Barbell Shrugged - Feed Me Fuel Me  — To Be Self-less Requires a Little Self-ish w/ David Lovell  — 95

Episode Date: July 12, 2018

David brings a unique perspective of old marketing information to the dynamics of multiple business ownership, and modern trends in marketing for small businesses. Having mastered the process of managing multi-businesses and teams with a dynamic customer focused culture which drives sales and profitability. David has three advanced degrees in human development and Educational psychology, which shows in his passion for people and self-development. In this episode, David shares with us the joys he's experienced along his journey, and why his passion has shifted from developing businesses in the fitness and wellness space, to the recovery end of the spectrum. The shift is result of a refined thought process in which David has acknowledged the way of the market from preventing overtraining to preventing under-recovering as a means to create longevity and increased performance. David has had his own epiphanies over the years, but none more profound than the concept which he wraps his message in today: "If you plan to look after others, it is imperative that you look after yourself first." Self-care is paramount amidst David's philosophy of living in your creative genius to accomplish your greatest self. There is a way to create the balance required to live a fulfilled life. The notion that one must go without, and live with the proverbial pendulum swinging far from center is antiquated in David's eyes. As he grows and develops the organizations he's created, he makes that abundantly clear when he has an opportunity to mentor those under his charge. Join us this week, as David shares his wisdom with the Feed Me Fuel Me community and learn how to bring life's pendulum back to center while you build a great life and your greatest self! - Jeff and Mycal ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Show notes: http://www.shruggedcollective.com/fmfm_lovell ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ► Subscribe to Shrugged Collective's Channel Here http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedSubscribe 📲 🎧 Listen to the audio version on the Apple Podcast App or Stitcher for Android Here- http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedApple http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedStitcher Shrugged Collective is a network of fitness, health and performance shows that help people achieve their physical and mental health goals.  Usually in the gym, but outside as well. In 2012 they posted their first Barbell Shrugged podcast and have been putting out weekly free videos and podcasts ever since. Along the way we've created successful online coaching programs including The Shrugged Strength Challenge, The Muscle Gain Challenge, FLIGHT, Barbell Shredded, and Barbell Bikini. We're also dedicated to helping affiliate gym owners grow their businesses and better serve their members by providing owners tools and resources like the Barbell Business Podcast. Find Shrugged Collective and their flagship show Barbell Shrugged here: SUBSCRIBE ON ITUNES ► http://bit.ly/ShruggedCollectiveiTunes WEBSITE ► https://www.ShruggedCollective.com INSTAGRAM ► https://instagram.com/shruggedcollective FACEBOOK ► https://facebook.com/barbellshruggedpodcast TWITTER ► http://twitter.com/barbellshrugged

This is episode number 95 of the Feed Me, Fuel Me podcast with our special guest, serial entrepreneur, David Lovell. Welcome to the Feed Me, Fuel Me podcast. My name is Jeff Thornton, alongside my co-host, Michael Anders. Each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message related to our three pillars of success, manifestation, business, fitness, and nutrition. Our intent is to enrich, educate, and empower our audience to take action, control, and accountability for their decisions. Thank you for allowing us to join you on your journey. Now let's get started. Hey, what's going on crew? welcome to another episode of the feed me feel me podcast ders

and jeff coming to you from scottsdale remote with david lovell entrepreneur extraordinaire uh really appreciate you taking the time my man uh to to be with us today and and share some of your experience and your your wisdom that you've accumulated over the years in both business and as an owner of over 100, is that correct, fitness studios or businesses in the health and wellness realm? Well, that's a little bit large, not 100, but over 30 for sure. I'd have to count them up, but over 30 for sure. Right on. Right on. For everybody who doesn't know who you are, Jeff and I attended the GSD conference a couple of weeks ago at which you gave a presentation about self-care and building something that will outlast you but the crux of your presentation was about taking care of yourself as you build it and that I think that that self-care element was just so massive and resonated with me on such a high level that I wanted to make sure that you know we got you on the mic to share that same knowledge and guidance with our audience. But for everybody

who doesn't know who you are and how you got to where you're at, will you kind of give us the cliff notes of your journey? Absolutely, yeah. I'm a little bit older than a lot of people in the fitness world, so I've kind of seen a lot of different things and have a very diverse background. I actually was an athlete growing up, basketball mostly. And fitness was obviously important, but I didn't really get into fitness for about 10 years. But I've been in wellness a little bit longer than that. But the fitness is one of those areas that was so trendy for me. I never really delved into it, but I had a

background in it. I actually started out after college, with at-risk kids, a lot of sports programming, college kids, leadership development on that. And at the same time, I had started a marketing company. So I was doing both of those. I was married, had three kids, still have three kids, still married, married 30, over 30 years. But we, we, so I was doing both the marketing and the nonprofit at the same time and got into wellness probably in the early two thousands on that and really started to have a passion for, you know, for the body health. And then kind of led into the fitness side of that. But my background business-wise in the nonprofit world definitely opened up a lot of different

avenues and different perspectives on business and obviously in success of what that looked like and how that looked like. So it was very different and ended up with multiple fitness studios. I also do Massage Envy as well. And then just recently moving into recovery, which, as I shared at the conference and what I believe is there's been such a focus on health and wellness over the last 10 years, and it's boomed, and it's boomed in a big way. People are more conscious, health conscious, are working hard on their bodies. new wave, I think that's a byproduct of what's happened in the fitness area is recovery, where we've tore our bodies up, we beat it up, but we haven't really taken care of it or getting the chance to recover like we should. So we have gotten involved in cryotherapy, as well as a few other services that are part of that, but to help the body recover. So we can work hard, work it out

hard, but give it a chance to actually heal and recover before we go back and tear it down again and it really is i think we're at the first or second inning in that area where where it's going to start to grow and blossom as fitness has blossomed over the last 10 years on that so that's a little bit of my background over the last 30 years or so. That's awesome. And have you, like, with everything that you've done, have you always been an entrepreneur from the get-go growing up? Or was that something, what spurred that interest to become an entrepreneur? Because I know that's a tough path to take.

Yeah, you know, I have. I've always had that bent towards, you know, it's bent towards a pioneer-type mentality of going out and forging new places and new things. I think I've always been wired that way. It's different. It comes naturally for me. It's also a weakness. Every strength has its weakness. So when you have that bent towards a pioneer and starting and exploring new things, the backside of that is you create, but the management, the focus on detail after you've started something was a weakness. And so it's something that did come naturally for me, taking risks and jumping in on things was something I've always, you know, from early on, even as a teenager, looking at that.

You know, I don't think people more things than I've actually planned through. That trip is I take a risk, I see it, I go and move quickly. With that comes you make some mistakes and you fail along the way. That's part of the process that you go through. Love that. So you pretty much live by the mantra that your losses are really your lessons. Oh, yeah. They have to be. And everybody has to. I mean, even the worst of the worst always teach you and develop you and make you who you are today.

And, you know, over the years I've worked with a lot of people that have some very difficult, hard situations. It's made them who they are. The good, the bad, the ugly. They all go together. Fighting that is not as good as accepting and embracing it. Sure. I think that it's awfully serendipitous that you're really chasing after the recovery end of the industry at this point. And so much of what you're speaking about to audiences has everything to do with, you know, in that entrepreneur business building realm has everything to do with taking

care of yourself. Were you, as you've built things over the last 30 years, did you find yourself, is that also, are you speaking from lessons learned personally or things that you've, you've seen as you've mentored other business owners and entrepreneurs through their processes and the kind of the the careful guidance you would give would be to now where you know you're embarking on quite the journey but don't forget to take care of yourself along the way where where were you at in that spectrum and how long have you been up front in delivering that message well you just said a mouthful up front in delivering that message? Well, you just said a mouthful.

We can unpack all these. Let's start with, obviously, when you have great strengths, you have great weaknesses that come with that. So obviously, yes, I learned a lot of the lessons, things that we're talking about. And you're right, it is very serendipitous to be talking about recovery physically. But yes, part of my mentoring and helping others is about what do you need to do to be a whole person? Because it's not just about one thing. It's about a lot of things. And in life and the way that people go, they go hard at certain things at the expense of something else.

And it doesn't need to be that way. And how do you find that balance and that work-life balance? Where do you find the emotional balance? Let's just look at the fitness side of this. We talk about, you know, how do you physically get better? Well, you got to eat right. You have to have to put the right stuff in your body. Um, you can't out, uh, work your, your nutrition. Uh, we talk about that all the time. We talk about in your exercise, you have to have a balanced approach to it. You can't

just do one thing in fitness. You can't just do cardio. You can't just lift weights. You can't just do yoga. You have to do a combination of everything because your body is multifaceted. And we also talk about that when to have effective fitness, you have to tear your body down, but then you have to allow it to heal and recover and to get better. You can't overtrain or it begins to start to tear itself down and it becomes counterproductive. We talk about all that on the physical body side, but nobody ever really spends time talking about the importance of that emotionally. How do you do that within yourself? And the body, it's more than just the physical, but obviously you have a spiritual and you have an emotional

part of that. And it's the same thing. I'm a firm believer in working hard. We were made to work and work hard. But I have no problem with hard work. The problem is, do you have the downtime to recover that? Just like in fitness, work hard. You're going to get great production. The body is going to continue to grow and get better, but you have to allow it to heal and recover to get stronger on that. And the emotional side and working hard, that's part of it.

You have to build those things into your life. And striking that balance is really hard for people, particularly in people that are driven for success and they want to go out and they want to accomplish and they just go, go, go the true sense, they think that life is a sprint, and they're running hard all the time. But life isn't that way. It's a sprint. It's a walk. Sometimes it's a sitting down. And you have to allow yourself to be able to do those things to sustain longevity in there. You just line up 10 entrepreneurs. Just line them up and look at that.

They may be very, very successful people and they have very successful business lives, but nine out of 10 of them, their personal life's in shambles. And that's the hard balance is they gave up something, you know, for the business side. They missed that personal side. And if you were to really talk to them, say, what is the toll that has been in your life because of that? While you've been very successful, maybe you've made a lot of money, you've had a great impact on a lot of people, you've grown a lot of companies, whatever you've done to be successful as an entrepreneur,

what's been the emotional toll for your personal life being in shambles? And you talk to them about that. And there's a big toll. It's a toll emotionally, physically, monetarily. There's a lot of things that go into that, broken relationships. And so for me, from just personal experience of what that means and how we get so focused and driven on certain things and forget about maybe balancing out and having the self-care part of that. You know, what I've watched and dealt with, with other people still to this point. And then what I'm, you know, for me kind of, I think where my life mission or direction, while I will never give up the entrepreneurial side and the driven and going out and trying to build and create is to also be able to look on my own life to have a

balance, a more balanced approach to things. But to talk about this with the young generation of coming up in their 20s, what I've seen is I didn't have anybody when I was in my 20s. When I was hellbent on taking the mountain and conquering the world, I didn't have any role models. I didn't have anybody that was able to sit down and talk to me about what are the pitfalls of what you're doing? Are you really looking at the whole picture of things or are you just focused on one particular area? There weren't those role models to talk to me about that. And I believe that the train wrecks that I have watched over the last 35 years

of good friends of mine that were extremely gifted, talented people, but they have truly hurt their life. They've hurt their families. They've hurt themselves because we were just out conquering things and all of a sudden life fell apart. They've hurt their families. They've hurt themselves because we were just out conquering things.

And all of a sudden, life fell apart. But we didn't have those role models. Nobody was talking to us about this. It was always go, go, go, go. You've got to accomplish this. You've got to be able to be out there. You can make whatever you want of this world. You can just hit it and go. And nobody ever really sat down and talked about what do you need to do to make sure that you can sustain that over time? Where's the balance in your life? Are you doing things for yourself, the self-care, the things that you would do in your physical life if you were working hard on exercise? Are you doing that emotionally? Are you really finding joy in the moment and experiencing more than just the drive that's pushing you to these, and a lot of times these ideas that are in our head

that we put in there, some expectation that we put that says we're going to accomplish this. So it is, it's a multitude of how you come across those, but you know, the great part of being older is that you get to one, experience it, which is sometimes good, sometimes bad, but also to be able to watch it with a lot of your own peers on there. And then at this point to look back and say, how can I help the next generation coming up of great leaders? And I truly, I mean, I believe that this generation of late teens and 20s is a great generation of potential for leadership and great impact.

But they don't have the role models, just like we didn't have them. They don't have them. And we need to have people that can talk about this and help them find the work balance because they crave it. They crave success, but they're also craving that life of a balance. They really want it, and I think they can find it. But they just need to be able to think it through and talk it through on that. So that's a super interesting point. And, you know,

come up in this generation because I'm 30 now, you know, you come up and you have that mentality, be the hard driver, you know, work those. It's almost like the bragging rights. If I work 16, 18 hours a day, sleep two hours a night, and I'm ready to go again because you have the energy. But where does somebody go seek out those resources when they're sort of – they don't know where to look for that message, that message of taking care of yourself and finding that balance. Where do they look? That's what I mean.

I don't see it. People – everybody says – everybody can say whatever they want to say, and you can see it. But I agree with you. It's almost this badge of this almost an arrogant, I can do this. I can work 16 hours a week and sleep two hours and look at what I'm doing, and I can do that. And I want to say, no, you can't. You can do it for a little bit. You can do it short bursts.

But in reality, you can't sustain that. It's not possible in reality you can't sustain that it's not possible to sustain that physically it's not possible to sustain it emotionally it is absolutely not possible for you to do this you know we have a generation that is bored stiff is what people will tell you they've got to always have the next adventure the next exciting part you know technology whatever it is you know they're the social media that's driving so much of the anxieties that we have, but nobody knows that it's anxieties. It's not that they're bored and it's not that people that they're overstimulated and they have to constantly find that next thing and that next high or that next emotional push on that. And success is just one of those elements that can drive that. And you have to be able to pull back and say, no, it's not sustainable. You can't do that long term. You can do it short term,

no question about it. And I've done the short term, but it drives you to the point where then you have to end up giving away something else. And what are you giving up? And what are you giving away within yourself that's detrimental to you and detrimental to your health and your longevity of what you can do? I mean, we overestimate what we can do in a year, and we underestimate what we can do in five years. And that's just, we have these grandiose ideas in our mind of what we think we could do. But we need to have a longer view picture of it and to take a longer look at what are the values and things that are most important to you. And I don't ever want to, I mean, I'm not, I'm truly, I'm not one of those guys who want to bash money or success, or I'm absolutely, money is the number one. If you ask anybody that works with me or any of my staff, what's the number one rule? It's about,

it's all about the money. It's all about the ROI. You make a decisions based on that and you need to be able to, because money allows you to help more people. It allows you to be able to do more things. It gives you freedom, but it sure doesn't give you happiness. It just gives you options,

but it also allows you to do certain things for other people that you don't have. And I've had money, I've lost money. I've lost more money than most people ever make in their make in their life on that. It's just a thing. It doesn't give you happiness. It doesn't give you contentment, but it is important. So I don't ever want to bash it. I don't want anybody that I'm just, oh, you know, don't do that. Don't chase that. I'm all about chase. Chase your dreams, go after it, pursue it hard. But at the

same time, what's the most important thing to you? What are the values that you want to have? And really to begin with the end in mind, when you're my age, and I'm looking at the last third of my life, if I live to the 85, 90, 95 years old, I'm looking at the last third of my life. What do I really want my last third of my life to really be? And what is it the most important to me? Start there and then work backwards and say, can you have it all? Can you have, you know, successful life? Can you be driven? Can you go out and do great things in your career for other people, impacting people's lives? Can you not have a great family? Can you not be connected with your kids? Can you not have great friendships? Can you not experience great life? Can you not be connected with your kids? Can you not have great friendships? Can you not experience great life? Can you not go out and enjoy a golf game regularly or boating or whatever you do that gives you some kind of satisfaction and peace?

Can you not do all that? And to me, I want to say, yeah, you can. Why not? Who said you couldn't? Why do you have to give up something for something else? You don't really need to. You need to be able to look at it and balance it out and be able to embrace it all. So when you're mentoring young people, and I've experienced this both as a Marine and a business owner, when you're trying to impart that knowledge on young people, one of the tremendous hurdles that we overcome when we're speaking from a place of experience is just what you said, that I'm young, I can do it all mentality. is a people want to actually want to make those mistakes on their own as opposed to

leaning on the the knowledge of others so that they don't make those mistakes i i talk about this a lot with jeff with regards to the the quote-unquote hero's journey that a lot of us entrepreneurs celebrate and make sexy and you know know, the rags to riches stories. And when we get to the seat as you have, you know, and you become successful, you know, a lot of what we talk about now is you don't have to go through all that to make your story worth hearing. Yeah, that's a great question. And it's a great comment. Very insightful.

You know, when I was in my 20s, and I sat with my wife in my 20s and said, I don't know who to talk to. I don't know who – I look at some of these people, and I don't know who to share these feelings or these – I don't know where I'm going. I don't have any direction. I don't know who I'd talk to. And her response always, would you listen to them if you did find those people to talk to those people? And I don't know. It's a great question. And so for me now, and it's interesting, I mean, I don't feel like I'm in my 50s. So that's part of it.

I still view myself from my 27, 28 years old to when I'm working with my staff, my team, and I'm talking to them. I view myself more as a peer than I view as they view me as the old man and the dad of the group. And so at this point in my life, because it's so important to me and development of my team is so important to me and sharing important lessons on that. I don't care whether they're going to, you don't want to hear it or not. I'm going to tell them. And I'm hoping, and I'm seeing them respond. You know, just like you or I, when we were, you know, younger, we maybe, you know, wouldn't have listened, but some of it did get through. But I never really had anybody, nobody ever sit me, sit my butt down and say, do you see the direction that you're headed? Do you, do you see the flaws that are starting to pop up or the cracks

in what you're doing? Um, and really get ahold of me and sit me down and say that to me. Nobody ever did that to me. Um, and at least would have got my attention. And, you know, with somebody speaking honestly to me and saying, here's the fractures that I'm looking at, and I'm just going to tell you where this is going to end up. Do you want to go down that path, or do you want to try to do some things to maybe, you know, help you to be able not to end up, you know, where these things are going to lead for you in your life?

You know, honestly, I are going to lead for you in your life. Um, you know, honestly, I have no idea because honestly, you're, I'm not going to know what's happening with these folks that are, um, you know, my team or my staff and I'm working with till they're in their forties. Um, you know, till they go through more on that, I hope, um, for them, for their sake, I hope. Um, and you know, but, but you're right. You know, a lot of times we're stubborn people and, um, you know, you know, would, would I buy, listen to somebody? Um, I, I, I want to hope that I would have, um, but I don't know. I don't know. I hope that, and that's part of it is I, you know, I'm, I'm a little bit more aggressive in talking about these subjects now because I see a generation of people that want it and they're ready you know I you know they want to hear a relationship with people that are a little bit wiser where I know I maybe didn't have that feeling I really I sensed and see more and more these you know the young leaders and

entrepreneurs and and people driving for success way more open than I was and even my peers on that. So we'll see. I liked it. And I sort of want to go back to one that you talked about, one of the topics at the conference that you spoke about, and it speaks to how you really care about people and your staff and just not treating them just like just another worker,

but you treat them like family. There's some people that you hire on your staff that people consider to have a troubled past. Can you tell us a story of how you developed these individuals over a long period of time to take them from where they were at a broken place to having success in their life and in your business? Could you tell that story a little bit? Because I thought it was interesting how you mentioned that one where you fired them and then you hired them once they got their act together.

Oh, yeah, boy. interesting how you mentioned like that that one where you fired them and you hired them once they got their act together oh yeah boy um yeah it's uh it is interesting um i don't know you probably don't remember this reference but there's a tv show years ago called battle star galactica and um it was you know they got kicked out by the aliens and they were a ragtag group of society going on and broken warships and spaceships that didn't, you know, trash trucks and all that stuff. And literally they were trying to fight against, you know, the onslaught of the aliens coming in. And it was funny. I was sitting around. We go out to sushi a lot and we kind of have this private room in this place we always go. And I'm sitting around this room of kind of my key leadership team that's out there, and it just struck me that this is just a ragtag group of people that are trying to get through and change people's lives and making an impact in this world. It was the most fascinating thing because, you know, we'd been together about four years at that particular point.

A lot of it had been there, you know, from the beginning of when I had been with them in Seattle. It was just fascinating because, you know, I looked around the room. I had, I have three felons that were in that room. One recovering drug addict and three recovering alcoholics that are in this room that I'm sitting around. And those are the ones – I've got people that are 28 years old. Two of them had been divorced already, which is – that brings its own baggage. And I could go into them, and there's so many other stories of who they are.

And what really hit me was that these are individuals that are dealing with very big, complicated things in their life. And yet they want to make a difference in this world. They want to make a difference in people's lives. And I think the hard part for us, particularly when we're moving so fast and we're trying to succeed, we forget about the people along the way. There is no such thing as a self-made man or a self-made woman. There's nothing. We have this as an entrepreneur, we did all this stuff and I did it myself. Well, you know what? I didn't do squat. I had a lot of people, a lot of people come along with me on that ride for me to be successful in what I do. And we just forget about it.

And it was just striking to me is that it's all about the people. You know, I mean, our mantra in everything that we're trying to do is, you know, we're here to do one job and only one job, and that's to change people's lives. That's what we're here to do. Now, my role as the leader is to change my staff's life. That's my job. And if I can change their lives, they're going to be more effective at changing our members or our clients' lives or, you know, our people that are prospects that come in our door, if they can catch that feeling that somebody cares about them more than just about, um, you know, whatever the business is that we're doing, they're going to stick and it's going to be able to control, you know,

to contribute more and more, um, to what we're doing as a business and it's going to become successful. And that development of the people, my staff is absolutely the most important part of that. To be able to pour into them and help them. There isn't anybody that doesn't have issues. There isn't anybody that has demons that are carrying inside of them somewhere that, you know, from the past or whatever hurts that are there.

It's can you overcome them and can you make strides in your life to be able to handle those things and not allow them to continue to trip up. You know, that group, there were multiple people that I fired. I mean, I think they did some things and absolutely, I fired them on the spot. At the same time as I'm walking out the door with them, I'm calling rehab and saying, let's get you to rehab right now. Let's get you get you the help you need. It's not about not having expectations for my staff. I have very, very high expectations on performance and metrics and hitting those things. But I also have very high expectations for them

personally of who they are and to be able to help them deal with whatever they're dealing with. We're all dealing with something. And for me, it's about progress and being better than you are today, tomorrow. I want you to see that. And so once you get through whatever you need to get through, you know what? I'll take another chance on you. Redemption is one of the great parts of being Americans. I mean, the redemptive stories are just, we love those stories. And, you know, and allowing people to have a second chance to continue on

and grow in their life and work with them, overcoming obstacles on that, you know, it is part of that. So, yeah, it is important for me. I just care about, you know, making sure that we understand, you know, that there are still standards that we hold to, but we all make mistakes and learning from our mistakes and making sure it's, you know, we grow from those things. depending on where you're at and your reflection, trying to correct some of the mistakes that you made along the way through others? I don't know if it's – I don't think that it's not that thought out. But I think – I've had my train wrecks and they aren't fun and they're

not one, they're not worth it. And, and there is, there's a pain that goes with that. And there's a pain and a toll that it takes not only on you personally, but it takes a toll on your family and your kids and all those things. And absolutely, if you were to say, is that something for me that I would like to head off for young leaders and entrepreneurs growing up and coming up and charging the hill? Yeah, absolutely, because to me it's not worth it. Somebody needs to tell them that this know, that, you know, this is the risk that you're running. And this is this is the consequences for behaviors that you're doing

on that just so that they know now, ultimately, it's going to come down to the that individual's person's choices. I mean, I can't stop them from making the choices. And like you said earlier, is it you know, we're all stubborn. Sometimes we've got to learn our own lessons. Um, absolutely. That's true. But, um, you know, having a conversation and helping them recognize what's possible and, and, and heading in a different direction that may be better. Um, yeah, absolutely. I think that's part of the mission that I have, uh, on that. Do you ever find yourself, uh yourself telling somebody point blank that whatever path they're pursuing because it's not what they're good at and they don't enjoy it so it's kind of like this this uh this double-edged sword they're just kind of in the game because they feel like that's where they're supposed to be

yeah yeah it's interesting if yes and the answer, yes. All the time. I call myself, I'm just a big lovable jackass. with my staff and my team and the people around me, most people look at that and say, I cannot believe you just said that. But to me, you're exactly right. I want them to see, you know, the folly of what they're doing and help them understand that, look, if you do this, this is what's happening. This is the perception that you're giving off to other people. I mean, this is the stuff that you're doing that's causing pain, not only for yourself, but the people around

you. And yes, to have those hard conversations is part of the deal. I mean, if you really want to get into it with people. And the funny thing is, I'd say 95, 98% of the time, people know it. I mean, this is not like I'm saying something that's this big shocking, oh, my gosh, I had no idea. They know it. They just don't know what to do with it or how to do that. We end up seeing, you know, I've had multiple conversations where, you know, I'm saying, do you see that you're just this swallowing pig

and this pigsty of a mess that's stinky and gross and muddy and you're just in this hole and you're not getting out of it? And how many times do they say, I know, but it's my pigsty of a mess that's stinky and gross and muddy and you're just in this hole and you're not getting out of it. And how many times they say, I know, but it's my pigsty and it's my hole. It's my mess that I've made. And I'm so scared to get out of it. And a lot of times people just don't know what to do and how to get out of it. You know, once somebody says, Hey, here's a way out. I mean, it's refreshing to them. You know, nobody likes to be told, Oh my gosh, you're, you're, you're in a pigsty. But on the other side of it, not very many times they have people that are reaching down saying, hey, let's get out of this.

Let's do whatever it takes. Let's do the work that's needed to be able to help get us out of this mess that we've been and created in our lives and the mistakes that we've made and the silliness of the stuff that we're doing. We all seem to recognize that we have it. We just don't know how to do it or we're hiding from people. And then once we're not hiding anymore, it makes life a lot easier and at least gives us some comfort that somebody else cares enough about it to say, hey, look, you don't have to hide from this anymore on that. So, yeah. Where do you think people struggle the most with

seeking mentors or just simply asking for help? What's the root of that problem? Is it lack of access, lack of know-how? Is it just purely ego-driven? Where do you see in the people that you reach out to on a regular basis, their struggle with just simply finding assistance in the first place? I think there is a big fear, particularly if you are really high, if you're really bent towards entrepreneurial success, going after things and going hard. You know, it's that hero mentality that you already shared on that, you know, to be vulnerable and say, wait a minute, I do have weaknesses. I do have things that I don't do well or that I'm

not perfect. You know, part of the strengths that those people have that are driving and successful and going after it. Those are all great strengths. But with those strengths come weaknesses of, you know, there is an arrogance or a perfectionist mindset of that I am perfect or I can do everything and I don't need anybody. And that's just part of that weakness that comes with that strength because every strength has its own weakness that goes with it. So I think it is hard for you to seek it out if you're, especially if you're bent in that direction. So that is definitely there. I also think it's hard to be

vulnerable too. I think it's just, it's a difficult thing for humans. Once somebody's exposed it a little bit and pointed it out to, hey, you know, it doesn't need to for humans. Once somebody's exposed it a little bit and pointed it out to, hey, you know, it doesn't need to be this way, or let's talk about this, or let me help you with this. Let me share you my story a little bit so that you can see that you're not alone. I mean, we are the most connected we've ever been in history. I mean, I can contact anybody in the world within seconds. I mean, I can look on, you know, social media or my phone or my text messages or my emails, and I'm connected with more people than any time in the history that's ever happened in the world of history on that. Yet we are more alone than we've ever been. And that's the hard part of, you know,

that vulnerability of really allowing people to connect at a deeper level and connect with each other and being vulnerable with that. That's the hard part. And I think, you know, entrepreneurs and successful people, we isolate ourselves. We hide a lot. We perform really, really, really well. But nobody really ever gets to know us very well. And that's part of that weakness on that. And it allows, I think, for us to be very lonely. So I do think, one, it's a risk, you know, to go out and actually say, hey, you know, I kind of like to be your friend because that sounds so weak. I don't want to have a friend. You know, I want to go take the hill.

Let's go. But to be able to say, I just, I need somebody to talk to. I need somebody that can just, you know, point me in a direction or I can bounce ideas off on that. Because then it looks like you don't have it all together. And I'm just here to tell everybody, nobody's got it all together. There ain't anybody that's got it together. We all need each other and we all need to learn from each other on that. And it's so important to do. That's the honest truth.

I know you mentioned you didn't have anybody to sit you down earlier in your early entrepreneurial career. Can you pinpoint a moment or person where you've had that first interaction where they set you down and had that hard conversation or that mentorship moment for you in your life as you're on your journey? Yeah. You know, I mean, there's been multiple times you know i mean there isn't one person that's going to fill any of those needs all your needs are i don't want to say needs all those things that um a good mentor is going to do a mentor is going to can fulfill some in certain areas of that.

And I've had multiple people when all of a sudden, at one point, starting, I think I had 19 small businesses going at one time, which is absolutely the dumbest thing you could do. And to ask a question, why? And to really ask a question, why? Why are you doing that? You know, personally, spiritually, I mean, you have people that ask hard questions of, you know, and not even really giving you answers, but just asking you questions to get you to think and reflect on that. And there have been multiple people in multiple areas

because you just need to have those different things. You know, even right now, I mean, I, you know, it sounds like I'm some, you know, I've really got my self-care together and I'm really taking care of myself. This is a journey that I'm learning now. I mean, this is not a, I'm not sitting here saying I've got it together and I figured it out. I mean, I'm still trying to learn what does that mean for me at this particular point in my life? You know, what are the things that really feed my soul and what do I need? What do I truly enjoy doing? Because, you know, what are the things that really feed my soul and what do I need? What do I truly enjoy doing? Because, you know, when you're running so fast, you don't get to see the scenery very

often. You don't really get a chance to reflect. You're just running and running hard. You get a long distance, which is great. But, you know, it's kind of like, well, what did I miss along the way? There's a lot. So, you know, for me, I mean, I've got, you know, a gentleman in my life right now, talk to him today, um, that asks hard questions of, you know, not giving me a lot of

answers, but give me a lot of things to think about, uh, and to ponder about that. And, um, it, again, there's just a lot of times we try to seek out that one person. Um, and we flip and we use that word mentor out there. It's, uh, We need multiple mentors in our life to be able to do stuff and ask us good questions. Going off of that, what was the moment or the circumstances in your life where it kind of slapped you in your face? Because it seems like you're battling this double-edged sword in the early part of your journey in which you, number one, didn't know. You didn't have the resources of mentorship, but at the same time, it didn't sound like you were in a hurry to start asking those questions either. So at what point in your career did you realize the importance of mentorship for you and your progression? You know, probably the last 10, 12 years, probably really, you know,

when you're running hard, you know, the one common denominator we're all going to get in life is life's sometimes going to put a step on our throat and say, what are you going to do about it? And we all are going to have something or multiple things that we're going to have to deal with and face as a human being. It's just, it's the common denominator. If it hadn't happened to you yet, it's going, it's coming. I can guarantee it. You know, for me early on, you know, I had some health problems. I mean, I'm a young, you know, physically fit guy, you know, in my late 20s to be laying in the hospital in intensive care, you know, having doctors come in and tell me, you know, are you going to live and die? You know, they're not sure. That kind of wakes you up and you start asking, you know, whoa, what's really important?

And how do you do that? And, and start seeking that out because it's, you know, it's like, whoa, I gotta, I gotta have my priorities in order. But it, you know, it even went to a, to another level for me personally, you know, where, you know, my kid ended up having a similar disease that I have, um, where they're going to have to face the same struggles that I have physically. And that cut deeply into me because it's no longer just me. I had an impact and a negative impact on, you know, people that I care deeply about. And so that jolts you to the core of who you are to say, wait a minute, I don't, life sucks. This isn't fair. This is wrong. I don't like any of that. And you have to start asking some really hard questions. And, you know, that that journey starts a lot of different things and

how you handle it and how you deal with the struggles that come your way. You know, as part of that in the process of having people around you and bringing them in, if you don't do that, you end up isolating yourself and you can't live this life on your own. I mean, you just can't. It's impossible. And yet we try so hard to do that on that. So there are, there are always things coming your way. People, you know, people hear my story or they hear about, you know, what I had to deal with or what I still deal with physically, or, you know, what, what I had to do with my kids or the failures of this, or I lost a million dollars here or whatever. And people say, how do you deal with that? I say, you know what?

You deal with it. You just deal with it. You have to. You don't have a choice. And then they kind of put this on a scale. Well, wow, that's a big deal. It's like, you know what? Every single human being has something that they're struggling with that they're dealing

with. And to them, it is a mountain and it's hard. And it's not this scale of this was harder than something else. It's hard for everybody, and everybody has something they're dealing with that they need to overcome and help to get better and deal with and handle it and accept and be able to move on and improve on that. It doesn't matter what it is. I mean, you lose your job. You end up getting divorced.

You lose a child. You lose money. You lose a loved one, you lose your parents. I mean, you know, you're sexually abused or physically abused or, you know, defamed or shamed. I mean, there's all kinds of stuff that every human being's going through. And that's just part of the world. And we can have a victim mentality of saying, well, you know, woe is me and this shouldn't have happened to me. And, you know, they should on me and they shouldn't have done that. And, you know, we should on all over ourselves all the time. But the reality of the fact is you got to keep going.

You got to keep moving on and deal with those so that they don't stop you from improving and getting better. And having people around you, having the mentors to talk you through that, to be able to say, I remember when I had a hard situation. And this is kind of what I felt. It makes us less alone and connects us as people. And so having those mentors around you is absolutely crucial because we're all going to go through it if you're not going through it already. I think, Michael, you shared that, you know, what you were going through coming out of the military and understanding that, you know, overcoming those obstacles and the pains to be able to have a balance. It drives you to understand and have a different priority in your life than just going and conquering and achieving success. What is truly success? And success really, to most of us, is some idea

that we created in our mind. What makes you successful or me successful is really just based on what we thought about in our paradigm, in our mind. It doesn't mean that we are. It just means that in our mind, that's what we've created to be successful on that. And shaking down to the core of who you really are and coming up with what is the true priorities and what do you really want to be as a human being? That's success. And that can be successful entrepreneur or successful businessman, making a lot of money, impacting people's lives. Whatever it is, it can be a part of that but make sure that there's there's more to you than just those things that are materialistically held up in our society that's really interesting because you know as you sit back and sort of think about you know success that word success and you hear a

lot of times people or when you're looking for yourself evaluating your thoughts and saying is this something somebody else's story that I'm carrying of what I envision as success so like for instance my whole vision coming up as a teenager was buying a Lamborghini just for a Lamborghini's sake and then once I actually went on the car lot stepped in Lamborghini drove it around and I like, this isn't what makes me happy. This isn't fulfilling to me. So I sort of uncovered that it was a story that I was carrying around that was somebody else's vision of success, not necessarily mine. So for you and your journey, how has your purpose evolved from where you started as a young entrepreneur to where it is now?

Because a lot of the inspirational and motivational entrepreneurs I see nowadays, once they made that shift from saying, I just want to make a shitload of money to actually having a mission to serve others, they say that's when the paradigm really shifted for them. How has yours looked in that process? Yeah, it really is true. And all the young entrepreneurs are going, yeah, well, you've made your money, so you could save this now and all that stuff. But it is interesting. You're dead on. In our mind, somewhere along the line, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 years old, we made decisions as kids. And we made those decisions. We spend the rest of our lives trying to justify those decisions that we made about who we are and what we're going to be and all those things.

And, you know, a 7, 8, 9-year-old or a 10-year-old, 11-year-old, we don't know anything. thing. And we, to make those kinds of decisions for the rest of your life and try to justify your life based on those decisions that you made at that particular point, it's a sad commentary because we don't know enough as a kid to know what, what really are those decisions that we need to be able to make as an adult. And so for me, you know, I mean, it's a journey. I mean, I'm learning stuff now in my fifties that I sure wish I would have learned in my twenties, but I want to learn them in my fifties and I sure want to learn them when I'm 60. I want to learn them when I'm 70. I want to continue to learn those things and change. So the shift was, can you be successful? Can you make money? Can you have a successful business and do those things? And to me, I want to say, yeah, you can. Who said you couldn't? Now, it may be different than what you're seeing or learning from other people, but

it doesn't make it right. You know, the businessmen, they're all about making money, and, you know, they're firing people, and their staff is, you know, in and out and turnover all the time, because it's all about money and they're being successful and they're just turning and burning. Okay. That's one way to do it. Um, but is there a better way? Is there a way that you can be and have both? Can you not be a successful businessman, make a lot of money, impact a lot of people, have a great product, have a great fitness studio, whatever it is that your, your business is, can you not have that and impact people's lives for good to be somebody that is winsome, charming, caring, loving, you know, but also have high expectations? Can you not do it all? I mean, I look at the people that impacted me the most of my life, you know, the coach or

the teacher or the father or the mother or the mentor. It was not absence of expectation on me. It was a high expectation, but also high love and high caring and a hand holding to get there on that. It was never an absence of expectations of being able to go and be a better human being or a better person or to perform at a better level or to be a better athlete or to be better than who I was before. But at the same time, those expectations that were impacting me were also because I knew that person cared deeply about me as a person on that. So I want that for my team. I want that for my staff. I want that for my kids. You know, one of the parts of me, and this is the funny, the ironic part of that is, you know, my kids now are older and we're doing some business together. It's harder for me to have hard conversations about

business with them than it is with my staff who are not my family. Because I look at that, because I have something to lose. These are my kids and I don't want them to not like me because I'm their dad. But it's harder for me to have those hard conversations. But it's more important for me to have that conversation with my kids because it's something they understand. They know that I love them. They need to hear, wait a minute, this is how you treat people. This is the customer service. This is why you clean the bathrooms for your staff. This is why you're on the knees wiping your floor. You are working harder than your staff because that's part of doing the job. I have that conversation with managers all the time. But it's like, wait a minute, I need to have that conversation with my kids.

But for me, it's because I love them. I don't want them to not, you know, to like me back or to be upset with me that I had a hard conversation about why didn't you stand up when somebody walked in the door? I would have that conversation all day long with my staff, but then all of a sudden with my kids, I don't have that conversation. So it's not an absence of expectation. It's having the expectation and to be able to say,

I hope this is the standard that we're gonna live by. But let me tell you something, at the same time, I love you and I love you deeply. And I care about you as a human being on that. So being able to understand that and be able to balance that out in your life, to be able to impact people, it changes from money and products and performance

and metrics to the numbers are telling you something, but are we still keeping our eye on the ball? Are we here to change people's lives? Because ultimately that's what you do in business. Everything you do is about helping other people. That's why we do this, particularly in the fitness world. Can you do that and still be successful and I want to say yes absolutely you can do both you can have a great career make a lot of money have a great product but you can also help and mentor and impact people's lives for good on that I am beyond frustrated with myself and society that one of the greatest times to live in this world. It is just amazing. We live in a great country. I mean, we've got more freedoms. I mean,

we can go anywhere in this country. We got more beauty. We have more economic freedom, more ability to achieve. And yet we're so afraid. We're so angry. We're so depressed. Suicide's up 30, 50%. It's just the craziest thing that we get so worked up about the emotional things. And we're all running around scared and angry, as opposed to saying, wait a minute, we all got flaws, we all make mistakes. We're all scared people, let's all join hands and let's make a difference. And let's go, let's conquer the hill. Let's go together. Let's have fun while we're conquering the hill on this because it's that that journey is fun um the best part of it isn't getting to the top it's

the getting there you know it's that journey up because there's always another hill to go we want to end it there i think that was that kind of just nailed the the entire show right there. But before we let you go, brother, I want to ask you about your daily routine and kind of the habits of success that you've adopted over the years. And what how that manifests in your daily life. Now, I'm going to ask you two questions. And you can answer them on any level, mental, physical, spiritual, whatever suits you today. The first of which being, what do you do each and every day to feed yourself and kickstart the motivation so you go out and attack the day from the get-go? And the follow-on to that is, what do you do every day to fuel yourself and create that

sustainable carryover of motivation from one day to the next? Well, I know all kinds of directions. I'm going to keep it simple and keep it in the things that I hope people start to recognize because there are a lot of things that you have to do. I mean, you've got to exercise. You've got to eat right. I mean, we all know that. But I'm going to tell you two of the things, the starting of my day and the ending of my day,

that has helped me more now than anything else is one slowing down in the morning, literally slowing that when I get out of bed, it's not, let's hit the ground running and go. It's wait a minute, let's slow down. Let's enjoy. Let's, let's keep it in perspective. Um, I mean, I've even looked at right now starting to say, you know, writing out a gratitude list. You know, usually I'm writing down what are my 10 things that need to get done today. And this is, you know, but you go, wait a minute. No, no, no, no. What am I grateful for? I mean, that's one of the things I'm trying now at this point to really get

me focused in the morning and staying in bed and talking to my wife with a cup of coffee. First thing, because I want that time is so valuable to me personally, um, to connect with another human being that I care deeply about. And the other thing is I go like, go like crazy and charge all day long, but at the end of my day, and this is the funniest thing. And I think I even said it at the conference, you know, every day that I'm at home, I, in my day, in my hot tub with a tequila and a cigar with my wife every day. And it is so important to me. You know, I can watch another baseball game or I can see another TV show or whatever we do at nighttime. We can just sit around, you know, I can get on my computer and work or do whatever every day. It feeds my soul because at the end of the day, I'm reflecting on what happened that day.

I'm talking about what happened that day. I'm connecting with another human being that I care deeply about and it feeds my soul and it gives me the energy I need to sustain a more balanced life. Chaos for 12, 14 hours of the day. But at least at the beginning, at the end, I'm slowing myself down and feeding my soul on that. So for me, it's a little bit of a paradigm shift for entrepreneurs to go, wait a minute, really? Every day? No, every day.

I do that on that. So anyway, hope that helps. I love that. And where can everybody in this community go follow you and support you either or both personally and professionally? Um, that, uh, you know, right now, I mean, if you look up studio three fit.com, you'd see our fitness studio. I'm not on social media. That's, uh, I, I, I could, we could have a whole nother seminar on why that is. It's just for me, I'm not on it.

I just don't have the time to do that. So my staff, I mean, if you listen to my staff, they're going to think, you know, social media is the most important thing that we do as far as connecting with our clients on that. But no, I'm not on it. So Studio3Fit.com is our fitness studio that we just started in Seattle. StelciusCryotherapy.com is our cryotherapy business. We're actually starting a cryotherapy franchise to help get the wellness and recovery out there more to our community on that. But CelsiusCriotherapy.com, you can connect there with me.

I'm on LinkedIn too, David Lovell. I'm on LinkedIn. So if you want to look me up on LinkedIn, that's a good way to connect with me as well on that. Awesome. Thank you for your time, brother. This has been super impactful and very enlightening. Thank you for everything. Thank you for your time.

You bet, guys. Enjoyed it. Hey, much appreciated, brother. And for everybody out there in Feed Me, Fuel Me land, make sure you get out. If you're ever in the Seattle area, check out Studio 3 Fit and look for Celsius Cryotherapy to start creeping up in your local neighborhood as David sets out to grow that business as well. Until next time, guys, Feed Me, Fuel Me. And that'll do it for this episode with our special guest, David Lovel.

If you want to check out everything that David has going, please go to the full show notes on shrug collective.com. Also be sure to connect with us on social media, including Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at feed me, fuel me. We would love to hear from you. If you found this episode inspiring in any way, please leave a rating and a comment in iTunes so we can continue on this journey together.

Also, be sure to share it with your friends and family on social media, including Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, or any other social platforms that you use. We really appreciate you spending your time with us today and allowing us to join you on your journey. We would love to hear your feedback on this episode, as well as guests and topics for future episodes. To end this episode,

we would love to leave you with a quote by Penelope Quest. Giving yourself some loving attention isn't selfish. It's sensible. If you feel loved and cherished, even if it's only by yourself, you'll have more love to give to others. Thank you again for joining us and we'll catch you on the next episode. you