Fitness and Life's Roadblocks with Heidi Moneymaker and Lisa Newman

In this episode, CFO of Baja Sharkeez Restaurant Group, Lisa Newman and Professional Actress and Stuntwoman Heidi Moneymaker talk about living a well-balanced life through fitness, nutrition and stillness.  They share about their journey, their background and their value of saving money, being kind and compassionate to everyone, maintaining their circles and many more. Listen as they share tips on finances, managing life's roadblocks and achieving a happy and wealthy life. 

Transcript

Fitness and Life Lessons with Lisa Newman & Heidi Moneymaker

Living a well-balanced life through fitness, nutrition and stillness.

We have Lisa Newman and Heidi Moneymaker from Fierce Lotus. Really excited to chat with them today because these women are two badass women warriors. Lisa Newman is a Chief Financial Officer of a huge restaurant chain called Baja Sharkeez restaurant group. She's a fitness trainer and a mom of two boys. Heidi Moneymaker is an actress and a very successful stunt woman whose work you've seen on great action films like John Wick 2, the Marvel series and Hunger Games. And both of them are very passionate about living a well-balanced life through fitness, nutrition and stillness. Heidi and Lisa, thank you for joining us here today.

Yes, thank you for having us.  Thanks for having us. We’re really excited to be on the show.

Can you just tell us about just your journey? What was your background, how'd you get started and to where you are now.

(Lisa) Started teaching fitness classes when I was 18 when I was going to UCLA and I was studying econ there and business .I was always had a passion for fitness and finance and that led to continuing fitness throughout my entire life as well as being behind a computer and crunching numbers, making sure that the restaurants were profitable, etc. So those two elements in my life were so important that I just had always wanted to keep them keep priorities. So when I woke up, I would work out that was kind of like brushing my teeth before I'd sit behind my computer because you're in finance, you're in front of a computer crunching numbers and sitting a lot all day long. People could never figure out why you're an accountant - how are you so fit as most accountants don't ever get up and move. That was one thing I really try and push when two people in business that are sitting all day. Because it is about moving, getting your body flowing. And sometimes you can just get in a rut and you want to finish this project, it doesn't happen because you don't have that fitness factor involved. During my journey after I graduated college and was working I had two boys and that was a whole another spin when I started becoming a mom. And that again, you get pregnant and you try and figure out “Hey, should I keep working out?” How am I going to maintain not only my physical appearance but also the energy level because I worked all through my present pregnancy. Because as a businesswoman and an entrepreneur, I don't just “Hey, I'm on maternity leave right now, you work for me” I was still working. To make sure I kept my energy up I kept working out. When I was pregnant, I was obviously modifying my workouts, we weren’t getting hit workouts but I was walking and getting on the body and things like that to make me feel balanced. So that's kind of like where my journey started. 

(Hedi) I started flipping around when I was a tiny little kid and jumping off and was more a stunt woman before I was a gymnast. I like jumping off bunk beds and banging my head everywhere I go. My parents were like “This crazy kid that never sleeps, and then all the energy in the world is going to kill herself and us. So they found this local gymnastics gym and thought this will be a good place for her to get all her energy out. And so I started gymnastics, right when I was around five. I remember when I was six or something, watching the 1984 Olympics and seeing Mary Lou Retton win a gold, I was like “Yeah, I'm gonna do that. That's what I'm gonna do.” From that moment on, I was pretty psychotic. When it came to training, I was like “I’m gonna be in Olympics.” So I made to Junior Olympic team, but never made an Olympic team. But I did earn a scholarship to UCLA where we're both Bruins. I did gymnastics on the UCLA gymnastics team which was pretty life changing for me. I didn't grow up having a lot of money. I think my parents worked so very incredibly hard side jobs just so that they could pay for gymnastics. When I got to UCLA, I had opened all these doors for myself, and I realized that there's just endless options in this world. You just have to work hard and find the right avenue. I won 4 national championships when I was there, 2 individual and another 2 Team and set a bunch of records. We had this amazing team, amazing group of women and it was really one of the most special times in my life. When I graduated, I had to quit gymnastics. At 22, thing’s been in my life since I was five,I didn't know what to do. 

Because obviously I was gonna keep being physical and training and everything because you're an athlete, but like, where do you go from feeling the life's over. Luckily, I found stunt work, had a couple friends who gotten into the business that were gymnast and helped me get some jobs, basically doubling girls doing gymnastic stuff. I didn't really know what I was doing at first. And before you know it, I was learning martial arts and driving cars and doubling big actors and doing crazy stuff. But my first big job was Charlie's Angels Full Throttle, and I got to be one of doubles for Drew Barrymore. And I got to do a ton of stunts. And I realized, I can still be an athlete. There’s a career there for me somewhere. That led me down into the film path and kept me going as the athlete that I am. One day, I was training with a friend, kickboxing instructor and he kept saying, “There's this girl I train you got to meet her. She's just like you. She's crazy. She wants to train like for hours, you should really meet her.” And finally, after a few times of him saying that, I was like, “Okay, why don't you invite her and we'll do a private lesson together.” And so Lisa walks in the door, and we do a kickboxing private together and started training together and realize we complement each other very well. The training program we have right now, the action star workout program we have is a hybrid fitness program that we created by just working out with each other and creating the best workout for us and how we like to train and what worked well for our body type. A some point after, like a year, we’re like “ We should share this because all of our friends were like “We want to train with you, love what you guys are doing.” So that was my journey and actually how we ended up meeting and getting together and started Fierce Lotus fitness.

That's really cool. Could both of you share a little bit of some of the experiences you had with money or your perception of money when you were younger and how that may be transitioned for each of you.





(Lisa) My dad is from Germany and he taught me “You save everything, you don't spend, you don't live beyond your means”. That's kind of stuck with me through my entire life. I'm still very conscious of all of that. It's interesting for me to see how a lot of people live where its, “Hey, let's put everything on a credit card” and like when you're when in college, you're 18 or when you're on campus, there's like every single one trying to get everybody to have a credit card. And then everybody did and they started spending, spending, spending.

(Heidi) My dad came over from Germany and my mom grew up in LA. They’ve had very different backgrounds and they moved us all over. I grew up in Hawaii, I grew up in Idaho, in Oregon, I grew up on a ranch, on the beach, in the mountains so they moved us around a lot but one value that they always instilled in both my sister and I was “You don't live beyond your means”. When I went to school like I said, the credit card thing,I didn't have a credit card I wasn't and then when I got in like you always pay it off, you don't just make it. For me, it's interesting because you hear all these people that live off of credit and live beyond their means, and especially right now with the pandemic and what we're going through, I think there's going to be a huge kind of come-to-Jesus kind of period where, what while “We can't do that” , there's a whole different avenue of how we're gonna live our lives now.

So I'm glad that my background, my dad and my mom, they really instilled that in me, and then it stuck with me, even to this day, and creating and running all the costs with the restaurants and handling labor and financials and getting funding and managing that funding and making sure that it's spent responsibly. I think that’s where it came from for me.

(Heidi)Probably grew up with different backgrounds but similar values. My parents, they had credit cards, ultimately as we got older and it kind of became a credit world but same thing where they would save money to go buy a new vacuum or whatever it was. They didn't buy it and pay it off later. My mom was always dealing cash, my dad gave him the grocery money and then she'd have it in her pocket. She knew everything meticulously and definitely taught us to save, taught us to work. I don't remember ever getting an allowance, we had chores. And that was just part of the household. There was seven kids my family's chores, but I used to clean , both sides of the house had neighbors and I used to clean either one of their houses when I was in high school, and I think I made $10.I used to be a big saver when I was younger. When you never have any money, you're always worried that you're never going to have any money. So I was definitely always saving in college. When I got my first big job, all of a sudden, in five months, I've made this big chunk of money in the bank and I'm still living like, I don't have any money. I remember somebody saying to me one time like “Why don't you go do this or do that? You have some money now.” I'm like, “No, what if I never make any money again?” That’s my safety net, obviously relaxed a little bit now

I bought a house a year ago, new house and was one of those things where I had the option to go and go a bit bigger. I decided to go with the house that worked for me and my animals. I get very nervous having huge debts as well. So I think that's always been a thing.

(Lisa)Yeah, I think one of the questions you had posed in an email was “What does wealth mean to you?” And I think a big part of it is not being able to support yourself financially but being able to sleep at night, and that's being not being overextended and making sure you can pay your bills, and still live the life that you want to live. Being able to sleep at night for me, is different than other people for me, that's understanding that I'm not gonna be out of money or I'm not gonna be able to afford what I need to afford.I want to live now. So that's kind of taking care of your kids and family. 

(Heidi)The first thing that came to mind when I read that question, it didn't really relate to money so much. It was, for me, wealth is about your quality of life. That does include your bank account as well but it's also the people that you surround yourself with, and your family, your animals. For me, it’s achieving what I need and want to achieve so that I can live the quality of life that I want. If I decide I want to live on a yacht, great, but it comes down to like, “who's around me? Do I have good people in my life and do I feel happy every day?” 

I think that there's always that transition, the growth over time. Like, in the beginning stages, you're like, I don't know if I'm gonna ever work again. So let me really stuck it up but then also realizing that there's a balance to these things. When you talk about achieving the life, living the life that you really want, of course, the quality of relationships that you have, and all these things. I also noticed that both of you guys are in a very male dominated industry. Like for Lisa, if you're in finance that's very male dominated. And Heidi, in stunt world that’s also very male dominated. How did you navigate through those industries and like creating good relationships and connections and establishing yourself in that industry?





(Lisa) For me, navigating through that, it was just I worked my ass off and I made sure that I didn't make any mistakes. I think if you walk into a room and it's more difficult for a woman because they think that you're not as smart. I mean, that's just it ‘til now. But I think after a while when you prove yourself, you gain that respect and then you develop those relationships where people want to do things for you because you do things for them. In terms of whether it be, “Hey, I'm going to get you this report”, I'm going to make sure I'm on top of it right away, and they depend on you. That allows for your role to get information easily, you can have people help you more easily. I think that you have to earn the respect, but once you do, I think it is.

(Heidi)For me, my mom’s definitely a bit of a tomboy and so am I and my sisters and I were definitely feminine and girly the same time like my mom one day in the middle of like, my cousin's hanging out when I was 15. My cousin's friend came over with like a 450 brand new dirt bike and my mom walked out to like, hey, let me see that mom and she's like killing it in the paper ride and she just get 50 something I don't know how she gets on his bike and like wheelies it up the hill, and brings it back around. She's always been kind of like that and been able to hang with the boys so for me it's, I've kind of been like that too. I get along well with females but I like to go like when I was a kid I would leave in a dress and braids and come back with like one braid in and half me clean and the other half covered in mud, this braid out here. Balance of masculine energy, but when I got into the stunt business, which is very heavily male dominated, I mean, I have to say there's a lot more female, like characters and stuff now and it's obviously growing. I think I had the attitude that I did as an athlete of like, I'm coming into this new place and I want to be the best. I didn’t want to be the  best for a girl, I wanted to be the best in the business. I never looked at it like “Well, I'm a woman” and I'm like, I want to be better than all these people. One day one of the guys said something about me and he goes, “Heidi Moneymaker? She's the best stuntman I know. And I was like, “I want to be a man”. But that was like a huge compliment. I guess what we're both saying is, you work your ass off, and you'd be the best and gain that respect. 

That’s amazing. What's been like the biggest value that you feel like you really gained from your upbringing, and like your parents when it comes to working hard? Because the theme here that I'm seeing is you guys are such hard workers. And you really do your best. And it's not even like being as Heidi said, it's not like, I want to be the best stunt woman. I just want to be the best in my industry.  It's almost like you're not even really comparing yourself to others. you're wanting to be the best for yourself. So, what's been that value that you feel like you really hold on to?

(Lisa)I think understanding the concept of roadblocks. If there's a roadblock, how are you going to get over it? Because every day we come there. Every day, there's problems. It's not just in my Finance world, in my restaurant world, it's in my children. Being a mom, it's being navigating through school. It's for them. It's navigating through our business together, and it's never giving up when that roadblock is there and figuring out “Hey, how are you gonna jump above it or go around it or blow it up?” 

It's not like every time I see a roadblock, I'm jumping over it. It takes time, sometimes it takes a minute. Like I need to take some breaths, but there's always something in the back of my head that’s like “How am I going to figure out that there's another way? I'm gonna be able to figure out a different way and I do a lot of meditating. I meditate not necessarily on what I want to happen, but meditating on how the universe can bring opportunity to me to solve the roadblock which I need to hop over or destroy.





(Heidi)My parents absolutely are the hardest working people I've ever met. I mean, I remember them having nothing and working for all of us kids to have what we wanted. I definitely saw that growing up at hard work, you get where you want to go where you need to go by working hard. The value I think I took from my upbringing that really helps me in this world is they instilled in us that “No matter what, be humble and be kind to everyone”. It doesn't matter who they are. I think that first of all, spreading kindness does nothing but make you a better person and a happier person. I feel like it's helped me a lot. Long in so many ways, and there're so many times when I see this in my industry all the time, you see people coming onto set and they are so nice to the people they think they need to be nice to. And then they're really rude to people who are working their butts off to make sure that the scene is going well, people that do deserve a lot of respect. And I find that really disgusting. You never know who you're talking to, you could be talking to the producer’s son, you don't know if somebody is so even if you're not a nice person, it's a good rule of thumb to be nice to everybody. But I think that was something that I really took from my upbringing is like, you give everybody an equal chance in your mind to everybody and it kind of comes back.

That's amazing. I love these kinds of nuggets that you guys just shared right now because they’re really important to kind of think about especially right now we're all having a roadblock. How do we navigate through this and even in that like trying to figure out making sure that we're kind to ourselves as well as being kind to other people. And just knowing that not all of us are always on the same page. A lot of times especially during this roadblock right now, some people are like,” Go for it. Learn something new, and then some people are grieving. Just understanding the two sides and being kind and compassionate for both sides is really important. Thanks for sharing that. 

For both of you guys. You wouldn't be where you're at without like a solid team and I love your story of how you met just kind of almost haphazardly, but there was somebody kind of guiding you both together. How do you both maintain your circles of people that help you in the business world, or finance. 

(Lisa) I make a point to reach out to other people like restaurant finance, people that are have other chains to see what they're doing. To what works especially right now. I mean, there's so many government aid right now with loans. So it's really important to understand how each financial person ahead of these chains is working through it and figuring that out. I have a great team of women that work with me and we have weekly meetings and we have all zoom meetings now. But we would once a month, take retreats and go up and hike and move together and kind of do similar things like this in terms of how we're feeling and what's working for us. 

(Heidi)Nobody gets anywhere without their team and whether that team evolves as they move out or stays the same. There's no one single person sitting out there that achieved everything on their own. It's really important to talk about the team. My first team members, Lisa my business partner and one of my best friends. And luckily, we're kind of quarantined together so we have the opportunity right now to, to train and we’re launching a new app and a new programs and we had the time to work on that, which is really nice. When we're both busy in our other circles of life, we get together as often as possible, but usually just to train because it’s important to us to keep our head straight and everything. That's how my circle with Lisa is maintained. My sister Renee Moneymaker is also a stunt woman, and luckily, has moved down to LA and lives here and we co-parent, our niece, Rosie, and so that's a family circle. But also she's a big part of my film circle, I guess. We are very supportive with each other, always talking on the phone, always training together, always helping each other through roadblocks, as Lisa was talking about, and happy times too. I'm part of an action design team called 87eleven Action Design. And there's a whole team of directors and choreographers and stunt coordinators and fight team members that are within that team. And usually the way we keep that circle going is either if we're in whoever's in town goes and we train or work together in LA in our fight school and work with actors and get ready for films and stuff before on location, you know, we're training together and working together. And sort of spending time together outside of that. It's actually been really hard right now for us because that's a very physical world. That's like,doing Jujitsu and grabbing each other in throat like fight scene, you’re touching each other, you're in each other's face. It's not like Lisa and I can go for a run and we wear a mask, kind of maintain that. Usually that circle for me is really tight. And it's where I go, it's what I do. It's my outlet. And it's those guys and that team those gals, they have kept me rolling through everything for the last like, almost 20 years so it has been very harder now because we're not doing Zoom meetings or whatnot.

Jujitsu does online courses and stuff.You need to have a partner usually.There's solo stuff you can do, but it's really it is about the art of training, but it's also about the connection.That circle’s kind of like a straight line right now.





Can you guys talk a little bit about Fierce Lotus and why the name Lotus?

(Heidi) When we first decided to start our business, we're just going to write down every single word we can think of that we are attracted to, that we feel like describes what we want to do. I think for us, we love the idea of the lotus flower and how hard it's journey it is. It starts as this little bud at the bottom of a murky lake and it's never supposed to make its way up but somehow it fights and fights and fights and makes its way to the sunlight so it can grow and become this beautiful flower that you see. So for us the lotus flower is monumental because not only is it beauty and represents kind of like Yoga and calm and stillness, just sitting on the water, but it represents like a gnarly journey to get to that enlightenment. Fierce comes from her and I and ,if I think about us training, I think about us in a kickboxing gym, just wailing on kicking back and we're just like, the energy and the fire when it comes to training. And so these two words together for us just really embodied everything that we wanted to be as a company.

What are you looking to share with your clients? And who are you kind of going after?

(Heidi) Right now, our warriors are kind of in the 25 to 40 range. Most of them have done some sort of fitness and stuff in the past. We have this fun-kind of like film fight base workout protocol template for a couple of different workouts. Basically, what we want is to create that little community with them. We want them to get this little niche. It's not just like, okay, we're going to do “hit” workouts and we're going to teach you fight choreography, and we're going to bring you into our world a little bit. So that's kind of what we want, especially now where we started. We're starting a program and we're actually doing a live, we're gonna do live workouts in our app because we want to engage more and we want to bring in more with all of this crazy separation. For us, it's about building that little community. 

(Lisa)I think the fitness market is so saturated,you have so many different kinds of workouts out there and everybody, with most people's goal is to lose weight and feel great. In the fight choreography, we call it conscious cardio, because you have to think while you're doing something. So you're putting different punches and kicks together so you're actually thinking. And then we also incorporate unconscious cardio or it's just fitness - burpees and things like that. And then we have the school thing, we have the Muscle Building, the Cardio and then the Yoga. We always thought that those three elements of fitness is what's going to really transform your body. That's how our workout kind of came into.

(HeidI) I always remember this quote,I forget who originally said this, It’s “People don't remember what you did, they remember how you made them feel.” And for us too,we have a really fun workout. It is very effective, but really trying to bring people in and make them feel a part of a group because 

like I said earlier my circles like a flyer and I'm missing my group. So that's kind of great program, but it's really about bringing people in and letting them be involved.

I think there's something to that like as far as like you're really building a community. But also I love that your workout is not just any workout. Because as you said, the fitness industry is very saturated. And I know for myself, I don't like going to the gym just to go to the gym. I'm like, Can you give me something? I want to have like a function in my workouts. So for me as an aerialist, making sure that my workouts complement my training as an aerialist that's what I want to do. I met Heidi through 87eleven. I don't know if you remember but when I met you, the first thing that I thought of Heidi was like oh my gosh, she's so nice. And it's funny that you say that when you said earlier that just be kind and humble because when I first met you, that was the first thing that I said. But when it comes to like training, like same thing, like I want to train fighting, why not train in a really awesome way through like working out instead of just like regular exercises? I just want to say thank you for doing that, because that's really awesome. And as far as the community is concerned, I know you're building your community for the Fierce Lotus, what other parts of your life or your community that you love kind of serving into or giving into?

We started talking about things that we wanted to do and something that we were both very interested in finding a way to help was Childhood Obesity. It was a big deal for both of us. We struggle to this day to figure out how to make a mark there because one point we had talked about doing kind of like a couple of weeks where you, basically, bring, drop the kids off, we teach them a lot about nutrition, we teach them about fitness in a fun way and kind of get them going. But we realized that that's only going to help them this far, because they're going to go home. Unless, if the parents going on board, unless the parents can afford to do the things that need to be done in order to help their kids and are willing to do it, you really have a hard time with it. So we're still trying to figure out a way to be involved in that world. And there's a couple charities and stuff out there, but I don't know that they're doing much. For us it’s something we're trying to do. I guess we haven't figured it out yet. We're working on.

That's a start, it's always about like, you have that intention and a passion towards a cause.  A lot of these things sometimes take time to really develop. I love that you guys are conscious about that. That's awesome. 

I think too, it’s a  matter of the education and the knowledge with those kids ‘coz I see it too. I have a studio back in New York for quite a few years now. Eventually, I kind of ended up in California, the same thing too, I appreciate that sight coz you're like, diet, exercise, motivation or event or something. But I think a lot of us know, like, the physical fitness, releases all that stress and you just feel better and like, everybody hates going to the gym, but nobody really minds once you're at the gym like and after. But that obstacle, as you said early, so with the roadblocks, being able to get over that hurdle, whatever it is, as a huge piece. Can both of you maybe share like three tips that anybody would be able to kind of start implementing in their lives on a daily basis.

(Lisa)I think one tip, “Wake up every day and worry about your side of the street. Not thinking about what someone else can do for you”. That's one key tip that I could give. I try and tell my kids that, wake up and not only what you can do for other people, but just how you interact with everybody worrying about your side of the street in terms of your body, in terms of how am I going to stay fit today? What am I going to do today that's gonna make sure that I'm doing the best that I can, for my body,for my family, for everybody else and doesn't matter what they're doing. It's just worrying about what I can do for them, or for myself impacts them. 

(Heidi)I think something that was a giant marker in my lifetime was ‘96 would have been my Olympic year. And like I said, I had this dream my whole life, I wanted to be in the Olympics. And it got close to that time. And I basically told my coach that year I was like I want to, but I already got my scholarship. I don't think I'm going to make this team.I don't want to go through, I don't want to spend the next year going through the length that I have to go through to get to that place. So I just want to keep this at one level down, do really well and take my scholarship. And really what that was self doubt, it was gonna be a lot of hard work, but it was self doubt is like. I'm finally here, and I don't I don't think I'm gonna make it and I probably wouldn't have made it. However, I saw a couple of girls make that team that I've been competing with, most of my life and it kind of opened my eyes to like okay, but you made the choice not to, to give all the effort you possibly had because you thought you probably wouldn't make that team and it changed things for me for forever. You know what, I don't want to miss out on something. Because I decided that maybe I won't make it or I'm not good enough for it. So from that moment on, I was just like, there are no limits anymore. There's I'm never ever going to doubt myself. And so what I think for me long story short is that if you want something, you just really have to find a way to bleed yourself into it. Okay, so you have to make, here's my target, I'm going to throw my arrow or throw my dart at this target. My coach at UCLA used to make this analogy that you can either draw a target on the wall and aim for it and 30 darts, or you can throw the dart and then draw a target wherever it landed, being like, Oh, yeah. I wanted to go there. 

You have to go through things, but you have to believe you can do it and you have to give yourself that opportunity. So for me, that's a big one. 





(Lisa)And I think one more tip for me would be, I love Tony Robbins. And one thing that resonated with me when I was listening to him was he said, what makes people happy and one thing that makes people happy is the progress that they make every day. And so if you wake up and you're making progress in some  form that will make you happy. And that could be just making your bed in the morning. ‘Coz I mean, right now  it's difficult to make progress. I mean, people are losing their jobs, they can't go to the gym, they can't go out and do with a lot of things that they want to do. So get up, make your bed, get up and take a walk or get up and do 10 push ups and do 10 sit ups like do something that you can actually feel. Hey, you know what, I did that today? I feel good about it. 

(Heidi)Going along with that, for me. I had a couple of head injuries over the years doing stunts. And some of them like we're serious. Well, like, you know, not great. And so I had a hard time my brain and a hard time I would get overwhelmed very easily. So if I had these tasks to do. Normally, I'd look at and be like, done, you know, like 123 then give that time. It was so overwhelming to look at where I needed to go that I had to meticulously just think about the thing that I had to do right here like what about Bob the movie baby steps, getting to the next place baby steps getting to the next place and I've seen To 100% feel great, but I still use that. Because, when you're trying to build a huge company when you're trying to achieve a giant goal, if you keep looking at that thing that's so far away, you tend to feel the distance. But if you go okay, no, I'm going there. Here's my halfway marker. Here's the things that I have to do to get there Monday. Look at that. I'm going to step here. And then another thing I do with that every day is I make myself look back at what I did that day, even if it's just like, I got the house clean and make sure the dog went on a walk. I mean, maybe that's all I could do that day, but I have to give myself credit for what I achieved. I think a lot of times we don't look at what we've already achieved, and we freak out about everything we haven't done.

So, it's really good little wins. One thing I know one thing to piggyback on that is I've been looking back at my phone because we all like kind of keep a snapshot journal of our life. And sometimes you forget like, Oh my god, I forgot I did this. This was awesome.

These little victories are sometimes hidden closer than you think. Going back and revisiting. That's a really good tip. 





Thank you for sharing all those with us. It's just been such an awesome chat. We are down to our quick 10 rapid fire questions. Number one, if you could choose one book to live by, what would it be? 

(Lisa) Balance Warrior.That's the book we wrote. (Heidi) It's hard to say live by but definitely The Alchemists is that I feel like resonates.

Your personal hero living or deceased? Someone you know or maybe don't know.

(HeidI) Linda Hamilton Terminator Two. (Lisa) I love Tony Robbins. 

Number three. The one thing you intentionally have to do every single day.

(Lisa) Workout. (HeidI) I guess workout. It’s day off so I felt like I was cheating.

One hobby that brings you the most joy?

(Heidi) Playing with my dogs, fur babies. (Lisa) I enjoy jumping on. We have an in ground trampoline with my boys. We talk and we do flips but I really enjoyed it.

Number five, most rewarding thing you've done for someone in need.

(Lisa) Probably one of my sisters. She's a breast cancer survivor so I'm just being there for her through that whole experience. It was a good two year journey but being there for her, it's definitely empowering. And I felt good about it.(Heidi) I think probably becoming a guardian to my niece, and having her move in with myself and my sister. It’s been challenging, but also the most amazing thing ever and like a ginormous gift. It's a blessing sweetheart.

Number six is the first movie quote that comes to mind.

(Heidi) Say hello to my little friend. (Lisa) This one's I don't know this one. (Heidi)I couldn't think of a second one that was just.(Lisa) I don't even know. I don't know.

All right, last big purchase you made for yourself. 

(Heidi) Interesting cuz like right now no one's really making any big purchases.

(Lisa) We're not making, I meant we spend probably a lot of money on workout where we just did a photo shoot. That's probably and that makes us feel really good.

Number eight is a food you cannot live without.

(Lisa) Berries.(Heidi) I would say. Either kale or spinach.

I love that you guys have the healthiest answers so far. None of our guests like everything else. 

(Heidi) I love food and obviously she's got restaurants in there. We're not foodies.

Heidi, I was waiting for you to say tuna in a can because I read an article about you when you were I guess back in your gymnastics training days that you would eat tuna in a can with no mayonnaise.

When we travel all the girls like this one girl on our team was like eating fried chicken. I'm going over my coaches like, look at this, like how does he do not I can drink carrot juice. Like at a young age, obviously being a gymnast, you have to be very careful with what you eat. We started looking at food as fuel. And I know that my dad was very big and tell us to juice for us and everything. So I knew the difference from when I was juicing and eating healthy, how much better I was in the gym than when I wasn't and so for me, that's that. I mean, I can literally I look at sugar, and I see “can't” you know, like I just I've made myself think that way so like, not that I don't ever eat anything sugary and I do love red wine. I drink red wine

What is your spirit animal?

(HeidI) Unicorn. (Lisa) Unicorn.

And number 10 is finish the sentence.” If I'm stuck in an island by myself….

(Heidi) I'd be drinking a lot of coconut water. (Lisa) I'd be swimming, swimming. 

Awesome. Where can our listeners find out more about you? And another parting question is if you were to encourage our listeners to serve or give into something, what would you encourage them to do or look into?

(Heidi) I would just say reach out to your community. Reach out to your circle, reach out to your friends, whether that's a text, a zoom, whatever.I feel like a lot more people are hurting and having a hard time than they're able to tell. There's nowhere to go there's no one to talk to. There's nothing to do. For me right now, I think the best thing you can do is reach out to everybody. We’re big instagramers, there's photos on our Instagram account. We also just started a YouTube page Fierce Lotus Fitness and we're putting up a lot of workouts and we'll be doing some live stuff through there. And then our website is FierceLotus.com. In a couple of weeks we'll have an app, FL Fit for Fierce Lotus Fitness and you can find it on Google Play Store and we'll do it. We're gonna do all our action star live videos through that. So perfect.

Important links:

Fierce Lotus – Action Star Workout Program

87eleven Action Design

Baja Sharkeez Restaurant Group @ TripAdvisor

Balance Warrior - Book @ Amazon

About





Lisa Newman is a Chief Financial Officer of a huge restaurant chain called Baja Sharkeez Restaurant Group. She’s also a Co-Creator of Fierce Lotus Fitness . A fitness trainer and a mom of two boys. 





Heidi Moneymaker is an actress and a very successful stunt woman whose work you've seen on great action films like John Wick 2, the Marvel series and Hunger Games.