If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind pump. Mind pump. With your hosts, Sal DeStefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. Man, I tell you what, I was really excited to have this young lady into our studio. I'm incredibly impressed with what she has accomplished at her age. I think when we first had her down in the studio, a lot of people were asking us, like, oh, she doesn't exactly line with all your guys' fitness philosophies. Well, no, we want to bring more of these kind of fitness influencers, people who are dominating in their spaces. Amanda Bucci on YouTube is massive. She just started a podcast, so she's starting to get into that space as well. And she does these influencer academy things. She's very big into charity. She has a very interesting story, highly intelligent young lady. When we get on the podcast, she gets pretty vulnerable. It's a good interview. No, it's an excellent interview. And here's the thing, man, there is something to learn from everybody. I mean, I know we've got well over 10, 12 years on this young lady, but to be as successful as she is at the point in her life, I'm extremely impressed. I wasn't there at 20, was she 24, 25 years old? I wasn't there. No, no, she's a kid, but I mean, she's got great charisma, obviously a lot of talent, very, very smart, smart in business. There's a lot of stuff that we talked about off air where it was quite impressive. It's very impressive to see someone build that kind of a business in that short period of time, especially at her age. And she's extremely growth minded.  Like, listen, this girl is young. She's up and coming. She's already arrived.  And she's not stopping there. She's not settling for doing that. Like she's continuing to surround herself around other brilliant minds and like minded people. And she's learning, man. And it's very fascinating. I was excited to be a part of that. If we can play one small role in helping her continue to grow and develop. I love her message. I think she's coming from a pure place. Absolutely. And she's inspired, you know, millions of young ladies looking into getting into fitness and exercise. People who want to build muscle or burn body fat, all that stuff. She's inspired quite a bit of people. And she follows right into that realness. Like we talk about this in the show all the time that transparency is king. And the future of success on the digital streaming media is for people to be transparent and honest and real. And that is something that she is. And that was something that attracted us to her. That's the reason why we reached out and wanted to have it because we like what she's doing. And we like how she's doing. And I think she's got a really good message for the most part. Her last name is spelled B-U-C-C-I. So you can find her on her Instagram at Amanda Bucci. You can also find her AmandaBucci.com. You can also find her Amanda Bucci on YouTube. And then her podcast is called Bucci Radio. So you guys can find her at all those places. And we also did a YouTube. So if you guys are not subscribed to our YouTube channel, you guys can go to our Mind Pump TV on YouTube. We did a cool little What's In My Bag with her. And if you're not subscribed already to the YouTube channel, every single day we drop a new YouTube video. And we're doing more and more of the vlogging and entertainment side. So not only are we trying to provide lots of education and information for you guys as far as the fitness side. We're also trying to give a little bit of the entertainment side. So if you guys are not subscribed, go to the YouTube channel and check out Mind Pump TV. Also, if you're a new listener, if you're just popping in right now, the program that we recommend everybody start on that we offer is Maps Anabolic. This is expert exercise programming. It comes with workout videos and blueprints. It's very different from the other kind of workouts you may find out there. It's extremely effective at building muscle, improving performance, building strength, whether you're a man or a woman, Maps Anabolic is typically where we tell people to start off. If you want more information on that, go to MindPumpMedia.com. And again, without any further ado, here we are interviewing Amanda Bucci. First question, tell us about your parents. That's the first question. They go right for the heart. Absolutely. Did we just get started? Yeah, we were all. Pretty much. Tell us about that. I want to know how you started, like how this all went down. Okay, so my mom's name is Linda. Hi, Linda. She's probably watching this video. Oh, hi, Linda. You did a good job. She's totally watching. My dad's name is Tom. He probably doesn't know what live video is. So not saying hi to dad, but he exists. Yeah, my mom is a teacher. Well, she used to be a teacher. She's a guidance counselor now. She's also part-time at working for me as my bookkeeper and just momager type deal. But she's awesome. No, wait, wait. She works for you? Yeah. Oh, that's you guys get along that way? Yeah, we get along. So it's kind of like role reversal. Like if she messes up, you're like. It's not like messing up. It's more like how does she balance mom and like working with me at the same time? Because she's very much protective over like the finances and like trusting people. I'm like, well, now it's a business and it's not really trusting people. It's trusting that they'll stick to their contract and their NDA kind of thing. But yeah, she's amazing. How long now? How long has she been working with you? Only the last like year. Okay, so this is relatively new. Yeah. And so far so good. She just started doing it. She's like, you need to keep track of your expenses better. I was like, okay. She like just started doing it. I was like, all right. So do you think about it to like what better person to look after your finances than your own mom? Oh, totally. You know what I'm saying? Like they're the ones that are going to be like, all right, listen. Yeah. You don't need to buy the goat. Like that's a waste of money. You know what I mean? Like what are you spending this on? No, but she started doing it and then obviously it just turned into like too much for her me to be like, okay, you can't just keep doing this for fun on the weekends. Like it turned into a thing where she was spending a lot of time. So now she's working with me. That's awesome.  Oh, totally. So my parents got divorced when I was around 12 and it wasn't like a bad divorce. It wasn't like I never saw them fight or anything, but she just, I lived with her. My sister and I lived with her mostly throughout the rest of our lives and she was like that independent woman like completely just going after what she needed to do to make sure she could provide for us. She went back to get her master's degree in the middle of like the divorce and I was moving and then us being in high school. Oh, she's a badass. Yeah. Yeah. She's a super badass. So I've always just grown up with like the independent woman mindset because of her. Oh, wow. Yeah. Okay. So that's definitely obvious. You can see your strengths that come from that. 100%. What are some of the challenges that have come from that from having parents that split at that age and then being kind of having a woman that's really strong but maybe not have the male side so much. Yeah. I totally can't, I guess, imagine it being different. I didn't struggle too much with it because I think I just didn't really know what was different. Again, the male figure in my life was never like super prominent. Like I saw my dad. I still see him and stuff, but it wasn't very like prominent in your face. Like we have a really close relationship. So I guess just, I mean, maybe I'm like an intimidating woman to men. Luckily, I have a boyfriend who's not intimidated by me, but I guess that's very much still a thing that happens. No, talk about this. I'll tell you what, that was when we met you. That's interesting that you would even say that. Right.  You're like, who are you bringing with you? I was like, no, buddy. Yeah. And you're so young. Right. I think that, so talk to me about how you've dealt with that probably turning off guys, because it's maybe too strong for a lot of guys. Oh, I mean, before I met Brian, I met him back in December. I was single for like three years.  But I was like, am I too, too aggressive or too, maybe, I don't know what the word is, like too, too intimidating or whatever, because a lot of guys are like, they want to be the alpha. They want to be like the person that's maybe taking care of. They're just insecure. Yeah.  You know, that you're interesting. That's fascinating. You say that. I mean, I trained a lot of doctors and surgeons when I had my wellness facility. And I had a few, I had one female surgeon and a couple doctors and all of them were single. And they were incredibly intelligent, incredibly confident. Female doctors. Female, female, but they would tell me that that was something that would happen.  Like, you know, if you meet a woman that's really confident and strong and makes more money than you, then maybe that means I'm weak or whatever. Well, it makes you feel kind of weird being like, you don't have to be the caretaker and like be the white knight or whatever, like take care of somebody. That's like a natural, maybe something men feel like they have to do as they grow up.   That's right. For the kind of people that need that, yeah. So have you always been like an overachiever? Kind of, yeah. Like I definitely grew up like enjoying school. I loved it. I loved reading. I loved learning. I was in like high level classes and stuff. I didn't always have an easy time, like especially with sports. I did not have an easy time. I loved intellectual learning and I excelled with that pretty well. But I didn't necessarily excel in sports super well. So I would love it. Like I loved the learning. I loved the challenge. I loved the athleticism. Wasn't super good at it. Hand-eye coordination is meh. It's funny, I have a trainer I told you guys about. He trains me twice a week now and we do some like boxing with the bag. Oh, I've seen your video about the bag. Speed bag. Oh, speed bag.  I'm so terrible at the hand-eye coordination. That takes a lot of rest. He's like, you got to do this and this and I'm just like, I can't. And then I would do one and then like it would go back and forth a bunch. Yeah. And then I could never get it again and it would be so embarrassing. So I still, he still has me practice but it's just same thing with like the cross. I played the cross in high school. Catching the ball was like the thing that held me back in the second chair. I was so excited. Cradling is okay. Couldn't even catch the ball though. Like just hand-eye coordination. That was my problem. Yeah. Do you think that made you better and stronger because you weren't the greatest at all those sports and maybe you probably had to work a lot harder? Totally, totally.  My mom was very athletic growing up too and my grandpa was actually a professional powerlifter. Went like back in the day. Oh wow. That's awesome. So you've got them jeans in you. Yeah, I got the jeans and he was super excited. Is it the Irish grandfather or the Italian grandfather? The Irish one. Yeah. He's so national. He was so excited when I started doing powerlifting. It was like amazing. But yeah, so she got me into the gym and it forced me to practice and become better so I can get better at the sports. Little did I know it wasn't really even the sports that I wanted to continue doing. It was the training and the getting better and the challenging myself was what I really liked and the program that I got into for in high school was essentially to get better at being an athlete. So it was like a strength and conditioning program for kids in high school, all ages. So it was like some middle school kids and some older high school. Now did you fall in love with it right away when you started doing this kind of training? Kinda. I liked the little group of kids that we had because I felt like I finally was decent at something and then the people in my little group became my friends. I didn't super love it. I wasn't like... Were you really popular in school? I was like that. There was like a weird person in between like the popular kids. It's alright. You could say you were cool. No, no, no. I was friends with the cool people but I also was in the nerdy classes and stuff. So I'm picking up on this not because I think that's what you fit in terms of that but it's almost like the way you're talking about working out you felt like you really fit in for the first time. Totally. So before that you didn't really feel like you fit into any particular group. Yeah, absolutely. Very interesting. Cool, cool. So you fell in love with it. You're doing it. You didn't fall in love with it at first. What was the group? Yeah. When did you fall in love with the training? I think I fell in love with the training when I started doing... I was in high school... Sorry, in college... I just finished high school, got into college and I think I was really loving it. I realized that I loved it so much when I didn't go to the regular college gym and I literally brought my car in order for me to get a gym membership. So I was like very dedicated to fitness at that point. I loved training and I loved making new workouts for myself and it was just really valuable to me so I think like the ending of high school and then into college especially because the last year of high school I played lacrosse because I didn't get on the soccer team so it was like the the backup wasn't super good played the bench junior year senior year I was like I still want to be on the team but I don't want to sit the bench the whole year so I'll be the bookkeeper so I did the books and then I was just like you know what I would rather spend my time at the gym around in the cold wet field in Rhode Island practice with the team and then not even play so it just drew me obviously to go to the gym more. Now a lot of time for a lot of people when we find this kind of passion for working out all of a sudden where it's like oh my god I want to do this all the time it's my favorite thing to do a lot of times it's motivated by you know it's a new thing that I've never done before or it could be I like the way my body's changing or it could be you know like for me what motivated me to really work out was based on my insecurities my body imaginations I was a really skinny kid so I fell in love with working out because I could change that and it was this thing I could manipulate and mold and did you find any of that for yourself? Yeah I mean I definitely was starting to feel a little bit insecure in high school it wasn't super prevalent though it wasn't like I never had those stories where I was like I feel like I'm looking at myself and I feel well I mean a small bit but it wasn't like a very prevalent part of my life in high school I would say in college I did my first bikini competition because I was very like body conscious and I liked training and I did want to like look better I didn't look bad by any means I wasn't like overweight or anything always kind of healthy focused on that but I never nailed down the nutrition part of it I always like exercising but nutrition I would be a pretend flexible dieter and I didn't even know I would eat egg white omelettes and salads and then I would also just like love Oreos and whatever the heck else yeah it was like by accident so it wasn't necessarily because of that but I got into the competition because I saw somebody a friend of mine do it and I was like oh my god that must be like the secret missing link to like me getting to look the way I really really want to it was like the next level for me that I was like did you feel like you needed the competition to motivate you to get to that leanness or was it just the training and stuff for it that you were I think it was like the nutrition for it that I was like oh this is like I was trying some different things I would um I would just try to eat cleaner I remember in my I forget freshman or sophomore year of college it must have been freshman year because I would do five weeks before Halloween because like I don't know Halloween I was in the sorority we'd all go out and wear like slutty outfits and shit but that's what Justin does so like get ready for the Jasmine costume what's slutty outfits that you wear I'm a mouse duh oh your mouse he is the French maid he is the reference I did we'll connect here don't worry keep trying keep trying oh ok well back up I tried to basically eat clean before Halloween so I could look a little bit better and I was like it worked a little bit but not really it was like a couple weeks you know so it I realized how quickly I could change by changing my nutrition and I was like oh wow it was a meal plan though and I did it for it was a five week prep for like my first little OCB show I did so it was like eat this you know specifically this is the same food was it the standard you know tilapia asparagus type of so you thought it was a missing piece little did you know you were about to embark on some horrible dieting stuff I mean some horrible shit yeah well luckily so it was only five weeks and I realized at the end of it I didn't obviously had no idea how to get back to normal eating but I was like I didn't get into the whole let me just eat clean forever because that's the only way I like stopped after the show and I was like I don't want to I don't want that anymore that's terrible I don't want to give up like things that I like so that's when I found flexible dieting and I was like oh this is the magical piece and then I started doing that and then I prepped myself for a show using flexible dieting and it worked great and I was like this is great and I would do the whole like let me fit pop tarts and candy and ice cream into a bowl and like all that and then I did my first competition second competition using flexible dieting and that was when I moved to Los Angeles for the first time that like the the second show that I did was in the middle of the summer when I first moved to LA so you're in Rhode Island at this point you come to LA you're doing the competitions you're starting to be more aware of this whole world and you know looking at yourself a lot it had to be a massive culture shock and then you go to LA and then you go to Venice yeah what was that like because like LA is like the root of all like insecurity like you go to LA and all of a sudden you're like oh man Vanity land was it like had it been total polar opposites huh would that challenge you even more or were you like this is great it's California kind of I was definitely like naive and just gung ho to just be there I did get there I did my competition I felt really great about myself but it wasn't I was in Venice it was like weird people everywhere super diverse culture tourists everywhere I was a waitress on the Venice boardwalk on it sweet crazy people everywhere walking up and down every day and it was just thongs and roller skates and our attire for the restaurant that I worked at was like whatever the heck we wanted there was no and then I also worked at a restaurant back in Rhode Island and our attire it was like a fine dining restaurant I had like a button down and a tie and they were like okay there was this one girl that would wear like those Sophie shorts and like a crappy t-shirt I was like you would like just wore your pajamas what are Sophie shorts like those cottony shorts that like cheerleaders wear I guess oh yeah cotton shorts I didn't get away with that I appreciate that what's wrong with that I wear those all the time I would so you moved yeah what are you starting to put together you're now over there you've done this you've done it a couple times enough to get in competing shape so you've seen yourself probably in the best shape I would imagine in your life what things are you starting to learn about yourself like in just your relationship with exercise and food what are you starting to piece together at this point well yeah this is where it will kind of take a turn for like the negative so I I did the show it was great and all that stuff and then in the middle of the summer the show ended and I had friends come to visit me in LA I was like oh my god so fun it was my birthday I was like did you have the awareness right then when it happened or is this like you later like looking back oh I had it right there oh shit oh shit this is fascinating so that was the summer that I started binging a lot so it must have been probably it wasn't that long and it wasn't as severe as other people but it was definitely like binge eating a lot I had like a little calendar on my bulletin board that said like this many days no binging and like I would have to do that whole thing let me ask you this when you're doing this and so this entire time you know you're doing it you're writing it on your calendar what are you thinking like while it's happening are you thinking like this is weird this is a strange behavior I need to be more aware of it or I was very confused number one because I had heard of some people doing it but they were the clean eating people and I was a flexible dieter so I was like I didn't deprive myself of certain foods why is this happening little did I know caloric deficit is why it's not necessarily and it also probably was because of the flexible dieting a little bit more too because like because you're introducing you're introducing those foods all the time those foods are engineered to get you hooked on them and so when you're introducing them like that and then you put yourself in a deficit and then you get freedom afterwards and that's really it the root of it really is the mentality around food and the relationship with food because what happens when you do competitions to a lot of people not everybody when you treat food that way even if it's flexible dieting you there's two gears that you have there's either I'm on or now I'm off there is no lifestyle that exists other than those two so when you're on you're on and when you're off you go way off totally this is no different than the way scientists now view addiction with drugs in the past or for most of the time we've understood addiction or what we thought we understood of addiction was based on models of mice or rats being put in a cage and given the option of drugs or water and food and of course the rat goes back to the drugs over and over again until it dies and we're thinking there's a chemical dependency but now scientists realize that if you take that mouse and you put it in like mouse heaven or rat heaven give it access to food and fun and sex and all these other things and you give it access to drugs very few of them become addicted also the environment or the state of mind that the person's in and so when you're in that state of mind where I'm on diet or I'm off diet when you go off you go off you see what I'm saying it's like this moral thing that happens you see this happen with almost everything else so at this point this is happening with your relationship with food what are you starting to do at this point how are you piecing it together how are you moving forward from that yeah I mean again I struggled a little bit I would go into the cabinet get the cookie butter jar eat it all and stuff like that so my I guess like the biggest thing when I was thinking about it was how can I stop myself from from the starting point that will like trigger it's the trigger thing like what's the trigger how can I you know stop doing that and the only thing which is not something that I did because I wanted to cure myself I started another prep and that's not necessarily obviously the thing that you would do is to cure that or fix that or whatever but I was just like that's the only way I know how to be motivated and stop doing this so I did another prep I probably started that three months after the last one had ended and I was just like you know what I'm gonna do this and then that went really well I did another one I did another show it went great and then the binging did come back a little bit but it was less so so I was focused more on after that prep it was focused on like okay I'm gonna do a reverse diet I'm going to focus on getting my calories up I was doing all this myself too and I was like I'm not going to binge and even that mentality still being in my head and the whole on off thing you guys are talking about it's very much so like off season and on season so determining between the two it was always very difficult because that's where the freedom comes in that's where you start to feel like you can do whatever especially when you're focused on flexible dieting so much so it was I think I slowly was starting to like think about it being a lifestyle but I didn't really know how to make it that yet now what role you're doing YouTube at this time hmm no Instagram Instagram are you at this point because I think I had like 10,000 followers because you're very transparent to your audience to your followers and fans were you transparent at this point with your Instagram were they aware of this with you and was this part of you helping yourself with your awareness sharing it with them yeah actually yeah I was like very good about sharing I remember the first time I shared it and I was like terrified to share it and I made like I bet you got incredible feedback all of the great feedback people always appreciate that yeah and then you have like no idea now the amount of times that I've shared things that are like terrifying or struggles I'm waiting for the feedback because I know so many people are just going to jump on it and be like thank you so much but when you first do it people are going to think about me but it's it's all your laundry out there for the world one of our one of our early episodes was on our motivations for when we first started working out and it was all I mean we were all insecure at some point you know being the skinny guy or whatever not performing and we talked about it for an entire episode right and it was it felt really good like doing this is very therapeutic that's why I asked you if if it played a role and you becoming aware of what you were going through it definitely plays a role for us but yeah you're right after we did that I remember after we did that episode I was like oh man I wonder how many people are going to hear that even just doing YouTube and podcasting is therapeutic talking about yourself absolutely it's like you have a therapy session with either yourself or with other people yeah and it's it allows you to just express that in the safe environment how many shows have you done at this point where we're at right now in your life because you did 8 total you said right yeah so are you 4, 5 in how many you in right now 3 oh you're just 3 in right now now as you continue on this journey and you start doing more shows are you each time kind of picking up things and learning like this is good bad what are you going through as you continue to progress and you're learning about your relationship with food now and exercise yeah totally so there was a few things that I picked up the second time that were like a good slash bad so the first thing that I picked up for my first like structured reverse diet was that the more food that you eat doesn't necessarily mean the more muscle you're going to build in your off season so I had to go through like getting a little fat and I was like oh this didn't work and then I also realized that the more food you eat in your off season doesn't necessarily mean the more food you're going to eat in your prep because I had to get lower in my second prep and I was like I'm so confused like why do I have to eat less because I did my reverse diet and like it should have been magical like it should have just allowed me to eat more but that doesn't necessarily happen this was your fourth yeah I think your metabolism is now starting to react to all the shows totally yep and that was like my metabolism reacting to the shows it was just it was just getting there so I did three shows that summer I did one national show I didn't place one local show that I got overall and then another national show that I didn't place that so I was like okay like whatever and then I started a really strict reverse diet again and I stayed really lean it was one of those where you would add like 50 to 100 calories or so every few weeks stayed super lean even got like a little leaner after the first show and then I went out and I did I did it very strictly and I was tracking everything and I was still into tracking everything I was very like I was living alone I had I'm new to LA again so I didn't have too too many friends and I was just like I have no reason to go out and eat something off my meal plan or my macros or whatever because I don't have that many friends I was like I don't have a boyfriend I don't have date nights like none of that so I was just like why would I go all by yourself or do you have family there? I had um so the first summer that I lived here was just for a summer and then I met people at my waitressing job so when I moved out for the second time permanently I had that like couple friends that must have been a huge growth period for you oh yeah that transition totally especially because I'm kind of like introverted and I won't necessarily just go meet people I'll be like I am in the same space as you but I don't which contest did you start to really put this together is at this point where you're like okay my metabolism is reacting a certain way I need to yeah and I knew I wanted to do the reverse diet thing too however I also that year entered the bodybuilding.com spokesmodel search so here it is I finished my competitions in July August comes around September comes around and then you apply to the spokesmodel search and I got in so I you know you need at least double the time that you went to homeostasis at least I never did more than like four months so three months or so went by I applied started dieting again for the spokesmodel search and I specifically remember that winter it was over the holidays again I was in LA I didn't go home for the holidays I went in between because I still didn't have a lot of money and I was like it's really cheap to go home between November and December I'm going to do that instead of go for the holidays and I hung out with my friends tracking all that for Thanksgiving and I was like you know what it makes me feel good I'm going to do that and I'm like prepping for this bodybuilding.com spokesmodel search and I remember specifically for that it was like an eight week prep for that in the middle of the winter and I specifically remember when my body just stalled and I was like so fucking pissed I was like are you kidding me like why do I have to do this I remember being so angry that I did like fasted hit cardio in the morning because I was like why isn't this working I don't know ok let's spawn it'sjego the opposite what's happening is you know you gave us you said something like it should take you twice as long to come out of your prep as it does to go in or something like that well like if you prep for four months at least eight months off so I've heard that and people have repeated that a lot of times but I think that's just given by coaches right it's just like if your body learns to adapt especially through repeated exposures to subcalorie diet and lots of energy expenditure, you start to develop adaptations that last much, much, much longer. I would imagine. No different than when you lift weights or try to build cardio. I'd imagine coaches say that so they can get their clients back into a prep. It depends on the person. But if you start to notice- Well, some coaches just don't know, too. That's what I dealt with. I mean, a lot of the coaches that I talked to when I was going through the NPC and IPV, I kept thinking that as I moved up the rankings, I would meet these just really brilliant coaches that were giving really good advice. And a lot of it is passed down kind of bro science from one coach to the next of, because if you take anybody for 12 weeks and you restrict them by 500 to 1,000 calories a day and you tell them to do cardio for an hour a day, two times, you know? They're gonna change. Yeah, they're body, you're gonna get lean. But it's what you're doing to that metabolism and then what happens afterwards that I don't think a lot of them are really talking to these girls and guys afterwards. I met a lot of men's physique and bodybuilder guys that couldn't figure it out. And they get on the off-season, they put on 40 pounds, you know? It's like so bad and none of that is good weight. I mean, literally you're maybe getting 10 pounds at most if you're an anabolicly enhanced of muscle and they're the 30 is all bad weight. And it's funny because we will refer to it as a damaged metabolism or my metabolism's broken. But in reality, your body's doing exactly what it's supposed to. Super efficient. It's becoming very, very efficient. It's doing a good job of doing it. But it does so by down-regulating receptors for certain hormones, which then your body produces more of those hormones to try and give you the same effect and you get this kind of cascading effect. You get in women a progesterone estrogen imbalance that can happen. Many women will lose their period or won't menstruate. I lost mine for a while. Yeah, and so that's, and by the way, that is a very obvious, and I want, I know we're on your channel when you have a lot of female fans and for those people who diet and want to compete, like that is a clear sign that your body is getting very adapted to becoming efficient. Not necessarily a bad thing, but kind of is, especially if you keep doing it. Well, Amanda, were you, did you notice any other signs? Were you going through like, did you notice like sleep or energy? Hair loss or scan? Did you do anything else you go through? No hair loss or anything, but definitely energy, definitely the sleep, especially last year. So back kind of like to the timeline thing. So the spokes model search happened. That was in January, took two months off, gained 10 pounds in like the two months. So I was like, I'm gonna do a little bit of a bulk before because I had planned on starting this prep. So I was like, I'm taking my YouTube channel seriously. I'm going to do this prep and when I document the whole thing, I had this whole like elaborate plan. And that prep got me from like 6,000 subscribers, like 100,000 in six months. So it was like, you know, all of these things kind of happened for like partially for like career purposes, but there was lots and lots of dieting. So did that second prep that year and then again, it was like really low, really low calorie. And then I like lose the timeline, but the prep this past year was the worst one and it was very low calorie. I would like take naps after I woke up and ate my breakfast in the morning and it was just my energy was super low. I felt like brain fog and all of that stuff. No hair loss or anything. And I also wasn't doing that much cardio. Like my coach took more of like the lower calorie, less cardio approach for the adaptation purpose. And that's rare. That is very rare. He's a very smart coach. So obviously you had a good coach. Yeah, he's a very good coach. So, and he kind of just flowed with what I knew was my best career moves at that time. And he's really aware of my health and aware of the after.  So it wasn't that bad with the cardio, but definitely like the low calorie mess with my energy a lot. But I was just like, I'm gonna keep doing it. Did you notice any digestive issues through this process? Yeah, yeah, I had some digestion problems, especially there was one point in like one of the preps that I did where I was eating like broccoli slaw firm. And I was like, I can't, I was like, I can't, like what's going on? Like I was so bloated, so bloated. And then he was like, you know, broccoli is one of those vegetables that is really, what's the word I'm looking for? It's salt high and sulfur. Yeah, I said that as a question. Yes, cruciferous. That's the word. Yeah, so what happens is, especially through hard training is you get this hyper inflammatory response and the gut becomes inflamed. That's your gut response to everything. As it becomes inflamed, you get- I'd also be very bloated on show day. Cause I was like stressed. You get inflammation, the gut causes dysbiosis, which is gut bacterias often. We know that controls so many things from mood to added to all that stuff. But besides that, when your gut is inflamed, the food you eat the most, some of it will travel through the gut lining and your body develops antibodies. And you develop food intolerances, which is super common with competitors. Because they'll eat the same food over and over during this like starved state and also this hard training state. And it just sets up this stage for this immune response. And then all of a sudden they have food intolerance. It's like, oh, I- To all the food that they're used to eating. That's usually where they'll start happening. You'll find like, oh, I used to be able to eat that. Now it makes me super bloated or it makes me constipated or whatever. Wow, wow, wow. So at this point, so this is happening. When do you decide you wanna stop and not do it anymore? So last year, what's it now? October? It must have been a year ago now.  I'm gonna do these shows. I said that I was gonna do them. I finished them and I literally started breaking down.   Did you break down on your channel too? Yeah. Oh, wow, so you did that for them. Yeah, I've done that a couple of times. Keeping it real. Keeping the crying in there. Yeah. I don't know. I tried that one time. It didn't work. Really? I was like, no, we believed it. Yeah, yeah. What was it really about? Somebody had just- So this actually, this is still, I would imagine you're still probably, I mean, kind of growing through this. It's only a year ago that you did your last show. I remember what I found that was really crazy was when I was going through the process, I was fully aware of what should happen to me afterwards. And I still partook. I still would find myself kind of binge eating on stuff. Totally.  And it was like, whoa, if that's happening to me, like how many other people, like they're just oblivious of it, aren't really thinking about it, right? Like that's what went through my mind right away. So last year, after that last show, I had a couple trips planned. So like I went to New York, I went to, I forget where else, Vegas for the Olympia. And I was just like, I am so burnt out. Like I know I shouldn't be doing this, but I just ate whatever. I wasn't necessarily like binge eating.  And that like went on for a few months.  But I did it too frequently and too long. So I gained 20 pounds last year. So I was like 113 on stage and I got up to like 139 was my highest this year. So it was like 25. So last night we had dinner and you kind of saw something that I hacked into myself that I created because when I was competing, I found that just going for a walk afterwards, like are there new rituals or habits that you've now created that were positive that you've kind of taught yourself from the whole competing process that you do different now that you weren't doing before? Yeah, totally.  So I was like, I have to de-stress whenever I would feel very, very stressed because I'm like prone to anxiety. And my body would just react like my gut would react very, very bad. So I learned how to meditate and read and relax. So I started meditating because of prep. I still not want to do it super consistently, but I do know every single time I do it. And it's one of those things that I'm working towards doing it daily. So it's not something that you can just do to fix your stress. It's something that you can do to prevent it from happening frequently and more strongly for yourself. So that's definitely the number one thing that I've learned how to do since competing. Anything that you still kind of struggle with like that you maybe see yourself catching bad patterns or habits are kind of starting to go back to. Do you ever notice anything? Yeah, let me see. There's definitely, I guess, some just food focused stuff and then training focused stuff. So mindset behind training. Now it's not fully there, but like my goal is to just feel good with how I'm training. I'm still getting out of the mindset of like I will do this to look better versus I will do this to feel better. I'm like so getting there. I'm definitely on the other end of the spectrum more so now. Doing things for the motivation to look better is definitely a competing mindset. You're moving very quickly. Yeah. Well, no, you're moving so this is. I surround myself with good people. Hyper aware. And you know what? I will say this. We've said this all the time. Maybe you can chime in on this, but since we started the podcast, I grow at 10 times the speed I did before. Oh my God, yeah. Same thing for you. Yeah, totally. Yeah, maybe because we talk about it so much and we talk about ourselves. That's not the feedback we get to be given you. The minds that you're hanging around with. I mean, it's always nice to meet other really growth minded people and then listen to their journey and the things. I think we pick up something from every interview that we do with somebody. Yeah, totally. So out of all the things you're doing, the YouTube and the podcast, where is most of your focus going right now? Are you really trying to put a lot of energy in the podcasting arena more? Like where are you thinking business wise right now? Yeah, so I mean the podcast this year didn't require a whole lot of my energy. Like it was easy. I live in LA. It's easy to meet people. It's easy to just do it. And then I have like an editor and someone who does the blog posts and stuff to get it up there. Haven't focused on growing it too much in podcast realm. Like I've done podcast interviews and I think like you guys said earlier, that's like the number one way to get exposure for podcasts. So I'm trying to do that more but this year was like so much growth and change and transition and like stretching myself with business, my own physical fitness goals, my mental wellness goals. I can move to a new place. I got a new boyfriend. There's all these things, like new businesses, obviously the podcast, my coaching clients. I started a fundraiser with a couple of friends for pencils of promise. Like there's all these things that I'm doing this year for like building purposes. So I'm like laying foundation for stuff this year. Do you ever feel overwhelmed at all with carrying all that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. What do you notice in yourself when you see that coming? Like the way that I react to, yeah. So there's like interestingly enough, I talked to Jordan Syat the other day on a podcast and he worked for Gary Vee. You know the trainer Gary Vee, yeah. And he told me that Gary, he won't physically show his stress to other people when he's overwhelmed because it doesn't allow anybody else to feel good about the situation. Like it just makes it worse. I'm the opposite. I make sure everybody knows that I'm stressed. Which is probably healthier. Let's be honest. Yeah, I let everybody know. Sometimes I just get really overwhelmed and anxious. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just not feeling it today. Yeah, it's just one of those things where I kind of just get really overwhelmed and make sure everybody knows. I have to talk about it. I have to have a plan of action. If I don't have a system in place or a support system in place because I've hired a lot of people this year for my team.  And then delegating to other people is important as well. So when I kind of realize I'm getting there, it's either like something has to give or I have to put something else into the system like another person. Do you have any mentors or anything business-wise? Like people that are really helping you with this right now? Yeah. So I hired Louis Howes this year and we started in January. He has this mastermind program. That's 25 or 23 of us or something like that. And it's a year-long program essentially. We just get together three times a year. We'll do calls once a month with each other and just talk about what each person is either struggling with or going through or we need support on. I have learned so much from that group this year. It's like absolutely crazy.  It's not just about business growth, but it's about personal growth and the impact you're making on the world. So not even just Louis, but Louis is really good at bringing together amazing people. So the people in the group, we've all like really been able to- You have to expand on. I just, what I find so fascinating about that is someone at your age to make the decision to make that type of investment. Yeah.  No, let's talk about that. I'm so mature. I'm sure a lot of people watching right now or listening right now probably don't know how much that costs. I know it's not cheap to do that at all. No. It's a major, probably could have bought a car instead. And you didn't go buy yourself a car. You decided to rent- Yeah, I know Honda Civic though. But I mean, let's talk about that. Where did that come from? I mean, who, I would have never thought to do that at that age. Like I would have gone and bought myself something if I had those kind of funds. So who instilled that in you to reach out and continue to grow yourself like that? That's a good question. I think my mom again was very much so, I'm always been very practical because of her. I've always not really been materialistic. Like things to me don't really mean a whole lot. So the reason, the thing that sparked my interest in the program was that throughout the last year or so, not this past year, but 2016, I was growing my business just on YouTube. And I realized last year, like I wasn't really an entrepreneur. I was just doing YouTube, having sponsorships, did really well with just promoting my sponsors and vlogging. And I was just, it wasn't really promoting so much because I was just vlogging and living my life and they just showed up. So it was really easy for us to have a great relationship. And I wanted to take a step back for making so many videos every week. I was like, I don't want to really vlog that much anymore. I also was like last year gaining the weight. So I was kind of insecure to be honest, making videos. And I was just like, I need something else that's not me having to be like, look a certain way.  YouTube's so great, isn't it?  Thank you guys. Shout out. I'm just kidding. The people watching are nice. Troll69. You know who you are. No, really though. YouTube can be tough like that. Talk about that. What was that? I, we shared on the show. I mean, it was the one time I got emotional on the show. It was when we first started. I got like a lump in my face. It was like, it was like our first like. It was brutal. Our first non five-star review that was left on our show. And it was totally directed at me. And like, I remember like that feeling of the first time that happened. It hurt my totally single mouth for no reason. I don't even remember. Well, here's the worst. He gets so mad. No, the worst part about it, here's what happened. This is why I was, this is why I was, he hated it so much because it wasn't a bad review on Mind Pump. It was a great review on me, a great review on Justin. Everybody's great. They left us apparently.  I get rid of Adam.   It had to be an ex-troll for me. Yeah, no. I don't think I have, literally I've been, I'm friends. The things that they say that like hit you right where you're already insecure and you're like. Well, you know what? That's why you grow so fast. So happy. And that's where I was heading with that was, you know, what it was a major eye-opening thing for me to realize like, whoa, like I can't believe that affected me like that. And it pointed out my own insecurities. Totally.  Are you, do you guys get into this? I don't think they're, my students in particular are people who are really just getting started. So they're totally not in the realm of like being bashed yet, you know? I feel like you have to maybe break a certain threshold for people to like use, you gain a lot of success and then people start to just care about being mean to you. So they're not there yet, but I will eventually, but yeah, learning how to deal with that stuff is like a whole other podcast, it's interesting. What do you say when people ask, like they meet you and they don't know you and like they ask you like, well, what do you do? Oh, that's, yeah. What's your job?  I say that I have a YouTube channel, podcast, own a couple of businesses. I don't like, it's hard to even say what it all is. So I kind of try to- You don't have an elevator pitch? No, I need to build one. Cause that's been so, it's evolved so much this year. It still is. I'm in the middle of like a rebranding with like a marketing guy. What's the why behind what you do? Like why, why do you do all that? Oh yeah, so my overarching goal is essentially to show people that they can do something that makes their life feel fulfilled. Like they feel fulfilled in their life based off of either what they do or their mindset behind why they're doing it and what they're doing. So whether that's fitness, whether that's health, whether that's their business, that's my overarching goal. And that's why I like to focus on the value of the podcast episodes and the YouTube videos. That's why I'm like vlogging. It's not really helping anybody. Maybe it's entertaining, whatever. It's, I don't feel connected to it. That's actually really cool. I feel the same. I feel it's more the soap opera part of the business, right? The people just want to kind of connect to the day to day stuff. It's like, what are you really learning or getting from this? But then talk about what that's like to feel almost attached to that because you know that there's a ton of people. Probably. And that's how you start it. People want that. And I rewatch my old videos and like these are really fun. I kind of miss them, but I just like don't feel inspired to pick up the camera in the same way anymore. And I get like being a role model based off of how you live your life on a day to day. You know, like there is value in that. Just like seeing how someone lives versus like just talking about topics. It's like you can really see what you're doing and what the other person is doing and then how they live and how you live. And I get that to an extent. Yeah, but when do you have your life then, right? Like what is yours? You know, what do you have for yourself that you're not sharing with everybody else? I think a lot of people don't really think about that. I think a lot of people probably look at you and they're just, everyone, they're very envious of all the people connected to you and that look up to you probably. No one thinks about like, what does that mean for you?  Right. What's it like for you like outside of your relationship with your boyfriend? What about like friends and people you hang out with? Do you get a lot of time with that or do you sometimes almost feel alone for somebody who's connected to so many people? Yeah, there's totally that like aloneness feeling for the massive connection. And I think that's why when I first got started with YouTube, again, I don't have that many friends. I wasn't doing a whole lot of stuff. I was like alone to like, YouTube was my family. Like they were my friends. Yeah. And it was just like funny. Yeah. But that's where it came from and that's why I like was so excited to do it every single day. And now that I've kind of like built my life and I have businesses, family, friends, friends and family. I live with my boyfriend, but friends and family I probably could be way more connected to if like taking steps back from like what I'm doing during the day with business stuff. I probably could spend more time with them and talking to them and being more connected to them. So yeah, there is that struggle of like I want to show my life still but like I also have a really great one now and I kind of want to keep it to myself. Not in like a selfish way, but just. Well, no, it has to be. You know, it's necessary. Yeah, and it's not. And it doesn't even matter if it's selfish, it is.  You know what I'm saying? That's what I've been learning a lot. And that's a very important thing to understand because as much as I'm a parent, so I have two kids and it's very easy to fall in the trap of being a martyr for your kids. But the reality is I'm not gonna be a great dad or the father that they deserve if I don't take care of myself. If I'm not my best, then they're not gonna get my best. Absolutely.  Everybody else. Absolutely. We were, we talked a little bit about this earlier when we were getting coffee but I want to ask you here on the podcast. Are you, what drives you to do what you do is are you driven by inspiration and by your passion or are there other things? In other words, can you find yourself, are you able to do things you're not necessarily inspired to do or is that like death? I used to be able to because I thought that I had to do everything on my own. I didn't know anything about teams. I didn't know anything about outsourcing. I didn't know that I couldn't just hustle and do all like heavy effort, heavy grind, heavy hustle. I was just all in on the hustle and I had no idea about anything else. Like I would work just morning and all the way to the night. And again, like not really a whole lot of life outside of that. And I was like building and I was okay with that until I again realized how much more there is to life. And I was competing. Competing was building my YouTube channel. Things were going so well. My Instagram was growing. I was connecting to a lot of different people and it was just going well for that. And the grind was the only thing that I really knew. So now that I am able to take some steps back, I'm really motivated by time, like quality time with people. Quality time is my love language. I don't know if you guys do love language tests. Have you ever done that? I've read the book. What's yours? I think I'm a touch guy. I'm, you know, I like, I'm gonna receive gifts.  Gifts is the best. I like shiny things. Ah, interesting. Hence why I said, that's why I was so impressed that I remember getting to a point where I had that kind of money. And I know mine stems from as a child that didn't have a lot of money at all. We were poor. And so when I finally got to a place where I could buy things for myself, it wasn't until I was in my late 20s that I really start to reinvest into my personal growth and education. So I find that really fascinating that you did that early. But I also know too that mines stem from my childhood of wanting shiny things. Interesting. Is one of them a communicator or something like that? Words of affirmation. There you go. That's me. Cool. Yeah, for sure. So you're a... Quality time. Quality time. Yeah, so quality time is important to me in terms of being able to have the time to spend the quality time. So I'm motivated by having more time.  Or like going to dinner or like enjoying myself with people. I really like one-on-one or like two-on-one or three-on-one interaction. I'm not like a big group type of person, but if I can get quality time with people, that's what I'm motivated by and like the people that I really care about. So because you said you weren't a material person. Yeah, just give certain my last one. So do you have a big, like do you have a good concept of money or for you is it more like I love what I do and this is great also. And then sometimes I'll go on vacations. Yeah, that's kind of it. I never really had like a bad view of money, but I also didn't, I wasn't poor. Like my parents did well. They were able to pay for my first year of college and then I got student loans. I also did my waitressing on the side so I can make money. But if I ever needed anything, like my dad would come down and take us out to dinner and give me and Lindsay like 50 bucks or whatever for the week and stuff. And so I wasn't like poor. I didn't have like a bad view of money, but like whenever I started, I was really, really into making money for myself. I was like, I don't want them to give me anything. Like at some point in the middle of like early freshman sophomore year of college, I was like, I don't want, I don't want you to give me stuff. I want to like work for it. So, what was your question, original question? But well, the cost, so some people- Oh, the money question. Yeah, it's not like, when I first, when I was 19, I was managing Jim. So I had staffs, 30, 40 people working for me. And I was making six figures and this is back in 1998. So it was a lot of money, but I didn't have any concept of it because I lived at home. I didn't really, I didn't buy things. I don't care about things too much. I just loved what I did. And so it was just like, oh, cool, I'm making money and I just put it in the bank. It was like the, yeah. It's like- It wasn't a big deal. Right. Yeah. Do you find yourself like that? Yeah, totally. Yeah, like there's, it's there and you're like great, but it's more of like, now I'm like investing a lot back into my business. It's just an exchange now. It's not like, you know, when you get to a certain point where you feel really comfortable, it's, there's not much more that will make you happy aside from less money problems. So once you hit a threshold where you have minimal problems living, I feel like after that is where it's kind of, I mean, for me anyway, personally, it's kind of like, it's an after effect and it's more for increased growth. So like the more you can make, the more you can invest back in it and the more it can be better and the more you can build better relationships and the more time that you can have and, you know, like investing into things that will give you more of like whatever you're motivated by, whether it's time, whether it's like some people are motivated by, I forget what test it is, but someone said there's like time, challenge, money, and like something else. So some people are very motivated by- Beer. Yeah. It's like the Facebook survey I just filled out. Yeah. Awesome. Depending on which color you like, it tells me. Yeah. Well, time is mine. What characteristic about yourself would you think or would you attribute to most of your success? Is what would you say has got you this far, like that you've leaned on the most, like I'm this type of a person and that's carried me this far? I think honesty, it's like a weird thing. I guess the one constant in all of my social medias over the last, I don't know, since I started was like me just being very honest about everything. Really open, really transparent. I don't hide my feelings. I very much so express all of them all the time. And I think that's helped me get to where I am today just by whether it's connecting with my audience members or just being open to people I work with or people that I love and live with about how I'm feeling. And that's success in all areas of life is because I've been so honest and I haven't been shy to ask for help. I don't feel disempowered, is that a word disempowered by asking for help or like being the person that's looking for growth through other people, like educators, mentors or whatever. You would be surprised, well actually I was surprised, I don't know if you found this that when you ask people for help, they usually do it. Yeah, that's great, thank you for asking. It's very nice. Yeah, it's great, like you'll go up to someone who you think like why would this person help me? They're so- Well you have to ask it in a certain way. Oh, like how? Like you can't expect them to just, I mean it depends on who you're asking, why you're asking it, if it's someone that you've, maybe they have 400 videos on their YouTube channel and then, I don't know, however many podcasts and then you ask them what's the best way to lose fat. That is the worst thing you could do because you haven't done your own research. Like you have to do your own, maybe trials and errors for yourself, like you go through this, this and this and you're like I wanna get to the next level, I think you're the greatest person to help do that. Versus like hey, can you help me oh it's super love if you answered my DM. It's a little different. Yeah. I love that you addressed that because that's something that we all deal with, that's a challenge, right? There's people that all of a sudden drop it on the page or they heard from somebody that oh, ask the mind pump guys and you just come directly in, you ask a question that if all, if all you did was go to our YouTube and see that we've categorized- Or like your website, like get your programs, you spent time building. Right, like the least could do that because it is tough for, and I think you're very similar to us where we're trying to connect with as many people as we possibly can and answer as many questions, I can't go around and answer everyone's specific question, especially when I've already created something for that exact answer. Totally, you spend time creating things so you don't have to answer that question a thousand times. Right, right. I know for us, I just love meeting people. So if people ask a question and I think they're genuinely asking or whatever, I'll answer it. We had- It's a vibe you get.  I'm like, because you asked. Yeah. You know, it's cool. We get to meet new people. Yeah, totally. So looking forward, what are you excited about moving forward? Where do you wanna be in five years, 10 years? What's the big plan? It's funny you asked that because this is the first year that I even envisioned what a five-year would look like. Last year, if you asked me this, I'd be like, I don't know, everything has changed so much. And now I have actual businesses versus just making YouTube videos and having sponsors. Obviously in my head last year, I knew that wasn't long-term and I was like, I don't know what's next, but now I kinda do. Main focuses are a couple different things. The podcast is like so fun for me. It's a really number one great way to connect with really fricking awesome people, like you guys said. Like the amount that you learn through speaking with other people is just mind-blowing. Like even today and yesterday, meeting you guys and just talking with you guys, you guys are so experienced in podcasting. You have so much life experience in so many different areas. You guys are all really different, but you have a lot of value to bring as a team and as individuals. And then it's just, again, it's really fun talking to people. I think it brings a completely different type of value to audience members. You get to hear from different people, different perspectives, and the whole purpose is to give you something that you can take away and you can learn and grow from yourself. So it's not even like we get to grow. It's like everyone else gets to grow with us and it's great. So I love that. And YouTube is a little like that depending on how you set it up, I guess. So figuring out how I kinda wanna create video content that connects and resonates is something I'm going through now. I have my businesses, so my coaching clients that I have absolutely love that. My goal is not just to get as many people and shove as many people in there as possible, but to actually get these people, the results that they're looking for is really important to me. So consistently working on building that and making it better, making the experience better. I just had a live event this last weekend and it was just the experience for these people. They cried. They figured out their life purpose and I had a life coach come in and stuff. That's awesome. What scares you about all this? What are you most? Not being good enough. Oh, I was so scared when I first started that. What do you mean by that? Not good enough for everybody else or what do you mean? Not good enough to get them the results that I'm telling them I can get them, I guess. Do you feel like an imposter sometimes? Oh, totally. I know that I've had success for myself but I know so many people have success for themselves a little bit and then they coach people and I don't want to be that person but I know that my heart's in the right place and I know that I have the right resources and the right drive to make sure that I do everything I possibly can to make it the best program ever. But it's still new. It's not like I've been doing it for 20 years and I used to be this and I have this background in business and I have this background in this. I don't but I have the heart and the drive and the genuine care to make sure these people get what they want out of it and like last weekend was a confirmation for me that I am doing the right thing. This is very similar to what it's like for coaching our clients, getting clients in shape. Totally. And of course, you know, 80% of them still fail at that because it still takes them to put the work in. I'm sure that's very similar with what you're doing with the influencers.  I actually like totally compare it to fitness coaching because I completely am aware of when you are a fitness coach, you can be really great but someone also still might not get results because even though you're really great and what you're giving them is really great and maybe you've given them everything in the whole entire world but they still might not succeed for whatever reason within themselves. So I like comparing things to fitness and fitness coaching because they connect a ton. Right, a lot of parallels with that for sure. And again, being the coach, I remember having to kind of figure this out and then you also get better at, I think, setting the table for them, the expectations, right? Giving them better perspective on, all right, listen, you're not going to just turn on your Instagram or your YouTube and all of a sudden you're going to have a half a million people. It's going to be hard. You're going to go through this. Like, is this a lot of stuff that you guys talk inside the class and stuff? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like an intensive program. So they are very aware that it's not going to be some magical quick fix. It's a lot of like mental work. It's a lot of emotional. If your brain and your mentality isn't in the right spot for you to grow and stretch yourself so you can help other people, it's got to be worked on throughout the process. So you've been around a lot of great minds. You're a part of the Lewis Howells Group, which I think is awesome too. Single bested business advice you've gotten. Oh, so hard. Invest in a coach. Grant Cardone was one of the speakers at one of Lewis's events and he said the best investment he's ever made was his $3,000 that he invested in his first coach. It just helps you accelerate way faster than you would if you try to just figure it out on your own. Cause we all want to, super ego boosting if we can figure it out all on our own, but when you have people who have been in your shoes and are where you want to be and they're just, you're paying for their insight and their wisdom, it's like, it makes so much sense. It's invaluable. It's invaluable. I think another reason why it's a lot of people don't do it is when you hire a coach, it's like, now you're serious. Oh, totally. When you pay, you commit. When you pay for something, especially expensive. And that's scary for a lot of people. Yeah, it's high ticket price, yeah. You're like, oh, I have to actually do it. I'm not just like paying 200 bucks for something super quick I can get online and then just like, it sits there. Like, no, no, no, you're committed, you know? Any bad advice that you've been given that you just totally like, oh, disregarded, that was terrible. Oh, that's good. Bad advice that's terrible for business to just focus on social media. It's like, that was where my main focus was just, it wasn't necessarily because of business. It was just because I started on social media. It was fun, I liked to share. It just kind of happened. I kept doing it naturally, but not necessarily for business. But I think people think that, yes, you have to be on it, but no, that's not the only thing you should focus on. You should focus on things that move the needle forward for you, building out the things that you're going to be doing, not just like building out your social media and like making it pretty and then like engagement and the algorithm and all that stuff. Like, yeah, it's important, but it's not the most important. Right, what comes after that. Yeah, like, you know, yeah. What do you find then with people like that? Do you get that a lot where they're so focused on that? But then at the end goal, it's like, well, what are you going to do that with? Because we talk about this on the show a lot, a lot of times people think- It's like when you're focused on supplements. Right. Instead of like building your fitness foundation, it's the same thing. Right, right. You're talking about splitting hairs of difference by the supplements you're taking. Like, that's not a big deal. Well, that's what people see. That's why. It's what they see. They see the, that's the surface. And so- It's not the, it's under the iceberg. That's right. So you see the surface and for the average person, that looks like it's the most important thing because that's all they see. They don't see all the other stuff that's beneath, that's the real work. Well, I also think that people don't, a lot of people don't see, I think you put a lot of thought into even the pictures that you post and the content that you put out there. What are some things that speaking to the YouTube and audience and people that are probably wanting to be influencers, what are some of the do's and don'ts with social media and Instagram? Oh, this is good. So some of the do's are definitely to storytell. Storytelling is like something, like one of the most important things you can do as someone who's trying to grow and build a tribe and connect to people because people connect through stories and you are the only thing that separates you from like the next person who's doing fitness on Instagram. Obviously you can like create really creative content.  So definitely differentiate yourself, not only differentiate yourself, but tell stories. Things to not do is again, just focusing on the wrong things, focusing on only doing it for the likes and the engagement, but like making the impact is more important than the amount of followers and likes that you have. So people are just like, how can I get more and more likes? I'm like, what, are you doing anything with them? Like are, what are your people liking your stuff for? What are they getting out of it? What impact are you making? Cause it's not even just about the followers anymore. Like, yeah, having followers helps you get more opportunities cause people see it as a status symbol now. Like even you guys are like, oh, it's a great opportunity to get you on.  Just call this out right there. A snap. I was like, no, but the impact that you're, like if you're small and still growing, focus on like, how can you make the few people who are already following you lives better? Cause if you're just an extra person that's just like posting pictures of themselves, emojis for captions, you know, there's not like a whole lot of substance behind what you're doing, you're not going to make it in the long game. Like you're just going to, you know. Well, do you just want attention? I mean, is that why you're, you know, that's the thing, people have to ask themselves like, why am I doing this for attention? Cause if you just want attention, that's easy. But if you want to turn it into business or if you want to help people or whatever. Attention's easy. Attention is very, very easy. It's, I mean, I can't tell you, there's, there's pages that have, I know pages with a quarter of a million followers on Instagram who will try to sell a product or a program that they're put together and we'll get no response.  All they care about is liking their pictures. To marry you, you know, that's about it. Well, if you're, if you're also intending to, you know, start a social media to build a business, what are some of the things that maybe were good investments for yourself? Like to get started, like, did you, do you use like a better camera for like photos? Do you use, is there certain like stuff that you use for YouTube that's worked really well for you for someone who's just starting to get started? Yeah. I think in terms of cameras and stuff, honestly, like if you're going to get started with photos, like an iPhone, it's pretty good. If you don't have an iPhone or an Android, like turn the HDR on on your iPhone or whatever and focus on really good lighting and focus on all that stuff. Having a good camera totally helps. Having someone take photos of you who you trust that can take good photos that knows angles, that knows lighting, that's definitely the biggest game changer for attention and marketing purposes. Cause if you're taking shitty photos, like no one's even going to see your stuff. Like no one's going to click on it. No one's going to find it. No one's going to care. You know, it's just the attention game on Instagram, especially is super, super strong. You have to scroll and like be something that pops out.  It used to be able to kind of be the bare minimum that you can do when it would work, but now that there's so many people growing on social media, there's so many people that have a lot of followers and there's so many people that are signing up every day. So it's the attention game. Now, do you follow a lot of like the new apps that are coming and do you find it important to use Snapchat and Twitter? And like, what do you recommend for people? I think it's important to use Instagram stories.  If you're using Snapchat, that's cool too, but Instagram stories, if you use it, it's like the poor man's vlog. I heard someone say that once. I was like, oh, that's good. But vlogging, I think is super connective and emotionally connective because you get to see what people are doing right now. You get to see their faces. They get to talk directly to you. And I think a lot of people forget that they should talk to people. You should speak to your people. You have to talk to them, not just like take a photo of your sock. That's cool socks. But like, I'm wearing chucks. I hope that this, you know. He doesn't normally do that. So like instead of you just taking your photo of your chucks and help the people who like chucks or also connect to you, talk about something that connects to them versus just taking the photo and being like someone's gonna scroll through. I think a number one Instagram stories helps with the algorithm. Instagram wants you to use it. If you use all the features, even better. I think Instagram stories is super important. And then Twitter is cool still. I think it's hard to connect all the social medias together. You can, but you have to purposefully have to like be intentful and strategize how you do that. Strategic. Strategic. I think I was trying to say that, but I was like, I'll make it up for you. Yeah, great, great. You personally have favorite platforms that you use for one just because you like to use it and or two ones you find convert to money better than others. Email list converts. The best. That's it. Everybody says that. Everybody says that. Well, I did, so interestingly enough, I did a launch that was like a very marketing style launch where we did email list stuff. But I also did Instagram and social media posts and like I did YouTube video stuff. I'm almost positive, almost like 75% of sales came from the email list sequences versus me posting and telling people about it. I also spent a lot of time with that launch, hyping it up months and months before. I had a Facebook group that we would ask, answer questions in about the program. I made videos showing what I was doing with it. But if you're doing digital stuff, it's really hard to like visually show your experience with it, you know? It's like, I'm on my computer again. Here's another thing of me working, you know, it's kind of just hard to show that. So I did talk about it. You have to do like dramatizations, like Lego stuff. This is what I built out today. Yeah, seriously. But definitely focusing on like hyping it up and building it up and being really excited about it on your own social media is great. But I do think email list is still the king for conversions. Everybody we've talked to says that that's, and probably- It seems so dinosaur, but yeah. It seems that way, but I think- People are used to clicking on things in emails though, you know? Yeah. They're not used to clicking on Instagram. Where you do most of your business if you think about it. And it's also, it's not like you're just emailing random people. Like these are people you've been talking to you and helping through email, so. Yeah, and you're not just like selling through them to selling them through email all the time. Like you're writing maybe valuable stories or valuable tips. Like I'll like share things with my email list a few times a week that are like helpful to them. Send out podcast episode blasts and all that stuff. So like things that they like to see. It's not just like- So there's value there, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you work a lot of hours? Yeah, I'd say so. I would do less. What time do you start? What time do you stop during the day, be honest? My goal is to start at eight and my goal is to stop at four. But like lunch in between. That's not bad at all. That's your goal, but what happens? That's a goal. I just started having that goal two weeks ago. Okay, awesome. So. Is it working? Kind of. Over the last like few weeks there was some things that were already in place like this meeting today. And I mean, I guess it's still like nine to four or whatever today. But yeah, there was like still some things in place that I was like, okay, I can't get around that. But like my goal is to just set up like meetings and interviews and any other just computer work during the day. So I'm not doing it like in bed at night and stuff like that. So like my goal is to make sure that everybody who has responsibilities to do things for like the next day on my team is all doing them during those hours. So I have to get back on.  There's so much bad information. And it's especially to women and girls and to have a young girl like you who competed and did all that, but sends this great, positive, honest message is awesome. That's why we like having, that's why we wanted you out here on our show. Yeah, thank you guys. So I really appreciate it. It's encouraging. Hopefully we're best friends now. We are. All right. We're awesome to talk to you guys. Well, she already told us what her favorite podcast ever. That was the next question. I'm sure we'll offer. Definitely think that we'll, this will be a regular thing.  We go down to LA all the time. So I'm sure we'll- So a quick hour flight. That's right. I'm sure we'll do plenty of collaborations in the future. I was super excited to have you here. It's been an absolute pleasure. Thanks so much. You can find us at Mind Pump, our website is Mind Pump Media, and we also have a YouTube channel, MPTV Mind Pump TV. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Superbundle at mindpumpmedia.com. The RGB Superbundle includes maps anabolic, maps performance, and maps aesthetic. Nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by Sal Adam and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints and over 200 videos, the RGB Superbundle is like having Sal Adam and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction of the price. The RGB Superbundle has a full 30 day money back guarantee, and you can get it now, plus other valuable free resources at mindpumpmedia.com. If you enjoy this show, please share the love by leaving us a five star rating and review on iTunes, and by introducing Mind Pump to your friends and family. We thank you for your support, and until next time, this is Mind Pump.


So here's where we're at, chat. We are currently six and one. But here's the thing, what does this team need most, chat? Okay, not new coach. You guys say new coach every time. That's not what I'm talking about. Calling it quits, a leader wants to discuss his future. Hey, coach, I've been feeling a lot better recently. Still not where I'd like to be, but as long as we're winning, it shouldn't take long to get there. Okay, Lyle Collins is not gonna retire. Listen up, listen up, listen up, folks.  There's one thing that matters to me, okay? Commitment to excellence, okay? Commitment to excellence, that's what I care about. What is this, who can tell me? Who can tell me? What is that?  That's what that is, that ain't excellence.     What do you mean the cowboy suck? We gotta go out there and we have to, we have to establish a ground game against it as a defense. We have to control the damn ball. Coach, what does the word excellence mean? I can't do words good. Listen, excellence is everything that you need in life, okay? That's being better than your best. You know what's excellent, coach? Ice cream.  We gotta win a damn game. Who's that, wait, is that guy's last name, bro? What does that say, B-O? Bird. Bird. That's caught by the big tight hit, OJ.  Dude, let the kids play the damn game. Why you won't let us do that? Oh my gosh, man. Dude, why are we playing so bad? Let's go Carl. Let's go Carl, look at this. And sometimes all your best ladies fight. Nice. Look, hey, Ben, don't break, chat. We're gonna Ben, don't break. Big sack. Big sack. Okay. Patterson goes and a 47-yard run. No way. What? I pressed the button like a whole second ago. And this is right down the middle. Sorry, hey, we're tied. If you're a coach or a player, you can either really look forward to them or really dread them, depending on who you are. Good sack, dude. Dude, Gordon Carl, freaking killing it, dude, after having broken ribs to start off the season. Oh. I, dude, I roughed the passer. No, I roughed the passer. And it's a first down, dude. Have some hand-to-hand coordination. We're 7-1, okay? We're the best football team in the NFL. That's right. That's right, we are. What? What? Dude, the ball literally hit you in the chest. Okay. Oh, my gosh. We just got so lucky. Good job, Dean. Good job, Dean. Good job, defense. Yes, fan. Frick, just run. Why did you spin? Right here, look at this. Boom, interception 100%. 100% chance on this drive, interception. Oh, what? What did I, hey, what did I say? What did I say? What did I say, Jeff? I told you. Look, listen, that's just the amazing coaching, okay? That's just the amazing coaching on display. We're gonna take the lead right here, ready? Oh, Odin, dude. Nice, dude. Let's go. Nice, money, dude. Lowell, the speed. What happened in the last two minutes of this game? I got upset here.  Not right there. Really, what a last two minutes of football? Hell of a job. That is a team effort right there, okay? We're about to go into the half down about three points, which already, I'll be honest with y'all, I was happy with that. I was happy with that. But you know what y'all did? Y'all went out there, okay, and you said that ain't enough. You said, come on, Joe, that ain't enough. That's what you said. And when you had the opportunity, okay, some people might have said that was lucky. That was not, that was not. Coach, go pause the game, y'all worked. We lost five yards. What? Can't pause, let me even pause the game. What are you talking about? This ain't no game, son, this is real life, okay? So y'all need to go out there in the second half, and we gotta keep doing that, okay? We gotta keep being prepared to take advantage of the opportunities that come about. Coach, we are in the middle of a play. Why are you in the locker room? What? Wait, where is everybody? The game's started, game's started. Oh, Lord. Here we go.  Oh my gosh, touchdown, touchdown, 100%. Oh! Let's go for a ball team. Let's go, let's go Murray. Dude, I feel like Murray has not been that good lately. We don't need to kick a field goal here, so let's fake it. Oh my gosh! Why? How did he get through that? How did he get through that? I have no idea what just happened.  Wait, did Gordon Carl get hurt again? Dislocated shoulder? Dude! He's so good when he's healthy, man. What? No!  No! What? Here's a pick. No, Daniel Cummings. Basemass. Thank you, Reptiv and Dunlop again. Lyle Collins injured again? Torn labrum. Dude, we just convinced him to not retire and he tore his labrum. Okay, you got to catch this one. Nice. Oh, dude, why am I... Why was I on fire earlier and now I just keep doing kicks? Ben Malone, user-hits-stick-fumple!  Wait, I called it the end of the game. What the heck, dude? Thank y'all for joining me today. We had a hell of a football game today. We did. I was very, very happy with the performance that we had. I thought that Patterson did a damn good job. I think we got a little sloppy towards the end of the game. Okay, the end of the first half was pretty incredible. Pretty much everything went our way and we did everything that we could with that way that it went. Patterson, obviously, is a threat with the ball in his hands a little bit. He's got some speed to him, too. Mr. Underscore must-ash here with the T3 times. Yes. It's been four years since you took over the head coach spot.  Any plans on how to fix that? I would call our defense opportunistic. Whenever the opportunity arises, they will fail. I think that as time goes, that as a very young team, both offensively and defensively, hell, I'll be honest with you, as far as talent goes, I think this is a Super Bowl caliber football team. And coaching as well. We're a Super Bowl caliber coaching staff as well. But what I'm talking about is the intangibles. Are we gonna get the effort? Or are we gonna get the consistency? You know, that's what I'm referring to. You know, obviously, we have the talent, we have the coaching, but... Mr. Underscore must-ash here with a follow-up. Oh, of course. What does it feel to be the only team in NFL history to have more punt fakes than actual puns? Well, you know, that's what we call keeping them on their toes.  What we do is we fake a lot of puns, and then whenever we do punt, we catch them off guard. We catch them sleeping a little bit. So that's why our puns are incredibly effective. It's really, we're going for the long calm there, and I'd say it's worked out quite... You know, we gotta keep running the ball a little bit better. We gotta, we have the... Coach, Ed Verde, ESPN Dallas. Yes. Did you pay Mike Evans to not score on that play? He had opened field ahead of him and ran into your team instead. Any comment? Fear. You know, I think, I didn't do any of that now, but I think he had fear in his heart. I think he had fear in his heart and his mind.  I'd probably be scared too. Hey, Coach, Jeremy Sprinkle here from the ex Dallas Cowboys. I'm now homeless. Wait, why? How did you get in here? My family holds me in failure, and I live off scraps that Debo gives me from the locker room. How did you get in here? Thanks again for dropping me a couple years back and ruining my life. Security! Hey, hey! I'll see y'all next week. Security! Coach, any thoughts on how wide we've been this season? Hey, we are always wide.


South Africa's power crisis is worsened, with state-owned enterprise SCOM extending stage 6 power cuts, which involve 6 to 8 hours of outages or more. The crisis in the country has been going on for months, and SCOM authorities and the African National Congress-led government have been harshly criticised for letting it continue. What is the current situation in the country, and how have the government's policies led to it? Bhagamele Khlubi Majola, the National Spokesperson of the National Union of Metal Workers of South Africa explains. Yes, so unfortunately, SCOM has just announced stage 6 load shedding. We've ramped up from stage 4 to stage 6, which means there will be an increase in the number of hours that we will not have electricity. And of course, this is just part of the continuous energy crisis that South Africa continues to experience at SCOM. As NUMSA, we see the energy crisis as really existential to our survival as a country, because until we can actually get a handle and we are able to control this persistent load shedding that we're subjected to on a daily basis, there's no way that we can expect any meaningful economic growth to take place. And this for us is something that requires urgent intervention. According to our own research, according to the CSIR, we are losing about two billion rand a day as a result of persistent load shedding. So really, this is something that we've got to resolve because of the socioeconomic conditions that the majority of the working class in South Africa are exposed to. Well for us, first of all, we do believe that the ANC government is not really serious about dealing with this issue. We think that because the ANC government, from the time that it took over running this country, it has been driving an agenda for privatization. What we see in terms of this persistent load shedding that we're exposed to, we see this as an example of how energy generation in this country is going to be privatized because as long as there's no solution to load shedding, then we will accept any cost for the price of energy as long as whoever the service provider is, is able to guarantee energy supply. And if you look back in ESCOM's recent history, we had GCEOs of ESCOM in the form of Brian Walefe and Matelo Coco, who were actually able to reduce load shedding significantly even to the extent of eliminating it completely at some point. And now where we are under the leadership of André de Reiter, South Africa is subjected to the highest levels of load shedding in the history of ESCOM's existence. We have the lowest energy availability factor. This is having a direct and detrimental effect on all businesses in this country. And certainly us as a trade union, because we are losing members as a result of job cuts and retrenchments where so many of the companies where we are organized, certainly in the manufacturing sector, are closing down or shutting down or retrenching because of the impact of persistent load shedding. And if you look at what the ANC has been driving, they've been driving the privatization of state-owned enterprises. And as long as we don't have a solution to load shedding, then it becomes easier to justify the involvement of private energy companies in the provision of energy generation in South Africa. And we feel that this is ultimately where they're taking us. They want to be able to basically involve the private sector as much as possible in the generation of energy in South Africa. South Africa has also been in the news for its ambitious plans to shift to renewable energy. The government recently launched the Just Energy Transition Investment Plan. However, it has been slammed by critics for failing to give any major role to ESCOM and instead trying to include private players. How is the Just Transition linked to the wars of ESCOM? Well, as Noom Sir, we aspire to the principles of the Just Transition as defined by the International Labor Organization. And the ILO is very clear that the process of transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy must be a process that does not disadvantage the working class majority and future generations in any way. And what we see when you look at the process that's being rolled out in South Africa currently is that the South African government has taken decisions which in fact will disadvantage the majority of people. First of all, the companies that are going to be tasked with rolling out renewable energy are going to be privately owned renewable energy companies. ESCOM has not been allocated a role to play in providing renewable energy that has been handed over to the private sector. And as Noom Sir, we feel that if we are genuine about dealing with the issue of climate change and if we're genuine about tackling the impact of climate change and how it's affecting the poor and the working class, then the thing that would actually make sense would be to give ESCOM 70% of the renewable energy market because in so doing you are forcing ESCOM as an entity to transition and to depend less on coal but to also form part of this process of being able to contribute and provide renewable energy as a solution for energy in this country. And the fact that the NC government has not allocated ESCOM a role in this to us means that they're not serious about adhering to the principles of a just transition. Right now ESCOM employs a minimum of 30,000 staff and if privately owned renewable energy companies continue to dominate in rolling out renewable energy, then it means ESCOM will shrink. It means more and more workers will lose their jobs. And again, this violates the principles of a just transition which really are about protecting communities, protecting workers, protecting their jobs and their livelihoods. And we're not seeing that with the South African government. Secondly, if we are to transition in a genuinely just way, then renewable energy should be in the hands of the state. The state should own the technology so that communities and workers and the country at large can benefit directly from it. If it's going to be strictly in the hands of the private sector and what we were seeing is that so far, those who are dominating are foreign owned privately owned renewable energy companies, then where's the benefit to the working class majority? There's no benefit. It's simply another example of capitalist extraction for the benefit of the private sector. And it's not going to result in what just transition is actually trying to achieve. What we know, for example, is that the CSIR has said that at least 100,000 jobs will be lost in the province of Umbu Malanga if there's no social plan which is devised to ensure that workers in those communities are either upskilled and retrained or the whole economy of Umbu Malanga is sort of realigned so that it can play a meaningful role in renewable energy. We're not seeing that happening. And so this is why we're saying that when the South African government claims that it's implementing a just transition in South Africa, they are perverting the meaning of that phrase. They're perverting it because this transition is dependent on loans, which will have to be paid back, very, very, very expensive loans costing billions of rand. And at the same time, there's no ownership component, which is going to benefit workers and communities. And at the same time, we're expecting hundreds of thousands of job losses. So this is why we have a real problem with this process because at the end of the day, it's going to be the working class and the poor who are going to suffer. The private sector is going to become extremely rich from this process. Electricity will cost more. And it will mean that the poor and the working class, again, will be denied access to something that really is going to assist in development. And what will this mean for South Africa's development agenda when we are beholden to Western Europe in the form of extremely costly loans? It means that our developmental agenda is reversed. It means that as a country, we will never escape the profile of being a developing nation because we will now have to pay back these loans. And these loans will definitely affect our growth as a country. So this is why we are raising the alarm and doing so very loudly as a union to say that the just transition in South Africa is unjust and will result in more suffering for the working class and the poor. Is there any way to turn around ESCOM and ensure better power supply for working class South Africans, as well as bring about a sustainable transition to green energy? Well, we believe that ESCOM can be restructured in the sense that, first of all, what should happen is that this process of breaking ESCOM down into three parts, that should stop. You have to change ESCOM's balance sheets. In fact, if anything, you're going to duplicate roles because you're going to create three separate companies that are going to require executives to run them. So you're actually going to increase ESCOM's cost burden from a salaries perspective. Secondly, as I mentioned earlier, ESCOM should play a greater role in renewable energy. And if we were to do that, we would be future proofing ESCOM for future generations. We would be ensuring that this entity is playing a positive role in this climate change crisis that we're facing. And thirdly, if we are genuine about a just transition, then we would choose a path that is number one, affordable to the country. And number two, results in the least loss of jobs as possible. And most importantly, results in the empowerment of communities and the working class. That is how, that is what a just transition looks like. It's a process where working class, the working class and communities are driving that program for their benefit. And where they, in the long term, it results in the long term sustainability of the masses, not in the enrichment of an elite minority. That is what a just transition is supposed to look like.