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.
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The Alimond Show
Michael "Mike" De Vivo of Vivo Training Systems - From High School Challenges to Fitness Entrepreneurship: Transforming Health, Navigating Business Growth, and Engaging the Community
Ever wondered how a high school "fat kid" transformed into a leading fitness entrepreneur? You're about to uncover Michael "Mike" Christopher Paul DeVivo's (MCPD) remarkable journey from struggling with weight to establishing Vivo Training Systems with his wife, Jasmine. Their story is one of resilience, keen observation, and a deep-seated passion for health, leading to successful weight loss and the eventual creation of an innovative online training business. Join us as we explore Michael's pivotal moments, the blossoming of a college romance into a powerhouse fitness partnership, and their forward-thinking transition to online training.
Effective communication can make or break health and fitness interventions, and we highlight how well-timed and tailored messages can empower at-risk groups. Listen to the fascinating origins of the Fit Quest Podcast, inspired by Joseph Campbell's hero's journey, and discover how Michael and Jasmine use wellness challenges, workshops, and personal training to engage and uplift their community. With firsthand experiences shared, we aim to motivate listeners to embark on their own health and fitness adventures, armed with insights from the trenches.
As the holidays loom, the temptation to indulge is pervasive. Our conversation zeroes in on maintaining a healthy relationship with food during seasonal festivities, offering practical strategies for celebrating mindfully without falling into unsustainable habits. Michael shares his vision for expanding Vivo Training Systems, the importance of balancing family and business life, and the joy of "workout cookouts." Don't miss the lively exchange with our guest, where unexpected questions lead to candid and thought-provoking reflections, making for an engaging and entertaining listen.
You know, I've been thinking about going by an acronym, because acronyms seem to be cool these days. So, if you go, my full name it's Michael Christopher Paul DeVivo, which would be MCPD, which if I ever want to rebrand myself, I feel like that's the way to go. But Michael DeVivo or Mike, by people who talk to me a lot the more we talk, the shorter it gets. Basically. Yeah, as you know, yes, basically yeah, as you know.
Speaker 2:Yes, absolutely yeah, no, I love that.
Speaker 1:And a little bit about myself. I started in the health and fitness world a while back and I've stayed there ever since, I think about circa 2004,. I weighed about 300 pounds In 2004,. I weighed about 300 pounds and I lost those 100 pounds over about four years and during that time it was a path to a lot of things to meeting my wife, to getting my degree, to working in cardiac and cancer rehab and to traveling around the US. And now I'm here in DC. I have a family in Northern Virginia and I'm running my company, vivo Training Systems.
Speaker 2:That is amazing. Would you mind giving us a little bit of a backstory of how it all began, and was this something that you always knew you wanted to do, or what led you here and how you got to where you are today?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So I used to be the fat kid, since I can remember, basically, and growing up that meant a lot of the typical things that the big kids go through. I would say and I get a lot of big kid clients nowadays, which is a lot of the typical things that the big kids go through. I would say, and I get a lot of big kid clients nowadays, which is a lot of fun to kind of be in that mentor state. But I had a lot of hard times figuring out how to be confident and how to like use my body in a way that felt useful. So I did a lot of like hard labor jobs kind of thing and I got into a lot of what would you call it Like tackle sports. I did football, I did wrestling, contact sports basically, and I realized at one point like 17 years old I would say point like 17 years old, I would say that being so heavy wasn't as much of a good thing as I was projecting it to be, because I was telling myself a lot of I don't know, just different excuses it felt like.
Speaker 1:And then something just clicked in me. I think it was partly due to the fact that I was supposed to be the captain of the wrestling team at that time and I was put in a lot of leadership roles and I didn't feel like a leader at that time. So something clicked and it was a pile up of a bunch of things if I really look back at it. It was a pile up of a bunch of things if I really look back at it. But and I think I see that a lot with clients nowadays, honestly, when they're, when they're really ready, when that readiness is there.
Speaker 1:But that was that time for me I made a choice. I looked at what other people were doing who were in positions that I wanted to be in. It's funny just watching the skinny kids like eat or not eat, for example, and figuring out like, oh my goodness, they say they eat a lot, but this and this, if I really watch, I probably look like a total creep, honestly, like the last year of high school, but I was losing weight, so people were like taking notice, basically.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And asking me questions and I was like well, you always do this and you always do that and I think the reason you're having problems here is because of this and the reason he's not is because he's doing this all the time. You're super observant, yeah. So I just got really observant basically and I just applied it and that really helped actually, because I had gone through a lot of moving when I was younger, so I had to be really observant, being like the new kid in school a lot of times, and that got me into college and I lost a bunch of weight then and I thought that I should apply this skill that I had developed basically. And the school I chose to go to had a really good program. That was Appalachian State University up in Boone, north Carolina Shout out to my mountaineers. So I went there and I went to the health promotion program, exercise science program, got my degree, met my wife in the same program and who is also my co-founder in our business, nice shout out, wifey.
Speaker 2:This is very relevant.
Speaker 1:This is jasmine devivo, nice and um. So we met there and we thought at some point we would like to work together. But that was like in a gym environment, basically at that point. Or we worked a little bit in physical therapy environments for a bit and so we worked together and people were always like why are you? Are you guys okay Like, what are you? Are you guys actually Like, what are you doing? Are you guys actually getting along as well as you get along at the gym? Because something seems odd here. I'm like no, this works really well. Yeah, it's like. But I always thought that was funny.
Speaker 1:But that eventually made us think a lot about how we could maybe start our own business. And I went to go get my master's a few years later after traveling around the US, when she followed me. So I thought that was a good sign to put a ring on it, definitely Right. And we started our company let's see 2016, full time, where she was able to quit her job as well, and I was doing it full time before that, for a couple of years prior, and so that was a big kind of change and celebration and phase shift really for us. So that was really cool and we've been working pretty much in this area. But we started to go online prior to the pandemic and the pandemic was really interesting because we were trying to go virtual prior to that and people were looking at us like we were trying to go virtual prior to that and people were looking at us like we were crazy.
Speaker 2:Just ahead of the time, yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm saying, I'm saying and now I'm trying, now I'm trying.
Speaker 1:I'm kind of gloating, honestly, but I'm proud of it because it was something that I I thought would be really useful and I saw it being really useful with our clientele because, as I moved around a lot, I would be working with friends from places I lived before when I was growing up and then when I was going through different professions, like physical therapy and gyms and corporate wellness and those kind of things and corporate wellness and those kind of things, and I would see that people would fall off if they didn't have like a set plan and routine in its regular place and I could just write something up for them and give that to them.
Speaker 1:And that would extend that little bit like maybe they were moving away, or maybe I was moving away, yeah, or maybe, um, I was moving away, for example. So we started to look into apps and programs right around 2016 when we, when we went full-time and then we really started pushing into it, I would say about 2018, oh wow. And so that was about two years pre. Like virtual, we were were doing Zoom, I was doing Skype, skype.
Speaker 2:I was doing Skype Good old Skype.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and it's funny to see all the virtual platforms kind of pop up now and everything. Yes, but it's really cool because one of the things we're doing now is we're trying to expand our services to people who you wouldn't usually think would use, like virtual services, for example, so like people who are out in the field, who are using their hands more and picking things up more and whatnot. Because of the virtual literacy. I guess that people have gotten to at this point where they can actually watch a call, watch a workshop or follow along with the video or check in for routines. That's gotten way easier for a bunch of people really quickly and it's been kind of. I don't know where that tangent came from, but I saw that when we were going into virtual and that's kind of where we're at right now. I would say so from the beginning to now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, that is amazing. I love that you were like already ahead of the game. I know people are like what that's crazy. And then when it happened, it's like wait, no, that is amazing. I love that you were like already ahead of the game. I know people are like what that's crazy. And then when it happened, it's like wait, actually he was on to something. And it makes it so much easier because you open up your clientele to so many different people in other states or maybe in another city. Maybe they just don't want to drive and it's convenient, right, right. And there's maybe a positive impact in doing that because you get to see how people are in their own environment how they're maybe lifting a certain way, how they're moving a certain way.
Speaker 2:Do you find that that's been a little bit more helpful?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and we've had some clients in different countries as well which has been a lot of fun. So I've had clients in Brazil, I've had clients in Spain, I have a lot of Latin American international clients. That's so cool. Yeah, it's a lot of fun. It's a lot of fun. Jamaica, china's hard, just because of the time difference. Yes, honestly, that's probably the. I've had that before, but usually it's just it's more, it's less live, it's more recorded for the farther ones.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes.
Speaker 1:You know, but, yeah, different environments. It's fun when we'll do these group classes where anybody can log in at a certain time and we'll do a live group class for the business that we're providing like a wellness program for, and it's really cool to see people log in from different living rooms, like across the US and in different countries, and the dogs will be in the background and in this class we have a policy that you can bring anybody who's there, anybody who's in the house with you, or a neighbor, anybody who's there with you. They can do the group class live with you, because business pays for it and they just jump all in. That's awesome. It's so much fun. It's so much fun. That's one of my favorites, I would say, examples of that.
Speaker 2:No, absolutely. I can see why Like bringing people together and meeting each other.
Speaker 1:Dogs jumping on people while we're doing like core exercises yeah, it's great.
Speaker 2:I saw that you have something called and forgive me if I say this wrong but it's called Lunch and Wellness.
Speaker 1:Oh, Lunch and Learns. Lunch and Learns. I'm so sorry. Lunch and.
Speaker 2:Learns.
Speaker 1:Can you talk to me about that and what that program entails? Yeah, so we do lunch and learns at different businesses, actually to introduce ourselves to the employees and then to give some sort of actionable knowledge for that specific population. So we recently worked with a friend of mine at A1V I believe Colin Chapman correct me if I'm wrong, but they do a lot of event work and picking things up and wires and setting things up and moving big batteries and those kind of things. Yes, and so we talked a lot about lower back health, for example, in a lunch and learn environment where there'll be like food or water or drinks or something like that, or it'll be like at a meeting that they usually have once a month or once a quarter and we'll go over different strategies and we'll do like a little health assessment, sometimes with people. Last I brought it was really funny, I brought a foam roller with me oh yeah, I'm familiar with this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I brought a foam roller with me and some people look at it like it's an alien piece of technology. Oh, my gosh I feel like and and if, if you're listening to this, it's a long cylindrical foam thingy rod basically yeah, and, and you just use it to massage yourself. Give yourself a self-massage. You can use fancier words like self myofascial release techniques for example yeah, you can use an acronym.
Speaker 1:you can put that on acronym too. Yeah, um, but you just use that to help massage different areas of the body that get tight because you're in positions really often, maybe on one side of your body more than another side of your body, for example, and in that, in that um situation, that was the case and so, uh, it was a small group and we got everybody to go on FOMO Learn, try it out, and it became like a little challenge during the Lunch and Learn workshop. But things like that that's what we usually do for Lunch and Learn. We do some interaction, we tailor it to the population and then we introduce ourselves and our services for anybody who's looking to get into ways to make themselves stronger.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and for anybody who's inquiring what type of programs or how are you helping them Like what do you have to offer that variety of different things for certain people? Maybe some people are like no, that's not for me, I don't think I have the muscles for that.
Speaker 1:Or oh I can't stretch like that, Like what all types of because I think a lot about how we need to target our population, you know, and segment and specialize and all that. And so when people ask me this question, I feel like I'm saying the opposite of that. But what we're really just trying to do and it goes with the name it's not just a flex for my name being DeVivo, but the name of our business is DeVivo Training Systems. So the things that we're trying to help people train for is their day-to-day life, and I think what makes us different is the fact that when we're creating a program for an individual or a company and we're going to tailor that in a way, that's not going to be like I want you to do these many sets, these many reps on these days back and by.
Speaker 1:It's not like that. It can be like that. If you want it to be like that, I've done many a program like that. We can do that. That's fine. But what we really do is like okay, these are the times of the day when you're going to have most success doing these things for your healthy habits. It could be exercise, it could be nutrition, it could be taking like 10 deep belly breaths, honestly, and then we figure out, we do an analysis. We need a vigorous assessment at the beginning. We ask a lot of questions at the beginning, basically, yeah, to get to know.
Speaker 1:Right, and the nice thing is that I've built a rapport that a lot of times our referrals are very organic, so I can do a lot of background. I listened to one of your guys' podcasts on the way here which one, by the way? I listened to Cliff's podcast actually, because it was the most recent one yes, and I was like health and fitness professional on here.
Speaker 1:Yes, oh my gosh, he literally was just here this morning, that's amazing and I love that because I can just research you guys and find out and I feel like I know you guys basically.
Speaker 1:But same thing when I get to work with like small businesses, for example, we figure out like where can we increase those communication points? And maybe one of the things I should have mentioned was in my master's program. My master's was focused on public health communication. So I have my master's in public health from GW down the road here and the research that I liked working on while I was there and we almost got published, which was fun was communication interventions for different at-risk groups. So we worked with the diabetes education group and one of the things we did was look at whether or not different types of communications throughout the intervention would elicit a different effect positive, negative, neutral, whatever and we saw some really promising results and there's other research that supports this or else we wouldn't have been able to fund the research in the first place that if you get really good communications at the right times that's tailored to that individual population, you can see an increase in the results in the positive direction. Oh, wow, okay, so I love that so much Okay.
Speaker 2:Snared out. I love it.
Speaker 1:Right, and this is one of the reasons why I do a podcast, for example, because I'm hoping that that communication can be there at the time when they need it Absolutely, and we try and figure out what that looks like for an organization. And that'll be through like emails, for example. That'll be through wellness challenges that we'll do, I love that. That'll be through lunch and learns, for example. That'll be through workshops which are more hand on, so we'll do like a kettlebell basics workshop. That'll be through virtual group classes. That'll be through paid for personal training or nutrition coaching.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that is awesome. So you're like out there in the community and like engaging with people. Yeah, in people's minds I'm really extroverted, so I just no, that's great. I have to. Yes, I have to. We love that.
Speaker 1:It's a little bit selfish.
Speaker 2:Oh, it's not.
Speaker 1:But also it. Also it's my way of like judo-ing it a little bit. Yes, giving it back, yes, exactly.
Speaker 2:And what does your shirt say? Is that? This is the business. Yeah, show that. Okay, love the roots. There we go, set those roots Vivo.
Speaker 1:Here we'll go for the second half.
Speaker 2:This is for the wifey, if she's watching, and you guys too but wifey yes. Love that, that, um yeah, so this is a.
Speaker 1:this is the world tree in uh norse mythology. Okay, igdrasil, I'm not familiar with that. I'm so sorry. Yeah, um, it's okay, I forgive you thank you, I so appreciate it I really just like trees and it's a. It's a going joke with my wife, actually that I didn't like trees, cheese and teas okay, now things that rhyme, huh yeah yeah, I was really just kind of poking at her at the time.
Speaker 1:It was the whole like you meet someone and it's like what's your criteria? Well, you've got to like this and this and this and I'm like well, I don't like teas, trees and cheese, which was all not true.
Speaker 2:I like all those things. Talk to me about your podcast. I want to know the name of it for other people so they can check it out what made you want to start it and all the things that happen on there.
Speaker 1:So the podcast that I am doing right now is called the fit quest podcast, and that is with my friend, josh Lemons, and Josh is a former personal trainer and strong dad, I would say, and a current strong dad who I love talking to about, honestly, just the things that we're working on, both with ourselves and with our clientele Anonymously I'm not saying anything about our clients personally, but sharing the lessons that we learn and then updating each other on the things that we're working on personally, and we use a very I'm not sure if you're familiar, are you familiar with Joseph Campbell? I'm not. So Joseph Campbell, the hero with a thousand faces, this is our geek out moment. Josh used to run a philosophy podcast, cool. And so there's this framework for the hero's journey. Right, you heard the hero's journey? I have not. No, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2:I'm so bad at this world, I'm going to give you a list of things to read. It's going to be a scroll, isn't it Just kidding?
Speaker 1:But the hero's Journey long story short is the framework for the storyline that you typically see in a lot of stories, mostly Disney, for example, I've heard of Disney Right, where there's the finding of themselves, finding the guide, yoda, Star Wars, yes, yes, and then like hitting a peak and then the Valley of Despair, and then rising back and coming back and bringing everything to the people and rinse and repeat, you know, but I think about that a lot and my friend Josh thinks about that a lot.
Speaker 1:So we thought a podcast about us going through our hero's journey in terms of our health and our fitness and our daily life and things we're training for on the regular and the strategies we use and the insights that we have. We like to share them and we do better when we share them. Yeah, which is funny, because he was like I don't really want to do this right now. I feel like I'm not in a good, like he wasn't in a good place for it and I was like, all right, that's fine, we just take a break and we take a season, you know, yeah, and then we got back in it and we're like, oh, my goodness, everything's working so much better now.
Speaker 2:Sometimes you just need those little breaks, right?
Speaker 1:Yes, you do, I think everybody has seasons too. That's another thing that I would talk too much about, which I talk about on my podcast?
Speaker 2:No, please, I'd love to talk about that. Mental health, mental wellness. Oh, my goodness, how that plays a role in like your body and moving.
Speaker 1:So fitness seasons, for example, this time of the year. I don't know how long it takes to when this will be published or whatnot, but I'm assuming, like fall right it takes about within a week.
Speaker 1:Okay, oh yeah, we'll be fine. Okay, so this time of the year there's different things that are going to affect your fitness level, for example, and your mental health level as well. And if you journal, that can be a really useful tool for you, kind of to look back at this time of the year in your journal and see what those patterns look like. Because even though you may think you know, it's really hard for people to remember what they ate two days ago, for example. So it's going to be really hard for you to tell me how you felt a year ago at this time. But if you look back or if you can look at pictures a lot of people you keep your pictures that time of the year. So look back at your pictures, for example, you can kind of see what happened around that time of the year.
Speaker 1:And maybe this year is different, you know, and they can be very much, but there's some general themes at different seasons of the year. I would say, and the seasons aren't always climate related Right now it's back to school season, yes, right, okay. So, like in the fitness world, that means I'm talking to a lot of people who have just realized they have way more time or way less time due to whatever their responsibilities are in relation to back to school. They also realize like traffic is way worse, for example, and all these other things that you may not think affect your health, but they affect your health, maybe like three degrees of Kevin Bacon down the line, and it happens every time at this time of the year, and it's a really good thing to think about when you're going through a transition, because that's when people really mess up. Basically, it's I'm not trying to scare people too late.
Speaker 2:I'm just kidding but it's really.
Speaker 1:I think that's a really helpful tool for people to be aware of, and that's one thing we talk about on our podcast. No, I'm just gonna say, and that's one thing we talk about, I'm gonna stop plugging the podcast.
Speaker 2:No, plug it we want you to. Sharing is caring, so go check out his podcast.
Speaker 1:Yes, I'll talk about this the next time I'm on our podcast. There you go. We would love that. See giving it back.
Speaker 2:Yeah, boom, love it. And where do you see yourself in the next five years with your business and yourself as a person?
Speaker 1:Man, I'm deep in dad world right now. How many you got? I got two. I got a daughter who just turned eight years old. Happy birthday, yeah, happy birthday, Zena. And then, yeah, the warrior princess yes, your princess. And then I've got a two year, two and a half year old Ari, and he is a bowl of joy basically most of the time, unless he like falls off things and then he's not happy.
Speaker 2:I would be there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but yeah. So I'm really focused right now on like number one, trying to be the best that I can be, and I'm very grateful that the way I run my business and the community that we've created allows me to do that. And so it's kind of like and that's why that the number two is like giving back as much as possible. So I feel like building my business gives me the ability to be with my family. I have a really nice schedule, Like I was, like we scheduled this pretty quickly. I can move things around pretty easily. It's really I'm very grateful, you know, and I can, I can do that and my business allows me to do that.
Speaker 1:So a second after that is getting to the point with our business really, where we feel like we can gosh. I want to get to the point. This is something we haven't talked about, actually, but I want to get to the point where one of the things we do is we do these family and friend and client free workouts on our farm and we do them all summer long. We just finished our our 10th season of doing it and we do and we do. We call them out outs and do them their workout cookouts.
Speaker 1:that sounds fun yeah, and we always like, we'll always have some kind of meat and some kind of drinks usually it's like seltzer water and and whatnot and uh grill up and then people do, uh, potluck, and we just tell people you can come for one of the outs, you can come for both of the outs, you can come for the third out, which is the hangout afterwards. Yeah, and I really want to get to the point where that is kind of organically spreading a little bit, where people are doing it in other places, like I've had people who have done it in Colorado. Oh, wow, now.
Speaker 2:Totally far yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, I used to live in Colorado for a bit.
Speaker 2:Okay, Well then that makes sense yeah.
Speaker 1:So I have some friends out there. You can have your seat over there, right.
Speaker 2:I'm leaving you guys passing the torch.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that's really that'd be really cool. That's kind of on the five. That's on the five-year list. We just finished that season, so that's big in my head right now. Congratulations.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you now congratulations, thank you, thank you, and yeah, like 10th season, so that's a lot and that, and we've been doing that for free, for we one year, we did it one year we did it like every three weeks and that was hard, I'm sure, and now we're doing it every month and that feels about right, yeah, you found your sweet spot yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1:And then the other thing is I want to do more um like east coast. We want to. We want to move more into like the east coast. We've kind of been like dc mdva and I want to get into like north and south of here a little bit more with um with the small businesses and I really like like what I'm seeing with some of the small business networks in the area. We're part of the Loudoun County Social Collective, I think right.
Speaker 2:Okay, I've heard of them.
Speaker 1:No, yes, I think somebody is she's familiar with them. Yes, okay, that's one of them that I think I heard about you guys, oh nice.
Speaker 2:That might have been Dulce who went out to one of those earlier, one of. That might have been Dulce, who went out to one of those earlier one of them, but they're very active.
Speaker 1:Yes, so I've been doing that more and that's been a lot of fun, because I still have this little bit of a wanderlust to go and see new places and work with new populations and whatnot. So, yeah, that's probably the next five years is getting those out, outs to the point where people are starting to do them more and kind of spreading the vibes with that, I would say. And then number two is building our corporate portfolio across the East Coast, going a little bit larger, regional.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, absolutely. I'd like to know are you the only one that's running your business, or do you have team members, employees?
Speaker 1:So we have mostly me and my wife, and I'm mostly the person who's in front of the camera and with the client relations, and my wife is the one who's doing the scheduling and the program design and the flyers and all that kind of stuff. And then we have a couple of contract employees who help us with things like websites and videos and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2:No, that's good. I love that you have like a system in place that works. Every entrepreneur, business owner, has different ways of doing it and I always love to hear like those different ways. In case somebody else wants to hear and learn. Yeah, they can figure out how to do it like if it's through contract or different ways.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm very good at doing the client relation stuff and I'm very good at the application, like the individual application work. I would say work. I would say I know that I'm not very good at the specific details of like billing or like making sure that we're getting the exercises in the right order at the right time of the year, based on the observations that I've made in the assessment, you know. So it works really well, honestly, and we noticed this when we were working together.
Speaker 1:Actually, like I said a while back, and it was so nice when I would talk to my wife about like clients that I was trying to work on their programs with and she would just have, like these little gems that would just fit in there. I'm like, oh my goodness, yes, that's perfect, amazing, and she almost went into physical therapy school. These little gems that would just fit in there. I'm like, oh my goodness, yes, that's perfect, amazing. And she almost went into physical therapy school and I mean, I really think she could have done really well in physical therapy, she doesn't? We're both a little rebellious and brought up in ways that we don't like a lot of certain conformities in the workspace Common workspace is just why I had to own my own business.
Speaker 2:I think I'd like to know at least one of them. Okay, if you don't mind sharing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sure, where do I start? Oh, my goodness, let's see. This is one of the things that you don't say in an interview. Probably you ready for a drum roll? I don't like not having creative control over programs I have a lot of knowledge about, because I know the difference in the impact. If I feel like I know the difference in the impact, short term and long term, like, and it's just a matter of, uh, hierarchy, then what are we doing here? Are we trying to help? Are we, are we trying to do what somebody says? Because somebody said that?
Speaker 2:Yes, no Okay.
Speaker 1:And like, what are we doing really at the end of the day?
Speaker 2:Yes, no, but see, and that's why it's good You're meant to be your own business owner, entrepreneur. So that way you don't have to deal with that, but I was just curious. I was like what does he mean? But now I have an idea. You follow. Yeah, I'm catching.
Speaker 1:I'm trying to think of an example, maybe, where I'm not going into too much detail, but a typical wellness program where maybe we're working with a population who is very type A, for example, and you could apply a cookie cutter design to that wellness program that you know has a certain amount of signups. Or you could take some of the data from the like bonus parts of the wellness challenges and previous wellness challenges and see, like, what the comments and the feedback looked like Because there wasn't a lot of looking at feedback, for example and maybe apply that in some way. And what's funny is I've done that before in some places. Some places are cool with it and some places aren't.
Speaker 1:And I still have this problem, even when I go to different businesses, because now my bosses are the new businesses yeah, you know, and giving them an idea that doesn't sound like a typical wellness program, for example, it can mess with people's heads a little bit. Yes, yes, yeah, but I feel like I have a pretty good batting average at this point, honestly, like I've made wellness programs I don't even run anymore. I just started a couple of wellness programs and there's I think last time I checked in, there's one that's gone for like 12 years at this point, and they know how to run it and people just come in and apply and update and you're updatable and you can just go awesome basically, and every year they have this big challenge and everybody gets into it.
Speaker 1:I think they got t-shirts nice, we love going now yeah yeah love it.
Speaker 2:Um, I'd like to ask if there's anything that I have not touched on that maybe you would like to share with our listeners, in regards to either your business yourself, anything Want to make sure we get it all.
Speaker 1:I would say that it's most of it. We got the podcast, we got the wellness programs going. Any new events going on? Or maybe a book in the works? Oh man, something, maybe no.
Speaker 2:Sorry.
Speaker 1:I've been taking a lot of the writings I've been doing lately and I've been working on putting it into something that could possibly be published. But this is actually the time of the year where we get ready for the holiday season, you know, which is crazy, because I still I still scoff at all the holiday season stuff I see in the grocery store. Oh yeah, right right now. But like I as a business, I understand that, like this is getting ready for holiday season time basically. So I would say, if you're getting ready for holiday season time basically, so I would say, if you're getting ready for the holiday season, which you're probably not how do I say this to our general audience here? Because it's the season of getting into the holiday season Two words at the same time. Into the holiday season, two words at the same time.
Speaker 1:The best thing I would suggest for people is really just remembering that their relationship with food is something that doesn't need to be stressed about.
Speaker 1:It just needs to be nurtured, and I think that's a big theme that's starting I'm starting to see it right now as we get into back to school, as we go to back to school, and that's something I think I'm going to be focusing a lot with my communications with businesses and I got some flyers that I'm working on right now. So when I think of what you just asked me, I think of the flyer that I'm making right now. So, yeah, I like focusing on food relationships around that time of the year and start thinking about your relationships with food, because people are going to be good, the sun's going to be going down more, yes, uh, yeah, exactly, I know, I know, and it's going to be coming up later, which I love, like catching the sunrise, but then if the day's already going, it's really hard to catch the sunrise, basically. So those kind of things are coming and there's things you can do, not just to I don't know mitigate it, but also to celebrate it. So see if you can kind of flip that around a little bit. Yeah, as as we go into that time of the year and that's going to be my, my messaging going forward like, how can you celebrate this time of the year? How can you do that in a way that's healthy for you?
Speaker 2:how can you nurture, like, a good relationship with your food instead of, uh, we get into a lot of like abstinence policies that last about three days in about a month basically, so that's gonna be a big one oh yeah, no, it's tough, especially like when you go into a grocery store and you're trying to like actually do maybe, okay, you won't maybe deprive yourself too much of it, but it's so hard when it's like blasted, like right, and you're like you gotta buy this because it's that holiday season.
Speaker 2:Oh, you need this, you need some of that. We've got this like. So it's kind of hard too, because you get invited to all kinds of places and you're trying to be like that's why I'm trying to give it out there now, honestly yes and I know it's early for the holiday season, but I feel like I should say it now, because you're gonna get.
Speaker 1:You're gonna get blasted with it. You're already getting blasted with it in the grocery stores right now, so that's another reason why I feel like I have to say it now thank you, no, I I'm grateful that you said that, because for me it's hard give you a little heads up. Yeah, it's coming, it's coming y'all, winter's coming, winter's coming yeah, but um no.
Speaker 2:And then is there, maybe like a mantra or a saying, that you like to live your life by that. Maybe you would like to share with our audience Something that you use as inspiration.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I had a client once in Colorado when we were training out there, that trained so hard and she was always pushing herself and it wasn't the same vibe as, like you'll see, like a masochistic-esque person training themselves.
Speaker 1:It was an obvious like I'm going to get better at this. I suck at this right now, but watch me in a few weeks with this thing. And like everybody noticed all the time and people would come up to her and they would ask her what are you training for? And my favorite response and this is part of the reason why we have the name of the business as well okay, is that she was training for life. And my favorite response and this is part of the reason why we have the name of the business as well is that she was training for life. And I think that's the end goal that I try and instill with people that you're going to have different seasons, like we talked about, but how are we training for your whole life? How are we taking this and implementing a strategy that's going to help you through your whole life?
Speaker 2:No, absolutely. Thank you so much for being on the podcast and thank you for sharing your insights and all these things, even things that bother you. I appreciate you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, those are fun questions. I had to think about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, that's what I like to do Throw people off and put them on the spot. You know what I do? No, just kidding. But I know it was a pleasure having you.
Speaker 1:Thank.