Barbell Shrugged - Hard Work Beats Talent: My Story of Couch Surfing to a 7 Figure Business — Real Chalk #71

Episode Date: April 16, 2019

We all need inspiring stories to keep us motivated and remind us of what is possible. Sometimes we settle with mediocre and forget what our original goals were. We forget what we were put on this earth to do. We get scared. We fail. We make excuses. We put ourselves in a place with limits. But what if... What if our soul has another plan the whole time? What if we don’t know what it is, but it keeps us awake at night? It reminds us that what we are doing is either right or wrong. It consumes our every movement, breathe, thought, and action. It is a gut feeling that never steers you in the wrong direction. It is... Everything you were meant to be and more. You just have to trust it.   This is my story. It always gets me emotional, so I’m sorry for the sad parts, but it’s enough to light you up for the week and it’s real shit that we can all accomplish.   Enjoy! I love you all. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Show notes: http://www.shruggedcollective.com/rc-fischer ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ► 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

All right, everybody, we are back with another episode of Real Chalk. This time, I really wanted to dive into a few things that really made me want to start podcasting. I had a lot of things happen in my life that don't happen to a lot of people, and I made a lot of moves that I feel like are really important to go over that I think will help a lot of people. And in reality, I started the podcast think will help a lot of people. And in reality, I started the podcast because I just wanted to help people. My first podcast was actually a nutrition episode that I really wanted to get across to my members. And they would all

ask me questions about nutrition. And I was like, well, I don't really have enough time to tell you everything about nutrition in a way that makes me feel good about it. Like I don't want to tell you like five or six things in like two or three minutes. So – and then move on and then just like not give you the value that you need. I need everyone to understand so many things. So what happened was I created a podcast and I sent it out to everybody in the gym and I sent it out to just other friends, family and stuff like that. I'm like, here, do like, check this out, listen to this. I did a little bit of research, made sure I was tip top on all my stuff. And when I sent it out, everybody's like, dude,

this is awesome. It's hilarious. It's this, it's that. And then I talked about my personal story about how everything became the way it is with the gym and everything like that. And I was like, man, this is really powerful. And people really, really dig it. And they're really excited about it. The thing that happens after a while, though, is you start podcasting, you know, 100 plus episodes. And three, I mean, I probably had like 300 now. But like you just run out of things to

say. You, you, you run out of, um, new topics, like people to talk to, um, things like that. But so I think it's nice to, to full circle, come back around, talk about some things that really, really get me excited. I really want to motivate you guys for the week. And I think it's just really, really important to talk about my story and also add new things to the story that are the story that is. It's the story that is. It's the story that I'm living every day right now. And there's so many things that happen on a daily basis that is beneficial for so many people and there's so many things that I could say to help so many people.

Yeah, I don't know why I said it like that. But nonetheless, let's get this thing going. Let's start talking about all the things and if you're a new listener right now and you don't know my story, you're about to hear some really cool shit and I'm really excited for you. If you've already heard my story a million times, oh, I've never really like laid it down on the Barbell Shrugged Collective. I laid it down on my own Real Chalk episode back in the day, but I never really laid it down on here. So I don't

know if anyone knows the full deal, but basically I wanted to go in the military, like more than anything. Like I, I was a helicopter pilot in, um, in college. I went to university of Hawaii and I was going to pilot school at the same time and I got my license. And after that, I wanted to go in the military to fly. And the military officer, the officer, the recruiting officer, sorry, he said, you know, you have to have your degrees. You can go in and become an officer. And that's how people get, you know, these flight jobs. and while I was in school, I had met someone who was an amazing athlete and always just kind of like offered me to go work out with him. You got to come work out with me. You got to come work out. And like, I was just like a kind of a surfer bum at the time. I was like smoking a lot of weed. I just was like an average dude. And I went and started working out with him one day. He's like, he really got me to go work out. So as I was working out with him one day. He's like, he really got me to go work out.

So as I was working out with him, like as the months went by, this guy's like, dude, you are like a freak of nature. Like, I don't understand how you are so strong. And one thing led to another. Like, I found out that he was like an all-American football player and was like one of the greatest athletes like in the nation. And he's, you know, building me up and telling me that I'm like some freak athlete so it meant a lot coming from him and wanting to go into the military as a pilot started to feel a little bit less and less like what I wanted to do because I started to realize that I was like this really cool, like freakish athlete. So I got into CrossFit

and I started, well, I didn't get into CrossFit yet, actually, no. I got recruited by the Olympic skeleton and bobsled team at the time. That's what happened first. So Verizon, the phone company, they were going every state, all 50 states, and they were trying to find new athletes for the Skeleton and Bobsled team. So I tried out for this after working out with my friend for like a few months. I didn't know that I was going to try out for this. I saw the flyer, and I was like, I'm going to give it a go. Let's do it.

So I went, and I did that, and my scores were like second in the nation. So I was like, holy shit, this is so fucking cool. Like, I could be an Olympian. Like, this is amazing. So one thing led to another. I'll fast forward it. I wound up moving to Utah and I trained with the to do really well and make the team and everything, and I tore my ACL snowboarding in an accident, which is partially why my knee is completely fucked now. It's probably mainly the reason why it's really messed up now. Everyone thinks it's from too much crossfitting or this or that. It's really not. It's my own dumb fault for being in a snowboard accident. Anyway, as that happened, I had graduated. And then once I graduated with my degree, I was like, shit, like, I don't want to do the Olympics again, because it's every four years is really when anybody cares about it. It just seemed like a lot of work to put in and maybe I'd get hurt again or, you know, a couple of things can happen along the way. And it's just a long time.

So a friend of mine was like, you should try doing CrossFit. I bet you'd really like it. And if you're going to go in the military, it's the best way to train. Because I was still thinking about going in to be a pilot, but I just like, I just wanted to do something athletic so bad. So, um, I went to my first CrossFit gym and the guy that was running it happened to get second at the CrossFit games. So he, he knew like who was going to be good or like, he just knew a lot about it. He was, you could just tell when you talk to him that he, he was different than most people. So when I first walked in, he just gave me this look like, Oh my God, I can just tell this kid's going to be good. I did like my first workout. He like absolutely loved me. And he asked me to train with him and to, you know,

get ready to go to regionals and all these things. Like, he's like, I know you're going to do good. I know this, uh, just by watching the way you, and I can just tell, blah, blah, blah. And I wasn't really super into it, but I was like, yeah, I'll do it. Let's go. We'll train. My overall goal is to go in the military anyway. I was thinking about being like a Navy SEAL at this point because they were like the most athletic people I could think of. So that was my goal at the time.

And I'm running. I'm swimming, I'm doing all the CrossFit workouts. And I'm starting to realize that I really am like this pretty freaky person. And I'm, I'm, I have the ability to go to the CrossFit games, which I didn't even know was like, I didn't even know how cool it was at the time. It just seemed like something that people did. And if you made it there, great. Now it's like a way bigger thing. This is 2011. That was my first regionals. So one thing led to another. I made it to regionals. I didn't know what I was doing when I got there. I got a lot of no reps and didn't really understand how competition went. I had no idea what I was doing. So when that was over, I was like,

so pissed. I was like, Oh my God, I can do this so much better. Like give me another year of training and no one's going to beat me in this. Like there's just no way. So I kept training and it was, it was, uh, it was, it took over everything. It was the greatest feeling I'd ever had. I loved how hard you have to work to really show how good you are. Like there was nothing better than earning, earning that spot. You know what I mean? Like there is no luck. There is no this, there is no that. Like you did well, you were prepared and you worked so hard to get there. And that is the only way that you could get there. And I loved that about the sport. I had to practice my gymnastics all the time. I had to do my cardio all the time. I

had to work on my strength. I had to do everything. And training was my favorite part of even being on the Olympic team was just the training aspect, being on the Olympic team was like just the training aspect, being in the gym with the guys and being outside pushing sleds and all this stuff. And that was pretty much what my life became. And I loved it more than anything. It was the greatest feeling ever. And I realized that I could train for a living. And it was just, it was all I ever wanted. And the um, but the, the, the idea of being in the military was something that was still in my head as far as like what I needed to do for money and like a career. Cause like a career was like really deep in my, in my mind. And my, my parents

were always like, you know, you have to, you have to have a job, you have to have a career. And I didn't know what CrossFit was going to be or what it was going to do for me or if it even would be a career. So I kept the military number one and I thought, where else better to go, especially if I want to be a SEAL, than to move to San Diego and move to California. So I went on Craigslist and started looking at different jobs and I found a CrossFit job. It was like a manager of a CrossFit gym in San Diego. And that's where all the Navy SEALs train. So I can go train with them and talk to them and live that whole lifestyle, which I was really excited for. And I decided to make the move. And I came out for this job. I was really excited about it. Like the first month was going great. And then it was just like a ton of micromanaging going on to the point where it wasn't really fun anymore.

The person who owned the gym was like, oh, I'm going to make all the workouts now instead of you. And we're going to do this and we're going to do that. And I want everything to go in this direction. And none of it was what I really envisioned myself doing. So we kind of butt heads for a little bit. And there was eventually a point where I was just like, I just can't do this anymore. The members hate the workouts. I feel like everyone's taking it out on me, and it's really not because I was running the gym.

But what was really being done on the back end was really what was running the gym instead of me. So eventually, we just got in a huge fight at the gym, me and the owner. And I was like, forget this, I'm out of here. And I'll be able to get a job, you know, at any CrossFit gym very easily, like, who wouldn't want to hire me? I was this great athlete. And I was really knowledgeable, I have my degree in exercise physiology and another degree in nutrition from University of Utah when I was on the Olympic team training. And I was a helicopter pilot and like all these things. I mean, I had such a great freaking resume to give to people.

Like who wouldn't want to hire me? So I found out that no one wanted to hire me actually. So I went to every CrossFit gym and I tried to tell them that, you know, I'd start from the bottom. I would do anything. I would even start cleaning the floors, like whatever I had to do to get a job there. And they all were like, well, we don't really know you. I came from Utah. So like no one in California knew me. Like, we don't really know you, so we only hire from within the gym. Like, that just kept happening over and over and over and over again, or no one had anything.

And I went to University of San Diego to be a strength conditioning coach, like, see if they had anything online, like, pretty much, like, applying for everything that was, like pretty much like applying for everything that was like, anything that had to do with fitness. Like I tried for everything, even like basic gyms, anything like that. I probably should have looked for like a server job or something. I probably would have got something. I don't know why I didn't look for that at the time, but I was so passionate about fitness and so passionate about just anything that had to do with that genre of work that that was like all I wanted to settle for. And I wasn't willing to settle for anything else. And months and months went by and my bank account, you know, became nothing. Like I went from having like $5,000 saved as a young kid to having about, you know, just a couple hundred bucks and my rent was going to be $1,200 next

month and I didn't have it. So throughout the time of me looking for a gym to work at, there was one gym that told me no, but they said that I could work out there. So I started to work out at that gym in San Diego. It was called Pacific CrossFit PB at the time, and now it's called San Diego Athletics, which I think they went back now to a CrossFit name. But anyway, I was working out there the whole time and I basically told everybody in there, hey, I got to go. I don't know, like, I don't have any money. No one really knew my situation. I was just there and I worked out and everyone thought everything was fine. But when I actually told them my situation, a lot of them really felt for me and they wanted to help, but they really couldn't. There's nothing they could do. It was something that I created for

myself and I had to deal with it. And at this time, I really didn't have any clue what I really wanted to do. Like I love strength conditioning. I didn't know if I wanted to be a strength conditioning coach. I loved the idea of being in the military. I didn't even know if I really wanted to do that anymore because I loved CrossFit so much. I just really wanted to keep training and something told me like I had this weird gut feeling that that was like what I was born to do. Like I just knew that if I kept doing that, because like when I worked out it inspired people like I could see it like they were just like man like he fucking loves this and at the time it didn't matter like you weren't making money from that love but inside I just felt like it was the right thing to do

so I kept doing it and that's where I spent a lot of my time when I wasn't looking for a job, and then what happened was I was like, all right, guys, I have to go home. I don't know when I'll be back or if I'll be back or whatever, but I just want to say bye to everybody, and this girl who was at the gym at the time, her name was Erin, Erin Dwyer, actually. She said to me, you can stay on my couch for as long as you need to get on your feet and you know, whatever. So I was like, Oh, I don't know. I don't even know this girl like blah, blah, blah, blah. So I spent like two or three days like in my car, no place to live. And I still was working out every day. Nobody understood like how bad it really was for me. I was going to Whole Foods actually and I would, you know, grab as much food as I could and I'd

go sit down and I would just eat it. Like I wouldn't pay for anything. I did that for months. Like, man, I stole thousands of dollars worth of food. I'm sorry, Whole Foods. Had to do it. I really, really had to. Anyway, I wound up saying yes to her, and I said, let's go. Let's do it. I'll stay on your couch. And I was there for like three or four months. Oh, it was just painful, you know? Like you just feel like such a piece of shit.

Like you just come home every day, and yeah, you still don't have anything happening. You just like feel like such a loser. And then, you know, I have five brothers and sisters on my mom's side that I grew up with. And I have some other sisters on my, on my dad's side. There's a lot of us. And, uh, I was like the one person in the family that was like really always did well. I had always had good grades. I was like the kid that went on the Olympic team and I killed sports in high school and everything was just, my future looked so bright for me. And I was the only one in my family that was like that. And my mom absolutely like loved me for all of those things and looked up to everything I did. And I'm on this couch and I'm just like laying there and I'm like having anxiety

attacks every night. Just like, what am I going to do with my life? Like I'm letting my mom down. I'm letting my family down. And I couldn't sleep. I couldn't, I couldn't do anything. I just like felt frozen all the time. And it was just like this horrible gut-wrenching feeling that just felt like shit all the time. But I just knew that whatever the answer really was for me to get out of it at that time, like, oh, just go be a server or just move home and get the job with more job security or do what everyone is telling you to do. I've never been that person. I had to go against the grain. I had to do what wasn't possible. It just felt like the right thing for me. So there was this competition. It was called the OC Throwdown. It was the biggest competition

outside of the CrossFit Games. And they threw an online qualifier. And all the best athletes in the world, people I was watching on YouTube, people I looked up to, these were the best CrossFitters ever. They were all signed up for it and it was free to sign up. If you got top three, you would win $100. I think it was $300 for first, $200 for second,

and $100 for third. And you have to submit your video to make sure it was legit. And then this is like when Instagram and Facebook was starting. So like when someone posted something of you doing something, it was like a big deal at the time. Nobody was getting hundreds of thousands of followers or millions like it is now. But it was like, you know, people were starting to use it. So I had gotten top three, I think, in every single workout, and I won some kind of money. And at the end of all of it, I was second place overall.

And it was insane, because I'm thinking to myself, you know, I always knew I was this good, but to actually put my scores up against everybody else and see how it went, and to see the way that it went it was just like oh my god like I am good enough like I know that I can go to the games and I know that I can show people you know that I can win like I knew I could win like I didn't think that I was going to just go and do well like I never thought that I was going to go podium or that I would go and get top 10 or 20. Like I always thought in my head and in my heart that I was going to win the games. And it was, it was this, you know, just perpetual feeling of just like throwing myself forward and just, just utter confidence. And it blasted me through the most depressing times I ever had. Oh shit, I'm starting to get a little upset. Sorry, guys.

It's a little, it's a touchy subject. So I got second in that online qualifier, and then I, anyway, got second in the online qualifier, and then the competition was a month after the qualifier. And it was $200 to sign up, and I did not have the money to sign up, obviously. So the owner of the competition called me up on my phone. Yes, I still had a phone. My parents, thankfully, still paid for that. And my car insurance and whatever. Like little things like that. My mom

still helped me out with, uh, we'll get back to that in a minute. But, uh, I said, Hey man, yeah, I don't have any money. I'm actually sleeping on a couch. I don't really have anything. And you know, things aren't really all that great for me right now, but I I'm super stoked that I was able to show the world, you know, who I who I am and how passionate I am about this and how much it means to me. Hearing my story from myself, Justin, the guy who owned the competition, he said, You know what? I'm going to give you a free billet. I posted some videos of you and everybody's going crazy. They want to see you. They want to meet you. They want to see who this guy is.

You have to be there. I said, Okay, let's go. So I got to go to this big event and holy shit, like within the first day, I think I was up in the top three and it was insane. Like every event I was wearing, you know, friends' clothes, using friends' Olympic lifting shoes that didn't even fit me, drinking and eating food that I had stolen from Whole Foods that day. either laying on a couch or an air mattress for the last like couple of years and like I didn't have the best of everything given to me to help me become the best athlete I just I only had this giant heart that wouldn't stop beating so by the end of the competition I think they had given me second place. I have a second place trophy in the gym right now. And they found out later on that the points were kind of messed up. But I actually had won the competition.

But even second place at the time, it completely changed my life. Like I had sponsors coming at me like, you know, wear my clothes and I'll give you a couple hundred bucks a month or a thousand bucks a month. And Progenix was like, you know, we'll give you some money and you take Progenix every day. And I had other people there that were like, you know, I can give you a job like doing this or doing that, or you can coach at my gym or all these different things. And that's actually when I moved to Los Angeles and I started working at Ronnie Teasdale's gym across at Mean Streets. And I and I wound up moving down there. So it was a very pivotal time in my life. It it it needed to happen.

It was if it didn't happen, I don't know what would have happened to me. Like if that one event did not go the way that it went, I can honestly say that I don't think I'd even be in CrossFit anymore. I think I would have had to have moved home for sure. Maybe I would have stuck it out a little bit longer and stayed on the couch. I'm not 100% positive, but I needed the affirmation of that competition to show the world who I was. I needed it for my heart. I needed it for everybody else. I needed it for my family. I needed it for so many things. And it just, it went the way that, that it should have went. And there was a couple of things that I did that, you know, I don't know if I could ever replicate again. It happened in the moment and needed to happen. Um, there was some ring handstand pushups that I had no idea how to do at the time. And I was doing them strict and everybody else was like wrapping their feet around the, the, the, the straps and pulling themselves up. It was like this weird tactic that you could

get through it really fast. And I didn't know how to do that. And I was the only person doing them strict and thank God actually still got like top three in that workout. Uh, cause everybody was falling apart. So even now, I don't even know if I could do that again. That's just like one little example. And then, yeah, I mean, I literally cried. Like, holy shit, I beat all these guys that I was – ah, shit, I always get fucking emotional. I was watching these guys on YouTube. I like looked up to these people more than anything. They were my idols. So I started working in LA now,

and I'm starting to make some money. I got a place to live. I bought an air mattress for myself. I still didn't have a real bed yet, and I'm sleeping in an air mattress an air mattress for myself. I still didn't have a real bed yet And i'm sleeping in an air mattress With I have a girl roommate Uh, and i'm in like not the nicest part of you know, la it's kind of kind of a shitty part Yeah, but it was fine and uh Yeah, I had single-handedly Like had the most hysterical conversation with a texting conversation with this girl who let me move in with her. And I basically tricked her into – she said she only wanted a female.

And I told her I was gay, and I told her that I have never liked a woman ever, like all sorts of ridiculous things. And she's like, well, I have a boyfriend, and I don't know. I don't think he would like you. You're kind of good looking and stuff. I just looked at your Instagram and I like made up all these things and she was dying laughing. And by the time it was all over, I'd gotten like a discount on rent and she, you know, decided that having a guy roommate would be fine, especially a gay one. And then lo and behold, I'm just none of the things that I said. Oh, that was actually really funny. I forgot about that. So I'm living with her and I'm coaching as many classes as I can. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm going to all these different gyms saying hi to people. I'm like

really trying to build my name up. I'm trying to, uh, have a nice impact in the community. And at the time it was just such, such an amazing time to be a CrossFitter. Like you could go to any gym and work out with anyone at any time. And it was fun. And it was like, it was the thing to do. Like it was a throw down session. Um, Instagram wasn't even big enough yet for you to like, you know, be too cool or be videoing everything. Like no one videoed anything. And it was just an amazing time. And like, and those times are gone now, unfortunately. You don't really go to people's gyms

and do a bunch of dumb workouts that will, you know, fuck your body up anymore. And it's not the same feel as it used to be. And back then everyone wanted to compete, not like, you know, like a sliver of the gym. Like it used to be like half the gym wanted to compete and half of them wanted to just work out. And now it's like 1% want to compete and 99% want to just work out. So amazing, amazing, amazing time.

And I still had never had any actual money. So I didn't know what it felt like to have any money. I'm actually still stealing food at this time, even though I was making money. I wanted to save, so I was still stealing food. Anyway, I... What the fuck was I gonna say? Shit. So I'm stealing food still, right? Yeah, I'm at Main Street, and I'm working there. Oh, okay. And I go to Regionals. I make it to Regionals, and I get one place from going to the CrossFit Games. Are you kidding me? I missed it by one freaking spot. So the year before, I told you that I was going to come back and just destroy. And now I have this big name.

I'm starting to make some money. And, oh, that's where I was going. I was like, I never had any money and what it would feel like to have some. So I missed it by one spot. To my head, I'm like, all right, now I've made a humongous leap. I went from like being the best guy that everyone thought was going to go to the games and kill it. And I fucked up. I didn't know how to compete. So I went from like, you know, getting 20th or 30th of the games at regionals the year before to now I had gotten fourth place. Huge, huge improvement.

Everybody knew that I, you know, belonged to the games that year i just had like one really bad event that really screwed me over and um along this time i was telling you guys i didn't have any money so uh some some personal training clients started to come around because i was the best guy around that people wanted to train with. And I'll never forget telling somebody that my out, like my, my fees were a hundred dollars an hour. I was like, Oh my God, like this, this person's going to freak out if I tell them a hundred dollars, but I really need time to train. And like, if I'm going to personal train somebody, it's better be worth it. So I spit out the a hundred dollar number and they were like, all right, I want to come three days a week. I want to do this. I want to do that.

And I remember just being like, oh my God, I just made 300 extra dollars a week from this guy. That's like, it was so much money for me. Like that's an extra $1,200 a month. And I'm just training somebody. Like no big deal. I was only making like $20 a class coaching. So now I was like, holy shit, this is insane. I'm coaching like five classes now at a time. It was just an amount of money that didn't even make sense to me.

So I – within a year – and this just kind of goes to show the type of person I am, like, when it comes to saving, and especially now, like, preparing for a rainy day, like, fuck, I had a rainy whole bunch of days, but after a year had gone by, I was personal training like crazy, I was marketing myself like crazy, I was working out like crazy still, I wasn't even, like, sleeping, and I didn't even care, I loved every second of it, and I had saved $60,000 in one year. Like I was this bum ass kid and like just grinding away. And all of a sudden, like, I mean, that means I must have made way more than 60 grand that year. Obviously, like I was grinding so hard. I'd saved 60,000 bucks. I had met this kid at a competition. His name was Kenny Leverage. He was like, I could tell he's gonna be my best friend and he was for a couple years

Sadly, we don't talk anymore. I fucking hate every second of the fact that that's a real thing uh, you know people make up stories and You know, we just separated over time and uh, i'm really bummed about it Actually, if anyone's listening to this and and knows that whole piece i'm still bummed about it. It sucks. He lives in my town. I never see him anymore. We used to live together. We were just homies and it sucks. But anyway, when I met him, I knew this kid was going to be like my best friend. We were going to be training partners. We were going to go to the games together. We were going to just take over the world. So I wound up moving to Newport beach and I coached at another gym called

orange coast CrossFit. And at that time I still have my 60,000 bucks saved. And I had went to regionals two more times with them. And during that time, um, I was training some people there too. I definitely was putting more time into training. And as things started to unravel to me, there was a couple things that I noticed. So for those of you who know my story, this is some parts right now that I'm going to talk about that I've never talked about before,

and I think that they're important. So at this time, I start to notice that like people are creating CrossFit gyms as a business and they're starting to make money from it. And not only that, I'm starting to notice that the social media aspect is coming out. People are getting bigger sponsors. I'm starting to notice, you know, people are making money in other avenues that are besides CrossFit. And I'm starting to notice that it's time for me to, you know, people are making money in other avenues that are besides CrossFit. And I'm, I'm starting to notice that it's time for me to, you know, get back on that career track. Even if I made it to the CrossFit Games, I knew that the outcome of it wasn't really a full career yet. And like, I wasn't necessarily content with the fact that I was just making money from classes, from coaching and private

training and stuff. I knew that I needed something more for when I couldn't do this anymore. And whether or not I made it to the games, I knew that it wasn't going to give me the sense of fulfillment that I needed at the time. So I left that in the back of my head all the time. And Kenny didn't do that. Kenny would drop all of his classes and use sponsorship money to keep him afloat. And when he did that, it definitely helped him. He got in better shape and he made it to the games a couple times. But I started to notice that when he went to the games, it didn't do anything special for him.

He got a couple extra sponsors that would give him a couple thousand dollars. But it wasn't life changing money. It was something he would burn through again, because he had to train. So he couldn't coach classes. And yeah, he was working less, but he was training more than me. But in the end of the day, we had this, we had the same things. We lived in the same apartment together, we had the same amount of money saved. We had a lot of the same opportunities, except he just had the ability to ask for more money because he had been to the games. And I started to notice that business was really going to be like where I flourished. And I knew that that was around that time when I started to compare myself to him, I knew that that was the way that it should go.

So this guy that I was training at the time, I had no idea who he was. I knew that he had money, but I didn't know how much. He drove an F-150, wore regular clothes. You would never think anything crazy from him. So he used to always kind of drill at me, like, what do you want to do? And like, you know, I think that you're a great coach and I think you would do amazing, you know, owning your own gym. And I agreed, but at the time there was so many gyms. I was like, fuck, like, I don't even know if like owning a gym is a good idea. I don't even want one.

And I, and I see how hard it is to run one. And I know that training would be completely done for me, which I wasn't completely done with it. It just wasn't what I wanted my main focus to be. So I got to the point where I knew everybody in the gym. Like, it was hard for me to train. Like, I would start talking to everybody. I mean, or they would talk to me. And I'd almost have to put headphones on and go in the corner and just be a dick. So after a while, I was like, you know what, I'm going to start training somewhere else. So I started taking a lot of time and going to other gyms to train.

And I started to notice that every gym was different. And I would think about my favorite things from each gym like oh man well i wish i could go i wish i could go to a gym that was like that was like these people and like these people but also kind of like us at the gym that i worked at and it didn't exist and there wasn't a lot of you know cool people at these gyms where you could, you know, throw down like we could at our gym, but our gym was like really shitty, you know, but we prided, like, it was, it was part of the vibe of the gym, like, that's what you want, it was like this, like, grungy gym, and like, it was gnarly, and blah, blah, blah, but I was like, fuck, it feels really good to be in a nice gym, like, I want that gnarly feeling, but in the, with the nice equipment,

like, I'm not trying to be, you know, bougie,. If I was going to spend $200 a month, why wouldn't I do it at the nicer gym? Obviously, I wouldn't if the vibe was way cooler at the cheaper gym, but not cheaper, but less quality equipment. But if I could have that vibe with all the nice stuff, like, that would be ideal. So it started to, you know, brighten up in my mind that the idea of owning a gym actually wasn't a terrible idea. I just needed a lot of money to pull off what I wanted to do. So I told my client, because he's always, like, trying to offer me, like, you know, we should open a gym together. I'd give you the money. And I was like, hey, would you ever be, like, completely opposed to giving me, like, a million dollars? I know it sounds like a lot. And I don't even know if I'd need it. But I just want to know that I could have it when it comes time to opening a gym. And he said, yeah, you have to pay it back. I want you to understand that. Like that's part of how this works. Because

I didn't know anything about how the deals work. And we decided we were going to do it. And I didn't get excited about it until the location popped up that was right. Because we looked for locations for months and months. And I didn't, it was nothing that really like was the right location with the right size and the right layout and, you know, ceiling height and the rent price and just all these things that really come into play when it comes time to, you know, really making this thing work. Because a lot of people, they think they could just do it and they don't realize that there's demographics like how much money is everybody making that area, you know? How much is the rent going to be versus how many people can actually be at capacity in the gym, you know? How much money is it going to cost you to put in the bathroom

that you need or the shower that you need? And all these things that go into play when it comes to opening a gym. And there's a lot going on. So much more. And I know so much about business now that it's crazy. And it's all through experience. And even my friend who has a master's degree in business is like, yeah, the best way of learning business in general is just to do it. And I really believe that. I don't think I could ever have learned the things that I've learned without doing them the way that I did. Any book would never have been – I've never sufficed. That's just a side note.

But yeah, we eventually got this space that I have now. It wasn't even for rent. My friend knew the guy who owned it before us, he had like a globo gym in here, there was a bunch of, a bunch of just regular machines, leg presses, you know, shoulder press machines, you know, pec deck, a cable crossover, like shit like that, it was a, but it was a personal training gym, but it was super, super fancy. And yeah, like I had to buy all that equipment and give him money to leave to take over this spot. So he agreed at the time. And I think I had, I want to say I'd given him $50,000 to leave. I had to pay $200,000 for all the equipment.

So we sold the equipment and I got the money back. I got the 200 grand back. So that was like a break even. I gave them money to leave. And then I spent, I don't know, like 200 grand building out the building the way that I wanted it to be. But they had spent $750,000 on the build out. So they actually wanted $100,000 to leave instead of 50. But I gave him, I mean, we gave him 50. That was like the best deal they were going to

get. No one takes over a lease and then also gives money. So like basically I won the lease bid on that just because I was willing to give some money. But you put together the $200,000 and $750,000. Now you have a million dollar space. And I just got really, really lucky because these people put $250,000 bathrooms in, they redid the outside. Just a lot of feng shui going on inside. If you've ever seen my space, it's very, very special. So I just changed all the colors. I changed one of these like ugly wood floors to like this polished marble. It's just sick. And then, you know, I put $100,000, $150,000 in equipment in here, top notch everything. And it was going to be fucking cool. Like I knew it was going to be cool now. I'm like,

oh, wow, like this is gnarly. So before I had ordered the equipment, actually, I had spent quite a bit of time traveling around like all over the country, like dropping into gyms, figuring out what I liked about everyone, because now it wasn't just the gyms that I had been to around here. It was important to me to check the most, you know, famous and most successful gyms around the nation as well. I was like, I have to go to these places and figure out what makes them successful. I'm not going to talk to the owner or anything. I'm just going to creep around. I'm going to check out all the equipment. I'm going to take a couple classes. I'm going to do whatever I have to do. I'm going to start counting how many wall balls they have and how

many plates they have and how many members they have. And I just want to know what my equipment list looks like and all of these things. But at the time, nobody wanted another CrossFit gym to open. So no one was going to tell you those things. So that's why I had to do like my little detective work, which is what I like to call it. So I did all those things and I decided that I was going to like have my gym look a very, very certain way. I had a small floor space. The gym's 5,500 square feet. My floor space is 3,500 to actually work with. The most I've ever had is 400 members in here. And that's not monthly though. It's like monthly and punch cards together. And like on average, I usually have 300 people kind of working out in the gym. So I created this really cool layout where instead of the huge rig that comes off the wall,

I created these power racks that kind of come off the wall, which gave me an extra couple feet all the way around. And then I put a pull-up bar through the middle of the room to give me the extra pull-up space for when we need that. But also because it's where it is, you can work out underneath it. So I didn't lose any floor space, but I maximized the ability of people to do pull-ups and toes bar and all that stuff. I also have this one little little very low area in the gym where that's where all my assault bikes are. But I couldn't even put a rower in there because the

ceiling's too low. So when you put the rower up, it would hit the ceiling. If you put rowers in there, you'd run out of space really fast. So I all the rowers like tilted up in a very specific way in a very specific place of the gym and then the bikes are just like in the very most perfect spot ever so then I had to you know just figure out where I was going to put all these dumbbells because I planned on having a lot of people and I also think if you're opening a gym you should always plan on having a lot of people there's nothing worse than having a workout where you don't have enough equipment like that always turns people off right away. Or when they walk in, they see something small and they don't understand that they're part of something big. You need

people to understand and to feel like they're part of something big. You know, like you never see a, you know, a Barry's gym or a, or a orange theory or something, you know, with only a quarter of their equipment because that's just not how you get the vibe going. You have all the shit in there right away. They come in. They know you mean business, and it's time to sign up, and it's time to go. So I really think that that's the way to go, and that's the way that I knew I was going to go, and I did, and I went all out, put all the money on the line, and yeah. so everything was all set. The gym's all perfect. Everything's in the right place. And I'm super stoked to make the deal happen. I had to give

my, I had 60 grand still saved. I had to give all of that money, literally every cent to my investor. He wanted to know that I was a 100% invested. So I started getting a salary. So my first month, I had no money. So I borrowed that from my mom. I paid her back like right away because I started making a salary from the gym. And after a few months, I just gave her the money straight back. And Instagram was getting bigger at this time. So this is when I decided to start showing people that the gym was fucking cool. So no one was really marketing their gyms on Instagram yet. And I wasn't really even marketing myself too much yet, but I knew it was important to market the gym. So as the gym started, I would just make a post, you know, I just bought 30 grand worth of Olympic lifting plates. And I just show a huge stack of Olympic lifting plates.

The gym's not even open for, like, two more months. And I think by the time we had opened, we had, like, 10,000 followers, because everybody's like, holy fuck, this gym's going to be insane. And I would show pictures of a custom bar that I had made. I would show pictures of all the racks coming in, 10 assault bikes coming in, 10 rowers coming in, like, skiergs, all this stuff, you know, like, a whole room full of dumbbells, kettlebells, stuff that no one had ever seen, uh, when everything got painted, I showed that, like,

the inside of it, you know, looked like an equinox, it was super nice, I showed the showers, all these different things, and it was really the only place you wanted to go after this, you're like, come on, this place is insane, and Ryan Fisher owns it, it's gonna be nuts, like, whatever, I put like a $40,000 sound system in the place, it's like, insane, it's even more money now, I added a bunch of shit to it, I can put the music up and rattle your ass off your feet outside the gym if I wanted to, and yeah, it was the shit, and it is the shit. And as I did that, it built up so much hype. And like my first day, I had 100 members in my gym and I had that, you know, crazy, fuzzy feeling again where I was like, OK, like this is what I was meant to do. And and uh, and yeah, like, oh my God, the feeling of just like that success, opening those doors and seeing everybody come in was like, unlike anything I had ever felt.

And there was one part of the story that I left out here that the year before, cause I had gone to regionals now like a few times, and the year before was the year that I actually, for those of you who don't know, I freaked out on a judge in front of everybody, like thousands of people, and I told them I was going to kill him, and they almost expelled me from CrossFit for life, and they publicly shamed me on CrossFit.com

and said that I was a maniac and crazy, and this guy doesn't deserve to be part of CrossFit, and he doesn't exude be part of crossfit and he's not he doesn't like exude the vibe that we want and blah blah blah blah it's just insane you can go to youtube and type in ryan fisher no rep and you'll see uh the animosity that was behind it it's got like well over 100 000 views on it now so after that my mom was like i don't want you opening a gym like no one's gonna go to it because like they just ruined your name and it was just another hit that I want to tell you guys and I want to I want that to shine through on this podcast right now is like that was a humongous hit

like I will never go to the games ever again after that moment because CrossFit hated me anytime I ever competed I got the worst judging ever after that. Like the games was no longer a thing that will, that would ever happen for me after that. And it's my fault. I accept it. It is what it is. Uh, and I've talked about it a million times of why I fucking lost my mind. And it's basically, they didn't know the history that built up to that moment and feeling a judge take that away from me because he was no repping me and that's why I freaked out that is the response that they got they didn't know about me on the couch they didn't know about you know me crying my fucking self to sleep at

night stealing food and putting everything on the line to stay in this sport that I love more than anything in this fucking world you know like fuck like, fuck, anyway, that's what happened, I fucking lost it, and I'm still pissed about it, because I should have went to the games that year, it was my best year ever, um, but that was the moment, like, after that, I knew that it was time to move on, It was time to start my career. It was time to fucking just put my head down and do something fucking great that didn't have anything to do with my athletic ability. It didn't have to do with my body and stuff like that. But like, I wanted to do something for other people, something that's fucking inspiring. I wanted to open something great. I want to be part of something great. I wanted other people to be part of this great thing. And I want to leave my

mark on this world the best way that I could. So I opened this fucking gym. It was out of control. I did everything I could to make it the way that I wanted it to be. I learned as much as I could. I read everything. I coached every single fucking class. 5 a.m. all the way to 7.45 p.m. was the last class.

I didn't get done until like 9, 9.30. And I coached every one of them. I coached private clients in between. I was coaching 12. was the last class. I didn't get done until like 9, 9.30. And I coached every one of them. I coached private clients in between. I was coaching 12, 13 hours a day. I did everything I had to do with the workouts. I made this. I made that. I did fucking everything, you know? Like, this is going to work. And it's going to be fucking sick. It's the only way that I am going to be able to live my life, like, fulfilled, you know, like, I didn't make it to the games, I didn't want to go to the fucking Olympics when I tore my hamstring, got all fucked up, like, something needs to break for me right now, like, every,

I get so close, and then something shitty happens, and I'm fucking over it, all right, rant over on that, so, yeah, I blew the fucking hinges off this place, 300 members in a year, I wound up being in every magazine for, you know, having one of the nicest gyms, most well-run, best vibes in the gym, like, everybody wanted to stop here and drop in, check it out, I was on podcasts all over the place. I was everywhere. It was cool. And I think people forgot about the stupid freak out moment relatively. A lot of people were still scared to meet me. They didn't know me. They thought I was a maniac still.

And I'd meet them over time, and they liked me and everything. I was still competing at the time. I had gotten fifth at regionals, two places away from going to the games again, even though with all that work and everything underhand. And yeah, like that was a huge step for me, and it was something that I didn't really plan for. But as you guys can see as the story goes on, it was something that was inside of me the whole time. And for those of you right now who are younger and you don't know where you're going right now, or maybe you're a gym owner right now and you don't know what the next step of your life is, and you listen to this podcast because you want to be inspired or you want to know what I did to get to where I'm at now,

I never let that hope go. It was something that I couldn't let go no matter what. It was so deeply ingrained that I didn't know how to feel any other way. It was the only way I knew how to feel. So I know a lot of you guys have gut feelings, but there's sometimes you have a gut feeling that you literally cannot let go of. And that was what I had. And I'm so happy that I had that. And I'm not like a super religious person or anything. But if there's anybody in this world who was looking out for me, they let me know that that was the way, that was the path, that was what I was meant to do. But I lived in Newport Beach and everything here is really, really expensive. So even though everything was up and cruising, we started making some money. I started to realize

that I was never really going to make the kind of money that was going to buy a house here and be able to have kids and support a family. I started to realize that I just pretty much had used my life savings to create a job for myself, basically. And actually, I was making more money as a personal trainer than when I owned the gym. And I started to think about that. And it was something that kind of bothered me. I was putting a lot more hours in. I had a lot more like international fame and I wasn't making any more money. Like I wasn't, it wasn't the money that I expected to make. And it wasn't that I needed it to be happy or anything like that. It was just that I needed it to understand that I chose a career that was a smart move for me. So yeah, I had started this career and it's something that I'll probably always have.

And it's way better than being hired by somebody that you could be fired from. But it's not also enough money for me to be able to flourish and be able to do the things that I want to do and be able to have a family. So there was something I did at that time purposely that I didn't realize was going to be such a big deal later on. And it was the online programming that I do now. So I never wanted to put my workouts online because I always thought that that was weird. Like you would pick a CrossFit gym back in the day, for those of you guys who don't know, by looking at their programming online, you would look at every gym in the area and you'd be like, Oh, those workouts are cool. Those are cool. I don't like this guy's

workouts, blah, blah, blah, blah. And that's how you decided where you want it to go. Either your friends went there or you liked the programming. And I always thought it was weird that people put the, like once I owned the gym, I didn't think it was weird before, but once I owned the gym, I was like, ooh, that doesn't sound like a good idea. I mean, I'm like this super successful gym right now. Everybody wants to be like me. What if they start doing my workouts? Then they can pretty much be me without, like, you know, paying for it, or they could just copy me very easily. And a lot of people were every once in a while I would post a workout, like on my Instagram, I wouldn't post it on the website and if I bet I never posted a workout on the website ever. But people would

just be tagging like crazy. Oh, you know, we did cross the chalk workout today. It was awesome. It was this, it was that. And I started to realize that the workouts that I was making for my gym were much different than everybody else's. And I knew they were. I knew I put more time in. I knew that I was looking for something very specific in my workouts for my members. Like I'll never forget what it felt like to coach a class and give, you know, them X amount of work. And then people are looking at you like, is that it when it's over? And I think that's like, what's very important about experience before you open a gym is like, you know, how many classes have you coached to get to the point where

you know what everybody wants? Like I knew, and I still know what everybody wants for every class. Like they want a certain amount of work time. It has to feel a certain way. It can only be a certain weight. There's something, I mean, they all want their body to look a certain way. And because competition is falling off so much, everybody just wants to look good.

So I'm, you know, now my programming's changed dramatically. And if you follow Chalk Online right now, you can go back to 2014 and 15 when I used to make workouts. It's still on the app. You can look at the stuff I made then. And you can look at the stuff that I make now. And it's way, way different. I incorporate a little bit of bodybuilding here and there.

It's in my own interval style way, the high-intensity interval bodybuilding way that I kind of invented. And, yeah, people dig it now. And, you know, every workout now, you know, 40 minutes of class is working out, whether it's strength and a Metcon or it's all Metcon or there's rest and strength and rest and Metcon rest and strength. And I'll go back and forth. I'll make sure the entire time is filled. I'll have extra credit. Sometimes There's never anything for them to think about. They are fulfilled every day. And that is very, very important to me. Anyway, because I cared about it that much, it was something that people would ring,

ring the phone all the time. You know, what's the workout today? We want to know what you guys did the other day. We saw it, but we lost it. We should have screenshotted it or something. And it started to become apparent to me that a lot of people were really interested in what we were doing. And I had always looked up to this gym called Jim Jones in Utah when I used to live there for the training for the Olympic team. And they had an online subscription that was $500 a year. And I remember them saying one time they had a thousand people on there every year. And I was like, holy crap. And I never forgot that. But that guy trained the movie for the movie 300, all the athletes and all the actors in 300. And he was in men's health and all these things. And everyone signed up for his program because he was super famous and whatever and i didn't think i'd ever be able

to do anything like that but it was something that was in the back of my mind for years i mean this is in my mind for years i didn't think about it a lot but i started to think about it you know as i i was owning the gym for about three years i've been i've been open for five now about three years. I've been, I've been open for five now, but three years in, I was like, all right, I think I can put these workouts online and I think people will buy them kind of like the Jim Jones thing. Um, I got to have like multiple programs. It has to be better somehow. So I, I put on, you know, now I have three programs on there. There's CrossFit, there's sweat. And I have this thing called the daily D, which is for people who don't have a lot of equipment, a lot of time, or they travel or whatever. So it's, you know, the daily D, which is just, it's dumbbells only. Uh, you need,

you need dumbbells, a pull-up bar and a jump rope, and that's it. You'll never need more than that. It's super popular right now. It's crazy actually. Um, so I put all those on there. It's all on there. And I remember I wanted to charge like a hundred bucks a month or something. And at my friends at the time were like, dude, I don't think you should do that. It's a lot of money. You know, nobody was really doing this. And I was like, man, but I put so much time into it. Like, it's like broke my heart to think about selling it for anything less. And you know, like what if a gym started following the program and like they were only paying, you know, they were all suggesting like 20 bucks. And I was like, that's so much work, like fuck them, you know, like I don't want to do that. But I swallowed it up anyway. I realized that we had like 10,000 followers on Instagram and I had like, you know, 50,000 or something

on my Instagram at the time. And I figured maybe I'll get enough $20 in there to, you know, create something really cool here and, uh, and, and get enough money that I think is worth it. So I put it out there. It fucking started killing it like right away. Um, people were posting the workouts everywhere, man. Like we're still, I mean, still, I mean, we're growing even more now than ever. Like there's so many people that do chalk programming that it makes making the workouts now even more stressful than ever for me. Like I know that thousands of people are going to do this workout or see this workout and judge me from this workout, or maybe it's their first week on Chalk Online and I still want the workouts to be as sick as I've ever posted so every week really is like everything

I have in this programming so um yeah I wound up putting it on it was $20 and like within I don't know like within like two days I had like a few hundred people on there and it had more than like doubled my salary that I was making from the gym. And it made coming to the gym a lot more enjoyable to me. Like obviously like the people that were here are my family and I love them more than anything. And those are my peeps. But you know, I felt a little bit more appreciated. Like now my programming is getting out to the world and like, it's not just the people in the gym that have affirmed that it's amazing and they love it and stuff like that. But now other people are, and I'm getting, I'm getting paid for all this time that I put in, like all the coaching hours, like all the time I was in school, like

all the time that I put my life on hold to do what I love to do and to make my mind think the way that it thinks, to make the workouts that come out on paper that I put into the computer for you guys. And all of that time started to get, you know, paid off. And like, what a great feeling. Like, now I understand that people always tell you that, you know, if you just keep loving what you do, the money will come. And it's so hard to trust that when you're in such a hard time in your life, you know, like I had so many hard times where I was like, fuck that comment. Like that means dick to me.

Like fuck this person. He doesn't know shit. Like he got this handed to him or this happened or that happened and it really doesn't matter like guys i have created a seven figure income for myself and it's not just from the gym and it's not just from chalk online it's from a ton of shit that i do i don't even like telling you guys that that's even a thing in my life. But I think that it needs to be said because the idea of making six figures in my life was like an impossible feat. It was impossible.

And if I had made that, I would have thought that I didn't have to do anything else in life. I would think that that was, you know, I had made it and like, wow, especially growing up as a kid, thinking of a hundred thousand dollars was like the craziest thing. And like now I, you know, I've had months where I've made, I might make that in a month. And it's, it's, there's no difference in anything like zero. If you don't love what you do, like, like absolutely nothing. Like my lifestyle right now is the same. Like I'm looking at houses to buy that are more expensive than I've ever like thought I'd ever afford. But like, I still drive the same car. I wear the the same clothes I have the same lifestyle in the gym and it would not feel the same if I was making a million dollars

being a nurse or being something that was not what I was meant to be and it wouldn't feel the same if I was doing what I loved. And no, you know what? Instead of saying it wouldn't feel the same, it would actually feel the same if I was making significantly less and doing the same thing. Like the amount of money that you make does really not do very much for you or anyone around you for that matter except give you like a little bit more security in life where you're like okay this is cool like i can do this now or whatever like you don't even really want anyone to ever really know how much money you make and you don't really want the amount of money that you make to turn you into someone that you're not so like as much as i thought like when I started making money I'd want to like

go buy a Lamborghini or like you know go show off some cool shit. I start to think about the people who do those things and it wasn't like it wasn't really the first thing that came to mind for me. Like I wanted to go climb mountains in Norway and go fly a paraglider through Switzerland. And I did a bunch of other things that like, that made a lot of sense to me. And like experiences always superseded any sort of material thing in my life. And it's, it's something that I still care about a lot. And when I think back at all the things I have done and all the things that have gotten me to where I'm at, there's so many like particular moments that literally they were the poorest times of my life. They were the most fucked up times in my life. And they put more smiles on my face than anything I have now. The point of this story is to inspire you. Fuck, I hate getting

emotional. It sucks. I hope you guys don't make fun of me. The point of this story is to tell you that all of this shit is doable you know all of it anyone can really do it if you uh if you really really bleed passion every day where everybody knows that that's what you're about and you will not fail like you want everyone to think of you as the first person when it comes to mind of like, I want to open a gym. Who would be the best person for that? You should be the first thought. I want to create a company and I need a really good partner. You should be the first person for that. I need to tell someone something that I know that I don't need anyone else to know ever. And I want to trust them. You should be the first

person for that. You should be the first person that people go to for everything, for energy, for trust, for work ethic, for inspiration. Like there should be something about you that leaves a mark on everyone on this earth every single time that you meet them. And if you are like that and you live your life that way, good things will happen and people will put things in your hands. Or if you ask, they won't say no because they're very, very confident in you. And I've had things happen to me recently that would never happen. Shit. People didn't think that way about me. So.

Yeah. Shit I hate doing this. So. Always. Stay passionate about what you do. Realize that. All things are possible. And.

Keep grinding along. And don't ever forget that the people who are around you are always assessing situations. They are seeing what you're kind of like the God that you want to believe. And they are looking at you as if God is looking down at you. And when someone needs you, they'll fucking ask, and, and you'll be ready, because you don't put less than 100% effort into every day, so I'm gonna try to laugh right now to open the, to lighten the moment, But yeah, I went from a piece of shit to this badass gym and making an income that I never imagined and creating a huge family of people. And there's some parts of that story that I've never shared before,

and I hope that you listen to me, and you follow me on Instagram, because you know some of these things, and you have respect for me, not only as an educator, and a business owner and an athlete and just a fucking hopefully a rad person but uh hopefully it's all the above and uh and yeah fuck um i just want to send a powerful message across to you guys right now because there's a lot of you guys that are in that limbo stage and I need you to understand that a lot of hits happened for me and a lot of things happened and to keep your focus on track is very very important and to not give up is very very important and always be learning like when I was learning everything i could for opening the gym that was like very pivotal piece because when you start the gym it has to be a certain way

in the beginning or it's too hard to fix those things later on like even i'd love to check athletes in every day in my gym but it wasn't something that we did for four years so now it's very very hard to implement so when you start gym, there has to be a very specific vibe that is set in the beginning. It's there forever. It never leaves because it starts like that and it just flows. That's why I coached every single class. And that's why I cared about all that stuff so much because I never wanted that feeling to leave. And it's always here, whether I'm here or not. It's just fucking lives in this place. And you need to do that if you open your own gym or you open your own space. And when it comes to the people that you're around all the time,

I've said this a few times here. I was crying most of the time, but, uh, those moments and those relationships mean so much. So the, the days that you're having a really bad day and it happens a lot to a lot of us, you have to just fucking put that behind you and put the best version of yourself forward and, and be nice to that person. And if you're coaching classes right now and you don't own a gym and you want to own a gym, or you are doing something right now and you don't own a gym and you want to own a gym or you are doing something right now that you don't necessarily love and you cannot wait for the day that you get to do something that you do love every person that you meet right now is very very important and even if you're having a bad day right now you have to suck it up and give the best

version of yourself forward. And you always need to keep learning. Like whatever it is that you want to do, no matter how much you know about it, keep learning more about it. Things change all the time. Opportunities change all the time. Look at social media right now. Kids aren't even going to college anymore because they realize they can make more money on social media. I was walking the beach the other day and I made a post on my Instagram about the houses that were

on the beach because there are millions of dollars. And I remember growing up as a kid and thinking, you know, I have to be a lawyer or a doctor to own one of those houses. And it's absolutely incorrect these days because the people who own those houses now could be a professional youtuber it could be you know someone who invented some small thing that we use every day which you know that could always have been a thing but it also could be someone on instagram who's a fitness person and he's not even someone who went to school. He's not someone who knows more than you. He's just someone who puts out the content that people like. He understands what his business model is and he has enough money to buy that house. And I think that that's very, very important

right now because that person didn't have to do any of the stuff that I did to get to where I'm at and go through all those bumps in the road because they were on top of the trend. And I had a whole podcast on trends. And they just saw what was coming and they attacked it and they hit it hard. And they're business savvy. They deserve everything they get because they kept an eye out. And when I opened my gym, I kept an eye out and I looked at what everybody was doing. And I started my gym on the Instagram and I created an online programming from that because it was something that I was looking out for. So you always need

to be looking out for what's going on around you. If you're just stuck in your bubble, it's very, very hard to diversify. And if that word diversify is really what creates more success in your life. Like I could have been stuck with just the gym if I kept myself in just the gym and I didn't understand what was happening around me. And I never would have created that career for myself that I have now that has solidified, you know, the amount of income that I need to own a home now in Newport and to have a family. I'm no longer nervous about those things anymore. And it's all because I was very aware of what was going on around me and I was very good to the people around me and I always put my best foot forward. So if there's anything you get out

of this podcast, it is literally everything i just said in the last 30 seconds make sure the best version of yourself is always forward make sure you're always looking around at what's happening around you and just remember that whatever moment you're in right now that's maybe not the best it's it is temporary you know like if you have the drive it's temporary if you don't have the drive this could be it's temporary, if you don't have the drive, this could be it for you, and if you don't have the drive, you listen to this podcast right now, hopefully, I just lit a fucking fire under your ass, and you're ready to go, and yeah, that's it, I'm fucking ending this thing now, because I just laid it down, I cried a whole fucking bunch,

and I'm excited about a lot of things I said, and maybe not excited about a lot of things I said and maybe not excited about a lot of things I said, but I really wanted a lot of you new listeners out there to understand where I'm coming from, who I am, you know, why I am the way that I am, why I post certain things. Who the fuck is Ryan Fisher, you know, and why should I listen to him, And, you know, why is this gym cool? Why is this? Why is that? Blah, blah, blah. You know?

Like, now you know. You just know a little bit more about me. And if you already knew a lot of that stuff, I added a bunch in there too. So, yeah. And I cried more than fucking ever. I sound like a giant pussy. So, all right. That's it.

If you guys want to find more about me for any reason, you don't follow me on Instagram. It's Ryan Fish, R-Y-A-N-F-I-S-C-H. That is my IG. If you want to see any of the programs that I've made recently that are sweeping the fucking world, it's JimRyan.com, G-Y-M-R-Y-A-N.com, Jim Ryan. All things Jim related. That's why I put Jim Ryan like that. And if you guys ever want to join any of my challenges, the carb cycling challenge literally has more people on that fucking thing than a Tokyo bus going through the city. It's insane. Everybody's doing it. The results are insane. It is literally, it's going to be what puts me on the map more than anything

because it's that big and it's uh it works really really well and people are fucking stoked on it so you have my programs you have the nutrition challenges you guys can go to crossfitchalk.com sign up for my online program you guys have access to my whole library you can go check out what i was making in 2014 you can go check out what I made today. Everything is on there. You have access to Sweat, to CrossFit, to the Daily D. And if you guys ever just like need some inspiration,

you can go ahead and cruise through some of my older podcasts. A lot of topics on there. A lot of times when I'm talking solo, there's a lot of some personal stuff on there that's good stuff. And you can send me a message anytime. I usually send a lot of video messages back on my Instagram because I don't feel like typing. So you get me on there, which is a little bit more personal. And yeah, guys, I hope that you love this episode. I hope that you share it with everybody you know. I hope you don't make fun of me too much for crying. And I hope you

guys have a great week. I hope you're fired up. Yeah, I don't want this to end right now. I hope you don't make fun of me too much for crying. And I hope you guys have a great week. Hope you're fired up. Yeah, I don't want this to end right now. I feel like we're so close. I feel so close to you guys. And yeah, it's all the feels. And I'm just really excited that I get to talk about my story with you guys and motivate people and be the person that I wanted to listen to so bad when I needed it. And now I'm the person that gets to tell you guys that. And it's the greatest fucking feeling ever. I will not cry about that. That is something I'm fucking stoked on. And that's it. I love you guys. I hope you guys loved this episode. And that's it. I'll see you guys next week.