Limitless Healing with Colette Brown

147. Move Today 365: Russ Rogers Promoting Outdoor Physical Activity and Community

June 17, 2024 • Colette Brown • Season 1 • Episode 147

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In this episode, Colette Brown welcomes Russ Rogers, founder of the Move Today 365 movement, author of the 5 book series of children's books "Today" published in English and Spanish.

Colette and Russ discuss the he importance of getting outside and being active. Russ shares his journey from his childhood days, early adult life as a youth pastor and his current mission of promoting physical activity and social interaction through his movement, Move Today 365.

He discusses his personal experiences, the importance of physical activity, and provides valuable tips for young parents on encouraging their kids to stay active.

Episode Highlights:

 01:02 Introduction to Russ Rogers
04:15 College Years and Early Career, Experiences in Mexico and Return to Modesto
08:02 Birth of Move Today 365
14:23 Tips for Young Parents encouraging their children to get outside
19:27 Upcoming Move Today 365 Events

Follow along and get involved at:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/movetoday365/

Website: https://movetoday365.com/


Podcast: The Journey Behind 'Move Today 365': https://movetoday365.com/#media

______________________________________

Connect with Colette:

Instagram: @wellnessbycolette

Website: love-colette.com

Thank you for listening to the Limitless Healing podcast with Colette Brown! It would mean the world if you would take one minute to follow, leave a 5 star review and share with those you love!

In Health,
Colette

[00:00:00] Colette Brown: Our next guest is the founder of Move Today 365, promoting physical activity and social interaction. Also a published author. a father, grandfather, and an amazing human.

[00:00:13] Colette Brown: It is my great honor to welcome Russ Rogers. Welcome, Russ. 

[00:00:17] Russ Rogers: Thank you so much, Colette. It's so great to be here. This is this is very exciting. 

[00:00:22] Colette Brown: It's good to have you. And I just have to give a shout out. You are coming from the Santa Cruz area where my daughter is in college. That's close to home, like talking to you.

[00:00:32] Colette Brown: It feels like I'm a little bit more connected with her that, you're in the same vicinity. So it's great to have you and Russ.

[00:00:38] Colette Brown: I would love to dive into you a little bit more and to understand what you're doing today. I think it's always good to do a little bit of a deep dive back to childhood and find out where you were raised and a favorite childhood memory that might have impacted you. To today or something that just really shaped you formatively as a child?

[00:01:02] Russ Rogers: Great question. So I was born and raised in Modesto and parents raised there. They built a house when I was eight months old and my mom today still lives in that same house. 

[00:01:12] Russ Rogers: Years later. Yeah. Wow. There are many, there's three of us kids. My sister died about 18 years ago. The three of us sons.

[00:01:20] Russ Rogers: We have babies and then they've had babies and they've multiplied many times and my mom has 29 

[00:01:26] Colette Brown: great grandchildren. Wow. 

[00:01:28] Russ Rogers: Yes. 29. My number of grandchildren is a very small snippet of that. The other two, Their families went off. But yeah, growing up in Modesto was fantastic.

[00:01:38] Russ Rogers: We lived out in the, in, in kind of a ranch out about three miles from town. It was just a great upbringing. We had three boys that lived next to us, three neighbors and we were all the same age. So we always, out in the front yard playing, having a great time enjoying outdoors activities and being creative and, all these things.

[00:01:58] Russ Rogers: So it was fantastic. Now [00:02:00] Modesto is more than tripled in size. So it's a different community than it was when I grew up, but it's still Modesto. And childhood memories, I would say There wasn't like one specific thing, but I will say this. My parents were always involved in everything that I did and that was impactful.

[00:02:17] Russ Rogers: Everything. My dad got his pilot's license when I went off to college, just so he could fly down to Southern California to Cal Poly and watch me play baseball. That's the kind of love and attention that, my parents were, we went to Mexico and we had no house. We worked at an orphanage.

[00:02:34] Russ Rogers: And my dad and his crew went down there and built the house. It was just, yeah. So I can't say there was one specific thing, but it was just a love and attention that my parents gave not only to my, myself, but to my siblings. 

[00:02:46] Colette Brown: Yeah. It sounds like your neighbors too, like this, right? When you have that kind of energy and warmth that attracts and it shapes those around you too.

[00:02:54] Colette Brown: So that's beautiful. So you go on you grow up and you went to college, obviously Southern California. As you just said, and you were playing baseball and where do you go from there? What was your degree in and what did you start doing after? 

[00:03:09] Russ Rogers: Yeah. When I went to Cal Poly, I had no clue like many 18 year old kids.

[00:03:13] Russ Rogers: And I was actually 17 at the time I was a young college student and so I had no idea what I wanted to do, but I had to claim something within that first year. I always, yeah, I always was very intrigued by the hotel business. So I decided to major in hotel business management. Which I worked in a hotel for about a year in my entire life.

[00:03:32] Russ Rogers: So you can see that was not the plan of where I went and I'm sure that it happens to many people, but yeah. So I went to Cal Poly, played baseball, studied hotel business management. And then after that I stayed in Southern California and I volunteered as a junior high youth leader. And you really was engrossed in these kids lives and in developing them.

[00:03:56] Russ Rogers: And then, from there came back up north to Santa Cruz. My brother [00:04:00] had attended Bethany University. And so I ended up going there for another two and a half years of college. And getting, my degree in in biblical studies. And then while there, while I was there, I was interviewed as a youth pastor for a local job.

[00:04:15] Russ Rogers: So ended up going to school and being a youth pastor at the same time. And it was just an amazing experience serving at that church for six years as their new pastor. It was awesome. 

[00:04:26] Colette Brown: Okay. And then where does that take you? Because today I want to talk more about what you're doing, which I think is such a beautiful movement of the move today, 365, but we will get more into that.

[00:04:39] Colette Brown: So after you're a youth pastor, where do you go from there? 

[00:04:42] Russ Rogers: During the six years, one of my youth leaders went over to Fresno and became a youth pastor over there and he introduced me to this orphanage called Rancho de Sus Ninas. It was down in Zuccotti, Mexico, just over the border about 30 miles east of Tijuana.

[00:04:56] Russ Rogers: And so we went down there and we took kids and we took groups, took other groups and we went down there several times, I would say probably six times in all. And each time it just, it really just came inside of me. It was really a part of my heart and seeing these kids from infancy to 18 years of age.

[00:05:14] Russ Rogers: And while I was youth pastoring, I really all of a sudden started feeling like I need to be here and my family, my kids were really young. My son was like, basically like two months old. And so we ended up moving down there when he was five months old and serving for two years at the orphanage at Rancho De Jesus Ninos.

[00:05:32] Russ Rogers: And my position was raising money and getting groups to go down there. To go and to serve and we built churches and we built schools and we built homes and, different activity center. It was an amazing experience, just remembering, the power would go off at 10 o'clock at night, like boom, power was off.

[00:05:49] Russ Rogers: You had to light candles before if you wanted to stay up a little bit later, washing dishes in the tub because we didn't have a kitchen when we first moved down there. That was an amazing experience. And then at the end of that two years experience. [00:06:00] We moved back to Modesto, stayed with my parents, and then my hometown pastor called me because he, my dad was a contractor.

[00:06:07] Russ Rogers: And he said, you know how you have experience in Bethany University, which I graduated from. They are in need of a development office. And I was like, okay what does that entail? And he goes, we need to improve the entire campus inside and out. And so while I was there, I got hired at Bethany, and I served there for eight years also coaching collegiate softball after my first year took on that position.

[00:06:28] Russ Rogers: Raising money improving the campus inside and out, getting Mission America Placement Service, which is called MAPS, which is basically retired people that live in their motorhomes, they would come to the campus. And they would work for free with the college would just, feed them in the cafeteria, but they would work for free.

[00:06:44] Russ Rogers: And so we got so much work done there. if you look at the history of my adult life, it's all been around kids, right? From youth pastoring to we're Rancho de sus ninos to working at the college and then started a training business and training baseball and softball athletes.

[00:06:59] Russ Rogers: So it was just, An amazing adult life, from my late twenties on up. It's been incredible. 

[00:07:06] Colette Brown: Yeah. It's obviously very community forward and not everybody can build community like that and take on the leadership position, the vision, and be able to pull people in to say, Hey come live over here and you can live for free, but you just need to work for us a little bit.

[00:07:25] Colette Brown: And What a gift that is to the community itself and for the people that are also the outliers and you're pulling them in. So you're obviously a big connector. Is that fair to say, 

[00:07:37] Russ Rogers: yes, 

[00:07:41] Colette Brown: I'd love to know more about the movement that you're doing today. So give us a little bit more about what that is and I would love to use this platform as a way to tell people that it is an opportunity that they can get involved in too, because you're on a mission to have this around the world.

[00:07:59] Colette Brown: So tell [00:08:00] us more about the move today, 365. 

[00:08:02] Russ Rogers: Absolutely. So the thing about it is I heard this recently, you can create a business or you can create a movement and so that really, you know, responded to me, I just really gravitated to that, it's yeah, that is awesome because it is a movement.

[00:08:17] Russ Rogers: And when I was doing personal training for about 20 years, I also have a landscape business that I'm still doing and simultaneously when I was doing the personal training, but during COVID, that all came to a halt, the school closed, the parks closed. So I said, now's a good time after 20 years, step away from this, step away from personal training and still continue my business of landscaping.

[00:08:37] Russ Rogers: But it's there's something inside of me. So after about a year, I was like, being involved in kids lives for all this time. I just needed to get back involved. And, but I didn't know what, at what level, because when I'm landscaping, yeah, I'm building a personal relationship with the people that are there, but it's not doing any, it's not doing anything inside the heart, because personal training you're there and you're just with that person and you're giving your time and your energy, and your coaching expertise to this child. After that time I was missing that and I was like, okay, what is it? And so I had bought this journal. I sat on it for a while. I took it on a flight to the East coast. And all of a sudden it was just like one of those moments they came raining down like, Oh my goodness.

[00:09:18] Russ Rogers: And I just started writing and I didn't know what it was about. I was just writing my thoughts. And then pretty soon I just have pages and pages after about three and a half hours of writing. And I was like, this kind of sounds like this could be a book and, never did I ever think that I was going to be an author and everything, but it started to materialize and then I decided to break it down.

[00:09:36] Russ Rogers: And so I ended up writing five books called Today, and these books are about encouraging families to get outside and do activities together. It's for the first five years of a kid's life. Each book represents one year. And it's just awesome. And the development of the books and the brain work in it and relating it to the publisher and her staff and creating these books was [00:10:00] an amazing experience.

[00:10:01] Russ Rogers: And so as a result of that, that we launched those books in June of 2023. Now they are in Spanish. But then a friend of mine said, why don't you take that idea and turn it into an activity? And I was like, that's a great thought. So we thought about maybe doing quarterly events in the community. So we did, we just did a simple walk and it was just so highly attended and people were starting to talk about it.

[00:10:25] Russ Rogers: And I was like, maybe we scrapped the idea of doing quarterly events and we just start doing walks and that's how move today 365 came about because it was like, yeah we're encouraging people to be a part of this walk one time a month. But let's build that into a lifestyle. People that aren't moving people that are sitting idle and I just heard this thing the other day from the Mayo Clinic 200 years ago, the average person because a lot of them were involved in agriculture, their sit down time on a day was 3 to 5 hours.

[00:10:57] Russ Rogers: Today, it's average is 13 to 15 hours a day that a human being sits and does nothing. And so you can see the importance that we need to move. We need to be active. And it's not only healthy for the brain and the mental aspect, but it's, we need it in our bodies. We need the vitamin D. And move Today 365 came about to really encourage people to get out there and to move.

[00:11:21] Russ Rogers: And so what we do is on the second Saturday of every single month, we have these walks and the walks are from Natural Bridges to the Santa Cruz Lighthouse. And it's a two mile walk. We go at 8 30 in the morning on the second Saturday of every month. So we're now we're on our six, one or 2024. And it's been amazing.

[00:11:39] Russ Rogers: And the idea is to grow this across the country. We have 14 states that are represented. Now we have two countries, Germany and Puerto Rico that represented now, and we want to grow this and keep adding states and keep adding people to these communities. And it's awesome. Collette. It's awesome. Because when I get out there, it's a different group.

[00:11:57] Russ Rogers: Every time I've been out there in the rain [00:12:00] solo by myself walking on that day. Inclement weather. I've had, other people are Renee and Pennsylvania who was walking up and down our stairs. Cause it was snowing so heavily that day, people going to malls, we've got people on beaches.

[00:12:14] Russ Rogers: It's just, it's awesome. And to, so to see these photos, to see these videos that are coming in from people around the country and around the world that are moving and I'm promoting that and again, it's a movement, it's not a business, it's a movement, it's encouraging people to get outside and do these activities.

[00:12:31] Russ Rogers: Together, building community, building families, building relationships, and yet getting some activity and it doesn't stop there because I want to encourage people to just not only move one time a month, but basis move today 365. It's every single day, get out and do something every day and I'm telling you it's a lifestyle change that will be healthy for yourself, not only physically, but mentally.

[00:12:53] Colette Brown: Oh, and I think that's a really good point because the mental component for people that are not moving is detrimental. And there's a lot of pharmaceuticals going around because people have depression. And there are simple ways that somebody can look at their life holistically and say, if I move more, if I eat better, if I get a little more sleep, if I add some mindfulness and meditation in there, if I get light exposure first thing in the morning, there's simple things that people can do to sprinkle in to help that mental health.

[00:13:29] Colette Brown: The physical is good too, but I think the other component is I don't know how much you focus on it, but the lymphatic drainage benefit when our bodies become stagnant and our lymph glands don't clean out on their own. We have to do that manually, So that movement is so important to create a healthy. Environment And I love that you're starting with the kids because it's through the parents. We educate our children in how to eat, right? How that physical activity like you shared in the beginning about your [00:14:00] parents being so actively involved and giving you that space to run around.

[00:14:04] Colette Brown: can you give three tips to young parents, maybe let's say that, that have kids and they have a busy lifestyle and, mom and dad are both working and what can they do in their day to day life to encourage movement? 

[00:14:18] Russ Rogers: Yeah, that's a great question. The thing about it is we are all faced with choices every day.

[00:14:23] Russ Rogers: The moment we wake up, the moment we wake up, we, we can hit the snooze button, right? We can jump up, we can make some coffee, we hit the shower, we go to the gym, whatever. we start making choices immediately. Out of the gate. And kids consume our time, schoolconsumes our time, work, all of these things.

[00:14:40] Russ Rogers: And really the most important thing is if we can build in all of these things into our lives, from working every single day to kids every day, we can build in this busy time, a moment throughout the day that we can set aside the phones, we can walk outside, we get away from TV and we can actually spend quality. Really making that first choice to say activity, movement, whatever that is, going out and building a sandcastle, flying a kite, riding a bike, getting on the scooters, putting on a backpack, going on a hike. These are all different little simple things that we can do and that's what the books are about.

[00:15:15] Russ Rogers: Simple ideas. Getting us outside, getting us together. I think the choice that we make every single day of eating right, just like what you preach, what goes into our bodies, it's the choice to say to ourselves, I need to do these things, right? And then to create it into a daily habit. And find that time, for me, a lot of people will get up and work out, first thing in the morning and I'm not a morning workout person.

[00:15:41] Russ Rogers: My, my time is like three to five in the afternoon. And so it's that is the slot. That is the best time for me. After five, I started going downhill and I was like, in terms of not wanting to exude all of that into the night, and so I found that slot from three to five. That is my time to get out there and do it.

[00:15:57] Russ Rogers: So getting up, making those choices, [00:16:00] putting it into our schedule because making it an important part of our life. And thirdly is think about this. Not only is it beneficial to yourself, but think about what you're doing to your kids. 

[00:16:11] Colette Brown: Think 

[00:16:11] Russ Rogers: about what you're training them. We spend so much time with our young ones, training them up in the way we should go.

[00:16:17] Russ Rogers: This is a important aspect of their life, for their future to enjoy, outdoor activities. I gotta give my daughter prop. She's she's got a seven, a four and a 2-year-old, and they live in Connecticut. And, it's very rural, but, I'm constantly seeing posts and they're sending pictures and videos and stuff like that.

[00:16:33] Russ Rogers: And she just, she's out there taking the boys and get them in the mud, get them in the dirt and the rain. They put it on their rain gear and just, it happens and it happens all the time. If we take that approach and give these kids that experience when they're young. And if we're not in a rural area, we live in the city, we can still do those same things, getting outside and appreciate the things that are around us.

[00:16:56] Russ Rogers: I get out and move together. So training that child so that becomes a lifestyle of theirs for the future. 

[00:17:02] Colette Brown: Yeah. And I hear the excuse, you probably hear it too. I just don't have time, right? We all have time. 

[00:17:08] Russ Rogers: We all have time. We can put it in. 

[00:17:10] Colette Brown: We all have time. And I would say if you don't have time, go ahead.

[00:17:13] Colette Brown: How much TV are you watching a day? How much time are you spending on social media? What are some things in your life that you could clean up and right and just, and change it around? And I think that those are just excuses. And the other important thing that I think you said is schedule the time, put it in your calendar because if you've blocked some time out for a meeting or for whatever it is, you can block time for that too.

[00:17:39] Colette Brown: And protect it. And honor it because it honors you and you can perform better when you're feeling optimal and movement is a very key component to that. 

[00:17:50] Russ Rogers: Yeah. 100%. Yeah. I think that's very well said. And if we can do that, then we're going to change many lives. And that's what it's about.

[00:17:57] Russ Rogers: Influencing, encouraging, inspiring [00:18:00] people to move and create a better life for themselves and for the children. 

[00:18:04] Colette Brown: Yeah. That's, it's so important. And this podcast is about all things wellness. And one thing that I feel I don't talk about enough is the exercise and which I do every day and I'm a morning person.

[00:18:18] Colette Brown: So if I don't do it first thing in the morning, the rest of my day, I'm like, I just understand that I won't get it done. I've learned that's a time that I protect and it's a non negotiable for me. Even if I don't feel like it, even if my day is crunched, I will say, I'm going to take 10 minutes and I'm going to do a high intensity workout right now, 10 minutes.

[00:18:41] Colette Brown: Let's go. And I do it. So whatever it is, and there's no excuses and I work out from home by the way too. So some people say, I don't have the money to go to a gym. I don't have the time to go to a gym. I don't either. I don't have time in Los Angeles to drive. And that's the reason I work out from home because I don't want to take an hour to two hours out of my day to drive and park and go in and wait for the class to start, wait for a machine.

[00:19:05] Colette Brown: I would rather take that 30, 60 minutes and. And I do it at home and I feel great. So 

[00:19:11] Colette Brown: No excuses. so how do people get in touch with you? Do you have kind of chapter heads in different cities or are you planning on doing something like that? How would somebody get involved if they don't have something already going on in their community?

[00:19:27] Russ Rogers: Yeah. So they can contact me directly. You can follow me on at MoveToday365 on Instagram. You can message me on there. You can email me at MoveToday365 at yahoo. com. All of the information about what we're doing is also on the website, which is MoveToday365. com. So any one of those means. You can get the dates.

[00:19:50] Russ Rogers: you can find the books on there. There's athletic gear on there. There's podcasts on there. There's all kinds of information on the websitebut follow me on movetoday365 on [00:20:00] Instagram. And that is a great way to at least let me know that you would love to get your community involved.

[00:20:06] Russ Rogers: It's really a simple thing. And the beautiful thing is it's free. It is free. It just takes a little bit of time to just say, Hey, shout out to friends, shout out to family. We're going to, we're going to meet at the mall and we're going to walk from here to, whatever target or, some other, shopping center or whatever, but just two miles.

[00:20:25] Russ Rogers: And so if you hit me up, you DM me or whatever. Then I will give you the information to start this in your community. It's very simple. And then after that, once you get that going, then you encourage the people that are with you to get out and to communicate to other people and invite others.

[00:20:41] Russ Rogers: And so it's just really a word of mouth kind of movement. And and that's the way we're going to build this and build it up across the country and around the world. 

[00:20:49] Colette Brown: I love that. And you're a natural, like we talked about earlier, community. organizer. Like you've built things from the ground up and you've rallied people to come together.

[00:21:00] Colette Brown: And so what a better platform to use than what you're doing right now in collecting people that are interested and you leading them because a lot of people need that. That leadership and that encouragement and a little guiding light. So I really want to thank you and just say what a beautiful job you're doing in the world by helping in this way, because people need to step forward into their gifts and yours definitely is of leadership and community.

[00:21:28] Colette Brown: So thank you for doing that. 

[00:21:30] Russ Rogers: Thank you, Colette. I so appreciate it. And I know we have a newer friendship and and I'm, supporting you 100 percent with what you're doing with your granola and, the food that you put inside your body, and so with that combination of eating right and putting exercise and movement in your daily schedule, it's so important and I'm so thrilled to be a part of your podcast and to help spread the message and get the word out to all these people.

[00:21:56] Colette Brown: I appreciate that. One question that I do ask all my guests [00:22:00] toward the end is if this was your last message that you had to broadcast out to the world, what would it be? 

[00:22:07] Russ Rogers: Jim Valvano, who coached in 1980s coached North Carolina state. He said three things just before he passed with cancer. And he said, there are three things in life that make a beautiful day.

[00:22:20] Russ Rogers: And that is, if you can cry every day. If you can think every day and you can laugh every day and he goes, if you do those three things in life and do it daily, you will have a great day. And I would add that add to that component. If we can not only laugh, cry and think, but we can move every day, then it's going to be a great day.

[00:22:40] Colette Brown: I love that advice. That's really good. I'm just reflecting on those tips and thinking that if you're doing those things, it means that you're connected to the heart. And to other people and that you have compassion and you can, those tears will come up when there's something that is moving, whether it's happy or sad.

[00:23:02] Colette Brown: And the laughter that comes by a gratitude practice of being in the moment. And so really living. So I think those are checkpoints of, are you really living? Are you really living your purpose? Are you living open to the world and things that are coming towards you? And and what are you giving, what are you giving back?

[00:23:23] Russ Rogers: Yeah. And that's so important. We've got to give and giving does an amazing thing to our heart. It really does. It gets us away from self and it helps us to look outwardly and not inwardly. 

[00:23:36] Colette Brown: So 

[00:23:36] Russ Rogers: that's vital to our everyday component of living. 

[00:23:40] Colette Brown: Yes. A psychiatrist told me recently in an interview that people that are depressed her recommendation is go volunteer, get outside yourself.

[00:23:49] and your depression will start vanishing. I know it's deeper than that, but for a lot of people that are teetering on that that area, when you do get outside of yourself, [00:24:00] and you start to see that, Oh, my woes are not As bad as this person or like an orphanage, imagine like what you saw and experienced in Mexico is just probably moves you until today.

[00:24:15] Colette Brown: Get outside yourself, move, love, laugh, give, do all the things. 

[00:24:20] Colette Brown: anything else that you'd like to leave us with today, Russ? 

[00:24:23] Russ Rogers: I would just like to encourage people to just take a moment today, 5, 10, 15 minutes and get away, get outside. I want you to think about the memories and the opportunity that you have to build those memories, not only with your spouse, your friends, your family.

[00:24:42] Russ Rogers: These are opportunities that you can take to get out and be with community. And, we so need that. So I encourage you today, move today, three, six, five. It's so important. Make outside activity and moving in your body and everyday lifestyle. 

[00:24:56] Colette Brown: Yeah. And hey, and if you're doing it tag Russ, so he can share the movement and the activity.

[00:25:01] Colette Brown: So other people realize I'm not alone in this. I'm doing this too. So I'll try to raise my hand and be more cautious of when I'm outside moving to or moving that I, I tag you and say, I'm doing it. So 

[00:25:14] Russ Rogers: appreciate it. 

[00:25:14] Colette Brown: So important to share that. Russ, thank you so much. We're going to put your information in the show notes.

[00:25:20] Colette Brown: You also left it earlier in the podcast. So people know where to find you, but what a light you are in the world. What a gift that you give sharing your resources and your mindset and your passion about getting out there and moving and Collectively, by taking care of ourselves, we can make the world a better place.

[00:25:43] Colette Brown: So thank you, Russ. 

[00:25:44] Russ Rogers: Thanks, Colette. I appreciate it. 

[00:25:45] Colette Brown: I appreciate it. And everyone, thank you for listening. And until next time, be well.