Sam and Shaan do a dedicated fitness episode, walking through their full “body stacks” — every dollar they spend on training, nutrition, equipment, and recovery. Sam breaks down his $15,000/year system, and Shaan shares how he went from completely unfit to building sustainable habits. They discuss discipline over motivation, hiring coaches for everything, and why fitness is ultimately the best use of money for an entrepreneur.
Speakers: Sam Parr (host), Shaan Puri (host)
Introduction: Why a Fitness Episode [00:00:00]
Shaan: The point of business and money is to live a really long and good life. And the best way to do that — money is maybe number two. Number one is just being fit.
Sam: I wanted to spend ten minutes talking about my personal — well, I was like, what do engineers say? They say “tech stack,” “marketing stack.” Let’s talk about our body stack.
Shaan: All right, it’s Friday, and we’re going to do something a little different. People know us for our brains, they know us for our money, but they also know us for our bodies. Me and Sam were doing an episode, and for some reason we got on a thirty-minute tangent about fitness as an entrepreneur — what we do, more specifically the routines, the things that are working for us, the tactics, the goals. So we decided to make it a separate episode. This is the body episode.
Let us know if you like it. Sam, what are they going to get by listening to this?
Sam: I name-drop lots of products that I pay for. None of these people have paid me. I’m more than happy to accept payment from them. If you’re one of these companies — or a competitor — pay us. Willing to be bought.
Shaan: So anyway, it’s a twenty or thirty minute episode on different fitness stuff — the things we spend our money on to be fit, which is kind of more important than the whole making-money thing. Because if you’re not fit and you’re not healthy, you can’t really do that thing.
One of our friends — super successful, been a guest on the podcast before, worth hundreds of millions of dollars — said this once. I can’t use their name because it’s a little not politically correct, but they said: “If you’re rich, there’s no excuse to be fat.” They said that because I was like, “Man, you spend a lot of time working out — what are you trying to do here?” And they said, the point of having financial freedom is to be able to spend your time doing things that are luxuries, things that make your life better. And one of the things that makes your life way better is having a good fitness routine and being a healthy, fit person.
Sam is extremely fit — in the top point-one percent, probably, of founders who are fit.
Sam: Yeah, I mean — that’s an easy game to win, maybe.
Shaan: And I’ve been going from pretty unfit to now, as we say, I was the before-before photo, and I’m getting to the after. So you get both perspectives — somebody who’s all about that life, and somebody for whom it doesn’t come easy but they’re making it happen. Enjoy the episode.
Sam’s Craigslist MMA Trainer [00:03:30]
Sam: All right, how are you?
Shaan: I’m sore.
Sam: From what?
Shaan: So I went on Craigslist — I wanted something. I think Craigslist is massively underrated. If you want a job, Craigslist. If you want a couch, Craigslist. If you want to learn something, Craigslist. Whatever you want, Craigslist has got the thing for you, and it has the most liquidity.
I was looking for a new chef, so I went on there, immediately started getting hit with responses, and I was like, “Why don’t I use Craigslist more? Look at these responses, this is amazing.” So I was like, what else do I want? Craigslist is my magic lamp, the genie, and I need to make another wish.
I go — remember that video of Mark Zuckerberg? This is the part I learned from you, which is describe it like a kid with no filter. I literally just put up the post: “Hey, I was on TikTok and I saw this video, it looked awesome, I want to do that. Will somebody come to my house to just train me kind of like that? I’m a beginner, I don’t even really want to ever fight — I just think that looks like a really fun workout. I don’t know who I need, you don’t have to be an expert, just somebody who could watch that video and if you think you could do that for me, call me or text me.”
I posted that and immediately got a hit from some guy who’s like, “Hey, I did anime for ten years, I could totally train you. I trained with the Diaz brothers in Stockton, I’m a Cesar Gracie purple belt, I’m a striker.” He calls me, I’m like, “All right, do I need any equipment?” He’s like, “No, you don’t need anything.” I was like, “What do you do during the day?” He’s like, “I’m a handyman.” I was like, he’s like, “This is cool because I’ll get back into shape too.” And I was like, “Sounds fun.”
Sam: Did he fix a bunch of stuff at your house afterwards?
Shaan: No, but in my mind I was like, dude, I’ve been looking for a handyman too. My wife’s always on me about building and assembling things and hanging things. I was like, this is a two-for-one, baby. Which basically means this guy was probably looking for handyman gigs and just happened to see this and was like, “Oh, I used to whoop ass.”
He goes, “What are you doing today?” I was like, mentally not prepared to immediately get in a fight today. So I said, “How about tomorrow?” He goes, “All right. What time?” I said, “Morning.” He goes, “I’ll be there at 8 AM.”
He came over looking like a handyman — comes over in his handyman boots, jeans covered in paint. He rolls up with a set of keys that has like fourteen hundred keys on it. I was like, “Bro, do you have the keys to my house? What’s going on here?”
Sam: He did the whole workout in his jeans?
Shaan: In his jeans. Throwing kicks in his combat boots. I was like, what the hell is going on? But he knew what he was talking about. He trained me, and I am still super sore. I had to ice my knuckles, my hand was in so much pain last night. It was great.
Sam: Did you do some reference checking?
Shaan: No, I don’t do reference checks. Did you guys wrestle or do jiu-jitsu? Did you roll?
Sam: He said, “All right, we’re going to start with the basics. Here’s how you move your feet, here’s how you throw a jab, here’s a cross.” You know these things but he was like, “Let’s clean it up, let’s do these right.” But I told him, “Dude, I don’t want to just learn technique — I’m not here to learn technique. I’ll learn just enough to make the session worth it. I want the sweat they were breaking in that video. A competitive sweat is what I’m looking for.”
And then he hits me with this — he goes, “Yeah, I didn’t watch the video, but I got an idea what you want.” I was like, “Bro, there was only one thing in it, it was one video and you didn’t even watch it?” He’s like, “No.” But at the end we basically sparred — ten minutes we just fought and it was amazing.
My brother-in-law Aaron, he was there, he was like my sparring partner.
”When Violence Is the Answer” [00:09:00]
Shaan: Dude, I’m reading — this is so funny you’re bringing this up. I listen to like three audiobooks a week because I like walking. The book I’m listening to now is called When Violence Is the Answer.
Sam: Far.
Shaan: The premise is that violence is rarely the answer, but when it is it’s the only answer. And when it is the only answer, you want to act fast and as violently as possible. It tells these stories, and the whole book is basically: when you have to be violent, you want to annihilate them as fast as possible and take their mind completely out of the equation. Because like, if you’ve ever been punched in the balls, you’re like, “I can’t fight, there’s nothing I can think about.” Right? Or imagine being in a fight and having your elbow broken — you can’t do anything. That’s different from a punch in the face, where sometimes you can still…
Anyway. It’s so funny you’re doing this now. I’ll have to give you the cliff notes of When Violence Is the Answer as soon as I dig deeper into it.
The Zuckerberg MMA Revelation [00:11:00]
Sam: It was an amazing workout. My takeaway is — Zuck went on Joe Rogan, he was talking about it, and Joe’s like, “You’re doing MMA now?” And Zuck goes — he gives some reason for starting, and then he says, “It’s not like, ‘Why are you doing MMA?’ It’s more, now that I’m doing it, I’m like, ‘Why have I not been doing this my whole life?’ Because this is clearly the best.”
He says it in such a computer-nerd sort of way, like he’s found the best workout — like, in The Office, “What is the best bear?” There is a best bear. That’s how he was saying it. And I was like, yeah, exactly. And so when he said that I was like, that’s probably right.
I like the idea of getting a competitive sweat in the morning. I sit at my keyboard all day after this, but if I could start the day with this very intense, can’t-think-about-anything-else workout — extreme focus is required, my mind is not going to be drifting around thinking about the to-do list — I’m going to be locked into this. It’s a very primal thing. I’m going to break a huge sweat and then I can go on with my day. Everything else in my day will be much easier.
I know I’m preaching to the choir with you. But I feel like that’s been my realization with it.
The Body Stack Concept: Fitness as the Point of Money [00:14:00]
Sam: I wanted to spend ten minutes talking about this because you sent me this gym picture and your gym looked sick. Like two years ago or a year and a half ago you saw mine and you were like, “I’m gonna get one.” You got one and it looks awesome.
I saw this guy — a picture of a 71-year-old, his name’s Mark, he started Primal Kitchen, it’s a sauce brand I love. He’s 71 years old and he shared this picture of himself and he just looks great. Not a huge muscle guy, but really fit, abs, looks awesome.
And I realized: this is the point of business. The point of business and money is — one, providing for your family; two, it’s fun and fulfilling; but three, the point is to live a really long and good life. And the best way to do that — money is maybe number two, number one is just being fit.
I wanted to spend ten minutes talking about my personal — well, I was like, what do engineers say? “Tech stack,” “marketing stack.” Let’s talk about our body stack. Our pack stack. I’ll run through all the things I’m currently doing.
I would put myself in the category of a weekend warrior. I don’t have formal education on this, but I listen to podcasts, I read books, I’m self-educated — which means maybe I’m a B+, not an expert, but I try to read and learn and teach myself. Okay, go for it.
Sam’s Full Body Stack [00:17:00]
Sam: All right, let me walk through what I do, and then you can go because I know you didn’t prepare — you can think about it as I go.
What I do: four days a week of strength training, and then the other three days cardio. Those are usually lifting weights or bodyweight stuff. So you’re working out every day — seven days.
Shaan: Do you take a rest day? Some days you do two?
Sam: I do every single day. The day I want to rest, I’ll just go for like a 15,000-step walk, which is like a two-hour walk. That’s usually my rest.
I sleep from 11 to 7. Right now I’m around 11 or 12 percent body fat. I have a background in athletics, so I’m not a complete noob, but I basically learned all about this in the last six or seven years. I used to just do what I was told; now I kind of know why I’m doing what I’m told.
My goals with healthy eating and working out are basically three things: one, live a long and healthy life; two, look good naked; and three, achieve certain fun goals — running a certain race, hitting a certain body fat percentage, lifting a certain amount of weight. That’s really it. And two — people don’t admit that, but I just want to look good naked.
Shaan: You know what? That sounds not weird.
Sam: Might be a little weird. Look, I’m just saying what people think.
All right, here are the products I use. I spend $299 a month — call it $300 — and I have a trainer at Central Athlete. It’s a place in Austin. I have an app, they just tell me exactly what to do. If I have questions, or an injury, or I’m traveling, I text my trainer Jesse and say, “I’m traveling, let’s adapt this workout.” Then we meet once a month to say, “Here are the goals for the next month, here are my goals for next year, let’s work backwards.”
The second thing: I pay $600 a month for a daily call from a nutritionist — with My Body Tutor. Someone calls me every day saying, “What’s the plan today for your diet? Let’s work backwards from where you want to go.” It’s a 15-minute call. Soon I’m going to switch to the $200-a-month plan, which is a once-a-week call.
The third thing: I spent around $3,000 to $5,000 upfront and built a home gym. Maybe it could have been $2,500, but I think it was probably $3,500.
Another thing: blood work. Two to three times a year, I spend on average $200 to $300 and I do InsideTracker — it’s a fun way to track your blood and see where you are and see if you can improve things that weren’t great the time before.
Next: I get massages one to two days a week at a place called Run Lab in Austin. I have a history of calf injuries, so they massage my calf, and it’s covered by insurance — I only pay about $20 each time.
Then I do a subscription to Audible — have you heard of Aaptiv? It’s like an audio workout thing.
Shaan: Yeah, I pay $100 a year for that. Whenever I’m traveling and I need to do a bodyweight workout, I say, “I want to do a 60-minute bodyweight workout,” and it’s like a trainer in your ears. I find that fun.
Sam: Next: MyFitnessPal. I track everything I eat and I spend $60 a year on that.
Then I spend $100 a year on Fitive — whenever I do cardio, I try to keep my heart rate right at about 145 beats per minute for a long cardio workout. That’s zone two or zone three — one of the zones I want to stay in.
Then I basically subscribe to Pandora — I’m like the only guy who pays money for Pandora. I pay for Pandora, Spotify, YouTube, and Audible, and I listen to all of those when I work out.
Next: I have zero budget for Whole Foods and healthy foods. Whatever I see that I want, I get. I don’t question the price; I’m doing it no matter what.
And then finally, I’ll probably spend around $1,000 a year on equipment. Lifting shoes, a lifting belt, replacing my running shoes consistently, any type of equipment I need — I just buy it.
Finally, I listen to Nick Bear — remember that ripped dude? He came on the pod. He’s amazing. I listen to his podcast, I listen to Mind Body Pump, that’s another one of my favorites. And I follow tons of ripped dudes on Instagram. You know how they say you’re the average of the five people you hang out with most? I feel like I’m the average of the fifty accounts I follow on Instagram — I’m constantly seeing ripped dudes, people running far and running fast. I get that on Instagram.
Sam’s Fitness Rules and Future Goals [00:23:30]
Sam: That’s all my stuff. Let me wrap up with my rules.
Rule one: I always have a goal with a deadline. Next year, my goal is going to be to run a 100-mile race. This year it was to hit a certain body fat percentage. Always have a goal.
Rule two: I always hire coaches. If there’s anything I want to learn, last year I learned boxing — I had a boxing coach. This year I wanted to get my nutrition right — I had a nutritionist. I always hire a coach, no matter what.
Rule three: No processed foods and no sugar, unless it’s planned and intentional. Like, I know two or three weeks in advance, “This is a special occasion, I’m going to splurge there.” I don’t fret over money if it makes me healthier.
And finally: I’m not trying to be perfect, I’m just trying to be the least bad most of the time and intentional about when I am going to splurge.
What does that add up to in dollar amounts?
Shaan: Did you sum it up?
Sam: Well, the upfront home gym cost was about $3,000, and then I’ve been buying stuff as I go — let’s call it $5,000 total. Then I’d say I spend around $15,000 a year.
You know, LeBron James has this famous stat — he spends a million dollars a year on his body. When that first came out, other athletes were like, “Whoa.” Other NBA guys were like, “I don’t spend anywhere near that.” But you look at LeBron, he’s the pinnacle athlete in terms of physical fitness even among athletes in other sports.
I’ve met NFL guys and they talk about it — “LeBron said he spends that, that got me thinking what am I spending, and why am I not investing in my body?” Conor McGregor said, “I heard LeBron James says he spends a million dollars a year — I thought I didn’t spend anything.” And so he hired full-time staff, started doing the whole thing.
I think it’s funny how that one person saying that triggered a chain reaction. And I actually think it’s smart that you’re sharing this, because it’s not our typical thing on the pod — we’ll joke around about it but it’s not a usual segment. But I think it is a big part of being an entrepreneur and a founder.
Shaan: Dude, that founder fifteen is real. For me it was the founder forty-five — that was real. I gained so much weight stressing out, eating wrong, sleeping badly, not working out because I didn’t have time. And that really costs you.
Mental Health Stack [00:28:00]
Sam: We didn’t even talk about mental health stuff. So for mental health: I write every morning — it’s not really “Dear Journal,” it’s more like, “Here’s what I want to get done today. I’m pretty bummed about this and this, but I’m very thankful for this.” That’s my version of journaling. And then obviously lots of therapy. Those are my mental health things.
Sam’s Future Experiments [00:29:00]
Sam: All right, the things I want to try.
One: an executive health checkup. You spend somewhere between $5,000 and $20,000 — or $20,000 in one shot — and you go for three days to a Mayo Clinic-type place, and they just do all types of stuff to you. I’m not convinced it’s entirely necessary, but I test everything mostly for fun.
Two: a concierge doctor. Have you ever had one?
Shaan: Briefly. I had a kind of amazing experience once. I got really sick with Lyme and my face broke — I had Bell’s Palsy, it was horrible. I spent $25,000 and had a doctor on call. That was awesome.
Sam: I want to get one of those.
Three: skin stuff. Do you do anything for your skin? Sunscreen?
Shaan: Dude. I haven’t washed my face in like six years. My face gets wet in the shower. That’s the wash. There’s nothing left over on the towel when I dry off — it’s just the soap from the shower.
Sam: My wife knows everything about skincare. She’s like, “You’ve got to use this, then you do this, then you do this.” I’m like, dude, that’s way too complicated. I’m not doing any of that — I’ll just use hand soap. But she’s telling me I have to use sunscreen, so I want to start doing some skin stuff.
And then the last thing: I want to do a five-day fast. That’s on my bucket list.
Those are some of the things I want to try. That’s my body stack.
Shaan’s Acquisition Year Letter: Getting Fit Enjoyably [00:33:00]
Shaan: Have you heard — by the way — how young people, instead of saying “how many people have you slept with,” they say, “what’s your body count?”
Sam: That’s so funny.
Shaan: “He’s catching bodies.” That’s right. And then you come up with “here’s my body stack” — some young woman raises her hand and she goes, “Hey, teacher, what’s your body count?” I think I’ve seen it in context.
All right, so my buddy is going through a company acquisition, and I told him — when we got acquired, I did one thing really well. I wrote down, “All right, I know what this year is about. This is the acquisition, and I know this could go many ways.” I talked to a bunch of people who got acquired. For some of them they got really depressed, they were bored at the acquiring company. For some people they had a great time. For some it was just… “I don’t even remember, I was kind of a zombie, on autopilot.”
I didn’t have much intention behind how I spent that year. So I said, “I’m going to have some intent.” I wrote this document — let me read part of it to you. Tell me when this gets boring and we’ll switch.
“My 2019 mindsets” — this is 2019, we got acquired by Twitch. At the top I wrote a quote: “Time is what we want the most but use the worst.” I said, “This document is a chance to think about how I want to spend the next year of my life. Time is the most precious resource. Here’s how I’m going to invest it.”
Number one: get fit enjoyably. Number two: earn and learn. Number three: become a great person — like Ramon. Our buddy Ramon is the honoree.
On “get fit enjoyably,” I wrote: “Every year I’m getting fatter, less mobile, and I shorten my lifespan. This is a bad trajectory. I need to invest now or I’m going to pay later — hell, I’m paying right now. Getting fit means dropping to 185 pounds, feeling athletic. The word ‘enjoyably’ is really important. Every time I’ve tried this in the past, I start, I get motivated, I take some action, get some results, but it’s hard. I don’t really like it, so I slip up and eventually give up altogether.”
Sam: What did you weigh then? 220, 225?
Shaan: Something like that. I said, “Three weeks later, I’m back on my couch in my boxers eating chips and queso. This cycle is bad. Long story short, willpower is not the fuel to use. If I use willpower, I fail. Instead, I’m going to find a way to do this in a way that’s enjoyable. Because when I like it, I’ll do it. That means I’ve got to figure out foods that are clean that I actually like, and exercise that I actually look forward to. Here’s what winning looks like: I’m 185 pounds by the end of 2020, with a new set of exercise and eating habits that I enjoy and am not forcing myself to maintain.”
I’m proud of reading this. I did not hit that goal. I’m not 185 even now — I’m probably 212, 213.
Sam: Doesn’t sound like much, but it probably is a way to double that in terms of muscle mass composition versus body fat. And 185 for you — a lot of people don’t realize, but you’re six-one. 185 would be pretty small.
Shaan: Yeah, I picked a number. But specifics aside, I think I got the idea right. At that time I was working out zero times a week, eating like dog shit, didn’t even have a game plan. And I actually had very little evidence that this was doable. If you’ve been in great shape before, you’ve got that in your back pocket. But imagine never having done it — never. I never saw abs. It was the Loch Ness monster of my body. Like, where is this thing?
Shaan’s Body Stack: The Two Things That Worked [00:39:00]
Shaan: So that’s where I was at. Now the two things that worked for me.
In terms of my body stack, I share two things with you, but I do everything else differently. I also get a coach for everything. I have a personal trainer. And with nutrition — once you told me about My Body Tutor, I do the $200-a-month plan where I text every day.
Sam: You dig it?
Shaan: Yeah. I’m not the most consistent with it — I’ll forget to update it at night and update it later. But yeah, I do the coach thing. That was really, really important.
And same thing with the MMA thing — “I want to do this, let me get a coach.” A coach is not because you don’t know how to do it. It’s because it’s the real way to commit to doing it. For me, I was like — even better, I need somebody to show up at my house. I looked at what trips me up. It’s not that I go to the gym and do a crappy workout. I just don’t go to the gym. So I was like, what if the gym came to me?
I saw your home gym, got inspired — “what’s the flooring you used, what’s this, what’s that?” I asked you for every little piece.
Sam: It was way easier than you thought, wasn’t it?
Shaan: Dude. I copied the exact same setup. Same rubber flooring, a few kettlebells, some other stuff. It wasn’t a lot.
So I got a home gym, and then I got a trainer to come to my house. Obviously, this is a luxury not everyone can afford. But hey, that’s the point of this show — building wealth and then figuring out how to use it. This is how to use it.
Secondly: nutrition. The coaching thing — I’m right on board with you. Mine was “remove friction.” Find the places where the habit slips up and try to get rid of that step. That was bringing the gym to me.
The last piece was: what is the version of this I’m actually going to enjoy? I had to find a trainer who I vibe with, who I actually like hanging out with — the conversation is fun, it’s not just that they’re good at their job. And secondly, we do workouts that are fun for me. Sometimes my trainer will come over and say, “Let’s go play basketball.” We’ll go to 24 Hour Fitness and play pickup basketball. And it’s kind of weird — you’re paying this trainer $100 to go play pickup basketball with you. But yeah, I’m actually paying for me to exercise regularly and get in great shape. I’m not paying for a specific hour block of time or a specific skill set.
So same thing — MMA looks fun, I’m going to do MMA. We do training that’s about mobility sometimes, or very simple things. I told my trainer — very simple — he said, “What are your goals?” And I think for every other client his goals are, “I want to lose weight, I’ve got a wedding coming up, I want to look good with my shirt off.” I said, “When I stand up from sitting, I feel like an old man. I don’t get up like an athletic person.” So that was my first goal: I want to be able to just get up. We do this exercise on the ground, “Let’s get up, let’s go over here” — I don’t want that to be an eighteen-point turn. I need to just get up. Not like, “Oh yep, let me get on my elbow, then my knee, put both hands on the ground, tripod, then I’m up.” That’s how I was moving.
Same thing with running — “I don’t know if I run right, I think my gait is all messed up.” So we spent a lot of time literally fixing my walking gait, my sitting posture, my habits for the morning — how to get loose. Those things matter to me.
I would suggest: don’t make your goals the cliché thing. Think about what would actually feel good as a middle step between you and being absolutely ripped. Because that became very motivating to me. I started to see results in all those little things first — “I’m smoother when I run, I’m smoother when I walk, I get up more smoothly, I can crouch down and play with my kids” — like, I could just sit in a squat. Those things were really important.
I had to find somebody who knew how to train in a functional way like that, not just “all right, let’s do three sets of twelve with heavy weight.”
Sam: Do you set time aside for working out? Is it every day at the same time?
Shaan: Every day at the same time. He shows up at my house. I’m not going to be rude and leave him waiting. I have to drop what I’m doing and go do it. And that’s it — that’s the whole thing. We do it at 3 PM. I actually prefer to move it to the morning now, but whatever.
Discipline vs. Motivation [00:46:00]
Sam: Dude, I don’t like Andrew Tate that much — I think he says some silly stuff — but he says a lot of interesting things I agree with. One of them that I’ve been obsessing over: he goes, “I’m not motivated, I’m disciplined.” And I thought, that’s beautiful. That is a really beautiful idea. And that has definitely been key to achieving a lot of goals, whether it’s work or fitness — it’s just like, I don’t… I remember when I was starting my business at like two o’clock, people would call and say, “Hey, let’s go hang out.” I’d be like, “Dude, I gotta work.” They’re like, “What are you talking about, you’re the boss, you can do anything you want.” I was like twenty-three and I’d say, “It’s a school night, I can’t go out on a school night. I get there at eight, I work until six, I go to dinner. I can’t do these things.”
I remember thinking — I’m not motivated to do this, but I’m happy I have this routine. This is discipline. I kind of forced myself into it. Same with fitness, same with anything. Motivation is a really good way to get started, but it’s not the best way to maintain. Discipline is.
And the cool thing about discipline is you can kind of force yourself into it. Like, all you did was told this dude to show up at your house and now you’re like, I gotta do it.
Shaan: I heard this great quote on discipline. I always thought about discipline as being able to force yourself to do something even if you don’t want to. And that’s true — that does happen. But that’s not really the definition. Somebody said it beautifully: “Discipline is just remembering what you really want.” Because in the moment, you want to just sit down and rest, chill, eat that bag of chips. But it’s like — okay, that is something I want, but what do I really want? If you remember what you really want, you’ll go do the things that vote towards that outcome versus this outcome. Discipline is just remembering what you really want.
That felt a lot better to me than “I forced myself to do it even when I didn’t want to.”
Sam: Yeah, it goes away — like when you wake up in the morning and you’re sore, those other things…
Shaan’s Approach: No Timelines, Infinite Game [00:50:00]
Shaan: The other things I do differently than you — I don’t set specific timeline deadlines. Which is crazy to me because in business, of course I do that. I will never set a goal without a timeline. But with fitness I looked at it differently.
My trainer kind of taught me. He was like, “All right, how old are you?” I was like, “32.” He goes, “Okay. So you’ve had 32 years to build up these habits. And now you’re looking for a six-week revamp?” He’s like, “The way I look at it: you spent 32 years getting here. Maybe it’s going to take a little while to get there. And that’s okay. What’s another year? What’s a year or two of working at this when you spent thirty doing it the wrong way? Can you spend a few doing it the right way?”
And he was like, “What I don’t want is: you work out, blah blah, and then you DoorDash Taco Bell, and now you’re feeling guilty and you’re eating the wrong thing. Because if you’re going to eat it, eat it and enjoy it. Don’t bring the guilt. Don’t bring the shame. Don’t feel bad that it’s a setback and have this mental baggage.” He’s like, “Just remember — when you’re the dude you like, who you’re becoming, you could eat Taco Bell and it’s not even going to mess with you.” He lifted his shirt — still there. He’s like, “That’s who you’re becoming. Just focus on that. Don’t go through this emotional up and down.”
I’ve gone very much the tortoise-not-the-hare route. No timelines, no deadlines. My only goal is to rebuild my habits of eating and exercise to be healthy. I don’t care how long that takes. I’m going to do it. There are no setbacks — everything is progress compared to how I was before, even how I was a month ago.
It’s a very strange thing because I’ve never chased a goal this way. I’ve never let myself do it in this infinite-game style — no clock, just trying to be better today than you were yesterday. And it’s okay if you do something wrong, you learn something in that process too. This pat-on-the-back style — I’ve never tried it. But this is the first time.
Closing: Guy Next Door Fitness [00:55:00]
Sam: In other news, we’re going to be launching the “Guy Next Door Fitness Plan.”
Shaan: Dude, we should totally do that. Attainable fitness.
Sam: Hot enough, yeah. We’re going to go Midwest seven, New York six.
Shaan: That’s amazing.