Habits and Hustle - Episode 494: Adam Schafer: The Shocking Stat That Explains Why Most Trainers Stay Broke

Episode Date: October 17, 2025

Listen to the full episode:  https://youtu.be/NrHBimydPBU?si=mI2cLamva379hWMy  Why do 70% of personal trainers sleep with their clients, and how does this statistic explain why most fitness professionals never build real wealth? In this Fitness Friday episode on the Habits and Hustle podcast, Adam Schafer from Mind Pump drops truth bombs about what separates successful trainers from those who plateau at $40K a year. We unpack the psychology of professional boundaries, why "motivation is bullshit but self-belief is everything," and how the same insecurities that lead to sleeping with clients also trap people in toxic relationship patterns.  Adam Schafer is the business strategist behind Mind Pump Media, a fitness podcast generating over $10 million annually. With eight national certifications, a pro-card in bodybuilding, and experience managing some of the largest fitness clubs in the Bay Area, his greatest achievement remains creating a media empire that disrupted the entire fitness industry. What we discuss: Why trainers sleeping with clients is second only to hospitals for workplace affairs How breaking professional boundaries costs you the highest-paying, long-term clients Why your peers lose respect and won't work for someone who crosses these lines "Motivation is bullshit, self-belief is everything" - the mindset shift that creates success Breaking addiction to "broken people" - how ego-feeding relationships mirror bad business choices The confidence factor: Why self-belief matters more than looks, talent, or connections Why successful people keep dating the wrong people despite self-awareness Thank you to our sponsor: Therasage: Head over to therasage.com and use code Be Bold for 15% off  Air Doctor: Go to airdoctorpro.com and use promo code HUSTLE for up to $300 off and a 3-year warranty on air purifiers. Magic Mind: Head over to www.magicmind.com/jen and use code Jen at checkout. Momentous: Shop this link and use code Jen for 20% off  Manna Vitality: Visit mannavitality.com and use code JENNIFER20 for 20% off your order  Prolon: Get 30% off sitewide plus a $40 bonus gift when you subscribe to their 5-Day Program! Just visit https://prolonlife.com/JENNIFERCOHEN and use code JENNIFERCOHEN to claim your discount and your bonus gift. Find more from Adam:  Instagram: @mindpumpadam  Podcast: https://mindpumppodcast.com/ Find more from Jen: Website: https://www.jennifercohen.com/ Instagram: @therealjencohen   Books: https://www.jennifercohen.com/books Speaking: https://www.jennifercohen.com/speaking-engagements

Hi, guys. It's Tony Robbins. You're listening to Habits and Hustle. Crush it. Hey, friends, you're listening to Fitness Friday on the Habits and Hustle podcast, where myself and my friends share quick and very actionable advice for you becoming your healthiest self. So stay tuned and let me know how you leveled up. Before we dive into today's episode, I first want to thank our sponsor, Therasage. Their tri-light panel has become my favorite biohacking thing for healing my body. It's a portable red light panel that I simply cannot live without. I literally bring it with me everywhere I go. And I personally use their red light therapy to help reduce inflammations and places in my body where honestly I have pain. You can use it on a sore back, stomach cramps, shoulder, ankle.

Red light therapy is my go-to. Plus, it also has amazing anti-aging benefits, including reducing signs of fine lines and wrinkles on your face, which I also use it for. I personally use Therisage trite everywhere at all the time. It's small, it's affordable, it's portable, and it's really effective. Head over to Therisage.com right now and use code be bold for 15% off. This code will work sitewide. Again, head over to Therisage, T-H-E-R-A-S-A-G-E dot com and use code be bold for 15% off any of their products. That is really tough. tough to date a male trainer. Well, I mean, any sex. If you have a husband, then you're a girl and

you're a trainer, like, that's tough for the opposite to say. You've got to have a very confident partner that is okay with that. I don't know people know the stats on this, but like 70-something percent of trainers sleep with their clients. So it's a very like, that's 70 percent. You know, it's the only thing that's higher in infidelity is hospitals. So doctors and nurses sleep together more than trainers and clients do. That's one and number, that's number one and number two. So it's a really like, it's one. Seventy percent. On both sides, men, girls trainers and their clients? Yes. And men. Who does it more? Men. Yeah, men with women. Yeah, men trainers with. I bet you men and their older clients. Totally. Like that for sure happens

all the time. All the time happens. And it happened a lot in my space. Now, I also attribute a lot of my success to resisting that. Like I had many clients. I knew I could have taken advantage of that situation and they paid for training for me for probably years in hopes that I would one day, and I'm aware of that. But I also know that. So like I was, I was about my money. I was about business. And so I, which why I got into man. And I used to teach that the trainers too all time. Like, listen, all of you guys, you're going to have an opportunity. And the difference between you being a decent, okay trainer and a very successful one is can you resist the temptation to sleep with your clients? Because you're going to have, it's going to come your way. And it's

going to be tempting because they're going to be good looking and successful and all the things. and you're going to want to, and in the back of your head, you're going to think, oh, this exception, it's like, and then that's the beginning of the end for you. You'll never be that successful if you do that. So anyway. I love that. Okay, why won't they ever be as successful?

Because it takes you down this, like, weird path of like then you become that trainer. Yeah, you become, one, you open Pandora's box, right? Like, you break the seal. You now, like, once you do it once, you're going to do it again, and then you've now become that person. Then you get a reputation around that. And then people know, like, and you know what? The best paying type of clients, no.

and they find out and they and they're not the ones that are really good the best relationships the best clients like they're not looking for that they're looking for someone who's intelligent that's professional that's going to help and like so yeah you might get the little floosy who just came out of a divorce and she wants to you know take advantage of the young good looking trainer it's like and have a great night whatever like okay so you get that one but you're going to miss out on a lot for that and then you're also your peers lose respect for you and if like in my case i managed all my peers at one point we were all peers I was a trainer then the next day all of a sudden, I'm their boss, and they don't have to work for me. Imagine if I was a trainer who slept with all the ladies in the gym, and then now I'm your boss telling you what to do, it's like, I get no respect for my female trainers. I'm going to get no, and most of my, even my male trainers may not give me respect because of who I am. So, like, it will kill your career. It really will kill your career if you do something like that.

And so I'm always telling trainers that. So you have to rethink, you have to know all this, right, that I grew up in an environment like that. I grew up with, I mean, I had, I had girlfriends that would, like, show up to the gym to see who I was training and stand out in the parking lot, do crazy stuff because they were so jealous. Yeah, they were so jealous and insecure. And so I would date these girls. I'm like, I can't have a girl like this. This is my passion. This is my career. I had no intentions of leaving this industry anytime soon. And so I knew that I needed a very confident woman that was not going to get. And that's how I

am. I'm very much so that way Katrina and I are so great like this. Like we both kind of have this similar philosophy of like if you're going to cheat, you're going to cheat. Like me being jealous about it and digging through your shit is not going to stop it or start it. It's like if anything, and I've seen this, like, I've seen, I've been pushed in that direction because I have such a jealous girl. I'm like, man, I'm fighting over something I haven't done. I'm having to defend myself. I may as well go do it. And so like I have that attitude of like, I just, I'm going to trust my girl until she breaks my trust. Also, I got to say, it's like a huge turnoff when someone is that like insecure and jealous and they put that on you. Because I have the same, I have the same kind of mentality.

Like, there's nothing you can do about it anyway. If someone wants to cheat on you, they're going to find a way. Yes. You think you, by going through their phone and their email and all this bullshit is going to make a difference, like what? And you catch them and then what? Yeah. You know, like, okay. And now it's, and so what?

They're going to deny it and not going to deny it. Like, if you even put out that energy, like, I won't even circle back to something you said earlier, but if you can give your kid any character trait, it was going to be confidence, right? Yeah. And I, again, I'm not to say, everything that you're saying, I can just basically say, me too, or I agree. But to me, confidence is really the gateway for anything. Number one, if you're even like kind of good looking, but not really, if you're confident and you hold yourself in a certain way and you believe in yourself, you're a hundred times more attractive. If you believe in yourself and everything is a projection. And so the second that you show, like, and not just show in a fake way, but when you're genuinely a confident person and have a high self-esteem, because there's a difference. If you have a high self, and think of yourself in a certain way in a belief system. What you give to the world is such a different sense of of like a physical attractiveness, mental attractiveness. There's nothing that will ever surpass that

trait, that quality. 100%. There's something I always say. I say that because in our space, motivation and hype is like a real popular thing. I say motivation is bullshit. Self-belief is everything. That's 100% true. I believe that. I just, if you have the confidence, you believe in yourself, like everything else, everything else falls into place from there. You just kind of believe that you, and you don't have to believe that you're good. You don't have to have like a delusion.

You don't have to be delusional about it. Like I didn't have, none of us that started the podcast had any like delusion that we were doing or we're the best. But we all had this self-belief that we're going to figure this out. Totally. And we will and we'll keep trying until we do. And so,

yeah, no, I'm a firm believer in self-belief and confidence. I think that leads to everything else. And I found that in a partner. And taking it full circle from how you started this conversation. And like Katrina is every bit just like me in that. Like she is the same way.

Like she just has that. She has so much confidence in herself that if I were to go out on her and do that, her attitude is just like, you're lost, buddy. By the way, I was just going to say that. Your loss. So the fact that she would even have that kind of self, self-confidence, self-esteem to me, you met somebody who is perfect. Yes.

And like, and the fact that you recognize that that, to be. be with someone like that will surpass any other type of kind of person. The fact that you had the, like the, again, I hate to keep on saying the word, self-awareness is so key because it will, it's now going to, it's changing the trajectory of your entire life for the good. 100%. And the part that nobody told me about that I still today have this like, it blows my mind. Katrina and I are on 13 years, 13, going on 14 years now.

It's been 13, 14 years. Oh, wow. Yeah, that we've been together. And this is no bullshit. I am more physically attracted to her today. We have better sex today. The love has just grown and grown and grown and grown and grown. It just keeps getting better and better and better.

The older we get, the more time we spend together, I had no idea would be like that. In my experience, every other girl I ever dated during the honeymoon phase, the flame is going, the desire is going, the less is going. And it's like, and that would always fade. It would always fade after six months or a year. And it didn't necessarily always go completely away, but it just wasn't there the same way. Her and I were the opposite. It was like, I don't even know if this is the girl for me or I'm really into her.

And it's like, okay, I really like her. She started, now I like her more. Now I like, it's just grown and grown and grown and grown, the longer we stay together. And the more things that we go through and we build and we do and the more challenges that we have and that we see how each other handles it. Like, oh, yeah, there's no way that I'm at where I'm at today if I didn't meet her 13 years ago. She's allowed me to be way, way, way better than I would ever have been. for sure. That's amazing.

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You know what I think? I have a lot of guy friends. who are very, very successful, especially in this culture we have, like L.A., New York, kind of big, you know, big city places who are good looking guys, super successful in their 40s, still have never settled down. Yeah. And they say in words, you know, I really want to meet somebody and have this blah, blah, blah, life, you know, fill in the blanks. And yet they still can't get out of their own way and still dating 20-year-old bimboes or 22-year-old people who have nothing in common. They have nothing in real life in common. and when I meet these people, like, yeah, it goes on three dates, six dates, and then they repeat the pattern over and over again. And these are people who are like, again, which is interesting, self-aware, really intelligent, very successful. You would think that they would

have the wherewithal after doing this for 30 years, that they would stop the pattern and then be able to do what you did. Now, I guess this is my question. How do you, I don't even know if you can answer it. Like when you have the wherewithal and you were cognizant it's to know, that the ones that you were dating were not the right ones and you wanted to have that life. Yeah. The pushback I, what I get with people or when I talk about this is like you can't force yourself to be attracted to somebody that you're not attracted to. Yeah.

How do you like tell people or help people get out of their own way? Yeah, yeah. So they can actually find real, find like real love and happiness in a real way, not just frivolous and silly and be alone. That's a really good question. And I have thought about it. And I do think I have some thoughts around how that worked or what I did. Because like I said, when I first initially started to kind of date her or even date the two

girls before, I wouldn't have thought I would be attracted to him. But what I, if you have become self-aware that you're attracting the wrong person and you're at least at that stage, because that's obviously the first step. Like, because a lot of people are stuck, they don't even realize they're in this lust phase and like, and they're attracted to all their insecurities, right? So they're attracted to it for all the wrong reasons to all the wrong people and they still don't even realize it. Like that's a lot of people for a long time, sometimes their whole life. But if you at least got to the point where you realize like, I'm broken, I attract broken people.

This is bad for me. What do I do from here? Well, you have to build with those, those things that you want. Like I knew I wanted this queen. I knew I wanted this badass, confident chick who was this solid partner that was going to be a good wife and a good mother and it was going to be growth minded. like so I knew I wanted all those attributes so then I stopped putting the other ones at the top like oh she's got to be a 10 at this and she has to look this way with this color eyes and hair and like that was I was using that that was still at the top but it was just like wait a second what if I

flip that and all these other characteristics that are really truly important what if I went after that first and then see what kind of girls fell into that category and be open to at least dating and listen I dated a couple girls before her that I tried that and it just it didn't It didn't work out, but it was a good learning experience for me that, like, okay, I know that there's, I'm starting to notice that I care. I like these qualities. I like these qualities that I didn't have and all the other ones that I was dating where I was the daddy, right, and all the other ones. So I'm liking this like strong, confident woman that's independent, has her thing, her shit together doesn't necessarily need me, but I'm liking some of that. But then I'm starting to formulate what that looks like. So you have to at least be open to dating in a direction that you probably don't think that you would date in. And so it starts there. It starts. It starts. with one becoming aware and then be open to looking at the straight. Listen, you don't, you're not, you're not going to, you don't have to go marry the person right away. Right. So just go on some dates and go have some conversations and see what happens and see if that, that sparks something else in you or at least makes you go, you know what? I'm going to go on another day. Let's see what

happened in the next day. Can I interrupt for a second? This is what I think happens, though. You are lucky enough to catch it, catch yourself early enough where you can like pivot and change. What I think's happening a lot more and more now with what's happening with social media and all the apps and people aren't socializing and going out as much. And they're really using, you know, they're looking at social media, like, they're looking at fitness influencers, looking at girls who are not even realistic. That's the first part. Yeah, yeah. And they are now like past the point of no return where they've been doing their pattern for so long. Where now they can't even, it's like hard. It's too hard because you're, you've been so used to, you know, doing things. the way you've been doing it, the people you've been doing it with, you can't even get your mind to change the neuroplasticity where you can be attracted physically to something that's more appropriate for you because you now, you're not wired that way. That's because, Jen, it's more because right now that's, it's a drug.

When you have an insecurity when you're broken and you're attracting the wrong type of person from you, it's like getting ahead of a drug. Yeah. And so you have to want to change bad, just like somebody who was addicted to a drug who says, I know this habit is bad for me. I need to quit.

It's going to be hard. And you're going to want to fall back in the behaviors because you're addicted to those behaviors. You have to become aware that that's what that person is for you. For me, it was that I had insecurities around being smart and successful and powerful. And so getting a woman that I could teach and lead and show her all the things with that fulfilled that, like a drug. It gave me, because the initial connection was awesome.

It was like, yeah. You know, I felt so good. Like a man. Yes. All this feeling of security and confidence and I'm the man would come rushing in. This is the right chick for me, for sure. You think that is because just like you probably think when you're high that this is great. This is so good for me, you know, because you're on the high.

You're on the high. And then the come down and the hangover and the, oh, my God, I feel so embarrassed because I'm this person again. Like, that's all it is. It's so true. It's they, they don't want to break the addiction bad enough that they're willing to go through the pain of the withdrawals. And so you have to, you have to be willing to do that first. Yes. And by the way, just like a drug, the longer you are aware of this issue that you have in partnering up with people and the longer you've done that behavior and habit, the harder and the greater the withdrawal is going to be when you get out of it.

If you've been doing that like I had been doing that through a lot of different girls until I was 27, it was a hard pattern to break. The very, and being completely honest and transparent, like this was also one of the things I loved about Katrina was when we first started dating, she was patient for me to catch up on that.