The most complicated part of owning a gym in 2023?

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Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome back to
One Good Question or Friday episode where we

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The question is kind of business related, but Abby's been here long enough

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to dig in. What is shit? Where to go? What is the

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most complicated part about owning and running
a gym? I get this question so

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much. I've been doing Instagram lives, and I get so many questions about

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how hard it is and how unprofitable
it is. But I think the truth

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is you hear that from people that
own gyms, and if you if you

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were a florist and you hung out
with floral people, they would be saying

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the exact same thing. Yeah,
like running any business is hard. Yeah,

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there's a lot of steps. Margins
are different in in fitness maybe better.

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Uh, Yeah, it's reoccurring.
Yeah, it's it's it's not a

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product you gotta restock. Yeah,
you know, like if you're running a

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supplement store, you got to buy
one hundred protein take a risk that you're

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going to sell a hundred protein at
a gym and you still have rent and

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overhead and whatever. Here. You
just need people to show up. I

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think the most complicated thing for me
is we're talking about this before we started

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rolling is projections. Yeah, projections
are I mean fucking I have an NBA.

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I should be able to make financial
projections. But it's it's hard and

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and when we started this business,
we had no idea really who our customers

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were going to be, beyond the
fact that they would people who wanted to

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We're concerned about strength and wanted to
be in a barbel gym, yeah,

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understood, kind of a warehouse hardcore
gym. Yeah. Beyond that, we

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got nothing, and I don't even
know if we still do because we do

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have a fat usapl crowd now,
but we also have very normal I like

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to squatt and bench crowd. Yeah. You know gen popit yah? Yeah,

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like yeah, one step beyond gen
pop right because they understand the barbell

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wow. Yeah yeah. And what's
the importance of projection? Budget? Budget?

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How much to spend here, how
much to spend there? What areas

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to improve on? Yeah, like, oh, you know, we made

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this much from clothes as much from
protein bars as much from membership. Oh,

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let's find a way to make more
on protein bars. Let's find a

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way to use that money to do
this. Yeah, it kind of it

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kind of gives you your your boundaries
to work within. Wig. Does it

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get easier over time projection? Yeah, yeah, just because you get more

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data on the back end. Right, the more data you have, And

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that's part of our issues that our
data year to year has been insanely different

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because of the economical and pandemic and
just the environment. The world has been

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so different. So all all our
three years are totally so united to take

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the world into considerations, not just
this world inside the gym in these walls.

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If we're lived in a different city, or the business was only the

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online or a different business model,
we might have better data over the last

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three years. Yeah, we also
started off with some some subpar software that

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was at the time cheap. But
yeah, yeah, it was difficult.

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I got hit up because this happens
all the time. I got hit up

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by by a software company about about
switching. And I'm like, well,

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here's the thing. If you can
do this, this and this and then

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solve this and this problem for me
and you can make it easy and not

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any more expensive than we currently have, then we can talk. But if

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you can't do any of those things, then there's no point in conversation and

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being able to project, you know
better. We can project better now than

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we could before. I think that
because I did new membership projections last fall,

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and I think we're kind of dead
on them right now. Good jobs.

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Yeah, We're we're pretty close.
Yeah where you know, sometimes some

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months are a little bit ahead and
some months are a little bit behind.

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But you know, I don't know
trial and error. I mean, I

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think maybe the most the next most
complicated thing is managing your own expectations.

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Yeah, because you got to take
emotion out of all the data, and

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that's the same at all. I
have too many emotions to deal with this.

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We could tell by that facial expression. Oh yeah, once you said

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that, like with the projections,
and I mean that's kind of like training,

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right, It's very similar. If
I'm doing this this block, I

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should be able to do this our
next block. I did not squad more

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than I did this block than last
block. Yeah, But like the emotional

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aspect is just, but the outcome
still doesn't, isn't for sure? Right,

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you could have hit a better three
last block than you hit a three

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this block to this block. Yeah, but yeah, maybe, but you

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could still hit a pr at the
meat. Yeah. And that's same with

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us, right because like Jim said, like some membership months are up,

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some are down, but next month
you have a big month and we have

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a pr out of nowhere where we
think we're trending downwards. Right, But

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but you can't. That's the whole
thing of anything you do. And you

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mentioned the other shows like it's all
long term. What you do in a

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week never affects what you're going to
do in a year. Yeah, you

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show up for that week, and
then show up for the next week,

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and show up for the next week, and then we can look over twelve

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months what happened. But if you
start to microanalyze every little thing, the

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good or the bad, you're probably
just gonna take too much emotion and you

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can't take the good. We can't. We can't get five new members in

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a week and freak out like we're
about to have not enough space here and

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go buy a new lease somewhere because
our projections are crazy off three days,

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right, Same with your lifting,
you can't be like, oh man,

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I felt so good today and then
crank everything up because it's gonna fuck up

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next week. So it's it's all
about slow steady return, slow steady data,

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slow steady adjustments. Is it very
objective? Like the business side,

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it's half and half right, because
you're doing with humans. Yeah, so

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you do that. You need the
data and you need to read that,

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and you need to probably maybe not
fifty fifty, maybe seventy thirty if if

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you're running a perfect business, seventy
percent data because the data doesn't lie.

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But then you got to under nderstand
your world. You gotta understand your demographic,

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your purchaser, your community. And
depending on the gym, the clothing

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is a little bit different than the
in person gym. Hey, you got

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to feel the vibe of the thing, and sometimes you gotta take risky calls

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or calls that your gut is telling
you to do. Yeah, for sure,

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and I just doesn't aside. Something
else we were talking about before we

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started here that in the trailing twelve
months we have hit the projections I had

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for the first year. It tells
you that's the impact of the of the

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of the pandemic, and that's not
really having this kind of experience in this

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space. Yeah, being in the
capitol California in the pandemic. Yeah,

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exactly. It's just such a different
landscape than most people fucked with. To

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answer for me though, like what
the most complicated isn't I don't think anything's

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complicated, And it's kind of like
training, Like just squatting alone isn't complicated.

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But how do you how do you
tie in rep sets? How do

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you tie in uh tempos? How
do you tie in frequency? So it's

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like you structure the program. Yeah, so that it's a bunch of mini

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problems, a bunch of mini puzzles
over and over. It's it's like resourcefulness

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and problem solving and for me my
new thing and it's kind of been this

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way. But like my brain is
always looking for answers. I don't want

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to look for problems. Problems will
show themselves. How do I look for

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answers? And how do I not
harp on problems? Because problems are always

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going to be there? Which problems
needs solving? Now? Which problems need

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a band aid? And then what
problems do you let fly? Right?

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Your left toe is three degrees wider
on your sumo. If you don't have

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pain. If it's not affecting your
lift, that's not a problem we need

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to solve. Just to fucking forget
it and let's fix the problem ahead of

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us. So yeah, for me, it's just all problem solving, mini

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step, mini step, mini step. It's too easy to overanalyze, dude.

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I can find problems everywhere. But
but if things are moving in the

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right direction, right by the data, just whatever problems are are the biggest,

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or or move the needle, what
makes the most amount of sense to

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make the most amount of money that
will make an effect. That's what I'm

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I'm just always trying to focus on. So it's yeah, the most complicated

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thing is doing all the little things
managing I mean, I guess seeing everything,

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but also not getting too caught up
in the little things at the same

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time. Yeah, for sure,
that too. Right, you spend all

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this time worried about your foot being
three percent out. Now you're not even

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getting your reps in for the day, or you're getting not getting your protein

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in the day because you're so over
analyzed on the degree of your knee travel.

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I would definitely like that. And
then you just get tired. Yeah,

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you just get tired with experience.
You just get tired of having so

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many problems. You're like, wait
a minute, like why am I worried

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about these things? You'll find real
problems, get sanded off by experiences.

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You'll find the real problems and realize
your toad doesn't even freaking matter. Yeah

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very much. So Yeah, now
your other shit's hurtin No, do you

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have any business stuff that you found
complicated doing online coaching, in person coaching,

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helping us run the gym? God
emotions, I think it's your own

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peoples, both like managing my own
as well as like taking those into consideration

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and being emotionally invested that son nikuelin
about this this morning, like just being

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like caring so much and then needing
to. As a coach, you have

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a plan, you know, athlete
decides whether they want to or care about

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following it or tell you or don't
tell you about things that they do or

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don't do, and then then maybe
things aren't going right for them, and

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then they're going off the walls about
like they're losing their head, and I

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it's like that makes me lose my
head a little bit, But then I

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realize I need I'm the one who
needs to keep it on, so they

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could keep theirs on and like show
face of oh everything's fine even if it's

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If it's not, they need to
notice that a little meme right and the

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dogs run around the house is on
fire. Yeah, So like it's just

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a lot of that. And then
when you care so much and things aren't

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going right, it's like, what
shit, what am I doing wrong?

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Yeah? I guess that's how do
I fix it? That ties into like

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the seventy thirty, Like thirty percent
is going by your gut and what feels

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good. But when you're dealing with
people, your business is people, So

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emotions do matter and how you talk
to people and how you welcome people and

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how you manage relationships because within commune, unity, within coaching, within classes,

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within online within an instagram and all
these things have such a human component

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to it that there is no data, Right, how do you talk to

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people? There's no data? So
yeah, how do you how do you

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kind of smooth things out and neutralize
these waves of emotions? Again, both

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yours because you are human and the
people you're dealing with. Yeah, when

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it comes to like like things that
don't go the right way if they don't

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match your projections or whatever. It's
hard at least for me to not doubt

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to just I doubt myself so much, you know, and it's like,

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well I don't probably probably not doing
something right instead of like considering all these

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other factors that are out of my
control. And then while that's going on

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internally, how how is that going
to your class when you're teaching them?

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And that's something I focus on every
day as much because I'm a pretty emotional

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creature. But like, how can
I call it fake or sugarcoat or if

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you want, But how do I
bring my best outside self every day here

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despite the chaos that's going on in
my little dark brain or in my personal

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life because of job too. Yeah, it's being the being the leader,

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being both me to you guys and
me to the members and me right,

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how do I bring up positive?
How every time do I step in a

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room and leave something positive? You
know the old saying of like you're camping

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or some shit, and like leave
the place better than you found it?

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How do I do that in every
interaction that I have in life despite the

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litter that's going on between my ears? Litter? Yeah, because I was

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talking about cleaning up at a camp
side. It was just a real big

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analogy. It was a big tide
in analogy. I kind of lost the

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metaphors somewhere I was in the analogy
is weaving. I was just weaving a

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dream. Okay, I got it. Thanks, thank you. That low

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moaning was the metaphor being shoved into. Yeah. If I could have if

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visuals, if this is a documentary, a little cartoon would have popped up

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with exactly what's it real? Now? Yeah, we could but garbage in

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his head between his garbage in your
head, jerk. Yeah, that's complicated.

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I don't think anything in life's that
complicated, you know, Like sure,

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like inventing the nuclear bomb or some
shit, probably was. But that's

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the thing with most of them.
Yeah, most of life isn't one problem.

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No, you know, I will
make it easier. Actually one big

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problems, much more easy to attack
than a million. Even power lifting.

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Why is power lifting hard? Because
you gotta get your squat bench and dead

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good. If you just guys you're
dead good, we can fo you know,

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like singular focus allows singular energy,
and that's easy when you got when

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you're spread doing a bunch of shit, that's when the ship is difficult.

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This viral video that I think is
on my Instagram story yesterday. It's a

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ping pong match but the table is
split. Yeah, it blew my mind

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and it's moving. Both of them
are It's crazy. There's one guy playing

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and the split by the net,
and another guy moving the table to help

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this guy win, and then someone's
moving the table for SeaBASS and helping him

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win, so they're floating around.
Yeah, it's crazy. Some workdays feel

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like this. Yeah, that's wild
where they're just many moving parts. Now

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that's very much my brain. Oh
yeah, that's what's happening to me on

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a daily basis. I'm just kidding. Yeah, is that too bad?

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You're you have much more going on
than I do, which makes me feel

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better. I guess, oh,
thanks, well, because I'm like,

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well he can handle it. I
don't know what I can and I can

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fake handle it. We show up
every day. I do, show up.

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Yeah, that's all we do.
Show up, show out all right,

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Abby? Where can they find you? Send up po box Instagram at

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00:13:31.519 --> 00:13:37.080
ABV dot Loop. Po Box is
twenty ten at twenty ten third Street,

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00:13:37.200 --> 00:13:41.240
Sacoment On, California, nine five
eight one eight sender gifts, We'll open

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them on stream. Something funny,
something fun. New episodes every Wednesday Friday.

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00:13:43.799 --> 00:13:48.000
Appreciate you guys, so so so
much. We will be at National

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00:13:48.159 --> 00:13:52.240
September fourteen and fifteen watching Abby Smash
Weights. Otherwise you can find us at

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00:13:52.240 --> 00:13:54.440
Third Street barbe Stock, I'm on
to California, Good Company at Peril,

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00:13:54.440 --> 00:13:56.480
at THESB dot c O. I'm
solom Mike where you want to find me,

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00:13:58.000 --> 00:14:00.440
Matt the Jimmy Deane on the social
media. This show is two percent

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facts. Per percent is a word, at fifty is just numbers. Fifty

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percent Facts is a Spreaker Prime podcast
and association with iHeartMedia on the Obscure Celebrity

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Network. We'll talk to you next
time.