awesome. So I'll tell you good unseasonally warm I think here, for you know, today is Halloween day as we're recording this and it's, you know, it's like almost 60 degrees. That's good here in St. Louis. We'll take it. 

Chuck Hogan  00:33

Hey, if snow's the alternative. Yes, the answer is yes. 

Brett Gilliland  00:37

That's right. That's right. I've tried to think Dallas, was it two forks and a knife or two? What's the name of the steakhouse there? I've been there a few times. 

Chuck Hogan  00:46

Oh, my goodness. Yeah. Two Forks is a big one. If you're in the barbecue that Hard 8 the feast, too I mean, seriously, if cattle is your game, then Dallas but again, St. Louis barbecue is –– 

Brett Gilliland  00:59

So absolutely. 

Chuck Hogan  01:00

You just say I'll send you some of mine. If you'll send me some of yours. 

Brett Gilliland  01:04

All right, we'll get on that man! So, well Chuck, you are the managing partner at Your Best Life. It's an organization helping people elevate, which I love right here: finance, family, fitness, and faith before we started recording you and I we're talking about our F's, mine's F to the fifth power, your faith, your family, your fitness, your fun, and your firm, which for me is work. But you and that's what you do. So to maximize the best life through mentoring strategies, community exclusive, once in a lifetime experiences which I'm some sure we'll get into. You've got a unique background: sales and business and relationship building, gives you a huge perspective on working with folks. So excited to dive into that today. But if you could Chuck, just maybe give us a little lay of the land and what's made you the man you are today? 

Chuck Hogan  01:47

Sure. You know, quite frankly, about 30 years ago, I decided that I've always been kind of a study of human behavior. But 22 years ago, when my wife and I found out, she was having our first child, I was like, Whoa, where's the instruction manual?  And I was like, Okay, I better get my act in gear and business had already been propagating successfully. But to be honest with you, Brett, I was like going, oh, you know how to be a better man. And it started really coming down to understanding why I do what I do. What moves me. And I realized that I had been filled through my out my childhood. I'm the son of a military family. So yes, 30 years in the Navy. I'm from Japan. Originally, my mom's Japanese. My dad's Irish. When I say Japanese and Irish. I'm talking 85 pounds or 11 and a half, portable. And then a redhead, blue-eyed Irish dad. I mean, so the real deal, the real deal. I mean, when you go melting pot, you're like, the answer is yes. And so you asked and so I'll just give it to you straight. I was very confused kid. Back in the 60s, lots of socio economic, I'll say variances, but more so I'll say racial barriers and living in Maine as a kid coming over from Japan. Charles Francis Hogan, a second named after my Irish grandfather, not looking very Irish. And in Japan, I'm half Japanese. So I'm not full Japanese. So I kind of felt like a kid without a country. So moving forward to when Cole, my son was born. I was like, man, there's this guy named Tony Robbins. So I started spending some time with him and actually was involved with his environment for over 22 years. Just recently now it was a senior trainer, volunteer trainer I should clarify volunteer trainer for Mr. Robbins and what was cool about that is I got to see a lot of different parts of life but the same the same strategy kept playing out I see people going, "oh you know if I just learn one more thing I learned another way to make money or learn another tax strategy and other tax hedge" I go "okay, so you've got more money. What do you do with it?" They go, "I'm still not happy."

Brett Gilliland  02:02

Yeah. 

Chuck Hogan  03:56

And so I've met DECA incentive millionaires. I've met billionaires. Some of them are elated because they they're living that life of contribution now and they knew how to give back. And God bless you and your wife, Julie, for doing what you do for cancer research and helping support families as a cancer conquerer myself, in '09, that we're talking about and experiencing it are very different things. And so my heart goes out to you and your lovely wife. My wife's name is Julie, by the way as well. 

Brett Gilliland  04:24

Ah, there you go.

Chuck Hogan  04:25

Hey, yeah, we married right, brother. I got the memo. That's right. So quite frankly, your best life and the way I live my life is by a very simple tenant, you can be doing your best but not being your best. I choose to be my best. So every day I'll do my best. And kind of a family motto and that's it's so simple, but living in you. Trusting in you, being you, delivers more of you. And that means exercising and prioritizing things like self care, eating healthy, working out, maintaining your health and vitality. Because if you don't have the oxygen mask on you first you're no good to anybody.

Brett Gilliland  05:03

Yeah, I love that. And so when I when I read that earlier, so let's dive more into that statement you just made as you can do your best, and not be your best. Talk to me about that. 

Chuck Hogan  05:14

Sure. So oftentimes, we'll even ask people, and it's a subconscious way of communicating. I've been certified in neurolinguistics programming and neurosis, conditioning, hypnotherapy for the better part of 20 years now. And what I can tell you is language patterns make a big difference. So when you ask someone how they're doing, it's a cognitive question. It's a cognitive ask, you're asking someone how they do. And so they go into process. Oh, how I do Oh, man, I'm busy. I'm busier than a one on wallpaper hanger. I got all kinds of things and stuff. I mean, my wife has a nickname for me on the weekends. And that's Manny Laborie for manual labor, because I know what the honey do list is not going anywhere. So part of this is is that how do we clearly identify how we're being because a call your life is how you feel? So if I asked you instead, and I got Brett, how are you feeling? You go, I'm grateful. I'm blessed. I'm happy. I'm elated. I'm contributory. I feel valued. So yes. And I have a very fundamental belief. I'm a very simple guy. I've really also migrated towards reducing all the waste, if you will. Or I'll just say simplifying. My wife calls it drama reduction. And I go Yes. With three tweens. And in, you know, the proximity to in college and one at home still. Yes, sir. And so what I realized was, is that at our core, we're all three years old still. We are when you're three, you really only have three responses. Happy, sad, or okay. You start getting into school, and then you start going, Oh, I'm elated. I'm overjoyed. Oh, you know, I'm, I'm excited mom and dad is like, okay, great. And when you're excited, does that make you feel happy? Yeah, when someone tells me oh, you know, if I felt more like a philanthropist, if I felt more contributory if I didn't feel marginalized, like Okay, great. When you do feel marginalized, how's that make you feel? Sad. Oh, but normally find these wonderful adjectives to go ahead and start to create layers of, you know, say balance I go. At the end of the day, your three, happy sad or okay. 

Brett Gilliland  07:09

And that's okay. 

Chuck Hogan  07:10

Yeah, and the worst thing is living in, is okay. Because that's survival. That's, that is the you can't measure what doesn't move. And so when people I'm okay, and I go, okay, so you're getting by they go, yes. Oh, you're doing your best. Ah, okay. And I swear, realizing there's a lot of people we're living in this marginalized sense of well being, which is getting by, doing your best. There's no thrive in their ideology. There's no expansion. So if the premise holds true, and we say progress equals happiness, which I do believe that that's any progress a millimeter or a mile. Of course, we're shooting for the mob, but that millimeter could have been the deciding factor. That was the spark that was the you know, jump off point. I go, okay, cool. So a millimeter or a mile progress equals happiness, what feeds progress? When I got this, shifted everything.

Brett Gilliland  08:04

And so I hear you say that about the feeling part. I wrote that down, as you know, more asking people how you feel versus how you're doing. I love that. But at the same time, Travis Thomas, who's the performance coach for the men's national team for getting ready for the World Cup? Yep, he was on a couple of weeks ago, and he talked about feelings aren't an indicator of performance. And what he meant by that was, if I ask you how you're feeling fired up, you know, I'm, I'm great. I'm gonna go out and score this goal, or I'm gonna do that. I mean, it doesn't really matter what you feel right. But I think it's a difference when we're going out to perform in a soccer field or in a business meeting. Yeah, it surely matters. But that's just how I'm feeling. 

Chuck Hogan  08:42

Yeah, but that's where standards shift. So I'll put it a different way. Well, let's test the theory. Okay, so you're driving in your car. And all of a sudden, someone cuts you off. I mean, like, they just rip across from the inside lane all the way in, they exit the off ramp, and they literally almost clip your car. 

Brett Gilliland  09:00

Yep. 

Chuck Hogan  09:00

And people go, Oh, that jerk that moron and I go, Oh, wait, wait, wait. So you had a feeling? See? Here's the difference. Feelings always come first. Yeah, they do. You think about it afterwards. Because if I say that was a father whose son was hit by a car, he realized that's the only exit he can take to get him to the emergency room to save his life. They go, Oh, my gosh, is he all right? Wait a second. The second ago, he was a jerk. So the mind distorts delete and generalizes information is the only way you survive, because you have billions of terabytes of data that are flowing through you at any second. And they go oh, that's baloney. I said really? What are you hearing right now? What do you feel on your skin where focus goes energy flows. So if all of a sudden we change where the focus flows, you change the entire experience. I said, Okay, wait. So how do you feel about that? So there are some guiding principles, and I agree with what this coach says. But the truth is you are how you feel. Because here's the deal. We were told as children, you can do anything you put your mind to. Not true. Because your mind doesn't know what's real or perceived. And on the other side, where focus goes, energy flows. So if I were to say you, Brett, as you look around that beautiful studio, I don't want you to look for anything that's brown. In fact, I want you to ignore the brown, as you look around, don't look for the brown. In fact, I know you're an achiever. So you'll make bay stuff brown too. Now, if I ask you to close your eyes, I said, Tell me everything that's blue. You may be able to guess at one or two things, but you will not be able to say with certainty what they were why? Because your focus was against going towards something I asked you not to look for them to do. Yeah. So when people are trying to move away from things, that's why if you're trying to move away from problems, you get more problems. So the focus should be the antithesis, which is prosperity, opportunities, what feeds progress is possibilities. Some people might call that compelling future.

Brett Gilliland  11:02

Yeah I was just gonna say, so how do we do that? Notice, right, so how do I focus on that and you said to your compelling future, you can see this f greater than p, this is your future greater than your past. That's our firm's mission, it's my mission, it is to help people achieve a future greater than your past. And so when you hear that, and based on everything, you just saying, how do you slow down enough to do that, though, when maybe you don't want to or it's a bad crappy day out, you're in the dumps? How do we do that? 

Chuck Hogan  11:29

So there's a couple of ways. First thing is, is that anytime we change any one of these three, I'll say, aspects of a behavior. And I'm going to borrow just from behavioral sciences for a moment, it's called the triad you have physiology, focus, and language. So there's a rule with this physiology first. So one of the things that people do is they'll get up and start moving their body. In fact, some of the most productive business people cannot sit at a desk and have a conversation. They can't they have to be moving around. These are the people that put the wear patterns in their area rugs around their conference table. Why? Because it seems like they're running laps, but they are engaged and in a state of productivity. Motion creates emotion. If we want to test the theory, you've been doing this, since you were a child, before you could speak, you would have a physiological response. If you are hungry, you wet yourself or you were tired. What would that be? Well, if you were happy, you smile. If you were sad, you might have pounded and cried. And if you were okay, you just sat there staring off into deep space, waiting for one of those other things to happen. Now, why is this important to note? Well, unconsciously, we are conditioned from the time that we're zero to seven years old, as to what our I'll just say "value systems" are, we inherited them from the environments that we were raised in. So anything that we heard loud noises, flashes, things, there are people who go back into childhood regression, and are going where did you become so sensitive to light or loud noises? And they're going, Oh, you know, I don't know. And then they go back and they go, Oh, my gosh, I heard these things. How old were you? I think I was 18 months old. Wait, what? But it's in your unconscious? It's throughout you the cognitive mind. Again, because it distorts elite and generalizes information will selectively get rid of things. So to your point, how do we get back to center two ways real easy. In fact, Navy SEALs do this. And those that are trained in elite, stressful exercises, they actually will do what they call box breathing. Yeah, two to one breathing. So box breathing is inhale for four, hold for four, exhale for four, and hold for four. And they'll do cycles of this. And what they started finding was their heart rate slows down, the EKG and the EEG of the brain, the waveform of the brain and the heart, actually go into sinus rhythm together. So the coolest thing when we slow down, the tendency in the human condition is though, when things happen, we speed up, we put our foot all the way down on the gas pedal like whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, if you're on a windy road that you've never driven on before, and it's foggy, you don't push down on the on the gas pedal, foot off the gas pedal and you become more acutely aware by doing what slowing down doesn't mean stopping doesn't mean retarding your growth and moving backwards. It means you slow down because all pain that we affiliate to is we're in the past, all of it. All fears in the future. What's coming up ahead. Where's the connection? Love contribution. Now, favorite quote from an unbelievable philosopher. "Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. So be grateful for today because it's a gift called the present." I will quote this great philosopher, Master Oogway, Kung Fu Panda.

Brett Gilliland  14:54

That's right. That's right. Yeah, that's right. So I mean, are you, you or your clients, whoever that may be, are you like I use a journal, I use a black journal. I'm constantly in my journals writing down and dreaming, strategizing and stuff. So is that a process that you use to go through that? 

Chuck Hogan  15:11

Every day? In fact, there's a simple two and a half minute process that I love going through with clients. Because what we started noticing was, is that most people account for their finances. Most people do not account for their time. Yeah, in fact, most people throw away time. And they wonder why they don't have enough net time to be able to accomplish the things that they aspire to achieve. And I go, Okay, well, tell me, where are you investing your time? And they go, oh, man, you know, I have a couple calls today. Okay, well, how much time you have blocked out, they go, Oh, I've got our, I've got an hour. I was like, well, whoa, it takes an hour for you to have a phone conversation. They go, Oh, no, that was only five minutes. And I go, what do you do for the other 55 minutes. They don't account for their time, they just throw it away. And here's the interesting part. And I'm sure Brett, you hear this all the time. And that is fill your mind with resourceful and nourishing information. Because the way that the brain functions is it doesn't forget anything that it hears, the difference is is whether your cognitive and you've actually decided this is worthwhile data. So people go to an event or go to a seminar. In fact, they'll even go to become coaches, you know, they go, I'm going to be a coach. That's awesome. Good for you. Then they go, Yeah, man. And after this weekend, I'm going to be certified as a life coach. And I'm like, okay, they go, you don't seem like convinced. I said, Well, I'm not like, Well, dude, you're you're just you're just jelly. You're jealous. And I go, Sure. That's it. And they go, Okay, wait, I know, you too. Well, Chuck, what what? What's your take? I said, Well, let me ask you something. If you went to flight training for three days, never flown a plane before. And you're gonna go ahead and tell me that you're going to learn enough in three days, where you could not only fly, you'd be willing to take your entire flammer family up in a plane solo, and then mirror and teach your wife and your kids how to fly this plane. That's what you're telling me after three days that you have the aptitude, the skill, set, the experience, the knowledge, the saturation, I said, you have a marinated enough in this, you have a limited amount of knowledge. And based on your current life conditions, you're making a decision. And so would you do this with like, going into an investment and spending all your life savings, your kids college fund? And they go Oh, heck no. Is it? Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, but you're willing to go out and take on the title of someone who's a mentor, a coach, and treat, teach other people. I said, Okay, great. Um, you're on your third marriage, you gotta teach them about marital status. Give it a fruitful relationship. You're estranged from your kids, you're gonna teach them about child rearing? How many successful businesses if you run? Can you go ahead and tell me about vertical integrated marketplaces and supply chain management and, and what C suites levels are looking for? Can you tell me about the sales and marketing of your bid? And then I go, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, dude dude dude. I'm just a coach. I go, Whoa, that's why I prefer to mentor strategist. Like, within organization, you have to have lived the lifestyle man, you have to have to like––

Brett Gilliland  18:13

You have to have the street cred, right? I mean, it's I've been doing this for two decades. And I know more about this stuff than anybody can learn in a three day workshop to try to go be this life coach. And that stuff drives me nuts. And so but I think there is something on a different topic for that is, is the how do you get that out, though? Right. So how do you get that life experience out of our brains? 

Chuck Hogan  18:37

Yes. 

Brett Gilliland  18:37

And to the people that need to hear it? And how do we help them make an impact? There's people driving right now that are stuck someplace, right? And whether they want to admit it or not, they're miserable. I know, for me, I was stuck for a while. And like you made this comment earlier as my income was going like that. Yep, my job satisfaction was going on. And I took a massive risk to leave and start a firm and but I don't think everybody's going to do that. Right. And nor should maybe everybody do that. So how do you get unstuck, if you will, and try to turn that trajectory around to have more joy and laughter in life versus maybe pain and anger in life? 

Chuck Hogan  19:13

Well, and you hit the nail on the head, your your beautiful segue, well, you're just letting these things out, man, I love, again, Sage experience and wisdom. So part of this is, is that people will do more to avoid pain than they'll do to give themselves pleasure. And so there's a difference between what I'll say our natural skill sets are and our adaptive skill sets. So folks have been educated through schooling and modern education. Now, what is your ranking in school? What is your pedigree? Where do you stand in your class? And it's like, oh, and then What school did you go to? Are you from an Ivy League school and all of a sudden it's like, Whoa, that makes a difference. Or did you go to Eastern Illinois University or Northwestern did you go to the––

Brett Gilliland  19:55

Ivy is the Harvard of the Midwest, just so you know, Eastern Illinois University.

20:00

No,

Chuck Hogan  20:00

No, no, no, I'm with you. And the deal is, is that it's, the answer is yes. That education is education. And what happens is, is that how is it exercised? So to your point sharing is caring. There are a lot of people that have shelf health knowledge. They have books and books and books, they've been to seminars, they've been at courses, and they haven't gone back into any of that data. And furthermore, it's kind of like having a home gym. If your apparatus is used for hanging clothes on. 

Brett Gilliland  20:29

Yeah.

Chuck Hogan  20:30

Then it's being misused. Why do I say this? Because the equipment was made for a purpose, but it's being used for other alternatives. And they go, Oh, no, it's yes, and I go, Oh, so you're on the treadmill while your clothes are hanging off the drying? I don't think so. Because at least the way I run, there's no way that clothes could hang on that treadmill. 

Brett Gilliland  20:49

Right.

Chuck Hogan  20:50

Why do I say this? It's only functional if you use it, apply it. And it doesn't mean that you're proficient with it. The first time you play tennis, you don't pick up the rack go. Oh, yeah. Beonborg. Jimmy McEnroe? You know? Nadel? No, the answer is no. It's like, oh, my gosh, that was a whoopin. One set like, cook me. And it's like, okay, great, or golf, for that matter. I go, I love what Robin Williams say, he goes, Hey, you know what we're going to do? We're going to put a whole tooth, 200 yards away. And we're going to make you walk it. And every time you hit it, you think you're having a stroke. And so why do I share this with the ordinary things done consistently produce extraordinary results. But we got to move away from thinking that if we put our mind to it, we can achieve it. It's what you put your heart to. It's what you decide has enough value to you that it aligns with your morals, your rules and your outcomes. And I'm not talking about goals. Here's the fallacy. Most people will prognosticate goals that aren't even theirs. They're not even there's Oh, well, we should have a 200% increase in revenue this year. And my god, based on what? They go oh, well, last year, we had 100% revenue growth and I go yes. What do you attribute that to? We got lucky on two big orders? I go. Okay, are those orders coming in this year? Can you count? No, but dude, I am hoping that we're gonna get some more big orders. I go, are you marketing towards that? And not really. Hopium is the biggest addictive drug way more than sugar. People hoping that prosperity is going to fall into their lap. I go, hoping to win the lotto they go, that would be awesome. Did you buy tickets? Nope. You're hoping someone's gonna give you one of those too? If you're not an active participant, your own salvation, you need to slow down and reevaluate what matters most to you in life. And feeling way more than things and stuff come and go. You and I experienced this as parents. Brett, how many times did your kids have a want? 

Brett Gilliland  22:57

Yeah, a lot. 

Chuck Hogan  22:58

Yeah. But that doesn't mean that their needs were being ignored? Yeah. Did they ever go without shoes, clothing, food, water, you know, athletic equipment, academic, you know, utensils, books? No, they had everything they needed. What they want is different. You're like, Oh, these Air Jordans are dead. My life would be brilliant, you know, if you like, going at $300 and they're custom painted by LeBron, you know? Or, or, you know, Michael, like, yeah, they should be enshrine, not on your feet. 

Brett Gilliland  23:32

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So what what what are you finding the people that you work with? And these are just the people that are the top of their game, no matter what industry that is, what let's talk about daily choices. I think those are huge, right? Like, for me, one of the big one is foods. I just got done with lunch. I went there. Yeah, like I like french fries, you know, but today I chose the salad. 

Chuck Hogan  23:56

Yep. 

Brett Gilliland  23:57

And so But while that sounds easy to people that may or may not have that problem, it is not easy for some people. And it's not easy maybe to get up at six o'clock and workout or do this or do that. So what are you finding the no-miss items are either for yourself, or the ones that you work with, or the best of their game? 

Chuck Hogan  24:14

Three things, three things. And it centers around body, mind and spirit. What I started noticing was is that most people did not budget for themselves out of 24 hours. So here's the one thing that's a constant burn rate time. At midnight, a new day was born. 

Brett Gilliland  24:34

Yep. 

Chuck Hogan  24:35

You get to decide what you're going to do with this 24 hours. So I started actually having clients color code their time. Anytime that is self care. That means sleeping, eating, showering, hygiene, any of that. That's all in my coding purple time. Now, why is this important? Because self care is not selfish. It's essential. 

Brett Gilliland  24:57

Yeah. 

Chuck Hogan  24:58

When you're sleeping your brain is detoxifying. You're actually eliminating waste out of your body that you don't even realize. So why is this important? Because people get up exhausted and they go, Oh, you're not sleeping well. So what's troubling you because that means your unconscious mind is unsettled. So I figured out a way around this, I started urging clients I said, take two and a half minutes a day, it's so fast and easy. So let's start off in the morning, when you get up in the morning, as soon as your eyes open, you take a deep breath in your heart starts beating, thank the universe, because you get another day, you get another day, whatever your religious faith is, just know that the universe has your back. Because through the night, you unconsciously not consciously, your heart was beating, and you had an exchange of taking in oxygen out of the air, releasing carbon dioxide. And it's like you're alive, your alive. 

Brett Gilliland  25:49

And you didn't even know it. 

Chuck Hogan  25:50

Didn't didn't elect it. So what if in the morning, you decided how you want to feel most often today? You just set it set the intention for the day, if that's happy, sad, whatever. People who unintentionally picks that I go, there are some people who unconsciously pick sad, or they'll pick the opposite which they'll go, I just want to move away from pain and I go, okay, then what's the opposite of that? Prosperity, opportunity, connection. Because here's what I know. And this is factual. Five, there's five human needs that are essential one air, you only got minutes without it. Two is water, you go days without it. Three is food, you'll go weeks without it. Fourth is lodging. Why? Because if you have a place to lay your head at night, and you can actually detox and take care of yourself, home is where the heart is. And the last one is love and connection. Now there's six essential human needs certainty. Some people call it security, or "the knowing" others, second is variety, what we call uncertainty, and there's an old saying, the call your life is in direct proportion to the amount of uncertainty that you can comfortably live with. There is significance. Fourth is love and connection. And the last few are growth and contribution, which are more spiritual. But the reason why I share these is the only one that crosses over and both is love and connection, the human condition is, is that we have an absolute need to feel important, connected, and necessary. The challenge is, is that 90% of the people walking this planet are dissatisfied with themselves. And they judge themselves constantly. The reason why I went back in earlier in our conversation, most people are picking outcomes and goals. And they're not even their own. And when they don't meet them 100% The brain tells you 99.9% Really, dude, you didn't have what it took to get it the point 1% and push it over the edge. You suck. Are you kidding me? Really, again, you always do this, you always fall short. we're our own worst critics and we berate ourselves. So what happens with outcomes and goals, especially those that we don't elect? We judge and then we try to back into an emotion of feeling and then we take mammoth action on it. And we wonder why there's a gap here, which is called not fulfilling, frustration, aggravation, because our life conditions aren't matching our expectations. And this isn't even real. So what if, what if you threw all that away? And you just started with? How do I want to feel most often? Why? I want to feel happy contributory I want to feel loved. Okay, great. Why? Because that makes me happy. Awesome. Here's the secret sauce. This allows you to hold on to anything. Anything that you hold valuable in near and dear. It's all about a feeling or a why anything you do? Well, let's go back to the soccer players. Why are they playing the game of soccer? They go Oh, because they get paid a lot of money. I said no, because they fell in love with a sport that fuels them that they are exceptional at. But here's the difference. Mike Tyson said this and I love this. They asked him "Hey, Mike, how's it feel to be the greatest of all time?" He goes, "I'm not the greatest of all time. Yeah, I'm not the greatest. I was a good boxer was a really good boxer." And they go "Yeah, Mike, but like, You mean, like you and your prime?" He goes, "Yeah. I mean, I hurt people. I was really good at it. Gus saw that he started training me" and he goes, "You can be great. You can be great because I became great. But I wasn't a good man. I was worth $500 million. And I wasn't a good man." He goes, "I'm a good man today." He goes, "I'm worth maybe three $4 million. I'm a good man. I'm a good father, a good friend. Because I struggle everyday with good man. Those I didn't have to struggle very hard to be a great boxer." People can live in their talents. There's a natural aptitude for it. And they living in that gift and then they get fostered through it. It's like, oh, it's so great. They're so good to go. No. That's why I have so much admiration for people who get out of like, very life altering conditions. So people go, Oh, you made it out of the hood. And I'm gonna go on oh my gosh, against all odds. And this person is now successful here like, why? Because their life conditions was not paralleled with their need their hunger, their desire, they go, I respect that every day and twice on Sundays. So to your point, when we move away from just the outcome, and we head in a direction, and here's the beautiful part about direction, we even have a pointer finger before we go headed in the right direction. And I go, Okay, well, what happens? Because my mismatch, your brain sometimes goes, What if you're heading the wrong direction I go, then yeah, of course, correct. You don't have to go all the way back to the fork in the road and make a left at Alburquerque. Instead of a right. There's this little thing called GPS. And now we have these maps. And this global positioning is like, you can actually figure out where the frick you are, and course correct from here now. And here's the best part, all the experiences and the learnings and the lessons that you get from this, I found the best gas stations, you know, the cleanest restrooms and, and best taco stands and the bed and breakfast on these little outskirt roads I didn't ever even know existed before. But there's a challenge with this. And this goes to the heart of what you're talking about with a soccer coach, we need to understand who we are. I'm a loving God, a gift from God, I have gifts and talents, I have a great sense of humor, I have a fast mind, I have the ability to speak and connect and communicate with people. I'm also really harsh on myself. So I'm going to move away from judging self, I'm going to be my best so I can do my best. I'm going to let go bereavement I'm going to let go of frustration and procrastination. Wow. Because now when I come up with this outcome and goal, it's a full body experience, there is no gap. And then I can take mammoth action. So this fuels the opportunity of being able to have a very fulfilling lifestyle. But again, I'm going to go back, setting the inspiration or the incantation, the morning the intention for the day, whatever that might be. And here's where it comes real. At the end of the day, just before you go to bed, you and take a minute and a half. So it was a minute the morning, maybe 30 seconds if you're being you know, overtly conservative. A minute, a half a night USA, how do you feel most often today? Wow. What what happened that allowed me to feel this way? Well, yeah, I had some conflicts. We had some disagreements we had, you know, some some really challenging situations. But we got through it through clear, authentic communication by being honest by being present. The better part is how do I want to feel tomorrow. So before you go to bed, and you go into this unconsciousness, you actually set the intention. So you set that beacon at night before you go to bed. And as you close your eyes, you go to sleep you don't wake up the next morning when you ask. So if I want to feel most often today, you can either affirm it, or you can shift it. The beautiful part is is that and now you're beginning and ending your day purposefully. And it only takes moments.

Brett Gilliland  32:58

I mean, 1,000% agree with that. I've been doing that for years. I think it's how we go to bed at night matters. You know, are you just crashing? You know, finishing your soda and going to bed? Are you you know, are you staying healthy, do whatever you need to be doing. But I think that self talk at the end of the day. It's critically important because again, we talked about this earlier, but once you expand on what you focus on expands, right. And if I'm focusing on being the best version of myself, I'm focusing on making an impact tomorrow. And then I wake up and say the same thing. That's my choice. Every day is my choice, right to go out and do that. And I'm putting it out in the universe. It happens yeah.

Chuck Hogan  33:38

Bear O'Brien said it. He goes that Today's a gift Today's a new day, how do I choose to spend it because it was blessed you with this 24 hours. And what I started realizing was is that most people devalue themselves to the point where everybody else is important. As parents, we live for our kids, we will sacrifice everything will move our schedules around, we'll do what we get to do and need to do. And I go okay, so let's look at that for a second. They go 20 out of 24 hours with 90 minutes a day was yours. unadulterated. Without any apology. It was yours. To feed your body, mind and spirit, I believe in a 3030 30 Move your body for 30 minutes, feed your mind for 30 minutes, feed your spirit for 30 minutes. So if that's a meditation, if that's in, you know, prayer, yoga, whatever the case might be for you to connect with self deeply and your Creator or the universe. Being the son of a Buddhist and a Roman Catholic. It was like, Okay, thank you God. And I'm gonna come back as a doorknob. You know, it's like, what's going on here? On the other side of it, I would said and this was probably my biggest life lesson about 20 years ago. I'm coming home from work, and I'm exhausted, and my wife is pregnant with our second child, and we have Cole and he's a toddler too, and some change. And Julie just wants to talk. And I'm like, Baby, I love you. But I've been talking all day. Just concept like we have a word bank. And I was at a deficit like I'm, I'm in the red. I use, this was Monday, and I'd already used up the Thursdays, you know, number of languaging and words, right. And so we didn't talk. And I could tell that she was growing more distant and aggravated. And as she's getting bigger with Marina, and long story short, it hit me like a ton of bricks. And I said, Okay, why am I working so hard? You know, here, I'm going through all this self help stuff and trying to learn and I said, my family deserves the best of me and not what's left of me. I'll move heaven and earth, for every client, I will show up, I will be fully present. I will, you know, shut everything else out, blocked my calls, do what I go, but I don't do that. And that went great for about nine months. Marina's born, life is good. I'm the playful Daddy, I'm the one changing diapers at 2am, rocking the kids to sleep. But Julie rest, having great conversation, and I am whooped you know, get to one of my occupations at the time. And they're like, you're right. And I'm like, I'm great. What? That's perfect. Yeah, life is great, man. I'm feeling you know, I was in adrenal fatigue, I didn't even know it. Yeah, as I'm pulling into my driveway said, Thank you, universe, my family, and I deserve the best to me, and not what's left of me. I have forgotten all my rituals, I have forgotten all the things that helped make me healthy and happy and full and whole. And so my family inadvertently was getting the adrenal push through best of me, but not the authentic, present, loving, guided daddy, and husband. And when I made that shift, Brett, oh, my gosh, it shifted everything. But it came from doing one thing slowing down. Anyone who knows me, I'm a high energy guy, when I'm on task, I'm in it to win it. But then I realized too, and I live with Simon Sinek says there is no such thing as winning. There isn't. There's finite or infinite mindset, finite mindset, you know, some of the players. In fact, actually, let me rephrase that finite player, finite ideology, you know, all the players in the game, all of them. In fact, you know, all the players in the game, and you know, the rules of the game. And when someone breaks the rules, they get penalized. Kind of like the bad referees. Whether or not you are engaged in that or not, doesn't make a difference, other people's judgement of you, and regulations and different things. But those are the rules that we that's what we signed up for. Here's the bigger part, the outcome is to win the game. So there's only two possibilities. Actually, there's three there's Win, lose or draw. But for most people, if they draw, they think they're losing, they don't go winning, they are losing. So I love infinite mindset, which is, you know, some of the players, but you only know the players up to a point because as you're growing and evolving, you're actually inviting through resonance frequency and through education and momentum and growth, other people in your world. The second part is there aren't any rules. There's only value alignment. Which means Oh, belief systems. Gosh, he's a really good guy. I liked this Brett. He's an amazing guy. I met his wife. Oh my gosh, they run a nonprofit. Yeah. kindred spirits. It's like I love this. But here's the best part. The outcome of the game is to stay in it for as long as you can. To live a full and fruitful life. Wow. That means there's more opportunities where every month everywhere and that life of prosperity, that simple, but most people's mindsets, and this is where they get the disconnect. And this is where sports with all due respect to coaches, they've got it wrong. Because it's such a conditioned environment. So it's there aren't exceptions. There's rules. There's roles and these are the rules. This is the protocol this what you Okay, okay, okay, okay. There's different ways to score goals. Have you ever seen someone who's in the game was having so much frickin fun? That they seem like they're running circles around everyone else? And you're going Dang, why is that kid smiling all the time? He just seems freakin happy he is because he's playing the game. And yes, the outcome is to win but in his model the world he's there to show up and have the best freakin time he can.

Brett Gilliland  39:41

So I think he's living in his he's living in his value system right? I mean, that's why you're having fun and so it's it's this vicious cycle that just continues to run, run, run and no matter how many times we know what we need to do we know we need to exercise we know we need to drink a lot of water. We know we need to eat right? But it's like the world we live in is so fast. To your point earlier. And I always say this too is we got to slow down to speed up. Is it without clarity, right? Whether it's written down or not without clarity, it's a confusing world Man is coming at you from every damn direction you can possibly think of. And so our clarity has to come from us writing it down, and the discipline to review it day in and day out and follow the plan long. You don't want to. 

Chuck Hogan  40:23

In time block. 

Brett Gilliland  40:25

Yeah. I agree with that. I have my calendar right here, is color coordinated. Sure. 

Chuck Hogan  40:29

Absolutely. And that's one of the reasons why I started with this color coordination. In fact, I even took it into business and said, Okay, let's look at it a different way. What if every engagement or there's a commitment was read, it's an opportunity, like you're a bowl, and it's a red flag, and you're, you're going for it? We're all opportunities. And I said, but you're not going to time block and 15 or 20 hour blocks, you can time block and 15 minute blocks. If you need an hour, and then you take for 15 minute blocks in your time together no big deal. But the outcome is to convert it to a shade of green. The green is is that oh I make connection with someone there a new client? Light green. Oh, I texted or emailed them. Like re made a phone call left a message like rate. Hey, we have an appointment next Thursday, medium green. Why? Because there's a commitment. Now we're an engagement. Hey, they're a client. Now they signed on board dark green. Now if I started going through my calendar, I see a bunch of red in his squandered opportunity, and we didn't do anything with that net time. Well, then shame on you. But if we're converting, and we're like, oh, yeah, that was a prospecting month. How do you know that? Because look at all the light green on my schedule, right? You know, and all of a sudden, now you have a gauge because again, you can't change or move. What you don't measure. If it's not moving, you can't measure it. So I go Okay, then let's go ahead and be deliberate about what we're looking for.

Brett Gilliland  41:49

Being deliberate, man, you gotta be deliberate. And again, I keep saying this even on this interview today, but even when you don't want to mean that that's the key right showing up even when you don't want to do it. So, Chuck, this has been awesome, man. And where do our listeners find more of Chuck Hogan? 

Chuck Hogan  42:02

Oh, you know what? You can go it's real simple. YBLnow.com

Brett Gilliland  42:07

I YBLnow.com We'll put that in the show notes. 

Chuck Hogan  42:11

It's for Your Best Life, we figure if you're gonna live life live your best life you already in it. Yet so let's get in it to win it and and to enjoy and to connect with other like minded lighthearted people.

Brett Gilliland  42:23

Love it. We'll put YBL on the on the show notes and we'll send them your way man. And thanks so much for all the wisdom you shared with us today from Dallas, Texas brother. 

Chuck Hogan  42:31

It's a, I appreciate you, Brett, thank you very much.

"Power & Empower" is what Rebecca Kennedy stands for. Rebecca's background in dance, gymnastics and track & field laid a foundation for movement, fitness and body awareness that she brings to every Tread class. As a former bootcamp instructor, NFL cheerleader, Nike master trainer and more, Rebecca aims to make every workout the best part of the day by celebrating movement and empowering others through positivity.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION

Brett Gilliland  0:01  

Welcome to the Circuit of Success. I'm your host, Brett Gilliland and today I've got Rebecca Kennedy on the show. What's up, Rebecca?

Rebecca Kennedy  0:09  

Hi guys, what's up?

Brett Gilliland  0:10  

How are you?

Rebecca Kennedy  0:12  

I am excellent. I'm so excited to be here with you guys today.

Brett Gilliland  0:15  

We're excited to have you so you are the Peleton Master Instructor, you are a former NFL cheerleader, a US a gymnastics athlete, you are a dancer a celebrity trainer—oh, my goodness. You got a lot of stuff cooking. 

Rebecca Kennedy  0:31  

Yeah, I dabble in a few things here and there… definitely has been a full fun experience in the fitness industry over, over the last decade so far.

Brett Gilliland  0:43  

Absolutely. Well, you get the benefit of getting to workout for a living. So that's pretty nice. And some of us have to, you know, get up early in the morning or we got to do it at night. Or if you're like me I showed you earlier on the on the video. My Peloton sits in the corner of my office. We got to get our work in. But tell us for those of the people that maybe don't have a Peloton out there, people that are around me all the time. They're like, "Oh, here he goes again. He's gonna talk about the peloton." But it is a game changer. Tell us why your experience, why you think it is a game changer.

Rebecca Kennedy  1:13  

Yeah, I mean, gosh, there's just been so many hurdles for people to kind of obstacle their way over and find excuses not to bring fitness into their daily life. And in all honesty, it depends on where you live, I think we figured out a way to help people find fitness in their daily routine, whether it's for five minutes or for an hour, there's a way for you to be part of not just like your own fitness journey, but be part of a bigger community too. So you get to meet like minded people you have we figured out like the coaching. So I know being in the gym for so many years, I just saw I felt the pain of of those coming in and not knowing what to do. And not having a trainer or not wanting to join a class. And maybe the time didn't work out maybe a gym was too far away, like I know, I talk to so many new moms and dads that just like can't leave the house for like, you know, logistically to get a babysitter for you to like go to the gym for an hour. Like it's it's pretty tough. So I think we really figured out a way to bring the the spirit of group fitness and personal training into the into your home. Just you know, you said it yourself. Like if you're going to stare at your bike every day, right? You're trying to everyday you're going to use it.

Brett Gilliland  2:35  

Yeah. And I mean, just the equipment, just the physical aspect of it is amazing. I mean, it is the best stuff. You know, I've got another bike and treadmill and stuff like that at home. But nothing compares to that and and the nice screen and all this stuff I could go on and on. But I think people listen to the show. Obviously, fitness is usually a priority for most people. And it's really become a big priority of mine for the last year. But I've had to make it that way. And I will tell you that as a guy, I'm now 41 who thankfully had good genes and stayed skinny, but I've not been a normal workout person, right? So I'll do stuff here and there. I stay active with kids, I play basketball, I do those things. But, for me the peloton whether it's right here on the app, or if it's on the bike, or if it's on the treadmill, or I can go outside and listen to you guys and tell us what to do when we're running. Or if I'm walking the dog here walk this way, you know, take so much of the emotion and the difficulty out of working out.

Rebecca Kennedy  3:31  

Yeah, no, I mean, like having a friend there especially like connecting with, there's so many different trainers and instructors on the app that everyone will find someone that they really, really connect with. And you know, we all have our favorites. And I think it's helpful to have that familiarity and that camaraderie between just the people that are on the app and you meet each other and then having that person in your ear giving you the motivation. So even if you don't own a piece of hardware, which I also go on about that. I mean, gosh, I've taught on treadmills for so many years, and the wear and tear that it can put on your body with if you're not running on something that's like, like the peloton, right? Your joints are just like, getting beat over and over. But I mean, from the bike and it's so silent and smooth and really comfortable. And then the tread the slap belt. It's like if you haven't run on one before I can't wait for your back the first time you do it. I mean it's like driving a Ferrari I mean the speed and incline knobs they roll so you don't have to there's no buttons that you're typing in anything. It's not you kind of take the cumbersomeness  of a regular treadmill out of it.

Brett Gilliland  4:44  

So you don't have to kill yourself to raise your score.

Rebecca Kennedy  4:49  

Yeah, no kidding. It's just right there for you. You know.

Brett Gilliland  4:53  

That's awesome. Well, tell us about what you know what before we move off of that everybody always ask us when you say some about Peloton The question is always "Oh, who's your favorite instructor?" Right? Yeah, we got to ask you if you can't work out with yourself, Rebecca, on the Peloton app, who are you working out with? Maybe you can't say you don't want to make any of your friends mad, but…

Rebecca Kennedy  5:13  

No, they'll, they'll, I mean, everyone has their favorites. And I think just like you have your favorites, too. I love everyone for a different reason. But I'm a huge Hip Hop junkie. So if I'm on the bike, I'm obsessed with Alex Tucsonans Hip Hop rides. If I'm taking a yoga class, I absolutely adore Ross Rayburn. I love running with Vex Gentry. I stressed Andy spear just as a fun fact. Before he was an instructor with me on Peloton. Back in the day, he was my personal trainer. 

Brett Gilliland  5:50  

 Oh, no way. 

Rebecca Kennedy  5:51  

Yeah. So I love I love working out with Andy. I mean, you said you meditate yourself. So I'm using the app Aditi has like, I see her regularly. I'm like, Is it weird that I you're avoiding? This is like the last thing I hear before I go to bed every night.

Brett Gilliland  6:10  

I fall asleep to you every night and you just don't know it. Well, that's awesome. So give us a little background maybe if you can, what what helped maybe from your upbringing or college, whatever it may be. What's really kind of helped you become the woman you are today?

Rebecca Kennedy  6:27  

 Um, I partly I think it's just in my DNA. Like, you know, I, I grew up in a in a home that we were pretty active. My dad is very, very active. But my mom, this is back—I'm going to date myself a little bit. There was a lot of aerobics on TV that you could… Okay, yeah. So I saw my mom doing all those classes, because she had four kids at home. So she would she would pop in Gilad, and do that, you know, step aerobics, and then I would mimic that I was put into gymnastics and dance at age three. And I loved it. Because I started walking at 10 months, I was crawling and everything I was just, I couldn't be stopped. I love, love, love movement. So much. And my mom was like, well, we need to put this energy into something. So she put me into sports. So I ended up I don't really think the nutrition part of it and lifestyle part really, I don't think I understood what, what I was doing until I was actually in college. But growing up, I was in school all day. And then I would be in dance and gymnastics until high school. And then I had to decide kind of which one I wanted to you know, sports are very demanding on your time and every coach wants you they are full force. So I chose to really dive deep into gymnastics because I was excelling there. And I thought that it was a really—I love a challenge. I think it's just part of my, my spirit. And it was one of the most rewarding sports because every single day that you show up to practice you had to figure out something new about yourself and figure a way to learn something new get stronger, physically get stronger, mentally, you know, sports, especially gymnastics, where there's like a constant level of fear playing, you're, you're really working with a mental, like a mental challenge there. So yeah, I mean, being an athlete my whole life and then getting into college, I was going pre law. I loved I believe in like fairness and equality. And I, I was interning at a law office in high school for a couple years. And having seen, you know, lawyers in my face and what their lives were like on a daily basis, they just kept telling me, pulling me aside like quietly and they'd say, like, "Don't do this." You know, follow don't follow this. Like you're a pretty happy person, like you don't want to have just be like reading all the time. And I'm like, I love to read but I'm glad that I had that dose of reality and I missed moving my body and moving for a living when I got to school, so I had to make that that change. After my freshman year I decided that I was not going to go into law. I would change my major and go into dance again. And forge that river see what that held for me. So it's a brought me to New York. I got my bachelor's degree in dance. I got picked up by for an internship with Alvin Ailey and Broadway Dance Center. And that kind of kicked off like my fitness career in New York. 

Brett Gilliland  9:59  

Okay, so I mean, that really becomes a personal brand, right? I mean, it's your dancing. And there's, you know, there's I don't want to say on every street corner, but there's a lot of trainers. And so to get to the level that you've gotten to, you know, with through through Nike through Peloton through whatever it may be. There's a lot of people out there, right. So what do you think it was about you that helped you in that journey, if you will, or that grind? That helped me get to where you're at today?

Rebecca Kennedy  10:27  

So, well, Brett, I mean, it's, I feel like it's a timing thing, because I started training in New York, when there was, I'm not going to put it all in time. Definitely, well, there's a couple of different things. But I started big box gyms. And I was just meant, like, I had a couple mentors that really helped put me into the positions to succeed. I heard I caught wind, after having got like, a year or two deep into training at a gym, I reached out to another company, and they introduced me to like corporate fitness. So I was working with people that were at desks all day, and then we'd go into like a huge conference room, and workout, you know, I lead classes there. And I just got to see what people were needing. And I think that why me, a lot of trainers, what I see now versus that or not, then but myself is that it's I don't care about, I don't want to say I don't care about me, but I really care deeply about, about my clients and about people in general. And I want them to feel the love for movement and how it makes their body feel and how that changes their relationship with themselves and their confidence and it bleeds into every area of their life. And so I know that that passion is inherent to me. And I think it's a gift and I want to be able to share it with people. But timing like the the boom of the fitness industry in the boutique fitness industry, you had like, gosh, Barry's boot camp was popping up SoulCycle was popping up, then then came like, you know, all the different ones that there's just too many to even to name at this point right now. Right. But I got in, in the first year when they started and I just I walked right in, I took one class and I was like, yep, this is what I want to do. I've been I was uh I used to YouTube, Barry's Bootcamp classes on the treadmill at the big box gym that I was teaching at, just because I love to be the group fitness aspect. And I love the the intensity of it. So I walked up to the owner. And I was like, Hi, I'm Rebecca, and I want to work here.

Brett Gilliland  12:51  

So let's spend time on that right there. Because you said, you know, again, it's not about just timing. It takes courage to walk up to a person and say, "Hi, I'm Rebecca, I want to work here. And oh, by the way, I am going to work here." So talk to us about that and before you do that, you know, the circuits of success, we talk about attitude, we talk about your belief system, we talk about taking action, and then ultimately that gets you results. Right, those are the circuits. Right. And so that took a belief system in yourself. But it also took action to shake that hand. So tell me more about that.

Rebecca Kennedy  13:23  

Yeah, well, so my mom has this theory growing up, she was like, if anything makes you feel nervous or slightly uncomfortable, you have to go address it immediately, like get the nervousness out of the way. And so I did just that, like if I sit on anything, and it'll just it I won't do it. So I have to make it happen. Like right away. I love my mom for like teaching me that but it you know, it kind of came from the, the confidence that I had in myself, it came from every single moment in my sport career to then… I'm gonna I think it's my parents really helped me instill a lot of confidence in my in myself. But I knew what I wanted also. So I think it's it's not just finding that confidence within you. But it's like knowing that you're meant to do this, and that you're willing to add value and know why. It's not just because you desperately wanted to do it. It's because I knew that I could do what they were doing and I would add something different and unique to it and that they would be grateful that I came to them.

Brett Gilliland  14:38  

Yep. So I love that. And I what I hear in that is I hear passion. But I also hear and have a question about thinking so somebody just asked me this the other day they're like "Did you know you'd be successful growing up and I'm like, or did you know what you want to do when you when you're gonna grow up?" And I said no, I had no idea like, but I knew I wanted to be successful. I knew that I was going to give everything I could possibly give to be successful. And it wasn't again to your point that for yourself, of course, you want nice things and finding things in life. But, you know, my mission in life is to help people see a future greater than their past. And that's what I get up every day. And I'm fired up to do this stuff or to do client meetings and run our wealth management company. But I hear that like, think time, did you spend a lot of time thinking about that stuff?

Rebecca Kennedy  15:27  

Yeah, I mean, gosh, I wanted to be a million things I was growing up, right. I could never see myself exactly like if you asked me, even five years ago, what I would be doing today, I don't know. So if you ask me where I'm going to be in another five years. But I do know that I believe, if I give everything that I have to what I'm doing, it leads me to the next place that I need to be going so I just, I trust the process. I have faith in in, you know, doing my best and that'll get me to the next place. I am

Brett Gilliland  0:01  

All right. So a little technical difficulty there. So we apologize. So talk about those when you heard me say earlier about attitude and your belief system and your actions. When you hear the word attitude, what comes to mind?

Rebecca Kennedy  0:14  

I always think positive attitude. I'm a eternal optimist. But um, I think honestly, like, leading with a positive attitude can change the entire landscape of your day of your life of that moment. Yeah, I mean,

Brett Gilliland  0:34  

yeah, I think when I talked about it as if you choose to be a victor, not a victim, right? Because there's, something's going to happen to you and I today, and we have a choice with our attitude to either how we're going to respond with either negatively or positively. Right. So your positive attitude, but I think so many people, something happens, and then it's like, they want to go get in the fetal position for a week and you know, cry about it when I think my assumption would be somebody like you says, yeah, that's okay. That stinks. I don't want to happen. That sucks. Really bad. But I'm gonna go out and take action now and do something about it. Fair. Yeah.

Rebecca Kennedy  1:07  

I mean, I couldn't agree more. I think I'm a very solution based thinker. So the mentality that I live with is trusting the process, but knowing that like, you have the ability that you kind of change anything, you have the ability to filter out what you're, what you're hearing how things are, quote, unquote, making you feel you can choose whether or not to, to react in, in a multitude of ways, obviously. So I think if you're in charge of of your emotions, you can really navigate into not to say that like feeling bad for a moment is fine. Growing up, we always had this rule in my house, it's like, if you're upset about something, you are allowed to have one pity party, and then you have to kind of keep going. And I appreciate that. It's like okay, go be sad for a second. But then once you're done with that, wallowing in it doesn't change anything and it doesn't. It doesn't make your, your, your life any better. But if you're solution base and I think at Peloton I thrive yours because we're a solution based company, especially when you're still like a startup and everyone is expected to be very like scrappy and the best at what they do. So when you're coming to the table, and you're trying to think about like, what's next? How do we, how do we get from point A to point Z, right? You're like, "Whoa," this is like I you know, I tend to take on big massive projects, and I don't get scared by them, because I know I can do them. And I'm a gymnastics like, you get kicked out of practice if you said the word can't, and I don't I don't, I'm not joking about that you would be kicked out and you'd have to leave the gym if you said the word can't. So it changes the way. You You're like your your genetic makeup, like after a while. It's like, I can do this, I just want to let you know, I'm afraid I need this thought I need help. And it learns it teaches you how to like, delegate and inform yourself of like, what? What kind of team and support do you need at this time? And when you're going through things, and you don't have to go through everything alone either. So knowing like, yeah, positive attitude. What does that mean? It's not that somebody is just happy and has a smile on their face all the time. It's like, positive that I'm going to be a winner. I'm not I'm like, like you said to Victor. I couldn't agree more, especially when you're whatever part of the team or of the family or of the partnership that you're in. It can be not just obviously in sports, but in every area of your life.

Brett Gilliland  3:41  

That's right, when thoughts become your actions, right. And then your actions become your results or your reality. And I think that if we continually say to your point, I say to my kids, okay, oh, I can't get my seatbelt on. I'm like, yeah, absolutely. You're right. If you think you can't, you can't right. Yeah, but if you think you can, there's another way, maybe you move the backpack and you get stuff and then you make it happen. Right. So we're on the same line there. So how about your belief system? When you think about, you know, when it comes to your eating, your sleeping, your movement, your businesses, all the things that you do? What's your belief system that Rebecca Kennedy has to follow, like every day,

Rebecca Kennedy  4:19  

Consistency and balance. My belief in there has to be a balance of everything. I'm not I can't live in the polar you know, ends of anything, whether that be like the extremes. I have dieting, of sleep of exercise of anything, too much of anything is not a good thing. Not enough of anything is not a good thing. So, you know, I'll give you a little insight when I was in New York at the beginning. I was also fitness modeling and the demand of being a dancer and fitness model and I was you know, New York City is very expensive to live in. So I had another job on the side a couple other jobs and, and one of them I was bartending late at night. So I would bartend overnight, I'd show up to like the gym first thing in the morning, when it opened, I would sleep for a couple hours, I'd go to castings go, you know, to dance class, maybe an audition, and then I'd go back to work at night, and I was trying to stay really in shape. So I was I was limiting my calories, I was maximizing my energy expenditure, and I wasn't getting a lot of sleep. That is not a sustainable way of life in your early 20s. Maybe it's more sustainable. But now, and, you know, especially feeling like I have a greater opportunity to be a role model. And I don't take it on as a responsibility. I just I am what I am. And so being able to showcase, okay, getting seven, eight hours a night, like how does that make you feel? Right? I'm drinking, you know, three liters of water a day, how does that make you feel? If I'm depriving myself of sweets all the time, or carbs, or you're doing the next diet, always and you're constantly in deprivation, like how does that mentally you feel? So I had to figure out what I needed personally. And I think consistency, when you find the things that work for you stick with them. And knowing that the balance is then okay, if I need to have one night or I'm not sleeping like the full seven, eight hours, that's okay. It's not the end of the world, but it's not going to be my consistent. If I need to have that sweet. It's okay. It's not the end of the world. I want that because it makes me feel great . So those two things, and it works in every area of your life, especially if like I can tend to be a workaholic, too. Like I know my tendencies. And I love what I do. So I'm like, no, no, no, it's okay, I'll take on that extra work, I'll take on that extra project, I can do it, I can do it. So the positive attitude also, like can get in the way but knowing your belief system, like you said, I am a firm believer and like you need to, you need to get your basics, but you need to know what your basics are.

Brett Gilliland  7:28  

Amen to that. I think that's a crucial thing. I talked about focus 90 I have you know, the business world and we talked about is, when you walk in your office door, you need to have mapped out what your first 90 minutes are every day. Now, does that mean you know three or 65 days a year? You do it? No, of course not. You know, I don't do it on the weekends. Right? I but I do it probably four to five days during the week. And there's gonna be there's gonna be a day where I miss it. But I know when I put my backpack down, I grabbed my big water. I know exactly what I'm gonna do. And I have found I'm controlling my day versus my day controlling me. Yeah. So because I think we can come into the office, right? And you you pull up your phone or your computer and all of a sudden these emails and voicemails and next thing you know, it's noon, and you haven't accomplished anything productive. Yep. Stop that, right. Talk to us about the food intake. So you being who you are. And you're, I'll be the student here, you'd be the teacher and just about busy lives and how we can make all the excuses in the world to not eat healthy. Now, again, I know there's that cheat meal, there's those things, but talk to us about what we need to do and how we need to prepare to eat healthy.

Rebecca Kennedy  8:38  

Yeah. So I'll start this off by saying I'm not a certified nutritionist. So I'm not going to ever give anyone a prescribed diet plan, but I'll give you a generalized suggestion that I typically teach my clients about and and will I live by myself. Um, so first and foremost, I, I can't help stress enough like how important having water is and obviously like, you know that your first 90 minutes or like you're getting it, I do my routine first thing when I wake up in the morning, and I'll have my water and then I'll have a juice of some sort, like, I don't talk I'm not talking like orange juice, right. Right now I'm having a green juice something that is going to be a little bit more nutrient based and not I'm I'm a very low sugar person. I just don't think it helps me sleep well. I have energy crashes and my schedule is all over the place in terms of like when I'm teaching when I'm working out so I need to have consistent energy. I don't want to have spikes in my energy. I love having college and coffee in the morning gives you a little protein. If you're not a coffee drinker, you can put it into your smoothies you can put it into so many other things, but having protein first thing in the morning is really, really helpful. And then throughout the day, it's going to be one of those things where like, a macro approach is always the best for me. And I think it's works really well for most people because it doesn't say what you can eat. It shows it teaches you like when you're figuring out what an apple is, versus a steak versus a bowl of cereal. You're you're you understand what you're putting into your body. And I think education is the best tool for helping people understand what they're trying to achieve here. So there's plenty I work I've worked with nutritionist or naturopath and I love the naturopaths approach because she takes into consideration or that he or she, whoever you're working with, will figure out the stresses in your life too. And like kind of what you need and give you a personalized macro approach. And the reason I love this is because I can have different foods every single day. That means if I'm traveling, as long as if it fits my macros, I'm totally fine. So I can be in the airport, I can be you know, in Kentucky, I can be in New York, I can be in Marrakech, I can be anywhere, wherever you're going. I've never been to any of those places, I don't know

Brett Gilliland  11:21  

what the tie is to Kentucky, but Okay, now, I don't know. But

Rebecca Kennedy  11:26  

either way, the point is, is like you can enjoy the foods of wherever you're at. I also want to mention like how, throughout the day, I think making sure that you're getting enough protein, enough fiber enough vegetables, my rule of thumb for the way I'm eating is like I want two thirds of my plate to the vegetables, and then protein and and the carbs come from the vegetables, we can also have, you know, sweet potato, some rice, some, you know, Cauliflower Crust Pizza, like whatever it may be. But I think it's really important to, to learn that carbs are actually necessary for your energy systems. Especially if you're working out if you're doing if you're riding on the bike, if you're running on the tread, if you're lifting like you need that energy supply. So in the past, they've been like demonized by the press. The carbs are not your friend or the keto diet or intermittent fasting and like we're all looking for a fast solution. So I encourage everyone not to take the path most taken but to take the path, path least taken which is the slowest one. And know you're not going to see the results overnight. And I have to say that you shouldn't see the results overnight because this is for the long game. So changing the way you think there's never going to be a pill, if there was ever going to be a pill that change it would have already existed. And I'd be afraid of what it would do to my metabolism to be honest. But I think it's a it's a fun game to learn how food can fuel you and how food can nourish you, know we live in a society that's extremely built around, built over meals, right? So we love to have conversations and quality time builds around meals. So be the owner of that and create meals that are are delicious and start to cook more I think if people cooked more, and ordered out less or went out less that it would be a far different relationship that that you'd have with food. But there's plenty of apps out there too, that when you start putting the food in there, that'll show you what you're eating and not to, like, get you all caught up in the mental side of things like how many calories am I eating, but just to educate you from a very baseline standpoint. And then you can kind of go from there.

Brett Gilliland  14:01  

Yep. I think it's good feedback. And I think too, you know, like for myself as your work during the day, I got four kids, I'm going to soccer games and basketball games and baseball games. And it's like last night, it's a perfect example. We're 45 minutes from home, it's gonna be late, they gotta get home and get showered and get to bed. And I know the parents are like they're saying, Yep, that's exactly what I did last night. Right? And so you find yourself going through a Chick fil A or Burger King. And it's like, you know, it's like, gosh, I'm so tired of doing that. But yeah, you know, so I don't know what the answer is. But I guess it's preparation and a process to have it maybe a cooler pack before we go. Yeah, it's not as fun.

Rebecca Kennedy  14:41  

I was like, what did we do when because I'm like having a hard time remembering she's like, sometimes you would just go home and after gymnastics practice and go to bed and I was like, I didn't eat?

Brett Gilliland  14:50  

Yeah, just went to bed hungry. But you have a good breakfast.

Rebecca Kennedy  14:55  

No, I know. Like, this is kind of crazy. But yeah, I mean, gosh. Having, like logistics makes make eating really tough. So I think you just said you have your first 90 minutes of the day, planned out every single day. Yeah, what happens if you just looked at the calendar, this is what I do on every Sunday, I map out and I use different colored pens for everything. So that I know when my workouts are, and I know, okay, well, I'm going to need to eat that day. So either A, I'm going to order something before, so it's like ready to go after and I know it's clean, and I know where to get things from. So knowing what's in proximity to where you're at. Or I'll just start to cook a ton of things on on Sunday, and then have it ready to for me to go. So either I can take it with me and just like put it in a tupperwear to eat like right after. Or I have a hold over. So I can have like a bar with me, which is like not super ideal or a smoothie or something like that. But get something into your system. Like right right away. Having, I'm a snack person. Like if you ever travel with me, I have a bag full of snacks. I know what you can take on TSA like but I think it's important like you can you can… Nothing is worse. You can probably relate to this, like you ever been so hungry, that you're just like, I don't care what I eat. I just need to eat right now.

Brett Gilliland  16:18  

Absolutely. My wife says I get hangry all the time.

Rebecca Kennedy  16:21  

It's a true, it's an emotion. It's an actual emotion.

Brett Gilliland  16:25  

I think the choices so you see I got my red shirt on. You see the cardinal hat in the background. I'm in St. Louis Right? So huge Cardinal fan. So here's my dilemma. So I'm gonna go to the cardinal game today. It's a 12:15 start. Yeah, I'm gonna go with some buddies. And we're gonna go have some fun and we're gonna go to a restaurant it's like you know, basically ballpark village at the at the at the game. We're gonna watch the Cardinals bring home a win, but I'm probably going to partake in like, you know, wings and a hot dog and maybe a couple beers. And what you're telling me is it's okay. Right? Because it's the balance the integration part, you're talking about? 100% Rebecca Kennedy would do the same thing. If you were going to Cardinal game with us today. You'd have a couple beers and a hot dog.

Rebecca Kennedy  17:06  

I'd have a burger.

Brett Gilliland  17:10  

We were gonna plant burgers or whatever the heck it's called from Burger King last night to try to be somewhat healthier. And I'm like, yeah, it actually tasted somewhat normal.

Rebecca Kennedy  17:18  

Oh, yeah. No, they do taste like burgers. It's very bizarre.

Brett Gilliland  17:22  

Yeah, it is kind of weird. But alright, enough of that. So talk to me about fears. How much has fear played a role in your life? And the second question that I always ask is, how many of the fears you put in your mind actually blew up to the magnitude you put them in your mind to be?

Rebecca Kennedy  17:38  

Yeah, I mean, you know, the monster that exists is like whatever you believe it to be right? It can. It can, it can grow bigger and bigger. But gosh, there was a there was a moment in time, I think I have a level of fear and fearlessness in me that evacuated my body at some one moment. And I remember this pivotal moment in gymnastics where up until that point, nothing shook me. I was like, I would jump off anything. I'd flip anywhere. I loved it. But I remember this one teammate of mine said, you know, like, you could get really hurt if you if you just bailed out a backflip and landed on your neck or like, you could break things, you can prick your neck, I was like, I think it was seven at the time. I was like, Oh my God, you're right. I was

Brett Gilliland  18:35  

Never thought of that.

Rebecca Kennedy  18:37  

not doing that anymore. You know. And unfortunately, in gymnastics, like, you can't not flip backwards. It's part of every apparatus and it only things, you learn one flip, then you learn two flips. If you learn one twist, then you learn two twists, you know, it's like you have to learn the baseline, but it's always going to be there. So, for me, once I had that fear in the back of my head, every single practice that I showed up to I had to face that fear. And that I'm not talking about once a week, it's four to five times a week three to four hours every practice and it is emotionally taxing. So you I had to find a way to kind of get through it. I'm gonna tell you a really quick story that the way I got over it, because it was pretty cool. And my mom is a very creative lady and I hope that I'm as creative as her when I have kids down the road but she would be she'd be the one bring me just like you bring your kids to practice. Every meeting every single practice sit there wait for me and then drive me home and seeing your kids like if they have ever have a roadblock like a mental roadblock or just a fear, you're just like, I wish I could help you but you can't do it for them. So she got me these books on tape to listen to on way to practice I've listened to them like before I go to bed. That didn't work. She took me to hypnotherapist, I went and talked to like multiple people, I'd go to extra practices just to have that one on one time with my coach, and not a lot of people around me. Nothing seemed to be working. So she went to, she was a visiting nurse. And so driving around and other towns made sense. She said, she stopped by this gym, and talk to the coach about my fear. And she brought back this, but like vial of, of tablets. And she was like, basically what you do, and we're going to do it when when we go to the next practice is, before you go to do your next backflip be like we're gonna go into the bathroom, put the tablet on your tongue, stare at yourself in the mirror, and you can't chew it, you have to let it dissolve. But while it's dissolving in your mouth, you just have to repeat the words, I can do it, I can do it. And you have to visualize yourself doing whatever it is that scares you. So I had visualization technique, I was like repeating this positive mantra over and over in my head until this thing which took like five minutes to dissolve. And then I'd go right downstairs immediately do it. And all of a sudden, I had no fear anymore. I could do it. So I did that for years, Brett, I'm not gonna lie. We had a lot of like those moments in the bathroom. I'm sure my coach was like, What is this?

Brett Gilliland  21:24  

"The heck is she doing?"

Rebecca Kennedy  21:27  

But at one competition a few years later, I asked my mom for one of them because I was like I'm having a little nervousness right now. And she was like, "Okay, well, you know, I have to get a new vial out of my bag. So just hold on for a second. Just close your eyes." And I obviously it was like, "Why do I need to close my eyes?" I saw appealing a label off of them. And I grabbed it. And it was vitamin C tablets.

Brett Gilliland  21:53  

So I was gonna ask… it's called placebo.

Rebecca Kennedy  21:59  

So it was like that moment. And I knew I just went and did my competition. I didn't really well. I knew how much of it was in my head. And, and so now, like, for example, I'm afraid of heights and I always have been. But I do everything in my power to challenge them. And I think if when you when you when you put it into… You try to justify your fear. You laugh a little bit, because it doesn't make sense. And I think that helps me. I don't just chalk it up to well, that's who I am. I'm like, no, that doesn't have to control my life. I hated the fact that I was afraid to do certain things and unlimited me on the amount of fun that I could have. So rock climbing, you know, walking on high bridges rope, like rope courses, anything that's going to challenge my fear. I have heights. I do it all the time.

Brett Gilliland  22:55  

It's awesome. Yeah, I like it. Talk to us about maybe a moment on what took you to your knees. You thought Man, this is it? Maybe you haven't had one. And but is there any big challenging moments that you've had? You had to overcome that? And how did you overcome it?

Rebecca Kennedy  23:12  

Yeah. Well, I think the the first one I remember is like moving to New York City, and not knowing anybody here. And just going from college where you had, life was like kind of taken care of for you. And then being in a big city where like, no one cares about you. No one knows your name. Like you can just exist here. So that was scary for me. But then I was barely making ends meet. I didn't. There was one month it was the first month that I was here that I didn't have enough money to pay both my rent and MetroCard. But I was living in Brooklyn. So I had to have a MetroCard. And I didn't have I couldn't have money leftover to pay my phone bill. So I had to live for a month without access to my cell phone and my parents didn't love that absolutely proud to even ask for help. But that was a scary that was a really scary month. Like I didn't know if I was going to be able to make it I didn't know if I made the wrong decision to move here. If I was always like going to be living in this… you know scarcity mindset, but I had to really rely on myself and I feel like the rock bottom moments are what really changes a person and sees what you're made out of. And that's where you kind of have to rely on your positive attitude and your belief system and like creating this. There's no in my mind, I'm not going to lose. I'm relentless in that way. And I figure out way to make it happen. So I ended up getting another job and like, you know, picking up a little extra work, which is not something I had really the time or desire to do, but like you do what you have to do, and obviously, I gotta turn back on and it was fine. So it doesn't seem like a big thing. But like the the amount of fear that I had in myself like I was here alone, and I had no way to get in contact and like it just felt very overwhelming and lonely. But I'll circle back to like a couple years ago, I tore both of my hamstrings while I was a trainer, and my entire livelihood is built on being able to move. You don't show up for work, you don't get paid, you don't train client, you don't get paid. I was supposed to be running a triathlon in four months, I was supposed to be leading my first retreat. And four months in one week, I had a lot going on. I just started my own business. It was it was mentally like debilitating. And I remember being like, so down on myself, it was also like I just gone through a breakup, I tore both my hamstrings. It was just like not things in life. We're just like, it felt like every wall was crumbling around me. And…

Brett Gilliland  26:17  

Don't you think that made you stronger, though? I mean, like when you really think about it, and whether you write a book or not. I always say whether I write a book or not. But this is a chapter of my book.

Rebecca Kennedy  26:27  

100% Yeah, it was at the moment that you're like, "What did I do back then?" That because I didn't sit in the shower and cry every day. I was like, this is a game plan. I'm gonna go do this. I'll meet with my physical therapist, what do you need me to do? I am, you'd give me homework, I'm going to do it. I was like, adamant about my recovery. I did what I can. So my also belief system is do what you can with what you have right now. So it starts with like, okay, what are you working with today, it's gonna be different than the what you're working with in a month. But like start with start with today work with the body that you have work with the means that you have eventually, like, you know, I think about the greats I always listened to. If you haven't already, like the the podcast,

Brett Gilliland  27:18  

The Circuit of Success?

Rebecca Kennedy  27:20  

The Circuit of Success, you have to listen to it. Because there's just listen that whether it's like Steve Jobs, or Bill Gates, or John Foley, or whoever it is, like everyone's success story is just teaching you that it has to start with nothing, or an idea, or maybe their rock bottom that got them to where they are now. But it all starts somewhere. I'm like, maybe this moment is the moment where I'm going to not just get back to where I was. But I'm going to I always end up spring so far forward. So I kind of look forward. This is weird to say, but I look forward to those moments because I've just, I've risen so far above where I was even before I get injured or before that rock bottom. And that is just like kind of it gives you this exciting opportunity to see what you're made out of again.

Brett Gilliland  28:14  

So now we're having fun here. I take I steal your cell phone right now. What's the one app you hope I don't delete from your phone? Besides email? Not that fun? I said? Besides that you can't say like my email or something like that. Oh, yeah, that's not very fun. Exactly. He can have emails.

Rebecca Kennedy  28:34  

I think I would say Instagram only because I really like connecting with everyone. I think it's a great way just to be able to share fun experiences and and you know, honestly, like I communicate with so many of my friends, family members, friends from the past members on Peloton, like you just have an opportunity to meet a lot of cool people. I've met so many people on Instagram, which is fun. Ya know, that's how we're here.

Brett Gilliland  29:05  

That's how we're here today. Favorite book? You're reader I see some books behind you there if you're watching…

Rebecca Kennedy  29:12  

I've read all of them. Um, my favorite book of all time would definitely be Don Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements that changed my life about 10,11 years ago when I read it, The Four Agreements are always do your best to be impeccable with your word. Don't take anything personally. And the fourth one is escaping me at the moment but I'll come back to you. But the the way the philosophies behind each one of them help you take a moment where you're going through a hard time and an understand it. It puts everything through a filter and allows you to see it through a different lens where like say for example, you know They're, they're doing layoffs or at your work or you didn't get chosen to be head on a project or whatever it is, or you get, you know, broken up with or you, you know, whatever the situation is it feels negative is don't take anything personally nothing anyone ever does is because of you it's because of that. And knowing that that is so true and you can really understand that it's they're very difficult to live by but when you do you end up having this deeper appreciation and the level of happiness deeper appreciation for for yourself in life and also just a level of happiness that that you might not have attained prior to that so it's good

Brett Gilliland  30:49  

I'll have to check that book out. Sounds good. I've never asked this before but I'm gonna have you do because I can tell family is really important to you if your mom and dad, I think they'll probably listen to this but if they're gonna listen to this, what's one message you'd like to tell mom and dad right now?

Rebecca Kennedy  31:09  

That I appreciate their support. And I think there's a my mom and dad bent over backwards for me to to do the things that I did. And I know there's probably a lot of parents out there that if your child was going into law, you'd be really proud of them and they decided they wanted to go major in dance instead that you want again, yeah, you're like maybe not and try to coerce them into doing something else but there was nothing that I could have said to my parents that they wouldn't have been like okay, well that's it that's what you're gonna do and I support you like what what can we do to help you like when I moved to New York, they moved me here like when I had my first show they were there. So I appreciate their support. I think that's one thing is like, in, in, in life um, connection is what people are really looking for. And having support from people. You just want to be seen you want to be heard you want to be felt like you're important you feel support is all of that. So I can't thank them enough for that. And I also appreciate them pushing me.

Brett Gilliland  32:17  

Is your mom crying right now hearing that?

Rebecca Kennedy  32:20  

She's a crier so she probably is, my dad, no.

Brett Gilliland  32:23  

dads that cry moms. Right? That's funny. Well Rebecca it's been awesome having you work in our listeners find more of you. Obviously you talked about Instagram but talk to us about your Instagram handles your websites anything else like that? Where can we find you?

Rebecca Kennedy  32:37  

You can find me on Instagram. I'm at R K solid NYC is RK Sol ID NYC. I'm also on Facebook. I know a lot of you guys are on there. So you can jump on my Rebecca Kennedy Peloton page. I'm very active on that. You can go to my website. It's Rebecca Kennedy fitness.com.

Brett Gilliland  32:59  

Awesome, Rebecca. It's been awesome having you and I look forward to everybody getting to hear this. You've been awesome. We appreciate your time.

Rebecca Kennedy  33:07  

Thanks for having me, Brett. It was great.

Recognized as a global thought leader, Chip Wilson is a serial entrepreneur, philanthropist, loving husband, and father to five sons. As Founder and CEO of Westbeach Sports and Lululemon Athletica, Chip created one of the greatest apparel business success stories of all time and is widely credited as the creator of the “Athleisure” retail category, now a $400 Billion a year global business. He creates possibilities for people to live longer, healthier, more fun lives in his pursuit to elevate the world from mediocrity to greatness.