Scaling a Brand For an Exit with Equinox Cofounder Lavinia Errico

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Welcome to Money Maker, the podcast that gives you the tools to enrich your life in every sense of the word. I'm your host, Nelly Galan. Let's get started. Lavinia Erico. Which I like to say Erico. I'm Latina, so I pronounce my R's correctly. Co Founder of Equinox Dear friend, and you are so much more than anything I could even say about you because first of all, I love you to death. I always tell everybody if I was a guy, I would date Lavinia because not only are you beautiful and gorgeous, you're congruent. And very few people are congruent. So I'm just so thrilled to be here with you. And we have to say how we met. It's unbelievable. We both had an IT guy that was helping both of us and he thought we looked like each other. Remember?

Of course.

And he kept saying, you two look like sisters. You need to meet each other. And we met and it was like instant chemistry. And I have just loved knowing you ever since.

Aw.

I love that. And I love that. Erico.

Erico. I don't know why everyone goes Erico. No, it's Enrico.

Oh my God. I mean, it really does make you want to shake your hips a little.

That's right, a little bit. But I just love your story. But I'm going to start with now because I think what I am loving so much about this part of your journey because you still look like a child. And it just goes to show there is no chronology. Because when you're living in your spirit and you're healthy and you spend a lifetime of exercising and eating well, this is what it looks like. But how did you get to this place, which you've been in for a few years of this congruence? And that doesn't mean everything's perfect all the time, because it's not for any of us, but that you're really embodying a lifestyle and a spirituality, and it shows. And I know that that was a process for you, Nellie.

For me, every breakdown creates my breakthrough. I've had three really big breakdowns in my life. But this last breakdown, sister, that was a doozy. I didn't see it coming. I turned 60. I thought it was in such a strong, great, amazing, badass, awesome place. And boom, one after another. And in ways in that it was like, whoa, man, it just took me down. And then in the middle of COVID that in itself is taking everyone down. So it was getting through that muck. And first for me, when you talk about congruency, it's first you have to go in and you have to say, okay, how did I participate in this? Because it's never everybody on outside of it. First we have to look, and you do the work, and you look at like, okay, I could have done that better. I could have communicated myself better there. And then when you go even deeper, like, you start seeing choices that you made at a time when you were a different person, when you didn't have the emotional intelligence, when you didn't have the mental mindset that you have as you've gotten older. And like, oh, I realized that I did that out of fear. I did that out of abandonment issues. I did that. Like, you start seeing, and you're like, oh, that's pretty gross. You start seeing real things about you, and then you work through them. And so these last three years for me have been a lot of that. You know, I love astrology. Built my whole business on astrology. But I had an astrologist in 2019, amazing guy Michael Noor said to me, whoa, your next couple years, girl, you better buckle up, because you're going through the darkest part of your life. And I'm like, no, no, no, no. I even went back to Teaneck, New Jersey. I went back to the hospital to make sure it was the right time.

By the way, that was my hometown, Teaneck. Did you know it was Teaneck?

Yeah. Tina. I was born in Holy Name Hospital. So I called the hospital, I said, hey, I need a new birth certificate. I lost mine. And I was thinking, no, even if it's three minutes off, I did not want to attach to that on any level. But he said something to me that was so amazing. He said, lavinia, you're not going to recognize yourself at the end of it. He said, you are going to be more aligned, you're going to be more expansive, you're going to be freer, you're going to be liberated. You're not going to give a shit what anybody feels or thinks. You're going to be in a whole new space. So as I'm going through all of that, I'm at the bottom of that snake pit. I just kept thinking to myself, okay, girl, just remember what he said. You are going to be more expansive, more liberated. Even when I'm like crying and I'm thinking, I don't know how this is going to happen. And the truth of it, I went through it, I did the work, and now I really pinch myself. There are so many things. I mean, I've had post traumatic stress about sleeping in a house alone since I was 10 years old. I had an aunt that was murdered and never did I ever, ever think, ever I would sleep in a house alone. I could sleep in an apartment building because there's people next door. I couldn't even sleep in a townhouse. So when I got divorced, everyone thought I was going to have to sell my home.

And that house is a big house to be alone in.

To be fair, including my ex husband, he definitely told the staff, she's never going to be able to live here alone. She's going to have to. But you know what? When I got down to the root of my fears and I did the work, and I did the work and I did the work, I feel so capable, I feel so resilient, I feel so liberated that it's amazing, with so much autonomy. Like before I used the word autonomy. I don't even think I knew what that meant because I didn't walk the walk of it. Sometimes we have to fake it to make it well.

But you know what? It's good for people to hear that. You know, you and I both have had many blessings in our lives. And not that we haven't worked for them, because we have, but you don't get through life with just blessings. And even if everything seems great on the outside world and people see you and they go, oh my God, what's wrong with you? You've made money, you've done these incredible things, you look good, whatever, but then life just throws you curveballs and they're very tough. And I think that's why you and I relate to Each other. We were both going through horrible years. I had to move to Miami to take care of my parents. It was crazy. It was like my life went upside down. And you were going through an upside down period, too. And yet, I love what you always say. You always say you can't get through it except to go through it. You can't shortcut it because there's something you're supposed to learn. And, you know, you talk a lot about the bad moments is when you really grow. Not when everything is great and you're making money and everything's great.

Yeah. When that starts happening, it's like, okay, there's going to be growth here. There's going to be spiritual growth, mental growth, emotional growth, and physical growth. The analogy somebody once told me, and it really is true, is when your garage is a mess and you can barely close it, at some point, you're going to have to make a big mess. You're going to have to have your driveway a mess and the side of your house a mess. You have to pull everything out. You got to make this huge mess. And then after you have this huge mess, then you throw out what you don't want and you paint it and you make it look nice and you put in cabinets. And then all of a sudden, it's better, it's transformed. Right? And so often I think we're afraid of the big mess. Like, we have such fear of that big mess. It's like, whoa. Like, it just. It's too big. It's too big. I can't contain that. It's too much. And the truth of it is, at least for me, when these things happen, I always consider myself before these last three years, a spiritual person, but not a religious person. But the truth of it is, when I was at the bottom, I found myself praying to God. And now I started going back to church. I mean, I found a church that feels right for me, you know? And actually, you and I once went to church together, and it's in that genre. You know, the music's amazing. The people are amazing there. It's messy. It's not some perfect church. And I love it. I've gotten so many amazing things that have come out of that breakdown, you know, and all the challenges. You know, it's really funny, you think to yourself, if God was giving away some of the shit that I got, I wouldn't raise my hand. Said, oh, I'll take that, and I'll take that, and I'll, yeah, give it to me. But the truth is, who I've become through it is, like, pretty amazing.

So let's go backwards for a bit so everybody knows how you got here. And you are from New Jersey, from a big Italian family, lots of kids. You even have a twin.

I do. Vito.

Vito. And the thing that I remember you telling me is that the common denominator in your family is that everybody was into exercise and movement, which is not very New Jersey Italian, I have to say, from that era. But you guys were into it. And so can you talk about how your business emerged? Because all of you were doing different things. I think you had gone to college, as I recall, and you were in theater and dance in California. And then you came home, and when you came home, something happened that sort of congealed everything that you guys were all doing disparate things, and somehow it all came together. Can you tell that story?

Well, first of all, when I lived in California and I was at usc, like you said, I was a dance and theater major. And in those days, you could never be skinny enough. And I didn't quite have that body. I had more of like a. Yeah, we're ethnic.

We have curvy bodies.

I had a curvy body. So working out, I really had to do that. So I started working out. And then before you knew it, I started teaching, teaching aerobics. I even started a program at usc. I went and had flyers made and put them at all the sororities. I went and took a Jane Fonda class in Beverly Hills. I took, like, five classes because that's all I could afford. But I was a dancer, so I could remember. You remember choreography. So I basically took that class and went and taught that class downtown, brought my little box and told people whatever they want to pay me. But I would walk out of there. Like the first class, I think there were five girls. The second girl, 10, till it built into something. And it's interesting because I never thought of myself as entrepreneurial. I just thought of myself as I know how to make money. Like, I remember my parents dropped me off of college, and my mom was like, we can afford your room. We could afford your food and everything else. You're going to pretty much have to figure it out yourself, you know? And of course, going to usc, where everybody had so much money, it was like, whoa. So I had to be creative and think of ways to make some money, thankfully. Yeah. And I just got the bug. I just found that I loved, loved, loved exercising that way. So we come back to New York.

Don't you become a rockette somewhere in

there, as I was a Rockette Nellie.

I mean, I think that's a very big moment.

That was during my senior year in college. The Rockettes were coming to LA to do the Christmas Spectacular and they were bringing 12 of the girls from New York. And then we had a big audition here. So I did the Christmas show for two years and I did other shows. I danced on the TV show Fame and Interesting until I started really getting paid and then I lost a little bit of love for it. I didn't enjoy the whole auditioning and there was just something in that that didn't really feel right in my heart. So then I go back to New York and I just kept complaining, like, the gyms here are horrible. My brothers were working out in this gym down in the basement that had no windows.

Yeah. So like the east coast wasn't like the west coast back then in terms of like holistic things and exercise.

No. And I mean, I remember going to one club and I walked in there and it was like men were walking around with shorts on and their socks from their suits.

Ah, skanky.

I mean, and at like 27 year olds, you're like, wow, that is not a good look. Part of going to the gym was that you'd like the vibe. Like there were good, healthy bodies running around. Men look good. And, you know, that's how it was in la. You were excited to go. And so then after complaining a while, but we found our ways because there were some good studios. And I went into the executive program with Longcombe, owned by Cosmere, and that was great. And I was getting promoted left and right and going and love what I was doing.

So you were doing cosmetic stuff?

Yeah, I was in the executive program and I kept getting promoted. And then I went into fragrances and it was great. I loved it. I thought the beauty business was amazing. You know, in those days you had nice big expense accounts and it was fun. There were so many perks. And my training ground was amazing. That's why sometimes when I talk to young people, I say a corporate trajectory is not a bad one. I know everybody wants to be an entrepreneur.

Not in the beginning. No. You learn a lot.

Yeah. I feel so blessed that I had those four years in a corporate and the training that I had, it was impeccable. But then after complaining a while, we

were all you and your brothers in your family.

Yeah. And then we just. They were in construction and getting started out of college doing that. And at one point they were doing construction. There was this Guy Anthony, who owned a gym that went out of business. It was an all women's gym. It was actually not in the city. It was in Westchester. And he said to my brothers, you guys are big. You know, workout guys. You go into this business. We ended up doing that, me and my two brothers, we ended up opening that one. We called it Westchester Health and Fitness. I like to think we were, like, seeing if we had a proof of concept.

When you did that, did you quit your other job?

At that time, I was in fragrances with Listen, and I kept that job. I was doing both. I mean, it was crazy in the beginning before we opened, because, you know, it took about nine months to get it open, but there's a lot to do.

And you guys had never done that. You don't even know what you're doing.

We really didn't. But we hired some good people that worked with us and consultants and we got that opened and. Yeah, and then finally when it opened is when I left. But for eight months, I was doing both. It was crazy. It was like, oh, God. Like I kept saying, oh, my God, I'm going to get caught. But, you know, at that time, like, we had no money. Like, you have to do what you have to do, right? Then we finally opened and we learned a lot. But, you know, it's interesting because when I look back at what we did, we didn't make a lot of mistakes. Like, you know, how like you usually your first business, you think, oh, my God, thank God we did this wrong and that wrong, but we really didn't. That's why I always say, I feel like it was so aligned.

I think you've told me other times that you all thought, well, we need this place for us.

We wanted a gym. We were never really ever thinking we were going to be building this huge brand. I remember my brother Danny saying to me, because our color was this pantone purple and we painted these sneakers, we glued them on top of the thing to say coming soon or something anyway. And I remember him looking at me and he goes, do you think we're going to be successful? And I don't know if I was just being polypositive, but I was like, oh, no, we are really successful. We are really, really, really, really, really successful. I said, I don't know, but I feel it. Plus, because I was in there selling, so I really could see how excited everybody was. The community was. I mean, people were just coming in and dropping money, and we were pre selling in this little studio that we rented that when it rained, there was water coming down. I mean, when I look at it now, I'm like, how do people just drop off $750 and walk away in 1989, I don't know if I would have done that. But people just, they loved our enthusiasm.

Well, also, you've told me that a lot of the vibe there and then later when you built Equinox was that you guys were also like a family owned business.

I think it was the vibe of all of us. And then we hired people that we could vibe with.

Remember, you guys are also like young and cute.

That was definitely a big part of the attraction, for sure. I hired girls as if I was still in cosmetics. I wanted them to look beautiful. And because in cosmetics, we used to put people out with flyers in the middle of stores, I had no problem sending the girls out on the street with flyers. In those days, people didn't do that. They thought we were crazy. The girls were like, I'm going to go out on the street. And I'm like, oh, yeah, you're going out on the street. You're going to go actually right in front of the train station when people are coming off. And it was magic. They would not only give them flyers, they would. But the men thought the girls were so cute. They would follow. Come on. I'll go back and join now.

And it's good that you had almost like a sample run outside of the city. If you made a mistake, it was okay. And like, that community was into you. You know, coming into the city is a different animal. It's more competitive, right?

Yes. And there wasn't a lot of competition doing anything really great. So the truth is, we got in at a really great time. I think we went into a great location. The Upper west side was so right. And it was still cool. The Upper west side at the time was like, cool. Downtown hadn't quite got there. I mean, I remember one of my brothers took me downtown. I was like, why are we going downtown? Like, he was like, oh, no, Lavinia, this is the new hip. This is soho. And I was like, for me, anything on the other side of 36th street wasn't happening. So, you know, we got in there and we opened up and we just had the best classes.

How did you guys even find the place there? Like, how did that happen when it

came to the real estate? I mean, look, we had magic together. But my brother Danny, I mean, to this day, he's still magic in real estate. Like, that is just his lane, you know, he's so good at it. I mean, to be truthful, from what I understood, there were like two other or three other people bidding on that space on 76 in Amsterdam. And, you know, in those days, a gym was not something the landlords wanted. Like, it wasn't like, oh, let me put a gym in my building. It's going to really make the value of my building go up, or more tenants are going to want that. In those days, it was not something that they wanted. Honestly, they'd rather have a dry cleaner than a gym. So for him to be able to negotiate that and get it and stay and, you know, and then the next one and tell the story of how

you came up with the name and the whole branding of it, because I think that's a great story.

We lived on 69th and Broadway. I was on one floor, my brother's on the other. And we would invite people in for Monday night dinner. We would order Chinese food, and we had all these friends of ours who were in different businesses come in, and we would brainstorm together. And the way the name came, because there were all kinds of names being thrown out from Amsterdam muscle to whatever. And then my brother Vito had gone up to the Equinox Hotel with his now wife, whose cousin was a chef there, and came back and somebody said, would you do this weekend? And he was like, oh, I went up to the Equinox Hotel. It was amazing. And we all kind of looked at each other. Equinox, it just sort of. It. It landed. That's a name. And then we started really understanding the energy of the name and obviously the place and the most balanced and time of the year. And we looked into it. It was like, wow, that's a name. And, you know, that was also, again, before people used names like that.

There are more industrial names versus creative names.

Exactly.

Did you guys even know. I got to go trademark the name. And I got to.

We didn't trademark it like the way people today trademark it in everything because of all the merchandise they want to sell. And then really with the branding, a girl who we knew who was in part of that group, she was doing the logos at the time for us. Like, and that was when you used to do hand logos. I mean, and then we were sitting there having lunch outside on the stoop. Because at the time before we opened Equinox, we had rented this office. It was the basement of a brownstone. I mean, I remember standing in there going, I'm not so sure this is safe. Like, it feels any minute this building could just collapse. Like, it was old. It was such an old building. I don't know how they had tenants in it, but we were sitting there having lunch with my brother, sitting on the stoop. We would go around the corner, get deli food and come back. And that's kind of how we met this guy, Gordon Pennington, who had seen my brothers there the day before. And you know, my brothers are like two good looking guys. Long hair, ponytail, good looking. And then the next day I'm there with them, and then the next day and he's looking at this, and then finally he comes over, he goes, okay, what's going on here? And as it turns out, he was just brought in to completely redo Tommy Hilfiger, all of his branding, his whole company. Because at the time he was very, like, kind of nautical ish. And the next thing you know, he's like, I want to work with you guys. And we were like, we have no money, but he liked us. He's like, all right, we'll figure it out. And that's the thing that I always want to say to young people now is, like, you have to understand, like, your spirit, your energy, your vibration, it attracts. Like, if we would have been the three of us just sitting there eating on our phone like that, there would have been no energy, there would have been no vibe. There would have. He wouldn't have been like rollerblading by thinking, wow, I want to meet those three people. They look like they have something going on, you know, because we did, like, even though we were eating, we were talking, we were laughing, we were creating.

Well, you were in what today would be a startup.

We were totally in A startup on the stoop.

A startup on the stoop.

A startup on the stoop. I love that. And then before, you know, we had him, and I really feel like I would love to find him, to just let him know in my heart how much I really feel like he brought and just how much I valued what he did because his work was amazing.

I know. You've said to me, when we did Equinox, it was also that it was clean and beautiful. That wasn't him.

It was all of it. Number one. The design that my brother Vito really went with was very industrial and hot, and the lighting was hot, and you look beautiful in there.

It's probably the beginning of pickup places.

Earl, let me tell you. Our biggest competition was happy hour. So we had to get them at a happy hour and get them to be excited to come to the gym, because really, the only Time people would go to the gym would be like on the weekends, there were all those weekend warriors because everybody was happy hour.

So what is it that happened? Because I know that the big thing that happened, which in today's world, we would say it's influencers. But back then, you had celebrities start showing up at your gym. How the hell did that happen?

Even before we opened, you know, we just put the sign up. You know, we literally put the entire front of the gym, we turned into wood and we put the Equinox logo and said, the most progressive fitness club in New York City coming soon. Right? And then we had a big arrow around the corner. Pre sale office. But even during that, you know, first of all, it's the Upper west side. So all of the news was up there. Abc, all of that was up on the Upper west side. They did all the soap operas from up there. So automatically we had all the soap opera girls and guys, we had the newscasters, we had all that. The Upper west side had tons of celebrities. So even before we opened, we had. I remember when Steve Martin came in to join and he's like, I don't want anybody knowing I'm joining. We were like, okay, yeah.

But I remember being in New York at that time, it would come out in like, page six. John F. Kennedy, Jr. Going into Equinox, Madonna going. Like, people would take paparazzi pictures of them going to the gym.

Yeah. But I got to be honest with you, and I really mean this, we never called that in. I mean, you know, we were deliberate on getting a lot of the models, for sure. I mean, we went out to the model agencies and said, hey, we'll give the models three month memberships. And we had a whole model thing where they would have to do stuff for us, and then we would give them the membership. But the celebrities, they kind of lived in the hood. They lived in the hood. I mean, John F. Kennedy didn't live in the hood, but he used to rollerblade up. He was about the only one that I got really excited about.

He was the most gorgeous man on the planet Earth. I don't think I've seen a man more gorgeous than that.

I'm telling you. I remember the boys played. I guess it was like touch football with him a few times in the park. I was right there watching. I was a spectator, which would never happen, but he was just. Oh, my God, he was just so yummy to look at.

Yeah, he was. He really was. And back then, I think people also have to hear that when we all lived in New York at that time. Celebrities in New York were like, they were a big deal, but nobody bothered them. It wasn't like la.

It's so different. I mean, but that's why I think people lived in New York because they wanted that. They didn't want to be run after and having their picture taking and all this stuff. You know, in New York you could just kind of go under the radar. You put your sunglasses on, you walk out and people leave you alone. And I think also at least then, people that are in New York, everybody's there for a reason. They want to make it. They have their own shit that they're doing. They're there for that. They're so focused. They're not thinking about what everybody else is doing. You know, they were just so focused on their own trajectory to make their life happen, you know, little different.

So from that first place on the Upper west side, how quickly did you guys scale?

I mean, we were opening one club a year, but you know, it wasn't even just one club because yes, we were opening up clubs, but we were also adding things to our brand. We were adding wellness before people were even talking about wellness. You know, we put in a wellness center. We did the first Medi spa in New York, which a lot of people don't really know about. We did a regular spa. We did a Clarin spa in one of them. We kept refining the brand. So our first club, the way the first club was to way. The last club that we did was completely different. We kept evolving and evolving and it really was kind of like the last club that we did. I would say when you look at Equinox now, it hasn't changed that much.

Right, so you finally found the formula.

Yeah, and we had to evolve with it. It was a process like anything at that moment.

What propelled you guys to sell? Was it something that you guys had at a certain point you go, we're going to build this and sell? Or was it something that it was just an offer too good to refuse?

It wasn't an offer to good to confuse because we actually went out and put together the offering. And in retrospect, we definitely sold a little early. But I think I was also part of like that wanting to sell at that time. When you add up the gym before that and what it took to get that open, there was a lot of years. You know, I can't really speak for my brothers because I can't speak for their journey. For me, when it started getting so big, I'm all about creating, create something new, getting the next thing, the next thing. But when it's up and running, that's not my lane. I'm not the queen of operations. And our meeting started to change so much into very operational, that for me, I was just like, oh, this isn't fun anymore, you know, But I was still creating. Because the thing is, you have to keep these members. And especially by the time we close, we did have competition. We had a lot of competition because

people probably thought, wow, these people have

hit between crunch and Sports Club came in and new brands are coming in. So we really had to stay on top of it, which that was fun for me. That's what I love. Like, if I could just be creating and creating and creating, like, I'm good. I just think people were talking to us about it. So then we kind of jumped on it and we went with it.

So what is it like where something ends for you and yes, you get paid off. Like when we sold Telemundo to NBC. But what does that feel like in terms of your soul? You're still young. You've now made some money, which is what everybody. We all think money's going to make us happy. And that now we got money and this. But now you're, like, still young and something has ended. And now you move to California, which was the dream for all of you, and you have to start again, and it changes your whole life. What was that like?

Remember I told you in the beginning that I had three breakdowns? So that was my second breakdown. I really thought, honestly, because it took us almost a year to sell between the forensic accountants and this and that. So it was a lot. And then I remember when we sold, it was in December, and I kept thinking I was going to feel this elation, like this water was going to chase. Different now that I never had to worry about money. And I just thought everything was going to be so different. And I remember that night, the day that we closed, we had a nice gathering at Cipriani's downtown. A lot of friends came, and everybody was like, can you believe it? Because it was a big exit. I mean, today, no, because these tech companies sell for billions. But it was a huge exit at the time. And people like, can you believe it? And I remember thinking, oh, it just hasn't hit me yet. And then the next day, it hasn't really hit me yet. And now we have to go in and, like, really tell everybody. And it was really hard because they didn't really, really know that we were Selling. They thought we were going to actually stay aboard. They didn't realize we were actually packing up our offices and leaving. And so it was all of that. And then it was Christmas, and we come back from vacation after New Year's, and I'm walking my son to drop it. Mafia's in second grade. And I turn around, I'm saying goodbye to some of the women, and all of a sudden, as I'm walking off the playground, it feels like my ears feel like they're muffled and the whole thing is coming in. I thought I was going to faint. I didn't know what was happening. And one of the women said, are you okay, Lavinia? And of course, I still have to keep up my image, right? My wellness image. I'm like, oh, I'm fine. I just had a moment, and all of a sudden I'm walking out, and I'm walking out and I'm waiting. I'm like, am I having a stroke? What's happening here? Again, muffled. I literally got into bed. I called my partner at the time, and I was like, I don't know what's happening. He said, mo, maybe with all the traveling, you picked up a bug in Mexico. I'm like, okay. And I later on learned that I was having paralysis for my identity. I was in, like, identity paralysis. Because my whole life, my whole identity is. Have been everything outside of me. Being a great dancer, being a great student, being great. This being, like, my whole identity was never here. It was all on the external, the accolades, the equinox of this, the that I knew the program, and I'm walking out, and I guess my whole nervous system just went kaput. And then I dove into deeper therapy, and I started to understand more about that. So if somebody would have ever told me that I would go to the darkest, like, I couldn't even get out of bed for three months.

Nellie I always say sometimes when you win, you lose, and sometimes when you lose, you win. You put these expectations on a goal, and then the goal happens even bigger than you think. And then you're, like, weirded out. Like, why is this not making me happy? And it is, because it's an inside job.

It is. And because, like, that's why I've probably mentored women as much as I did, is because I wanted women to understand. Like, I kind of gave up everything for that journey. The only people I really saw as friends were the people that worked with us. Everything was that I didn't take time to be with my friends. I didn't Take time. It was like everything I did was that I made friends with, like, all the health and beauty editors. Don't get me wrong, I like them, but it was transactional, not relational, exactly. And I had a lot of that. A lot of. I call them agenda shifts. And when I had a look at that, I really was so lonely after that because I didn't know who my real friends were. I didn't know who I was. I didn't. I felt like an imposter. I was so lost, you know? And then people like, well, it doesn't take long to find yourself. And I'm thinking, you know what? It takes work. It doesn't happen in 10 therapy sessions.

Listen, life is about momentum, right? Sometimes you have shit years, and then other years, like, what happened to you guys, where everything works, and then you have to go with it because you can't just go, stop. You can't go find yourself in the middle of a momentum. But when the momentum is toward the end of it, it's almost like all of you crashes and you have time to go, I don't even remember. Like, I remember entire years of my life that I don't even remember because I was working so hard and in momentum and no personal life, no nothing. And, you know, I think it's good for women to hear because I think you and I both have had challenging relationships, right? I think we've had all the success, but it's hard because there is no free lunch, right? Like, when you let certain parts of your life just fall through the cracks, it adds up. And it's good for women to hear that, because you can't have it all at once. You can't.

You know, it's interesting that you say that about relationships, because I had a girlfriend over yesterday. She's an amazing spiritual teacher. And I said to her, you know, I'm single now, and I got divorced.

Me, too. We're both single at this age.

And I said, you know, I think I need a relationship coach. And she said, what? I said, I just realized I really don't know how to do relationships.

I'm with you. Let's do it together.

I really feel that because the way I've done it in the past, it hasn't really turned out so great.

You know, I think it's also that when you're masterful at something. I'm just going to give you an analogy. My stepson is a skateboarder, a professional skateboarder, number one skateboarder in the world. Nike contract. And he is still in his career, but at the tail end. And he said to me, I haven't done anything else but skateboard for 15 years. And it's like I brought him back into the world. Like, oh, you got to deal with your finances. You got to deal with this. I think when you hyper focus, you achieve quicker than anybody thinks you can. But a lot of shit falls through the cracks. And then you spend a lifetime learning the other part, you know? Like the other day I was getting together with a friend of mine here who's a guy, and he goes, I've worked so hard, but I haven't had your success. I go, yeah, but you've had great relationships. You don't figure out everything at once. Even if other people think you do. Other people see you and they think you have it all, but you don't. Right?

You're absolutely right. You can have it all, but you can't have it all at the same time.

So let's talk about your post Equinox Life. Living in California, you got divorced, start all over again. And you've gone through a lot, too. Now you have a whole new idea. You're in growth mode again. So what is this new brand that you are about to launch?

First of all, I want you to know how excited I am about this. It's called Move Joy. It's a women's online platform. It's really about moving, but not in the context of exercising. Because what I've seen so often is that what's happening right now in the exercise world is very jarring for me. And it actually brings up a lot of my past. Because we never moved to feel good. We only moved to lose the weight. We moved to get the scale. We moved to look good in a black dress for the weekend. We moved to look good in a bikini for vacation. We move because we want to look good for our son's wedding. But, like, okay, the thing with that is it's not sustainable. But when I finally had the shift about moving, when I'm just moving my body to feel good, and I started to really think about that. Now, as you know, I've been moving my whole life. I've even gone on to do a couple of different certifications in the fitness industry over the years, more for my own personal practice than to teach. But I really got in there and I looked at this and I'm like, why are all these new brands starting? And they're all about jarring and high impact, and people do it two or three times and they're like, oh, no, I just can't do it. It's such an effort. They don't enjoy it. And you want it to be fun. Like, you want to walk out of there and be fun and feel good, you know? So I started helping out a group of women that I'm in these different women's groups. And during the beginning of COVID we were all getting on zooms together. And I'm literally watching them, Nelly, I'm watching them. You know, the first week on, everybody's like, great, it's fun. We have downtime, we're going to have a glass of wine together. Two weeks later, people are like, you know, a lot of these women are 50 plus. They're living alone, they're lonely, they're isolated. You could just see their life force was just dropping. And I'm like, guys, come on. Like, we have to get this up. Many of them at the time were living in New York City, and we know how grim that was. So I was sending them to different brands that I thought they should get on. Try this move with this one. They come back the next week. Oh, I didn't like that, Luminia. I didn't like it. So finally one of them said to me, why don't you teach us a class? And at first I thought I hung my leg warmers up a long time ago, but I thought about it and I was like, you know, the truth of it is I could give them something that they would love because I'm one of them. I know. And I put some time and energy, and I must have watched hundreds of different videos on YouTube and everywhere else. And I'm looking at this and I'm going, I could make that more fun. That's a good movement. And I could do that. I could make more fun with that. I could add breath work into that, because I'm the queen of breath work. And I believe breath work is what keeps us really, really strong. And so as I started to do it, I said, let's try it. And we literally, at one point, we went from 5 women to 10 women to 20 women to 30 women. And when we were in full blown Covid, we had a lot of women on there and everybody was loving it. And then of course, once everything opened up and people went back to work, I was like, okay, I'm done closing shop. But then I had a small group, mostly from LA now, that were like, please, can we still do it? And the truth is, I realized I loved it. It actually kept me in better shape, you know, because of the way we did it. I didn't need to go to the chiropractor anymore. I barely ever needed to get a massage because I wasn't moving. Like I was moving in a healthy way where I felt so good. And then some friends who were in the affiliate marketing business said to me last year, why are you not making this into a real brand? I was like, because I understand what it takes to build a brand and I don't know if I'm really up for that. And the more I thought about it, I was like, I got this moment where I woke up Nellie and I'm like, I got as if God told me that I'm going to live to at least to be a hundred. I really got this download like, you are going to live to be a hundred. What are you going to do for 40 years if you're not helping and impacting? And I see when we really did a deep dive to the numbers, I mean, 72% of America is either deconditioned, overweight or obese. And the truth is most of these fitness brands, like the national ones, they're not talking to these people. It's not sexy. You know, they want to talk to the people that want to like get ripped and have a six pack and have this and get their body weight down to here and that want to do all this extreme stuff that isn't who this is for. Even though I believe anybody could get on there. So we're in a pre free beta, getting ready to start our regular beta where I have a couple, I have an advisory board that I'm working with and physical therapists just to make sure all the exercises that we're doing are correct for these people and the movement. This is the best part of it. What I noticed during this was that people would get on early and talk and then they would stay later and talk. So all these communities were being built with these women and that is what turns me on. Like I could see. So they. Who's doing things? Who's going to be coming and visiting, going to Florida.

I can't wait to go on. I can't wait. I want to do it.

So at the end, let me just tell you, at the end of the class, once we are up and running, there'll be different breakouts so women can go into different breakout groups just for support. If somebody's going through death and grief, if somebody's going through a breakup, love that wants to figure out how to start dating over 50, whatever that is, there'll be these breakout rooms for women to be able to have connection. Because, you know, the attorney general just came out and said what's killing people over a certain age is loneliness and isolation.

That's absolutely true. Well, I'm just so glad you're back and I'm glad we can all participate because I know you're great at all this. I mean, who wouldn't follow you? So are you going to be on it?

I hope I'm going to be kicking it off. I am teaching them. I am training about six people that will be able to do it because I want it to be live. Because that's the only way you build community is if it's live, we'll have a little bit on Evergreen. So if you can't make it or you're traveling, but it's designed to be to happen live, I love the way we're building it. So even when you sign up, you'll be able to say, hey, I'd like to be on with women that live in California. I'd like to be on with women that live in Miami. Or, you know, you're going to be moving to Austin, Texas. Hey, I want to go there so I could start meeting women before there. So it's really about movement and connection.

How fabulous and how great that we both made it through these last couple of horrible years and we're both coming back to life. And I'm just so happy to get you back doing what you're great at and sharing it with all of us. So I thank you so much, Lavinia.

Thank you. I'm happy and I'm so happy for you.

Moneymaker is a production of Money News Network. Moneymaker is written and hosted by me, Nelly Galan. Our executive producer is Morgan Lavoy. Thanks for listening. See you next time.