The Uneducated PT Podcast - #45 Damien Hennigan - Men's Performance Coach

Episode Date: August 29, 2024

In this episode of the Uneducated PT Podcast we speak to Mens performance coach Damien Hennigan. Damien helps Men struggle with low testerone to improve their performance through diet, exercise and lifestyle. Expect to learn why men are struggling, how to increase testosterone naturally, why men become people pleaser and the damage that causes and much more. 

Hello and welcome to the uneducated PT podcast with me, your host, Carlo Rourke. The goal of this podcast is to bring on interest and knowledgeable people from all walks of life, learn a little something from each conversation and for you, the listener, just learn something from each episode. So don't forget to subscribe to the channel, press the box below, show some support, and I'll see you on the next episode. Okay, before we get started, can you tell the listeners a little bit about your background, how you got into the fitness industry, what you do today and why you do it?

Yeah, giddy up, Carol. Well, listen, thanks for having me on. on the podcast lad. This is, um, I'm sure we're going to have a good old chat today. So I'm originally an a Raskaman man. Um, I've been living out of Ireland for the last 14 years. I lived in Melbourne for a while, but to kind of give you the backstory and I'll give it, I'll make it brief because it could make it fucking shocking long and who wants to be here at all the details. But I left, I went to college civil engineering is what I studied, didn't pursue that, but went into IT, uh, IT technician.

I worked on Pierce Street in Dublin for a while. And I figured out very, very quickly that sitting at a desk wasn't for me. So while I was working in the IT company, I studied neuromuscular therapy. And that led me on to getting into PT. So kind of, I don't know if you remember the guy Kelly Storrett that used to do the stuff with CrossFit. Yeah, I used to do that stuff with clients like rehab, ballwork. And I used to just, you know, regurgitate everything. Kelly Storrett used to say, he was my God at the time.

And from there, I worked on cruise ships where I got introduced more to CrossFit, which is, they were talking back in, back in 2008 at this stage where CrossFit was just only a website still. But because I was working on cruise ships, I was exposed to a lot of Californian. What cruise ships were you on? Oh, three different ones. I started on Princess Cruise Lines. and then moved over to so that my first cruise was from a san pedro port in los angeles to hawaii four days at sea to get there and then six days flying around the islands and then four days back it was a long cruise but a great crack great crack yeah so yeah got introduced to cross fate from the clientele that will be coming on the ship then from the ship pretty much saved off enough money to move to australia moved out to australia moved out to a

Australia. CrossFit was going on here. Kind of got into a gym and set up my own little boot camps, which evolved into CrossFit. And yeah, I ended up running and owning my own crossfit gym for 10 years in Melbourne. Where, where I was in, I was living in Melbourne. I actually left during COVID as well. I was down on Carlyle Street. Where, where were you based? I was over the west in Williamstown. That's where my gym was. Yeah, yeah. So. So you have St. Kilda over the eastern suburbs and that's where all the Irish land to first. You have your Jimmy O'Neills and whatnot and all that sort of crap. But yeah, for me, I knew when I got there because I'd just been on cruise ships and done like a year on cruise ships. And I landed in Melbourne. I was exhausted because cruise ships was just a party lifestyle.

Yeah, I'd imagine so. Oh, best crack, but just burnt me out. So I got to Melbourne and I literally just rested for us, or pretty much slurice. slept in my mate's house for the first two months it was there. Didn't really do much travel and just got into work. And, you know, it just, it kind of snowballed. And before I knew it, I had a fucking gym. How did you find that run a business abroad and, you know, even kind of, you know,

because it's difficult to, to start a business anywhere. But, you know, especially away from home where, you know, your connections are probably a little bit less. Carl, it was 100% by accident. you know I was working in this gym I was doing PT sessions I was gaining clients the Irish accent worked well for me and then I started kind of adopting into turn these boot camp classes I was doing into CrossFit because I was learning more about CrossFit I got qualified as a CrossFit level one over there and you know then all of a sudden I was buying in equipment because I leased out at a corner in the gym and then

I started to charge rather than charge like my clientele for individual sessions. I was like, okay, I'm just going to put you on a membership because we're doing this as a group and it's on a specific time. So all of a sudden I had members paying me a weekly debit. And then be low and behold, lads and lasses that were I was coaching started saying to me, why don't you just get your own warehouse? Why don't you just like, you know, why don't you branch out here? And I was like, No, this is, this is grand. This is fine the way it's going. How do you even do that?

Funny, funny circumstance bubbled up with the gym that was working in. The owner actually sold the gym. So these new guys took it over and didn't quite see eye to eye with them. I think they're taught I was doing something shifty. And, you know, I was taking a membership. But I had actually organized with the original owner that he gets a percentage. of what I earn from the clients. So, but they just, we didn't see eye type.

So that was my cue. Let's get the fuck out of here. They gave you the push that you probably needed. 100%. 100%. Yeah. We moved out of there, moved all the equipment, got a small little warehouse, a tiny little place.

Within six months, we outgrew that new location. It was mental. Things just skyrocketed first. And it just so happened. that there was another warehouse just around the corner, way bigger, double the size, way more expensive as well. But I just viewed it and got talking to the agent that was looking after it. And we just got on well and I threw a random wild number, not what he wanted. And he was like, no, no, no, no, can't do that, can't do that.

As we're leaving the warehouse, he got to the door, he didn't open the door. He turned out if we signed paperwork this evening, would you have a deposit for me? I was like, oh, yes, yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, let's do it. Let's do it. Bang, we had a warehouse. I shot myself. Yeah.

Because it was way more expensive and it was way bigger. Well, fuck me. Like we done it. So that was our new location and we were there for a good eight years in that new location. And it's funny, it's still going now because I sold it during COVID. So new blood has taken it over and it's, I'm happy to say that the CrossFit Westgate flag is still flying high. What did that do for your confidence?

The, the, what, the new warehouse or the selling it? No, to take, going from working in a gym to almost running that gym to then taking over a premises, then to taking over an even bigger premises. Because they sound like stepping stones the whole way up to like taking more and more risk. Yeah. I never actually thought about it until you have kind of, like said it that way. It was just kind of taken a chance.

Like do you think, like, let's say if you had first got over to Melbourne before you had even, you know, started training people, and you just, you had just got off the cruise ships. Like, I presume you wouldn't have taught in your wildestreams that, okay, I'm going to take over this massive premises with this massive bill coming in every week that I have to make sure I have this amount of people coming through the door so I can, you know, because it's, it's. for entrepreneurs and business owners like you have to have a degree of self-esteem and confidence

and be able to back yourself to go after them kind of things yeah and just pure chance as well i'll say because i don't of none of this was planned out yeah this was plotted it's just like something happened i reacted yeah something happened i reacted again something happened i reacted happened, I reacted. And lo and behold, you're in a situation. You were like, oh, Jesus. But you make it work. If I can make it work. And that's kind of something I've, I definitely sits with me now. I always hear my clients as like, oh, you know what? I can't, like we can't go on holidays this year. We can't do that because I don't have the money now. So we'll put it off, put it off, put it off. My mentality is I'm going to do it. However, I can't.

So if it's a like I've mentioned about money, if it's a money thing, let's say there's something I want to go to let's say I beat that and this is this actually happened two years ago when a mate of mine was, I just moved back to Ireland. He had planned. Let's go to Ibita and I was like, oh fuck, okay. I looked at my bank account at the time though wasn't a lot of money in it. But I said yeah, fuck I'm in. I just got the flights. I booked the flights. He said I'll book the hotel and we'll sort it out. It just turned out like I had about eight weeks in 10, we were flying out. Well, in that eight weeks with my business and everything, I managed to accumulate seven grand. Yeah. Now, at the time, if I had said no, because that seven grand wasn't

in my account, well, I wouldn't have got to experience I beat that time. So it's the way I operate now. It's just my default. I should first ask questions later. Yeah, yeah. You'll you'll find your way to make a work, but you have to go all in on the thing. 100% 100% yeah it's the philosophy that I just follow and I follow it

kind of by accident now I just find myself just I'll say yes to something something that I'm really excited about and I'll figure the rest out as I go but that's saying yes

and figuring out as you go stems probably from being able to back yourself because you have confidence because you've already you have the evidence that it's worked for you before 100%

yeah and I think the only way it wouldn't work for a person in any way is if you just don't try. You know, you book that flight and you're like, well, now you know you're going. So what has to happen in between to get you there? It's like, oh, now you have to reverse engineer.

Correct. Yeah. Correct. You know, if you book the flight and just sat in your hands, I'd just complain because you could sit in the pub with your mates and go, oh, fuck, I'm after booking this flight to fucking I beat her. I'm going in eight weeks. Oh, where the fuck I'm going to get the money yet you're handing over $50 or 50 euro every time for a fucking round

a beer. Yeah, yeah. That's not the solution. There is a solution, but that's not the one. Well, I do that with clients a lot of the times who say, they might say something to me. I'm not a runner, but I'd love to run. And then I'm like, okay, we're signing you up for a half marathon. They're like, kind of haven't even round 5K. Don't worry.

We'll make it long enough that we reverse engineer it. So, like, you're going to start running because you know you have this thing in three months time, six months time, nine months time. So now you're going to reverse engineer. And all them times that you didn't go out for that walk, you're probably going to go for that walk because there's pressure now. Or all them times that you didn't do a run a 2K or a 3K, you probably will now. And you'll probably start to eat a little bit better now because you know that's going to contribute to you having this thing at the end of the journey. And you're probably going to get to bed a little bit earlier rather than going out and having them a couple of drinks. And all them little decisions

accumulate to them being able to run or do something that they never thought they could do. 100% 100% it's like putting the carrot but it's actually a proper carrot it's something that they actually want to do they actually want to get to because they have said it

they've mentioned it so yeah 100% agree so good so what happened next then so obviously you so you were working in Melbourne you had your own gym for the last eight years you sold it how did you feel about selling it

was there was a were you content was there a bit of sadness about it how did you feel yeah your baby right was 100% so funny funny it was I had gone to Bali in 2018 and I met a load of Irish people over there doing the online thing and I was like wow like this is this is

the life and kind of it hit me that I had moved the whole way across the other side of the world and I was working in a business where I was in a concrete block a concrete warehouse my concrete warehouse looked directly into the belly of another concrete warehouse. I'm like, wow, is this my, is this my Australia? Is this what I moved the whole way the other side of the world for? I felt like I was like, I've, I've nailed my feet to the floor here. So I said, right, something has to change here. Maybe what I can do is set the gym up and run it remotely, go to Bali in 2020. That was, that was my plan. So it went to Bali in 2018 on a sunny Webster Olympic weightlifting camp, brilliant crack. And then,

and I was like, right, what the plan is? I'm going to spend the next couple of months or half a year setting up the gym in a way that I could run it remotely. Well, the plan was to go back to Bali in 2020 for like a month, two months, three months, whatever. Not that far away that I couldn't just get back if I needed to, but of course, the world had other ideas.

COVID, COVID came up and kicked us all in the dick. So, um, so I'm, so I. I was like shite, right? Well, Bali isn't happening. So close the gym down as like every other business had to do. And started doing the online thing then. Were you doing the online thing while you were in Melbourne? I hadn't started it.

I hadn't started any online. No, it was 100% driven by COVID. But the idea was already in my head to try and run the gym remotely. That was always there. It was like, how can I, how can I separate? myself from the business so I can do more traveling see more things so it was a funny thing like COVID was a little bit of a blessing and and a curse you know number one I had shut my business down I felt like I lost my purpose and that was the

for the first time I realized I was in the right industry because my my purpose was taken away from me and that that couple of weeks where you didn't know what the fuck was going to I'm going to have to go back studying I'm going to have to go on the tools, go back to engineering, go back to IT. And I was like, I don't want that. I don't want any of those things. I want, this is my, this is, I've invested the last 15 years in this industry.

It's this or die. And that's when that's when I knew as like, right, fuck, we gotta make this work. So I said, I gotta try something different here. And of course, the online thing was the only only avenue to go during COVID. And through, you know, through bit by bit, you know, trying different things.

trying a lot of stuff that didn't fucking work and then trying other things and then getting mentorship in it and eventually figuring it out got to the point where it was up and running and i was like there was there was a month where i made this massive chunk of revenue and i didn't need a warehouse i didn't need to pay staff i didn't need to pay rates i didn't have all these fucking expenses i'm like what the fuck am i doing what am i doing here so it's hilarious like my um One of my coaches actually kind of seeing what was going on between opening up and closing down and opening up and Melbourne done the longest lockdown. So we were fucking closed and open for ages. So he's seen that I was the online thing that I was going. And he actually met an offer. He was like, are you going to continue the gym or do you want me to buy it off? Yeah. I was like, buy it.

Take it. Take it off me. So I was this an Irish man or an Aussie? No, an Ozzie. He was one of my, he was one of my coaches. Mm. yeah so and he bought it off you during lockdown as well when melbourne had like three big huge lockdowns didn't they mass yes we did yeah we're all doing fantastic at the start and then it just went to tits but we know all the people knew that it wasn't going to last the way it was going because at the start it was all in the news oh we're in zero cases oh we're doing so great but like look at the rest of the world we can't avoid what that's what's going on there then we ended up doing the longest one they're doing the longest yeah because I remember I had just got over to Melbourne and I was there for like six months and I left

when when obviously everything started to come in the news and airlines were shutting down. I was like, right, I'm going home. And then I remember seeing all the news, all the Melbourne citizens like open arms about how tough their lockdown was. And I was like, wow, I made the right decision going home. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And I'll tell you what, that lockdown living in Melbourne,

ruined it ruined melbourne a little bit for me um and i kind of talk about it now that's why i've moved up to the sunshine coast yeah because it i feel covid has actually ruined living in this city for me yeah if you would have asked me before coven i would have told you melbourne was home yeah happy out but after what happened then i was like no i'm not about it then of course moved back to ireland got super comfortable in the wide open spaces of rascampton and so when i came back to Australia I was like, I got to move away. I got to move away from Melbourne and everyone was saying, you need to go to the Sunshine Coast.

Wide open spaces, chill lifestyle. You love it. They weren't wrong. So tell me, tell me. So obviously you transitioned into the online coaching. So what, tell me how, how you ended up deciding on, you know, the niche that you're working with. Like I know you, everyone, the Alpha clan.

So tell me a little bit about where the idea for that came from. Okay. So when I started the online thing first, I was just throwing shit against the wall and seen what stuck because I wasn't sure of how it worked. But I got mentorship and they always spoke about figuring out your niche and narrowing it down. And at the beginning, I just didn't know who I could have worked with. So I just launched a program and I was getting men and women.

I was good, you know, got results with people. But the more I went down the rabbit hole of creating. the program and getting results, the more I discovered that men and women are completely different in what they require. And now when I was running the gym, I actually, it's funny, I feel like a charlatan now because I was just tearing everyone with the one brush. Everyone come in, this is, everyone's doing the same thing regardless because you're not focused on sleeping on nutrition or not like that. You're just focusing on the exercise. Yeah. Yeah, it's not, it's not really about behavior change or anything like that it's about you know getting people in and just

getting them moving and getting them training 100% 100%. So yeah true slowly working with more mentors and you know really understanding this nicheing down. Yeah maybe a year and a half ago I said right okay let's just solely work with men and since I have made that move over the making of the content for social media, the way I deliver the program, the how I look at it's, it's, it's, I'm not going to say it's easy, but it's definitely way more streamlined. And I feel the way it's really, it's streamlined because I am 100% qualified as a man. Yeah. Well, I would hope so. But I know I'm creating what I felt I needed. Yeah. As a youngster growing up and even as an adult because we, you know, it doesn't matter what age we are. We still need direct. right 100% 100% and you know what it sounds like an obvious thing but it's actually if people who know who run a business is actually it's actually a scary risk to take because you think to yourself that oh well if I'm you know cutting off half of the population from what to work with me I'm you

turning down business and I need to make money to make my business work but actually like once you once you actually do that and you're talking to essentially you, it makes it a lot easier to resonate with people. Absolutely. Absolutely. I don't feel like I know you are. You all I always get the odd message now and you get oh why don't you work with women and people some people take it maybe a fence to it when I'm like it's not that I'm saying no, I refuse to work with you. I'm just saying I will work better with these group of people over here because I'm not specialized in what you need.

It's not my wheelhouse, but there is people that can help you and I can direct you to them, but I'm going to stay in my lane if that's all right. Yeah. So what is, so what are some of the struggles that the, that the men that you work with have when coming to work with you? The, the, the, the big keyword that always pops up is structure. Structure. I'm lacking structure. I don't have structure. I'm lost.

I'm in a rush. I don't know what to do. My food. I don't have structure around my food. I don't have structure around my gym. I don't know how, I don't know what to do if I was to start in the gym. There's actually.

Yeah, it's it's lacking again, coming back to to change the word structure, but direction. It's like what there's so much information out there. And I don't know what to do. And I know I've been stuck with myself in business. You know, what do I need to do in business? I'm not, I'm not a business person. I wasn't a business person at the start, but I tried to do it myself and you're, you're

getting snippets of information in different places. You're trying to glue it all together, but it's just clunky and it's not efficient and it takes you longer. So I look at it like, you get the business person to help you and they're like, okay, well, you've got ABC going quite well. Let's just smooth it out. And this is what we can do to smooth out the transition between A and and B and C and you're like, oh, holy hell.

Now I understand. So I suppose that's my role. It's like, right, what is your structure? What are you doing? Okay, let me make a couple of suggestions here. Let's see if that structure, this new structure now works for you. And we'll run with it for a couple of weeks. And if not, you know what?

If it doesn't work, we'll scrap it. We'll build another one. And we'll keep doing it and keep doing it until something starts to stick. Yeah, one of the quotes that I was going to quote you on was you said that my greatest weakness is trying to do it all by myself. And then one of the questions I was going to ask is, as men, do you think we find the hard to reach out and ask for that help? Yeah, 100%. And I'm guilty of that. You know, you, in several situations, with my gym, 2016 in my gym, West Goet, who was the,

worst year the gym ever had. And it's funny, 2000 came home to Christmas time, 2015, rang in the new year. And I had said to a few people, oh, it's going to be the best year I've ever had. But I had all these ideas on my head of what I was going to do. But there was no real structure behind them. And an actual fact, it was the worst year the gym ever had. So the end of 2016, I actually got business coaching. 2017 was the best year the gym ever had because I reached out and I will forever do that. I have to remind myself to ask for help now because I will always get some form of mentoring. I think my choice in getting mentors now has got way more specific. Before it would have been very general, very like, okay, just give me the overall vision of what I need to do. But now I'll specifically work with like I'm working with a little. Lewis Potts at the moment, you know, because he's like specifically on helping you become a better coach. There was a young chap I hired recently to help me with automations for my business.

Like I know what I need in my business now, but rather than me kind of just trying to string it together myself, no, I'm going to get the people to help me to do it. Do you think that reaching out for help and and known what you need help in that comes from a lot of self-awareness? It comes from a lot of, it would come from a lot of self-awarest, but it comes from the fact that I haven't stopped reaching out to people now. You know, I've, I've had mentors since 2016, pretty much nearly every single year and different ones. And the more mentors you go through, some are fantastic, some you're going to learn a heap from. Others, you learn less from, but you're always taking something away. You're always taking, and you level yourself up. And now just because of my experience working with people and seeing where my business goes to and where I go to on a personal level, it's always positive.

It's always positive. So I can't see myself ever stopping getting mentorship. I don't know. Even when I retire, but I'll get a mentor to show me how I should retire properly. Not that I plan on retiring, but I just see the value in it. I see the value in. But I think that's the, that's the, that's the, that's the, that's, that's the, that's, that's, that's, that's, you see the value in it. I suppose people that don't see the value in it are people who have never reached out for help or had a mentor. That's it. You know, there's, or maybe there's the obstacle, you know, or will this work for me or, oh, I don't know, I'm not too sure. Or maybe it's too much of a financial commitment. There's always a block. There's always. Where do you think that comes from? Is that a lack of self-esteem?

lack of confidence. It will be, it's, you've, you've, you've, you've had an experience somewhere in the past. You've had something that you've maybe forked out for something you've given a crack and you taught it was going to give you the answer and it didn't. And I suppose my response to that is, okay, try again. Because it's like you go on a date for the first time

or your first date with anyone, is that going to be the best date you ever have? No, it's like, continue. dates with the one person the dates get better you get to know each other over time over time it takes time one experience with something doesn't make it or break it doesn't mean it was the only way it's going to unfold doesn't mean it's it's the the worst way it's going to unfold it's just an experience you've had try again try again so you said that um one thing that the the men that come to you looking for help one thing that they're lacking in is structure is

there anything else that that men need to feel better about themselves to improve the quality of their life well a big area i work in is hormones testosterone okay that's the the big thing for men it's what it's the essence of a man it's it's it's what makes you you and it's what makes me me Now, there's several ways to look at this, but my approach is always lifestyle. Let's look at your lifestyle and let's improve it. A big part of my business and how I operate my coaching is, let's do bloods. Let's look at your blood work. Let's see what's going on.

Let's look under the hood because you can tell me what's going on. And you might say, all right, well, I'm not motivated. I'm gaining weight to beat the band. I'm depressed. I'm anxious. And I'm like, okay, well, let's, let's just do all these things over here and see what happens. But if we also, while we're doing all the things, look under the hood and actually do a blood test. Because I work with a lot of guys that are between the ages of 35 and 60.

So there are lads that are getting on in life. And typically around that age, we're seeing a decline in testosterone anyway. Now, seeing it even in younger men at the moment as well. Yes. Yes. It's a funny statistic. It's something like 20-year-old men nowadays in the 2000s have lower testosterone than men in the 80s in their 60s. Men of the 80s.

In your opinion, what do you think is contributing to that? Oh, yes. This is a this is the big one. Lots of things have changed over the last 20 years. D diets have changed. The way we work. has changed our fathers and their fathers were all working on tools we're wall building stuff most people are now sitting behind a desk you know so what they're putting into their bodies has

changed and their activity level and then also you know people aren't sleeping people are not sleeping properly anymore people are addicted to devices people are watching netflix people are staying awake all night people are loading themselves up on caffeine you know there's all of these things men and women are suffering yeah well it's the early morning for you so that's all right yeah it's only it's only 11 o'clock for me it'll be cut out by far so yeah exactly exactly but it's it's those like basic things that are getting um kind of just disjointed that little bit that are affecting people's quality of lives yeah yeah are the Society is designed now for people to be inactive to be, you know, up all night.

And obviously these things all impact your testosterone. Well, you can just pick up your phone right now, click a button on it, not leave your chair and food will be delivered to you. Yeah. And you can continue to work and just repeat, repeat, repeat, not even see daylight. Yeah. Yeah, all these things play a factor and they are ruining testosterone levels. and so I presume then obviously with joining your program and with these men focusing on their improving lifestyle factors you know getting better quality sleep getting them to move more

getting them to train getting them to lift weights this all impacts their testosterone in a positive way absolutely absolutely so it's a it's a wild thing with testosterone so So let's say I've taken a guy, we've looked under the hood and we see his testosterone is really low. It's not bottomed out. It's not in a negative range, but it's low. So he's not feeling the best. Now, the likelihood of him been in that range for the last five or six years is high.

Your testosterone level doesn't just drop down overnight. It slowly decreases. Now, we don't need to take him up to a high level for him to feel good. Yeah. We just need to take him up one or two points. Now, we've looked under the hood. We've done six to eight weeks of changing the lifestyle. We look under the hood again.

Now, as I said, we'll only see the testosterone level jump up a little bit, but he's a different man. He's motivated. He has energy. He's training in the gym. He's present with his kids. He's like, I feel like I'm on testosterone. I was like exactly because that little nudge that were,

that little lifestyle adjustment that we've made you're now sleeping better you're now eating better has allowed your production of testosterone to upregulate and because it's been so low for so long that little nudge has made a massive difference yeah do you think that's that's that's impacted the quality of the relationships or in these men's lives with their partner and their kids 100 percent yeah 100 percent they're coming home from work at the moment and there'll be guys listen to this, you're coming home from work and you're drained. You're having a meg left in you and you get home and all you want to do is sit in the couch and watch telly. You're not present. Your missus has probably given out to you because you've done all your things at work,

but she asked you to get milk on the way home and you fucking forgot it because your heads up your hole and your kids are your kids are pulling and dragging out you and they want to play a ball and you're like, oh yeah, I'll be out in a minute, I'll be out in a minute, I'll be out in a minute. But yet all you're able to do is sit in the couch and scroll on your phone. You don't have the up and the drive in you. You get a. man now that's more organized on his daily in his daily life because if if your testosterone levels are optimized you think clearer if you think clearer you're going to be more productive if you're more productive in the day you're getting a lot more work done and you're not bringing that shit

home with you then when you do come home guess what you have energy and you haven't forgot the milk it's a it's a it's a ripple effect isn't it like you like one you make one positive action and that produces a positive outcome. You feel better. You produce another one. You produce another one. And then it can go the other way as well with people. It's like, okay, you know, I scrolled on my phone.

I got a bad night's sleep. I'm wrecked the next day. I haven't moved all day because I'm wrecked. I'm hungrier now. I've, you know, so I'm eating hyper-palatable foods. You know, I'm gaining a little bit of weight. It's harder to move now again. And it can spiral one way or it can, you know,

trend upwards depending on what action you take. That's exactly right. Yeah. And our job as coaches is to just view their, you view whatever cycle that they're in and just interrupt it. Just interrupted for a second and they, oh, hold on. What can we do here? And that one little thing, it's always one thing. Start doing one thing and Jesus, that's it. If they can keep doing the one thing, it might be, I don't know, you could pick a pletter of different things. Start eating breakfast in the morning.

Go for a little bit of a walk. You know, put your phone away an hour before you go. go to bed just something simple but just do one of those things one thing six weeks later they're different they're different human and it's like people people fail to understand that even though it might be simple advice just because something simple doesn't mean it's easy i know no sure that's the mistake i'd be making with business at the start is trying to do the big things set up an email list you know organize the direct debits you know put classes together set up the website oh crazy trying to do it all at one No, no, it's a small step, the small steps that make the greatest change.

And you said your number one priority shouldn't be your family or your partner. Can you elaborate on this? Yeah, absolutely. So as men, we will mostly get our fulfillment in life from being of service in some way, shape or form. It's the male energy. It's the male essence. We're problem solvers at heart. We wanna be able to fix things.

Now, if you take your focus away from that problem solving or being a service provider and focus on something else like kids are your partner, and that's what happens a lot of times. Like, oh, I need to look after these. You stop doing what gives you fulfillment. you stop, you take your eye off the direction that you're going. And what in turn happens is your direction starts to slip. You don't serve and provide as well as you can. Therefore, you don't make cash. You don't, you don't look after the thing that you're supposed to be doing. So this kind of

starts to disintegrate. Then what happens over here because you're fully focused on family and kids is that those relationships start to disintegrate because you're now more frustrated. You're not fulfilled in your actual life. So what happens is everyone suffers. Everyone suffers down the chain. It's super important for a man to figure out what his purpose is. And his purpose is going to be in some form of service. Whether you're a plumber, a lawyer, a doctor, a teacher, that is service. You are in a service to other people. You're giving back. You're helping. Within there, you will find your purpose in doing so because you are taking care of these people over here you're going to get that fulfillment you're going to feel good about yourself if you feel good about yourself what's going to

happen is everyone around you in your immediate circle is going to get looked after because of that yeah so your your wife in your kids they're going to get your attention but your attention is going to come in the form of your presence with them because you're now a more complete man so it's it's kind of i was i was listening to a podcast there the other day and it was a really good your man was talking about um an interaction he had with a therapist and uh she she was saying to him she was like okay you're you're your friend to your friend and you're your partner to your partner and you're your uh you're the father to your son and so on but who are you to yourself yeah and it made and it made me think it's like how many times do you're you're

do especially men, especially men with families, they're providing everything for their family, for their kids, for everyone else, but they're not looking after themselves. And, you know, downstream from that is probably,

you know, destruction. I had a very interesting experience with Jerry Hussie. You know, Jerry, yeah, he's, Ireland's answer to touch. The soul coach, exactly right. I went to one of these gatherings in Kildare.

And it was amazing. So to give the brief outline, he took us all through this meditation in the middle of it. And the meditation was just you relaxing your body. But after a while, it was like, right, you're in the room on your own. And everyone else around you has gone away. It's just you now sitting on this seat. And then someone's going to walk in the. back of the room and you're going to know them now on the lead up to this meditation he'd kept talking

about like the person that has the answer is yourself you have the answer that you're looking for so as we went into this meditation is a right there's a person that has walked in the room and as they walk up closer to you you kind of feel more familiar with them for some reason you know them but you're not going to look turn around you're not going to look at them then they're going to come around they're going to put their hand, their right hand on, or their hand on your left or right shoulder. And you're going to feel that. And I was in this now. When as he was talking me through it, I was, I was like, yeah, I'm here. Like, you know, I'm in the room on me own, but I can, I can sense this person. So he said, this person is going to walk around in front of you. And when you

open your eyes, you're going to recognize them. And when I open my eyes, it was myself. It was myself in front of me, but it was my 12 year old self. And he said, whoever's in front of you right now, because he'd set this all up, it was like, you know, you have the answer. And the answer is going to come from you. So he said, I'm going to count down from five. And in five seconds, you're going to hear exactly what you need to hear from this person. And listen up carefully in four seconds.

Are you ready to hear in three? Now I'm thinking to myself, shit, am I going to have to talk to myself? Like, like what's going to? There's no one in front of me. It's just me. Like, you know, but yeah, when he hit one, care, when he hit one, what came out of my mouth was, I'm proud of you.

And that just hit me. There was, there was emotion after. There was tears. I could, the people around me, they were, they were in tears as well. But that was a massive changing point in my life because I, would have lived a life of looking after everyone else first or else kind of on this self-destruct pattern where you know i require people's validation i'd be always the one at the bar saying hey we're fucking let's have pints i'd be buying the shots for everyone because i didn't i didn't want

people to fuck off i wanted them to stay out with me and all this sort of stuff and i knew then why i was doing all that because i required people to give me the pattern the back I was looking for for people to be proud of me. That's them they goes deeper into family stuff there and I know where it comes from. But once I said that to myself, shit just changed. I stopped this people pleasing stuff. I stopped the drinking. I stopped the whole persona that came along with that and I started looking after me. I started putting myself for.

And that has made all of the difference. Everything, my clients that I work with, my family now, everything just gets looked after way better because now I'm proud of what I do. I'm proud of me. I put myself as number one. One thing that I picked up there, especially was when even when you said people please. Would you say that's something that a lot of men in your program deal with or suffer with? I very much think so. Yeah, it's, um, you don't want to, the way I approach it is, I call it the S man syndrome. You're a S man and people, the lads will be there. Yeah,

they'll be nodding their heads. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Fuckin this fella asked me to do this, this. I fucking do it. I said, yeah, you're given out about it because that resentment is built up because you have said yes. You could have said no, but it is it feeds into that people, please. You tell you tell a lad he's a people pleaser he'll go fuck you what do you fucking say that to me for yeah yeah that's that's the that's the therapist terminology that's right but yeah the yes man is very much more uh trades yeah because they say it themselves oh for fuck sake get on fucking being the yes man again jesus or like if you wanted to say it like you say you're talking about i'm too nice to that that lad you know that's right that's right so i always approach it from that that angle and i just give my

story. I give my story about the way I used to be. So to give the like the background, my parents would have split up when I was younger and you know, you see your parents go separate ways and you do whatever you can, you think you should be doing to try and keep them together. But no matter what happens, they leave. So I created this behavior when I went to college and whatnot have if I drink, I'm a fun guy. People hang out with me. Well, that means I create this relationship with alcohol. That that I need to be out drinking all the time, partying, and that's what keeps people close. And that's what makes me feel good. So that was my behavior I got into. And then I talked to lads about that with themselves. I was like, have you ever been told you've done a good job?

Have you been ever told that someone's proud of you? You know, because we experience as fellas, like, you know, you go to secondary school and it's like, be quiet. You've Like speak when you're spoken to. And if you do speak out of turn, if you're not putting up your hand, given the correct answer at the correct time, you're sent out in the hall. And you're put out there on your own.

And that's your experience as an adolescent of rejection. And it's a man's biggest fear. You don't want to be rejected. You don't want to be cast out. You need to be in the group. So to remain in the group, you become a yes man. It's our defense.

And that sticks with us. It goes the whole way from, you know, going out in the pub, even if you don't really want to, you're going to go anyway. You know, someone rings you. You're finished your day's work. It's nine o'clock at night. Someone rings you. Oh, there's a pipe bar.

Can you call it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll be down in two minutes. I'll be down in two minutes. And then you'd hang up the phone. That fucking bullocks, that fucking pipe, you know. But we do it because there's something there that we haven't quite healed. Are we, we haven't quite heard.

And for me, that when I told myself I was proud of me, that was my healing. I didn't need to hear anyone tell me they were proud of me anymore. I didn't need to hear it from my dad. I didn't need to hear from my mom. I don't need to hear it from a partner. I don't need to hear it from anyone because it's coming from within me now. I don't need external validation.

So that's a big part of the journey I take lads on. It's just trying to get them to understand that. But it's a slow process. Well, my next question was going to be for someone who might not have this huge revelation of why they behave the way they behave but we know that they're a yes man

we know that there are people pleaser and we know that that's actually impacted their physical health their testosterone. So how can how can people go about being less of a yes man? Okay.

So there's a very simple start. Because I'm not a psychologist and I'm not going to be like psychoanalysing people. I will just give my own. Yeah, more even just practical advice for. For. So this is always my advice. And I do this in my seminars is like, right. Rather than responding immediately with yes, because the immediate responses,

oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll get it done. I was like, right, change your response. The response from now on is going to be let me get back. you. Okay. So what you've done there is you haven't said no, you haven't committed, and now you've given yourself time. And what you can. Oh yeah, you've taken the pressure. And it's always on yourself. Because if you say yes to something and you normally will say yes really, really quick and then you'd be like, bollocks, I've double booked myself. Or you know, it's something and then you're like, now you've added double the stress because now we have to say no or you have

to cancel something else. And it just becomes. comes a shit show. So I just say, make every response, even if you 100% know that you still can do the thing, still respond with let me get back to you. Make that the default. And then an hour later, two hours, whatever, you can send the message and you can say, right, or I actually can't. And that's the and that's where we start. Well, like it is, it is a nice little step and stone because just saying no, right away I can't do it or I don't want to do it. That like for some people that is a like that's too difficult to do. It's so on Irish. Hmm. It really is.

Isn't it? Yeah. You know we as Irish people we go out our way to help people. Yeah. And help each other even though you'll get people given out about it. Oh for fuck sake, you know, help but we'll still do it. We'll still. We'll still do it.

It's just the Irish thing. But yeah, rather than overloading your plane, and stressing yourself out to the bollocks, let me get back to you. Very simple, and it's a start, and then you get more and more comfortable, and it goes from there. And then also, it's like, okay,

now that you're saying no to things that you don't want to do, you have the opportunity to say yes to things that you do want to do or things that you now have time to do, like focusing on yourself, like focusing on your health, and all the positive benefits that come from that downstream. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Because I think that I lose, put us on to that book, the coaching habits. And it's like if you say yes to something, ask yourself the question, what are you saying no to? Because this is always the thing, you know, someone makes that phone call late at night for for you to come over and help them with that burst pipe. Well, what are you saying? If you say yes to them, what are you saying no to?

Well, you're saying no to time with your wife, time with your kids, a quality time that You're not getting back. You're not getting back. So always frame at that when you're headed. If I'm saying yes, what am I saying no to? Yeah. When you break it down like that, it makes it easier to say no to them things.

Because sometimes, because a lot of the times we don't look at the hidden cost. That's right. That's right. So what advice would you have then for your younger self? Oh, yeah. I suppose we've almost really gone into it. Yeah, yeah, like if it's to go off what we're saying there about the, you know, the pride, it's like, okay, well, just be yourself and don't worry about what people think. Don't worry about it. But that's, could you imagine saying that to 12 year old Damien? Could you imagine, like, even, you'd be like, what do you mean?

Sometimes you sometimes like advice advice is helpful but but experiences it's truly helpful That's right that's right I fully believe that everything I've been through my life was fucking perfect it was meant to be there there's been ups and downs and wibbles and wobbles You know I've dealt with them I've dealt with them as they've happened And so if I was to give advice to my younger self, knowing what I know of myself and where I've got to, I'd be like, gety up son, keep going. Drive it like you stole it. It is true though, isn't it? Because it's like when you come full circle, even the moments that were difficult in your life are actually a blessing. Yes. Yes. I fully believe that. You gain a resilience. You gain. knowledge. Like there was a, an example I've given to someone there recently, just on a,

on something that happened in my life and not too long ago, me getting my permanent visa in Australia. So I was on a de facto visa with an Australian girl. We actually split up during that. So it's kind of a thing, I'm fuck, like what's going to happen with the visa? But it was already in processing and fair play to where she decided, she said, yeah, we'll still go for it. I'm still happy to help you out. I was like, you're bloody legend. But there was that period of time where I was just expecting the immigration to ring me and be like, you've got 28 days to leave. You know, and I was like, I shot a brick. And that process lasted two years.

Now, in that time, my brain went through all the scenarios of if that phone call did happen. And when, so I got the visa, everything was grand. I've actually got my Australian citizenship. there recently, so I'm pretty much a true blue Aussie now. But when I came back to Ireland after COVID, I was already ready to go. Because because I had previously gone through all these scenarios of if I get kicked out of Australia, what's going to happen?

When I landed back to Ireland after, or just after COVID, my business was up and running in not even two weeks, in a week. And I was like, how the, like, a little bit of me was like, what the fuck, but I do a lot of journal. and so I was zoom or a lot reflecting. It's because of all that, you know, all those anxious nights, all that stressful thinking, it had, it actually paid dividends.

It actually had set me up because I was now playing out one of the scenarios. You know what I mean? You were ready to go then. Ready to hit the ground running. So you said that, obviously, that you, you're a big advocate of, you know, reaching out for health,

invest in yourself, investing in mentors. So I suppose my next question would be like, what's one piece of advice that stuck with you that you've received off a mentor, a friend, you know, someone in a business, anything that springs to mind? Yes. My first mentor and friend as well,

because he owned a CrossFit gym at the time too. Scott Wade is his name. He's an Australian fella over here. here in Melbourne and it's when my gym was at rock bottom 2016 I hired him through the affiliate solution and he came to my gym for three days and he just basically dismantled everything. But in that three days he got to know me more, you know, and got to understand bits and pieces of me. I used to talk about, you know, what I was doing prior to me giving this 110% commitment to the gym, which that's what I do in that 2016. I said, right, I'm 100% focusing on the gym. I'm not

going to do anything else. And I used to like my raves and all that sort of that. I was like, no, everything else is getting pushed to the sideline. And as I said, it was the worst year the gym ever had. He said this to me. Damien, you need to get out of your own way. I was like, but what do you mean? He said, you've given up parts of yourself that give you something, that fill up your cup, that give you fulfillment. You need to get back to doing them. And He was not wrong. So as I said, 2017 was the best year the gym ever had. And the start of that year, I rang in that new year at a rave, you know, for myself.

And I went along myself because at the time there was no one else that would really go along with me. So I went myself and I was this four day rave in Australia and I had a fucking great time. And I'll tell you, like, he wasn't wrong. We are our own obstacles. You know, I always talk about, because pretty much, I'm not a teetotler off the drink, but I have really pulled way back in it. And when I moved back to Ireland, I struggled with, you know, telling people, I'm not drinking because, you know, there's almost that expectation. Yeah. But you know what?

Do you know what it was, Carol? It wasn't the people. It was the debate in my own fucking head. You know, I was having this a bit. Will I drink? Want a drink? What will do? I'll wait.

like getting in there and decide when I go in there. No, just don't bother. Don't bother at all. Or they'll expect you what I do. I'm like, shut the fuck up. Am I drinking or am I not? They don't give you shit and they don't. As soon as you go in there, someone might say, oh, you're not drinking.

You're all right. But that's it. It's done. And then after that, once they know you're not drinking, happy days. Once you're sure of yourself, everyone else is going to be sure of you. Bingo.

Bingo. that's what it's all about yeah so that was the advice get out of your own way best ever yeah i love that um what do you feel passionate about that you think other men should know well it comes in the the coaching that i do here i think it's doing blood work doing blood work i think is a an essential one that is so simple to do, but it's very much overlooked. Guys are very bad at taking care of their health. That we let it go, we let it go, we let it go,

and it's like, it's only when you're absolutely fucked that you're like, oh shit, I better do something here. And it's great to do all the exercise and all the eating and all that sorts of. That's brilliant to do, but let's look under the hood. One of the biggest killer, silent killer is in men is prostate cancer. There's a simple blood test that you can do. You don't have to get the finger up the bum, you know.

But there's a simple PSA test that you can do just to monitor the growth factor of your prostate. So simple. That in the self is, I think, it's 30, 30 euro. And you can get that through RANDex, which is a private blood testing company in Ireland. It's so, so simple nowadays. But yeah, do bloods, lads, do bloods. And in saying do bloods as well, like a lot of lads will be going. If I do blood, sure, I don't know what I'm reading.

you don't need to know. But what you do need to do is get a blood and it's a snapshot in time of where you are. If there's something a little bit out of whack, no problem. You don't shit the bed. What you do is you make an adjustment in your lifestyle. High cholesterol, let's change your diet. You know, your diabetes reading a little bit high. Okay, start walking.

Do that for the next three months. Do something, make a little change and then do your bloods again. what's changed. And that's it. Just do it. Do bloods on a regular basis. The more data you collect, the more you're going to understand your own health.

And we haven't really talked about it, but any training advice for men who are just starting now, obviously you've been in the fitness game a long time. I'm sure you've made every mistake under the sun. Like what training advice would you give for someone starting out or training advice that you'd give your past self? Yeah. For well, for me, I was a skinny little runt when I, when I started training, I was like, the advice I would give myself if I start and train again is like, you don't need to train as much.

Yeah. You don't need to be in the gym five days a week. You don't need that. You do need to eat more food and you do need to monitor your nutrition. That's, that's going to be an essential part for you growing muscle and getting strong and eating the right food. Not following these dirty bolts. That shit is just going to make you sick. so yeah

people starting out in the gym you don't need to be in there every day like three times one hour three times a week is fine it's fine yeah so less is more in terms of your training and especially if you're looking to put on strength

you're looking to put on size make sure you're eating adequate amount of meals any advice in terms let's say someone is you know someone is quite skinny they find the hard to put on weight any particular advice in regards to that? Yeah, for the skinny lads out there,

stop focusing on all upper body stuff, squat. You've got to train your legs, lads. You have to. Like your quads, your glutes are the biggest muscles in the body. If they start gaining size, everything starts gaining in size. Plus, in the research in testosterone, what happens when you train your, legs and do a heavy leg session is you get a decrease in your testosterone production.

But what happens in the next 24 to 48 hours is you get an up regulation. You get an up spike in your testosterone. This is what's going to help you grow. And that it's, it's leg training specifically that causes that. You still get it when you do your bench and you still get it when you do your roles and stuff. But when you train legs, that's when you get the most dramatic effect. great advice um if people wanted to read so let's say there's a lad listening to this who's you know struggling with structures kind of struggling to get their shit together where can they find you where can they reach out how can they reach out to work with you and where else can they find

information and content from you yeah so just simply on instagram at hennigan coaching and then i have the facebook account which is my full name damien hennigan send me a DM there or an own message I'll help you out 100% Thanks for watching if you like that episode And you want to see more content like this Make sure you're subscribed And I'll see you on the next one