Best of: Andrew Coates; The Mayor of the Fitness Industry

You're listening to the PT Prophet podcast, episode number 325. Today is a best of episode where we are highlighting an episode that Beverly recorded with Andrew Coates back in 2022. Many have grown to see him as a connector, a speaker, a writer and a trainer. Everyone knows him and he's been frequently described in the most complimentary and well meaning way possible as the mayor of the fitness industry. Are you ready? Let's get started.

Hi, I'm Beverly Simpson, former fitness manager turned online personal training business owner and this podcast is where smart fitness professionals, including trainers and clinicians, discover how to increase client performance and movement, package and position their products and services and get out of their own way so that they can increase their revenue to live a life that they love without sleazy sales. Welcome to the PT Prophet Podcast.

Welcome back to the PT Prophet Podcast. My name is Chris Little. While this episode isn't brand new, there's lots more that I can tell you that we didn't cover before. So Andrew Coates and I are actually both based out of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. So I can tell you lots of nice things about him from knowing him personally since 2016. We chose to bring this episode back because when we repurposed some of the content for YouTube shorts, Andrew's clips were some of the most well received because of how he delivered what he had to say. With that in mind, it's no coincidence that Andrew has also put a lot of work into his career. So here's what I'm going to do. First, I'm going to summarize what the episode covered and second, I'm going to share with you a list of book recommendations that Andrew shared earlier this month, many of which I've been recommending to our accelerators here at B. Simpson Fitness. This episode's biggest takeaways were continuous learning, effective communication, critical thinking, application over theory, and adaptability. All of these concepts still hold true to today's industry standards. And now for the book list. These are curated for anyone who wants to get better at writing, which would in turn also help you with your speaking. All recommended by by Andrew Coates. The books to start with Essentials are On Writing well by William Zinsser and Everybody Writes by Ann Hanley, which I highly recommend getting the newest edition because it's been updated to today's current trends. It's a book that I personally really like as well. Books to develop your process and overcome procrastination are the Practice by Seth Godin and the War of Art by Steven Pressfield. Books to improve writing and editing are Sin and Syntax by Constance Hale and Write Tight by Lawrence Block. And books to earn and keep readers attention are how to Write Short by Roy Peter Clark and Writing for Busy Readers by Todd Rogers and Jessica Laski Fink. Books to understand the identity and experience of right being a writer are Pity the Reader by Kurt vonnegut and Susan McConnell and Bird by Bird by Anne Lamont. Books to build writing habits are written by Beck Evans and Chris Smith and Murder your D Things by Roy Peter Clark. And lastly, Andrew recommends a book that has autobiographical wisdom from an icon. So that book is On Writing by Stephen King. And to make your life easier, I'm going to actually link you to the public Facebook post where all these books are recommended within the show notes of this episode. And now let's dive into that episode with my good friend Andrew Coates.

Andrew, thank you so much for joining me on the show today. Honestly, it truly is a pleasure and a privilege because just in the last few days I've had numerous amounts of conversations with people who have been directly impacted by your work. And I know specifically for me what it felt like when I was a first brand new trainer binging teenation, trying my best to implement the things I tried to learn in a book and put it on human beings. So truly it's a pleasure and a privilege to have you on the show. Thank you so much for joining me.

Thank you, Beverly. Well, I appreciate it. Kindness.

Great. So I go ahead. I'm just going to go ahead and dive right in. I'd love to know. Chris, we talked right before we hit record on a mutual, on a mutual colleague of ours and he had mentioned to me that academics have played a huge role in your life. And so I'm curious, what specific, how specific specifically were you able to take all the learnings in your career and actually implement it for your clients?

Trying to think of a good way to answer this. I think one of the most successful qualities, important qualities that successful fitness professionals can have is the desire to learn lifelong learning, continuing education. And that's meant like you. I mean I've been in the industry just shy of 12 years. One of the first resources that I found was T Nation. So I've been reading them for a really long time and T Nation's a great clearinghouse of it's funny because as I write for them, I will say it's a good way to test your barometer of what's quality information and maybe what isn't particularly useful. And they have a legacy of having really highly educated people like Dr. John Berardi in, in their inception or I'm trying to think there's, there's been a lot of PhDs. Dr. Mike T. Nelson is definitely one of many of the, you know that Eric Cressy is very well educated and a lot of very technically skilled, even if they're not PhDs. People like Dean Somerset, Tony Gentlecore. That list is a very extensive list. Right. And you get trainers like Ben Bruno, who, well educated, not necessarily like, you know, PhD type, but he, Tony and several of the other people on there are great at taking high level knowledge and information and communicating to the everyday user, whether it's writing, whether it's video, whether it's their social media. And so I think I was inspired by that community and some other people. Dr. Mike Isertel in the Renaissance securitization team, Dr. Lane Norton. I found his then assistant and now very widely renowned and well educated Soheili and over time just got exposed to more and more of the really smart, successful people in the industry. I start listening to podcasts, which got me onto more people like Brett Bartholomew's and Pete Dupuis of the industry and Kelly Coffeys and then traveling to events and getting to meet all those people. And then it just continues to expand your horizons. So I'm not sure it's. Not everybody has necessarily a talent for taking the academic, the research based stuff and then turning it into something that's accessible for the end user. But by simply practicing, first of all, the client in front of us is the practice of doing that. Right. So your communication skills and your ability to take that, that abstract knowledge into something that's actionable is forged with our community, communications with our clients. And you do that enough over the years and then you start turning around and you're practicing it with a podcast. Me and Dean Guido had a podcast to start with five years ago. Now it's just me or whether it's, it's writing for the different publications that I write for your own websites. These things develop those skills over time. So I know that's a bit of a meandering answer, but I don't think any of it was ever really intentional. You just look back and go, wow, that's like anybody's career. Very, very few people who are in any sort of like successful space in the fitness industry will probably be able to say, hey, I intentionally knew where I wanted to be and I follow this roadmap. Usually it's much easier to connect the.

Dots in retrospect, yes, absolutely. And you're also bringing up a very nuanced and conversation that I think is important to hit on is this concept between navigating or developing our critical thinking skills and being able to assess what is actually going to be something worth implementing. And even, and even more than that, the next step is once you implement it, how do you decide whether this is useful or not?

Things embedded in there critical thinking? I find that a lot of people, a lot of the consumers, but even a lot of the fitness industry is very tribal. And I noticed that they don't have much, by the way, of original thoughts of their own. I find this is very normal within society. And not to get into complex things like politics or social, you know, complex social issues, but you notice a lot of the people that you interact with, they seem to have all of the very same opinions and positions as the tribe. And there's something inherently wrong with that. Whether it's the person who. There are certain social, ideological things that show up in the fitness industry. You get the carnivore zealot, who also happens to be the person who doesn't believe in sunscreen, who also happens to believe in a few other things. And you notice that there's all these sort of consistent ideological ideas. It's like, I think you've been listening to the Liver King and you know, a couple of other individuals in the industry, because I don't think you have an independent thought of your own. And this shows up with, you know, the Keto tribe, and it shows up with the militant vegan tribe, and it shows up with the. All of these different ideological positions, whether they're social ideological or nutritional ideological. Right. Because most of nutrition in our industry is still very ideological. It's very religious, it's very belief based. And the people who are the biggest devotees of it are evangelical in the way that they approach it. So I guess to kind of go back to what you're saying, I think it's important to recognize that stuff. And then this is something I pulled from Naval. And I'm not sure if you're familiar with Naval, but he's got a book, actually it was written by another author who took all of Naval's greatest tweets off the Internet. Naval's sort of an angel investor turned philosopher. And I like this because Naval said he stopped thinking in terms of an ism, basically a tribe, when he would catch himself defending positions within that ideology that he didn't agree with. And so I think if we all agree with every ideological position of nutrition or a training methodology and we just got to step back and go, wait a second, what's going on here? I'm just adopting someone else's set of belief systems and I'm not using my critical thinking skills. Even the quote, evidence based, the hardcore evidence based side can become very dogmatic. I mean evidence based is supposed to be anti dogma, but they become very rigid in their interpretations as well and they also can become quite dogmatic. And then there are people who I genuinely find move with the evidence. So it can get really confusing for a fitness professional. And I don't know if your audience is more fitness professionals or the end users, but fitness professionals. And so someone may be listening, going, well, what's the answer? The answer is to, to not just take your, your idols and your heroes in the industry and assume that everything they say is gospel. Because if you'll notice, let's say the evidence based community and there's the dogmatic side and then there's the open minded side. And I tend to have friends within the open minded side. You look at someone like Dr. Mike Israel, Dr. Lane Norton and others in their space, Dr. Eric Helms, the list goes on. And they are their colleagues and they have a mutual respect but they all don't agree with each other on everything. So if they don't agree with each other on everything, it doesn't really make sense for you to just say one of them, like this person. Everything this person says is gospel. It is correct, it is 100% infallible. That's actually not how science even works. We've heard a lot of crazy shit over the last couple of years on all spectrums. And when people use language like the science is settled, you know, you're dealing with someone who's dealing in dogma, not evidence. So back to fitness, because this stuff is very broad, broad, sweeping. I think it's expose yourself to a variety of people and ideas. Don't lock yourself in an echo chamber of just the things that confirm your biases, read different books, go in. I also think it's very valuable to collect a group of individuals in the industry who are very academically proven and trusted. And by and large, if there's a consensus amongst them amongst that broader group, then you can probably treat something as very fundamentally sound and that can help you decide on, okay, what then can I turn around and use as foundational principles for what I would do with clients, for example, calories in, calories out. No, it's not that simple. There's a lot of life and complex factors that go into it. But fundamentally speaking, the laws of thermodynamics, we're pretty sure that that one is solid. Okay? And then you start to get into understanding how hormones affect metabolism and how stress affects metabolism and making sure that people are retaining lean muscle mass and all these sort of things. And then you can apply that calories in, calories out through that leg, as opposed to saying, well, no, calories in, calories out there are nonsense. Because I read it in this one guy's book. It's, you know, fasting is magical. Autophagy. As soon as someone starts throwing around the word autophagy, I know that they don't know what they're talking about because, like, ask that person, what does that even mean? Right? It's like, there are some people who are just gonna be so locked in their positions, their ideas, that, you know, there's probably not even gonna be all that valuable to have a conversation with them. You just gotta save your own inner peace. This is a different concept. All right? I'm not arguing that this person on the Internet, no, I'm going to keep my emotional energy positive for the client in front of me, but it also doesn't mean not to expose yourself to different ideas and belief systems. So that way you at least understand. Well, if this, you know, quote keto zealot on the Internet believes this, you were. You will come across a client or a potential client who comes to you and says, hey, I was thinking about trying keto. And if a client says this to you, and this is not my original thought, if they come to you and ask, hey, I was thinking about trying keto, they're already doing keto. Someone in their family, in their life, has been evangelizing to them the greatness of keto and how it's superior to everything else. And they want to try it. And you need to be able to know how to navigate that instead of going, ah, keto is stupid. Okay, cool, you're interested in this. I'm really, really happy you're doing research. Let's give it a shot. Let's see how you feel. Okay. All of a sudden, because they're scared you're going to disapprove, you've now shown them that, hey, they can come to you, they can trust you. They can feel safe sharing this with you. And you just make sure that they're feeling open about communicating with you. And then they don't end up feeling bad when they kind of go as one of my clients who went through this whole process is like keto's bullshit. Because she realized, wait a second, she can't just eat whatever fat and whatever she wants. Right? So. And you retain that trust and then you can do a couple of things. You can be in a position to say, all right, well, yeah, that one's been seemed to agree with you. How about, you know, we give this a try and you can also turn around and say, all right, great, Keto, here's why keto works. Keto is actually really great for creating an environment to cut down on your calorie intake. Now, you'll probably hear people tell you that calories don't matter with Keto. Now that's actually like sort of one of their false myths. But keto can really work well because of this. Also, initially, you're going to lose some water weight. So you can educate them about why it works, what doesn't work, and retain that trust in that relationship. I know. I'm wondering.

No, you're not. No, I think that it's, it's just so important. I mean, you bring up so many really good points and honestly, it makes me reflective back into my early career because I think that, I think a couple of things. Number one is that there is the tribal aspect of human beings and always seeking out that confirmation bias is innate in us. And social media has really just created a pressure cooker container experience to amplify that. Number one, because people will not say what they will type to people's face. Right? That's number one. And then I also know as a new trainer is that, and I think this is human nature, is that we oftentimes are seeking to be right in order to prove our own bias versus actually helping people. And I think that that can be very. I think that that's totally normal and especially for someone who's new, because I know that that was for me too, is that we had this or I had this urge to want to prove myself for my client and my colleagues. And then there becomes. And then there comes the shift. Because that's. Because ultimately what we're all trying to do is get our clients the fastest, most efficient results possible so that they'll go and brag and tell all their friends about us and then we can grow our business. And ultimately it's like this cycle of making sure that we, you know, we're trying to be right so that we can achieve that, but then if we just really listen to our clients, then we would achieve it. So it's this switch, I feel like, comes with experience and failing more than succeeding for at least for me.

I'll give you a perfect example of this. Recently I put up a post about this and it's this. You know how tone isn't a thing, right? We know that there's no such thing as muscle, right? Bullshit. And trainers listening. I hope you guys let this one sink in because it might challenge something. We've all had that thing where new client, potential client sits in front of us and they're like, well, I don't want to put on too much muscle, I just want to tone up. And how many of you have had to choke back the urge to look at this person who doesn't know you and doesn't yet trust you and to say to them, well, actually, tone is not a thing. Now if you've done it, you know that the client, you've lost the client right there. You made them feel stupid. Okay, so what I try to get trainers to do to think about is, okay, first of all, why do we need to tell this person that tone isn't a thing, Right? Because we need to be right, technically, right? Pedantic, obnoxiously, right? Instead, my answer this is I'll smile and I'll say, I know exactly what you mean. Because trainers, you goddamn well know what tone means. Muscle tone. It is language in use in the general population. And the sooner we get better at hearing them and sitting back and listening and actually hearing what they're telling us instead of feeling the need to insert ourselves in there and educate right away, hear this person. This person has probably been through this process. This person is probably scared and intimidated about sitting in front of someone who they think knows a lot more about fitness than they do. There probably took a lot to work up to this point to even get in front of you. And you can really do a lot of damage by turning around and immediately telling them that they're wrong or they use the wrong language, okay? They're going to walk out the door and then they're going to see some marketing that someone says, hey, you know, you can do my six week program, get long lean tone muscles. And they're going to go, okay, cool. And they're going to gravitate to that. And you've lost this person. You're not going to help them. And you didn't save them from someone who uses that language in a sleazier form of marketing. So instead, build that trust with them. Listen, hear them, we damn well know what they meant. And then over the course of a few weeks as you really develop that relationship without even needing to turn around and tell them that the word tone isn't a thing. We can teach them about how muscles built and how body fat is lost and how they can achieve the look that they're looking for through the process. And I hope that, like, sets off a few light bulbs, because we can get them where we want. And it's not about using misinformation. It is not about, you know, factually spreading anything that's wrong. It's just about actually going, all right, well, that stuff's actually not as important. We're still educating people, but it's not as important as actually just listening to that person hearing where they're coming from. Because there are a lot of people out there who are frustrated and they feel defeated and they want help and they don't know where to go. And our industry's messaging is all over the map, and fitness professionals squabble with each other over ideology and different methodologies, and they need to score points and be right about stuff and argue in the comments of the dumbest crap. And people are sitting there going, I just want help. And the sooner trainers kind of put away all that other crap and just get down to listening and hearing what people want, you will be so busy that you're turning people away. If you get good at the messaging, at the listening part, at the empathy part, and about putting your wants and needs and your ideologies and belief systems second, and do what helps the person in front of you, and you won't save everybody. There are going to be people who are going to be determined to do the liver king's crap or the snake diets guys crap or whatever other sort of extreme nonsense that's out there. You can't save them all, but you'll. You'll save a lot more people if you just start hearing what people are trying to tell you.

I think it's so good. And I also think that there is a second component to this, too, for people and for newer trainers or, you know, teenage trainers who are in the middle of their career and maybe not, you know, writing for T Nation yet or whatnot. But what happens too, is that, is that they're also looking for approval from their. From their colleagues or their mentors, you know, seeking out that confirmation so that they can double down on what it is that they need to do, when in theory, they just need to do the reps, just start working with people, just start doing the clinical hours and actually get you know, that's how you'll develop the skill, because what we're talking about is skill acquisition. So, you know, there is a huge mindset component to this and releasing that imposter syndrome, especially in the beginning and in the middle years. So I'm curious for you, how did you actually navigate those waters when it was, when you were going through it? And how have you also helped your, you know, the younger trainers do, and younger in career, in time, move through that process?

All right, so second part. First, like you with a podcast like this, it probably started with a podcast. And despite mine and Dean's initial desire to probably provide something that was a bit more to the general population, we found that with a podcast, we were more interested in having conversations with fitness professionals about the things that made fitness professionals tick and successful because it helped us. And if it helped us and if it helped other fitness professionals, then it cascaded down to fitness professionals doing a better job with the end user, the customer who wanted to help. My road has been not unique, but certainly like the lesser traveled in that I just went to a lot of events, met a lot of the it actually, I kind of look back, I'm like, shit. Like an astonishing number of the individuals who are well known figures in the industry are people I've met and become friends with in my travels. The podcast was a great way to further establish those relationships. But I had a long time before I was probably seven years in the industry working on a commercial gym floor, working with the, you know, the people I was training and interacting with them on social media like Facebook, before Instagram really became big to where the things that I was writing and sharing and doing were geared towards helping the end user. So I think I had already established a lot of that before I started having those interactions with the people who I was just following and listening to on podcasts and reading their books and doing their courses. So I think if a coach ends up in those spaces early, it is very tempting to write or do your social media or do your videos to, as you said, seek the approval of, you know, the, the leadership tier of the industry. Right. And I like pointing out how Eric Cressy is not reading your stuff. Eric's busy running Cressy sports performance, the New York Yankee, strength and conditioning and raising his twins. I love saying that. And you're laughing because it makes sense.

Because it's totally true.

Lane Norton, as much as he's like bombastic about all the bullshit that's out there in the industry, Lane's not Scouring. He's way too busy to scour the Internet to look at you. And you know you've got 350 followers or 3500 followers and go, hmm, that person said something that's not quite right about calories. They don't do shit like that. And guess what? There are a small handful of generally level individuals in our industry with a little bit of notoriety who sometimes pull this crap. I'm not going to name names, but there's some people that I generally their Persona non grata to me now. Okay, if they do that, guess what? It's not going to destroy your career. They're busy doing this to a lot of people. You really don't stand out. I'm not worried that they're going to show up on your doorstep and start messing with you. So don't worry about the approval of these people. In fact, if in your travels through whatever you do, you actually do interact with someone, you end up with someone as a Facebook friend or, you know, they end up following you. The good ones, which is the overwhelming majority, are going to see that your messaging helps the end user. And they're far more likely to approve of that than if you get into a lot of really technical stuff that's going over the head of the person who just wants to feel less painful. We don't need to talk about subluxation of the blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Right. Or like, you know, the glenohumeral. Whatever. Just like, this person is dealing with shoulder pain. All right, cool. They just want to feel better. Right. And again, you know your Tony Gentlecourse. Who? You know him and Eric, the founder, along with Pete, the founders of Kresi Sports Performance. I like using them as a metaphor. Tony's a great writer. He's a great communicator. He's great at this stuff. And if you're not already following him, go check out Tony's stuff. Just to see an example of a guy who's been doing this a long time. He's got a very good nature, great educator. And Tony is far more likely to approve of what you're doing and get on his radar if he sees that you're doing a good job of communicating with the end user than writing anything that would come out of an anatomy textbook. I think I've driven that point home a little bit.

Yeah, I mean, it's. Yes, it's true. It's, you know, be so, you know, talent talks. It's. It's, you know, just be so focused on what it is that you're here to do, that the rest, people will pay ATT attention. When you're just really dedicated to, you know, your, your craft and helping the person honestly that you're working with.

Here's something else that's important too. So, yeah, you get the approval of quote, industry leaders and then what, what is that doing for you? Right. How does that help you? And yes, I can say that it is opened a lot of doors if I have a lot of valuable relationships in my career, because that's happened. But that's not necessarily what is most advantageous to most people. For me getting to speak at fitness conferences, speaking other fitness professionals. To have a podcast that is geared towards fitness professionals. Okay, great. That's sort of a bonus thing I find fulfilling personally. Is that actually helping me get another client in the door? Is that helping me grow my online client business? Not directly, it's not. It's something that I find I enjoy as an extra, as a piece of my career, but it's not necessarily doing anything to make me a better trainer or earn a greater livelihood, which is an honorable thing to do to actually earn a livelihood. So you have some financial security to stay in the fitness industry. Anybody starts talking about, oh, I don't care about the money, I only do it for, you know, to help people. Well, that's bullshit. You can help a lot more people in the long run.

Oh, we could talk about this for hours.

Okay, Your legacy, working your way up through crunch right into upper management ranks. I mean, how many times did you have to have this conversation with those passionate young trainers who are scared to sell themselves? Right? I mean, that's, that's.

I mean, this is deep rooted too. Right now we're talking about people's relationship with money, which is also generational, Generational. And we're also talking about people forgetting that money is a tool. And just like a hammer is, a hammer is there to build a house, it can also destroy a house. And so it's really the energy behind the person, not the tool. I mean, so true.

But it's something that's at the very core of a trader's career and success. And you could go one of two ways. You could really just pour yourself into being so knowledgeable, so passionate, so damn good at coaching and creating results and making the people line up to work with you, that the financial side kind of takes care of itself. There's still some wisdom around how you treat your finances and how much you're charging for your services. I mean, I Think those things are huge. But I think you're right. Our belief systems around money are a big thing too. One of my big things is I think especially the last couple of years, a lot of trainers left the industry because even before, you know, global pandemic happens, they were uncomfortable with the instability of and the word I like to use, sorry, the lack of security of our income. All right. And one of my favorite books really blows the doors off of this one. Antifragile by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. Now it's a heavier read. It's a brilliant philosophy. Nassim is a pompous ass of an author who likes to remind you at every step of the way that he's smarter than you are. But he has great ideas. Forgive my bluntness.

Love it.

This whole idea that, okay, the person with a 9 to 5 salary job is somehow more secure and stable than the trainer who income varies month to month. Well, how many people do you know over the last couple years or even before it, their salary went from $60,000 to zero overnight. And unemployment benefits notwithstanding, whatever severance, the ups and downs and whatever of our income tend to average out to being something fairly consistent. And the person with the salary job still has to work. What do you think? You're a trainer, you're constantly looking for that next client. You have to work your business. I mean, it's not like someone shows up, salary secure benefits, that's it. And then they stop working or putting in effort. Talk to most of your friends that have those kinds of jobs. They're stressed, they're burned out, they're unhappy, they're working extra hours. There's trouble with the relationships are struggling because they're caught doing way more than and they're not paid or compensated fairly. They have no or little control over their own pay structure. And you look at our industry and go, we work hard at it passionately. We're doing something that we love. Yeah, our hours can be unconventional, but we have a lot of opportunity to control our inputs and our efforts. So if all of a sudden we notice, hey, business has been down the last three months. All right, cool. What can I do about that? All of a sudden business went from 60,000 to 50,000 as opposed to 60 to zero. Right. And all right, well we maybe punch a few more hours, maybe we go and start reading some books on the topics. Maybe it's sales, maybe it's business, maybe it's leadership, maybe it's the philosophy about something that has to change your belief system that has to Change in order for you to be more successful. And we have a lot of room to detect when something's maybe slipping a bit to then go and do something about it. Maybe we can change our marketing efforts, we can change our social media. We can decide like a couple of coaches that I know, Beth Barocco and Eric Roberts, they're both part of Jordan science mentorship and they early in the pandemic stuff, they leaned hard into TikTok. And Beth especially thought, oh, TikTok is stupid. This is Beth's. You know, I'm trying to think. Beth's not in her 20s, so, you know, she's probably saying, how's the stupidest for kids? Beth turned around. I think she's got about, I don't know, she's got several hundred thousand followers on TikTok. Eric's got over a million. Their Instagrams grew because their TikTok grew. Beth had to hire assistant coaches, a full time salesperson, a coo. And she has a whole bunch of stuff going on in this really thriving business because she leaned hard into TikTok at a time when it was growing really, really well. And I don't know, I don't think the horses are completely out of the barn on something like TikTok. I've leaned into Instagram hard and my Instagram is one of the faster growing Instagram accounts in the industry and I'm having a lot of fun with it. It's definitely helped my online coaching business. It's sort of a playground. It's a little bit of a bonus, but that's something that I really set out to do two and a half years ago. And yeah, it requires some patience and commitment to it. But if you're frustrated and struggling with your how things are going, you are in control of so many things within your career that you can put time and effort into, lean into. And I love the idea of seeing all of the smart, caring, passionate people stay in this industry for the long run to help more people. The ones that are frustrated because they see the liver king or some fluffy influencer with, you know, half a million followers, most of whom are bot followers, there's an illusion of success, a lot of fake stuff out there. And instead of feeling discouraged and saying, well, I need to quit and become a paramedic. And being a paramedic is a noble profession, we need a lot of them. But I think we can do a lot more on the front lines of everybody's health by actually helping people so they're less likely to end up in an ambulance down the road at some point.

So good. There's four things that really you brought up that I think are really important to highlight is that number one is you're going to get what you focus on. And so what I noticed in what you just said is that it's easy for the people who are struggling to just keep focusing on the fact that they're struggling and always focusing on the gap. Right? And that's why they get more of the struggle, because your brain literally says yes and. Right. And so what I also noticed is that you ask yourself very powerful questions, which is, you know, it was Richard Bantler that said the quality of your life is determined by the quality of questions that you ask. And so instead of asking, you know, why is this happening? Why is my Instagram not growing? Why is my TikTok not growing? You started to ask yourself, well, what can I do if business is down for three months, months, what can I do? And that question in itself, in my opinion, is the difference between the employee mindset and the entrepreneur mindset. Because the employees are the ones and there's nothing wrong with them. We need them. Right? So it's just you defining for yourself, well, what are you, what camp do you want to be in? And it's okay, whatever camp you pick. But as long as, in my opinion is that it's a conscious choice. Because the fourth thing you said is that security is an illusion. You know, people, we're going into a recession right now, and I'm putting that in quotes because it's, you know, opinion, right? But the people with the nine to five jobs are the ones that are sweating right now.

And we can be fearful that, and think that fitness, personal fitness, is a luxury and worry that all our clients are going to leave, or we can relentlessly and proactively put ourselves out there to create such a valuable experience to our existing clientele. Word of mouth that during difficult times, people start investing more in their physical health. Now, the last two years saw two different types of mentalities. There were the people that found a way and really committed to their health and their wellbeing. And there were the people that wrote it out on the couch, told themselves, I'm doing a good thing and I'm being a good person and fine, okay, cool, whatever gets you through it. But now a lot of those people are waking up after the last two years fully indoctrinated in a lot of very bad, fear based what have you, and they're struggling to get back out into the world. They're out of shape, they've gained weight and they don't feel healthy and they feel poor energy. Well, there's going to be a wave of those people right now who are going to say, I really need to turn my life around. They're going to invest in their health and wellbeing, but there's going to be a lot of other people are going, well, we're not going to go to Hawaii this year, but I'm going to make sure that I stay healthy. They're going to forego the luxuries. They're not going to buy the new car. Right. They're going to pull it off. They're going to drive the car for a little longer, but they're going to say, you know, my gym membership is a non negotiable. My trainer's a non negotiable as well. So you can be really fearful right now or you can continue to do the things over the course. Weird shit's going to happen the next five years, okay? Weird shit in the world that you will never be able to anticipate.

2020 taught us that every month it's.

Like, what the hell, right? The memes. The memes were great. It's like we almost have World War Three in, like something to do with Iran, I think. And then Australia was on fire. And then down comes Covid and then comes the lockdowns. And then, you know, it's just one thing after another after another, right? And then it was like the. Everybody was worried about. Of course the memes are great. What is it that the killer bees in?

I was just about to bring this up. Like, my husband is like this. My husband is like this. He's always like, every day like, oh, the cicadas are coming, the bees are coming, Covid's coming. And I was like, you got one right? Okay, one.

When is Godzilla going to. And again, the same author I mentioned, Nicholas Nassim. Nicholas, he wrote a book called Black Swan. And it's not the Natalie Portman movie. It's a concept about unprecedented events that are hard, if not impossible to anticipate, both good and bad. And just the philosophy around, like hedging your whole life around the worst case scenario, but benefiting from the uncertainty of the good things. So if you are committed to working on your craft, communicating effectively, to say the least, being a great communicator with the people in front of you, finding an outlet, a lot of people will tell you, oh, you don't need Instagram, you don't need An Instagram following. The people telling you that have large Instagram followings, just take note of that, okay? Or they're trying to sell you something. And even I'm saying no, you can be very successful without one. I think there's a lot of value in having some sort of media platform that reaches the type of people who want to train with. And it doesn't have to be Instagram. It can be TikTok. Set aside your. Your belief systems and biases about how stupid song and dance for kids TikTok may be. There is still real estate for very good quality people on there. Don't hop the trends. Just do really good stuff. Go follow Eric Roberts. Go see what he's doing. This guy actually really does a killer job. So you can learn, right? Look at the people who are actually doing really great in that space. Go read a bunch of Gary Vaynerchuk books. You want to get into philosophy on success in branding and social media. Gary's the man on that stuff, right? Maybe you don't like the hustle and grind philosophy behind Gary, but there's a lot of really important stuff in what he tells you. I'm an avid book reader, so I can speak in books as metaphors for different things. And I've committed myself to. On my drive, I listen to audiobooks I built up so that I listen to them faster. So I actually go through between physical books and audiobooks about 80 plus books a year. And I've done that for many years. And you know, you'll get those people who will say, whoa, you shouldn't do that. You need to sit down and just study one book and master it. Whatever. It's like, cool. I've got it as a resource book. Whenever I need something specific out of it, I'll pull out that book and I will open it up. But a lot of these things are just about philosophy. Something that you said earlier about being the entrepreneur versus the employee, that's the E myth revisited, right? I knew it the moment you said, I love that. It's a great book on philosophy. You do not need to memorize that book. You just need to understand a few basic concepts from it. Let the story distill in your mind. Books like Extreme Ownership, about taking full ownership over everything. A client comes in and does something abominably stupid. Well, how did you set up your communications so that way you actually proactively helped make sure that client didn't do that stupid thing that they did? What can you do? Instead of going, well, that's not my fault. Or you got an employee who does something problematic. It's not my fault. Let's fire the employee. Well, how did you communicate to train that employee so that way that didn't happen in the first place? And, well, if it happened once, it could happen again to someone else. Maybe that's important going forward. Where's the lesson in that? And there's so many other great concepts, there's so many other great books I could talk for 10 hours about, but I think fundamentally it's just exposing yourself to more new, better ideas. And you mentioned imposter syndrome earlier. Twelve years in, I still have a lot to learn. I'm constantly learning. I'm doing Joel Jameson's course right now. It's a conditioning course. It's one of pretty much, he's the authority on that stuff. I am learning things. I love it and I will never stop learning. I attend conferences. One piece of advice I will give fitness professionals. As fitness conferences start ramping back up, start attending this stuff. Go meet the people who are the speakers, presenters, but go meet and connect on social media with the people who are right there next to you on the same journey, the same path you are on. Our friend Chris Little, he did that. He followed me, came with me to an event in Kansas City that's now defunct, but he met a lot of people. That opened. He made a lot of friends. It opened a lot of doors to him. I did the same thing back in 2017. It changed my life. I met two people at this 2017 event. I am. I just met them, got them on social media. Didn't realize each of them hosted their own event. I'm speaking at both of their events this year. After years of relationship building with them without thinking, hey, I was going, hey, I want to go speak at these events. I didn't know I was interested in that stuff back then. So you never know what's going to happen. If you just get yourself in front of like minds, you'll see what they're doing well, you'll be inspired. It can really help motivate you. A lot of us are just in a city, a community where maybe there's not a lot of other people who share our vision. You connect with those people, you know, around North America and the world, it can really feel like you're not alone. It can really inspire you, give you great ideas. It can help you on the path. That can feel kind of lonely sometimes.

Oh, my gosh, there's no kind of about it, especially in the online world, right like it's, I mean it's so, so powerful. And the other thing too is that you said is that it's easy for us to look up in terms of people who've already been there and to follow, you know, success leaves clues and to follow that path. But to also remember to look at who's next to you because it's the network and the people that you're with that rise together and at, you know, Eric Cressy and Tony are perfect examples. They built that together. Dr. Pat Davidson and Dr. Ben House, like they did that together. I think of like Molly and Jen, they, they were next to each other in conferences. Pat and Dr. Ben, small world.

So Pat will be here in Edmonton this weekend so I'll be hanging out with him. He's got a two day seminar going. He's been on my podcast. Pat's a lot of fun because you're part of the compound performance world, right? Kyle and Matt and Dean part of that. And Jeb Johnston. I Met Jeb in 2017 at that same event that I met a whole bunch of other people including Pete Dupuy. I met Tony Jelcore at that event in 2018. Just John Goodman at that event. Like that list goes on. It's Mike T. Nelson in 2017 and 2018. I was just in Minneapolis speaking at an event. Mike's local. Mike came to hang out, spent the weekend with me. That stuff is cool too. And I know we said earlier it's not about seeking the approval of these kind of people but it can be really fulfilling and rewarding, you know, to get in their space and learn from them, interact with them too. So that's been something that I found personally fulfilling. I don't think it should be at the top of most fitness professionals list but if you get the opportunity to go to events like this, go to them. I met Molly Galbraith you alluded to in February this past year at Raise the Bar. This is an event that I want to put on people's radar. I'll shout this one out because my friends Nick Lamb and Derek Mendoza, they did it in Orlando this past year. They're probably looking at Dallas for late February this coming year. So again, just Instagram page Raise the Bar. It's a really cool event. It had the who's who of the industry speaking at it last year. It'll be another killer event this coming year. These guys are doing really cool stuff. If you want to go meet like minded people and get immersed in like the industry leaders as well. This is one that's worth prioritizing. So I will be there. There's discussion. I'm probably going to be in the speaking lineup on it. That's not confirmed, but it's something that would be really cool. So we'll see how that one goes. And then there's a handful of other events. Look around the industry, see where the people who you are interested in learning from that, you like what they're doing. Whether it's like seminars like Tony Jellicor and his wife Lisa Lewis do a bunch of seminars. They got one.

She's brilliant. She was on my podcast. She is brilliant.

Lisa's incredible. Yeah, they're doing something in the UK right away. Whether it's like Renaissance Periodization's team, they travel around, they do a lot of seminars. They've been up here in Edmonton several times or Alberta. So they always go to Calgary. And Pat Davidson, again, you know he's coming here but Pat travels around or another great place, especially if you're in the Washington state area. Luca, host of our my pal Luca, he's got a great gym there and he hosts, he's not doing it this year, but an annual business, fitness and business event that I love. I always attend that and but they do a lot of educational seminars, whether it's, you know, a guy named Derek Henson coming in doing sprinting stuff or it's Brett Bartholomew doing his art of coaching stuff there or if they're bringing in business for unicorns and it's Pete Dupuy and Mark Fisher. And it can feel overwhelming wanting to do all this stuff. We don't have to do all this stuff, but it's out there. If you're following these people and looking for it, make a point of going to one of these things.

I mean, I couldn't agree more. I mean I think that the time and the money investment in yourself as a professional is ultimately going to be what helps you, in my opinion, with the skill acquisition. Because if nothing else, you're going to be inspired just being around the people that are speaking and hanging out with you. I can't. And this is true for introverts that I've connected with and also extroverts. You're going to find like minded people around you when you choose to invest in yourself.

Absolutely.

So I want to be very mindful of your time because I know that, you know, we're, we're running low. So I will, I will ask you this last question because I'm curious, especially for someone who has been in the industry for a long time. And since our brain, you know, is designed to automate, it is designed to go for the fast track. How have you continued to stay excited, motivated, want to learn more? When you have years of experience behind you and it would be easy to almost, you know, just rest on the laurels, how have you stayed motivated and continued to sharpen the saw, it becomes.

Part of your identity, right? I enjoy reading, I enjoy learning, I enjoy studying. And you can't necessarily teach people that, but you can develop an identity around anything. It's like the people we work with, we foster an identity of them being a more fit, a more active person who eats healthier, right? You can foster an identity by, you know, if. If it starts with seeking out the things you're more interested in, then whether it's coursework or it's books or if it's live seminars or podcasts or whatever, I probably started mostly with just reading articles online, YouTube videos of people like Lane Norton was one of my early ones. And podcasts like, there's an old classic called the Fitcast where I learned about who a lot of the people were in the industry, and then it became traveling to events as I had the resources and the ability to do so. It's as simple as I love it. But there's also something else, too. I also derive a lot of enjoyment from spending time with the clients who I like spending time with. I'm fortunate enough to be able to. I'm in a position where I can kind of choose. And again, I'm not super picky about it, but the people who I get to spend my time with, I think about. It's like, hey, I really enjoy this person. I really enjoy this person. I really enjoy this. So I find it's fulfilling. Now I'm more extroverted, so I tend to be good about being around people like that. But if you're introverted, it's especially important that the people who you're spending your time with are not draining, not emotional. Vampires. You do have to set some boundaries around that sort of stuff. But I have no trouble working through a long day of clients. My last client this evening is a cardiologist I've trained for years. We're great friends. I see him four times a week, most of the time, and he's funny. We talk about. We have a lot of shared interests. I've got an old friend who I train in the evenings. We love Blue Jays baseball. He loves talking hockey. I've known him for 15 years, longer than I've been a trainer. He's an old friend. I enjoy my client Larry, who I splash around on my social media a lot. Larry's almost 72. He's really strong. Go look. I've seen him.

I've seen it. It's amazing.

I'm telling this little listeners, go scroll a little bit. Look at some of the cool crap that Larry's capable of. He's got the set and people go nuts. They just love him. So getting to spend time with people like that, I look forward to it. So it's never hard to get out of bed to want to go do this stuff. And then for me, I'm at the point now where I actually would rather read a book that I'm interested in than to sit down and watch a TV show. I'm at that point, and that's not everybody, but that's where I am. And it didn't start out that way. So I think it's just leaning into it. Finding the priorities, the gaps you need to fill within your education, your knowledge base, and just continue to find things that interest you and then see where your horizons expand to. So it's the best answer I've got on that one.

So good. So, Andrew, thank you so much for pouring into us today. I really appreciate it. For those of you who have not had the pleasure of seeing your work, where are the best places I can send them?

All roads lead through Instagram at Andrew Coates Fitness. Right. Usually my website is in my bio. Me and my partner are doing an intake on our online women's group strength training platform, Forever Strength, right now. So that's technically in my bio. But my website is Andrew Coates Fitness, and I will link all the articles I write for T Nation, muscle and fitness magazine, et cetera, on there. Anything I write myself. I haven't had a lot of time to do much of my own writing recently, but it's all on my website, my podcast, everything. I just share on Instagram. And if anybody has any questions, please shoot me a message. I respond to every message I get, even if they end up in my hidden folder. That's something that's important to me. So if you have any questions about anything we've discussed here, if you're looking for book resources or anything else, please ask. I will help. Okay.

Thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Thank you, Beverly. I appreciate you having me on.

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