Upgrading Your Programming and Financials with Jared Aquilina

You're listening to the PT Profit podcast, episode number 176. Today I'm sitting down with coach Jared Aquilina and we're talking about upgrading your programming and financial skills. 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 Profit Podcast.

What's up, coach? Thank you so much for pushing clay.

On another episode of the PT Profit Podcast. I'm your host, Beverly Simpson, and if this is the first time that you are hanging out with me today and listening to this show, welcome. I'm super pumped that you're here today. I'm bringing a very special personal trainer coach who is a program design specialist as well as financial coach Jared Aquilina. And I am really excited because we have a really awesome conversation about upgrading your business, both from a programming standpoint as well as a financial standpoint, so that you can actually achieve the life that you want to achieve in a freedom, financial wealth, well as life wealth. In this episode, we also talk a lot about leverage and how we can use program design to leverage more time and wealth in our business, as well as ways that we can enhance and set up our financial situation as fitness professionals. So without further ado, let's go ahead and roll that interview.

What's up, Jared? Thanks so much for joining me today. How are you?

Good, how are you? Thanks for having me on.

Of course. I'm doing so good. This is going to be such a great conversation. I'm super pumped. Same for those of you who have never heard about your work, Jared, can you share with us a little bit about who you are, who you serve, and how you got there?

So my name is Jared Aquilina. Of course. I've been a trainer in New York city for about 15 years. I like to say it's exactly 14, but 15 just sounds better. And I primarily focus on strength training, muscle building, etc. And you know, my main focus or specialization is program design. I've always really been interested in program design and seeing long term progress kind of play out training clients for years. And just recently I kind of launched a program design tool called Big Picture Programming and it designs a 12 week program for any client in under five minutes. And it's helped me immensely just because I've had a high volume of clients actually over the last couple of years, even during the pandemic, I've gained a lot of clientele. So just to kind of release, relieve that stress of day in, day out programming, it's really allowed me to kind of streamline my program design process so I could really get focused on helping people and training people and doing what I love.

Oh, I love this. And I can't wait to dive into more about the programming tool. But I'm just curious, what brought you into fitness 14 years ago?

So growing up, I was actually obese as a, as a teenager and I joined Weight Watchers. I joined with my aunt at the time. Yeah, when I was 15 years old and I lost £40. And I really saw, you know, what that could do for a person mentally, obviously, physically, of course. And I've always wanted to kind of instill that sort of progress and results within other people because again, you know, when people are not feeling good about themselves, not feeling confident, there's nothing better than seeing results on your body and on your mind. And I really wanted to kind of bring that to other people. And then I ended up going to Temple University where I studied exercise physiology and kind of played out from there. I became a personal trainer.

That is amazing. I did not know that about you.

Yes.

So, you know, in that process of joining Weight Watchers.

Sure.

You know, doing that, you know, were you also working out or was it just food?

It was mostly food. I was, I think I was a freshman. Yeah, I said freshman. So I was on the freshman basketball team. So my main mode of exercise was just playing basketball two hours every day after school, five days a week. And I remember going with my aunt every day and I would actually, every week we would have to weigh in one time a week. And I'd say I was there for like 12 to 15 weeks. I was called up every time because I always lost the most weight. I thought I was like a little bit at an unfair advantage because it was a lot of middle aged people. But it was interesting. They had to put me in front of the classroom and kind of say how I did this. And you know, it was just interesting speaking to all these older people. Like they're looking at me like, oh, what's this like teenager doing here? But I still had the same struggles no matter what age. And I just, it was, it came down to just right food choices and right portions. I think this is when they came out with the point system, which really People kind of follow today with flexible dieting or more of like a macronutrient approach. So I've definitely had that skill set at a young age.

For better.

Yes.

Okay, so then you go to Temple University and now you start, you start learning about exercise physiology and now we can start transitioning into that conversation of program design. How, how did you fall in love with that process? Because in my experience and working with hundreds of trainers, program design tends to be one of the biggest struggle goals that a lot of the coaches face for a multitude of reasons. Wanting to keep clients engaged, wanting to, to, you know, help them achieve the goal and especially when cold goals are different and then, you know, make sure that they streamline it so that they're not spending hours in the admin. So how did you fall in love with that and then learn to come up with this system that is effective?

So I fell in love with that. Actually it kind of precedes going to college, but I'm going to kind of tie in my college experience with that. You know, after I lost some weight with Weight Watchers, that's when I got more into weight training because I mentioned I just did it through basketball and then the Weight Watcher program, and I followed the Miami Hurricanes football strength and conditioning program with one of my friends at our locals high school gym. And I remember I printed it out, remember when we printed things out? And I really learned the power of having a 12 week program, you know, laid out in front of me, seeing what I was going to do on day one, what I was going to do a week later, a month later, etc. And kind of moving along to college. Finally, for my senior internship, I interned at Villanova University for their football strength and conditioning program. And all of the college kit or all of the athletes got a printout of every workout they were going to do for that whole summer. And I really saw the importance of having a high volume of people and what a plan can really do and help facilitate the program for all those amount of people. So once I kind of learned from that, I learned how to use an Excel sheet because as the intern I would have to input all the weights, all the sets and reps, etc, I kind of gained that skill through that internship. And then as I kind of moved along in my training career over this, these last 14 years, my Google sheet expertise kind of evolved and then culminated into big picture programming, which I released a couple months ago.

So how do you decide? How do you, what's the process in which you go through putting together A program for a client.

First, of course, I'll put them through an assessment process which could, you know, isn't just that one day, it could take a couple of weeks. And of course it's centered around their goals. But mostly it's based on a periodization model. I think although we're all unique in some way, we still need to follow some sort of plan. And the periodization kind of allows you to oversee the whole plan and kind of sets the tone for the next 12 weeks or even six months to a year. And starting with that periodization, that bigger picture allows you to break down the process from there. I personally, if I. I know you didn't ask, but I like an undulating periodization approach, just allows people to. Allows the trainer to change the sets and reps on a weekly basis, keeping the clients a little bit more interested. For the most part, most of my clients want to either gain muscle or lose fat. So just a good overall solid weight training program is going to be pretty applicable for everyone.

Can you break down specifically what you mean when you're talking about undulating periodization process?

Sure. So undulating is more of a wave type model of the sets and reps. So for example, in week one, let's say we're training someone for three days, we might see two to three sets of 10 to 15 reps. The next week will be six to 10, the next week will be four to eight, and then we'll kind of wave back up into a higher REP range of 12 to 20. And that repeats over the course of a month. So you kind of take those four different rep schemes that I just said and then do it over the course of every month. So it kind of again, keeps people engaged and interested instead of the typical, like we're just going to do 8 to 12 reps for years and years and it kind of gets stagnant and you want to keep training fun, but of course productive. So we kind of get a mix of both with that undulating model.

I see. So now how do you. And how does the coach determine whether they need to progress, whether they need to modify when it comes to the performance of this undulating process?

So typically, sometimes it coincides with how their nutrition is like what their stress levels are like after the 12 weeks, I'll probably add weight depending on this, the client's skill level. If it's a little more of like an advanced client, I'll add weight every month. But if it's someone who's maybe a little bit older, maybe a little Bit more high stress. Maybe a senior executive, et cetera, doesn't get good sleep, has kids. I won't progress the weight as much and just focus more on sticking with the set and rep scheme. And ways to progress would just be pushing those reps towards that higher range. That's why I kind of give it a range. For example, on that week one, 10 to 15. Maybe in one to one we're just working with 10. Maybe in month two, we just kind of push that same weight to 12 reps. Month three, pushing that same weight to 15 reps. So it really leaves some leeway for the trainer to autoregulate. You know, we can't always solely rely on a spreadsheet to apply to a client. You know, people are unique, humans are unique, which gives us the value as a trainer. Like, hey, we're watching you, we're taking care of you. And these are the things that we're kind of seeing and assessing on a day to day basis.

Okay, I love that. So now, you know, in terms of the performance of a programming program, how do you as the coach decide or assess? Just like you said, you're assessing every single day, assessing whether or not the program is working or you're just. Or maybe not. It's not the right word in terms of working, but in terms of how can you, if you're reaching like plateaus or maybe you're not seeing a lot of movement, how do you decide between what is part of the process and then just stick to it and then what is. We need to make an adjustment.

We need to make an adjustment. That's a really good question. I think it ultimately comes down to are they seeing the results that they signed up for for what are their goals? If someone isn't losing weight, you know, we need to look at A, the program, B, the nutrition, their sleep. So usually I will change the periodization model. Maybe their body isn't responding to that sort of rep range. For example, typically females can be doing higher amounts of reps at the same relative intensity as a male can. So let's say we both have a one rep max of 100 pounds. I could do, you know, 80% for five reps. You might be able to do six to seven. So, you know, it really depends on the client. And it's up to me to kind of change that periodization model which will get them to their goals. But ultimately I think you need to kind of assess these things over a three to six month process. And that's why I kind of set up My programs that way.

Love it. And would you say this is true for fat loss and for muscle growth?

You mean how the program is set up? No, because I will push the weights more and I'll push the reps more if someone is trying to gain muscle. Usually most of my clients work with me with nutrition, so they're in a caloric surplus at that point. So they have the energy to kind of push those weights. They're not getting fatigued as fast. If someone is, you know, it's summer right now, everyone's trying to maybe get a little bit leaner or stay leaner. I'll kind of keep it on the lower end range just to, you know, kind of maintain their results that we've gotten over the course of the year. So it really is highly dependent on what their nutrition looks like and how many calories they're taking in.

So now I'm curious, in your experience and how you set up your programs right, you know, does this look different for a gen pop person versus someone who is athletically inclined or training for a sport? How do you change up the periodization programming depending on the client?

Sure they do. Some people have a different periodization model, but it really comes down to the actual workout. So some people, if I see them twice a week, you know, they're just a gen pop client, someone trying to just stay in shape. Maybe just your typical busy executive corporate worker. I'm going to have them do a total body workout because I'm only seeing them for two hours a week. So I really, I like to kind of paint a big brush over their body. You know, some people might be a little bit more type A. I see them four times a week, then that's when I can kind of get into the nuances of more isolation. Of course, depending on their goals. You know, for example, I have a guy now, I see him four times a week and we do an upper, lower, upper, lower split. So that type of person, I could really attack like half their body on each day. Again, the person who just wants to stay in shape, really busy, they have kids. I'm going to just take a total body approach because like I mentioned, I'm only seeing them for two hours a week. There's only so much I could do. So we kind of have to make the best of it for the short period of time that we have.

And I love it. Now, in, in your opinion, right, when it comes to, you know, programming, we know that repetition, the mother of all learning and that we need to be practicing in order to for skill acquisition. And this is true across business health, all of it. Right. However, we're inundated with short intention spans and libraries of on demand, blah, blah, blah. So how do you, how do you help keep your clients engaged and motivated doing a program that might be considered boring when you compare it to, you know, what's available to them?

So in my big picture programming template, I do have a lot of visualizations that I do show the client month to month. So that one keeps them engaged through that visualization process. It just gives them like a fun presentation to look at. It's like watching an NFL game that has all these flashing lights. Although this isn't a gimmicky thing, it's just nice to see that progress. And then two, I will call it something else. You know, maybe, you know, I'll call it like a Jersey arm blast program if someone wants to get bigger arms. So if you kind of make these fun little quirky names, it kind of gives people the impression that it's unique to them. And, you know, it's kind of cool for them to tell their friends or, you know, for us to kind of laugh about. But you know, if I just called it three day program, they're not going to really be excited about it. So as long as you kind of change these small things here and there, it's going to show the clients that you actually care about them. And that's what having a program is all about. You know, to know that this trainer cares about you. They made a funny names program and they're set for the next 12 weeks to a year.

I love that. Now how do you, how do you go? And honestly, I love that. And I think that naming your exercises and naming your programs, for example, is, is going to be a way that you layer on the uniqueness of you. Everyone, yeah, everyone wants to talk about, you know, how we can stand apart in the market space. We'll name your workouts.

Absolutely.

Number one. Okay, so now, how do you go about the exercise selection of your program?

So, exercise selection, I like to base it off of the eight fundamental movement patterns. Your squats, your pushes, your pulls, etc. Those are all things that we do in life. Those are all things that we just need to, you know, survive in this physical world. And what are the eight? The eight are. Wow, you're putting me on the spot. So push, pull, squat, squat, core, lunge. That's four, carry. Did I say rotation? I think I have throw in there. I think I have like a few that are kind of like in one sort of category, you know, your throw, your sprint, your jump, etc. So that's kind of like a little bit more of like your athletic based movements. As long as I see those eight in the course of the week, then I'm fine. I'm not going to really program all of those eight in one day. My program sheet, for example, mine has only six slots for me to put exercises. And that doesn't, you know, exclude the warm up. We could be doing jumps and throws, etc. In a warm up, which is a great kind of nervous system activation exercise or way to activate the nervous system. So you know, you're not just limited to having to use those eight in one day. And that's really what it comes down to, the nuances of program design. You know, if someone again wants to do that upper lower split, I'm not going to be doing a lunge or squat typically on those days, on that upper body day. So as long as I see those eight movement patterns over the course of a week, then it's good to go.

Okay, I put you on the spot only because pull, hinge, carry, which I, which I usually think of carrying core is kind of what I love together. So I went, yeah, what are the three?

I don't know, a lot of, a lot of trainers kind of like rename them. They'll be like, oh, there's six fundamental movement patterns. But like I mentioned, I think a lot of those athletic ones or typical, like athletic movements kind of fall into one category. So as long as you're hitting all the, you know, movement planes and movement patterns, then it's going to set a human up to be strong and healthy.

Love it. So how long are your workouts?

I do 60 minute training sessions. My virtual sessions are anywhere from 30 to 45 minutes. But I would say like actual strength training portion of a workout is probably only 40 minutes. I'm a big fan of a good warmup, cardio warmup with some dynamic stretches to kind of help people open up all those tight areas. But you know, I kind of subscribe to the dogma of I'd rather have a really good warmup and you know, have three to five exercises executed really well for a good workout instead of kind of just rushing into a workout and doing a very complicated eight session workout that's not really going to give people the results they want to see.

I love it. So now in the fitness industry, I feel like, you know, it's, you bring up dogma and I love that mostly we all fall into these camps where we make decisions on this is what we do, this is what we don't do. And I think that truly the masters are the ones that aren't trained to make other people wrong, that they're always learning but deciding on their process. So to me that is like how someone is pro chocolate ice cream without being anti vanilla. Right. So I'm curious your opinion on, you know, where do program, where do the HIIT workouts fall in and what's your take on into your program and what about the cardio like the whole idea and constant concepts of cardiovascular training versus workouts like where does that sure. Program.

So with my clients personally, a lot of them, I just meant I just try and get them to get 10,000 steps per day. If that's not possible for them, just kind of give them a set goal to do a little bit more low intensity cardio throughout the week. I do also offer remote coaching for my clients. A lot of them will sign up for more of like a supplemental program that I'll give them on the days that I don't see them. And that's where you kind of see those hit workouts. For some of them that are very proficient in our workouts where they might not need my guidance for those supplemental routines, I'll give them additional strength work to do. But honestly all of it is surrounded is around just getting steps in per day depending on the person's goals. But you know, some people, I've had endurance athletes in the past, so I'll just give them a supplemental program to do for running, biking, etc. So it really boils down to what the client wants. But getting in those steps every day is going to keep their metabolic rate higher and ultimately keep that fat off.

Okay, so you, you think it's client. So just to clarify, you're saying it's almost like just client pretty.

I think it's.

For supplement. So you have the program that's the strength training program and if they want to supplement their movements when they're not seeing you, they can add in their hit workouts if they love it.

Yes, yes. I have someone, they like to follow an app, you know, and it's mostly hit workouts. So I kind of take that into account with our training and just because I'm seeing them on a week to week basis, you know, we can kind of talk about what they did and what we're going to do and I can kind of manipulate those things from there. Of course I like to be in the most control as I can. So usually I will have them do some remote coaching with me. Most of my clients, I don't even think like to do cardio, but they, you know, some. Some of them do it. So that's why I kind of just suggest, like, hey, just get out for walks. You know, especially with people still kind of working from home, not commuting as much, I really emphasize getting out from multiple walks per day as opposed to just that one chunk like I mentioned, that's just going to keep your metabolic rate up. And considering everyone wants to lose fat, keep the fat off, that's the best way to do it.

Okay. I love it. So now, one of the things that I really love about this program that you've created in is that you've been able to maximize your leverage, essentially. And the way that I define leverage is you have different levers that you can pull in building your machine, your business machine. And when you have a lot of this stuff systemized, like you do with the programming, you literally can just pull this lever and then free up some more time and then create more wealth inside of your life and your business. Not just money, but also in your freedom and flexibility. Right. So I'm bringing this up as we transition the conversation, because now that you've done this and automated this for your. For your own business, you've. This has allowed you to explore other options and other ways of growing wealth and health in your life. And I've been seeing in your content how you have now been really helping trainers and coaches. I'll say trainers specifically manage their money and manage their financial wealth. So I'd love for you to dive a little bit into that. Is this just like a passion project on the side? Tell me a little bit more about this.

So, you know, it's funny that you mentioned all that. And I have been able to gain some free time from big picture programming and from my success as a trainer. And, you know, I think these two kind of go hand in hand in hand because everything is about looking at the big picture, whether it comes to your business, whether it comes to your clients, and whether it comes to building your wealth. So, you know, kind of a funny story, I've always been interested in investing, interested in finance, because I like that compounding progress over a long period of time. And I think that's what building wealth requires. It requires that kind of consistency and constant contribution. So I've always kind of talked to my fiance, Marlo, about how I want to become a financial coach for personal trainers, because from my Conversation with a lot of trainers, they really have a system for managing their irregular income because let's face it, this is irregular income. We don't make a salary, we don't have a employee contribution to a 401k. We're kind of just left on our own. We're a small business, we're a sole proprietor, often just a single person business. And we need a system to build our wealth and hopefully see our investments build over the long term. So she is a. She is. She does tattooing, she does semi permanent tattooing. And she got a targeted ad for a tattoo artist that teaches other tattoo artists about their finances. And he is a financial coach. So I actually ended up reaching out to him saying I was interested in doing the same for personal trainers. And he actually ended up becoming one of my clients when I reached out to him, which was awesome. So then we started talking and then now he's actually mentoring me because he is a licensed financial advisor. So he's been mentoring me to become a financial coach for personal trainers. And there's been trainers in the last few weeks that I've been talking to. I helped them kind of set up all their bank accounts to automate their savings, automate contributions to a 401k, to an IRA. And ultimately I want to help trainers increase their value through a program design and just the value of their life through building their wealth. And I don't think there's a lot of people out there kind of doing that. Like I mentioned, we are just a sole business. So just to be able to help trainers do that, gain back their free time, which will ultimately relieve some stress so they could help more people. Because that's what it's all about. I'm here to help more people, make people more healthy. And the more, you know, competent a trainer is in their program design, the more stress free they are. Because they live a wealthy life, they're going to be able to put that energy into their clients.

Oh my gosh, I love this and I love talking about money. And I. People have weird relationships with money which they feel like, oh, this is greed. You know, you're. I'm greedy. If I want this, if I want to live outside of, you know, if I want to grow my means, I must be greedy. And that's just a not the case. I know plenty of really miserable rich people and really miserable poor people and the reverse is the same, right? And I think that these conversations need to be had because most people think they have time when the truth is time, you Never get back. And it's a, it is a finite resource.

Absolutely.

But when you can get to the point where your money makes money for.

You.

Then freedom and flexibility is then. Oh my gosh, that is.

Yeah. No, it is. I agree.

And when we're talking about wealth, I'll just say for me, I'm not defining that necessarily by the greed or love of money, but more so as the way that you can actually show up in your life in terms of having a rich, full, affluent life. Not just bank account.

Yes.

Okay, so what's the process? Where do you start people?

So usually I'll start them on a clarity session. I'll just get to know what their attitude is about money. It's funny that you mentioned a lot of people kind of see it as being greedy. So I like to get it, get their mindset about how they perceive money. You know, are they able to talk about it with their friends, their family, even with me? So I kind of like, like to alleviate that stress around it and just get them talking. Let's open up the dialogue. You know, even trainers are afraid to ask for a raise from their clients or, you know, up their rates from clients. And I think having that conversation, the more you have the conversation, the more you have a system built around money, the more you'll be comfortable talking about it and increasing your business. And ultimately the program, it's kind of, it's a little bit modeled after the Profit first program, which I love that book. Yeah, so it's, you know, it's about like a bucket system. You have all of your money flowing into a business account and ultimately you want to automate all of your expenses, all of your retirement contributions. You want to automate all of your savings into its own separate accounts. Like a bucket. It just allows you to keep things more organized. So you have like a lack of a better term, big picture view of what's actually going on. You understand where the money is flowing in your bank account and out of it. It just allows you to manage it better that way. And it's a six week pro, or sorry, it's a 12 week program. After that kind of first two to four weeks, we'll get more into taxes and accounting and how you could maintain your bookkeeping and automate your bookkeeping. I don't know how many people. And this actually, this last year I actually helped a few clients with their taxes. And I'm like, aren't you like 47, you know, like, and haven't you done this before? You know, it's it amazes me how many sole proprietors especially, are still, you know, stressed and confused around taxes, around tax time. So we'll go over taxes and how we can make that a breeze for them. Every April. What is it? I forget what it is. April. April 15, actually, it depends, right?

I just now have to file every quarter.

File every quarter? Yes. I usually do the one time a year. But you do save some fees if you do. Every quarter.

Yeah. And it also depends on the business type. So I am an llc, but I'm an LLC incorporated. So because I'm incorporated, I'm required to pay payroll taxes to myself and as I grow to my employ, which is why I'm required to. To file quarterly. However, this is information I realized now after being a sole proprietor for six years. So this is why I'm so passionate about this. Because, you know, when I brought this to my accountant, he's like, you made how much as a what? And I'm like, yeah, sorry, you're lucky.

I don't think you're lucky. I think you work very hard.

No, lucky. In terms of, like, my liability. My liability options were very. Were open. I was a very vulnerable company.

That's okay. Okay, that's fine.

But it's important because, like, this is why I'm also called to your work, because it's, you know, you're not. You're. You're. There are a lot of people that fall into this category and not even realize it.

Absolutely.

Oh, I'm going to figure this out. I'm going to figure this out. To. All of a sudden, they wake up and they're 47.

Yes, absolutely. So, and we'll. We'll go over accounting, taxes. I'll usually set them up with the ein number or business ein number if they don't have one. Just basically, we want to make everything legitimate as you can. We want to give them a system that's going to set them up for success. We'll go over emergency funds, how we can kind of automate those and then build up to a good emergency fund. As you can see, some trainers didn't do well the last couple of years, and there's things that might blindside you that you're not prepared for. So we want to keep them prepared for that. I think overall, it really comes down to that mindset, just kind of talking about money, not seeing it as the cat dispenser just went off. Just changing their mindset around money, and ultimately it's just gonna. The more comfort you have, the more wealth you'll build and then you'll gain your free time back.

Yeah, I think it's so important. So I'm curious, you know, you know, we talk a lot about, about comfort, comfortability with money and money management. What is the stance and the conversation that you have around risk tolerance? Because when it comes to building assets, whether it's building your own business, whether it's investing in stock market options, there's also going to be a level of, you have to know what your level of risk tolerance is. So how do you coach people through that?

Sure. Usually for the, for a person who has a lower risk tolerance, you know, when it comes to building their assets, whether it's a investing in the market or investing in themselves, I just prefer to start small. Even the smallest, any amount of contribution is going to make them a little bit more comfortable. And typically I'll kind of skew them towards lower risk assets for the most part. Because essentially I'm not a financial advisor. I can't, I can't tell them what securities to buy. Specific ones, of course, I could just give them my advice and it's all recommendation. But I'll typically just have someone, for example, if they're going to invest in the stock market, just invest in the index or the s and P500, but with small amounts of contributions, and then we can kind of increase that percentage over time. Let's say we start off with 5% of their income per year and then kind of up at a percent, up at 5%, whatever they're kind of comfortable with. A lot of times they don't even have an account. So to kind of see their money go up and down. It's better to start small that way. You don't want to have someone throw, I don't know, 5, 10, 50,000 right away and see it plummet. So it really comes down to just seeing it every day and being comfortable with the ebbs and flows of the market. And then when it comes to investing in themselves, ultimately they're going to have the most control over it. So no matter how much you invest, whether it's money and time, it's the time you put in to get the output. So in terms of that, I think it really depends on the person.

Yeah, no, it. For sure. And you know, especially now, I'm curious. Your opinion. I recognize. And we'll make sure all those disclaimers, this is all not financial advice. This is all opinion. You know, as we're seeing, you know, a lot of this, in my opinion, in my opinion, by the media in terms of this conversation around this economic downturn, around this, you know, we hear people talking about we're officially in a recession. And that type of fueled language in from, from the media can be really detrimental to people's how they navigate their risk options. Right?

Absolutely.

So how can someone be prepared during this season for however long the season is going to be?

Sure. So if someone were to was thinking of investing, I would just say contribute slowly and then wait towards the economy to grow and then contribute a little bit more aggressively. Right now in my opinion, I would suggest just to kind of keep some cash on the sideline. But really playing like mentioning what you said about the news, a lot of it becomes self fulfilling. For example, even with inflation, when inflation was coming up, people are going to go out and buy more items and buy more products because they don't want to see themselves paying a higher price later on. I mean I did that with chicken breasts. You know, I'm a trainer, I have to have my chicken breasts. So I ended up buying a lot of chicken breasts but the price never actually went up on what I was buying. So a lot of this recession talk and inflation talk. Are you going to edit that one out?

All right, just laughing because it actually also brings me to the point of like, you know, remember, remember back in, you know I. I've been seeing these tiktoks about like Covid's back and then everyone's running out to get the toilet paper and it was just like what a human behavior is so bizarre.

No, it is. And you are skewed by the media that way. And the toilet paper thing was the same. I'm sure there was a lot of toilet paper. It just happens to be a lot of people. It was self fulfilling and we ended up over buying and a lot of people have extra toilet paper now. But in terms of the recession, you know, usually I will show people, you know, specifically when it comes to comes to stock market returns, I just show them the, the mean of the return over the last 10 to 20 years and say this is going to be 8 to 10% per year. And just focus on the long term. If you're going to focus on short term fluctuations, that's when people kind of lose money. And when you kind of think about it, that's how your emotions are, you know, on a day to day basis. If there was a price on you based on your emotions on a day to day basis, it's not always going to be consistent. But you have to kind of look back at the last three months, at the last six months, say overall, how did I feel? Did I feel good? Did I feel bad? And the same thing comes to your investment, same thing comes to the economy on a day to day basis. You just can't really measure it that way. You can't look at it on a day to day basis. Just focus on the big picture.

Now we're looking at trends.

Trends, exactly.

Yeah. And this is true.

Absolutely.

In your programming, in your periodization, we can't be making adjustments every day. We need to be looking at trends over time. So good. Okay, so now a lot of this stuff for someone who's brand new, you know, to even having this conversation, they're like four. Okay, what Ira, what? Right. It can feel like even when you start to Google, it feels really overwhelming. So what do you recommend someone who is brand new to this, what's their.

First step for investing?

To even go down this process of assessing where they're at. Like who, like is there. Is this one of those things where they should just, you know, call you, get advice right away? Is this something that they should learn on their own? Like what is the first process? What is the first, first step?

I definitely like to get them on an hour call, go over with, go over them what their income is, what debt they have, what credit cards they have, what bank accounts they have. Basically I want to get into the nitty gritty and all the information I can get out of them about their finances. Of course, if they're not comfortable divulging some of these things, that's fine, but I really need to know everything about their financial situation to kind of give them a bigger picture on the path that we're going to do moving forward. And then when it comes to investing, I usually set them up with a betterment account and that's just kind of your standard robo advisor that has an automatic deposit and an automatic investing feature built in. So it kind of just takes the emotions away from it. I don't recommend, I know we were kind of talking about risk tolerance and volatility. I don't recommend someone to look at it all the time. I know we just mentioned about trends and emotions. You know, that's going to, kind of your emotions are going to come into play when it comes to your investment. So as, as much as you can get rid of your emotions in regards to that, the better.

Yeah, you know, so, so it sounds like the person needs to get comp. Get. Needs to get competent and fully aware of their full financial liabilities. And assets. Because a lot of people think they have assets which are actually liabilities.

Absolutely.

And they just need to get really. So it sounds like, you know, get getting clear on that where they're at and where they're going is going to.

Be the first step.

I think a lot of people don't even look at their bank account. They might not even know. I know several people who do that. Several people who just live on a credit card and they decide not to look at it. And the same can come with when someone is gaining weight. You know, I know it's inverse when you're losing money, but if someone's gaining weight, sometimes they just say, hey, I don't even want to look at it. And if their goal is fat loss, and they know that they want to lose fat, but they just don't want to acknowledge that they're going on a wrong path, you know, ends up being more detrimental in the long term. So the faster you can kind of acknowledge the things that you're doing, acknowledge the mistakes that you made so you can correct them and move forward, the better off you're going to be.

Yeah, I think that that is the number one thing that I'm. So many people just seem to miss or not talk about or take for granted, which is that you cannot change what you can't see. What gets measured, gets managed, whether you're going to. And it doesn't mean you have to count calories. It doesn't mean you have to count your pennies. Be. You can be abundant in a budget. It's. You can just. In the budget of calories, budget of money.

Absolutely.

But it's interesting is that, you know, oftentimes, not all the time, but oftentimes people will show up in their health the same way that they do in their wealth.

Yep.

They'll have. Or they'll have one handled and not the other. When the principles are the same.

Same. The principles are absolutely the same.

Yeah, sure. Okay. So I want to be mindful of your time. So thank you for pouring into us today. Can you please let us know? Someone wants to go deeper with. You want to learn more about programming. They want to learn more about getting financially set up. Where are the best places I can send them?

Definitely go to my Instagram. It's at Jared Aquilina. Or you can go on my website, aquilina strength.com.

Okay, great. We'll make sure that we link all this up.

Awesome. Thanks. I really appreciate it.

Of course.

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