Carey Rouse: Discover Why This Health And Fitness Entrepreneur Says You Can Achieve Wins Every Day

I do really believe 100% from every part of me that everyone has the capacity to be able to do the things that they want and not to be held back by the mental baggage that's in our head that we want to push through.

Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. In each episode, we get down and personal with people who go after the things they want to make all their wildest dreams come true. Join us as we unveil and dissect a formula for what it takes to do the thing. Here is your host, Stacy Lauren.

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. This is your host, Stacy Lauren. All right, guys. You know what's cool about me getting to do things that are new? That's how I met my next guest. We both actually were in Ryan Moran's investment mastermind group, and we met during that time, and I really loved what he was doing because I am really passionate about helping people be their best selves. And one of the best ways that you could do that is by living to your fullest potential in terms of your health and how you take care of your body. And that's what he does. He does it for himself, and then he also helps people do that as well. So I'm so excited to dive in and get a chance to talk to him more about this and how he helps people do the thing in terms of their health. So I'm excited to welcome Carrie to the show. Hey, Carrie.

Hey, Stacy. Thanks for having me. It's good to be here.

Yeah. Thanks so much for coming on.

Yeah. I am excited to get on your show. It's been great to see you just kind of move forward with this and help so many other people do the same thing.

Thank you.

Yeah.

And just a quick aside. We were talking right before we hit record, and it just feels alive. So I have to mention it to the listeners. But I was doing the do the Things Start a podcast challenge, kind of like an intro video into that, and we did this group Zoom where everyone's setting up their podcasts. And I just love. I could just immediately tell how much you do the thing, because while everyone's talking about what their podcast was going to be about and setting it up, you were like, hey, I'm over here, and I've already set mine up, and we were able to show yours as an example. And so I just think that's the ultimate do the thing. When you're able to just hear something, look at it, and do it, there's.

Just not enough time in the day. So I try to move as fast as I possibly can, and if there's opportunities to squeeze in more productivity, that's a really important thing for me. So it was fun. Yeah.

I like that idea of it being productive. So you don't need to even think about it. You're just automatically doing it. It's not like you have to put it on a list or follow up. It's already finished. Yeah.

I think a lot of people get hung up on trying to do it right for most things. You can't do it right until you've done it wrong a couple of times. And I think that's a big sticking point for a lot of people because they think they've got to do it right the first time, and that's just not the case. And you'll find a lot of times, I think if you practice this more and more often, you actually become, it looks good and it's good enough or it's right the first time more often than not. And it kind of just gives you that confidence to. To do that the next time as opposed to just waiting.

Yeah. I mean, you're hitting on something really important that I've been really exploring is that idea of being okay, just sucking at something, so then you're not scared to move. You're not scared for it to look bad. You're not scared of what people think about something. You're just continuing to move, and then, you know, you can evolve along the way.

Yeah, absolutely. And there's so much of that in this entrepreneurial journey that we're on that the. The number of things that you could suck at are just unbelievably high, that sometimes when you do this too, you kind of have to experiment. Maybe you are bad at something, but. Or maybe 10 things, but you're going to find one or two things that maybe you're not so good at, but you really like doing. And those are the things that you kind of double down on and you do it until you're better. And then I think you find opportunities to divvy out the work for those other things that you just don't enjoy and that you suck at.

On that note, I would love for you to share with the listeners more about you and your story.

Sure. So I always like to start with my age. I just turned 51, like, a week ago, so I'm extremely proud of that. Age is. It literally is just a number for me, and it's an opportunity to be better than I was the year before. And that's how I live my life. It's what can I do to be better than I was yesterday? And a lot of times that manifests as fitness for me because I'm passionate about fitness and I've always done fitness, but I haven't necessarily been deeply involved in fitness until this past year. So prior to that, I was. I was always into fitness, but then really spent most of my time I was a technology consultant. So for 25 years, that's what I did. And I didn't feel much meaning in that. And for good reason. It just. It didn't satisfy the itch for me to be competitive, to compete, to win, to push myself a little bit further than I was yesterday. And so this last summer, I decided that I would quit the job I had in the career I was doing for 25 years. Probably the best job I've ever had. And I thought, you know what? I think I have enough money that I can be poor for a couple of years and I can make this work for me in a passion that I really care about and get it to the point to where it's adding enough value that I get to do what I love and make some money. So I started my company, rausfit, and it was originally only a personal training company, but within a month or two, I had read ryan Moran's book, 12 Months to a Million, I think. And it just clicked so much with me. And I realized I needed a physical products component of my company. And at that point I had to really think about, well, who was I going to serve and what would the product be? And I thought about maybe people that are like me, so older, pushing really hard with fitness. And I really have finally settled with any athlete that pushes themselves to the limit and they don't really have the mindset of, maybe I'll just rest a little bit and it'll be okay. That that's really just not an option for me. And I know there's a lot of other people out there that feel the same way, and when they have a small injury that's holding them back, it's super frustrating. So about three years ago, I had a friend of mine introduce me to some CBD products, and I had used some of the cream that they had on an injury on my elbow. I had it for months and it was stopping me from lifting heavy. I was super frustrated. After two weeks of using it, my pain went completely away for good. And then fast forward two or three years and the same thing was happening with kind of an arthritis pain. I had in my fingers. I applied the CBD cream two weeks later, completely gone. So at that point I was completely sold. So I kind of done two things. I figured out who I was going to serve and what products I was going to use to serve them. So I rouse FIT exists and as a health and fitness company that serves serious athletes with advanced recovery. With the products that we serve.

Yeah, and I love that it's coming from you needing something and then you're then able to solve a problem for that need.

Yeah, I mean I think that's sometimes an easy way to figure out first of all who you're going to serve. Typically we all like to hang around people that are like us. And so the thing is you gotta have passion for the person you're serving for a very long time because there is going to be some lows and there's going to be some highs and it's just easy to get up, give up. Unless you're really bought into that population that you're trying to serve that you would serve anyway. Because these are the, these are your people, these are who you hang out with. And then really kind of an easy way to figure out at least a starting point on what you're going to solve is you got to look at the issues that you have or that I had as it pertains to that population. And of course there's more detailed interviews that I have to do. And it really took several months for me because my avatar that I was aiming for shifted over those months based upon the interviews that I was doing. Because it's really not a good idea for me to guess at what masses want. I need to ask the question.

Yeah, I like that you're diving into what the people in your community are really looking for. So then you're able to best support them with that too.

It's funny because I didn't really understand the power of some very detailed questions and you really got to sit down with people for maybe a half an hour to 45 minutes and ask them open ended questions that are not biased. It's harder than you think because there's a book called the Mom Test and the premise is that if you could ask questions in a way of your mom that are unbiased such that she wouldn't give you the answer. Oh, that's a lovely idea. Then you're asking it in the correct way. And one of the ways that they say in the book is to, to get information is you want to ask questions of your audience where you're not Even mentioning that you have a product or a product idea. All you're doing is exploring kind of the issues that they have. But you've also got to be careful about leading them with certain issues that you know you want to tackle. So just, just an open discovery session. Yeah.

And I'd love to hear more about your community because don't you run challenges inside of the community that you have?

I have had some challenges in the community, their fitness challenges. There's anything from getting enough sleep to getting enough water to doing certain exercise routines and it's just a matter of time before we get more and more people participating in that. It's definitely a slow process at first because I think people are bashful. So I end up putting most of what I'm doing in there and trying to generate some, some engagement. And then recently I've also tried to just ask the community what challenges would they like to do and waiting on feedback from them before we kick off our next one.

I like this idea of. So when I think of doing the thing, so many people ask me, what is the thing? What is the thing? Right. It's more about the do. It's kind of like understanding what's your higher level goal. And for you and your community, most likely it's achieving the highest possible health. Right. And feeling good. And so I think. So then what you're doing though, underneath that is you're giving them these other little mini challenges to get towards that North Star goal. Like when you're thinking about getting more sleep or you do something on drinking more water or working on their exercise. You're not overcomplicating this big task or monstrous thing. You're kind of breaking it up in pieces to get people to actually want to do the things that they want to do.

Yeah, it's, it's got to be bite sized things because everyone comes in at a different level and it's not about being the best, it's about being better than you were yesterday. So picking a spot and picking your own target. A lot of the challenges I've done are we have a theme, but they pick their own target because everyone has different constraints. But as long as they can improve, we all need wins every single day. And, and that's actually something else I want to start incorporating into the community is that I really want to encourage people to think through and try to achieve a win every single day and post it to the group and all those little pieces just build our confidence in that. Hey, we are winning and we are moving forward. In our progressing because we're taking the time to acknowledge those things.

Yeah, I love that ability to just reflect in that moment of what's good and what can you actually celebrate and have a win for? Because it just. Then you're starting to look for the wins. Right. You're actually looking for it and then that's when you find it because what you focus on grows.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. It just becomes one of those things that's a habit that you kind of build over time where you build wins into your routine because you've gotten used to. To doing that. And it really has a positive effect on your entire mindset.

I'd love to talk about, let's say you're trying to help someone get into a better root exercise routine. What. And whether it's through a challenge or through another mechanism, what do you suggest there?

I typically like to keep things simple. People over complicate stuff and they're trying these wacko exercises and they just can't sustain it. So for people that. And there's really just two types of things that I like. Moving weights. That's what I like. I like. I think that there's excellent exercise from jogging and riding bikes. And I ride my bike quite a bit. But I like to focus on weight training because it's actually probably the thing that not enough people do. And I break it down into really two categories. Either you going to the gym or you're not going to the gym. So you got exercise equipment in the gym or you're using body weight. And so I typically just talk to them and find out where are they going to be spending their time. And then we just simplify it. I don't try to throw in too many exercises and I give them targets to shoot for. And then it's important to track that to find out how they're doing over time.

And have you noticed anything when you're building out a challenge for your community? What works for them or why? Why are challenges effective in your mind?

I think it's got to be something I mentioned earlier where they can. They can set their own rules within the parameter. So, for example, we have a drink enough water challenge and I'll throw out a suggestion, but it's really up to the individual to choose something that they will try to target and then report back. So I feel like giving them flexibility to choose their own target is something that makes the challenge a lot more approachable by more people.

Yeah. And you mentioned reporting back. Is that where they're posting something in the group and saying that they did it.

Yes, exactly.

And I'd love to talk to you about that more because that's the piece that I think is really the gold. Right. Is having that accountability system for yourself, especially if you're struggling with motivation, it is helpful to have that external accountability to a group or knowing that people are counting on you to provide feedback, so then that helps motivate them. Have you noticed anything specific about that in terms of that reporting back piece?

Well, I mean, the folks who end up reporting back get definitely a lot more feedback from the other folks in the group. So if you are posting something, at least there's an opportunity for others to chime in, provide words of advice and support. So I feel like the people that do end up posting end up getting a lot more out of the experience than ones that don't. But there's a lot of people who just. They like to watch, but it's still interesting to them. And who knows if they're. They may still be doing this challenge on their own, but just not reporting. But I. I do feel like the ones that are reporting get the most benefit out of it.

Yeah, totally. And then what about for just getting more sleep? What have you noticed about that? Because I think that's something everyone wants to do and that really can make your whole life better, you know, is when you can sleep good at night.

The one challenge I did was trying to get a set number of hours of sleep per night. And it's up to you on this number of hours. One thing that I noticed is, for myself personally, it's easier for me to both get more sleep or consistent sleep and get more work done the sooner I go to bed. The problem is there are so many distractions at night with TV and other things that we aren't productive many times later at night. And we end up kind of wasting time at the end of the evening and staying up too late, and it messes with our sleep as well. So one thing I encourage people to do is, is to consider making their schedule even earlier. And I think you can add a little bit more consistency then. And when you're up early in the morning and no one else is up, there's a lot of things you can get done.

Yeah. And so you're tapping into the why, why do you want to get more sleep? Which is you're going to be more productive. You're going to be able to tackle your day in a much better way.

Yeah, I mean, I think that once I shifted my schedule, I go to bed at 8 and I get up at 4 in the morning. I mean, I have a solid seven or eight hours of work by the time I get to noon every day. And I start trying to ramp down maybe around six or seven every night so that I have that last hour to just chill a little bit because it's usually pretty intense throughout the day and I need my mind to kind of settle down so I can get some sleep. But I think that obviously you're going to have more energy with better sleep. But I think the sleeping pattern in terms of when you do sleep can have a great effect on your productivity.

I'd love to also hear, do you help people with food and what to eat? Do you have that as part of your community?

I do. I'll be the first to admit I'm not a nutritionist. And any meal plans that I provide to people or example meal plans, so that's something that I want to make clear to folks. But I have been doing this for 20 years, so I know a few things about what works and what doesn't work. So I do work with clients where I will create a custom meal plan for them where they get to choose which proteins and veggies they like. And then I gather some other information from them, like their body type, what their goals are, height, weight, age, gender, all those things, because they all play into how many calories I plan for them to have each day. And I create a meal plan that essentially is all their meals plus a grocery list for an entire week. And if things go well, then we might make a tweak to that and then they have the next meal plan for the following week. I am in the middle of developing an application as we speak. I was, I was on the call with my developers this morning doing some testing, and within the next month or two, we're going to release a new app that people can get for a really, really cheap subscription. And they can just enter that information themselves and it'll automatically spit out everything for them, how much they need in all the meals, the shopping list for the week, the total calories for the day. So I'm pretty excited about that when we eventually get it out.

Yeah, I like that. And it's great because it kind of directly links to Ralph's Fit, which is this thing that you've been working on for a while. It's directly connected.

Yeah, it's definitely ties in to everything I'm doing with Rousefit. Serves the same purpose. Again, it's. It's about simplicity because it'll be super simple in terms of using and what they have to put together on a weekly basis. That's one thing that people fall short on or try too hard is there's just too much variety even within a week, for anybody to properly track the food that they're bringing in. And then it affects on your body if it's too inconsistent. There's no way to determine what's working and what's not working.

Yeah, this is great. And I like. Because it's so easy, and you mentioned this in the beginning, it's so easy to overcomplicate things. You then go into that failure, failure mentality because you're like, if I'm not gonna do it right, then I'm just gonna throw it all to the wind and just do it all wrong.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. I find that probably the biggest component for people following through is accountability. And that isn't just accountability to somebody else, but accountability in terms of, hey, I spent this money to do this thing, and I'm accountable to myself. I don't want to be wasting my money on something I need. I need to follow through with this. And then the other component is having other people in your life or there to push you to do the right thing, and they aren't completely distracting you. One of the things that make it very difficult for some of the people I work with is they don't have that support structure from their immediate friends or family who really understand what they're trying to do. And instead of supporting their decision to maybe eat a certain thing or not another thing, there's always these distractions to do something else. So I always tell people that we have way more control over our environment than we realize. That could be things like if you watch too much tv, then get rid of your tv. If you eat too much of this thing, don't buy it. The list goes on and on. But we just have to take control of our environment and make it more suitable so that we can meet our goals.

Yeah. So it seems like the main components to being able to eat better are keeping it simple, like you said, having the right level of accountability and then really being able to control your environment and making sure you're around people that are supporting you and your goals and not trying to contradict what you're trying to do. Is that. Oh, and celebrating your wins, I think, too, because then at least you're coming in at it from a positive mindset and not all the things that you're doing wrong, because I think that's so Easy to do when you're trying to do something positive for yourself.

I think that's a really good summary.

I'd love to also ask too about the people, because I think, and I'm curious, do you give your clients advice when they have someone that may be not supportive and having them help them become more supportive? Because I think some people have a hard time with their friend or close family member saying, oh, you said you wanted to eat healthy, why are you having those French fries? Right. Because then it feels judgmental. How do you work with that, those interpersonal skills? Is that something you get to do with the clients that you work with?

Sometimes that's difficult because I do all my work remotely. All my clients are remote. So I'll create plans for them, exercise plans and meal plans, and they execute. And then I check in with them almost daily via text. And then we have a zoom meeting once a week to talk about the progress and any tweaks for the next week. So I kind of get just a one sided view of what that relationship is like between them and let's say their immediate family members or something like that. A lot of times they just need somebody else to open up to, to vet. They need to be able to let out maybe some frustrations that they're having. And I don't know that I have any specific advice or how they would approach that specific conversation with their significant other. But I do believe that if they start seeing results and their attitude starts changing because of that and there's this positivity that's coming out of them that I feel like a lot of times that can really sway the individual that has been kind of the naysayer for them. And I have an example of a wife that I work with and her husband was. He just didn't want to play along. Right. He didn't see the point in all this. And she started losing weight and she started feeling better and she started being more positive. And he went out of his way to acknowledge that he's seen a difference in what's been going on. And now in his own way, he's moved in to try and to improve his own health because of what he's seeing going on. So I think it's hanging on and showing those positive results and sharing that with the people that are close to you.

Yeah, it's like that positive momentum breeds positive momentum.

Yep.

And then on the opposite side, when you have someone that maybe nothing's working and they're not losing weight and they want to lose weight or they are not noticing any difference, but they're doing the work. What would you say to that person?

Well, I've had somebody like that as well. I will tell you, because I can't monitor them. I think that when people aren't following the diet specifically exactly. And they're just kind of substituting their own things, thinking that it's equivalent, that's where they're usually failing. Another item I've seen, and this is a common problem with a lot of people, hormones are. They can wreak havoc on all parts of your body. I am not a doctor, but I know that if your hormones are out of whack, there's almost nothing you can do until you get those back in line to have your body behave like it's supposed to. So I've seen that sometimes and I just suggest that the clients at least go to the doctor to find that where their hormone levels are at.

Yeah, I'm glad you said that because one of the things I really focus on with my community specifically is just really understanding themselves at the deepest level and whether that's what triggers you, what activates you, learning your personality style, your values and also from health wise, because there could be, like you said, something just even hormonal that's happening and you don't even know. But if you're focusing on that and you're not just continuing to move forward and push through the fire like I think a lot of us are trained to do, when you actually take that time to reflect and think about what is happening and notice it, then everything could change. Because then you might be able to get something simple kind of tweaked to help you assess where you're at.

Yeah, people just don't spend enough time really. They give up, they give up too early and they haven't spent the time or the discipline to have consistency long enough to figure out what's happening with their body. The whole fitness thing, it just takes a long time. It's not something that can go really fast. And yeah, there's crash diets and you can, you can lose a lot of weight in a short amount of time, but then everyone would agree that's not sustainable. But even the steady state after something like that has to be different than the steady state that you had prior to that if you want to at least maintain those levels. And whenever you have great difficulty and you feel like you're doing all the right things. One thing that I would really ask people to look at themselves and be honest is that how, how consistent are they really being with exercise and especially diet. Diet is at least 80% of the battle.

Yeah. And I'd love to go back to what you said in the beginning about you leaving your job and realizing that you could be poor for a few years to even start this business.

Yeah.

How did you get that mindset to be able to. Did you assess the risk? What did you do to actually be able to do that and actually quit your job?

Well, this is kind of dorky, but I love spreadsheets, and they're a big part of my life in the past. And so for the past, I don't know, 20 years, I have kept a personal cash flow spreadsheet that lists out all of my projected expenses and income for three years. And I update it about once every month or two because it's always wrong. Right. There's new things that happen in your life and, oh, I. I didn't get that raise or whatever, and I have to re. Make a new adjustments. And so it had been a while since I looked at my little spreadsheet. It really was because I was turning 50 last year. Everything was just. I had to really evaluate, was I doing something that really made me happy? Because I'm pretty far along. I. I better make sure that I'm doing something that I love. Recognized that I wasn't, and so what could I possibly do? So the dorky side is really, I went to that spreadsheet and I just did the math on where I was at financially. And I. It literally told me, you can be poor for two years. And I just thought, you know what? There's got to be a way to do something I'm passionate about that will eventually add value. So that's all that it took. I just knew that I needed to make a change in my life. I mean, I've other. I've done other things again in the past in my life, trying to do my own thing and not necessarily be an employee. But I learned a lot from those mistakes that I tried in the past. I even tried to create a SaaS technology company and quit my previous job right about a week before COVID So that was a disaster. It did not work out, but I learned a lot from the experience. But this time it was something that I wanted to do, and that's really what it was for me. Just, I know what I'm passionate about, and I just couldn't continue to do things that were not meaningful to me.

So how did you actually just do it then? Do you remember kind of what got you to Say, okay, I'm ready now.

Well, I planned ahead. I'll tell you. There was a date on the calendar that was important to me. It was a payout of a bonus that I was going to get. So essentially I decided that I would hold off until that date. But I knew three months before then that I was going to make this work. I knew financially it would work. And I started taking action on forming my entity, working on my messaging. I made my own tool that would calculate the meals for my clients that took me like a month or two to put together. And so there was a lot of pre work I wanted to just have ready. And I also started talking to more people about it and letting them know that was going to be my journey. And turned out that most of my clients initially were actually friends that I told that I was going to take this journey. And I think I had my first client really a few days before I even quit my job. So there was definitely some planning ahead. But is that what you mean by how did I end up making the jump?

Yeah, and I think you're surrounding yourself with your people, right? People that believe in you and that you're talking to about what you're doing. You're figuring out the tactical side on the risk assessment and what it's going to cost you to make the jump. And it sounds like you have a really healthy approach to failing when things not working out. Like you use the term earlier learning experiment.

Yeah, Yeah. I mean, trust me, I've tried a lot. Even in the last six or eight months, I've tried a lot of different things. Different things for advertising, different things for attracting clients, different ways of interacting with clients. When I first started, I did have a couple of people that wanted to train in person, and I did that a couple times. But I had done that for years prior because it's something that I've done on the side for 20 years. I knew that I couldn't do that, but it took doing it and failing and proving to myself, yes, okay, this, this is not the path I want to go. Because when you first start a business, you kind of want to do anything to make it work. Throwing spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks. And that's okay. I mean, there's just no possible way to know the most optimum combination of things when you start a business that are going to help it grow the most. So you got to try some things.

Okay, Carrie, the time is here. I would love to hear what your number one piece of advice is for the listeners on Doing the thing.

Well, I think the most important thing to realize do this, do this exercise. When you decide to do something and you're not sure if it's going to work, think about the worst case scenario and whether or not you're even going to remember this five years from now. And then think about the best case scenario. And in almost every case you're going to. If you look back five years for the best case scenario, you're going to remember what happened and for the worst case scenario for trying something new, you're not even going to remember what it was. So just keep things in perspective and you're never going to really grow until you just push beyond where you are comfortable right now. So if you really want to grow, you've got to try those things and just do it.

Can you please share with the listeners how they can learn more about you?

Sure. Probably the best place to start is my website and then from there you can find me on all the social medias. The website is rouse fit.com Rouse is my last name. It was nice and short and it was meaningful. So if you go there you will learn all about me, all about my company, my products and my services.

Yeah. And then remind them again about the CBD oil because you're selling that, right?

Yeah. On that website. Everything is done there. So everything is e commerce done from the website. And I essentially have three main products that I sell that are CBD related. A CBD oil for tincture you put underneath your tongue for overall wellness. CBD sleep gummies to help you get better, sleep to recover better and then the CBD relief cream that is a topical cream you put on to aches and pains and muscle issues on your body. Those are the three products that I have and if you have any questions about it, I also have a pretty extensive blog with several articles on what is CBD and how to understand it. If you're newbie in this or you're a little bit unsure about it, just do a search on my website for CBD and you will find several articles that will be helpful.

That's great. That's the educate part of the do the thing formula.

Yeah.

Could you please tell me in your words what do you think do the thing means to you?

I think it's a little bit of courage. I think it takes a little bit of courage to just do the thing as opposed to overthinking it. We don't really know what's exactly going to happen on the other side of this effort that we're about to expend. But for me, it's just having the courage to give it a shot and the courage to get it wrong and the courage to grow.

Thank you. I'm glad I asked you that. That was really good. And thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate it for sharing all of your wisdom with the listeners.

Stacy, thank you so much. It's a pleasure to be on the show and I'm really excited to see where you go with all this stuff because I know it's been an inspiration to you. I can see it every time you talk about it and how excited you are. So it's just a pleasure to be.

A part of it and for the listeners.

Do the Thing thanks for listening to the do the Thing podcast. We hope you enjoyed the show, but even more, we hope you'll be inspired to do the Thing. Do you have a burning question on Doing the Thing that you'd like answered? How about an inspiring do the Thing story of your own that you'd like to share? We'd love to hear all about it. Just leave us a voice message at do the Thing callcast co or email us@helloothethingpodcast.com.