John Spencer Ellis - You Can't have an Elephant Mouth and a Hummingbird Ass

Hey fitness fans, welcome back. This is Eric Malzone with the Future of Fitness Podcast and the Fitness Marketing Alliance. This is episode number 15. So I get to talk to John Spencer Ellis. So John is a big name in the fitness industry and has been for a long time. So if you don't know who he is, uh just go pause this for a second, go to johnspenserellis.com and then come back. So he was the founder of Nesta. He was a millionaire by the age of 30. And he's one of those celebrity trainers that you'd see on TV. In fact, he was on the Real Housewives of Orange County for a bit as a trainer for them. And he's also an entrepreneur coach now. So he is uh he's very honest. He's done his time in the trenches, and he's just got a great vibe and outlook on life overall. I I love how he's calling out the imposters on social media, you know who I'm talking about, right? The ones that uh sit in front of their Lamborghini or in front of their uh private jet promising that they'll make you a millionaire overnight. And he also talks about his experience with haters. You know, once you get to a level of exposure that he's at, you're gonna get haters, and how he turned it around once. There's a great story at the end of this, and uh bought himself a new Porsche thanks to the haters just hating. So I hope you guys enjoy this. I thoroughly did. And uh yeah, without further ado, John Spencer Ellis. Hey everybody, this is Eric with the Fitness Marketing Alliance, and today I have a very special guest. I am talking to John Spencer Ellis, who uh, you know, I'm gonna I'm gonna let you describe what it is you do because you do so much. Uh John, thank you for coming on. Maybe give uh the people who are listening, if they haven't heard of you um within the fitness industry, they probably should have, but give them an idea of you know what you do now, kind of how you've raised up to where you are, and that may be the whole episode right there. We'll see what happens.

Yeah. Um I I have done this a long time. My gosh. So I started in the fitness industry in 1992. And when I say that to some people, they go, Man, that's the year I was born. Which is that's cool. I mean, that's that's the truth, but that's just how long I've been in the industry. Um the things that people probably know of my work, uh, and I've done a bunch of different stuff, uh very, very diverse, but the things that probably known best for is as the CEO and founder of Nesta, the National Exercise and Sports Trainers Association. We're a nationally accredited, NCCA accredited personal trainer certification, and we have a total of 35 different courses. The divisions of that are also the Spencer Institute, which is coaching, wellness, personal development, brain science stuff. So, and then the Nesta is then the coaching. Then we have the MMA Conditioning Association, which we started in 2010, although Nesta was started in 1992. The MMA Conditioning Association is now the largest uh martial arts, fitness and conditioning association in the world, and we've trained numerous UFC world champions, including Chris Cyborg, um Michael Bisping, um, other champions like Mark Hunt, who isn't a UFC champion but has won many other championships, and uh Dominic Cruz and Anthony Pettis and Tyron Woodley. These are all superstars that are trained by our coaches and instructors. And it goes way beyond that. But I'm super proud of that. We our goal in 2010, I said we're gonna create the pre-eminent MMA conditioning association in the world and fast forward, and we did, which was you know, I don't know, it just still blows my mind that that has come true. So that that's the other uh uh division, and then the last division is uh the International Triathlon Coaching Association, ITA. And we have a triathlon coach certification, which is used by a lot of people who train uh top Ironman competitors and champions as well. Um, I also founded the Get America Fit Foundation, which is a nonprofit, and I help vets and underfunded, underprivileged schools with exercise equipment. We uh provide education and training for the teachers to help the kids as well. And I uh some of the stuff with the vets is giving back uh helping programs that help with their psychological re-entry after having, you know, uh exposure to conflict and war. Um, and then aside from that, adventure boot camp, I created adventure boot camp, which was kind of one of the original uh mass boot camp programs. Um and I also uh I'm trying to go through the list here, and it sounds silly, but it's but it's all this stuff is true. Uh I also uh own and operate the Fitness Hall of Fame and the Personal Trainer Hall of Fame. Wow. So there and then there's more to it, but that's those are big chunks, and it keeps me incredibly busy. I have an awesome team, um, and we work very hard, and um, it's a lot of fun, even though it's a lot of work.

Yeah, okay. So I I have a question I'm guessing everyone who's listening is the same thing is okay, first of all, do you sleep? And then how do you how do you organize all of your days? Like how does that come, how does that work?

Um, well, as an example, you know, at the time we're recording this, uh, we're getting close to the uh next induction ceremony, uh, induction ceremony, which is uh in San Francisco. And uh so really there's only like two, two or three huge weeks for the Hall of Fame that I have to do the uh work with the advisory board and get everyone ready, and then we do the ceremony and things like that. That's it. For the rest of the year, it's pretty mellow. Um, as far as you know, for Nesta as an example, that's the biggest division. Um, I do a lot of the marketing, I manage our ads, and I do the SEO, and then I keep the vision and uh develop strategic partnerships. And I have a director of education and vice president, I have a CLO, I have a bookkeeper, and uh and I have an accountant and an attorney who are you know part of the team, but you know, not full-time, obviously. And then I have a um a personal assistant, customer service person, and then a director of the Spencer Institute as well. And then we outsource too for graphic design and and uh help with social media and things like that. For me personally, to get as much done as I can, I'm super efficient. Um I'm very pragmatic. Uh so if something's good, I do it. If I don't like it and it's not working, I stop. Um and I constantly assess is it good? Yes, do more of it. If it's working so so, I either try to modify it or I abandon it, depending on where I think it's gonna go based on the next uh modification or edits or tweaks or whatever it is. Um we're still learning. You know, it's a it's a process. It's it's you know, you never arrive. Yeah, you're always tweaking, adjusting, and things like that. Um, but we have a very streamlined operation, and we were able to have a fairly small team and provide what we're told is excellent customer service, which is great because the reason that we've acquired a lot of new students is because we're told that I don't know this for a fact, but we're told that some other associations had poor customer service, and because of that, they came to us instead. And and now fortunately, we thrilled them with good customer service and products and services. So uh that goes a long way. That's a that's a good lesson right there.

So, what do what do you guys do differently in customer service?

Uh we answer the phone. We don't have a robot that tries to, you know, uh, you know, route you around. You know, like when you're trying to like communicate with your bank or your credit card and stuff, press one, press two. Yep. Para español, numero those. You know, it's like you just keep going. It's like all these different trees, right? We pick up the phone and we talk to people. And we're we care. And we do our best to communicate fast and effectively on social media. Um, we have private groups that we help people out with. Um, I answer questions on my podcast, and um I do Facebook Live and do QA and help them with that as well. And we just do our best and we care, and we do our best to show we care. I think that's it. And also, what what this is always weird to me, but people say, You're the CEO of this international association, and and you'll get on the phone with me and you'll answer my emails and you'll do a Facebook Live and do QA. Um, they're surprised and they're grateful. Now I can't do it all the time, and I wish I could do more, but the reality is if that's all I did, I wouldn't be able to operate the business successfully. That's just that's just a fact. But I do my best, and what I try to do is uh consolidate all of those efforts into chunks so I can do a big push to help and then interact, and then I have to go off and actually run the company as well. But I do my best, and and our team is always here and and we care. Our team has been together. The shortest amount of time the person's been on our team is 12 years, and the longest is 17. So that says something about our family, you know. We don't have a turnover. It's not that we have a high or a low turnover, there is no turnover.

There is no turnover.

No, that's incredible. I know. Well, because I here's the thing. Um, that's that's a whole other opera right there, right? But I I believe it is that I I treat them with respect, um, I treat them fairly. Um I I'm guessing I pay them about 20% over industry standards, and I give them enough autonomy to do what they need to do, and I don't micromanage, but they do like when I show more leadership. And then and then we communicate regularly and then we go out to lunch together. And although everyone works remotely all over the country, whenever we're together in the same town, or there's some of us in the same state, we'll get together and you know we celebrate each other's birthdays and things like that as well. So it's it's cool. Yeah.

Yeah, that's really cool. Do you uh how much time do you invest in their personal growth?

More and more. Um, I don't know if I can quantify the number of hours because it's different for everybody and every, but but I insist that they do some type of personal growth or professional growth. And if they want to go to an event, I'll I'll uh compensate them for that. Uh if they want a book, I'll get them the book or the audio, or I'll turn them on to a good podcast, or uh some live events that we're gonna be attending this year, next year together as well. I don't know if I have a everyone's different. I don't have a number of hours or minutes or or uh, but we're doing more and more. And we also uh will get a company access to different training online as well to go through and uh to to improve because you, as the leader, uh the the the uh president, the you know, it's important that you do that, but there's definitely quantifiable results by bringing everyone else along for the ride. It's like Jim Collins, good to great, you gotta get the right people on the bus, but you gotta be driving the bus and uh you can't be hanging out, you know, the halfway back back in the bus having a cocktail. It's not gonna work.

You know, I've noticed uh, you know, I've had the pleasure of interviewing a lot of people so far. And of all the people that um have sustained great leadership over time, there's one common theme that I've seen organization, all those things are obviously very important, but they tend to really invest and uh in the personal growth of their people.

Yeah, they want to know you care.

Yeah.

Um, and I made mistakes. I was gonna say I made a mistake in the past and I corrected myself halfway through. I made many mistakes. One of them was not being personal enough with all the different members of my team because it's like, I'm ready to go. I'm like, okay, let's go. You know, call me, let's let's let's talk business. They want to they want to tell me about their kids' soccer game or what they've done over the weekend, or maybe a funny movie they saw. You know, uh my the my VP loves Star Wars, so there's like I always send them silly memes with Star Wars stuff, and that goes a long way. It's so it's so simple. It's so simple, but people like that. They they want to know you care.

Yeah, and it's it's funny, even just the little thing, just walking maybe by their desk and saying, Hey, great job on that project. Right. Little things that seem to resonate, and you have no idea how powerful they are.

I also never raise my voice unless we're laughing.

Okay.

I don't yell and I'll raise my voice.

Yeah, you don't seem like someone who would.

No.

Uh so at what point in your life did you realize I'm an entrepreneur? Was there a particular moment or something like that?

Uh I was a kid. I by the time I graduated high school, I probably already had seven or eight jobs. Okay. About half of them were ones I created myself. I would mow lawns for my neighbors, I would wash their cars, I painted the numbers on the curb, you know, so the the postal service would know where to go. Like on the on next to the curb in certain neighborhoods, they'd spray paint it on the concrete. I would provide a service. I bought stencils and and would do that, and I would I would charge a couple bucks for that uh to make it look nice for the neighbors. Um I used to trim hedges uh for my dad's shop at a barber shop. And so like I would do like it, I knew early, early on. It wasn't pretty, and I didn't make a lot of money when I first started, but I knew that I had to create my path. Um I just saw a great quote on the meme. It said, uh, your salary is the bribe they give you for giving up on your dreams. Whoa. I think I think I got that right. Yeah, that's that's some heavy stuff right there, man. Yeah.

Wow. Yeah, sorry, that gave me a moment of pause. Yeah. So there's there's you've been successful um in many different ventures, but you know, I I think in entreprene in entrepreneurialism that failures are the greatest lessons, obviously. Um people that I talk to are are rarely braggadocious about the things they've achieved, but more they're very honest about the ways they failed and how they push push forward through that, right? Yeah. Um, what do you do you have one or two failures that you've you've had that you think were maybe the biggest lesson? About a hundred.

Um one of them is interpersonal, the other, well, I guess they're both they're both let me think. Okay, so the first one is um, and and I've said this before in other interviews, but it bears repeating because I think all people who give get a, you know, and I'm using air quotes, uh, success, you start to believe your own hype. And everyone goes, hey man, you're great, this is awesome, you're doing cool, and uh let me get I want to get a picture with you, and and like, oh, this is awesome, and and and meet my like they what you get different opportunities that other people may be excluded from after you get like so. What happened is from the time I was uh say I'm almost 50 now, not quite there, but I'm getting close. So um probably from 26 to 36, which is a long stretch. I had a lot of successes. I was uh on the cover of different magazines, I was I was voted one of America's most eligible bachelors. I was asked to be on the bachelor TV show twice. It's stupid, uh, but uh but it's the truth. And then and uh, you know, by the time I was 30, I was uh worth over a million dollars. And and so you start to believe all this nonsense and this crap because people are telling you all this great stuff, and you go, yeah, yeah, yeah, supposed to be true. It's stupid. So um I went in the wrong direction because I believed that stuff. It's important to be proud of what you've done, it's important to um have a sense of accomplishment and all that, but you shouldn't change who who you are. And part of it was too like in my late 30s, I was also on the Real Housewives TV show for a couple of seasons as as their as their life coach, boot camp instructor, and nutrition coach. And and that was for a while before the deadliest catch came on Discovery Channel, that was the number one rated reality show in the world. And again, same stupid stuff. Like people would stop you on the street, they would want to come talk to you in a restaurant and all this stuff, and it's dumb. But I believed it, and it's wrong. And I had to get past that. And I probably tarnished friendships over that and all that kind of stuff. But I think you know, people have known me for a very long time now know that all that has long since passed. And um, I'm uh I'm grateful for everything I went through, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Um, but I'm on the other side of that, fortunately. Uh now I'm just grateful and I can laugh at my foolishness. Um, so that's the big, big lesson. That's number one. The second one is getting sidetracked with projects or hobbies or bright, shiny objects which take you off your main goal. So at being an entrepreneur at heart, I I started a men's skincare company uh called Metro. I did that years ago. Um and I've started like a coupon thing like um Groupon, uh, which worked for a while. Um and I I had a resort in the mountains outside of Los Angeles, uh, a mountain resort. Um that worked for a while. And I basically I just spread myself too thin. I couldn't do that. Um and then for years, I was, you know, I've done martial arts for 20 something years now. Um and I still train all the time. And but I I was training for the I did the jujitsu world championships. Um, I'm training in five different martial arts at the same time. Um I'm still next in December, I'm I'm training for my third black belt and my third third art. Um so I'm still entrenched in it, but I'm like, I'm too old to do anything significant and no one cares, and I'm pretty good. And if someone assaults me on the street, I'm gonna be all right, right? So, and I'm not gonna compete anymore. And one is because I got so sore and so beat up that I had to take a nap when I get home from training, which screwed up my business. I couldn't focus on my business. Then I would be so messed up, I had to go to the chiropractor and massage therapist to get fixed. So then I more time away from my business. And then I was just so mentally exhausted that I couldn't do much. So I was pursuing a goal for what I thought would give me fulfillment, and it did for a while, but ultimately things got suffered and got compromised in the interim. So I still train. I did yesterday. Um, I will tonight, but I'm not killing myself, and I don't have to get in a cage or a ring or on the mat with people in the stands yelling and screaming and taking head trauma. Not necessary. And so that was dumb. Again, that was dumb. I admit it. So and this part of it is just me. I'm uh a high achiever and I want I wanted to be a world champion. That was the goal. Um, I lost. I actually got punked pretty good because I dieted so much I had like nothing uh when I was terrible. Um so um now I just do it for fun and I'll and I'm okay. But so those are the two big ones, uh, two big ones to recap, um, believing your own hype because people say stuff, and secondly, getting distracted on things that aren't your primary focus and won't ultimately take you to your primary goal, which you know if you were honest with yourself and did honest self-assessment, you there was perhaps an incongruency. And so you have to do I thought, well, my business is doing great. You know, over the years, we've done phenomenal. I think I'm gonna take a few years and have some fun with this. And I did, but then after a while, I'm like, God, I'm just beat up, man. And I for I said, for what? I have a lot of friends that I actually help transition out of the UFC and start businesses. And and they're 10, 15 years younger than me, and they're destroyed, destroyed physically, mentally, emotionally. A lot of them have head trauma. They, you know, their bodies are jacked up. I know one guy I worked with, uh, he had three fights in the UFC, a couple in Bellator, and he can't even do a down dog in yoga because his shoulder won't support him anymore. Wow. And he's 45. Think about that. That I mean, it's a it's a tougher pose for a lot of people, but it's It's not that hard after you fight in UFC, like doing a down dog.

Right.

Not that big of a deal.

Yeah.

And so it's anyway. We're getting off track here. But I I just the goal is focus, focus, focus.

Yeah.

If you're gonna do something like that, think of the uh lost opportunity costs. I probably thought through them, but didn't analyze it properly.

So there's, and I wish I could remember the name of the book or where I got this from, but there's there's a comparison between you know when it's time to give up and when it's time to let go and what the difference is, right? Because as as you know, especially as entrepreneurs or even more so um being a man, I think we're always told, you know, don't give up, dig in, right? Never stop, you'll always get there if you just keep trying. But at some point you just gotta let some things go. Is there times you in in your in your career that you felt like, okay, I let that go and you had a sense of relief? And is there maybe times you felt that I quit and now it bugs me because I feel like I quit?

Um it's more than semantics because it's what's what's on the other side. I think semantics could just be, yeah, I'm letting go, I'm quitting, or whatever. It's just it could be your vernacular. But if if you quit, you gave up on something perhaps prematurely, and it you could have seen it through to its fruition. If you let it go, this is my perspective, you're letting it go for something greater on the other side. So, as an example, uh when I got married, I let go of teaching my boot camp. I uh let go of a radio show I was hosting, and I was uh hosting an executive producing a talk show. And it was, it was my wife goes, What are you doing? And I let go of all that, and I let go of, and that was probably you know $300,000 a year in revenue, which is a lot of money. And I was so much happier after I did that, and I was healthier and I got to sleep in, and um it was a very, very wise choice, but it's hard to let go. Sometimes it's hard to see the other side. Um so letting go, in my opinion, is allowing yourself, releasing yourself to do something greater and that personally fulfills you more and hopefully financially as well. Uh quitting is giving up and you don't really you're just sick and tired, burn out, and you don't really have a next step. I don't know. I'm some people may disagree, but that's how I perceive it.

No, I think it's great insight, and it's just totally what you're lending, you know, what lens you're looking through anyway. Yeah. How many hours a night do you sleep? Uh eight. Eight? Solid. Okay. Yeah, yeah. And uh there's like four and sleep. Pardon me?

I was expecting to be one of those four to five hour guys. No, I think that's nonsense. I anyone I know who goes, oh, I only get my four to five. Well, what's happening is you probably have adrenal fatigue. Right. And if Dr. Amon were gonna do a brain scan on you in your 40s, 50s, and 60s, you'll probably see that you have some cognitive decline or some type of plaque built up on your brain from your sleep deprivation because you can't, when you when you sleep, your brain gets washed. Your brain gets washed when you sleep and it moves away plaque and and things like that that can build up over time, which can cause cognitive decline and uh early set Alzheimer's and um all types of uh brain ailments, and so sleep deprivation and missing out on proper hormone release related to sleep um can be a huge issue. So I'm super, super cognizant of that. That's the reason I know this is because I'm a sleep nerd. I was a spokesperson for uh the National Sleep Foundation and the Sleep Number Bed, and we have a sleep science coach program, so I love this stuff. Um, and so um it's it's imperative. I so yes, eight hours of sleep. Once in a while, it's a little more, it's a little less. But I have a French bulldog that that sleep on each side of me that uh, you know, I have to be very still.

Uh so let's I want to pivot a little bit because I think uh well, obviously the name of the show is the future of fitness, but you I can't imagine um a better person to ask some these questions to. How how do you see uh technology changing the fitness industry in the next say five years?

Well, obviously there's a lot more wearable technology, and there's an app for everything. However, I use very little technology with my training. Um I I use an old weeder principle called intuitive training, and it's basically getting feedback based on you being self-aware of what's happening and what's and yes, I mean the the technology can help a lot. You can tell if you have adrenal fatigue, you can tell if you have a metabolic disorder, um, you can do blood lactate testing, um, you can determine if you're in the proper brainwaves pattern for deep REM sleep. All that's great. I'm not discounting it, but I think what happens is people get so caught up in all that stuff that they forget to say, hey self, how how do you feel? Rather than going, well, the data shows this. That must be the way I am. You know, it unless you're doing specific like biofeedback and things like that to try to understand the correlation with the data and your physiological, psychological, neurological response. A lot of times people just rely on it. Well, my Fitbit said, whatever. I guess that's the way it is. I prefer to say, I wake up in the morning and I'm like, how do I feel? How sore am I? Do I feel compelled to do the foam roller? And I do anyway, but what is my body telling me? And do I feel dehydrated? Uh, do I like sometimes if I'm super sore from training? Like I trained with my Muay Thai coach yesterday. I'm pretty darn sore. Today is not gonna have any explosive power stuff because I did that yesterday, but I'm just basing it on how I feel. Not that I don't need science to tell me that. I need to do something restorative today, maybe some slow, steady, maybe some basic fundamental strength training that is not ballistic and has no speed at all. Because I did that stuff yesterday. I pushed sleds, flipped tires, did battling ropes, and hit the bag in mitts yesterday. I'm good. So now I have to ask myself, what sounds right? And also I look forward, like tomorrow I'm doing taekwondo. That is very fast, snapping, bouncing, plyo, light on the feet. I'm not gonna do agility stuff today because that's tomorrow. What makes sense without getting too technical and mired down in the minutiae? Just pay attention to your body instead of the going back to what you said, I think we're we can be and probably will be too dependent on technology rather than paying attention to ourselves. It's kind of like what happens in society right now. Like um we're more connected than any time ever in history. But we're not connecting as we did, but we're more connected. Make sense? Yeah, oh, absolutely. It's the same thing with the technology with the fitness. I'm connected to all these wires and gadgets, and I got Wi-Fi. I don't know where to plug in this stuff. It's getting kind of weird and creepy. So now I don't pay attention to my own body because I'm paying attention to a device. And I I I I don't I hope we don't uh abandon that. You know, some in some cases you have to kind of revert back to the campfire, you know?

Yeah. Well, you know, I and I know we're doing this over uh Zoom technology, right? But one of the things I truly enjoy about having this interview series is that I get to sit with somebody, even though we're not in the same room, and we can have a conversation with no cell phones, no computers, and it's just us talking for 30, 40 minutes, right? How often does that actually happen in life nowadays? Well, that's a good point. That's a good point. Yeah. I don't know.

I don't think it's um we would probably be sitting next to each other at a sushi bar on our phones facing forward, right? Or with a group of people, and like as soon as everyone's done eating, everyone dies for their phones. Right. You don't, you know, there have you ever heard of doing this though, when people are all get together at a table, they all put I have my phone here. They have they all put their phone like in a pile in the center. And you keep your ringer on, it can be buzzing, beeping, you can get chimes, notifications, or whatever. And whoever reaches for their phone first has to pay the bill.

Yeah. Because it's just it's so instinctual now, right?

It's just yeah, because there's an addiction. There's also what's called uh digital amnesia, uh technological or digital amnesia where we were so reliant on it, our brain doesn't have to do certain tasks as it did before, such as triangulate things with a map because now we have GPS and we have Google uh directions and we have ways and things like that. Uh we don't have to memorize phone numbers because it does it for us. We don't have to memorize where the keys are anymore because everything is voice to text or what's called semantic search or natural language processing. And so a lot of that stuff has taken the tactile um spatial placement orientation uh skills away from us. And even the way our brain processes information is completely different. Look at look at a seven-year-old on an iPad. It's insane. The brain is being rewired faster now than any time ever in human history.

Yeah. And it's I don't think people realize how fast everything is changing because we're in the thick of things.

And it's yeah, we're we're the fish in the water. Yeah.

Exactly. Uh, you know, I'm curious, John, what what uh what habits do you have daily that you think over time have made you successful? Is there anything that you can nail down or anything that then it may even be subconscious by now?

Uh I I know exactly what it is. Awesome. Um I don't bullshit around. It's that simple. I don't waste time on anything. If something is working, I do it. If it's not, I stop. And then if it's questionable, I test it, and then I might alleviate it or escalate it. Um when I'm ready to get up in the morning, I get up. And I'm a firm believer in the first three hours of your day. Do as much as possible in the first three hours of your day to where by the conclusion of those first three hours, you've done more work than the average person can in eight days, and you're ahead. You win every day.

I love that.

The other thing is I do work rest cycles, and I learned this, I think, from Evan Pagan. And so I'll do like after the first three hours, I do that chunk because I have it and I'm drinking coffee, I'm good, I'm fired up. After that, I'll work an hour and a half really hard chunk, and then I'll stop, I'll get up, I'll pet my dog, I'll drink some water, I'll do foam roller or a yoga posture. Then I go back, new task. And I want to close that window in my head too, close it off. It might be an hour and 20, it might be an hour and 40, but I have to finish the task so I can cycle through and close it off my brain. Done. Move aside. Next, I go back. What's the next chunk? Boom, I'm gonna do this. Hour and a half, boom. Super, super hard, very focused, focused and try to avoid the squirrels and bright shiny objects. It's not always perfect, but you do your best. And then again, take a break, foam roller, stretch, uh, play with the dogs for a minute, come back. And I do that until I'm done working, or I'll like maybe I'll cycle out and then go train and then come back. That's great. That that I'm that's that's really what does it. I I I see people, it's kind of like when someone goes to the gym and they say hi to all their friends, and they're like, do these wimpy stretches, and they go, they check their phone, or they sit in their car for 20 minutes, or or you guys see like someone on the bike doing this. I'm like, you're wasting your life. I I tell you, it's I can tell by how someone walks how successful they are in life with a fairly good degree of accuracy. Um, there's two two things, right? Remind me of the the F-15 pilot. Okay, so first I'm gonna tell you about a guy who I used to be when I used to race bicycles, and uh and I worked at a bike shop when I was in college as a mechanic, and I I wanted a job, and he goes, Here's the broom, go sweep the shop. And he would use the broom as a litmus test to see your enthusiasm, your passion, your thoroughness, your energy. And that was a that you didn't even get an interview until you swept, so he could see how enthusiastic and thorough you were. Because it was a microcosm of how you perceive life and your work and what you value. Sounds really interesting. And I've I will always remember that, and I have done that to other people too, uh that want to work when I had when I had my office building and uh I'd say go sweep the warehouse because I want to first of all if they bitch and complain, gone, you know, yeah, it's okay, it's not for everybody. And then going back to the I think it was actually an F-16. I said F-15, I think it was a 16. Uh, my friend Waldo Waldman, uh speaker Hall of Fame, uh veteran of two wars, uh uh top gun instructor, uh, New York Times bestselling author. He's a freaking rock star. So we've been friends for a while, and um I had sushi with him uh on the Las Vegas strip, uh I don't know, two months ago. And I got there early, and I'm like, where is he? You know, and I'm looking around for him and and I I'm looking out, sitting at the bar, looking out at the strip, and everyone's just kind of meandering, stuff like that. And I see this dude just not running, but just like walking with conviction. Um, I said, that's him. I knew it right away by by the way he was walking. He gets shit done. That's it. But that's but look what he's done in life. There's it's not an accident. How you walk is a microcosm of how you approach your life. Look at people that you know that are kind of ethereal and they kind of look around and it'll happen when it happens. And then you know people that just get it done, right? How do they walk? I I bet this is true 99% of the time.

Yeah, my my memory automatically flashes to a good friend of mine, Dave Sillerman, who now runs uh uh Crosslead, which he worked with. He was Navy SEAL, worked all the way up to the ranks where he was liaison to uh Congress for the Navy SEALs, and he walks exactly like that. Yeah. He's always, and ever since I know him, because we were on the same water pool team in high school, since the age of 14, he's always walked in the head of the pack with purpose.

Well, let me tell you this too, for the ladies watching this or hearing this, aside from all the other martial arts, I've taught self-defense for years. And when a woman walks with conviction like that and strong, you are so much less likely to be a victim of an assault. It dramatically reduces because they're gonna the guy's gonna think, this chip's gonna fight back and I might get kicked in the junk. But that's but if you're kind of meandering and looking around, this is for men and women, but that unfortunately women are often a victim of this. Walk with authority and conviction, stand tall, move briskly, and then approach life the same way, and you're gonna win twice.

That's awesome. So if you had a message for you had a magic microphone, right? You can talk to all the fitness pros and fitness entrepreneurs out there. Um, is there any message that you would give to the whole industry, right? As far as maybe like as compared to other industries, maybe blind spots that we have in the fitness industry, or maybe something to keep their eye on, or or just maybe, you know, a point of inspiration. Is there anything that you'd want to tell fitness professionals? Just keep learning.

We all have so much to learn. And I see in my Facebook newsfeed every day that everyone's a coaching expert, everyone has a $10,000 package telling you how to make a $10,000 package, you know. It's sickening uh at times. There are a lot of very good coaches and trainers, super smart, very successful, highly educated, they've done the work and they've earned it. And there's also a bunch of Yahoos out there that have no idea what they're doing, that are fooling people in the industry and the consumers, and that pisses me off. And and because the internet and good social media marketing kind of levels the playing field for the uninitiated or the really creative, um, people get screwed over and it's sad, it's a bummer. And so um I actually just did a um a video uh for my coaching program that makes fun of this. And so hopefully you'll see it on Facebook. But I'm I'm sitting very stoic in my house, real quiet, and I look right at the camera and I say, I'm a fraud, I'm a con. I'm a charlatan. If we were having this conversation 20 years ago, all of this would have been true. But unfortunately, people sit in expensive homes that they've rented for the weekend to shoot a video like this, and they stand next to expensive cars to give the illusion of success, but the only victim is you. You know, and then I so but but I start the I almost went through the whole script. I but I start it saying like I'm a con because I want people to go, what's going on? What? Because there's so many people are so full of crap. That that's my you know, like my warning to everyone is do your due diligence. You know, it's okay to rent a home once in a while. There's no a lot of people do that for tax purposes or they're mobile or they're a digital nomad or whatever. There's nothing wrong with renting a home. But when people rent a home that is like 15,000 square feet and they have it for the weekend, and then they just do a whole bunch of video shoots and put them in the can, and then you know their buddy rents a G5 and then you you hold it on the tarmac for four hours so you can take 20 selfies in front of it next to the pilot, you're a jackass. I mean, come on. Everywhere. Don't be fake. If you leased it and paid for the the jet, you have a net jet fractional ownership, cool, take a picture. If you own a Lamborghini or lease one, or you have a Ferrari or something like that, cool. But don't just stand next to one and act like, hey, I'm Joe Bob Bitchin. That's stupid. And and and eventually you're gonna get found out, you know. So I I did all of that. I'm I I made fun of that and saying I was that person, but then said if I did this 20 years ago, I would have been because I hadn't accomplished those things at that point. Now I have, but at that point I hadn't. So it's gonna be interesting. I'm actually getting the final edit on that today. It's gonna be funny to see what people say. And you probably still won't believe it, too. What? You're gonna put that up on your Facebook? Absolutely. I'm gonna I'm gonna run that thing 24-7 and run and put a big budget behind it on Facebook. Yeah. And people will, I'm sure they'll there'll be some haters, but that's fine. Um look here, think of it like this. If you reach a million people, it's quite possible you have a five or 10, 5% haters if you reach a million people. That means you have 50,000 haters. But that also means you have 950,000 people who love you or at least want to hear your message. So don't let the 5% or the 50,000 get in the way of you helping the 950,000 who care. And that's hard sometimes. That's hard because you don't, oh, they hate me. What did I do? Well, if you really did something stupid, then that's different. You need a correct course. But if you're just out there helping people and you have a compelling message and they just don't like you because they're jealous, insecure, inferior, whatever, let them hate. It's okay. Um, I used to get so upset about that, and now I just laugh at it. In fact, I gotta tell you something funny. This is a true story. So it I was I was training uh with Corey Beasley. I'm not sure if you know who he is. He's a he's a well-renowned martial arts fitness and conditioning coach. He's a member of our MMA Conditioning Association, is also a good buddy of mine. And uh he's probably trained like 20 guys in the UFC. And so he was training me when I was getting ready for the worlds. And so we shot a bunch of promo videos uh on different stuff with it just on the iPhone, just so I could use them for social media and just to kind of monitor my progress and all kinds of stuff. And he has this one silly exercise called the blanket. And so you shake this like a sound blanket or a moving blanket, you know, the kind of heavy, ugly blankets, and you shake it like you're shaking ants off at a picnic. Uh, but you also move around like you're shadow boxing and with fast footwork and stuff like that. It looks stupid. You look like a complete idiot, but it's actually really hard and good cardio. And then like you'd superset that with like shadow boxing with uh dumbbells or resistance tubes and maybe a speed bag or something like that. So it's like agility, cardio, light, movement stuff. But doing this shaking this blanket and stuff like that, I and I was I'm in the video and I look like an idiot doing it. I mean, that just it just looks ridiculous. But someone hasn't done it, they it looks like you're a fool. And I I used to get so I'm I used to write back, and I'm like, I and this is an ad I was running on Facebook, and I said, You don't understand, man, it's really hard. You should try it. And then I can try to justify it and say, just try like three, three at two minutes with 20 seconds off, and then do like burpees in between or something like that. You'll see it's really tough, which which is all true, but you just have a bunch of haters, especially when you have a bunch of 20-something high testosterone ego MMA guys. Everyone's a hero. But what happened is that ad went to our MMA conditioning association, which has now trained all these UFC champions. I was running that ad, running that ad, and it was so effective, and everyone was making so much fun of me. This is a good lesson here coming up. Everyone is making so much fun of me that they're passing it along, and there's so much virality to it that the viral spread of it superseded my spend, and I was getting views for one one thousandth. I can't even say it, one one thousandth of a penny per view. Wow. So it backfired. It's sitting in the garage right now. That's a true story. Yeah, oh, that's great. True story. So so I I I and I took it off before I realized what was happening, and then I started, I looked at all the data. I'm like, wow, who cares that they make fun of me? This is awesome. So I I cranked up my ad spend and bought a new car. So it's so the the moral of the story is let them make fun of you sometimes. It's okay. Um, I've spoken on stage with um Ty Lopez. Everyone knows Ty is. Hey, I'm here in my garage, my Lamborghinis, but what I really like is my book collection. You guys have seen all this stuff, right? Everywhere. Um so I actually that's funny. I actually was imitating him on stage right before he came out uh last year at a Thrive event. But uh he's actually a good guy and incredibly bright. He has spent, he spends $10 million a year on YouTube ad spends. $10 million a year. He does about $50 million a year in revenue. He has a bunch of legitimate businesses. That mentor box, have you ever seen that that he does? That does $50,000 a day. And it's now the world's largest book subscription service. $50,000 a day in revenue. And he spends, he says about five minutes a day working on that business. The point is, doing all those things and allowing people to make fun of him, saying, Oh, I'm stupid, I'm here in my garage, this is my Lamborghini, and then people made a bunch of uh spoof videos and all this stuff. Some guy's next to his Yugo in the garage. He has like an old pinto or something. Hey, here in my garage with my pinto. And then it's just but he allowed people to make fun of him because of the virality. Let people do that. Don't be cynical. That's that's actually something he says too. Don't be cynical, uh just have fun with it. And that goes for everything you do. I'm sure there's people who love what I do, and there's people who hate what I do. I know and I rest well at night because I'm always in the service of other people, I'm always smiling, I'm always having a good time. I want people to be successful. And if I can play a big part or a small part, that's cool. And if I can't, then hopefully I can direct them to someone who can. And then everyone wins and it's all good. So if people want to be jerks, let them be jerks. But laugh all the way to the bank whenever possible.

Well, I believe you. I think you have uh a I think this is only a sliver of what you have to offer for people who are listening and I hope so. I don't know. How do they go out and how do they find out more about you? Where should they be watching you?

Okay, well, if look, if you're in in the fitness industry, you can get to all of our programs and all the things we do in all the different divisions of martial arts and triathlon and coaching and sports psychology, all that stuff. Just go to nestacertified.com, N-E-S-T-A, Nestacertified.com. And if they want to go to my website and they can get my podcast there, my YouTube channel, and all that kind of stuff, it's my name, johnspenserelis.com.

Thank you so much, John. This was really uh I had a great time. I laughed a lot. Yeah, you're excited. And uh I can't say thank you enough. And I'm sure we'll be in touch really soon. So uh have a great rest of your day and we'll be in touch. All right, brother. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Future of Fitness podcast and webinar series. Uh, we're working really hard here to keep great content coming out, and we'd like to express our guide to you by offering you a free seven-day marketing crash course. So here's how you can claim it. If you go to fitnessmarketingalliance.com forward slash free gift f R-E-E-G-I-F-T, and you enter the promo code FitMARK F-I-T-M-A-R-K, you can claim it that way. The other way is you can text us. So you can text the phone number 805-619-5550, and you text the word FitMark F-I-T-M-A-R-K. So thank you. Keep listening, go claim that offer. It's a ton of value. And if you ever want to get a hold of me, or if you have suggestions for guests, topics, or anything else, or if you just want to ask a question, uh, I always respond. You can reach me at Eric E R I C at Fitness MarketingAlliance.com and keep listening. We have a lot more coming down the pipe, and we'll make sure that we're keeping the value great for you guys. And farewell till next time.