 If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go Mind pump with your hosts Salda Stefano Adam Schaefer and Justin Andrews In this episode of mine pump. Oh, I'm excited for this one. We had a good time We got to meet with one of the I don't know. What would you call him like one of the gods? Whoa, well, he's well. He's oh geez that world. He's an og. He's one of the og I watched I watched Jason and I think I've mentioned this on the show before It's why I was so excited to finally get him in here. I watched Jason working out in a Parking lot to a gym doing these made-up cry And I think he talks about the show the CrossFit wads back then and this is like the very beginning of all of it And I remember my buddy telling me watch this kid dude. He's gonna be a bad He must have been like 19 20 years old. Well Jason Khalifa. It was a very successful CrossFit competitor and now has to be one of the more Successful CrossFit box owners although now a lot of his box is no longer CrossFit. He started that way, right? How many gyms is he on like 20 over 20? He's got like 20 locations worldwide worldwide extremely successful He also has a very interesting personal story His young daughter powerful, you know was stricken with a life-threatening disease and is undergoing or undergoing chemotherapy for treatment and He talks a little bit about that. It's pretty touching the guys that he's a really good guy Super genuine dude very very genuine dude very good. Good guy again. He's very influential in the CrossFit world For more information on Jason Khalifa. You can go to his website, which is Jason Khalifa Khalifa spelled K Al IP a Com or you can go to Ava's kitchen dot org AV AS Kitchen dot org and I believe there's I believe there's a way where you can donate money or whatnot to the to some organizations that'll benefit you know research For children his Instagram page is at Jason Khalifa and we do talk a little bit about training. We mostly talk about business We talk about his personal story and if you're coming over and listening to this episode and you've never listened to my and pump before And you're a CrossFit Trainer afterwards we had a nice conversation with Jason and he agreed that our Our prime and prime pro programs will probably benefit Crossfitters the most now these are correctional programs so not workout programs So you can continue to do your CrossFit wad or workout But what these programs do is they come with self-assessment tools to help you correct potential muscle imbalances or recruitment patterns Address it relatively quickly, which is always like something to consider well going into your work It's also very specific to them like right now I know like a lot of times when you do CrossFit wads you kind of do this group mobility warm-up, which is still pretty good It's better than nothing But what this will do will address your specific needs and how you should be warming up before you do individualize your experience a little bit more Right So how you prime your workouts should be very individualized based on your recruitment patterns based on your imbalances your weaknesses your strengths And if you prime properly you just lift better And that's in maps prime, but it also comes with maps prime pro which is purely correctional It focuses on the wrists the neck the the spine it focuses on the shoulders and the shoulder blades the hips The ankles the feet It's a very comprehensive correctional program that athletes get a lot of benefit from so for more information on the maps Prime and prime pro programs or the prime bundle which takes them to puts them together and discounts them Just go to mine pump media Dot-com and without any further ado here. We are talking to Jason Kalipa I'll start with your background man. I didn't know you've been in fitness that long you've been in you've been in this for as long as we have Yeah, so I got let's see I started working at the conventional gym called Malpitas health and fitness. Oh my god I remember that yeah, you know that one I started working there when I was let's see 15 so at 14 I started a community center I used to ride my bike there on the summer and did like a summer job there And then when I was 15 16 I started working at the conventional gym behind the front desk I used to you know, give people towels sell them Gatorade, etc. And So I was throughout high school on the weekends and mainly on the weekends and then once I graduate from high school I was inspired to do more right and I Was kind of a wise ass in high school. I didn't perform as well as I should have I met my my wife when we were 14. We've been together ever since Yeah, and so we have two kids together and so, you know, I met my wife always well I had a bunch of friends I was popular in high school and then a lot of them went off to college And I was planning on going to college and doing different things But then the problem was is I didn't get into any the schools that I was looking to get into I was specifically Santa Queen University right at the street And so when I was working the front desk, I used to see this guy men making tons of money selling gym memberships and I was inspired Um, so when I graduated from high school, I went to west valley And I I the first day of school kind of like woke me up. I was like, you know, no one really cares about me I got to get my shit together, right? And so I really started um working hard I I eventually got into Santa Clara. I graduated from Santa Queen University Same time as my wife same time as my friends, but on the road there when I graduated from high school I started doing sales at the at the gym. And so a typical day would be, you know, go to um west valley in the morning Go to the gym workout And then I would work until late like that that prime time was like from four to seven when you had a lot of walk-ins A lot of leads So I would do a lot of sales then and then um, I'd go home and work on homework and Throughout college, uh, you know, I I started a clothing company that didn't do very well made some investments That didn't do very well But the sales of the gym was was a good thing and allowed me to buy my wife a wedding ring We talk about all the first off men. I think I know him. Did he come from 24? I think he did No, no in no, no, I don't know. Okay. There might be a few We talk about it all the time how if you learn if you want to learn sales skills One of the best place to learn Is in a gym with a lot of volume because the sales cycle so fast That like if you sell cars or houses or something like that like you're gonna be one person a day Maybe or one person every week or but in the gym you sell If especially if it's high volume 5 10 15 people you get a lot of nose you get a lot of objections And you just hone your communication skills very very quickly When did you find out like you liked it and then you were good at it? Uh pretty much right away I mean men really took me under his wing and what I was first inspired by was obviously the commission checks Right, but then when I was inspired by was just the the you know the art of the you know the deal You know, it was like to me That's when really this concept of this, you know the sport of business the sport of sales kind of came in where You have a lead coming and you're looking at him. It's like, all right, you know, it's you versus me You know and now granted that being said You know, I was obviously um, I had my ethical compass, right? Was was I really want to make sure these guys got what they were looking for right? Like it wasn't hard selling but I did the best I could right so as I walked them around I toured them. I would look at all the different, you know nifty things I could to try and uh You know position the gym to be something they wanted to be a part of and I do think at a young age Learning how to talk to people from all different backgrounds all different ages all different ethnic backgrounds Was probably the most rewarding experience of my life because it really taught me how to interact and how to listen to what people wanted Listen to what people wanted and then either we had it or we didn't and most of the time. Hopefully we did um, you know, which also then You know this conversation kind of drove me to find crossfit to find group style community-based fitness because what was happening to me was I was selling a lot of gym memberships making good money and what I found was was just this sense of um Holowness when I would tell someone that they would come in and lose weight and get in better shape But then I would see them a month or two later and they'd be gone They wouldn't the retention was bad and what was happening was you know, again I was I was making good money, but it left me feeling empty You know I'd go home and it and yeah, sure the art of the deal was great and I loved sales But at the same time I wanted to sell something that I really believed in and so when I found crossfit When I found this group style training with a coach in a community It really took it to the next level because I felt like the results were much better because you had someone supporting you You had a group environment that kind of encouraged you to work harder And that's why I chose when I graduated from college to pursue opening up You know community-based functional style gym versus conventional gym, which I had looked at Um on the road, right? I had looked at opening up a regular gym, but we chose to go the other direction Not to mention the difference in cost like a big gym a big box gym is you know, the investment's massive Yeah, it's a million. Yeah. I mean I All money aside, um Because I had the current owner of milpitas fitness And I were going to go in on partners on on a on a conventional gym, right? But I think that Yes money and the the upfront cost and the barrier to entry was huge on a conventional gym And the barrier to entry on a crossfit style gym is very low, which is amazing and and detrimental at the same time Which we could talk about but um, that was another reason for it But the primary reason was I really believed in the product which the passion I have for this group style training I think was a was a big Reason why we've been successful in in growing What where where were you at in your life at the time when I I told you before we got on these mics that we had actually Met and I'd seen you before because we have a mutual friend austin And I watched you compete in the parking lot at milpitas. Yeah, where where are you at in your life? I don't even remember with that. Well, it was a long time ago. I know that Yeah, I mean I was in I was in college for sure And I was probably you know a senior in college Maybe a junior senior probably getting ready to graduate and this is before the games writing this before the games This is before um, I opened up our a gym So what happened is I graduated from college in 2008 and like june july 2008. I graduated from st. Clair Took me a couple of tries, but I finally got in graduated at the same time in my life And uh, when we graduated, um, I didn't quite know what I wanted to do right So I I interviewed for different jobs. It just didn't feel right And and finally I decided to open up a gym. And so I signed a lease And then I ended up winning the crossfit games like all in the same week Oh, oh you couldn't ask for better publicity for a new especially crossfit gym Yeah, so me at the time right winning the games was right here in our backyard, right? It was in the you know, watsonville, you know that area so winning that signing a lease graduating college You know, I had just proposed to my wife. It was a it was a busy time. Wow. Yeah That's not like an orgasm of things. Did you did you had did you succeed right away with your gym? Or was it a struggle starting off? So when we opened the gym, you know, I kind of opened it With a with a foundation of skills that I think really really helped me because I loved I loved crossfit, right? I loved the Group aspect, etc But I also had a set of business skills that I had been developing for the last four years And I learned every day from the owner of the gym, you know Him and I would get on the elliptical at night and I would just learn from him learn learn learn Just listen about Different different ways of different problems that he had and what I did was I took that business knowledge that he shared with me and then I took the passion that I learned from crossfit and austin and others And then I combined them for our business. So I signed a six-month lease On a thousand square foot space 1500 actually and I signed a six months six months lease. I just told myself either a I'm gonna be bankrupt, right and I'm you know gonna Whatever or b I'm gonna be so successful that we need to expand out of here and Obviously option a was not an option, right? And so we we we pushed and and within six months, you know, we had a hundred members doing well in that location That's a lot of people in a thousand square feet. Yeah, and then we ended up expanding and you know, that's kind of next step Next typical entrepreneur jump out the plane and then build your parachute on the way down That's it. No, I mean you got to be all in and for me. It was a good timing You know my my my girlfriend and I at the time or fiancee and I, you know We were fortunate enough to be um living in a situation where my expenses were minimal, right and You know, I had I had great support for my family and just went out there and did it Now they say like true growth really happens when we have our major failures and setbacks and it sounds like you've had a Lot of success out the gates. What are some of the things that that set you back or that you fail that during this whole time I mean, I think with the gym, you know, learning how to manage people learning I mean, I think some of the problems kind of happened later. So, you know, obviously outside the gym life I invest in a different things that I've learned a lot from right I invested in this thing called batter blaster Which was like this pancake him in a can at the time I invest like five grand for a young kid. I lost it. That sucked started a clothing company wasn't qualified to do So lost that that sucked um different stuff like that, but but primarily when we opened the gym We were pretty successful, but it was a lot of work You know, I I ended up falling asleep on the on the floor multiple times You get there early you stay there late and you're just you're on their hustle And what's what was cool about sales and what's cool about business is I totally relate to both Is the work you put in is a direct byproduct of what you get out of it, right? And that's what I think I fell in love with sales the most if you came in if you got on the phone Right back in the day, there was no self, you know, you had the you had the you know phone on the You know every day I go through a list boom. Hey, it's jason cleave. It was you know And you know, um, you were in charge of your own paycheck and the same thing kind of applied with business, right? I was in charge of my success or failure. And so we we generally performed well Um as we grew I started to learn a few things and a couple years ago. We brought on um Not only, you know, you know a best friend from years back But also someone who could come in and help us with the management side What what I learned was I wasn't the best manager I I just kind of figured people just kind of figured out And people want to be having some guidance and direction I wasn't offering that and so that's something we've learned the hard way and a couple other things too, but I think hiring good people has helped us with that now Where did you get this uh this drive? Where did you get this ambition? Is it from your upbringing? How are your parents or how are you raised? So my dad's an engineer works for city sounds a he's awesome Came from Iran with nothing when he was younger. Um, that's that's that's you know, interesting My mom moved here from Rhode Island She works at the Sanctuary University, which is cool. And I think at a young age I started being influenced by certain people, you know, my grandma and grandpa during the revolution in Iran My grandma and grandpa were basically forced out of the country and they came here with nothing And my father was already here like at two years earlier to go to school But they came here with nothing and I remember at an early age Just um showing up at their dry cleaning business and my my grandma and grandpa at the time must have been I don't know. Maybe maybe 70s 60s 70s. I can't remember but I mean, they're they're doing a dry clean business I don't know if you've ever been into a dry cleaning business. I mean, it's not the easiest work, right? It's a nasty chemicals this and that and You know, you've seen that from a young age You kind of put in place like man this this you know, we got a grind and then obviously Once I got a little bit older and I was introduced to man and Joe and the guys at Melpete's on the fitness At the age of you know, 15. That was a very influential time of my life, right? And so that's probably where I learned Hard work, you know, like they never they never tried to they never tried to encourage me to Hack anything ever like it was just hey, look, we're gonna do it one way and one way only You're gonna grab this stack of a hundred contracts. You're gonna call every one of them every single day There's no hack. There's no secret system. Just get on the phone and make some calls reps reps get your reps in That's it, right now at the moment now you have a large Yeah, what 20 locations. Yeah, you were talking about going over to Asia to set yours up or you've got a few over there How are they receiving? Fitness over there receiving the crossfit brand over there or so those locations are not crossfit. They're They're they're group style functional fitness classes with a varying degrees of of Duration and we also have yoga and they receive well. Those are in corporate environments So our business nc fit is separated 50 50 from revenue and potentially even locations between corporate And uh commercial or open to the public explain the difference between the two So, uh open to the public. We have um five locations that we solely own and operate we lease We have some here in the bay area and we have one in cabo mexico We also have two locations inside the bay club which are inside conventional gyms that we Operate right those are our locations at seven and then those are our open to the public locations Our other ones are corporate sites with companies like western digital gopro silver spring networks We manage their fitness inside their companies Um specifically for western digital on a global scale and so that brought me You know years ago to all kinds of countries So we I go on tours all the time to asia where we have locations in thailand, philippine, singapore, malaysia I mean japan it's it's it's pretty amazing. It's awesome That's fucking away. Were you always uh, were you always an athlete or into fitness at this point? Was it just something that was besides working in fitness? Was it a passion of yours to work out as well? Yeah, it was definitely a passion to work out. You know, I played football and I threw the shot in high school um, maybe could have gone on to play football, but uh because of a few reasons we didn't um, I used to race bmx bikes when I was younger And when I got out of high school, I um, I got in a little bit of a little bit of like moi tai I started cutting down weight. I was 260 in high school pretty big Holy cow. So I started cutting cutting cutting and um And then and then I kind of got into like the bodybuilder type thing You know never competed in a bodybuilding competition, but kind of got into the you know like aesthetic looks And then I was introduced to kind of the crossfit style and that's where I really fell in love with it And so I trained that for a while and then obviously I won the games and then competed Did you feel like you took to it right away? Like as soon as you started doing the movements and stuff Yeah, for the most part of me I took to it But it was also just like the I think it was just the grind that I fell in love with you know, one of the things I like about Crossfit in particular is just this concept of amrapsin and Uh, just four time workouts. We were really pushing into the clock and I believe there's a big carryover to kind of that mentality and how you treat your rest of your life, right? I I am I've created this philosophy that I have written down called amrap mentality and um Well, I'll just tell you what it is. So basically, you know years ago So I met my wife when we were 14 We you know, we got married in 2009 like like I was saying we got engaged in 2008 We got married in 2009 a week after the crossfit games In 2009 that was pretty interesting um and So I got married We the gym was growing and we had a a daughter in 2010, right? And so I don't know 2000 you gotta get it right 11. Come on dad You know what's odd about that is I say my daughter's birthday all the time because she's going through chemotherapy treatment and they always ask the birthday 421 11 got it. All right Okay, um, so, you know, uh, I had I we had a daughter Uh married businesses growing we start getting into corporate a little bit and I started asking myself Man, how am I gonna balance being a good father, right? Being a good husband because these are priorities for me in my life But also competing at a high level in professional sport while growing a business I'm like, how the hell are we gonna do this? And you know, it was it kind of like dawn on me one day, you know, I was walking with my kid I was walking with my wife and and daughter. We were going on a walk And I was just distracted thinking about competing walking on my hands thinking about what the competition was going to have And I wasn't paying attention to my wife at all, right? But I was with them but I wasn't really with them and I wasn't present I wasn't focused And it was that day that like my wife's like, hey, you know, what do you think about this? I'm like, what do you think about what and I wasn't paying attention She knew it, right? It was just like a big slap in the face to her, you know, like here I am with her hearing my kid and I'm not paying attention So later on that night and just for the ongoing years I started thinking about things as an amrap and when you're an amrap as many rounds as reps as possible You wouldn't answer your phone, right? You wouldn't stop and talk to someone when you're in it Attending an amrap you're in it, right? That's what you're doing. And that's the way I tried From that day forward, right? I slowly this concept was created But basically I try and treat each facet of my life as an amrap, right? So right now, you know, I was on my phone before we started now You see me turn it over and I'm with you guys like I'm not doing anything else but with you guys, right? Once we're done, I'll go switch gears to something else And so the whole philosophy is based on identify what you want to focus on whether it be family your fitness your business Work hard at it, right? Whatever that is And then switch gears Is that actually in your schedule too? Have you been able to kind of put that together and some kind of rituals like you follow like I'm I'm here And I'm present at this time and then yeah, like it's this like thing by like this morning I took a 5 a.m. Class, right? So I took a class at 5 a.m. That was my workout, right? Maybe I'll do something later. But for now, let's just say that's my workout time during that hour I'm not answering emails. I'm not answering calls. I'm just working out, right after I'm done with that Then I switch gears on to work and I try and segment the day that way And so like after six o'clock or whatever that time that is I go home Once I'm home, I try and be present and focused with the family And so the whole concept is this this evolution. I think about like riding a bike, right? You you have to focus to ride a bike You have to pedal to ride a bike and then based on the terrain or what you're doing you switch gears, right? You're still pedaling. You're still focused. It's not like you just changes Then every now and then the the kind of kicker to this amrat mentality Um, which I've been writing down a lot of thoughts on and hopefully one day We'll see a book come out on it is Is um, the reevaluation and the reevaluation I think is really important, you know, you identify your folks Is today are going to be different than they are five years from now. Maybe you get married. Maybe you have a kid Maybe something dramatic happens, you know, so for me that happened in um, you know In 2015 I I needed to switch gears, you know, I had a I had another I had a son a daughter growing business I couldn't go individual anymore So I switched gears and went team at the crossfit games And then the year after when I was trying to decide if we're going to compete again My daughter got sick and it was a very easy answer just to say, hey We need to switch gears, right or we need to reevaluate and say, hey look Competing is not on my list of priorities. Well, my priorities are this this this And uh, that was the reevaluation. Where does this where does this level of self-awareness come from for you? Are you a big reader? Do you have a mentor? Are you religious? Where does the where does the self-awareness come from? I'd say all the above. I mean, I think I think you know, I try and read I try and read I try and listen to informational podcasts. I try and um Listen to mentors a lot, right? Like I sit down with people all the time and just listen listen listen I want to educate myself as much as I can on different subjects and um Yeah, I mean that's and then and then just being aware, you know, like I just I don't want to look back and be like Man, I was an asshole. I could have been a better father. I could have been this You know, as long as you ask yourself that on a regular basis, you know, like a lot of times I'm on a spin bike in my garage. I just say to myself Am I doing the best I can to be a father? Husband and a business owner and maintain my fitness. Am I doing the best I can? And if I'm not then then just do better tomorrow. Like it's not a big deal You know, that's it's really impressive because when you get to the level that you've reached In like the games and things like that and even your success in business Uh, the ego tends to to take over and the the level awareness that you have to not more imbalanced, right? Extreme of it. I mean you have to know you're kind of rare, right? That that's the most guys that are at your success level both business and in sports like That's something that uh that most people struggle with you ever find yourself battling with that Do you have your moments of where you feel like you want to be cocky or you feel like that or Do you have this humility to you that you've always kind of had? No, I mean no, I'm just no I think I just strive to just do as best I can I think if anything I don't want to be a hypocrite if anything right I don't want to be a guy who says what I just said to you guys and then not be able to deliver it, right? If anything, that's what keeps me up is like, hey, man, am I really doing the best I can Like am I really being president focused when I'm with my family? Am I if not, I need to fix it tomorrow. Those are the lessons I learned from having children I got two kids myself and uh, did you get some of those yourself from them? Oh Like the lessons I learned. Yeah. Oh, yeah Yeah, and then and then with my daughter getting sick. It's it's transformed my mindset a lot Yeah, that happened in 2015 you said or 2016 so six six 16 january January 20th, uh 2016 so, uh, I don't know much about this if you don't mind me asking Questions about you have yes, you had two kids. So it's your daughter's your older oldest child So she's six and a half six and a half. So this happens your business is obviously at that time It's busy growing you got lots of shit going on you're competing like What happens like what goes through your mind at that point? How do you stay? I guess strong or how do you stay? Yeah, I mean the whole the whole thing comes back to one of the reasons why I do Want to put out a book called amaranth mentality is because of the amaranth mentality because of that that clarity I was able to fully shift gears and fully focus on the family and what needed to get done Um, I wrote an email that night at like three in the morning To our to like the head of our stat like our head staff Just like hey, look if it doesn't have to do with getting my daughter. Well, I have zero interest in talking about it Effective immediately this person's in is in charge. Oh, and uh, this might take a month. This might take six months It might take a year I don't want to hear anything about anything unless has to do with education on how I can get my daughter better How long did that last? How long did that? um so Like the like the full like zero zero zero Uh couple weeks, you know, um You know the the person at the time his name is matt who's running the company He's also one of my best friends So it was a little bit different because you would come to see me in the hospital and I would I would you know We would be if it wasn't like a heavy moment like if if things were like kind of calm ish I would just be like hey man, like what's the are we are we good? You'd be like, we're good. I'd be like, all right, cool So that's that's pretty much the extent of it for a while. Wow And then I got back in the swing of things now talking about like the that's a switch gears too fast on you But going into like the crossfit games and stuff like that what what is uh In your opinion the the greatest moment of of crossfit for you. Can you remember what that was? Yeah, I mean, there's been a few right? I mean, obviously, uh, winning the cross the game is a big deal But at the time it didn't really mean as much to me as as um, you know taking second and third So I took second and 13. I took third in 2014, right? Um, those ones went meant more to me, right? Because of the amount of workload you put in behind it, right? So, you know It's like for example if someone came in and gave you a check for a thousand dollars like that'd be great And like you'd love it But if you you know put in a bunch of hard work and I mean maybe money isn't the best example here But if you put in a bunch of hard work and then you saw the the reward for your hard work And you had put in so much time and effort, right? um It's like if someone gave you a phd versus working for 10 years to get it and then you finally get it It means more at the end because you put in all that sacrifice Was it also that the level of competition had gone up dramatically? Yeah, I mean you figure in 2008, you know, we had I don't know 300 competitors in 2014 you have 300,000 big big difference And so, you know for me other animals now man, you watch the competitions now and these are world-class like Ridiculous level athletes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah for sure. And so the last year I competed was in 15, right? And then with ava getting sick. It was an easy transition, but you know a lot of good memories of the games, right? I mean, you know, I specifically remember, you know, I try to incorporate some positive self-talk and and um And I think it was this one event particularly called the burden run and in this burden run you had run A long way then you come in you flip this thing called a pig Down a down a uh football field and it was heavy. It was it was a heavy It was like a big tire flip only it was called a pig And then after that you run with the log on your back for a while And then you get into the stadium and in the stadium you then pull a sled for like, I don't know 150 yards not that far and I just remember thinking to myself the night before we saw the event I was like, man, it would be so cool to go into that stadium being first and knowing that you're going to win, right? And that's exactly what happened. That was a really cool moment for me is that I made it in with such a lead That I pulled the sled halfway. I just stood there for a while and just kind of took it in I knew I was going to win and there was no benefit to to going faster as long as the win is a win Right at that point and so it was events like that and like I also won this half marathon row They were really cool where you know, you're going to win before you win It's kind of cool because most of the time if you win or do well, it happens instantly Whereas these ones you kind of had time to kind of let us sink in for a little bit Now being a smart business individual like you are And owing a lot of your success to your hard work, but then affiliating and working with crossfit Do you have any criticisms of crossfit the organization? I mean, you know just Like you would typically have I mean crossfits had a lot of growth and just like anything with a lot of growth You're going to have a few bad apples in in everything right and that goes from affiliate owners and gyms to you know The company I mean it's just naturally going to happen with the type of growth they have And so I don't think there's anything that stands out that's so odd outside of like business norms I just think with the with the low barrier to entry and the high learning curve You know by design it was going to be You know, there was going to be a time where it's not going to continue to exponentially grow And I think that's what you found now is that it's kind of leveled out if anything has gone back down And the reason for it is you have some owners who got into it who frankly weren't qualified and That's just business. How many do you that are still thriving right now that were started when you started? Is there very many? I mean, it's hard to say. I mean, I There are there are I mean There are a lot of gyms that are that are doing well, but it depends what you mean by thriving, right? There's there's gyms that are still there. Are they thriving? I don't know like Because it depends what you mean by that because to me there's a lot of gyms out there that I would close down Meaning if I was making 40 50 thousand dollars a year, right? And I had all the risk and liability and I had a hundred members in our gym I would probably shut the gym down and go find a job and work somewhere else Because it isn't worth the risk and liability for me, right for for that amount of money, right? And so I think there's a lot of owners that generally make, you know an income of and or I'll rephrase it If you're if you're making an income that allows you to kind of live paycheck to paycheck You're doing okay. You love what you do I think there's a way to love what you do and not take on a lot risk liability That's a better way to yeah You could still be in the fitness and classes and not have to be responsible for everything, right? I mean a lot of a lot of owners, you know, it's challenging because they've signed personally guarantee leases on spaces And you know if they can't pay the bills and if something happens, man, that's tough You know, you can't just bankrupt the company man. You're you're talking about a personal liability you're taking on Well earlier you talked about like the detriments of some of these warehouse gyms are going in that direction Did you want to describe that a little bit? I mean, I just think that's there's there's three threats to that kind of that kind of Philosophy, right one is if you have the same brand throughout multiple locations You're always going to be synced up with that brand, right? So, you know, if it's You know, uh, you have a ruka shirt on right if it's ruka And then something else called ruka sport and ruka this and ruka that they're all They're all connected to each other even if they aren't the same even if they aren't owned and operated by the same people They're connected because there's one, you know characteristic, right? So I think when you have crossfit this cross for this cross for this Everybody looks at it as like they're owned by the same people the the outside eye, right to most people that right So it doesn't know better, right? Yeah to people that know better. It's different, right? But you know, uh And so I think that makes a big difference um When that's a big threat because if you are if you're putting out a better product then, you know, other people with the similar name Might bring down your product. That's a problem, right? And then obviously you have, you know, conventional gyms that are Wising up to this functional fitness concept, right? And I think they're starting to put in turf They're starting to do different types of things because they're recognizing that people want these multi-joint, you know compound movements Um barbell complexes and now the sagittal plane finally Yeah, right and and and I think that makes a that makes a difference, right? Because these are instantly becoming competitors to that to that space And then lastly, obviously you have people at home that could just outfit their gym outfit their garage for, you know, $2,000 Um for with the with the with gear and so if you're not providing a phenomenal product It's gonna be tough for them to justify going to your space and paying that kind of premium It's always about the people That's how fitness works. I mean we experienced that running, you know, big box gyms where You could walk into a gym and if you were a good manager within a week or two You could you could produce numbers at that club and never seen without changing a single piece of equipment And I think a lot of people in fitness forget that they think it's all about the equipment location Those are important, too But I think that's it like oh i'm gonna open the place up and i'm gonna succeed and crossfit had this Explosion of growth and it doesn't it's no it's It reminds me a lot of the other things that we've seen in fitness that have exploded And then you get people who enter it who have no business running a gym We have no sales experience. Well, what are the what even what do the numbers look like j like you? What would you say is uh the low end someone makes having a box the high end and then probably what the Average is and how many people are probably in that range you think So i'll share this information from we've had about maybe 400 of foots come through what we call box of business Which is a seminar on my buddy and I do for not for profit I should clarify that it's for charity for pediatric cancer and so So, uh 400 so out of the 400 right which we do these randomly we don't we don't this is not a business for us It's just we do it for fun Um, I would say on average at the high end at the high end now There's there's anomalies and there's exceptions to this right at the high end You know an owner if it's owner operated right makes a big difference. Yep. If it's owner operated, you know 100 150 of its owner operated right maybe 150 that we've seen right now if it's now if it's is that profit or that's gross That's that's profit. Okay, that's that's there. That's there. That's their take home, right? Yeah 150, right? If it's not owner operated, right those numbers drop down a little bit because you have to pay an operator, right? So maybe you're looking at you know 70 000 for the operator and another you know, maybe 100 they could take home if it's really being ran well The the you know the owner could right and on the low end obviously have zeros right and then and then somewhere in the middle I'd say on average you're somewhere around two to three thousand dollars a month for the take home income for most You know on average for a lot of the owners we've seen right now That's that's just what we've seen now again. There's exceptions to all of these rules, right? There's people that are killing it You know making hundreds of thousands, but there's a lot of people that aren't what do you think now? Do you see anything common happening with the one the anomalies like the guys that are what makes them that good? Yeah, are they reinventing things? Are they maybe getting digital too or they what are they doing other things? Are they just running their box that fucking well? No, I mean, I think they're running their box well They have great coaches right starts the product on the floor. I think they have multiple locations, right? Um, and I think that they uh diversify their offerings a little bit. So they're not just traditional crossfit They have diversification of offerings to things like you know more less complex, right? A little bit lower barrier to entry so instead of doing things like rope climbs and and snatches they have another alternative offering called Whatever fit class that is less complex. What do you think the biggest mistake that the ones that aren't very successful make? What's the most common mistake you see? I think not treating like a business For sure. I think they they open their doors and I think people are just going to walk in. They're not this isn't 2008 or nine when You know that there's a lot of competition out there and you need to make sure that your product on the floor is phenomenal and That your facility is at least clean and uh And I also think like if you want to just offer traditional Crossfit that's perfectly fine. Just be aware that by doing so you're you are going to adhere to a specific demographic And that's fine. It's the same thing like jujitsu. I love jujitsu, right? But I would never open up a jujitsu studio because you're you're you're Your specific one demographic. There's only so many people that want to roll around and that's fine But just be aware of it, right? So how do you diversify? So if you're not just a jujitsu or not just a crossfit, what are the other ways that you you mold your NC fit to be kind of different? Well, I mean, here's a great example think about MMA A lot of these gyms when MMA was getting popular. They popped up, right? I saw it personally You guys probably saw it But what MMA schools realized really early on is not that many people want to get kicked in the face, right? You know, it's true. It's true. That's not even the best size And and so what happens is this is a perfect example for the crossfit space Not everybody wants to snatch and do rope climbs and that's fine Just like not everybody wants to spar, right? It's not a big deal But what do you need to do then is you need to start looking at your business and say, how do I Diversify this without getting outside my core competency, right? So if your core competency hypothetically is fighting, let's just use as an example What could you do? Cardio kickboxing class, right? Still similar You're just breaking it down so that the barrier to entry is lower And that's how a lot of these gyms have been super successful in the MMA world They have cardio kickboxing these cardio classes that make all the money Then they have the athletes that might draw people in or whatever, but it's not the bulk of their money Same thing goes for crossfit gyms. Yeah, the competitors do not pay their bills Yeah, always the case if anything, you know, it goes the other way Give me all the free stuff. Yeah. I think that's why we're seeing the popularity of Other fitness organizations like orange theory kind of following along the footsteps and you know doing us A different version or a more it's easier type of version, right? Like you get your treadmills your rowers And it's not crossfit, but it's similar. Yeah. Well, what happened is you had historically, right? You had 20 for our fitness Low barrier to entry low price point Generally In my opinion a lower lower level of results for the majority of people who participate in it. No, it's high volume high High volume, right Then you had crossfit come in high complexity high price point high coaching Great results if you if you assumed you were ready for that, right? But it's it's non debatable that the results are phenomenal You know, assuming you have the right coaching the right environment everything What happened is it created this huge middle ground where companies like berries Companies like f45 companies like orange theory have really been able to monopolize that middle market where it's not as expensive Hypothetically not as boutique as crossfit not as complex But um more complex than what's your thoughts on that? How do you think it's going to change the landscape of all these clubs and crossfits? You think it's going to force certain crossfits to evolve and adapt Yeah, I think I think certain ones will evolve and adapt and other ones won't and those ones will be fine They're going to have you know, they're 100 150 200 members and they're going to do great and but that but that's what they're going to be Right, they're going to be like the jiu-jitsu studio that go do right 150 200 students. It's all good Then there's going to be others who are going to diverse for their offering and do different types of things And they're going to grow past that amount with the amount of gyms that you have that you keep opening up Have you been faced with uh, the idea of maybe having to close one down? Have you thought like ah, this one's just not pulling its weight and it's more stress for me or do they all kill it? That's a good question No, um, we have not thought about we we've we actually yes, we have shut down a gym I shouldn't say I should say that we had one on sarah took avenue Um, it was an old like racquetball court a giant one near the casino over there. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I know this And we shut it down not because it wasn't profitable But because it didn't represent our brand well So what happened is as we've grown and we've expanded we and we've evolved Some of our locations haven't evolved with them with that right That was the gym that got us to where we were but not where we wanted to go And so we had to go ahead and uh, shut it down because we couldn't get a long-term lease on it And it didn't reflect our brand so we shut it down and we opened up another space somewhere else Oh, we'll talk let's talk about that. What was that like for you? I mean you had probably had to fire someone or tell them sorry no more I mean, I mean some of the friend desks and staff had to leave but I mean what because we had opened up So we shut down one and we we replaced it with basically two more and so no one really lost their job But they were different gyms and a little bit different areas and so But we had to shut it down because we were on a month-to-month lease Can't be on a month-to-month lease and We couldn't make investments in the property because we're on the month-to-month lease I mean, I'm not gonna we're not gonna spend 100 grand to fix the place up if we don't know if we're gonna be there three months from now And so we had an obligation to our staff and our members to shut it down and re-evaluate and some people were pretty upset about it But what's the turnover like is do trainers get turned over like because I know in the big box World, I mean you were typically turn over turn over trainers like crazy. Is it different? What do you um? It's it's it used to be like our coaches were with us forever We have one coach who's currently still with us for after nine years, right? But we're seeing it become more of a As the bay area gets more expensive and things that nature it is becoming more of a part-time Coaching position and they have other things they're doing But our locations each have like a manager and a head coach So they're full time with us benefits all that kind of stuff and then several others will be like part-time And so the turnover is it's not bad, but it can always get better Yeah Now is that something that you have your hands on are you going in and kind of or do you have guys that and girls that are Managing that for you. Are you going in and actually training and developing some of these coaches and having to fire them? Do you have to deal with that very much? No? We have a we have a group people to help with that. I'm pretty I'm pretty non-confrontational You say to like, you know that's that's cool. I don't want to do that. Yeah, you go you got that bro Have you had now? What did you find out you don't like doing that? Have you had a situation where you had to do that? Of course, I mean we've let people go Fuck it. I want to hear one I know there had to have been a heart you had to have had a heart because I remember The first time I had to let go. I was only 20 God I was only 21 years old And at that time like you I I didn't start at front desk But I started it as a trainer and then I got promoted within the same club. So It was like overnight. I was your peer right and then now i'm your boss not to mention Not to mention I'm 21 everybody else is older. I'm the baby 25 30 Yes, and now and then it got to a point where I'm not out partying with you I'm not doing anymore. I'm the boss now We have to run this club and I remember Watching my staff kind of get poisoned and it started with one or two bad apples And I let it fester for like six months before I had this kind of like half my staff were just a pain in the ass And I remember that feeling of having to let let go and I fired fucking five trainers on the same day And I remember how hard that was for me. It was a challenge. Did you do you remember ever? Yeah, I mean, it's still you know, that's not an easy thing to ever let anybody go And I think what I'm learning as as as we evolve as a business is that You know, if you if you keep people on the team, they're not the right people for the team Like the way we like to say it now is like we're a team right we're a team But as a team there's a responsibility to the team to put the best players on it And if you're not the best player on the team if you're not pulling your weight as a teammate We got to let you go and so we look at it as a team not a family in that sense, right? Where family you're gonna love them forever, right? You'll keep them on the team You'll keep them in the family forever, right? But a team right naturally if we all want to be able to pay our children's college funds We all want to grow and develop we need people on the team who are pulling their weight And who really want to grow with the team and and do their job well So we've got to let some people go and and I don't really do any of it, but I mean, obviously I've let people go and it's but most of the time it's more of like a Just an awkward conversation like but but I we always live by the rule. It's very simple rule No one should ever be blindsided when they're let go, right? They should know they should know especially like if I mean they should know you should give them We have an obligation as a business to make sure that we set up, you know Performance improvement plans and things like that so when we do let them go it should never come as a surprise And that's more of an ethical thing and then also from an HR perspective that kind of helps to you gotta be safe Yeah, yeah, first time I fired someone they cried I was 19 years old. Yeah 19 years old guy showed up late two weekends in a row I had to walk in and Had to fire him right there and he had a family and everything and I thought to myself like, you know what? I'm doing you a favor too, dude Yeah, because this you can't you can't you can't support your family if you keep showing up late two hours of work Well, yeah, you're teaching them. It's just work ethic. It's like show up on time You're responsible. Yeah Having this responsibility this many clubs. What are the things what are the things you like the most about it? And what are the things you like the least about it? Uh, the most about is obviously the amount of people we can impact, right? And being inside conventional jams being in asia different places We get to define what fitness is for some of these people like in china Like our location in shenzhen china. They've never heard of functional fitness, right? And they'll be you know, they'll be sitting outside I'll never forget the first class ever taught there We had this new location at western digital and the employees were out front like a lot of them are out there smoking Right just smoky smoky smoky So they come in they take a class and they didn't know what really hit them, right? I kept it pretty casual then after that they they What's happened now is the culture has shifted and now they they don't smoke anymore before class Only after class That's better than nothing. Yeah, right, right. You're stepping in the right direction Right, but we're defining what fitness is for them, right? We're letting them know that hey fitness is functional Let's talk about squats and and presses and lifts versus Um, you know specific machine based, right? So it's cool to see that and it's cool to teach them about workout They could think of that so that's the my favorite thing about the business is kind of the scope We work on and the amount of people we can impact, you know, our business is very simple the way it works You know, I've decided I wanted to pursue what I love for a living and I'm super grateful for everybody That's been a part of it then we want to offer that opportunity as many coaches as we can right or people And then those people then touch our members, right? They impact the members lives and then the members lives then support the greater community by doing philanthropic stuff, right? So we do blood drives. We do large donations We we are really invested in the the bigger picture and so that's my favorite thing about the business, right? Is that negatives? I mean, obviously, you know that the larger the scope the more problems you have I do think that we're we're probably less stressed today than it was a couple years ago because we've we've hired really good people There comes a time in business where you're like in this like influx We're kind of taking on all the you you're as you grow You got to know when to bring on good people because it'll really help your stress and that's We've been fortunate in that sense. Yeah Did you start the philanthropic work after your daughter got sick or was this something you've always So as a company, we've always supported different things We used to support the navy seal foundation do a lot of stuff with them Do like a memorial day events. We've done low-income schools. We've we've done donations for fitness centers at low-income schools I should say but then once Ava got sick. We we really like that's a that's a core value of mine forever We'll 100 always continue to support like an annual blood drive That's that's that's really large and we do it nationwide at different crossfit gyms And then we do different philanthropic events throughout the duration of a year to raise money For a group called nigo or jesse reese foundation so we can give families You know like a mini make a wishes is what we do I I want to ask you about and this might be kind of hard But I'm so much challenging a little bit is if we're looking at all the crossfit athletes out there that you know Who is who's your favorite athlete beside yourself? Obviously, right? Who's your favorite athlete and why and then who's your least favorite athlete and why? That's a good question. I mean favorite I mean a lot of these guys I've known for a long time. I think um, that's why I think you're a great person Asked because I think you've been around a long time You know a lot of guys and I know and I know guys that aren't all the best of guys that are involved And I know there's a lot of really great guys, so I'm fishing on you right now I mean, I mean I'll use ben smith as an example only because he doesn't get much Press because he's more of a low-key kind of guy. The guy's been to the games nine times He's been in the top five A ton of times been on a podium a ton of times. I mean he's legit as you get And he's just a really good humble dude. So ben smith is one of my favorites. I mean, obviously I have others that that are I like a lot And uh, you know matt frazier is obviously doing amazing things recently. I'm actually going to see him in rich next week So that'd be pretty cool You know someone I don't like When I when I so I got out of the sport in 2015 And the sport naturally kind of like uh, like sifted through the crappy guys Um back then no one got into it for the money or the fame Now it might be a little bit different like two years makes a big difference when I got into it I won the games. I won 1800 bucks My first sponsorship was a thousand dollars right now the game has changed a lot and sponsorships are massive And the money you win is big. What is it now? What's the money now that you can win? I mean three, you know 250 300 from the what a huge difference, but 100 to 300,000 Yeah, when I took I didn't know that when I took second and third I made I think I made I don't know 100 grand when I took third That's great. It's crazy. I think you won it and you got 1800 bucks Yeah, wow and so um The sport's changing. So what happens is you have people who come in sometimes for inspired by Uh, you know, um money and fame Oh, what can now do you feel like you can see that? Can you guys sense that? What's the difference between them and the guys that are motivated differently? Well, the guys who are who back in the day they start off as coaches, right? And so it's happening is a lot of these athletes They don't coach people and so it's it's a different dynamic where the guys in the beginning got into it Had alternative sources of income because they didn't have any money They couldn't make it through just the sport and they were coaches and they had a community around them to kind of rally them Now it's like these guys are being treated as you know professional athletes in a different in a different light Now not all people are going out there for The money to win they want to just compete, right? But it just changes the landscape a little bit and I can't really speak to anybody being a jerk I know you're so dodged around How about brandy we can talk about brandy I I see like parallels between like the mma with like tap out and how that Sort of lost favor in that community. Is there any sort of? Brands or things that have gone through CrossFit that have lost favor. I mean life as our x used to be one I don't I don't know where that one is. There's a few other brands, right? I mean That that kind of came in but they might have shipped they do a different industry. I don't know I don't keep up with all of them. Okay I'm always just curious because the culture is always changing so much. Yes. Yeah What brands and companies do excite you that are involved in CrossFit right now? I mean rogue obviously puts out great equipment, right? Reebok is is a synonymous brand with with with CrossFit I mean, I think they have they have competitors in the space now But Reebok's in a good job kind of solidifying themselves as the Reebok CrossFit games Um, you know, I think uh progenics is a supplement company. I didn't do a good job I think that let's see what other you know rpm the jump rope company I think they put out a phenomenal jump rope other brands in the space that kind of are exciting You know, there's so many right there's so so many You got from from from 511 to You know a lot of people have came in and a lot of these sponsors So they're going to find out that it's not as easy to You know the the CrossFit consumer is a smart consumer And it's also being very saturated in the marketplace. There's a lot of t-shirt companies And I think they're going to find very quickly that it's challenging Do you not affiliate yourself with any of these companies right now? Or are you affiliated with a lot of these? So I'm technically so I have sponsorship agreements with um rogue Reebok progenics and Actually all the ones I mentioned, right? Um, but other brands I like other brands like 511 and Pretty much there's there's other ones out there that I'll stop by their booth and say what's up But um, I'm not sponsored or anything like that where do you see The future of CrossFit growth because it seems like it it kind of plateaued a little bit, right? Like you're getting a lot of the the cream rising the top and yep the battle is dropping off Where do you see them going from there? You like the affiliates, you mean? Yeah, or just the business of it. Yeah, I mean, I think the business of it It's gonna I think you're gonna still have people are gonna affiliate I think that uh because I want to use the name and I think internationally it's gonna grow I think internationally. I think that's where the big market is now Yeah, I think domestically it's probably hit its peak and there's saturation I think domestically it's it's gonna continue to grow in china and different areas brazil Australia You know what I wanted to ask you talking about we were just talking about row take you back there again They uh, they just recently released a a fire pit. What the fuck is that all about? Oh, they do partnerships with different people like why what is though? I mean, I I don't know. I mean they I know that so there's nothing about the culture of CrossFit No, I mean, I know bill and katie. They like the they like barbecuing and different different things They probably decided to make one I don't I don't have Yeah, we saw that too long ago. We also make furniture right so our entire office What I did that know that our entire office like ergonomical or what you can do box jumps on it. It's all rogue supply code So it's all rogue all of our furniture all of our stand-up desks all of them are rogue supply code and they're awesome Oh, that's wow. That's pretty fascinating. I didn't know that. Yeah, it's kind of that rustic look How long ago did they move into that space? Are they like probably a year ago? Oh, wow Let's look let's look them up. We need some furniture. Yeah, no, they're definitely making moves for sure You were talking about out there how you wanted to enter into the digital world more of fitness What is that looking like for you? What do you think about doing? I mean, I think the the digital world is just a space that I think anybody with any type of social platform Should should look into right and I think we're in a unique position because we've proven certain things in the brick and mortar And now we can take some of those proven concepts that we use at our gym And try and share with other people, you know, for example, we have three Offerings right we have a 30 minute offering a 45 minute offering and a 60 minute offering Crossfit at our gyms and we found success with those and I'd like to be able to share that with other gym owners I like to share with other people and so we're looking at ways to do that Now the biggest thing we're going to use media for is is sharing with our current coaches Right is how do we put the best product on the floor globally? One of the easiest ways is to produce content Share that with our coaches so that they have a better idea of what we're looking for for their the way they execute their class that's a great point because like how do you keep uniformity or you know Because you've got a lot of locations like how do you keep them so that people know they're going to one of your places And not just another another box when we have session plans and programming that are distributed globally Right and they're held accountable for those right? This is a program This is the way we want you to brief it this way we want you to warm up, right? We give the warm up time But I think adding videos that we'll just take it to the next step And then obviously we have coaching development, right? So we travel out to these different places We we perform coaching development. We assess and then obviously domestically we could do that really easily because we have a lot of locations around here What do you think has been the the best business advice that you've ever received from somebody? Best business advice. I mean, I think there's a few things I was actually just with someone this morning who was telling me, you know, it's you got to say no to a Lot more things, right? You just tell me you got to learn to say no and I think I think identifying where you want to focus and pursuing that And then anything else that's not involved in that just avoid it You know as a gym we started incorporating spin and Pilates just to see it check it out, right? And I think what we recognized early on is that we're a functional fitness company on a commercial side Now for corporate we also incorporate yoga, but we're a functional fitness company We're not a we're not a spin company. We're not a Pilates company. We don't do Zumba That's fine and well, but that's not our thing So we need to say no to those opportunities and just pursue what we're good at and we're experts at And I think that's something that's big and then also just looking at business like a sport You know mark human as his book called the sport of business and I think it's a phenomenal Example of how to look at things, you know, I think as we get older We can continue to compete on a regular basis and one way to compete isn't the sport of business You never know who's coming at you when they're coming at you keep showing your toes And so I think that's good business advice is to Look at it like that. That's funny that books in my queue right now. I just bought it like maybe a week or two ago Super short. Yeah, it's a short. I saw it's a really short read, but I've heard it got great reviews I heard great things about it in regards to what you just talked about Jack Welch is winning and crucial conversations are great for the Saying no and those hard conversations like those are great reads for that outside of fitness So what are your interests? Um, obviously my family, right? That's Fine, that's that's top of list. Um, I like to roll jiu-jitsu. I mean, I guess that's part of fitness I like to mountain bike that's part of fitness, too Um, basically you spend time on family traveling eating good food That's that's pretty much what we're into. I mean, that's that's what we do Do you ever have moments because you do so much fitness stuff and that is a passion here Do you ever have moments where you feel like it, uh, kind of consumes you and you need to detach and you just need to Get away. Do you ever get that feeling? I mean, it used to be sometimes like that with uh, you know I'm being the gyms all the time. I was competing. I was spending three hours a day training four hours a day Whatever sometimes that's where I needed to kind of like take a break But now I use fitness as my outlet like there's nothing else I'd rather do like this morning yesterday morning every morning I'm up early. I'm in the garage or I'm out of gym and I'm working out That's just the way my day goes and it's a way that I I set my mindset I set my mentality and it just makes me feel good. So I don't use fitness as a has a fitness tool I use fitness as a mindset developer Relaxation tool and then obviously fitness a byproduct and looking fit as a byproduct It is I that's how I've used fitness for years and it's ironically keeps you more consistent Because as your life changes your fitness can change along with it. So stress A lot of people stop working out when shit goes, you know wrong in life. Oh, yeah, and I Turn to fitness when shit goes wrong because it's my my solace Yeah, I mean, you know, I uh, I had our crew bring You know gear in the back of the truck and I kept at the hospital for a month Just I would just go out there pull out a barbell pull out some plates Do box jumps onto the tailgate whatever because that for me Is was a good outlet, right? So I would leave the hospital room go work out come back I'd be energized fired up and then that energy and that fire up Was kind of like You know share with the group inside the hospital bed, right? Like it was, you know, they saw my energy And I think it just bled over and then it made me feel better, right less stress How did the how did that experience change you going through that? No, man. I mean, yeah, we're just totally different people. Yeah, I mean like how You know, it's funny on on social media I put up the night that my daughter was diagnosed just that I really wanted prayers and positive vibes I've never asked anybody for anything on social media and I just needed it now, right? But what I said on there was like life changed, right? I think at the time I wrote it I didn't really know what I meant But I figured it would change my life and it has right to me a little more compassionate. It's made me more You know just even more Caring to my children obviously and then and then even more in love with my wife I mean we met at 14 and you never know how a situation like this is going to change her and Dude, she's just an all-star. I mean, she's a badass and and she's the best and so for that I mean eternally grateful and just learning about family and close friends and how when things are are really wrong You know, those are the people you could depend on and everything else is just noise And I think so it's taught me a few things, you know, mainly That family and friends should be held like gold because you know every morning I'll never forget this, you know, we're in the hospital. We've probably been the hospital a total of like two and a half months, right? Ish give or take But for one We were in there for like a month straight And I'll never forget like every day I would just wake up my father-in-law would just be sitting in the waiting room It's like a six in the morning. I just be like the hell you doing here, man. You'd be like Where else am I supposed to be? I was like Got it. You know, like that's that's it. It's just like where else am I gonna be when my you know My granddaughter is in the hospital and so I think for to see that kind of dedication that I've also with my family They took our son they did so much stuff just changed the way I looked at family dynamics And then I also think just it taught me to be more at ease through life situations, you know I'll be driving and I just saw this earlier today like someone's just laying on their horn into someone, right? Just being a dick Just like bro, just be easy like relax a little bit man. Like it's all good Life could be a lot worse. Yeah, like dude. Have you ever been like in the ICU with cancer patients? Like once you have they'll just change your old perspective because there's families and they're just broken You know, I've witnessed personally four families now our three families get get told their kids had were diagnosed Like almost right in front of my eyes, right and the look on their face and the grayness I assume I looked at the same right just boom tears boom And she's like that moment right there We should be grateful for anything else but that, you know, I mean and I think a lot of times We don't count our blessings. We always count how negative people are like we're just we automatically gravitate towards the negative I mean look at the news, right? The news is nothing but negative negative negative because people gravitate towards that And I think we need to as a society gravitate towards what's positive in life So make us a lot more friendly, you know, a lot more happy, you know, and I think going through this situation has really helped me um To always reflect and that's you know, that's one of the reasons why you know, I got a gold go gold bracelet on I I consistently um Make a commitment to do certain things to that once this whole period of our life is over I don't ever want to forget. I don't I want to be constantly reminded Because it'll be a constant reminder of the blessings that we've been Received through this experience and how grateful we are that our daughter will be fine and How there is a family every day that's getting the same news we got and we should be grateful that we're good, you know And I think that's that's how it's changed me. What's uh explain the go gold. I'm not familiar with it So pediatric cancer the color for it is gold Okay, most people wouldn't know about it because I mean they know about pink because of breast cancer But pediatric cancer is one of those things where it's a little bit uh, no one really wants to know it exists until you're in it, you know Um, it's kind of a polarizing very aggressive type thing And I think we need to normalize it a little bit, right? Just let people know that there are success stories There's a lot of bad stories too But you know, we're an example of my daughter's doing treatment in six months and After that we'll we'll have some things we gotta do but she'll be fine And uh, I think just normally, you know, let any people know that, you know September's pediatric cancer awareness month gold's the ribbon color just stuff like that just being aware of it Are you um, do you and the family uh eat differently now because of what she's gone through? Do you guys have a different diet because of that at all or my my wife does something called avas kitchen Which is the annual, um donation, uh annual charity event that she has with michael mina who's a who's a chef Which we're super grateful for she has something on instagram called avas kitchen super cool They put out recipes every night that she cooks for the family. Um, I don't think our food is necessarily change change Um, I think we're more aware of what we're eating, but I think we always have been so You know, we've we've been told different things about keto diet this diet that diet for for to benefit the cancer cells But for us, we have a proven they gave us a road map when we first started this whole thing We were sticking to the road map and that road map two or three years from now might be totally obsolete based on new Science, but that's we had at our hands when she was diagnosed and that's what we're going to go with Yeah, I had a close family member who was diagnosed years ago and when you're in that situation it's uh It's hard to explain to other people because you you go you try and do your research You go online because you just want answers and there's a million and one Different things that you're going to read and all these people want to sell you something And you're in such a vulnerable position Um, so it's a it's a difficult difficult. What what type of if you don't mind me asking what type of cancer? So she has a leukemia called al l so Um al l is a type of leukemia. We're super grateful. It's it's it's a treatable Yeah, it's a two and a half year treatment process And uh for boys a little longer because it comes back in the testicle. Um, but two and a half years We're you know, she got diagnosed january 20th 2016. Here we are almost january 20th Or you know leading up, you know, we're in november now or whatever and so she she's she's reaching uh reaching the end of the cycle How is she done throughout the whole thing? Good. Yeah, good. I mean Yeah, I mean honestly like what am I supposed to say? I mean, I I can't complain, you know, again It's just all perspective on it. You know one person's Tragedy maybe you know for us it's just you know, it's you can learn a lot from children Oh, yeah strength. Oh, yeah, and when you see other families going through certain things, you know, it makes me feel Um, it makes me feel bad that I even can sit here and complain which why I don't complain Right, I can't complain about it because I've seen so much worse We're super grateful and she's done really well. Have we had really bad moments? Yes We've had really really bad moments, but um, I'll give up all those bad moments for a good outcome Compared to other people who might not be the way around right, right? Do you have a um like an ongoing foundation or anything like that where people can donate to or So we're really careful about you know, people donating to anything that we have control over Because I never wanted anybody to think that they gave any money to me personally, right? We've never taken a dime from anybody for anything because Frankly, we don't need it and that's not that's not right, right? So instead we donate to this company called Jesse Reese Foundation Um, which is really easy because it's like kind of like a they allow us to manage this account But we don't touch the money, right? We kind of let them know where we want to spend it at and what we want to do But they um, but they ultimately have the money. Yeah I've seen you. I've seen you at the stanford. Uh, I saw you had a a booth out there for that foundation. That was the um God, what's it called? It's the children the children's hospital out Palo Alto at yeah, Lucille Packard. Yeah, Lucille Packard So I've seen you out there. So we offered yoga at Lucille Packard for a long time We're gonna start it back up when they move over, right? One of the things that we recognize being impatient is that people need fitness to to stay active to keep in mind Exactly same thing. I saw when I went through the process exact same thing Yeah, uh, you see a lot you see the the people getting treatment or whatever and it's like and the family members around them They would benefit so much from yes, we started providing yoga there 100 complementary, right? That's awesome We we we removed it last like two weeks ago because we're gonna re introduce it into the new hospital They just opened up a new hospital But I mean that's that these are things that we could do, you know, and these are things that we will Um, continuously be uh passionate about right and that's the bigger picture about business You know, like I've never been more motivated to grow our business ever because I want to go out there and build a great business to help people do what they love for living Hopefully and then to provide opportunities for other people to to help them out, you know I definitely the reason why I was asking was because I mean I would I would love to To partner up or help uh in any way that we can help I know that you know our expertise is on the digital side and the podcasting and youtubing and things like that So the next time you have a big fundraiser or an event or anything like that going on I would love to have you back on and then do whatever we can to help support Yeah, I mean I would just say people just go donate blood right contact their local blood bank Sign up for be the match which is bone marrow transplant You know, that's those are easy things to do. They don't cost any money and You know, you never know when you need blood I don't care how much money you have if you need blood The only way you're gonna get it is if someone had offered it up before right and so I think being able to donate is really important. My wife and I'll be donating for the rest of our life My daughter, you know, we need to give back for the blood that she's used, right? That's kind of like my fault. That's the way I think about it in my head whether it's right or wrong Well, god speed my friend. Excellent having you on brother. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, you're a great guy Yeah, good conversation Thanks for coming on the show. Yeah, we'll definitely do this again for sure. Absolutely Check it out. Go to youtube mind pump tv subscribe to our channel We post 365 videos a year Maybe one extra one. We'll see what happens. Also, if you go to mind pump media.com We have 30 days of coaching. It's available for free. Thank you for listening to mind pump If your goal is to build and shape your body dramatically improve your health and energy and maximize your overall performance Check out our discounted rgb super bundle at mind pump media.com The rgb super bundle includes maps anabolic, maps performance and maps aesthetic nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by sal adam and justin to systematically Transform the way your body looks feels and performs with detailed workout blueprints and over 200 videos The rgb super bundle is like having sal adam and justin as your own personal trainers But at a fraction of the price The rgb super bundle has a full 30 day money back guarantee And you can get it now plus other valuable free resources at mind pump media.com If you enjoy this show, please share the love by leaving us a five star rating and review on itunes And by introducing mind pump to your friends and family We thank you for your support and until next time. This is mind pump