Behind the Rebellion: Harrison

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to another episode of Real Talk with Rebel. Back here with another banger of season two. I've got a great interview with one of my trainers, a good friend of mine, Harrison. How are you doing today, my man?

SPEAKER_01 0:11

I'm doing awesome. It's just another day to be alive.

SPEAKER_00 0:14

Just another day to be alive. Harrison's one of the most positive Zen guys I know, so I would have expected no other response from my man over here. But just you're a trainer at my gym, Harrison. I kind of know where you started out with Title and Rebel, but what's the origin story of your relationship with fitness, my man?

SPEAKER_01 0:34

It mostly started my senior year of high school. I'm not sure. I think it was just like the comparison of the people around me that kind of got me into it. Like my friends were working out at the time. And I just always had this underlying feeling of I could be doing more. And this relationship with myself that I wasn't doing as much as I could have been doing. And that would eat me up every single day. And it got to a point where I was just tired of it. And I just kind of like snapped. And I was just like, I can't feel like this anymore. And I just had to find something. And it started with I remember the summer after I graduated high school. I didn't really have like a like a home at the time because like I my parents were divorced. My dad sold our house and moved in with his soon-to-be um wife. And then um my mom lived in Mordala at the time. So I was just kind of floating around from family member to family member, and playing at fitness had this thing going on where if you're within a certain age, you can use the gym for free for the summer. And so I really took advantage of that. No doubt. Is how it started. And then, but even like I was I wasn't very knowledgeable about fitness then. I was just kind of going through the motions and just trying to figure out, you know, a lot of it was just watching other people in the gym, just trying to figure out what they are doing, how can I do that? How can I get better at that, you know, just and learning about new exercises that I haven't seen before through what other people around me were doing.

unknown 2:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:22

So it you would say it almost kind of started as like an escape or like a safety net situation, like you just needed something to turn to and fitness ended up being that thing?

SPEAKER_01 2:34

Yeah, like it didn't it probably didn't start as the most positive relationship. I felt like I don't know. It definitely seemed like I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 2:45

It was hard to fully understand what it was, but it definitely was it like do you feel like it was a a prove it to yourself situation? Definitely.

SPEAKER_01 2:58

I had to I had to prove something to myself that I wasn't this, you know, POS that I was believing I was at the time, you know. Amen.

SPEAKER_00 3:07

That's real. I think that's that's kind of a coming-of-age thing for a lot of young men, I feel like. You know, whether you figure out that fitness is your thing, you really find the field you want to go into, you find a hobby or a passion. But like there, there's something that kind of ticks in you when you're, you know, somewhere between 18 and 25, and you realize that your value as a man is dictated one on the value the world puts on you, but two on the value that you find in yourself. So I think that's a really big deal to find that inner value because that's what a lot of men struggle with.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

Yeah. And then about like a year of like kind of being like on and off with the gym, not nearly as consistent as I am now, you know, maybe three or four times a week. Like I I worked late nights, so I would go to the gym after work around like 11 or 12 o'clock at night and get my workout in. And so like I probably wasn't getting the best workouts in because I'm a now I've learned about myself. I'm an early bird. Like I I've no always known that, but I get a lot better of a workout in the morning. But um to kind of finish what I was saying, I was never super consistent until maybe around, maybe around like late 2020 or maybe early 2021 is kind of where like I started like to, it was really around the time I dropped out of college. Cause I was going to college at PicMew College for a degree civil engineering that I was just not interested in. I just kind of was like, okay, I could do that. You know, I I could, I could probably do that. Like, I I'm somewhat good at math. Do I love it? No. Does it pay well? Yes. So I was like, okay, let's try it. My both parents kind of in each year just kind of like, oh, just gotta do something, just do something, just do something. And, you know, and then I just kind of when COVID hit, everything went online, and that was the final straw for me. And so I was just put all of my attention into myself. I dropped out of college and said, okay, I gotta figure out me. I gotta just put as much time in my day as I can into me. And that's when I really started noticing the most changes in my mental and physical health.

SPEAKER_02 5:17

Hell yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:17

And then, you know, fast forward, you know, like three months of consistency. Like at first, when I started strength training, I did not enjoy it. I I I would bench press like every day, like that was the only exercise I enjoyed. Like, you know, I would I remember uh me and my I had two friends that I started working out with, and we would do like 10 sets of 10 on bench press, and then we would just rotate. We would just have the like the same weight up there, like like I don't know, however much weight. Everybody's gonna be able to do that. And then we would just do process of tents, and I was like, okay, sure, let's do it. But um, but yeah, after three months of like really showing up five, six days of strength training a week, that's when like I started was feeling better regularly on a daily basis, just doing something for myself. But then what really clicked was when I saw the progress. And it was like this feeling of I can actually do this. That like feeling like I I don't know, feeling like I'm not a loser, that I can actually get better at something. That's what really was the game changers accomplishing the feeling of I can get better at this. Because like I was never really good at sports growing up. Like I played a bunch of sports, but I was never the best. Um, I just wasn't in good shape cardiovascularly. And that was like the first time that I felt like, oh, I can get good at something. And that became strength training. And and then that same fall, that same year, I came across Tidal, which is now Rebel. And I it's funny, like uh I didn't even think about going there on my own. Like my friend who who used to work at Food Line right next door, he was like, You should, you know, he like he would like see my stories, like see that, you know, I've been really consistent in the gym. He was like, You should check out this boxing place right next to my work. And I was like, boxing, you know, I mean, there's this there's this bag in the gym and going to that. I just hit every time I walked past it. And it was like, you know what, why not? Why not just try it? And then another thing that got me in there was I remember hearing and seeing whiz Khalifa kickboxing. And I don't know why Wiz Khalifa kickboxing was just like, oh, that's so cool. Like badass. He's a rapper and he's Muay Thai. And he's learning Muay Thai. And I was like, huh, what if I'm more than just I can be more than what I am now? And so I started opening myself up to the possibility that I'm capable of more than I might think I am. And so I walked in. Well, I signed up online, first read class, and I walked in, and it was just, it was like me, Roberto, and maybe like one or two other people. And I never felt like more like I belonged ever before in my life. It was just everything just clicked instantly, the intensity of the warm-up, from to not knowing a clue of what to do on the heavy bag, but just feeling the intensity and the hype that Roberto gives off. And then just the whole experience just made me feel like I gotta do that again. Like I gotta do that again. And and for a while I was kickboxing like six days a week. That's all I loved it so much, and I still love it so much. And but that was really like probably the biggest turn in my fitness journey was coming across Rebel because it helped me find out that I can really enjoy my own fitness journey and have fun with it. Yeah. That it doesn't have to be all so serious, it doesn't have to be this is the right thing to do, this is the wrong thing to do, but it's all just a figuring out process of what works for you, what makes you happy with your with the time that you're putting into it.

SPEAKER_00 9:08

Yeah. And where do you think the transition kind of started to happen in how you looked at yourself and how you looked at fitness? Because you said it started as, you know, probably not the most healthy relationship. You noticed when you started feeling better, you noticed when you were looking better, but where did it kind of start to be, you know, how good can I be versus I need to not be like you were saying, this POS? Like I need to be more, I need to be more. When did it turn into how much can I be?

SPEAKER_01 9:42

I'm not sure because it it's definitely gone back and forth. Yeah, like I've gone through ups and downs for sure because uh I I want to say it was positive at some point, and then I mean, uh like it started with me like looking at myself in the mirror, being like, you know, first it would be like I would just try to convince myself that I'm a better person than I thought it was, you know, like found information in the mirror, like I am a better version of myself, repeating that in my head until I believed it. And but to answer your question, I'm not entirely sure. It was kind of like it was never like straightforward, like a clear understanding.

SPEAKER_00 10:17

There's always gonna be up and down. I just didn't know if there was a a point where that, I guess, you know, that aspect of it kind of entered the chat. You know what I'm saying? Like instead of it always just being like, I need to be better, I need to be better, like what was that first point of well, how much can I be? You know, because there's there's always gonna be the up and down. Sometimes, like we talk about negativity can be a really good short time motivator, right? But if it's just I hate this body, I need it to be better, that motivation only lasts so long, yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 10:50

I think what helped me figure that out was reading. I started reading different authors that were focused on like different, like Robert Reed, for example, like very psychological oriented, and then he has a lot of history in his books that I enjoy. But also read uh one of David's Gog David Gaga's books, Can't Hurt Me, and uh Never Finished. Um, and that had a really big impact on my mental health. I changed the way I looked at my own fitness journey, but also just the way I I thought about myself on a daily basis. And I'll never this one really interesting thing that really resonated with me is he he describes this story of, okay, whether you believe whether you believe in God or not, when you die, you're sitting in front of God. And he pulls out this poster board of, okay, this is everything you did. You know, you for me, it would have been like you worked at Texas Roadhouse, you know, you graduated high school, you know, you went to college for let's saying like I, if I had never dropped out of college, you know, you know, we went to college for a degree you didn't want, and then pulls out another sheet of paper, this is what you could have been. And then so basically just showing the describing the idea of what more are you leaving on the table that you don't realize you are? And that really resonated in me because I felt like my whole life I felt like I've capable, I've been capable of so much, but I was doing so little. So it wasn't until I finally started trying to do more, regardless, regardless of how often I failed, which was often. And that's when I really started feeling like like I was like a badass, like I could do something with my life. When I just started trying different things, one of those being kickboxing. So it was the act of pushing myself towards what I was afraid of that made the biggest differences in my life. And that being, you know, that fear of being like fear of failure really is the biggest one. I just always felt like I had to get everything right growing up, you know. Didn't want to ever mess up, wanted to be the the straight A student, never wanted to, you know, get suspended or get in trouble or anything like that. So I always felt like I had to get it right the first time. And then if I didn't, then I'm a complete failure. There's no doing it again. You failed. So it took a while for me to realize that if you just keep doing it, if you do it again, you do it again, you do it again, you fail again and fail again and fail again, eventually you're gonna win. Because you're gonna learn every way not to fail if you try enough times.

SPEAKER_00 13:39

That's real.

SPEAKER_01 13:40

And then one more quote, and then I'll take it back to you. But one quote that I also read, I actually heard this on a podcast, it was by Kevin Hart, and the only way you ever really fail is by not trying. That really hit me.

SPEAKER_02 13:58

Heck yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:00

So do you feel like that that philosophy really started in the gym and then translated into other parts of your life, or you just kind of adopted that as a life philosophy straight up?

SPEAKER_01 14:16

I want to say, I want to say a life philosophy, but it definitely started in the gym. It kind of just slowly trickled into everything else because you know the gym is what toss me, taught me how to do things I didn't really want to do. Like for like washing dishes, for example. I can procrastinate some dishes or laundry or anything like that. Folding my clothes, making my bed, anything like that. Never would want to do it. I mean, still don't want to do it, but the gym taught me is that you can do things now that you don't want to do that compound over time, that give you benefits that you can't get in a one and done and a quick and easy fix and just uh, you know, six-minute ads that you know, you can't just do it and expect to get everything you want out of immediately. But if you can do the thing without get immediately getting some kind of result, and then you can keep doing the thing, then you're gonna get dividends and dividends and dividends, returns on interest, returns on interest over time, the more you stay consistent. But the hardest part is just going those first few, you know, however many steps without seeing results. And that definitely translated in the rest of my life.

SPEAKER_00 15:40

There you go. And you talk a lot about being like super consistent, right, in the amount of discipline that goes into that and how that trickles out. So as somebody who really emphasizes and values discipline in their life, do you have any kind of like strategies to separate discipline and disorder?

SPEAKER_01 16:04

So it's kind of like the way you're thinking about it. Like uh focus on rewards rather than you know, I did this, so now I have to I have to go do this because you know I ate a whole pizza, so now I have to go run seven miles. Cause like that's so that I was kind of thinking of like something like that when you asked if it was like a a a switch from like a positive to a negative. Because it was it was definitely back and forth because it went to a point where I was, okay, so I I really want to eat a pizza tonight, or I I really want ice cream tonight, and then I ate however much I want, and then okay, guesstimate however many calories that was. Okay, that's how many calories I gotta burn tomorrow. And then if I don't burn that amount of calories, then I feel like I failed because I you know enjoyed a pleasurable experience, which everybody should be able to do. And then I immediately feel like, okay, if I don't go do this, I'm a failure, I've let myself down, versus okay, if I can get myself to go for the seven-mile run, I'm gonna have that pizza tonight. Because I worked for it, I earned it. And so, because I love food. I I've always loved food. I love Italian food, I love ice cream. That's why I need pizza and ice cream. I love them. So a part of what one thing that was really took a while for me to figure out is how can I enjoy the foods that I like to eat in a sustainable way. So how could I, so I took a did a lot of playing around with my diet to try to figure out, okay, how can I, how can I, you know, cut here and add here, and how can I move more here so I could do this? And then it was just trying to a long process of figuring out, okay, I have a calorie budget. If I burn this amount of calories and then it takes this amount of calories to get the amount of protein I need, then I have X amount of calories left over to hit my maintenance calories. So if I do a little bit more cardio in my day, then I have a higher calorie budget that day. So then I might have room for that extra dessert or that, you know, slice of pizza or whatever it is. So just kind of transitioning from okay, let's not punish myself with the workout from what I did yesterday, let's reward myself because of the workout I'm doing gonna do today.

SPEAKER_00 18:37

So, with that mindset, if it was a rest day and you got invited out to a party, would you not indulge? I would indulge.

SPEAKER_01 18:47

You wouldn't it's a rest day. And I I I tend to tend to indulge at least once a week without feeling like I needed to do something to earn it. But like if I'm, you know, eating pizza every day, then I feel like a POS.

SPEAKER_00 19:05

No, there's there's gotta be a balance, but just uh we always try to avoid the the like earn your meals situation, right? Like we don't want it to be like, oh, well, you didn't work out today. Well, you get one meal, not three. You know, so it's just that's always where I try to make sure that I kind of like have that that line built up, you know. So it's of course I can't eat everything that I want to eat all the time and not work out and expect to maintain a physique that I'm proud of, right? But just because I had a cheeseburger today, like you're saying, doesn't mean that I need to punish myself tomorrow. And even if I didn't do everything in preparation for this cheeseburger tonight, why can I not just still enjoy the cheeseburger, right? Because most of weight loss, fat loss, maintenance is on the weekly basis, right? It's not on, well, I ate like shit today, so I have to be perfect tomorrow. It's how does my maintenance, how does my surplus or how does my deficit look as a week, as a month, right? So that's where the consistency definitely does make a difference. But I I like what you're saying there. It's just that's where it can be difficult, right? Especially if you've had a a strange relationship with food or like food was something that you struggled with. So then having it not be something that you struggle with on the other side when it you know turns to your fitness journey is a really big problem that a lot of people have. So I'm glad that you have those, those kind of like rules set up for yourself. You know, that's that's a really big deal. So, how do you encourage your clients when it comes to the the balance of exercise, food, their relationship with that?

SPEAKER_01 20:44

So it it kind of depends on the person. And I encourage all my clients that are willing to talk about it to experiment, to just try, don't be afraid to try different things to figure out what makes you feel like the best you because that's one thing I was doing for a while. I you know, experimenting with different types of diets just to just to see how I feel, but they also taught me how different foods are making me feel. But um as far as with clients, I feel like everybody is different, so it's important that everybody tries different things so that people can figure out, okay, these foods always make me crash through my workout. So what if I tried this instead? So just trying to experimenting with different variables to figure out, okay, you know, when's the best time for you to work out? When's the best time for you to fuel your workouts? When's the best time for you to get your protein in, you know, post workouts if so that you're not eating right before you go to bed, type of thing? So just kind of trying to ask open ended questions just so they don't feel like I'm, you know, like I don't want to say like quizzing them, but like just like Honing in, like, are you eating your protein?

SPEAKER_02 22:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:02

Did you eat today? Are you going to eat after this? You know, just so you don't feel like they're being like scolded or anything like that.

SPEAKER_00 22:08

I always try to say it like seem curious, not accusatory. Yeah. Right? Like, did you do that? Like you know that they're gonna tell you what you want to hear, but it's like, hey, so how's that been going? Right. So yeah, being curious, not something that Melissa was talking about in her thing, but being curious with movement. But yeah, being curious versus accusatory is how I like to look at it. Because nobody likes to feel like, well, did you take the trash out? And you're like, well, no, but now I don't even want to, you know, because it's that that's but that's that's a really good tip. Like just staying curious with your clients because you want them to be curious with themselves, right? So I think being curious with them and showing them kind of by example how to be curious can make a big difference. So that's really good. And then how do you go about goal setting? Because I know like currently you're trying to hit a 225 bench. I know you've had like some running goals in the past. You've talked about some very mental or emotional goals that you've had. So what kind of goes into setting a goal for you?

SPEAKER_01 23:11

Lately it's been trying to just find a way to make fitness more fun. So my longest running goal has been in my really like the one of the first Calestinic goal. The first Calisthenic goal I ever set was being able to go from a L sit to a handstand. And because that and honestly, that's been fun. Like I've been able to fail and fail and fail and fail all over again without getting super frustrated, even though I've been working towards this goal for maybe I don't know, almost three years. I've and I'm still working on it. It's made it helps you stay in on the grind, like helps you stay consistent when you have a goal that you're really looking forward to achieving. So just kind of find a way to make it fun. But when you have a goal that's like that looks very ambitious, that seems really far away, then it has helped me to really break it into steps, break it into many goals. So like a L set to a handstand push-up, you know, breaking it, okay. The first very first thing I did is just focus on strengthening my core, and then can I hold an L set? And I did that for a very long time, just hold building the strength to be able to hold myself up. Because at first I couldn't even hold myself off the ground in the L set. So it took me a while just building that strength, and then I would work with pressing down into the L set very slowly, and then and then I kind of took a pause on that and then really just focused on my handstand for a while and just you know, and you know you saw me fail plenty of times, and I still fail, but it's it's more fun. It was definitely more scary at first when you know that first time you're going on your hands and you're like, Oh my gosh, I'm gonna fall on my back, and you probably are, but and then you learn after you fall that oh I'm okay, it's fine, I'm good. Let's do it again. So then it's like just kind of fine figuring out, okay, how can I make this more interesting? Like whether it's like trying to do a pull-up or you know, I was trying to work on a muscle up for a long time, but then I started getting more annoyed than I was enjoying it. So I've taken a break from it from trying to work at it, and I've just worked on a strengthening the same movements, but it's just not the exact movement.

SPEAKER_00 25:42

So then maybe you go back to a muscle up and it won't be so frustrating, right? Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 25:46

Yeah, so just not being afraid to change things up. Like I'll sometimes like if I get tired of my the split that I'm currently doing, I will throw it out the window and just do something new. I I did that like half a year ago. I was doing like the same things for like a year and like same movements every day, the same, you know, the same schedule. And I was just so over it, like I was just was just going through the motions every day. I wasn't feeling like I was having fun with my workouts anymore. So I I didn't like physically throw it away, but I just opened up a new note on my phone, and then ever since then, every day I'll write my workout for that day. I have like an intention on each day. Like today, my intention was pull with the intention of hypertrophy more reps. And so I'll have an intention, but I'll never have a set workout. Yeah, so that way I just go off of what am I feeling today? So never being like, okay, this is what you have to do. If you didn't do it, you failed, you let yourself down. But all right, let's feel it out, let's just see what I can do today. One thing that really really like going back to like the orange story, one thing that really helped change my perspective towards fitness was today is just another opportunity to see what you can accomplish for yourself. It's just another opportunity to see what cool shit you can do. Like whether it's a run, just a even because my first run lasted a quarter mile before I was out of breath. You know, so it's just like you said, staying curious and just trying to encourage yourself to find new things that you enjoy doing that you might not have thought would have thought that you would have ever enjoyed.

SPEAKER_00 27:31

Yeah, no, one of the ways that me and Carissa have been kind of like helping people set goals recently is with the verbiage like, how freaking cool would it be? Right. So like whatever that looks like for you, we can literally program for that, right? Like if your thing is like, how freaking cool would it be to do the Appalachian Trail? Like, hey, that gives me a really good idea of what your goals are, and I can program for that, right? Like, hey, how how freaking cool would it be to do a handstand? How cool would it be to be able to show up to a uh you know Ninja Warrior park and just be able to do this stuff? How freaking cool would it be if I didn't have to have my husband go to the grocery store with me because I can just put everything in the cart, right? So just having people kind of come at it with that mindset, I feel like takes a lot of the stress out of it. Takes a lot of the like, well, what should I be able to do, right? Because should always comes with a sense of failure or shame. Like, should and shame kind of go right together. Because if if you should do something and you're not, that's shameful, right? But if you could do something and you haven't, that's exciting, right? Oh, I could do that. That is a good idea, I could, versus I should, there's shame right there with it, right? So I think just how freaking cool would it be? And then just having the the client fill in the gap there, because that can be 300-pound deadlift, right? It can be very much in the gym, or it can be like, I want to be able to chase my kids up and down the playground, right? And that's so far from the gym, but becomes attainable because of the gym. So I think, yeah, just it's pretty pretty similar to what you're saying. Like, how what cool shit can I do, right? But just like how freaking cool would it be? And that can be for today, that can be for six months, that can be for two years from now. Like, how freaking cool would it be to play in a men's basketball league again? Um, bro, if that's your that's your goal, we can train towards you being a rec league menace, you know, but you gotta have something in mind. You have to have a goal. And I think people have such a hard time setting goals because they look for the right goal to set, or they look for examples of like, well You tell me what goal I should say. It seems like I should want to bench 225 and squat 300. Does that sound good? It's like, well, I mean, that sounds good, but does that sound good, sound fun, sound engaging to you? Because it doesn't matter how good a 225 bench sounds, a 300-pound bench, 300-pound hip thrust sounds, if that's not something that drives you to show up, makes you want to be better, makes you want to get out of bed and show up to the gym. You know? So I think that's very powerful, man.

SPEAKER_01 30:09

It definitely has to be your goal. Yeah. Because if it's not, you're not gonna want to do it. And if you don't want to do it, you're not gonna give it a year all.

SPEAKER_00 30:17

And so you said you kind of change on a fairly daily basis. Do you kind of block out those workouts in that sense? Like, do you focus on like barbell rows for a couple weeks at a time or just kind of come back to it when you feel like it?

SPEAKER_01 30:32

A little bit of both. Like, if I am really trying to move more weight, then I will definitely focus on it for a few weeks at a time or even longer. Yeah. But and what I'll normally do is I'll go through cycles of doing that, and so then I'll get bored of that exercise, or I'm just don't enjoy it as much anymore, and then I'll do a different exercise. So rather than doing a barbell road, doing like a cable pull down or just keeping it simple with pull-ups. Yeah. Just switching it up when I feel when I'm not feeling that exercise anymore.

SPEAKER_00 31:03

Heck yeah. And how would you say your mental health is now on the other side of having a really solid fitness routine, like kind of in place and being a trainer and being an example for people?

SPEAKER_01 31:18

Yeah, I mean, I definitely feel like I mean, I don't like the way it what I always want to say sounds but of the best I've ever felt mentally. I mean, I don't know why I didn't want to say that, but yeah, that that's a good thing. Yeah, no, really, no, really. But I don't know, I don't like it when I sound like I feel like I'm tootin' moan horn.

SPEAKER_00 31:39

But um that's not a toot, man. You're allowed to feel joy for yourself. You're absolutely right. That's a a masculine problem that people have is you know, feeling that like as men we should be like, nah, like it's it's fine. Like you should be like, nah, I'm happy. I'm feeling giddy today. You know, like that, that's fine. You can be joyous about stuff, man. Like you should feel good.

SPEAKER_01 31:57

Yeah. But to answer your question, as long as I'm doing the things that I feel I should be doing, you know, as far as something for myself physically every day, something for myself mentally every day, am I getting, am I aiming for, you know, I try to hit around 180 grams of protein, somewhere between 160 and 180 grams of protein a day. And then am I getting enough water and getting enough sleep? And then, because what I've learned is as long as I'm doing those things, I feel really good every day. But the more of those things I lack on, the worse I feel going throughout the day. So if I want to be the best person and the best example around our gym and around the clients and just around everybody in my life in general, if I want to be the best me I can be, I have to do the best for me.

SPEAKER_02 32:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:50

And if I don't do the best for me, I don't feel my best. And then that energy spreads to the people around me. If I'm not doing my best, I don't feel my best, then that rubs off on people the same way. If I am doing my best, I'm doing everything I know I can be doing. And then maybe more if I'm challenging myself, staying curious of how much more I can be doing, then I feel that energy rub off on the people around me. It's like, I don't know, it's like you have this different aura of, you know, you're on top of your of your own things, and you you just feel like I could take on the world today when you're doing everything you had on your schedule, when you planned out your day yesterday, and then you did every single thing you planned, or you made a to-do list of different activities. Maybe some are chores, maybe some are fitness or mental health related, and then you do all those things, and then you're just stacking wins, stacking wins, stacking wins, stacking wins. So as long as I'm structuring my day around my ability to continue stacked rent wins for myself, I feel like the best version of myself. Because for a long time growing up, I did not feel like the best version of myself, and that ate me up. So knowing that how I felt before, and how I felt, you know, it's I'm not perfect. So some days I fall off, some days I don't do the think, and I don't feel good because of it. And then it's like, oh, that's how I feel when I don't do the think. Okay, let me just let's do the thing tomorrow. Let's do the thing, let's do it right now, let's do the think, let's feel good again. So it's kind of just growing the understanding of okay, I can feel good every day. I can feel amazing every day, I can feel like the best version of myself and be the best version of myself every day. All I gotta do is act like it. Just act like the best version of myself.

SPEAKER_00 34:36

There you go. I think that's powerful, man. That's super powerful. And then how do you bounce back? Like you said, there's you know, there's days that you're just not doing that. So what yeah, what goes into a bounce back and not allowing it to be a spiral? Just the knowledge that you feel so much better?

SPEAKER_01 34:54

Well, it's the it's the day of feeling like crap. Yeah, it's like I can't do that again because I know I will fall off if I do. If I let that continue, I know I've I've seen that road before. I've seen that movie before. I know how it ends. I don't like the ending. So I'm gonna take control of the narrative and all right, let's rewrite the script today. Let's I want today, let's make today look or let's act today in a way that I won't be proud of myself at the end of the day because of it. Yeah, you know, feeling like I really did all I could have done because those thoughts eat me up at night. If I if I go through the day and I didn't do the thing, didn't do anything physically, didn't do anything mentally, and it's not a rest day. I know I could have. There's no crazy soreness, there's no injury I'm recovering from, I'm healthy, I'm not sick, there's nothing going on, and I didn't do the thing, it'll eat me up at night. And it's just a misery that's just not worth it to me.

SPEAKER_00 35:57

I feel you, man. That's that's some tough stuff. I mean, it's I've been there before. That's that's definitely real. If I stack enough days of not doing too much, or I'll I'll get into some very negative thought loops, but I've been really trying to. There was a guy that gave a really good analogy for life, and it was a basketball analogy. So resonated with me because I like basketball. But it's the the philosophy of ball up top, right? Like if you're playing pickup basketball, it's always just ball up top the next time, right? If you get dunked on, does getting mad and yelling and trying to fight the dude that dunked on you do anything? Nah, it just makes you look more stupid, right? Ball up top. So, like, same idea in life, right? Like sometimes you'll you'll get a flat tire. Sometimes you'll come home and there's a golf ball through your window. Sometimes you'll just whatever it is, right? You'll be driving somewhere and for whatever reason your car window, your car mirror gets knocked off, right? But it's like, do I sit here and scream and yell and mope, or do I just say, like, hey, good shot, life, right? Ball up top, you know. So that's that's been my kind of modality recently, because it is so easy to be like, well, like F that or why or try to like sulk or be mad at the situation, but yeah, it really doesn't move you forward, right? So it's kind of like waking up the next day was just like that ball up top mentality, right? Because if you wake up and you can just start over again, you got the ball, you can take it, you can dribble down the court, that's your life. Like, balls in your hands, right? But sometimes you're just gonna get dunked on, you know. Sometimes the guy, sometimes you're gonna play great defense, and bro hits the shot. Like there's been times that I've saved money, prepared, had the money for my taxes, plus the bills that I've had, and then well, something else comes up, right? So it's like, hey, I played great defense, my hand was up, I was on my man. Good shot, life. So, you know, just having that ball up top mentality because there's there's always you're always gonna get scored on even with perfect defense. You can be in the right position and still get dunked on. You know, you can be on the court where you're supposed to be, and they just made a better play than you had. Like that's that is simply life. So as much as yeah, you gotta be in the right position, you gotta set yourself up for success, you gotta be doing what you're supposed to be doing every day. But like, I would say, I mean, if as long as you're doing what you're supposed to be doing, even if the outcome doesn't always line up, like you still did what you could, right? So that's that's my big thing is you you might do everything you're supposed to do and still not feel like it's a great day at the end of the day, but that doesn't mean that you did any less. You know, just ball up top, check it up, let's go again.

SPEAKER_01 38:37

Yeah, that ball up top resonates with for me as why me versus why not me.

SPEAKER_00 38:44

Yeah, you know, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 38:46

And it's like, ah, why this happened to me versus you know what? Why not me? I'm built for this. Yeah, I got it. Let's go. And there's I can handle it.

SPEAKER_00 38:55

Even if I wasn't built for it, even if I don't got it, what is sitting here and crying do about it, right? Maybe I am built for it, but I gotta check the ball up to figure that out, you know.

SPEAKER_01 39:04

So a lot of ways I strengthened myself mentally over time was forcing positive beliefs into my mind that my mind didn't want to accept at first, even if it was just the belief of I'm the best me I could be. Even if I didn't truly believe it, just kind of forcing that thought into my head. Oh, yeah, getting my mind more comfortable with the thought of, oh, I can do this. You know, just practicing positive thoughts for a while. And that's what turned turned me into the person you see today. Is just practicing the positivity because I used to think so negatively about myself, really.

SPEAKER_00 39:40

Yeah. I mean, that's we've talked about kind of like the the instance of getting somewhere is is much harder than people think, right? Like you don't just start eating three chicken breasts and the perfect amount of rice and whatever once you look like a bodybuilder, right? Like you have to eat the way a bodybuilder that's 250 and 6'3 looks, even when you're 5'11 and 170, if you want to look like that bodybuilder, right? So it's like you're not just gonna wake up one day, be that guy, and then act like that guy, right? So even if you're sad, like you just gotta wake up and say, nah, it's gonna be a happy day. I'm gonna give it my best. And eventually that becomes real, right? If you're if you want to run a marathon, you're not gonna wake up run one day and just run a marathon, but like I can run a mile today and then I'll do a mile and a half next week, right? But you have to start training like a marathon runner far before you're a marathon runner. You have to start eating and lifting like a bodybuilder far before you're a bodybuilder, right? So if you're in a dark place, if you're sad, if you're really down on yourself, you have to act like somebody who's not down on yourself for a while just to kind of just fake it till you make it, right? Like that's it's the same idea. You might show up to the gym for six months and not look like somebody that goes to the gym, but if you want to look like somebody that goes to the gym, you have to show up like somebody that goes to the gym before you look like it, right? So that's that's the same idea. It's just people get so locked into like, well, when I'm there, it's like, but you're not gonna be there, right? The the process is what gets you there. You don't get to get there and then decide what the process was or what now I'm gonna do this because I'm at this point. So that's a very fair statement, man. It's just not lying to yourself, but hey, look, how positive can I be? Like, even if I'm sad, today is still a new day. I woke up. There's a big thing going around right now that's like, hey, if I was gonna give you a billion dollars, but I told you that you were gonna die in three years, would you take it? And people, everyone's like, well, well, no. It's like, oh well, I guess your life is priceless.

SPEAKER_01 41:48

I guess more than a billion dollars.

SPEAKER_00 41:50

Waking up every day for the next three years is more important than a billion dollars, right? Like, but people don't wake up like their life is worth a billion dollars, right? But they really should. If you were gonna get a billion dollars right now, but you wouldn't wake up tomorrow, would you take the billion?

SPEAKER_01 42:04

Absolutely not.

SPEAKER_00 42:05

Your life is worth more than any amount of money, right? So that's you just have to always remember that, always think that no matter how low this shit is right now, there's something I can do. I woke up for a reason, I can move forward, I can make progress as long as I woke up today. So that's super powerful, man. And then if you had one bit of advice for somebody that's kind of in that starting point where you were at, that just like I I'm not doing enough. I don't, I don't think I like myself right now. I don't know what I'm not doing, but I'm I'm definitely not doing it. How how would you go about starting kind of answering those thoughts or solving that issue?

SPEAKER_01 42:47

I mean, the biggest thing is just just never just to give up on yourself. Just don't quit whatever it is you're doing, whether it's schoolwork or a college degree or your finished journey, just never or learning more about your nutrition. Education is the best thing that could ever happen to you. Just constantly trying to just learn more, even if it's about your own mind, spending time with yourself, spend time with your thoughts, listen to your mind, what it's telling you. Try to, okay, if you're thinking a certain thought, whether it's you know negative or what, why do you why might you think like that? Why might you be telling yourself that? What could you do about it so that you wouldn't your mind wouldn't have a reason to even have that thought? So, just how can you change the way you think one thought at a time? And just spending time by yourself to learn who you are. For the longest time I didn't know who I was. I was still scratching the surface and I make an effort to spend time by myself. So the biggest thing is to just don't be afraid to try things that make you uncomfortable, to do things that seem a little bit out. Of your comfort zone to try that thing you've never tried before, but you've always thought about it. Maybe for me it was like passing title all the time, but because I used to live in a in an apartment complex uh across the street, and so I'd pass it all the time, and I was like, hmm, what if one day, but I would never act on it? Maybe that'd be cool. Yeah, like you said, that'd be cool if I could do that, but never acting on it. So just kind of like listening to what your mind is telling you, and then really thinking about it. Journaling really helped me. Uh, you know, especially when I was first starting working out. I noticed that I was able to think a little bit more clearly than before after working out. Just kind of just get your blood flow into your brain, just kind of helps you think a little bit better, and especially while you're working out, you know.

SPEAKER_00 44:49

The endorphins, all the adrenaline release, like it it definitely has your mind flowing in a different way.

SPEAKER_01 44:56

And so it kind of was like a almost like a gateway into my mind to kind of like help me figure myself out. So I kind of started this like ritual with myself that after every workout, I would go and just find somewhere alone and just sit with my thoughts and just try to understand, try to figure myself out. Whatever's on my mind, write it down and see if I can expand that thought. You know, if I'm thinking a certain way or feeling a certain way, try to understand it. Just to try to learn more about myself. Even if it's even if I'm thinking about something that doesn't really have to do with me. Just kind of just trying to figure out what who I am as a person. And so if you're never ever spending time with your own thoughts, if you're always listening to something, you're always watching something, you're always surrounded by other people, you're never really spending time with yourself. One thing I I read about was to date yourself. Oh, yeah. You know, go on dates with yourself. Well, and for me, that was hiking. I would just try to find as many adventurous places to go as I could, go by myself or take my dog Maisie, and we just go on a little adventure and be, you know, just an opportunity to leave all your stresses from the world behind to just be with yourself.

SPEAKER_00 46:16

Oh, yeah. I think it it really can take not pure solitude, but like the absence of outside influence. You know, like you can't be looking for how you're supposed to feel better in answers from other people or other people tell you who you're supposed to be. Yeah, and you can't that answer's not gonna come to you in a podcast or in a book, right? Like you might get the idea of what you're supposed to do or how you could translate something you read in this book into your own life. But I think so many people are looking for the answer from somebody else or from something else. They think if they listen to the right podcast or read the right book or ask the right friend, they'll just have the answer, right? But sometimes it's just having the information and then having the want, right? Having the desire to take the information, take the quote, take the excerpt that you read and mold it into something that makes sense for you and moves you forward. Because it's it's always a situation of when the the student is ready, the teacher will appear, right? So if you're not ready, people can be giving you great advice, great advice, great advice, but you have to do the work, you have to be on your journey, you have to be on the right path and be ready, or else even if you got the right lesson, you're not gonna learn it, you know. So that's real, man. I I think not enough people spend ample time alone anymore, especially with the social media. Yeah, social media. Even when you are alone, you're not really alone if you're connected to a phone, you know. But people feel more lonely than ever, even though we're more connected. But that's that's a whole different problem. Yeah. But to end on something a little more lighthearted, you are kind of transitioning into our main boxing dude at the gym, doing some extra certifications, getting your skills up, this and that. So gonna hype you up a little bit on that. If anybody needs boxing training in the the area of Greenville, Winterville, 252, my boy Harry here is one of the best in the business. But for you, if you had to never lift again or never kickbox again, only a hypothetical, and I need an answer.

SPEAKER_01 48:29

That's a really good question. I would never lift again.

SPEAKER_00 48:33

Really?

SPEAKER_01 48:33

Kickboxing is too much fun. I've never gotten bored of kickboxing. I've gotten bored of lifting.

SPEAKER_00 48:40

You had it here. You heard it here first, folks. Kickboxing over lifting if it comes from Mr. Harry. But yeah, man, do you have any closing statements for the people?

SPEAKER_01 48:50

Well, the main thing that I had a feeling we touched on, but we didn't, was the biggest thing Rebel has done for me as a person was the community.

SPEAKER_00 49:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:02

Because it's, and I'll tell members this when I'm talking to them about my own journey there. And it's the first gym I've ever been a part of. That one, I feel like I'm a part of it, but two, that I feel welcomed. I feel like it's weird to say, but I feel like I feel I feel loved. Like I feel like the people there actually care to see me grow versus a planet fitness where you're just a commercial gym where you're walking in and everybody has their headphones and nobody talks to each other. Like it's just like you're in a grocery store. Like, you know, it's like it doesn't, it's not a community at all. But Rebel, it's like everybody talks to each other. You don't walk through the door without getting a hello, you don't walk out the door without getting a goodbye. You know, you just feels like I don't know, I gotta, I'm getting a different. It's like I'm getting an aspect of community that I've never had in my life before.

SPEAKER_00 49:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:59

You know?

SPEAKER_00 50:00

You know, that's that's really powerful, man, because a lot of the stuff you were talking about was just kind of like being on your own, having that time, being willing to be by yourself. So for somebody like you that enjoys solo time enough and is very comfortable being alone to still have Rebel make such an impact on you community-wise, that that means a lot, man. That's always the goal. And I mean, you're you're a big part of that. You're instrumental in making people feel welcome the same way that you have. And I think that you're one of the best examples because you came into it through it, you know, like you came in before it was Rebel, came into Rebel, and have just kind of felt the love all the way up through. And now I think you show it as well as anybody. So I'm glad you feel it, and I appreciate that you show it, man. It means a lot.

SPEAKER_01 50:46

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 50:47

No doubt. Well, great, heartfelt, in-depth episode with my boy Scary Harry here. Thank y'all so much for tuning in to another episode of Real Talk with Rebel. Hopefully, Harry will get you back on here. I'm sure there's another two, three hours of stuff you could talk about, seeing as you had your own podcast in the past. But this will be it for today. Look back on all the other episodes. Check us out on Instagram, Facebook, hit up the website if you're looking for training in town, if you're looking for coaching in town andor over the phone slash online. Let us know. Check out the website. We're always happy to work with you on prices, help you out, and be there for you wherever we can. We'll see y'all next time. Peace out. Peace.