Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 609: Eating & Training During Times of Stress, Starting Testosterone Replacement Therapy, Current Mind Pump Workout Routines & Goals & MORE

Episode Date: October 4, 2017

Organifi Quah! iTunes Review Winners! In this episode of Quah, sponsored by Organifi (organifi.com, code "mindpump" for 20% off), Sal, Adam & Justin answer Pump Head questions about Adam committing to TRT, motivating self to eat and train properly during times of stress, fixing big box gyms and their current workout routines and goals. Mind Pump replacements? (4:26) Spartan Up! (7:48) Mind Pump goes through memory lane (17:17) Thrive Market brand (25:28) Quah question #1 – For Adam, how did you finally decide to commit to TRT (Testosterone replacement therapy)? (29:26) Quah question #2 – How do you motivate yourself to eat and train properly when going through tough times? (44:48) Quah question #3 – Now that you tackled the school system, how would you fix big box gyms? (56:00) Quah question #4 – What are your current fitness goals and routines? (1:07:15) Related Links/Products Mentioned Organifi Discount Code "mindpump" Thrive Market (website) Order of Man Podcast (website) Purple Cow, New Edition: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable - Seth Godin (book) Self-Care and Stress Management Tips for Caregivers – AARP (article) How the Rise of Boutique Fitness Is Affecting the Business of Gyms (article) People Mentioned: Andy Galpin (@DrAndyGalpin)  Twitter Brendan Schaub (@brendanschaub)  Instagram/Twitter Ben Greenfield (@bengreenfield)  Twitter Todd Orr Joe DiStefano Joe DeSena (@realJoeDesena)  Twitter Cal Fussman (@calfussman)  Twitter Shanna Mota (@shannamota)  Instagram Robb Wolf (@robbwolf)  Twitter Also check out Thrive Market! Thrive Market makes purchasing organic, non-GMO affordable. With prices up to 50% off retail, Thrive Market blows away most conventional, non-organic foods. PLUS, they offer a NO RISK way to get started which includes: 1. One FREE month’s membership 2. $20 Off your first three purchases of $49 or more (That’s $60 off total!) 3. Free shipping on orders of $49 or more How can you go wrong with this offer? To take advantage of this offer go to www.thrivemarket.com/mindpump Would you like to be coached by Sal, Adam & Justin? You can get 30 days of virtual coaching from them for FREE at www.mindpumpmedia.com. Get our newest program, MAPS Prime Pro, which shows you how to self assess and correct muscle recruitment patterns that cause pain and impede performance and gains. Get it at www.mindpumpmedia.com! Get MAPS Prime, MAPS Anywhere, MAPS Anabolic, MAPS Performance, MAPS Aesthetic, the Butt Builder Blueprint, the Sexy Athlete Mod AND KB4A (The MAPS Super Bundle) packaged together at a substantial DISCOUNT at www.mindpumpmedia.com. Make EVERY workout better with MAPS Prime, the only pre-workout you need… it is now available at mindpumpmedia.com Have Sal, Adam & Justin personally train you via video instruction on our YouTube channel, Mind Pump TV. Be sure to Subscribe for updates. Get your Kimera Koffee at www.kimerakoffee.com, code "mindpump" for 10% off! Get Organifi, certified organic greens, protein, probiotics, etc at www.organifi.com Use the code “mindpump” for 20% off. Go to foursigmatic.com/mindpump and use the discount code “mindpump” for 15% off of your first order of health & energy boosting mushroom products. Add to the incredible brain enhancing effect of Kimera Koffee with www.brain.fm/mindpump 10 Free sessions! Music for the brain for incredible focus, sleep and naps! Also includes 20% if you purchase! Please subscribe, rate and review this show! Each week our favorite reviewers are announced on the show and sent Mind Pump T-shirts! Have questions for Mind Pump? Each Monday on Instagram (@mindpumpmedia) look for the QUAH post and input your question there. (Sal, Adam & Justin will answer as many questions as they can)

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mite, op, mite, op with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. In this episode... We have found Sal's replacement. Damn it! We've been searching for two and a half years now, Justin and I have now found his replacement. Why? He has solid choice.

Well, we're not going to do it. I guys saw the choice. You just freaked everybody out. Well, we're not going to do it. I just want people to know that, hey, man, if something... My pump goes on. If he gets assassinated, we will, we will, the show will go on. Cancel that.

Don't put that in the universe, bro. So we talk about that. We talk about the Spartan races we just came from. They were awesome. Find out in this episode how Justin did in that competition. Yeah, I did well, because I didn't do it. We talk about we go mind pumps, trip down memory lane. Oh boy.

Oh, we had wacky ideas, including porn ads. Yeah, hopefully you're on the forums. So you can actually get to see some of this. We're going to write down some of what those ideas were back then. It's vulgar and shocking. We also mentioned two of our sponsors. The first sponsor we mentioned is Organify. We love their green juice and their protein.

All the products are organic. We're gonna talk about it all the time. Go to OrganifyShop.com, enter the code MindPump4Discount, and then we mentioned our new sponsor Thrive Market. This is a place where you can buy organic non-JML products at Ridiculous prices like half off what you would find at retail stores Just go to thrivemarket.com forward slash mine pump and get some free stuff They give you like a free month they give you $20 towards your first three orders of $49 or more great place to go

Thrive market.com forward slashlafts-minem pump. And then we get into the questions. The first question was, how did we, or excuse me, had it at them, finally commit, that we did you jump on right now? You jump on right now, you jump on right now. You jump on right now, you jump on right now, you jump on right now, you jump on right now, you jump on right now, you jump on right now, you jump on right now, you jump on right now, you jump on right now, you jump on right now, you jump on right now, you jump on

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Tyranosaurus. The next question was, how do we motivate ourselves to eat and train properly when we're going through tough times? Good advice coming from Sal here. Exactly. I added a second in there. There he did.

Then we answer the question, well, in previous episodes, we've totally fixed the problem of fitness in public schools. So now we're going to fix the problems with big box gyms. How to make them more effective. We got you. We got you. We're successful. Listen to our expert advice.

Finally, the last question is, what are our current workout routines and goals? Is Justin trying to grow his glutes? Also, this month, check this out. We want to talk a lot about our super bundle because I think we get a lot of questions from people who are looking to train. A lot of people are looking at the table. A lot of people are asking,

what is the program that you guys recommend the most to people? That's a hard question. It is a hard question because what we do recommend is that everyone goes through all of them because each one that we guys recommend the most to people. That's a hard question. It is a hard question because what we do recommend is that everyone goes through all of them because each one has, that we highly recommend that everybody goes through. Regardless, if you're an athlete,

regardless if you're fat loss, regardless if you want muscle building, or overall health. What have you not been doing? They each start with that. Each program has something to contribute to that, and I think everybody should at least go through it once. And that's what the Superbundle is.

It's all of our programs all organized for you. So it's like a year. It's basically a year planned out of different workouts, different routines, different phases, different adaptations. It's all set up for you. However, if you're just getting started, you don't want to commit to the big Superbundle.

The one we recommend is Maps and Obolic. That's what we consider to be our foundational program. You can find both of those at MindPumpMedia.com. And we also have some review winners. Excellent. Yeah, we got a solid 16 reviews this last week. All right. And we're going to give out five shirts.

So I'm going to read these off. A dog smalls. A dog? Yeah. Type one trainer man. Maxed out three Scotland 360 and I'm a tiny killer. Was that you Doug? Watch out. Yeah. Alright, so the name I just read to iTunes at mindbuttmedia.com send your shirt size, your shipping address, and we'll get that right out to you. Thanks. Oh, I'm back in my seat. Dude, I already feel so much better.

I was off a little bit over there. My questions, they just weren't coming to me like they normally do when I sit next to Sal. This is the best seat for me at least. Because you know why? Because I'm so close to his brain that some of it was clouding some of my information. And so I'd go to, and I'd be like, what is that noise?

And I kept, yeah, it was like the static My brain sounds like also like weird images of like penises and vaginas were coming I'm like what is in this guy's brain that's starting to leak over here leak over in the mind. I can't sit next to You know, it's weird about what you just said what that's exactly what was in your mind. I know you're making it up I'm not dude, but I'm, how did he hit it right on the lid? Dog, what was it? That's exactly what inspired your mind. Man, what a pleasure it was to have our boy.

Okay, gotta give him an extra shout out and not just his episode because Andy Gapplin. Gapplin, sorry Gapplin, sorry. My good friend, Andy G. Missed pronounce your name. Andy. I can do that to everybody though. It's endearing.

It's endearing. It is like that's the thing. Right, I've been calling Saul, Sal for a fucking ever. So. Everybody. It's starting to fuck up my name. Everybody else says that.

No, Andy G, I'm calling my G. Oh wow, he's a gangster. Is if Sal ever dies, or we get rid of him, he is who will replace him. Yeah. 100% of that's a much smarter version. And I think. Definitely first contender. dies, or we get rid of him, he is who will replace him. 100%. Much smarter version. And I think.

Definitely first contender. I think so would be okay with that. I feel like this is what's fair, right? I think we should do this as we interview guests. We've had lots of people on the show. We'll find our replacements. Yeah, each one of us is connected in different ways to different guests.

By the way, Brendan Schobb might be you. We have a hung out with this guy. We'll see. I don't know, we have a hung out with him. We'll see. I don't know, dude, his fitness science, his fitness science. Well, not on that level. Well, you know, here's a deal, bro. It's gotta be a replacement. It's gotta be a replacement. You can't, not just some other good looking guy

who can talk, bro, it doesn't work that way. You gotta have it all. Like Andy is definitely a smart, very smart guy, very similar views as South. I mean, it's South takes his shirt off. Yeah, well, no, that's right. I would never replace South. I think we get all agree.

We're not ever trading it. I believe we have, we have, we have, we have to see like a diaper. But if, if shit went down, I think we all need to agree on our replacement, so on, it's a good bet. Who would have called, right? Like, what if, check this out. What if, because South so great,

somebody in Florida says, hey, bro, I got an offer for you, 20 million a year. You only got to talk once or twice a week. You really think I would do for you to go to Florida for 20 million a year? Hmm. What's your number? Wow.

I need a number. So when we get closer to that number I know I'm going to start looking for your real-time like scrambling. You know what I do for reals? Because I'm an extremely loyal. I'm an extremely extremely loyal. You would come back and let's offer it. I take the 20 million, I give you guys some

millions and it'd be like come with me. We're moving the show to Florida. And then we'll take over. That's not a bad strategy. We just have to convince Doug and it's Justin's entire family. Yeah. Getting me to come would be pretty easy. Okay, what's up, bro? Justin can't come, but I drove all the way here. I got 10 mil for you, dude. If you come with me, I'm like, oh, I just got to give you some money and a chicken sandwich and you're over there.

Those are the two things. This is true. Dude, how productive and awesome was Spartan? My favorite trip we've done yet. By far. By far. And they're all good. I love all the trest paylor effects was awesome. All the stuff we've done is great. Spartan was the best.

First off, we were either on interviewed like 12 podcasts, right? Was that the number we came up with finally? Yeah. 12 when we were there. We captured awesome footage and video and all that for the YouTube content. We created a brand new program for the audience, which just on a win.

Can I even say? No, you shouldn't. No, I'm not saying shit. Well, I would I will tell people is it doesn't come until January, so South shouldn't have said that now because we're you shouldn't. No, I'm not saying shit. Well, I will tell people, is it doesn't come till January, so South shouldn't have said that now. Yeah, it's the way to go. It's gonna be a long time.

My bad. My bad, they're gonna be pissed now. My bad. But anyway, we got, we put some awesome, we create some good content together, a lot of hard work. We met some awesome people. We met the host of Order of Man podcast.

Great guy. Very cool, very cool. Of course, Greenfield was there. Ben's always loved there and people. About Todd Orr. Todd Orr. Tacked by two grizzly bears. No, no, no, no.

Or the two same bears. Three and grizzly bear twice. Yeah, it's a big difference. That was a, yeah, crazy. It's like, is it really though? It's like, is it suck more or less? Man, it's not like, yeah. If your body knew the difference.

Okay, if your body comes up to him, he's like, dude, check out what I did yesterday. I had sex with two girls. And then you find out the same girl, but he did twice. She just put a mask on. It's not the same. Okay, okay, okay. You could have good analogy, okay, fair enough.

Same thing, okay. But you got fucked by the same bear. Yeah. Twice for sure. And the same day. That was awesome. We met Joe De Stefano, my long lost cousin apparently. I don't know, but it's the same last name.

He's like, yeah, he's like good fellow. He's like old school. Yeah, he writes all the, like the programming for their certification, right? Their Spartan certification. He was an interesting fact that he's a very knowledgeable guy. Oh, brilliant. Can we just say this, and I told him on air,

those that have a chance to listen to the episode That you know we we've openly talked about obstacle course racing marathon running and this these types of training modalities and I expected to see some Shenanigans. Yeah, no, I expected to get the guy who was heading up the training for it I was not expecting to be that educated, to be honest. I thought a lot of the questions we were gonna ask who's gonna have some bullshit answer

that we'd see right through. But the way their programming is, I don't know, I mean, if you have to be certified, just to get certified by them, they won't let you come in, unless you're already certified by another organization. Which already separates

them from the norm of the organizations that teach this type of training, right? Any type of training, right? Right. And what really blows me away was, so this guy knows his shit, he's been in the industry for a while, he took courses learning how to create a certification. So they have courses in classes and stuff that'll teach you, hey, if you're a trainer, a scientist, doctor, and you want to make your own certification program,

here's what you need to do to be successful. And one of the things, this was mind blowing for me, one of the things was that they said you have to have at least a 90% pass rate. Because apparently certifications, if their pass rates go below 90%, they lose sales, right? So Joe DeCena told him, I don't give a shit. He says, make our certification,

like the only people that pass us are bad asses. You're not a bad ass unless you, if you could pass, it's your awesome. So their pass rates like 50% and they're proud of that, which I think is cool. I think that's very cool. that's a lot of integrity. No, that's why I was very surprised by what he talked about. I mean, his level of knowledge in exercise science was very impressive for somebody who's programming for obstacle course racing. I did not expect

that, but shame on me because of how much we fucking loved Joe Dacena and saw the people that he was out How about he does that with like everything how about the VPCO meeting that we're at what a fucking treat that was Yeah, that was great. He had a guy come out who spoke what was the name of the cow cow Yeah, what? He was great big great storyteller well, he was the writer for what big magazine? That's where S choir and he interviewed Muhammad Ali and who was the job. Oh, yeah, but he does this big talk about how How important it is to communicate and connect with other people but also the strategies do so, which was a brilliant thing to have someone talk about at an event where everybody's networking networking.

It was so smart. No, it was cool. And it's funny because while he's talking, me and Adam look at each other and he's like, dude, this is nice. I know I'm already thinking the same thing. The minute he started speaking right the direction we're going, we're both looking at each other like, wow, this is such a smart, smart, smart. Oh, just totally, that's why I like Joe. Also, a lot of confirmation on some of the things that we do here at MP that makes me feel good, man. I pride myself or we pride ourselves on that ability when we have a guest.

We just had Andy come in and give us all kinds of great compliments about, you know, he's doing four plus interviews a week and just did Joe Rogan and then to turn around and say that this is the best interview I've fucking done. Well, he just, he says that he likes, that we're doing it right, that our style of doing it is right, and that he said things on our podcast that he didn't really ever say, another podcast. And that's another thing that I kind of really am starting to pick up on is because we do so many other podcasts too and we've met so many people in the space is just the different styles and stuff and You know, I think we tend to have a different style because we're so on the surface. It seems so loose

Well, it's like unorthodox, you know Because like everybody tries to kind of create a formula to what they're doing And we just like it just like let's have a conversation Let's just stick with that and like try and improve on it Well, dude I get it when I get interviewed sometimes people will send me their questions in advance and also the stuff and it's like Let's just talk man ask me what you want to know about me and see where it goes And then that's where the best conversations come out of plus we enjoy what we're doing so pretty awesome and then we met What's his name from Yemeni from

no foods. Fascinating conversation. Very interesting. He came from the food industry from the bad side of the food industry where they spend lots of money and time designing the perfect taste, smell, the way it looks and feel, combination, to just overcome your body's natural systems of society so that you eat more of them. And he was talking about his health food and how good it tastes. And I brought that up and I'm like,

well, what do you think about this? And the money that food industry spends on doing this and do you think that's a good thing? And he looked at, I mean, I thought I was in a fandom, but he was like, oh, that's what I did. Well, he was like, we're fighting fire with fire. Yeah, he was very surprised I think by the conversation because you know to give everybody an idea of what was going on here This was you know shot out to mark with

Spartan for having to organize this it was definitely Challenging the first time they'd ever done this they did a day that was Friday was all podcasters. They had all these people, authors, CEOs, baritac guys. I mean, you name it. There were all kinds of great minds and entertaining people to interview. And we were slotted like these 20 minute or 30 minute slots that we would get people. And so it was really all over the place. And it was in a big room with other podcasts. Yeah, it was pretty chaotic. Yeah, very chaotic and not time for which I think feeds into MindPump.

I think all the other podcasts. We thrive in it. All the other podcasters were freaking out. Like, oh my god, I was like, how am I gonna interview somebody if I don't know anything about them? I'm like, we're like, oh fuck, this is fine. Yeah, so random guys to sound like, hey, would you get your shoes? Yeah, just get ready to say go.

Yeah. And we got him and I'm pretty sure he didn't know who my pump was, wasn't expecting the questions we probably threw him. We challenged him quite a bit too. So that was a- Another smart guy. Yeah, good interview.

We got to hang out with Shauna. Oh, yeah, shout out. Yeah, for more Gantafide. For more Gantafide. She's like a representative, right? Yeah, that was really exciting too, because you know, one of the things we waited a really long time to

Align with any companies really and I'm really excited with the people that we're doing business with right now And I love it too as we and you know when you're when you when you did the right thing and you waited for the right company When you continue to meet like executives or people from that company and they're awesome and you know meeting her and getting a chance to talk to her and listen to her experience with Drew and Organifi and the company. And it's just like, man, that makes me feel really good that we waited this long and vetted all these people

before we decided to partner up with. So that was cool. So shout out to Sean. Yeah, it's really cool because she represents the brand very well. So if you're listening to Organifi, do a good job picking her because she really represents it very well. So if you're listening, or you can't find you a good job picking her, because she really represents it well,

very genuine individual. And we, you know, again, we like, if we like the product, and we like the people, then we wanna work with you. It has to be both. It can't be one or the other. Like I can't like the product,

and then there's a bunch of international stuff. Yeah, it's gonna work. You know what my favorite thing of this trip was though? Besides all the hard work, and the hanging out with you guys and having a great time. We reminisced. Yeah, dude. We went down memory lane.

Oh, you're gonna share that right now? I don't know if I'm gonna share it. I think you should hold that till we decide how we're gonna do that. Well, we mentioned, so what we did, we were sitting around. Maybe just for the forum. We were sitting around the fire and late at night, so it's like 11 o'clock, we've been working since 7am,

and we're all hanging out, having a drink, getting loose, and we start reminiscing about the early days of mind-pump. The irony of this, it's only like two and a half, three years ago, so it feels like forever. It does, which it just. It's just so much shit. Right, I mean, it speaks to it. I'll let South finish the story. I mean, it speaks to how important

reps are. I think so. What is practice practice? Right. So many people get so hung up on the details. Oh, it's this way that and we did a lot of stupid things. And I don't think I realized how many bad ideas that we had until we started reminiscing like this. Now we found some notes. Oh man, I went through all of it. It was hilarious.

So I was sitting there, we're around the fire, we're drinking, having a good time, finally relaxing, and we're talking about some of the stupid ideas that we've had in the past. And we've talked about on the show how we did porn ads, like of the, and I just wanted to let me just explain the rationale to the audience.

Just because they could take us. Well, no, you to let me just explain the rationale to the audience. Yeah, just because you know, you need to explain how how it came about with Justin came in like in my remember put this on you do. I know I like I said it. Well, you know, you got to own it bro for sure. One hundred percent. But we got close hard hard. Yeah, Justin comes in the studio one day and this is kind of this is give everybody a little What it looks like behind the scenes of my pump, you know, you got you got all these visionaries working together Had trying to head towards the same direction outside the box. Right always trying to be creative thinking outside the box And we encourage that here because we we've definitely been successful in other arenas

Having this this mentality, right? So here comes Justin He comes walking in to this studio and then he's like, you guys listen, I've got this idea, hear me out. And he starts talking about porn ads. And at first, I think Sal and I and Doug, I's get huge right away because he's just like, whoa, oh no.

And Sal and I are kind of laughing like, okay, no, he's like, no, listen, and he starts riling off the numbers. And those, what porn sites get so many visitors. And it's so cheap to advertise on them. It's stupid cheap. Yeah, and our show is, especially in the early days. Well, we are very edgy.

Oh, yeah, we just, I mean, I think around this time, we just dropped an episode that was about vajasling and vaginas and like, I mean, we literally were in, we're, and so I think I remember, Sal and I looking to it, like, well, I mean, we do, we're not too raw for porn. I mean, I'm sure a lot of our listeners watch porn too. This may be too rough upon. So at this point, we all decide, or we decide that we agree that this is a decent strategy. Justin had came up with a brilliant idea and we were all,

well let me just say like it came from, I just had, I read this book, the cow. Yeah, what spur do you to come up with this? Purple cow. Purple cow. So I mean, the whole book's premises to basically get outside the box.

What she got me to read right afterwards. So I'm like, oh yeah, I see it. So that's probably why you accepted what I was going in that direction. You know, it was like, everybody's doing this. Like, you know, the formula for everybody has always been this. Let's, you know, disrupt that.

Let's do something like shocking. Let's do, you know, I wonder if this is the thing. You know, this might be lightning in a bottle, like, you know, because it's so cheap. It's like, what the fuck, why not try it? You know, and so- And a lot of companies can't do it, right? Because they're, because they can't do it.

Yeah, they can't, you know, what their brand is gonna be hard as a result. And we're so edgy and we're explicit and so it's like, probably not gonna hurt us, like who gives a shit? So we come up with the idea and we actually came, we actually put one out and we came up with a bunch of ideas. Well, we had all blocked them out.

This is the crazy part is, I remember that we were, we had an idea that we. This is the crazy part. I remember that we had an idea. We spent like three or four days, what I was trying to say, we were tasked out. This I went down after that whole, we all finally agreed just and closed us. Then the next step was, okay, let's take this series. Each one of you, go home work.

Each guy had a homework to go home, come up with a creative slogan to match the image that you have like 10 different ones each. Yeah so we all were tasked to come up with a slogan that matched the image that Doug was working on. Yeah so Doug was tasked with Doug we need to. No I don't okay. Just imagine Doug they got through all these like horrific images. Well because people need to know like if you're going to advertise on porn like we're thinking in our head Like how are we gonna get their attention? It's gotta be shocking because you go to okay, cuz when you go on a porn site

It's not like when you go shopping or whatever like I'm gonna look at stuff or you you're there for a mission And the goal is not to go off the site until you're done, right? So we're thinking we need to get their attention Yeah, and I I'm gonna tell you guys right now. I am not gonna go over the ads that we have No, because they're not your time. We were horrible Well, this is what I think we should do since you opened your mouth is I feel we owe it at least to our OGs in our Form fans, which is you should take the list that I know Doug has Yes, you can you you've talked about on the fucking show you met you have to people already explained Ourself with it. Yeah, but you didn't share that you didn't you can't come out and you'd put a dick to ease that was for you to do that Come out and tell people that and then not have a place for them to look at you already told people

I'm up with the program those that are listening can hold Sal accountable since he said this on the forum Yeah, to show us the list and Sal will have to. I'll put some of them on. We'll bring them here. Because some of them are really bad. I might have to filter. Because they were pictures, and they were, well, we only did one that was a picture, because we would have to.

That's my favorite ad though. But we had pictures, and they were explicit pictures, and then there would be like a slogan or something on there to try to get your attention. And we have Taylor up with us now, right? So Taylor is now in the company. Taylor was not a part of the company back then. So he had no idea.

So he had no idea. And part of Taylor's role right now on the media side is cleaning up our image. He's making everything nice and pretty. Yeah, he's almost solely responsible for a much of the imagery you see going on with the MindPump media page right now. And hopefully those that have been around for a long time appreciate and see the direction it's going.

And that is Taylor. And Taylor, he was sitting in with Tesla, listening, and he was just like, oh my God. He should not even believe his eyes are like, super bad as well. Well, here's the testament. Like, so not a lot of people realize, like how is behind the original MindPump media page, right?

Yeah, you went back home. Oh my god. We went there. And so like, you know, you've seen the evolution of the page, you know, that since Taylor's sort of taken over. And if you just keep going, you know, keep going to the beginning, you'll see what old MindPump used to look like. Oh my god.

It is so lyrously wrong. Oh, and the episode. I don't know. I was seeking. And our old episodes, and I'll tell you, like if you're listening right now and you're a relatively new listener and you're like, oh my God, I love mine, pump.

You don't need to go back. Can you just keep listening to mine, pump? Okay, keep trucking forward. If you're like a really hardcore listener and you're like, I love mine, pump. Try going back to the episodes around a number a hundred and you'll see what raw fitness truth was like back then.

We served it raw. It was good. Well, I think there's something to take from that with business and that's why I was saying that I think a lot of people get caught up in a lot of the details. Sure, that was a really bad idea. Sure, we spent probably, we wasted a little bit of time. But there was something to learn from all of that.

I think we would not have got the attention we did at the beginning. Had we not used the shock and our approach, I think that was important. We none of us had big names for ourselves. I mean, let's be honest, my stupid Instagram didn't have that many people on it. And I was famous in the bodybuilding world. So soccer mom's watching pretty much. So the shock and our approach was most certainly how we got the attention, but then also being able to go from that and then, you know, pivot over to some serious good content that people can actually have some takeaways from.

There is a fine line there that we danced a lot of the entertainment. On accolades, that yeah, it was totally on that. But there's no change gears real quick. Have you guys tried, I know you guys are ordering your stuff from Thrive Market also have you guys tried their brand of stuff? I haven't yet, have you? So yes, freaking great quality and even cheaper than the name brand stuff. So they have their own sources of organic, you know, whatever you're going to order.

And it's the Thrive Market brand, which I think, remember how we were speculating, Adam, like how the fuck are they making money? That's how they do it. I see it. Because you go on their site. It's like Kirkland. Right, right, Foska.

You go on their site, and I'm not exaggerating, you'll buy the same product. It's great. Just and just nailed it right on the head. It's exactly how it works. It did is, I'm not, listen, to the audience, I'm not sitting here trying to sell this, this is honest, you go on there there and you'll buy peanut butter,

organic, or whatever your, whatever your favorite brand is. It's 50% off. It's half off and I'm like, how the fuck could they be making money doing this? It's not like a little bit less, it's a lot less. Even if you count the membership fee, it's ridiculous. It's because of their brand stuff that they're probably making the biggest margins on. And it's good stuff. And I think that's. It's a of their brand stuff that they're probably making the biggest margins on.

And it's good stuff. And I think that's. It's a brilliant model. It's a very smart one. It's a brilliant model. It's very much so. And it's good quality shit. You know what I mean?

No, it's the same thing that Costco did. Yeah, it's just like Costco. I'm sure if, I mean, if we had the... You're right, it's exactly like it, right? Yeah, yeah. Memberships, fees, something. I Costco is not making a ton of money off of the Tyson brand that they carry in there or whatever, they're gif.

But Kirkland stuff. But, you know, everybody, most people that have been shopping at Costco, I don't, there's never been a time that I've shopped at Costco and at least half of my cart is not Kirkland. Yeah. Because a lot of their products are just as legit. It's quality still. It is. And when you look at it, I'm like, oh, should I can save another?

50 cents on top of that just buy god damn it. It's brilliant. Yeah, it's a brilliant brilliant model It's actually strange to me that we haven't seen more companies kind of go that that's what I'm saying Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It's exciting Well, because I got some of their stuff and you know when you whenever get a store brand, something you expect, or usually what's happened, Kirkland changed my mind on this, but typically you expect less quality, you know, the packaging is not, it's fucking legit stuff, great source. So you're right, it's exactly like Kirkland does that very, very well. In fact, I think some of their products, if I'm not mistaken, for Kirkland, at least I don't know about the right market, but for

Kirkland, some of their products are from the brand name stuff that they will then kind of white label and sell for cheaper it like they do this with their vodka I think and then there's a couple like their macadamia nuts I think of the same. I be profaned. Yeah that's one of the ones I was going to try. Have you ordered their macadamia nuts yet? Have you got them yet? From Thrive?

Yeah. No I haven't tried theirs yet. That's on my list because I'm really particular about those me to dude Cuz it's the only ones I like and that funny. There's a macadamia nuts are not the same for The white lines and macadamia nuts are my two Damien up kind of sewers over here. No, what's that brand a Hawaiian one mouth? It's the blue label right the light blue label. That's the ones I like yeah, everybody I'll go to Whole Foods and they have their little you know little macadamia, like would they all went bad or something?

Yeah, they don't take, and I don't know if it's the amount of salt they use or what it is, but there's, the freshness. Yeah, I don't know, but there's something about that. That, and pork rinds, I feel like pork rinds are the same way too. I like them if it's the right brand, if it's not the right brand, and they,

you don't like the gas station ones? No. The Chicharoni's there. Chicharoni's no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, I'm not a fan of those. The diarrhea's, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah chicharoni is there no no so no bueno yeah not a fan of the diaries yeah I like to call bring on the bird this clause brought to you by organify for those days you fall short on getting your organic veggies or whole food nutrition organify fills the gap with laboratory tested certified organic superfoods to help give your health a performance at the edge. Try Organified totally risk-free for 60 days by going to organify.com.

That's O-R-G-A-N-I-F-I dot com. And use a coupon code MindPump for 20% off at checkout. Our first question is from HVHaze9. This is to Adam. How did you finally decide to commit to TRT? testosterone replacement therapy. How did it? RTE.

How did I decide to vein? Finally commit. Well, you have to know the backstory first, which is as a 23 year old or so. Um, I dabbled in this steroid to use and I had no fucking clue what I was doing. Wasn't it some like bodybuilder friend of yours? It was. It was a bodybuilder.

It was also selling you the steroids? No, no, no, he didn't actually. Although I'm looking back now the way it all went down, I'm sure he made a nice little kickback off of me. Yeah, no, because I definitely paid way above market value for This stuff that I had no oh, I mean Back then I'm not I'm not you know, I'm not killing it money wise and so like that So I don't have a ton of money to be spending and I think I spent $1,500 on my first stack of what do you do remember what your first stack? I do I do what was it? It was

Testosterone was it just like an anthase it was an anthate and Deca and Echo boys so and What else did he give what a nonsensical stack and then then I can't remember what, yeah, I know, totally not. Nobody stacks deck on equal parts. Right, it was, and so again, looking back, that was probably like him calling, he was like steroid hook up, I mean, like,

what do you got dude? Oh cool, take all three of these. Yeah, just, what's in the back of the car? Okay, you guys some more, yeah, I'm like, do you remember what the doses were at first? I was over, let's see here, I know I was over 700 milligrams with a shit in here. Holy shit, your first cycle, 700 milligrams. I know I was over 700 milligrams with a shit in me. Holy shit your first cycle

700 milligrams. I remember because I know that you know people's typically what they'll do for first cycles is Well, at least if you have some integrity, you'll tell people 200 to 300 milligrams. I yeah going back now, you know Anybody that's ever asked me that like that or they told me like Adam I'm gonna take the stuff. I just want to hear your opinion like you're not gonna change my mind So then I'll tell someone, well, my recommendation is that you think a very, very mild dose because your body's never seen it before

and you're gonna see some results, like less is more here for sure. And no, but I didn't. And man, I just, I did not respond the way I wanted to respond but boarded my body respond in a different way. What I, while I was, why I used it, was for major insecurity reasons. I, Sal and I have addressed this before on the show

that we, I've always been called the skinny kid and, you know, lean and burden, you know, all the comments I've gotten them forever. And they, in my head, I didn't really feel, I've always been a confident guy. So I, it wasn't like I sat around my room and cried. I'm like, oh, I'm so insecure about being, but, but subconsciously, I made decisions like this that for sure were rooted from insecurities.

So, so you got to understand that. It drives you. It did, but I didn't think that, right? I wasn't like, oh, I'm taking steroids because I feel so insecure. Oh, you're unaware of it, of course. So people need to understand that. A lot of times you have to look deeper into things like this because it's not that obvious.

It wasn't like, this insecurity is making me do this, but it was. It was subconsciously doing that. And, you know, and the way I looked at it was, I knew about nutrition. I knew about weight training. I've been training consistently for years now. And I don't look anything close

to what these guys in the magazine look like. And I really wanted to. I really wanted to experience that look. And I had accepted that. I just don't have the genetics. And so if I want to look like that, all of these guys must be on an Xbox steroids. And I'm willing to dabble in that. And so I did. And in 100% regret it. If I could go back and do things over again, I certainly would, although it wouldn't have allowed me to talk about it.

And I'm sure I've definitely changed some people's opinions on it and views and been able to help others. So that is the plus from me going through this and experimenting with my own body. But what happened was like week over week, I was like, and mind you, remember I'm trying to get bigger, like I was skinny, and I weighed about 185 pounds around

this time, and like I just wanted to be over 200 pounds, I could just wanted to see that. And I didn't, I added like five pounds, like total weight, but I was getting stronger every week that I fucking touched the weights, I was going up by like 10 pounds. So like I remember watching the dumb, I was doing dumbbell presses around that time. And around that time I was pressing like 70s or 80s that don't remember, but I went like 70, 80, 90, 100, 110, 120s, 130.

Here I am like pressing 130 pound dumbbells and I'm like a buck 85 like in still skinny, but strong as fuck. Same thing for all my other movements, like this was what was happening. And so, I didn't, then I didn't get the results. All the bodybuilder guys were like, oh, bro, you were eating them wrong.

You know, you're eating them wrong, you had to do it again. And when you do it this time, you just need to fucking eat, you need to consume. Now at this point, when you're done with your cycle, how long was it for, do you remember? Oh, I ran for 12 or 16 weeks. So three to four months.

Yeah. Then did you go off for a little bit? I did. I did go off for a little bit, but I did not do any protocol to coming off. How did you feel when it, because of course, when you go off, your testosterone is to shit already. Did you, was it hard to deal with that whole? Well, because I was a young and kid that was testosterone was flying through me naturally.

When I came off, I didn't like see like all of a sudden I didn't have like a sex drive at all. But I definitely noticed that it was never the same. Like there was enough of a distinct difference that I was like, I used to be the kid who, I wanted to hump everything inside. I got multiple hard-ons throughout the day for no reason, that was the norm. And so that was always me.

After this, I still had a sex drive. I still, being around a good-looking girl, I'd be turned on, but I didn't feel like the 17-year-old boy that I used to feel like the 17 year old boy that I used to feel like before, definitely had lost that. And then I watched the strength drop every every week of just like I saw myself climb, every week I saw myself decline and it was extremely depressing. And at that time in my life I had thought I was only going to try and see where it went. When I saw that happen and I had everybody tell me that oh it was because of what you fucked up

the way you ate. You gotta do it again. Yeah, do it again. And so get it went. When I saw that happen, then I had everybody tell me that, oh, it's cause of what you fucked up the way you ate. You gotta do it again. Yeah, do it again. And so, did it again. Did you take more of the second time? I didn't take more because I did put that, I did make that connection. I did realize it wasn't,

because I could feel how much stronger, I could tell the testosterone was working, but it was obvious. I was eating chicken and rice all the time. I was just not getting enough calories. And this again goes back to what's more important. Like all the juice in the world,

you're not gonna build as much muscles you think if you're not feeding the body with what it needs to build, right? So I put that together and realized, okay, I need to take more. I mean, I need to eat more and, you know, I did take the same dose though. And this time added a bunch more.

Again, didn't come off correctly. This time, I really noticed that like, my sex drive was starting to decline, but still again, still there, so I never really addressed it. But this was enough to keep me away from testosterone for a long time. And it wasn't until like later in my 20s that I started, and it caused it was actually issues in my relationship. I started to get girlfriends that would get upset that I'm not having sex with them enough. Then it caused insecurities with them, then it caused issues in my relationship, and then

it was this cycle that I was getting in all of this vicious cycle of I'd be with a new girlfriend, and then things would be fine and then eventually she would get insecure because I'm not having sex with her enough and then I realized that I didn't really want to have it with her anymore and so I was starting to put this all together and this is my late 20s now. And then I started to think like, fuck man,

how did I really fuck up my test of oshrone and now I'm starting to... Just as you do know at this point. Yeah, I still didn't know. Like I still just assumed that it was okay, but now I'm getting closer to 30 and I'm starting to realize like, man, it's, it doesn't, maybe I should have this checked out.

Like let me go have it tested. And when I went out of tested, I was 200 and something. I don't remember, it was too slow. Right, I love. Yeah, for those wondering like free test is supposed to be somewhere between 400 to like 13 or somewhere in there, and I was abnormally low. And what I don't know, which really sucks,

which is also why I always recommend to anybody who's even thinking about taking test off-shrone, go get your blood work first. So you know what you're starting. So you, because this is where, this is what the struggle that people have that decide to do TRT or not is because there's such a wide range 400 to 1300. Sal may naturally be somebody who care that hangs around 900. I may be somebody who naturally care is around 1300 just and maybe someone who's around 600. And

I may do just fucking fuck around with steroids just enough to not kill my testosterone drive, but take it from 900 down to 450, which still you fall in the normal range. But it's low for you. But it's low for me, and that's why, and some hormone therapists won't prescribe testosterone if you still fall in that range, but you as a person notice a difference.

And why it really matters and what made me make this decision was, I know it's the other stuff. Like, and I never went through like real depression or anything like that, but, you know, I felt down and just wasn't motivated to lift like I used to be. And, you know, then I decided to go through the TRT. And when I did it this time, it was, for that reason,

it was more therapeutic than it was, I need to build muscle. I was at a different point in my life now. I'm no longer hung up on, I need to look a certain way or be something, it was more like, dude, I need to be able to fuck my girlfriend. Like, or she's, you know what I'm saying? Like if I want to have a good healthy relationship.

Or make an answer, me, shit. Right, right, I need to definitely make sure that I'm at least fucking normal, right? And so again, I went and had it prescribed and had the blood work all done and stuff and decided, you know what, I'd already done enough damage, like let's figure this out and see where I need to be. And so a lot of people don't know this, but I was already on TRT before my transformation. So I'm on test austro and in that fat picture, like people think that like, oh, you know,

because he talks about steroids and so, he probably took all these steroids and that's what- No, you just changed your training. Yeah, and diet. Yeah, so I was on test-osstron before that picture, but on my before picture and my after picture, it's the same, you know. And when I got into competing,

like I, once I started to get on stage, then I started up my dose. When I am staying normal, what I take right now is 150 milligrams. I stay at a very low dose of testosterone and anathase is what I take. That's how I use it. It's just to probably keep my levels. That tends to keep me at a very even kill. If I were to be aggressive and get, if I were to go get on stage again,

I'd wrap myself up to 250. That's what I would do, because that's enough to give me the competitive edge to where I can build muscle really well compared to everybody else. And that's kind of where I hover around. It's interesting too, because we see this with men,

when we take anabolic steroids and testosterone levels get crushed. And this is more common than people realize, by the way, like, you're going to read into bodybuilding forums and stuff, like, oh, if you take Annabelle steroids and if you do post-cycle therapy right and everything, then you'll be perfectly fine. That's not true, because I know lots of people who've done the did all the protocols and then went to the doctor and the doctor did the protocols to get the testosterone levels back up.

And that didn't work and then they still had to tick go on TRT. So there's definitely potential for permanent damage by going on these super high doses of testosterone. But what's trips me out is when women take birth control, which is also a hormone, which also, I mean, I wonder how much that throws women's hormones off. I always think about it. For a long time. I, you know, I've had friends, female friends. I'm a total antidote, but I tell you what,

Katrina's the only woman I've ever met that doesn't has never used it in her life before. And I think from a hormonal standpoint, I think she's the most even killed normal woman I've ever met in my entire life. Again, it's completely anecdotal. And I know there's exceptions to all the rules and stuff like that. But I'd never, before her, I'd never met a woman

that hadn't had to use it or did use it or whatever the case would have. Well, I have female friends that will go off their birth control. And they'll tell me they didn't feel normal for like a year or two years or longer. And that's just subjective how they feel. Like, you know, who knows what's going on otherwise, you know? Well, you know, too, as far as like TRT is concerned. Like, I remember listening, I don't remember what doctor was specifically, but there's like some research in the direction of TRT usage for like post-traumatic stress and CTE, and it's super interesting to me, like how it's being used more for therapy

and more for other alternative ways to help with the brain. Well, testosterone is a feel good hormone. It does make you feel good. This whole, the myth of the super aggressive or whatever, when you throw things off, that can definitely happen. But healthy testosterone levels make you feel good. And when they're not healthy, when they're low,

you're gonna feel depressed. I know a significant difference when I'm off and when I'm on for sure. And I always, I do this, like probably every three to five months, I'll use HCG and I'll come completely off the testosterone for a little bit just to kind of see what it feels like to be there and see if I've made some sort of progress

from getting worse. I just like to do that. And when I do, I feel okay, but it definitely, my set, my libido's just not there. I've not been able to get my libido all the way back to where I'd like it to be. And to me, it's really important. That's really, to me, that's more important

than the muscle building aspect or any other things. And so when I get back on, I'm like, man, my motivation to lift, my everything else, but what has been, and I've shared this on the show before, and this fascinates me. Being somebody who's a tracker, being somebody who's had lots of experience with this stuff, it fascinates me that more than test synthetic test,

osher on being in my system, nothing affects me more than stress and sleep. That fucking blows my mind. Yeah. It blows my mind that because I know how crazy strong testosterone is and wow, what a difference that makes when you take it, if I am stressed, nothing will kill me hormonally or fuck up my workouts or mess me up more than stress and sleep. If those two are better, it makes a bigger difference than actually synthetically pumping

something into me because I have been on a higher dose, 250 plus milligrams in a week, which is a high dose for me of testosterone, but been very high stress, not great asleep, because of work or whatever is going on. And my sex stress feels like I have no testosterone. And I've done the flip before, been extremely low dose, even off of it, but had a really good balance everywhere else. And my testosterone feels better. So I find that really fascinating.

A second question from H.F.E.H.H.9. How do you motivate yourself to eat and train properly when going through tough times? So I went through one of the most difficult, actually, I have probably a difficult five years. You're the best at following this right now. Yeah, I went through a very difficult, I don't know, five-year period where somebody very, very close to me who I grew up with, got diagnosed with cancer, watched her fight it, and then lose that battle.

And then I went through difficulties with my marriage and a divorce and all while starting a new business and selling my old business and moving and doing all this stuff. And this has been a very difficult thing. Things are settled now, much more settled today than they were then. But eating right and exercising right, the motivation behind them change, or at least the goals change depending on your life. So I would love to always have a life where I'm eating and exercising to perform better

and to be stronger, more muscular. That sounds awesome, that's fun, right? But when I'm going through those stressful times, I then view exercise and nutrition as a way to ameliorate some of the stress and to therapeutic. As therapy and to keep me healthy and to keep me strong enough to make it through those periods. There were a lot of people that were affected in my family

from the person I'm referring to who had cancer. Everybody handles it differently and we all had a very tough time with it. But I was the only one that exercised consistently and still paid attention to my nutrition. And I can tell you that I came out of it much, I survived it a lot easier than other people because I had those outlets.

So during that period of time, I would still go to the gym. I didn't like stop working out. But when I'd go to the gym, it wasn't like, I'm going after it. I didn't walk into thinking like, oh, fuck, I'm going to go lift so hard or I'm going to get this great pump. I went in there like it's a break. I'm gonna put my headphones on. I'm gonna feel my body, which puts me in the present,

which means I'm not thinking about everything else that's going on or thinking about the fear I have for, the future for this person or the regret I had in the past for maybe the things I might have said to this person or not done with this person that I could have. I'm just here right now. And it was only an hour, an hour, four or five days a week might have said to this person or not done with this person that I could have. I'm just here right now. And it was only an hour, an hour, four or five days a week that I would do this.

But it was enough to carry me through. And it became, because of that, I never missed a workout. I never missed a workout because I knew how important it was and how good it felt to do so. But by no means was I chasing PRs or really trying to change my body. And the same thing with nutrition, I think nutrition's one of the first things to go

when stressful times come. Because I know I do know a lot of people who exercise with when stress comes, although sometimes they do it, they might do it the wrong way, they might just beat themselves up to try and get aggression out or whatever too much. But nutrition for sure is the first thing to go for people because stress or sadness or

anxiety can cause us to either not want to eat. That's usually the first phase of depression or whatever, as you don't want to eat anything or then start to comfort yourself with food. And then it becomes this kind of vicious cycle where you're sad. So you eat, which is temporary, feels good good for the second, because I'm eating this whatever. And then now I'm starting to feel terrible, because the food I'm eating, starting to make me feel terrible, which it does, by the way, food will have an impact,

and does have an impact on your mental well-being. And then on top of that, now, because I'm eating terribly, now my body's gaining body fat, hormones are starting to change, and then if you're self-conscious, you look in the mirror, now you're going to feel bad about that, and it creates this, and now I'm feeling even worse, which then motivates me to continue the cycle, versus, you know, I feel terrible right now, I'm really anxious or stressed. I need to make sure I eat foods that I know make me feel good. And really the way I look at it, and this is the way I coach people too, is

look at your tool belt. Look at your, you know, open up your tool chest and there's certain tools that you know that you have in there that do certain things. For example, I know exercising regularly and properly makes me feel good and makes me feel stronger. I know that eating certain foods makes me feel healthy, gives me more energy, and it just in general makes me feel better. I know that if I might meditate this much time, I'm going to feel better and it's going to help me deal with stress. And I know if I sleep this many hours and do this sleep routine, that I'm going to be able to deal with problems a lot better. Now, I might not be able to change

the stressful situation that's happening, but I can definitely use all those tools that I'm familiar with, and I know in ways to really help me along through and through that process. If you don't use those tools, then you're just making it a lot more difficult for you. And then you become, it's like you're reacting.

You're just reacting to this issue. You see this issue? A lot with caregivers, right? Like they have a really hard time, taking care of themselves. And they really pour themselves into the situation where yeah, they're not eating, they're not sleeping, they're not sleeping, they're

stressing, but they, you know, just to do all those things you mentioned and to consider those things to be a better caregiver is such a hard thing to kind of realize. You see this important? A lot with parents, especially moms, but I see it with some dads too, where they get married, they have kids, and they become martyrs. Okay. It's everything is for the kids. That's all life is. I wake up in the morning, I make them lunch,

and I clean the house, I focus on everything for the kids, and I end up forgetting about myself, so that my relationships with my husband or my wife starts to suffer. I'm feeling terrible, my body, myself. My health starts to decline, and you become a martyr, and the irony of that is you become, you're not as good of a parent as a result.

You have to place yourself first if you're gonna do all these great things and help all these awesome people. If I have a truck, if I have a truck, and there's a situation where I need, where we need to haul stuff. Like, it's an emergency situation, you know, hey, we need your truck to haul these things out.

If I don't take care of that truck, if I don't check the tires and check the gas and the oil, and take care of that truck as well as I possibly can, I'm not gonna do what I wanna do, which is haul this things and help these people out. So think of yourself the same way. If you don't take care of and place yourself as a priority, you will eventually become worthless

for all these great things that you want to do, including help the people around you or do your job or become good at business or whatever you want to do, you're not going to be good at those as well. And that's the irony of it, is you have to place yourself as a priority before all these other things that you're thinking are more important,

because of course, if I were to list things of importance to my kids, right? My kids are more important because of course if I were to list things of importance my kids right my kids are most important I die for my kids yeah but I got to place myself ahead of them because if I'm not healthy and strong I'm feeling good I'm not gonna be your best you I'm not gonna give my kids what they deserve you know what they what they need at least well this is kind of cool because it's not often that we have like totally different advice on a topic and I do have something that's totally different, or the way I approach it,

than what you just named, which I think is an incredible advice still. I kind of look at it like this, like you have, and I believe perspective is everything. So when the question is, you know, when you're going through tough times, like well, what are tough times first of all, and what do we mean by that?

Like so, I've got my relationships with my friends. I have my relationship with Katrina. I have my business relationships. I have my relationship with myself, which would be like exercise and how I'm taking care of it. So those are like the main categories and everything kind of falls underneath that. Right?

So you can name something I could probably put that in one of those main categories with relationships, whether it be with myself, with others, with business, with what at. And when something goes wrong, it's like in one of those it feels, right? So let's give an example. Let's just say, fucking work is bad. I get fired, right? I'm no longer working this job.

That fucking sucks, right? Here's the perspective on that. Or here's some perspective on that. That's just job, right? That's a job that I work for this other company. They fired me, and I'm on that. Like, or here's some perspective on that. That's just job, right? That's a job that I work for this other company. They fired me. I'm not and I'm over there. That really fucking sucks but I have all these other relationships in my life that are apart of me and make who I make up who I am in my experience and so what I always try and do when I find that I'm having a tough time in one of these other one one of these arenas, I tend to put a lot of energy and focus on the other ones and try and excel at

the other ones. So if work is going really bad and that's what's all that's on my mind, I want to get that out of my mind and I want to put energy and focus on other things and excel at them. So maybe works not the best right now because some shit happened that I can't fucking control and that really sucks, but you know what's cool? My relationship with my girl right now and my friends has never been so good.

I just had this incredible weekend with them, I just had this great date with her, and I'm doing the things that make them happy and make me happy with them and I can hang my hat on that. Like, you know what, I'm not the best me at work right now because of the situation that's happened, but I am the best me over here.

And so when I look at these things that tend to happen to us and then we can flip that over to the relationship, fucking home life stuff, how many times have we gone through divorces or had something going on? Well, you know what, that does suck. There's nothing you do about it. It's fucking sucks. It is what it is. What I don't want to do is I don't want to dwell on it

and get caught up on it. I'm going to put all my energy and focus over here and work because my home life is going through it and instead of dwelling on it so much and beating myself up, I'm going to go put my energy and focus in business and I'm going to excel at that. That way when I look at myself at the end of the day and I go like, well, shit still is pretty rough at home.

It's not fixed yet, there's a lot of work to be done there. I'm still kind of going through it. But you know, that's pretty awesome that I'm kicking ass at work right now. So I tend to try and shift my energy and my focus on the other aspects of my life because rarely ever does one of them necessarily have to affect the other. But many times we allow that to to affect the other but many times

We allow that to bleed into the other arenas in our life and that's where you get really fucked When shit goes wrong at home and then you allow it to bleed into work You allowed it to you allow it to bleed into your working out you allow it to bleed into your other relationships Now that's your fault You know you can't help that your your wife left you you can't help that your wife left you. You can't help that your boss fired you. You can't help some of these things. You can't help that you broke your leg and you can't work out now.

You can't help some of these things. But what you can do is you can control that one fucking scenario from bleeding into all the rest of them. And that's normally our own fault because we allow that. So it's all about perspective and realizing that and then putting your energy in focus. So that's kind of my approach on when I'm going through a tough time. Next question up is prime and glory. Now that you've tackled fixing public schools, how

would you fix big box gyms? Oh, this is our real house. Yeah, this is this is cooler right here. You know what? I used to say this as a general manager managing gyms. And back in those days, I know what you're gonna say, bro. I'm back. I could finish your sentence right now. And back in those days. No such thing as bad clubs, just bad managers.

I wasn't gonna say that, but that's good. That's definitely very true. But I used to say this back then. And back then, consider when I was managing Big Box Gems, Corporate Gems, there was, it wasn't a huge divide, but there definitely was a fitness side, and then there was a sales side.

So you had your fitness side, which was your trainers, and then to a lesser extent, your group ex instructors, and your sales side, which are sales people who sell the memberships. And your general manager, although the general manager managed the whole gym, the way it was run back in those days was all the emphasis, or most of the emphasis was placed on the salespeople as a manager because of the ones that brought in most of the revenue. And then you had a fitness manager that would manage the trainers and help with revenue there. And I would have these all staff meetings.

So I'd get these huge gyms, boxes. And I'd stand at the front of my staff, you know, 50 people, whatever, trainers, salespeople, whatever. And I'd stand up and I'd say, in terms of the member experience, profitability and our revenue, the most important, all of us are important. Everybody plays a role. But the people, I'm gonna place a lot of the focus on, a lot of the energy on, or the trainers.

And I used to tell them all the time, the trainers play such a massive role in a gym. And it makes me sad that gyms have completely abandoned it because they have. You go into gyms and there's almost no effort put on the personal trainers in the gym. But if you're a big box gym and you know how to train trainers and make them effective and good, you will fucking succeed. The reason why CrossFit has succeeded as well as they have is because to some extent, I'm not saying their trainers are great, they're all great, or anything else stuff. What I'm saying is, they've got that energy and that culture, and that's the only way you can create that in your big box gym,

of that culture is with your trainers. It doesn't, it happens from all the staff, but the trainers really drive that. Well, they're the ones touching the lives. They're the ones touching clients, they're the ones in the gym, in the weight area, and the cardio, they're the ones in the gym and the in the in the weight area and the cardio the ones training people the ones driving the fitness information and unfortunately a big box gym of event of that but there was a period of time where when I was with twenty far fitness and for a short period after I left they were placing more time and money on this because there were managers like me and a few others who were showing and demonstrating that this was successful and it was becoming a model.

The problem with it is it required general managers who were good leaders and who also had fitness in their background and believe it or not, no joke, a good chunk. If not the majority of general managers back when I was a manager, barely even fucking worked out. Most of them started in sales and had no fitness experience. And I had started as a trainer, so I had understood it differently. So I would say what you fix right now

in the big box gyms, and when I say big box, I'm talking about the big super cheap membership, lots of people using the gym type of thing. Invest time, effort, and money in your training staff and get them to be excellent at training clients, getting clients, building programs and creating the culture within the job. Well it's interesting because you saw that for a minute, especially with 24-hour fitness and they really put emphasis on that, but then they lost that

and they lost the culture as a result because you know the new you know bean counters coming in that are trying to look at you know the actual financials and look at profitability and all these types of things. As a business owner, you know, you're always looking to, you know, gain sort of an edge in like what you can cut costs on and all these types of things. That's important to do. But this is not one of those things. No, no.

And I'm glad you brought that up because it's it really is. You were there when that shit went down. Yeah. It's the foundation of what your gym is and looks like and is perceived by all the members that are coming in. Your staff has to be friendly, they have to be approachable. Everybody in the gym watches trainers and what they're doing with their clients. This is something that the whole experience revolves around that.

I don't know that, like you mentioned, there's a couple other smaller gyms that it's inevitable because you have a smaller community where people actually interact and they talk. So I guess my advice would be more around the structure of the gym, how to do it in a way where people actually run into each other more. So there's forced interactions with each other.

So they actually talk and communicate. And your front desk is set up in such a way where there's like a few people that you know make sure they say hello, you know, make sure you talk to them on their way out, make sure you know when they're coming up to purchase like a drink or whatever, like there's this constant rapport and you know and that's what's going to help you to succeed in the future. That's what it's all about. It's this microcommunity, it's this thing that you create for people to have a certain kind of type of experience that they're going to want to keep doing. Yeah, because what you have now is you have this culture that's developed now is they've

gone in and this is what happened with 24 at least. They went in, they had people from outside of fitness who stepped in and looked at the numbers, saw all these workouts coming in, saw that 24 fitness owned all these markets, because they had the most gyms in there with the most amenities, and they said, fuck, all we gotta do is lower the price and cut cost

and we'll blow up, because they're using the same model that you would use for retail or something like that. And everybody who was in fitness, when we heard that, all of us shaking our head going, no, that's a terrible idea. And that's a shit. And we were fucking right. And now you've got gyms that are following that same model, kind of making money. And I think it's ruined the big boxes.

You don't see lots of growth in the big box gyms as a result of that. But I'll tell you what, I used to have these, I would do these regional sales trainings, right, with all the, I've done a couple of them with all the general managers from the region. And I'd say, you know, because we were blessed in many different ways for working for 24th and it's one of them is I got to work in a company that had 400 locations that I was also competing with. So although we were all working in the same company, I got to compete with clubs that were five miles away in the same city, and I got to see their numbers. I got to see what they were doing,

and they got to see what I was doing. And so imagine if you could compete with your other competitors that you could do that. So I could see what was going on to all to make a better place. And I used to remember I'd sit there in these meetings and be like, what makes us different than anybody else and people raise their hand. More locations, we have cardio in it.

And like, no, you, you're the only thing that makes a difference. The only reason why my club did better than this club down here was because me and my staff, because we had the same equipment. Or sometimes we had worse equipment. I was put in sometimes some shitty situations where we would outperform clubs that were brand new and whatever turn off the AC. You know, it's like you got to explain that to members and it's like, I don't know, man.

That's it. I tell you what, you put me in a big box now. I walk in there, you give me a fucking month and I'll show you some returns that'll blow your mind and it's not anything to do with the equipment or the frickin physical looks of the gym. It's all about the attitude and culture and the staff and I do think the root of that is with the trainers. You guys pretty much summed that one up pretty nice. I think culture is the for sure.

I'm in a living off of when I work for 24 or if I'm in this off of going into clubs that were underperforming and turning them around without changing anything else. So it most times it has everything to do with that. That's wrong. So, if there's something wrong with it, it's the culture, which is very similar to the public school issue that we talked about, it's the culture of the gym. And how you do that, it starts with you as the leader.

Like, you have to set the tone. I mean, I used to go crazy when I'd see my peers inside a gym and sitting at a desk on a phone behind a computer the entire day. We're in a fitness gym. You guys understand that, right? There's all your people, there's all your customers, how are you not engaging in talking to them and helping them? And there's not a lot of places where you get to, you know, anybody who's like a real entrepreneur really understands business would want to strangle most gym people inside it, like gym owners and gym people like that are working there because they all should be out

mingling with their members because those if you look at a big box gem, there's probably anywhere between 50 to 150 plus people inside there at one time. And those are your consumers, those are your buyers, those are your referrals. They're all right there in front of you to think that you're not communicating with them is like ridiculous.

That's absurd to not do that.'re not communicating with them is like ridiculous. That's absurd. That's absurd to not do that. But yet we do that in these boxes. You don't see this communication. The other thing that I think Justin said that I'll elaborate on more is the average person that gets personal training, shopped their personal trainer for three months before they actually do that. This is why I used to tell all my trainers

that you are constantly, you know, on stage. You are constantly being looked at. People are watching what you're doing, your mannerisms, how you engage with other people, you are on. In a minute you walk to that door, you need to be on. I walk in a big box gym now, and I just laugh. I'm like, I see trainers leaning on machines,

drinking coffee, you know, sitting down Why clients exercising like I see these things that I want to pull my hair out because that would not fly in my my Facility, there's no fucking way you would be a personal trainer flirting with some girl drinking a cup of fucking coffee sitting down Indian style while she's doing some fucking plank or something or Watching you bullshit on the floor while someone's exercising or on your phone. Now that's the big one I see with trainers. Texting on their phone,

why clients actually exercise. I mean, this is what's wrong and that's all going back to what Sal said. It's the culture. Somebody that's leading that place is fucking that place up. Yeah, you know, the irony of it is the traditional big box,

probably you're probably better off just doing the smaller box. the traditional big box, probably, you're probably better off just doing the smaller box. I think to run and pay for a big box and the amount of volume that you need and all that other stuff and, you know. The only real difference, though, is why that is is because it's easier to create a culture within the small.

So that's the reason why. Because if you were, and we saw this with other leaders and peers of ours Right, we always had it. I know you remember this there was always the guy that was pretty good He was a decent he was decent. He wasn't like the other put them in the small they put them in the small box He can man it he can manage a facility that saw 500 workouts a day and a team of five people But if you were really good you were you were leading the biggest boxes because you could run a 50,000 square foot location, have 25 people underneath you,

and you could create a culture inside that big of facility. So, yeah, it's possible. The reason why we see this explosion for small boxes, CrossFit, Orange Series, all your little small studios, it's just easier to create a good culture there. It's easy to control. It's true. Five to 10 people culture there. It's easy to control, fight it to people, but if you take that same formula,

you can have a badass big location. Next question is from Health, Healthy, Happy and Free. Where do your current workout routines and goals? Nice. For me, at the moment, I'm always training to feel better, but I do have like a secondary goals, I guess, when I go into my workouts. Right now, a long standing goal I have is to improve my mobility and control and range of

motion in my lower body. My hips, my knees, my ankles, my feet, my back. So my training for my lower body looks different than it does for my upper body, where it's lighter, it's controlled, it's tension, it's unilateral. I'm basically just, that's the main goal, it's going to be like that for a very, very long time, it's not up, it's, I've relegated it to that and that's all good. As far as the rest of my training is concerned, it's at the moment, I went through kind of a mini bulk where my gut has been feeling so good, where I'm eating food and absorbing it and having no issues that I thought I'd push my food and take a little

bit and see what happened. I gained some muscle and I felt real good and now I think I'm going to go back on a mini cut, but that's really more of my nutrition. Anything else is concerned? Yeah, I'll go ahead and go next. I think for me, I went through a period where we had talked about this where it was more unilateral.

And for me now, I'm kind of transitioning to see how that applies with barbell training and also a very specific gross motor movement, skilled type movement. So I'm sticking with three, you know, particular lifts and that being, I'm actually trying to get back into a little bit more of like what I used to do for sports-specific training,

whereas I'm adding in, you know, barbell squats, I'm adding in, you know, power cleans and, you know, barbell squats, I'm adding in, you know, power cleans and, you know, overhead press. So those are like my three, like, staple skill exercises that I'm just going to work on the skill and mastery of for the next couple of months. And my focus with that is just to get back into how everything is firing, well, you know, what my, how my body's responding, what my mechanics look like. And just because, too, doing that takes a lot of pressure off of the programming a bit

of, okay, I wanna add this muscle group in, this muscle group in. And I know this is kinda going back to my comfort zone because that's kinda like what I used to do, athletic-wise, but it's fun, and it's something that I enjoy. And- You've taken a break from it for a while, so I have to see what I'm- I have time, so it'd be cool to see how I can ramp it up

and get that back on track. So I'm gonna probably bore the shit at everybody with mine right now. You know, where we're at right now is different for us like business wise. So my workout routines and goals kind of reflect that. And what I mean by that is I'm pretty happy with where I'm currently at physically.

Well, I should have been lying. Today, I'm on this like, can you to lean back out a little bit because we just came off of four days of not training, eating whatever the fuck I wanted. I wasn't dialed in it all on our trip. So I feel a little soft and I know that once I get back to the swing of things this week,

I'm already back onto my regiment as far as eating is concerned. But if I had a goal right now, the goal actually would be to mentally check myself and be okay with where I'm at. I'm only gonna train like three days a week right now, the goal actually would be to mentally check myself and be okay with where I'm at. I'm only going to train like three days a week right now. I'm not trying to make major moves and gains and changes with my body. I'm very happy with my mobility right now.

I'm fully recovered from the fall off the ladder, so I don't have any real nagging pains or anything going on with me. So my body physically feels very good. Estetically, I look pretty weak sauce, nothing impressive at all. And so that's part of the goal is to, I'm challenging that right now and to be okay with that. Because I know that what it takes right now to grow the business we're in right now,

something's got to give, right? And I just answered somebody on the forum the other day or I just kind of said that something's got to give because they asked this question, like how do you guys deal with this? Schools like crazy right now. And I just answered somebody on the forum the other day or I just kind of said that something's got to give because They asked this question like how do you guys deal with this schools like crazy right now works like crazy I'm trying to achieve this goal like how do you guys handle that and for me I accept that something has to give and what has to give right now is me having a Hardcore physical goal or like I'm not chasing a PR I'm not chasing a look right now. I'm just kind of

maintain health while I you know help grow a monster business which that requires a ton of laborious work that's on a computer and flying and traveling and not always getting the most optimal food that I should eat. So for me I'm not focused right now on that. My focus is to be able to maintain it for it to reflect the rest of my life and the rest of the things that are high priority. And I actually think that a lot of people in the fitness industry struggle with this. They need those hardcore goals otherwise they don't want to. Right, even this question right now, what are you guys just saying? They want to know with this, I don't have a current like, that's been me though for the last few months.

Yeah, I'm not trying to change anything hardcore right now. And that's not to say that that won't, that could change next week. I mean, knowing me, somebody could put an idea in my head. In fact, I almost got one because I forget who was talking this weekend about Jiu-Jitsu. And I, that's been kind of getting tossed around it. Yeah, it was Rob, right? That was talking about Jiu-Jitsu and I, that's been kind of getting tossed around it. Yeah, it was Rob, right?

That was talking about Jiu-Jitsu and I'm like, man, you know what, I've been meaning to do that. I kind of want to get into that. Taylor wants us to do it for video reasons. Oh, I'll be down. Right, and so, and Justin's already said he'd be up to it, Sal loves it already, so, but I don't want to announce it on the radio

until I'm committed to doing it. I don't, you know, so right now, I'm not. What I'm committed to right now, I'm sticking to my book goal. I'm not, I'm committed to doing it. I don't, you know, so right now, I'm not. What I'm committed to right now, I'm sticking to my book goal. I'm not, I'm not in the books out. I'm sticking to my, my relationship goals that I set for myself with Katrina. I'm working towards my fitness goals,

or my my friendship goals right now as far as how much I'm spending time with them and I'm failing there. So that's a priority of mine more than my current workout and fitness goals are. And I'd like to maintain a healthy lifestyle as much as possible. So I'm kinda ebb and flow right now.

You know, we just had four days of not eating well and not training. So I'm on one side of this spectrum and then this week, I'll get back into this swing of things, eat better and train good. And so I'm just kinda, I'm trying to chill and we even in and of that. And I'm really just kind of, I'm trying to chill and we even ended that. And I'm really focusing on the things right now

that are really important to me, this business that we're building and doing right now is extremely important in all my mind most of the time. And then like my personal relationship and books, like that's kind of a big deal for me right now. So I hate to kind of shitty answer for this question that could have been better, right? Sorry.

No, it's good It's real though, man It's real. It's like you want to just throw out some generic shit. Well, that's longevity I mean that's longevity with fitness if you always have these hardcore goals You're not gonna last at number one and you will lose your motivation number two so Like the earlier question, you know what I'm exercising when I'm super stressed, the goal of the exercise is not to change my body, it's to feel better at that moment. So there you go.

I felt like in the past, and I was definitely somebody who used to be, and we talked with a show of time on or off, you know, I'm either dialed in, I'm either. Because you needed that, right? I'm either measuring the food and I'm doing this, I'm training hard, I got to focus, and that worked really well for me.

It really, really well to get myself in shape. But I like with a, I mean, I'm, I'm filling out my shirts right now. I'm moderately strong. I'm nowhere near the best of any of those things. I'm not the best aesthetically and not the best strongest right now. But I feel good.

I feel good and I feel. Well, you look good. Thank you, man. You look good. We'll give you a hug. You're balanced. Yes Go to YouTube mind pump TV. That is our YouTube channel if you haven't checked it out yet. What is wrong with you? How dare you also mind pump media.com. That's our website in roll in 30 days of coaching. It's free Thank you for listening to mind pump if your goal is to build and shape your body dramatically improve your health and energy and of coaching, it's free. and MAPS aesthetic. Nine months of phased, expert, exercise programming designed by Sal Adam & Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and

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