WHOOP Podcast - Professional video game player and champion bodybuilder Jackson "Bajheera" Bliton discusses turning his passions into a successful career

Episode Date: September 2, 2020

There probably aren't too many professional video game players who are also professional bodybuilders, but Jackson Bliton is one of them. Jackson is one of the most popular video game streamers on the planet and is better known as "Bajheera" in the gaming world. Each day, thousands of people watch Jackson play World of Warcraft, while thousands more tune in to watch him broadcast his workouts. He joins WHOOP CTO and Co-Founder John Capodilupo to discuss why World of Warcraft is his chosen game (2:20), having a dream job (8:01), dropping out of school to pursue his dream (10:24), why convincing his parents that gaming could be a career wasn't easy (11:00), getting into training, weightlifting, and bodybuilding (14:53), finding success as a pro bodybuilder (20:11), why workouts are good for the body and soul (21:29), using gaming as a recovery tool (24:00), how fitness helps him perform as an elite gamer (24:33), learning from WHOOP (29:27), his training philosophy (32:53), taking the first step toward self-improvement (35:48), and how to overcome poor recoveries (39:48). Support the showFollow WHOOP: www.whoop.com Trial WHOOP for Free Instagram TikTok YouTube X Facebook LinkedIn Follow Will Ahmed: Instagram X LinkedIn Follow Kristen Holmes: Instagram LinkedIn Follow Emily Capodilupo: LinkedIn

Hello, folks. Welcome to the WOOP podcast. I'm your host, Will Ahmed, the founder and CEO of WOOP, where we are on a mission to unlock human performance. That's right. We build wearable technology that measures everything about the human body, strain, recovery, sleep. We work with you to improve your body. More recently, we capture a data point called respiratory rate, which has been shown to be predictive in this world of COVID-19. So you can check out prior podcasts we've done on respiratory rate, COVID-19, and all the research related to that. You can use the code Will Ahmed, that's WI-L-L-H-M-E-D, for 15% off a WOOP membership. We have a really fascinating episode for you this week. WOOP CTO and co-founder John Capalupo sits down with Jackson

Blighton, who's had a career you never would have guessed, existed. He is both a professional video game player and a professional bodybuilder that is quite the hybrid. Jackson is one of the most popular video game streamers on the planet and is better known as Bajira in the gaming world. Each day, thousands of people tune in to watch Jackson play World of Warcraft, which remains one of the most popular games on the market more than 15 years after its release. Capo, our CTO, is also quite a gamer, quite a World of Warcraft player. And thousands tune in to watch Jackson broadcast his workouts every day. He's turned a passion for weightlifting really into a championship-winning natural bodybuilding career.

And he shares his training knowledge with his audience through streaming. Without further ado, here is Jackson. So I'd like to welcome Jackson, Bajira Blighton to the Wu podcast today. Jackson is a professional natural bodybuilder, a video game streamer, and rank one warrior in World Warcraft, and we're here to talk about this unique career path and how he optimizes his performance. Jackson, welcome to the podcast. You know, thanks so much for having me. That, when you string all those achievements together, pumps me up nicely. Thanks. Yeah, it's truly awesome. I like the sound of that. Awesome and unique. That's great, man. Well, I think, you know, starting, let's cover some basics for our audience. you know, why don't we describe what World of Warcraft is and what specifically you do in it,

which you're so good at it. Okay, so World of Warcraft is a game that's been around for a long, long time. It's a massively multiplayer online RPG, MMO RPG for short, which means that tons of people can log in and make a character and participate in a persistent world where you can do all kinds of stuff. You go into dungeons and raids with teammates, and battle against all variety of monsters trying to destroy the world. And when you're successful in your adventures,

you get items and things that make your character more powerful, and then you can take that and take on more challenges. One of my favorite things to do in the game, and what I specialize at is PPP, so player versus player stuff. So I like to take out other players. I like to take them out in the open world or in battlegrounds, which are a larger scale sort of team-based environment. And then my favorite thing is arena.

So that's where the rank one comes from is from the arena. So you go in with usually it's 3B3 is the most competitive bracket. So two of your friends versus three other people. And it's a death match format where you're trying to take out everybody on the enemy team. It's a very unique style of game where there's a lot of things to understand about the individual, other classes, and how to use your abilities to counteract other players' abilities. and it's something that you build familiarity with through years of playing and practice

and it's nothing there's like nothing else like it out in gaming and I find it to be really, really unique and fun for me. One of the coolest parts of World Warcraft is the community part. You mentioned the fact that it's massively multiplayer and online. It's not a single person game where you can just best everything. You really do need to coordinate and work well with large groups of other people to accomplish what you want to accomplish in the game. And I think that's what keeps it so fun.

And you form really strong relationships with these people. Absolutely. That's why it's been probably so much fun to have that be my main game that I create content with is because of the community. There's a lot of games where you can do where you could kill their players, you know. There's a lot of games like that out there. But I think the persistence of the world and the fact that you can have sort of an avatar that embodies like your presence in the world of Warcraft is really cool.

And you have that as a constant, content career, you have that tied to your personality as well. And so, like my character in game, for example, is a warrior. So in a world where there's all kinds of magic and all their stuff, my character, he's just all muscle and metal. There's nothing really special about him besides the fact that, you know, he's willing to put in the work with his, you know, make, you know, to get strong, to get skilled with his weapon, to wear heavy armor. And, you know, a bit of an underdog in a magical world, but definitely manages to kick some serious butt just by, you know, putting in the grind and that's that's kind of my style i don't feel like there's anything really

all that special about me besides the fact that i'm willing to put in that work and i enjoy the grind and by by outworking my opponents i'm able to succeed so you're also a very popular twitch streamer um maybe you could talk a little bit about how you got into streaming and how you've grown your community over time yeah so so streaming for those who don't know it's a just a live broadcast it's like i guess it's sort of the difference between uh youtube where you're recording ahead of time like a podcast for example or uh you know the live content is something that people can interact with in real time so you have me playing a video game got my got my video game screen is the main thing on screen down in the bottom corner got a little webcam where you know there's me live

and then we have a chat room whose people are able to tune in thousands of people are able to tune in hundreds of people thousands of people and they can all type their response to what's going on in game they can type questions they can cheer you on they can tell you you suck you know Usually, my community is usually really supportive and fun, so. But yeah, it's a fun way to share whatever you're into. When did you make the transition to playing World Warcraft and doing content creation and streaming on Twitch is a full-time job? And what were you doing before then?

I've always been to video games. And I thought that watching people play games was a lot of fun in addition to playing games. So going over from my friend's house and sort of watching them play through a game was pretty darn fun to me, just like playing games was. And so that's always been sort of part of my enjoyment of gaming was finding the storylines and sharing that experience with other people. And so when I was in college, I was watching a lot of YouTube videos about gaming. Even games I wasn't really playing. I wasn't really playing World of Warcraft at the time, but I still thought the videos were cool. And there came a time where I said, you know what,

I really enjoy watching these gaming videos. This is part of my day that I enjoy. This is my preferred style of entertainment. Don't really watch TV or anything like that, but I do like to watch gaming stuff on YouTube. So I thought, you know what? This World of Warcraft game looks awesome. I think I want to start playing Wow and I want to start sort of sharing my experience as a new Wow player on a YouTube channel. So I started my YouTube channel, started playing Wow, sort of chronicled my adventures a little bit. And so I was able to build a bit of a community on YouTube of people who enjoyed watching my content, which is amazing. And then I always really enjoyed, you know, interacting with my viewers in the comments. And then when I heard

that there was the possibility of doing your content live, like live streaming, I was like, oh, that sounds like a lot of fun because I can create content and I can interact with my community in real time. And, you know, it's been a blast ever since. The community element, the interaction with my, with my viewers who love to tune in. I mean, you see just like you get to know people that you might work with or see at the gym, you know, you see familiar names and faces in the chat and you get to know their personalities and it's a it's a really cool place to hang out every day and i'm grateful for it i think one thing that you've mentioned is that the willingness to put in the work and grind through stuff and i think when people hear oh a a full-time video game

player like i wish i could do that it's like so much fun to sit down and play video games but it sounds like it's been an incredibly long journey it's crazy and it is definitely fun to when somebody asks you know what do you do what you do for living you know if it's you describe what you do differently different people but saying you play video games for living is a really fun thing to say. But I suppose to answer the question that you asked me before is like when did I transition to actually having it be a job. I got lucky. I feel like I got to do it pretty early on. I think I had started my YouTube channel and I started streaming like I started YouTube in November. I think I started streaming that that summer. And then by the next, by the time the

next winter was rolling around, I think, is when my dad got a new job. I was living in Nashville, Tennessee at the time. And that's why I'd grown up for like 20 years or so, right? And so my dad got a job in Los Angeles. And so my mom and dad were going to move. And I was sort of in the position where I was like, well, I can move to L.A. to stay with my parents. But I'm kind of in a position where I'm in, you know, I'm 20 now. And I'm like, I don't think that living with my parents is really what I want to do at this point, even though like my family is super close. I love my parents. They're amazing. But instead of deciding to move to L.A., I said, you know what? I'm going to stay in Nashville and I'm going to do my thing. I'm going to do this. I was working as a as a

lifeguard at time and my parents were like, okay, so this kid has spent a lot of time on his computer. We've always been really supportive. He's somebody who has been like always a really good student, always active in sports, always did a good job with this. And here he was, this is at a time where I was taking a break from school. I was putting a ton of effort into my studies. But then I transferred from a college I was going to in Kentucky to Vanderbilt University to be back home to be closer to my family because my family was going through some stuff and I wanted to make sure I was there to be supportive. So I came back to school in Vanderbilt and I was putting a ton of effort in but I felt like there was something else that I should be doing and I felt like

the creativity that I had wasn't being put to use in the way that I wanted it to be. And that's one of the reasons why I started that YouTube channel is to have a creative outlet. And it was just so timely that once again, when the YouTube channel was growing, the streaming was growing, and then I was faced with that decision of what was I going to do next? It was like a very clear, like, do you go to Los Angeles with your parents, or do you stay in Nashville and work on your dream? And it was like, well, I guess that's not a super hard decision. So the one thing that my parents said, though, was, okay, so if you're going to stay, you

can't quit your day job because you need money to survive. like, okay, mom and dad. So as soon as they left, I put in my two weeks notice and I went full time. But to be fair, it was at a time where I was already making more from content creation than I was in my job. But primarily, it was a belief in myself and a belief in my community that I saw some serious potential here. I said, if I keep putting my passion and my time and effort into this thing, it can really be special. And that was kind of one of the things that I was sort of following what I call now that sort of like sparkling path

it's like it's not you know formalized yet but I feel like it's the right thing and that goes back to start in the YouTube channel I remember having a conversation with my mom and being like it was just so obvious to me this is the right thing to do for some reason it was like a shimmering path

it reminds me of like interstellar where the dad is like in the sort of 4D you know quantum realm and he pushes the book or whatever to show his daughter like this is the right move to make I feel like there's like some sort of quantum mechanic where like if you could go back you know 20 years and tell yourself something you know what would it be and I would be like trust your it's like trust yourself start that YouTube channel because you're really going to like what happens yeah that's an

amazing amazing story and actually a little bit similar I dropped out of college to start whoop with Will Ahmed and Aurelian uh yeah yeah it was at the time a risky thing my my dad's an academic and my grandparents are academics and I thought I was going to become an professor of philosophy yeah oh okay yeah yeah and he's a he's a chief medical ethicist for Kaiser Permanente so oh wow yeah yeah yeah they're all like what are you doing no like you stay in school I'm like no I and just like you said I can't explain it but it's felt like the right thing to do and just have belief in yourself and the people around you and uh yeah go out and do it that that's awesome yeah and that's not to say that my parents like didn't believe in me it's just like when you go from

you know, your son is a, you know, top athlete, top student, and then all of a sudden he's spent a lot of his time playing video games and he's like kind of in a position where, whoa, there's a lot of stuff changing. Is this guy okay? And I like to think that that was like their final, not the final test, but like a very important moment in like our relationship as like son and parent is like, you've supported me in doing all this really good stuff. Like, you know, whenever I wanted to play a new sport, they were there. My dad would like coach my teams or make sure that I was always a practice and they would always go to my my my races or games whatever I was doing and but it's it's really easy to support your kid doing like

these things that are on the path right right right going to school great we support that playing sports great we support that but it's like quitting school quitting your job to play video games right like I'm so sure about that one but they believed in me and I told them like I'm actually working on something here I'm not just wasting my time like you just watch and it was even harder back then, I imagine, because Twitch wasn't even around. And the idea now is at least more common and mainstream, like you, but you're blazing a new trail. Yeah, you know, ESPN reports on, you know, yeah, these like big e-sports tournaments and it's, so it's like a thing. But yeah, back then it was it was just getting started. But, you know, like I think that was like one of their big final tests is

can you support your son in doing something that you're not really sure about, but he is. And they're really pumped now. So, yeah. That's great. to have that kind of support structure. And now transitioning to kind of a total opposite, probably in most people's mind. Let's talk about how you got into bodybuilding and recently winning events and becoming a natural pro bodybuilder. So I'd love just to hear, when did the interest in bodybuilding and weightlifting start? You mentioned that you're an athlete and we can go from there.

Yeah, so I think that where it begins for me is you can go back as far as like just like, you those grainy home videos like and my dad coming home from work and doing pushups in the living room and me being like this little baby doing pushups with him just loving it um but i think that my my interest in training for the purpose of training like to be better not just because you know dad's doing it or it's fun is probably like most clearly like when i was 11 so my dad is somebody who's always gone to the gym you know he'd take me to the gym with him you know just because he had to go to the gym and uh you know child care wasn't really a thing right then so so all right kid go go hang out in the yoga room and don't break anything i got to get my workout in so but so i had that experience

but so my dad was always a big inspiration in terms of like lifting and and working out as something that people do um and it was also at a time where i was you know i've always enjoyed you know superhero stuff but let me tell you man dragon ball z that that got a hold of me something different so i i figured when i was about 11 12 years old i was like you know what i may have have to save the world someday and I better start training for it now. So I told my dad that and he was like, okay, let's have you start doing pushups. And so I was doing 50 pushups a day, 100 pushups a day. I'm going into 200 to 300 pushups today. I was hanging out with my friends. Like anytime I think about it, it was like, oh, pushups, drop and do 20. So I built up just doing a bunch

of pushups every day. And my dad saw that. And he was like, all right, you little psycho, let's start, Let's start taking you to the gym. And I was 12, but I, you know, I had been to the, like, we'd go to the YMCA. So the people at the YMCA knew me. I was a pretty big kid and I behaved myself. So I got to go to the gym with my dad and be, and use the machines and stuff. And so really, like my love of training began at a pretty early age. I've just always been drawn to the gym.

I've been a gym rat kid for a long time. But I also played sports in grade school and into the very beginning of high school. was a basketball player in addition to like every like I played everything right sure but basketball was kind of like my focus but interestingly enough when I was in like eighth grade like I got third place in the cross-country championship and I was like that's weird everybody else must just be bad like I don't know I don't know what to do with that but then when I got to be a freshman in high school all that working out and doing cardio and stuff just spending time on the elliptical must have must have been all right for me because I went in and I ran my first cross-country race and I was the fastest guy in my team oh wow I was I was

placing with people who were pretty darn good. And my coach is like, whoa, okay. And I was like, whoa, that was fun. I might be good at this. And so as I transitioned from basketball to cross country, and like, I think my, I played basketball in my freshman year, but then in cross country was kind of like, okay, I'm good at this in my freshman year. And then sophomore year on, cross country was my main focus. I ended up my senior year, I was like, you know, place in the top 20 runners in the state for my division. And, and then I ran a little bit in college as well. So the endurance, uh, stuff was kind of my main focus for high school into college. And I think that the transition from running to bodybuilding has been pretty natural because

I always lifted during that time too. I was a big kid for a distance runner as well. I was like 185 pounds running a 438 mile and stuff. Oh, wow. Okay. 1642 5K. I mean, it's not like crazy fast, but, you know, I, I, I never could get out of the gym. I like to eat, I like to lift, and I like to run. And so I was a pretty big kid booking it, but, you know, it was, it was, once I finished doing distance running, the gym was still one of those things that I did consistently. Sure. And then I was thinking to myself, I was like, well, I'm not, I'm not competing in any sports,

but I love lifting and I love working out. And the way that I trained is kind of a bodybuilding style, like focusing on, you know, trying to get stronger for sure, but doing mostly volume and things like that. And I was like, well, maybe we'll just compete in this in body, And so I started to tailor my training, but mostly my diet to gaining muscle and gaining weight and trying to progressively overload and maintain a caloric surplus and just sort of trying to learn about dieting as I went. And it's still, you know, it took me a while to figure all that out. But yeah, I was able to gain weight and I was able to continue to get stronger in my 20s.

And then I did my first competition in 2015. I went out to this and I went out to Muscle Beach. and I was like, this seems like a really fun place to compete. I wasn't in shape yet. I was getting there, but I mostly just wanted to learn what it was like to go and to see what a competition was like. And I got like third place in my division and the tall division. I got it to go on stage and it was really cool. And I was like, all right, this is neat.

I think I can do this. And so I dieted for two more months. I went back and I won the overall, won the whole thing. And I was like, yep, I got, I got. I got the bug. So after that, I put in three years of off-season bulk. And this is during a whole lot of streaming and life events and just continue to stay on the grind. And yeah, in 2018, I did some Muscle Beach warm-up shows.

And then I found Muscle Mania. There was a show close to my parents' house in L.A. you know what I'm in shape it's about the right time to do another show I could have done like I was thinking about doing like you know NPC or whatever else but I was like if I'm natural may as well competed in a natural show and uh I went there and the judges liked what they saw and they said all right you're the California muslimania champ wow congrats man congrats on your pro status and so then I went and I competed in Vegas and their world championships um as just like a my final show of the season it had been a long season so I don't want to say I mailed it in but I was

just like, I was just hanging on, you know? Yeah. Because all you have to do is I just had to go to compete there just to get the experience and lock in that pro status. And so that's in my 2018 season ended with, you know, that particular milestone. And it's just like, well, that's pretty cool. Yeah. That's awesome.

And do you think bodybuilding and weightlifting obviously places a large demand on the body and also a very strict lifestyle? And is that something you're hoping to continue in the future? Absolutely. I feel like there's significantly more strain to not working out. The whip might tell me otherwise, but there's significantly more mental and emotional strain to not getting a workout in for the day than there is physical strain for doing it.

But no, I definitely think that this is something that I've been doing for a long time. This kind of helps me maintain that sort of mental and emotional stability. It provides me with a particular type of schedule and discipline with respect to, you know, when I go to sleep at night, when I wake up in the morning, making good food decisions. It just really provides like a really solid backbone to the discipline structure that allows me to get everything else that I want to do done as well as just, you know, making me feel good. So I've been doing it for a long time. I guess I'm 30 now. I've been in the gym since I was 12, so that's 18 years. And yeah, I want to be the guy who's like 130 years old,

just slain into the gym. Yeah. Nice. You know, there's a few topics we touched on that are parallel between both the bodybuilding, weightlifting, and also competitive e-sports. Yeah, the focus, yeah, the focus, discipline, and, you know, not believing in yourself and competing. And do you see other parallels? How do you, like, balance the two in your mind? I think a lot of people are, think of them as such separate things, being a professional gamer and being a bodybuilder. How do you see them? Are they different to you, or are they kind of almost different manifestations of the same underlying principles?

I think that, like, for me, like, in my particular example, the type of game that I play involves a grind a little bit, right? So a lot of what you do in an MMO or an RPG, like the kind that I like, is you put time into your character, you know, to try to either learn the mechanics to a new boss that gives you better loot or you're just logging in every day, basically, and trying to get better at battling other players. So it's a long-term effort for steady gains, even if it's sometimes marginal gains over a long period of time. So the grind is definitely a parallel. The sort of competitive intensity can be a parallel as well when you're playing the game at a high level against other players. You're putting your skills to the test.

You're putting your mental fortitude to the test. You don't want to get too frustrated about losing a match and then having that affect your performance leading on to it. but um no i think that there's definitely some parallels uh between you know games and games for me but i think that part of it is it's just those are just two elements of of my life that i really enjoy and so there are definitely ways to tie them together but for me it's also just they they are just existing as part of me and what i like to do yeah definitely you know wake up in the morning and get your training in and then i feel like gaming is a fantastic way to recover just you sit back in

your chair and you get you got your water right next to you make sure you you're getting your food and as you go and it's uh but there's there's there's a there's a lot of like little things that can go into gaming and tying it together with fitness but yeah it's just two things that i love and the the the style that i have just put in the grind it kind of it makes a lot of sense with the games that i play and the games that i'm after so yeah um and do you feel like the fitness regimen that you're on and and dedicating so much time uh and consistency to working out helps you perform in World of Warcraft? Like you mentioned, you know, there might be mental strain on days that you're not working

out and letting go of that energy and also giving you the fortitude and endurance to kind of grind through some of the aspects of World Warcraft. Do you feel like the fitness aspects has actually helped the gaming aspects of it? Yeah, for me, I think. So I think I'm a much more like calm and patient person after like a nice two-hour workout. You know, like you're not getting antsy. I feel like, you know, it'd be kind of tough and you could probably get a little uncomfortable. just sitting down for quite that long without some exercise during the way.

But no, I mean, if you, you already feel like you've accomplished, like, one of your main tasks for the day, so you can kind of move on to the other stuff. But, yeah, I mean, like, just keeping you cool and collected and kind of having that, like, knocking down your, you're, like, mental energy level, like, a little bit instead of where you're, so you're able to, like, dial in and be focused because your physical body has sort of gotten the intense activity that it needs, and it sort of allows your, that's not really contributing to like the, the noise in your brain. You know what I mean?

So your body is, is good and ready to lock in and allows your sort of mental focus to take over. And we mentioned a few times your gains and games. Is it games and gains or games and games? Well, it depends on the order of the day. Right now it's gains and then games, but games and games is those, that's the, that's the TM. Yes, that's awesome. And so you stream your workouts on Twitch, just like you do your World Warcraft gaming.

How has that been? How has the gaming community responded to that? And do you feel like, you know, they've adapted to it and like kind of welcome it? Or has it been taking some convincing and things like that? We're curious how that's worked out. Yeah. So for the most part, there are viewers who are only interested in gaming. That's fine.

There are actually viewers who, I mean, like, it's unsurprisingly as well that there are some viewers who are like, you know what, I'm going to watch whatever you're up to do. I'm interested in either just you as your personality and I'll support you and do what you're doing, or they're actually interested in both the gaming and the fitness. But interesting enough, there's people who are really only interested in the fitness. They're like, I have no idea what World of Warcraft is, but I love your gym streams. So I'll come to hang out with whatever you're doing. And so it's really interesting to have overlap.

But I'm also not surprised that there are people who are, you know, really only interested in the game. It's not a problem. Yeah. But yeah, people have been really, really receptive. And it's also cool that Twitch has made that a possibility because there was a time back when, so we had the transition from Justin TV to Twitch. And then for a while on Twitch, non-gaming content was like unacceptable. You could get in trouble if you were doing things that weren't gaming because it's a gaming platform. But I remember that my wife and I were going to build a house.

And I was like, yo, I'm going to put a gym in this house because we're finally able to own our own place, time to make that dream come true, and to build a gym in the garage. And I was like, Twitch, I would like to stream my training. How do we make this happen? And so they, shortly thereafter came up with the, with the IRL section, which is like the, you know, the non-gaming stuff. And so over the course of time, there have been different sections where it's like sports or sports and fitness. And now it's fitness and health is the section that the training goes in.

But it's just like super cool that I can share that stuff too. And the gym streams are fun for me because I get the chat with my peeps while I'm working out, which is always fun to, you know, do that. but it also seems to make a big difference for people because we're talking, you know, a ton about just the fundamentals of diet and training, you know, hey, I want to lose weight. How do I do that? You know, talking through the basics of caloric deficit and tracking your intake of calories and macros and, hey, I want to build muscle.

How do I do that? It's like, when we talk them through sufficient volume and progressive overload and recovery and things like that. And it sounds like it really makes a difference to some people. So that's been fantastic to hear that. And we have, we have, you know, different, different sort of offshoots of that stuff. Like on our Discord, we have, we have like the Gaines channel. People can go show their swelphies, you know, their progress pictures.

And we get to work with awesome, awesome companies like Woo, where we get to build our team, our games and games team within the app. And people can join and they can share their progress and keep track of how they're doing versus everybody else. And that can be a supportive and encouraging thing for people. So it's been awesome to see the community grow and sort of, allow my passion to guide how I want to create my own content and then see that resonate with other people. Yep. It's been awesome. That's awesome. And speaking of Woop, you've been on WOOP for

a while now. Yeah, I got my monthly updates and everything. I've been on there for a little bit. Yeah. Awesome. And how have you found that Woop has helped you with performance or preventing overtraining or kind of helping you pack everything into the day that it's a busy day? Yeah, I feel like optimizing your effort and recovery is huge. The more that you've got on your plate, the more important it is to give each element of your day, your best effort, but also try to find a way to make that sustainable so you don't burn out. So for me, I think one of the greatest challenges moving from, so 2018 was my competitive season, right? And recovering from that diet took a little while. It was a pretty long season.

I started a little early because I was excited, and I went a little longer than I was playing to because I did better than I thought I was going to do. earned that pro status and so I had to do some more shows so it took a little while to recover from that and another big thing that was happening in 2018 was we were fixing to have a little baby and so in 2019 our little guy was born and so with 2019 comes some additional sort of not like barriers to the gains but definitely some augmentations especially with respect to the sleep I was going to say the sleep yeah yes sir so he's 15 months old now and I feel like We're getting some fairly full nights of sleep. He's an early riser.

He likes to get up anywhere from 4.30 to 530, which isn't that bad. But if he sleeps through the night, like that. But the sleep was definitely way different. But we're now sort of getting to the point where things are a little bit more regular. And it has been so much fun to sort of track that. But also in terms of my own priority system, like how important is the sleep? And I feel like being able to track it and being able to be mindful of it, elevated its importance for me. So it's been it's been a priority that I think I've been

putting more of my effort towards trying to get to bed at a reasonable hour rather than like I can stay up and I can work on a little bit more video stuff or I could be staying up later and streaming a little bit extra getting some more work in. But I feel like the recovery has sort of taken a bigger priority and a bigger importance for me. And that's been helpful in my workouts. It's been help of my my effectiveness with my with my day. And so I think it's been pretty impactful for me. And it's one of those things that's still going to change. Like, you know, the ebb and flow of how you decide to use your energy and time is going to be different. For example, we're going to be coming to the end of the World of Warcraft competitive arena season

here pretty soon. And that's going to be a time where I'm like, okay, so I am going to have to start staying up later to get these high-rated games done because that's just when all the best team's cue is at night. So I'm going to have to cut into my sleep a little bit, which might affect my workouts a little bit. And I have to be okay with that in order to accomplish that particular goal, but being mindful of the sleep is huge. Being mindful of the recovery is huge because when people talk to me about over, like they'll talk to me on the gym, they're like, hey, so what are some things I can do to avoid overtraining?

I'm like, uh, what? Overtraining, is that, I think that's, that's called under recovery, my friend. I'd be much more concerned about under training than over training. So I'm, like once again, I'm, I love the gym. When I was training in 2018, I was in the gym twice a day for two hours each session, weightlifting, because I just, I really can't get enough of it. And so for me, over training is not something that I tend to be worried about, but under recovery definitely can add up. Right. And that's, I think, where if you want to train really hard, you've got to make sure you're recovering really well, too.

Exactly. Have you ever gotten injured from overuse or under recovering or just from the volume you've done? I say that I train like a like a like a like a like a like a granny so I don't worry about getting hurt but no I I don't Chen I don't generally train like super power lifter heavy okay I there have been times where I do focus on strength and and when when you are lifting really heavy weight you get little like things you know like I like my elbow hurts or like my lower back hurts but thankfully I I haven't had any sort of like any big issues with with like injuries like definitely nothing major definitely no like a

few injuries. But like, you know, if I do like low bar squats, my elbow hurts or something like that. So I don't do low bar squats anymore. But I think that my focus is definitely on like moderate weight, moderate rep rather than like really heavy. But recently I've been working my way up to like five by fives and stuff. But I think I trained fairly conservatively. So that helps me get the reps in without injury. Do you have a coach or is this all kind of self-taught knowledge and you set your own path?

I don't want people tell me what to do, man. I just do my other thing. I feel like there's so much free information out there that I've just kind of taken that in. And I think that I also really like this being my own journey. I like to sort of check in with my own self and make sure that I'm accountable, really only to myself. I think that there's definitely value in having somebody with expertise helping me along.

And maybe that would make me train harder if somebody is like saying, you need to stick to your RPE, you know, rather than just doing, you know, you need to hit these sets no matter how you're feeling or like, you know, we really could sharpen up that die a little bit, I guess, instead of, you know, doing whatever. But like I said, this is, this is something that I do because I love it. Yeah. And my journey is something that I like to be in charge of. But there's so much information out there. And I feel like what's crazy is that the basics can take you so far. Sure. Like I'm just understanding like how to track your, intake of calories and macros, just making sure that you're doing something better in the gym

every time, you know, like, and making sure that you're getting enough volume. And like those things alone, I feel like can lead to so much progress, but also getting enough sleep. You know, that's one of the things that I've been working on recently is doing that better. But yeah, I feel like for me, it's, there may be value in a coach, but I just, this is, this is my journey. And the reason I compete in bodybuilding is because, so here's, here's the progression is I love the train, so I do it a lot. And if I spend a lot of time training, I may as well try to get better at it, right? And if I'm going to try to get better at it, I may as well put my efforts up against other people's. And that's just part of the fun. That's awesome. And it's really impressive

the success you've had, kind of just figuring it out on your own and grinding through it and get in there. That's great. I don't know. Awesome. Ed. So do you have any, I guess, parting advice for either for gamers out there that are looking to get more fit and starting on their for this journey. Yeah, it really, it's, it's much less important, like, where you start and way more important just that you start at all. I mean, it can, I think that if you're, if you're trying to achieve anything with your physique, like, just don't, just quit wasting your time and just start tracking your intake of calories. That's like, your food is what changes your body. I think that training, I mean, whatever it is that you're into, I think that's a great place to start. A lot of

one of the things I say on stream a ton is is train for your athletic goals and diet for your aesthetic goals. So if you want to, if you really love doing, um, jiu jitsu, right? So you, you want to get, you can definitely build fitness doing jutsu. You can get a lot stronger. Um, just if you want to lose weight, you got to be in a deficit of calories. Get sufficient protein, sufficient fat, and then play with your carbohydrates, depending on how much energy you need. That's like, that's, that's, that's the basics. But yeah, I mean, it's just, you got to get started somewhere. And so for me, like, just like as an easy example of, like, the closest thing that I can get to easing back in the gym is if I got, like, sick or something,

you know, you catch a cold or whatever, you've got to spend a couple weeks out of the gym. For me, a lot of times are like, right now is definitely a weird time because you don't always have access to a gym. But I would always, like, go to the gym and I'd shoot hoops for a while. I'd play basketball first, then I would kind of mess around on the weights a little bit. and as I'd go to the gym more and more and more, it was like, okay, the hunger for the weights is actually kicking in more and more and so it's been less time playing basketball and more time lifting weights.

And then before you know it, I'm just back to hammering the weights and training like I normally would. But the thing is, like it's like building the habit and easing into it is fine. But there is definitely undeniably the element of making a decision with your own self, an honest decision with your own self, to do what needs to be done and not make excuses and not like, you know, say,

I don't have to do it today or whatever. I worked out really hard this week. I can, I can not go on my diet today. It's just, I feel like there's definitely value in some no nonsense, discipline, and dedication and relying on that, relying on that decision that you made, you know, three months ago that you're going to kick butt in the gym and you're going to kick button on your diet every day. And you know when you're thinking clearly, not affected by hunger or fatigue,

what it is that you want to do and who it is that you want to be, that's, that is the thought, that is the mindset that should govern your actions rather than however you're feeling in the moment. So people ask a lot about like, how can I get motivated? Yeah. Or whatever. And it's like motivation is really nice. Like I think good free workout and good music make for like great motivation sometimes, you know, getting in the gym and kicking butt. But there are sometimes they're not feeling it. And that's the time when you can't really rely on that motivation. Like feeling like it is nice, but it's not required right so that's where you default to that discipline that dedication that decision that you made and you know but when when you're ready to start be serious about it start

tracking your intake start getting your exercise in start somewhere but always make the effort of trying to get better yeah I think that's the most important thing is having that discipline and the consistency because these things don't happen overnight and there's going to be days that you have red recoveries and you slept poorly there's going to be days or green and there's days every day in between and you have to keep your eyes on the goal and push through. But at the same time, it's like, you know, if you did ever, if you're in the red that day, you know, be ready for that. Like, hey, you know, I didn't get, didn't get the best recovery last night, but I bet I can still have a good workout today, you know. It's like, exactly. It's a thing to govern, uh,

your mindset towards it and make you aware of how your body is. So you don't overdo it, but it doesn't mean that it's an excuse. Yeah. Try to, you know, if you try to get to bed. Yeah. Tonight, you know, like still kick butt on your day, give it your best effort. If you're a little tired, it's like, yeah, it makes sense. Didn't sleep great last night? Oh, you know, oh, well, get a bit a little bit better tonight. And that's kind of part of the deal is that you're not going to nail it every day. The results aren't necessarily always going to be what you want.

But I feel like the effort is what you have control over, right? So if you put in your effort every day with your diet, with your training, with your recovery, with your work, with your relationships, whatever, put in that effort. And that's going to be the best thing that you can do, you know, and then hopefully things do go well. And I think that if you put it in consistent effort with the objective of getting better every day, then things will tend to get better.

Jackson, where can people find you on the internet and follow along? Yeah, so we are live every day for the gym and then for the weekdays for the games at a twitch.tv-v-B-G-E-E-R-A. That's the live broadcast. And Bej-A-J-H-E-E-R-A, just in case you need to know. And then my YouTube, my Twitter, and my Instagram are all Bejira Wow.

And you guys are definitely welcome to follow along for a combination of games and games. Love to interact on those platforms. Then it would be great to see you there. Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Jackson, for being on the WooP podcast. And we look forward to continuing to support you and watch you in the future. Of course, thanks for having me. Thanks to me ramble alone and share my story with you.

It's a lot of fun. And I'm definitely looking forward to continue to do cool stuff together in the future. Thank you to Jackson for coming on the Wooop podcast. A reminder, you can use the code Will Ahmed, W-I-L-L-A-H-M-E-D, to get 15% off a W-W-P membership. You can also follow us on social at WOOP at Will Ahmed. Stay healthy, stay in the green, keep that respiratory rate flat. Thank you.