The Alimond Show
Welcome to The Alimond Show --join us as we share our entrepreneurial guests' stories, uncover their secrets to success, and explore the unique paths they've taken to build thriving businesses in our community.
In each episode, our host, Aliyah Dastour, sits down with a diverse group of local business owners, from the corner cafe to the boutique shop, from tech startups to family-run enterprises. We peel back the curtain to reveal the trials, triumphs, and transformational moments that have shaped their entrepreneurial journey.
Discover the passion, perseverance, and innovative thinking that fuels these businesses, as well as the challenges they've overcome along the way. Whether you're a budding entrepreneur seeking inspiration or simply a curious listener interested in the stories behind your favorite local spots, The Alimond Show has something for everyone.
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The Alimond Show
Clif Brooks - Breaking Nutrition Myths: From Personal Trainer to Wellness Advocate, Battling Adversity, and Championing Personalized Health Strategies
Breakfast is not the most important meal of the day. That’s right—we’re debunking one of the most deeply rooted nutrition myths with our guest, Clif Brooks on this episode. Clif is the owner and fitness coach of Limitless Unlock Your Potential. So sit back and join us as we dissect the outdated dietary guidelines, like the food pyramid, that have contributed to the obesity epidemic in the United States. You’ll also learn the truth about processed foods and their ties to big pharma, as well as the benefits of intermittent fasting and the necessity of whole, nutritious foods for achieving your fitness goals.
Witness a story of resilience and transformation. From being a frail child to a certified personal trainer by 21, Clif shares the impact of early health challenges and the devastating loss of his father to a stroke at 56. His journey highlights the vital importance of health and fitness, especially for parents. Clif also opens up about battling alcoholism as a coping mechanism for a tumultuous family life, including his mother’s schizophrenia, and how perseverance has been the cornerstone of maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
Discover the power of personalized health and wellness. Our guest shares insights on creating tailored health protocols based on extensive data collection, from gut health to DNA profiling. Learn why generic online plans often fail and how understanding personal food allergies can make a significant difference. We even share a personal success story about starting a meal prep company, emphasizing the practical applications of these principles. Finally, we stress the importance of balancing health and wealth, ensuring that busy professionals prioritize well-being to stay healthy and present for their loved ones.
Well, my name is Cliff Brooks. I have been a health and fitness person. I'm a coach, I'm a personal trainer, nutrition specialist kind of. I've been in health and fitness for over 25 years. My company is called Limitless Unlock your Potential because I truly believe that the word potential, it, should be a curse word, because most people think when someone tells you, hey, you know what, you got a lot of potential. That to me means that you have the ability to be great but you haven't lived up to it. So it's like a slap in the face You've got potential but you're not actually living up to it. So that's why I wanted to name my company that to help people to bring out what's already inside of them.
Speaker 2:Thank you for sharing that. Now, when you came in this morning, we were like what did you have for breakfast? And you're like nothing. And I just wanted to talk about this because growing up we were told as kids, all the time before going to school, your parents are like eat breakfast, it's the most important meal of the day. Teachers always put that in our brains. Can you talk to me a little bit about why breakfast is actually not the most important meal of the day, if you don't mind?
Speaker 1:Okay, so let's go back to growing up. They were telling you that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Remember the food pyramid where you had six to nine servings of grain?
Speaker 2:Yes, why do you think?
Speaker 1:the United States is so overweight now Because of that pyramid and the ideals we were instilled on as kids. Yeah, it's all a lie, it's all I'm going to. Everyone's going to think, oh, he's wearing a tinfoil hat. But it's not a tinfoil hat, it's the truth. You don't go from the 1960s, 1970s. You can look at old pictures of people at the beach. Hardly anyone is overweight. Fast forward 50 years.
Speaker 1:73% of the United States is overweight. That's eight out of 10 people. Because you can't have 0.3 of a person. So it's done intentionally. And when you take a step back and look at it, the companies that own the breakfast cereal here give your kid a bowl full of sugar, send them into school. So now they're bouncing all over the walls and now they aren't paying attention in class. Let's fill them full of medication so they'll calm down. Well, no, why don't you stop giving them sugar before they go to school? So if you look, take a step back and look at it, the same companies that own the processed foods are the same companies that own the big pharma. So if you look at it, they get you coming with all of the processed foods, they tell you the sugars.
Speaker 1:They tell you that fat is bad for you. Then they tell you to start eating more carbs and then the whole country just blew up in 50 years. That does not happen. If you go and this will probably get me in trouble, I don't care If you go and take a look at where McDonald's the map of where they have all their McDonald's on their international expansion, and then you superimpose the global obesity trends, do it and tell me what you see.
Speaker 2:Oh, God, I'm scared, I don't know. Oh God, I'm scared, I don't know.
Speaker 1:You're going to see that the global obesity trends is where the United States has expanded and you'll see that those places where we have those international restaurants, the fast food, the convenient places. Yes, the fast casual. They're going to be the ones where it's the hot spots of all of the world getting bigger and gaining weight.
Speaker 1:Oh man, that was a loaded question, no, but thank you for sharing that the reason why I don't eat breakfast because I went down my little rabbit hole is because I do intermittent fasting. So now, intermittent fasting for those of you that do not know this, it's not a meal plan, it is a tool. A lot of people say, well, I'm using intermittent fasting. Well, that's great. You can use intermittent fasting with if it fits your macros. You can use it with vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian, the Mediterranean diet, carnivore, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1:All intermittent fasting is is a time restriction. So the one that most people use is, let's say, this is 24 hours of your day, most people will eat for eight hours and then they'll fast for 16 hours. So, yes, this is going to cause you not to eat as many calories as if you were eating for 16 hours of the day. So, yes, up to a point, you will have some results. But if you're not changing the food that you're eating, if you're still hitting the drive-thrus, if you're still eating all the highly processed cakes and pies and stuff like that they're good, don't get me wrong, but they're taking you away from your health and fitness goals. But if you were to still eat that in that eight hours, you're going to, yes, lose weight because, instead of eating for the full 16 hours, now you're eating for eight, so you're going to eat less calories.
Speaker 1:But unless you change and make sure you're eating the right amount of calories, the right amount of proteins, carbs and fats, the right amount of proteins, carbs and fats, the right amount of vegetables, vitamins and minerals In that eight-hour window, you're going to hit a plateau, because your body is literally made up of the food that you eat. You are what you eat. When your parents told you that growing up, it's the truth, because your body can only repair itself with the nutrition that you give it. So are you eating nutritious, real, healthy, whole foods? Are you eating things that are fast and cheap? And then look in the mirror and you'll be able to tell yourself maybe I should make some adjustments Just because it's convenient. Is it doing me favors?
Speaker 2:Damn, I feel called out, but truth hurts.
Speaker 1:The truth does. But first the truth will piss you off, but then it will set you free, because most look, everybody in your life is telling you that it's okay, don't worry about it, you'll do it tomorrow. It's not a big deal. This is why mediocrity is running rampant in the United States, because there's so many people in your life that are telling you that not doing what you're supposed to is okay, but it's really not so. It's self-discipline, and self-discipline is the highest form of self-respect, because you're doing what you say you're going to do. And you know why most people don't have discipline, why they don't have self-respect Because they don't keep their promises and their commitments to themselves. And if you want to increase, okay. So the best way to change your body is to raise your standards.
Speaker 2:AKA hit up Cliff.
Speaker 1:That is 100% what I will hold you to. But what I'm talking about is like take a look, people tell me all the time obesity runs in my family. No, it really doesn't. And here's what runs in your family the habits, the patterns, the low standards that your grandparents to your parents, to you, to your kids it's all been passed down. Have you seen those families where everybody's overweight and then one person says I'm not going to be like that and their entire family tree, a new branch, is healthy and fit? It's because they made a decision that they were not going to live through the same habits, patterns and standards. They were going to change that because they don't like what was going on in their family, so they weren't going to allow it in their family from them. So if you don't come from a healthy family, make sure that a healthy family comes from you.
Speaker 2:Yes, you can change that. You don't have to live that. Thank you for sharing that. I love the passion. I want to know your background on how you got into this industry, how you got to where you are today. How did you find out that this was the career that you wanted?
Speaker 1:Talk to us about that I'm 46 years old. I've got friends that are my age, that look 20 years older than me, because they don't take care of themselves. So for me to tell you why I'm here, I've got to go back to where I started from.
Speaker 2:Yes, please.
Speaker 1:I was born in 1978. I was born six weeks early. I was four pounds when I was born. I spent the first month of my life in an incubator, fighting to stay alive, and I was a small, scrawny kid. As I was growing up, I was really, really small. My mom didn't even want me to play sports when because that's how small I was, my goodness and then my dad talked her into it let me play football, and I broke my ribs my first game that I ever played football in middle school but my dad was a good guy.
Speaker 1:He uh got me these big football rib pads that I played the whole year. My mom still to this day, unless she sees this video, would never know that I broke my ribs when I was in high school. Surprise.
Speaker 2:Yeah surprise.
Speaker 1:And then from there, I was 11 years old and I started working out 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, 100 squats before I went to school, every day and before I went to bed. 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, 100 squats. Before I went to school, every day and before I went to bed 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, 100 squats. So 200 of each every day from when I was 11 years old to when I turned 12. I thought nobody knew what I was doing because I had my door shut in my room and I was working out. My dad knew what I was doing, so he bought me a set of dumbbells. So from 12 to 13, I used these dumbbells and since, remember, I was a really tiny kid, so he bought me a 10 pound set of dumbbells, and that was heavy.
Speaker 1:for me it was. It was rough. And then I used those dumbbells from 12, let's see, from 11 to 12 was body weight, 12 to 13 was the 10 pound dumbbells At 13. For Christmas I asked for a weight set. My dad bought me a weight set, but my dad was an army ranger so there were no free rides in my house. He bought the weight set but I had to put it together.
Speaker 2:Hey, that's how you learn.
Speaker 1:And then from 13 and going into my freshman year my birthday is in April, so I turned 14. So I started working out. I spent all my allowance on bodybuilding magazines, anything that I could learn how to get bigger. And from there at 13 to the time that I started freshman football. I started off at five foot two. I was 120 pounds. I had a growth spurt. I was now a whole five foot six, but I put on 30 pounds.
Speaker 1:So all of my friends looked at me and were like oh my God, what happened to you? Are you on steroids? I'm like I'm 14 years old, when am I going to get that from? So then I started training my friends in high school when I was 14 years old and then at 21, I got licensed, I got all my certifications and I started training people for money when I turned 21. So I'm 46 now and that's 25 years worth of experience, Thousands of busy parents that I've worked with to lose tens of thousands of pounds. Now the reason why I specifically work with parents, and now more so men, is because my dad died from a stroke when he was only 56 years old.
Speaker 2:I'm so sorry to hear that.
Speaker 1:My dad was my best friend I'm named after him, so every time I hear my name I think about him and he always told us he needed to lose 20 to 30 pounds. The doctors told him that he'd be able to come off of his blood pressure medication, but he didn't really think it was a big deal because every time that he went to the doctor's office he was always in the healthy range because the medication kept him there. But the underlying issue got worse and worse and worse and worse. And so he always told us like tomorrow I'll start eating better, monday I'll start working out. Tomorrow never happened. Monday never came. He had a stroke in his brain stem and died.
Speaker 1:Oh man, your brain stem is where all of your involuntary bodily functions are regulated your circulatory system, your respiratory system. My stepmother found him unconscious on the bathroom floor. We have no idea how long he'd been there. When she found him, she called 911. He was rushed to the emergency room and then, when he got there, they took him straight into ICU and they put a ventilator tube in his mouth. He couldn't breathe on his own. So by the time I got there I got there just in time to watch my father sign a DNR.
Speaker 2:What's a DNR? I'm sorry.
Speaker 1:A DNR is a do not resuscitate order. He didn't want to live attached to a machine for the rest of his life, so he signed this. So he signed this, and the hardest thing I've ever had to do was watch my father, my best friend, my role model, sign a piece of paper that says If I'm going to die, let me.
Speaker 2:I'm so sorry. Do you like the tissue? No, I'm fine.
Speaker 1:Sorry, Do you like the tissue? No, I'm fine, Okay. Three days later my phone rang at 3.30 in the morning. It was my sister calling me. My dad had just died from a second catastrophic stroke. The second hardest thing that I ever had to do was give the eulogy at my father's funeral. So, something I didn't mention earlier I'm a recovered alcoholic. I started drinking in high school because I wanted to drink away. The pain of just my family wasn't very close when I was younger and my mom was sick and found out later on in life she's got schizophrenia. That's why life at home wasn't easy and I started drinking in high school. You know kids make stupid decisions.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And the stupid decision that I made. I'm a middle child, so you hear all the time that the middle child is ignored and nobody cares about the middle child. So you hear stuff like that from people saying it on TV and then, like you, create it in your own life. At 14 years old I started thinking that because my older sister was daddy's girl, my younger brother was mom's baby mom's baby that I had no one to talk to. So at 14 years old I made a decision that I was going to go out and just never be home and try to make friends with everybody. So that's why I have so many friends and acquaintance now, because my home life was not a good one.
Speaker 1:So I just decided I was going to make everyone else my friend and when I did that, I started hanging out with older people, started drinking, got out of control when I was in high school, graduated a year late, got expelled from my high school and then had to go to another one because I skipped so much school. I took the whole month of April off for my birthday, my senior year, and the principal was like no, you're done, so I had to go to a different school. But the reason why I bring this up is because I started bartending at 21. I started personal training at 21. And you don't put someone with a drinking problem behind a bar serving alcohol. But I hit it. I was what you call a functional alcoholic, and imagine putting a pyromaniac in charge of a fireworks warehouse.
Speaker 2:No, not a good idea, not a good idea.
Speaker 1:So, needless to say, from the time I was 21 to the time I turned 29, I had four DUIs. Dang to the time I turned 29,. I had four DUIs Dang. I got arrested, pulled over and arrested and convicted of four DUIs before I turned 29, before I turned 30.
Speaker 2:Holy moly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and St Patrick's Day of this year, I celebrated 10 years of sobriety. Yay, congratulations Thank you, and the reason why I tell you this is because when my dad died, I went down into the bottom of a bottle and my life just got really bad. I blacked out for the entire year. I don't really remember anything. All the money that he left us, I spent it on vacations. I spent it on vacations. I spent it drinking and partying, trying to numb the pain, and all I did was drown my life, practically man.
Speaker 1:So yeah, it's been rough, but I've also. And then there was one day I went to Louisville, Kentucky, Like I was trying to quit drinking for a long time.
Speaker 2:Question Did you have anybody like as a support system during? Those times Dang.
Speaker 1:I didn't have any support system. I had the court system that told me I needed to go to AA. Oh well and well, if I had actually gone, maybe I would have seen changes. But the alcoholic brain tells you that you don't have a problem, so I did not go. I would fake the slips and yeah it was dumb it's okay, we all do dumb shit.
Speaker 1:Maybe, if I had actually gone, I would have learned my lesson. I wouldn't have gotten four DUIs, but everything that I had did back then. What is this saying? Everything that happens was supposed to happen in your life. If anything else, anything different was supposed to happen, then you would have made a different choice when you came to that fork in the road. Yeah, choice when you came to that fork in the road.
Speaker 1:So everything that I've been through, all the problems that I've faced, all the issues that I have in my whole entire life, they happened because they were meant for me to go through that, to fall on my face over and over and over again, enough to be humbled to finally ask for help. And then, when I got the help, I was able to hire a mentor, a coach, to get me back on track and fix my life. Actually, a coach can't fix your life. They can put the right pathway in front of you. It's your decision to walk that path. It's your decision to show up every day and do what's required of you. So I've ended up helping dozens of people sober up since the time I sobered up. So it was. It was really rough. It took me 15 years to stop drinking dang, it's a big chunk.
Speaker 1:It's a long time.
Speaker 2:But you made it through and here you are.
Speaker 1:I did. And then like there's. You know, when people ask you if there's one thing in your life that you would change, what would it be? If I change anything in my history, I might not be sitting here right now telling this story that somebody could see it and it would give them the hope that they can change their life. So there's nothing that I would change. As painful as it was, it's who I am. It made me the man who I am today.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, and I'm so grateful that you shared that story and, like your DUIs, A lot of people probably don't share that or kind of keep it away from their story, but that's part of the journey, like what you went through. And it definitely made you who you are and you're just being transparent and honest. So other people who maybe feel ashamed or whatever it may be, they know that there is hope and you can come out of it stronger than before.
Speaker 1:And that's the problem. People try to hide stuff and when you hide stuff then you're not taking accountability and responsibility for the things that happen. Me hiding all the DUIs. Me hiding all that stuff. None of my friends knew until I started talking about it Like wow, I had no idea you were that bad. Well, yeah, I was worse than what you saw. Only thing that you see is what was on social media. There was a whole lot that was never there. I was a disaster. I've had friends tell me I'm so, I was so worried about you, had no idea that you went through and just the stuff I would post. They were concerned. But if they had known all the stuff behind it?
Speaker 1:I would have really been concerned. Yeah, look, there are times I didn't think I was ever going to sober up. There were times that I had thought about ending it all, thought about driving my car into a tree and being the end of it, but with my luck, I probably would have just ended up a paraplegic, so that's why I didn't do it.
Speaker 2:Oh stop, this makes me so sad.
Speaker 1:But yeah, I know, yeah no, well, back then, your luck? It's not luck, it's the decisions and the choices that you make cause you to end up where you're at. It's not good luck that you ended up in this situation. Remember, earlier I said, you get to a point in your life and you make a decision Am I going to go this way or am I going to go that way? So let's say something that you would consider good luck happens over here. Every decision you made in your life got you to this point here that you consider good luck. Don't discredit what somebody's been through, the choices that they made when nobody else was looking, and call it good luck, because you don't know what they went through, the pain that they suffered In order to get to that place and become an overnight sensation that took 15 years to reach.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'd like to ask you for anybody who's listening. How are you able to help them? Just so they're curious. I know you've been through a lot. I would like to know the type of services specifically that you can offer with certain things that people are struggling with Maybe the type of food they're eating, Maybe mental health-wise something's going on.
Speaker 1:Everybody's different. Everyone is 100% different. There's no two people who are going to go through life and be able to have the same program, the same plan, because I don't know what you do on a daily basis, I don't know what she does on a daily basis. There's no way that I would tell the two of you that you have to do the same thing. So everything we do is 100% customized, and everything we do starts off with getting data from you. What do I mean by data? Gut health testing. We have you go to get your blood taken and then we run hormone panels, blood screening, dna profiling, because we need to see what's going on inside of you. And do I know how to read those labs? Yes, I do a doctor to look at the labs and explain them to you, because I understand where my zone of genius is and I understand where a doctor's zone of genius is. So that's why we have people in place to help the clients know exactly what they need. Then we put together a protocol that fits their body, their lifestyle, their goals and their needs, because no two people are the same. So you're as individual as your fingerprint. There's no way that if I tell you to do X Y Z. I can tell the next person to do X Y Z, because you're going through different things on a daily basis and that's why the whole testing allows our clients to condense timeframes.
Speaker 1:Yes, you probably could figure out how to get in the best shape of your life on your own, but you're going to have to go through years and years and years of trial and error and research to figure out what works best for you. Time is money. Are you willing to spend money up front to help you to reach this goal or are you willing to spend the time to figure it out? The difference is the time. You just said mental health.
Speaker 1:Talk about the emotional damage that does for someone who's tried and failed repeatedly to lose the weight. See, losing weight is easy. See and this is what I get from everybody, losing weight is easy. Keeping it off, that's the hard part, because people will tell you oh, I lose 10 pounds, 20 pounds, 30 pounds you could lose. You've probably lost a hundred pounds in your life, if not you most. I'm sure you've got a friend that's lost 10 pounds over and over and over and over and over again. But they're still in the same situation because their, their thoughts, their beliefs, their patterns. They haven't changed them. Your thoughts create your beliefs, your beliefs, their patterns. They haven't changed them. Your thoughts create your beliefs. Your beliefs create your actions, your actions create your habits and your habits create your lifestyle Habits was number four.
Speaker 1:How many people just start? I'm going to go to the gym and start working out. That's like trying to create a habit If you haven't first created it in your mind and seen it and have a plan to follow. This is why so many people never get results. I'm guilty of that. Or they go online and they try to Google something and get a, get a completely generic plan that is put there as a lead generation device that people try it and it doesn't work. Then they find out who posted it and then they call that person and get their help. That's why there's, if you go to weight loss on Google, there's 4 billion results You're going to get just like that. That's why it's there. It's lead generation. If you're on the first page of Google, it's not because you're the best program, it's because you have the best SEO.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, no, that's so true. Hmm, um, I'd like to ask as far as diets goes, that's also customizable, again, because everybody else is different. If somebody's maybe like on a vegan type of plan, if somebody has like allergies that they have, you're able to work with those types of people for any specific diets?
Speaker 1:That's why we do the gut health testing.
Speaker 1:Oh, I didn't know that it's gut health allergies. The test that we use. You're going to get 400 different results back from it. It's very thorough, so I'm never going to tell you that you can't eat X Y it. It's very thorough, so I'm never going to tell you that you can't eat X, y, z. It's not my place. You can eat whatever you want. Nothing's off limits. But if something comes back on this test and it says you should stay away from this, this, this, this and this, you should limit this, this and this and these are the things that you should eat. These two columns are causing inflammation in your body. So if you really want to see the changes in your body, you should stop eating these. But this is the problem. A lot of people are allergic to things that they eat on a daily basis because they like them, but it's not something that they should have. I'm allergic to onions. If I eat onions, I'm going to get a distended belly and it feels like I've got food poisoning multiplied to the nth power.
Speaker 2:Oh, my gosh.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's terrible.
Speaker 2:Onions.
Speaker 1:Onions.
Speaker 2:Man, that's in a lot of stuff. It is you really got to be careful.
Speaker 1:That's why I learned how to cook, and I had a meal prep company for a few years too.
Speaker 2:What Talk to me about that? I don't know.
Speaker 1:I used to own a meal prep company. I made my meals one day and posted a picture on social media and was like meals for the week. And then my inbox blew up, Comments blew up and I started a business like that stop, you make it sound so easy.
Speaker 1:You're like it was I, people know that I work out, people know that I eat healthy. So I posted my meals and there was like 20 of them and people saw it and were like hey, where'd you get that? I was like I made it. I made it like whoa, if you make it again, can you make some for me maybe?
Speaker 1:sure, I guess and then a lot of people were like yeah, yeah, me too, me too, me too, me too. My inbox blew up and then I started the meal prep company, just like that do you still have it or no? I was working at orange theory fitness. I was starting my business and I was cooking all at the same time. I had no life and I did this for like three and a half years oh my gosh, that was your life so I cut out the meal prep company makes sense.
Speaker 2:No, and you're too busy. You got to focus on the key stuff it was the most involved yeah, of course. Oh, my goodness, is there anything maybe that I haven't touched on, about your business or yourself, that you would like to share with the listeners? While I have you here, I want to make sure that we get all the key points for you.
Speaker 1:So I work with parents, but I specialize in working with men and I started this brand-new program. It's called the Catalyst. It's the spark in men's lives that creates transformation in their energy, in their health, in their fitness and in their productivity and their performance. So it's all about helping good men become great.
Speaker 1:Because of what's going on with what happened with my dad, I don't want anyone else's kids, I don't want their story to be my story, because my dad was ripped from our lives. We're missing decades worth of memories with him. If he just would have started eating healthier, started working out, he would still be here today. He met my niece. My sister has two daughters and a son Never going to meet them. When I have a family, he's never going to meet them.
Speaker 1:So I know how difficult, how hard it is to never be able to pick up my phone and call my dad, to never be able to see him on birthdays or go on vacations with him, and I do not want that for your kids or anyone else's kids that's watching this, because you may think that you're too busy, you don't have time or whatever excuse that you're telling yourself. Your children didn't ask to be born, but they deserve to have their parents there to take care of them, to answer questions, to raise them to be a productive member of society. Because I can tell you right now, if something happens to you and their kids are young, they're not going to understand why dad's not coming home. They're going to think mom's mad at them. That's why they're no longer here.
Speaker 1:But as they get older and they start learning about why you're not here, they're going to love you, they're going to miss you, but they're going to be so mad and they're going to resent you because you didn't do what was necessary to be here with them, to show them how much you love them. If you're not going to change your eating habits, if you're not going to start working out because you don't want to think about the hole that you're going to leave in your children, a hole that can never be filled. It never gets any easier. You just get stronger dealing with it and I don't want that pain, I don't want that suffering for anyone's family, anyone's children, because I went through it. Yeah, that's why I do what I do.
Speaker 2:Some powerful stuff there. Man, I feel so like I don't know, sad, like I wish that things could have been different. But I know everybody's mental state is in a different place, everybody's willpower is in a different place. In regards to like, Don't feel sad.
Speaker 1:You know I went through all of this. It was my burden to bear my cross, to bear whatever you want to call it. But because I went through this, the thousands of families, thousands of clients that I've helped their families have changed. You know, like when you drop a rock into a pond and you see that ripple effect.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:I helped one client. Then they change their family.
Speaker 1:Yes, so it's just expands yeah so the worst thing that ever happened to me. I use that as a way of of helping as many other families as possible, and the reason why I can sit here and have this conversation with you and your move, the way that you're moved, is because it's not a hypothetical situation. It's not. If you don't do this, this could happen to you. It's my dad didn't do this. He didn't think that this was going to happen to him. He was in the military, so he was in great shape when he was younger. He didn't do what he needed to, and he's not here, and it destroyed our family to and he's not here and it destroyed our family. So it's not me on a soapbox preaching to you about you need to do this. You need to do this. It's me having a conversation with you explaining this is what I went through and I don't want you or anyone else to go through the same.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no well. I appreciate you using that very hard situation to help better other people's lives so that they don't have to go through that. That's not an easy thing. A lot of people can take it a completely different direction and I know part of your journey is that other direction, but you got out of it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that wasn't fun.
Speaker 2:No. So I'm glad that you're here to help those people who maybe are going through it, and you don't want them to have 15, 25 years of them going through that until somebody steps in. So that's some powerful stuff, and the fact that you're using that very hard life lesson experience to help better others is saying a lot. So thanks for doing that. Man, I wish I could talk to you more, but I know we're on a little time crunch here. But if you could leave our listeners with a message, what would that message be? Or maybe if you have a mantra or saying that you like to live your life by that you could share.
Speaker 1:So I work with a lot of busy professionals entrepreneurs, executives, people that are in sales. They travel a lot. Here's what I want you to understand. You don't believe anything else I've ever said to you in this entire podcast. Just remember this Do not spend the first half of your life in hustle and grind mode, amassing your wealth and neglecting your health, only to spend the second half of your life spending all of your wealth trying to buy back your health. It doesn't work that way.
Speaker 2:That is powerful. I never thought of it like that. So a lot of entrepreneurs or business owners who are thinking that way maybe reconsider that and hit up Cliff. He'd be happy to help you guys.
Speaker 1:More than happy. Keep you alive and coming home to your kids every night, that's right every night.
Speaker 2:That's right. Well, thank you so much for being on the podcast and sharing your incredible story, your journey and everything that you're helping other families and kids with.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you for having me.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, thank you.