The Mind-Body Connection: P90X Founder, Tony Horton's Approach to Men's Mental Health Through Physical Fitness

Jeremy: [00:00:00] You should start getting more exercise. You could join a gym, you would work out more. If you just knew what to do.

Zach: All of those would've should've could've or probably the same story you've been telling yourself for years and they all in the same. Would you actually doing nothing or at best, not enough to get to where you want to go. ,

Jeremy: This week, we hope to write a new ending to that story with our guests. He is the creator of the best-selling fitness series P90X, and more recently the power of four.

Tony Horton: Stop doing the same things over and over again, expecting a different result. Thank you, Albert Einstein. It's true. And people let chainsaw.

I can't. I mean, it's all hard. All, I'm all. I got a job. I got kids and I got stressed. I have traffic and I have bills in the moon. I have a, I have a pandemic. And now you want me to work out five to seven days a week and eat vegetables out of you out of your mind will then stay miserable. My friend,

Jeremy: Tony Horton joins us to help you. And I get off our butts and actually work toward our fitness goals.

[00:01:00]

It is amazing how, when properly motivated, we can suddenly find the will and a way to take action on the things we say we want to do this episode is a shining example of that. Zach, for months, you have told me to go to the gym. I've had a hundred reasons not to get. I tried going, I hated it and I quit.

But when I knew that we were going to be talking to the world, famous creator of P90X, I had a reason to try it again. So now, well, over a month later, I haven't missed a workout. I feel great. And I'm creating my own motivation to keep going. And that is spilling over to other areas of my life.

Zach: I really, really want to say, I told you so, and I really, really want to rub it in your face.[00:02:00]

Jeremy: really should. I haven't

Zach: really want to, but instead I'm going to say congratulations. That's amazing.

Jeremy: way to take the high road. Come on. I served up a softball. You could have just completely smacked me down for that.

Zach: I could have, but you know what? We're all about motivating people, not bringing them down.

Jeremy: true. That's true. I've got to say, , I think so much of it. And we'll get into this in, in the interview and just a little bit, but so much of it is just having a plan because when I go into the gym now, and I know you talk about this with your CrossFit experience going in and not having to think about it, right.

Just doing what you're told makes it so much easier. I've been doing the P90X three for about five or six weeks now. And just the fact that I can just mindlessly go in and go, Tony, tell me what to do. How high should I. It just, it just fixed it. Cause the one day that I went in, I was like, I don't know what to do.

I read that you lift some heavy stuff and then you kind of run around and junk. And I just was like, this, this sucks, this isn't fun. This is boring. It's hard. [00:03:00] I don't even know that this is going to work. Like I had no direction and no plan, but having that plan and having that direction just makes all the difference in that.

Zach: And that's why I always say get a coach, weather, Tom demand through like Beachbody on demand or an in-person. That's how I've been successful. If I have to put together the plan myself, I'm not a fitness expert. I don't know how to do these things correctly without hurting myself.

God knows I was corrected at the gym this morning for something and yesterday and the day before and the day before that. So, I mean, it is really important to have somebody there just telling you what you need to do because. Our own motivation. Like we have just enough to get us to the gym.

Jeremy: Yep.

Zach: Then you add on like, planning what it is and planning the whole week and the whole month and what you're going to do.

Forget it. No one's going to do.

Jeremy: Especially not having the knowledge. What's worth my [00:04:00] effort, right? If you just go in blind and you lift a bunch of different stuff, it might work, but who knows? Why not rely on someone else? Who's done the research. That's done the homework that probably has a team of experts that know how to put a workout together to actually make you reach the goal.

You're trying to reach

Zach: Yeah. And there's accountability to it as well. Right? There's that external motivation, right? I mean, I know if I, if I hit the button and signed up to be at a class at the gym, I'm going to be there because I hit the button.

Of course, the other day I slept right through my alarm and I missed it. But. My intentions were good. So there's the accountability bit. There's , the professional there who knows what they're doing can help you along the way. And again, even if it's a video series, like they give good cues. And if you just have a mirror in front of you, you can figure it out.

Jeremy: It's amazing to just doing it and having the voice in your, in your head and when you're doing the workout and they're like, you know, get, get down another inch and I can tell, oh yeah, I'm not up. It's, it's weird how they can tell, right. They know what people at home are doing and they can, they can [00:05:00] guide you through that.

And then.

Zach: kinda like, it's kinda like they've been doing it for awhile

Jeremy: Yeah, maybe, maybe the Navy, they know a thing or two. And that's the most annoying part about this is that, you know, I've been paying for this Beachbody app for like, I don't know what three years, and I've done now collectively three programs. So I mean, I'm getting my money's worth, but, , all the work that I've lost and all the money, I could have been so much more worth the few dollars that it costs for the year.

Zach: That's okay. Don't focus on that though. Just think about getting the value in the

Jeremy: Exactly.

Zach: So again, I really want to say, I told you so, but I'm just proud of you for doing what you're doing, but I also want to remind you. That the physical exercise is not the only piece to this. Remember there's multiple parts to being healthy fit. And as our guests, Tony Horton, I'm like geeking out. So excited.

We got to talk to him is going to remind us like nutrition is part of this.

[00:06:00]

Jeremy: All right, well, this is a big deal for us. So we get to share this interview that we did with Tony Horton, just a couple of weeks ago. Super fun. In preparation for talking with the now a 63 year old Tony Horton, who could kick both of our asses. I found everyone kept saying how great he looks for his age.

So I started by asking him about how that lands when he hears.

Tony Horton: No, we're so caught up on our, on our appearance, which has been normal that's humans. Right. We don't want to look bad.

We want to be trim and look younger than we are. But ultimately, it's not like I don't get a, a facial occasionally just to sort of read things. But I mean, it really, what matters, I mean, who you are as a human being is really on the inside. how was your brain functioning and how does your body functioning.

Able to F you know, to, to live the life that you want to live, and hopefully you're living a big enough life, so that you're able to do things [00:07:00] physically that are kind of interesting, you know, and like riding your

Zach: bike or I'm skiing here in Jackson

Tony Horton: hole. And, and I mean, I, as a 63 year old, I feel as strong in the mountain as I've ever felt, based on my behavior in the last four months

Zach: has been pretty intense,

Tony Horton: just kind of turned it up a notch, and I've got a good crew of people that I hang with if they want to charge, , like I want to charge and they're all younger than I am, which helps.

And so they keep. You know, I mean, I developed a program, I mean, uh, called the power of four or something that I developed outside of beach body, which is basically duplicating what I do and trying to train and send that to other people who want to participate in it. You know, I mean, it's just the basic things that to me I've been doing for ever and ever.

And it feels like common sense to me. I mean, just taking the right steps. Eating the healthiest foods, like any exercising, five to seven days a week, and finding some time to meditate and find some mindfulness in my life. So I can let the pendulum swing the other way once in awhile,

and most people, their only form of mindfulness is a crappy night of sleep. And you know, their cortisol levels are through the roof. Their [00:08:00] adrenal glands are Brent and they look in the mirror and they go, why do I look like

Tony Horton Interview - USB: crap

Zach: and feel like crap? You know, it might've been that six pack of beer the night before, while you're

Tony Horton: Watching your team lose. So again, to me, it's just, it's basic, you know, I've been doing it forever

Zach: and I don't see myself ever changing. So how long did that take you? I know, for me, we talk about some of the, common things that we do that are baby. And how that helps somebody who it's not basic for.

Is that something that clicked right away for you that like, Hey, I need to deliver more of this to people and educate them, or did it take you a little while to like, realize that the basic things for you always basic things for everyone else? Yeah. It

Tony Horton: took me a while. It really did. It took me decades.

You know, and I'm still perfecting it. I don't think there's any sort of final

Zach: answer on, on what to

Tony Horton: do. You know what I mean? Things are evolving. There's new concepts and ideas and techniques and methods and philosophies and blah, blah, blah. And you read more and you learn more and you talk to smart people and you go, oh, okay, well, I'm going to, maybe that was working for me back then.

You know what I mean? I think [00:09:00] we should always be evolving. I'm always trying to evolve. I'm in the game of , pursuing joy. You know, and whatever that takes, that's sort of the bottom line for me. And so my behavior is certainly part of it, my mental, my physical, mental, and emotional.

State is a result of, my environment, my behavior and my genetics. Right? So there's, these were things that I, that I can control. I mean, people are like, oh my genetics by my genetics, you know, Jacqueline Lane lived twice, as long as his

Zach: dad, you know, it's deadhead, same genetics, Jack did. He just

Tony Horton: changed his environment in this behavior, you know, and I'm trying to do the same thing.

Not that I plan on living to be a hundred. Or am I, I, don't know. But yeah. Yeah. So it took a while. And so when you're trying to inspire people, it's really about the way you communicate, the way you disseminate your, your entailed to folks.

Right when we're done, I'm going to be doing the slide thing and Instagram. About getting out of your own way. You know, so often we're blaming we're finger pointing, you know what I mean? You know, you're blaming your parents and your genetics and [00:10:00] your friends and your bed, blah blah.

And one reality, the bottom line is stepped up. The buck stops with you, you know what I mean? So, um, it just get out of your own damn way. And, and what does that require? And I think a lot of people live in, so unfortunately what gets in people's way is they live in a fantasy world.

There's reality, which is, , the truth and the whole truth and nothing but the truth. And then there's. You're misguided version of it, because the way this is too hard, but this makes me happy, but I'm overweight and I'm miserable. But, uh, you know, I mean, so it's really distinguishing between those things, like getting your mind right.

And buckling down and finding out. What you really have to do. And that's hard transformation change. The switch I call it the switch going from the kind of the person you are, the person you are now. And that requires time. It took me time. It's going to take you time. So, you know, be the tortoise, not the Hare, you don't go for first, first grade to grad school.

There's a bunch of stuff in between and you gotta be willing to put in the time and energy and effort to get there. You know, the switch is a

Zach: bitch, which is this.

Tony Horton: If you think this thing's going to happen overnight, [00:11:00] Well, then you're going to be your misguided engine.

You're going to fail. So that's why, what I do is to try to tell people, Hey man, hang in there with me. Here's the plan. Here's the ways you can modify. You don't have to be perfect every day. Don't be attached to the outcome that pastor saturate history, the future is a ministry to speak in the moment. You know what I mean?

My workout in the gym the other day was pretty lame. So, but I was in the gym and that's all that really mattered. And I did as best I could without. Breaking my arm. You know what I mean? And that's, that's a long-winded answer.

Jeremy: that's okay. That's okay. Zach and I have been talking for months. I moved to this community that I live in six months ago, and there's a free gym here that is a five minute walk away. And I've been putting off going the one time I went, I hated it. Right. I went in with no plan. Didn't know what to do, which, ah, this is gonna suck.

I'm gonna hate this. And then when I knew I was going to be talking to you, I went, well, I better at least try this thing out before I talked to this guy, because I'm going to sound like an idiot. So I've been putting off, going to the gym for [00:12:00] literally months and doing the mental gymnastics of, oh, I don't know it's going to hide.

I can't get out of my own way, but you inspired me just by agreeing to talk to us, to get over there and start doing your workout, which I love by the way. It's, it's been a really great experience,

Tony Horton: What, what work are you doing? The power for stuff

Jeremy: oh no, I'm, I'm doing the, the ex. The peanut and the x-ray. Yeah, I've heard of it. Yeah. Uh, it's it's a lot of fun and, uh, I've been enjoying it and it's so funny because I do feel better after doing it.

I mean, just immediately just, just moving my body, the nature of just moving your body, you feel better, but that is such a hard thing to communicate to that person who hasn't made the switch, who doesn't have the opportunity to talk to you as motivation to turn on the video and go do it. So how do you, how do you convince someone that it's worth it?

How do you convince them to get off the couch and make that.

Tony Horton: Well, I'm going to sort of speak directly to you, Jerry. And here's what

Jeremy: Cause I am talking to me, but yeah,

Tony Horton: your purpose sucks. You don't have a purpose. You don't have a reason why that's substantial enough for you to be [00:13:00] consistent. you said it just a few minutes ago, you feel.

As a result of doing the workup. So, I mean, how many days a week do you want to feel? Great. How many days a week do you want to feel guilty in lane? You know, like, and so it to be consistent, you need a plan. So get your purpose in line. I'm going to feel good today. If I exercise today without making sh you know, that who cares, how much I bench, who cares, how much I squat and cares how perfect my ad is, look at the end of it at the end of the one workout.

I mean, all that stuff is just arbitrary, bologna, right? So you want to get rid of that. So your purpose should be. I want to feel good. I want to have more energy. I want to have more enthusiasm for life. I want my brain to function better because when I exercise, I release norepinephrine dopamine, serotonin brain derived neurotrophic factor inside my temporal lobe, inside my hippocampus, your whole life, everything about who you are as a human being physically, mentally, and emotionally.

Comes from inside the center of your brain called the hippocampus. Now a lot of people use drugs and alcohol and porn and whatever they all they use to try to temporarily [00:14:00] stimulate that part of part of the brain. But in general, those sort of short-term attempts really lead to long-term problems. So you want to have some sort of short term discipline and exercise and food discipline for a life of lifetime of feeling really well.

Right? So. The goal here, ultimately, man is just to figure out what your purpose is. That's so substantial as this is the bottom line. It's priority one. It's the foundation of who I am. Everything else is ancillary. Everything else is number is, is BCD F it's not a, it's not one that's who you are both figure because you understand the who you are as a 63 year old could turn out better than maybe your parents or grandparents did.

Number two is your. What time are you going to work out? What workout is it? And know that 30 days in advance or you just get your calendar manual. Okay. Like for me on Mondays it's cardio. Boom. I got guys coming over on tuesdays has showed us an arms. Wednesday is plyo.

Thursday is chest and back Friday is balls boxes, Saturdays [00:15:00] yoga, Sundays, the four hour. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Now I schedule seven workouts. I usually miss one, sometimes two, but I always get my five and don't forget about three days a week. So yourself down a set of stairs, it's the same damn thing. You know what I mean?

Because three or four days off, I got to go. you, but because it's going to kick the crap out of the three days on, it's just a feudal, right? Like, oh, I'm going to breathe three days this week,

Jeremy: Yeah.

Tony Horton: I'm going to eat three days a week. I'm going to sleep three nights this week. I'm going to go to work three nights this week.

I'm going to pay my bills once every three months. There's all this stuff that we naturally do. We don't question it. And all we get is survival. That's all we get. We get survival on earth. What does that like a C minus life? No, if you wanna, if you wanna a plus you gotta show up all the time. So you've got your purpose.

You got your plan now. How are you going to stay accountable? Well, you got, um, I'm looking at Zach there. You and Zach. Hey man. That's [00:16:00] it. You and I next 30 days, if I don't show up, you get to, you know, burn down my house. I don't know what the hell. But, you know, you get your tribe, man. You get, you are the company that you keep.

If both of you guys. So if your best 10 friends were all ice climbers, you'd be really good at ice climbing. You know what I mean? If you've been friends with people like, Hey man, it's 2022. The last couple of years have been crap. Let's just buckle down. Find some water. You know, I have like 25 people in my, in my quiver of friends and I'm always emailing and texting and call you showing up.

You don't, you're going to be here and that's it. You know what I mean? It's purpose plan and accountability through having the right kind of people in your life. And if you can't get it done, then you're supposed to be. An overweight, miserable son of a bitch, that's it? Sorry. You know what I mean? Or you can kind of dabble in all the other temporary ephemeral means in which to, you know, lose a few pounds in two months.

So you can look halfway decent at a wedding that nobody cares about. You know what I'm saying? So like [00:17:00] this, excuse my first time, I'm going to swear this shit is real and you have to get realistic about it. If you really want to make dramatic change and you want it to. You know what I mean? So there you

Zach: go.

So on the flip side of it, so I've got my purpose very well dialed in. I know what I want in life, which leads me to, I am at the gym or the yoga studio seven days a week. And like you like miss a day here and there, , so I've been giving Jeremy a lot of crap lately of just go, just go, but I know what are we going to do with him?

But for me, like this was a, this was a process for me because a 20 years ago I was about a hundred pounds heavier eating McDonald's every day, no exercise. And it was, it was a long road and there was a lot of, , habits that I had to put together. And now I get asked, Hey, what's the one thing you did? there's never one thing, like it's all these little things, but you know, a little [00:18:00] something about. All those little things that somebody has to do and how you can put those habits together. Could you talk a little bit about how you go from, , like you said earlier, preschool. To grad school, what's that look like?

What does somebody have to do to navigate that?

Tony Horton: What's the one thing you did to graduate from high school? Well, there's no answer for that. Right. And it's the same thing for that. I think it becomes overwhelming for some people because it's not a priority, you know? I mean, if it was a priority, if you, if it went from sort of like 10th on the list of first in the list and you were willing to put some energy into figuring it out, Then then it would be the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 17 25 things that you would do.

And those 25 things initially, uh, they seem incredibly overwhelming, right? Because it's 25 things, but you're the tortoise and you get it. And your job is just to show up and be in the moment and do the best you can and listen, right. Pay attention and see what resonates. See what doesn't,

if everybody else is going to CrossFit and you don't want to go to CrossFit, Don't [00:19:00] go to CrossFit. Like if yoga is like, you know, everybody's doing the yoga and you don't wanna, you know, you know, there's two kinds of love. You have to kind of have a, you have to have a general passion for what it is that you're doing.

And maybe a lot of people haven't found it yet. I mean, Peloton is interesting, but it's the same damn thing every day, you know, it's like, you're out of the seat, you're in the seat going fast or somebody is yelling at you. You know what I mean? It's like, oh, okay, cool.

But the reason why I've created what I've created. And all you have to do is just show up and look at me, on the screen. And you don't have to try to match what I'm doing or what anybody else is doing, but I try to create programs and formulas that afford. Injuries and plateaus, you notice everything I say is in threes, it makes it real easy, right?

So it's boredom injury and plateaus that keep people from Anna lack of a plan, purpose, accountability. There's another three. Right? But these are these, like I just told you that you have to, like, you have to, you know, get into like space suit and go to Mars and back and figure no, it's like, these are three things you understand.

Here are three more things that you understand. Or don't, you know what I mean? [00:20:00] Like, right. And then find some company, right. And it keeps, keep consuming new information. Like diet diet is, is a nightmare for people, Keogh, paleo, vegetarian,

Zach: pescatarian,

Tony Horton: you know, vegan vet that. I got blood work.

I went to a expert, I got the blood and they said, Hey, you're having you got, you got leaky gut and possibly leaky brain. What does that mean? Good. Yeah. So leaky gut leaky brain. It's just, it's just an enzymes and chemicals and things, you know, leaky gut is something. It's inflammation inside your digestive system, inside your body.

So that means like when you're eating the food, it doesn't all exit out of the back end. It starts coming out because your intestines are very porous. They're not like, , metal pipes going into your body. So fecal matter leaks out gets into the bloodstream, goes into all kinds of other places in your organs and heart and lungs.

And you can't figure out why, you know, I don't have deep pain anymore. Why I don't have shoulder pain anymore. Why I, you know, like you should get surgery or you need to have injections in your knee. I just eat plants and [00:21:00] I don't have those problems. And if I can go to the gym, I pouted myself, even though I wasn't very strong, I'm not even sore.

You know, I don't know. I mean, maybe it's partly because of the formulas that I created with, with my supplement line too, that helps as well. And the. If it's interesting to you and you want to get healthy and you're willing to see that there's, the bullshit version that you've tried. Like, you know, wake up in the morning and you have tons of energy and you have no pain and you're not tired.

And you rock through the day. You're doing everything right. If you don't know what three more things crazy. If you don't have those three things, then you need to make changes, stop doing the same things over and over again, expecting a different result. Thank you, Albert Einstein. It's true. And people let chainsaw.

I can't. I mean, it's all hard. All, I'm all. I got a job. I got kids and I got stressed. I have traffic and I have bills in the moon. I have a, I have a pandemic. And now you want me to work out five to seven days a week and eat vegetables out of you out of your mind will then stay miserable. My friend, [00:22:00] you know what I mean?

But, but the switches a bitch, right? Because there's going to be that period. But you, you, you know, I got a little expression, says, do your best and forget the rest, do

Zach: your best.

Tony Horton: And just what's your best today. Your best today might be. But it's certainly better than doing nothing, right? It's always better than doing nothing.

And 10 minutes, I added a program called 10 minute trainer. My cousin would do 10 minutes in the morning, 10 minutes at night and stop eating so much cheese and got off the hooch. All right. So she got off the Hutch, got off the cheese, worked out 20 minutes separately and she lost 45 pounds. I can't believe this is working.

Yeah. Because it's a thousand times more than you were doing before, which was zero. , so you know, you don't have to, you don't sign up for a marathon the first time you sign up for three K. You know what I mean? And then you progressed, it's all about progression to,

Jeremy: Totally. You mentioned your supplements. We wanted to find out more about that. Tell us, tell us about the supplement line.

Tony Horton: well, who's listening. Hmm. Let me tell you, uh, yeah, you know, I got sick in 2017. I got miserably ill with Ramsey. [00:23:00] Which is a shingles in your ear. And, uh, if you've got shingles in your ear, it goes into your brain and, uh, there's nerves that go from your ear to your brain. And it affected my vision and my smell and my taste and my balance.

So I couldn't drive. I couldn't work out. I couldn't get out of bed. All I did, I spent most of the day in excruciating pain, I got Bell's palsy, which was really hot.

Zach: It was a great lunch for me.

Tony Horton: , and I threw up all day. So I, you know, I wasn't really, really rough. And then when I was coming out of that very, very slowly about a three month process.

I mean, I was, I went to all the King's horses and all the King's men, and I just couldn't put Tony back together

Zach: again. You know what I mean?

Tony Horton: So, so, you know what I mean? All the tinctures and the acupuncture and like, you know, and then getting me out of that house and then the car, and every time like a car would make a turn, you know, Honeywell, I crawled out the window, it was brutal.

So I met with some smart people. I got very fortunate. I think there was a lot of serendipity, lot of kismet. And

Zach: just folks that I met, this guy

Tony Horton: will. That's six ELLs, by the way, all the ELLs. Um, but he, you know, he's a, he's a nutrition scientist. I mean, he knows [00:24:00] inside now. And he said, Hey, have you ever heard about HMB and how it reacts to vitamin D there's all these great studies out of the , NIH that, , they're talking about that maybe, you know, you can get your weight back.

Okay. And then like your leaky gut, let's come up with like some really high quality formula, fiber

Zach: prebiotics, probiotics,

Tony Horton: two servings of vegetables. Let's, you know, it's like this super pack of food. And then I, you know, and then I talked to my nutritionist too, about, about diet and, and I tried veganism twice and failed miserably.

I just, I got all

Zach: gone sad and I

Tony Horton: was eating too. Vegan crackers. You know what I mean? And not enough plants. So I got hooked up with fire road. Fire road, , it's a plant-based, , home delivery, food service, which, you know, I get my, I guess I get my two shakes in the morning. I mean, shake in the morning, shake in the late, late afternoon and meals in between.

And I can maintain my 172 pounds and I feel amazing. I don't have any inflammation whatsoever. It's called, it's called power life. If people are interested, , there's plant-based protein, whey protein. Cause you know, our, our, our cows are straight [00:25:00] out of Ireland. They're up there with the right horse accident.

They're hanging out with leprechauns eating grass, and then we would get there away from them. And uh, no lucky charms, just the way it's fantastic up there. And so the plant based a lot of seeds, a lot of nuts on mung beans, you can't get enough mung, beans, sunflower seeds, and all that. You know, vegan, vegan.

That's that's what this little green monster is and that beautiful. so my power life.com. If you want the discount, this is only for you guys. It's Tony. At my power life.com don't pay don't pay full pop pay, pay the Toni 30 discount code. And this form, this stuff saves life, man. I mean, I mean, a lot of it did getting back to fitness, going vegan properly, uh, you know, without the shakes, I'd weigh about 118 pounds.

Zach: so it's just, you know,

Tony Horton: getting those extra and high quality protein, the nutrients, the vitamins. You know, and w and the supplements, they're important. A lot of people, like, I don't need supplements. I never have, but not a, something to God's wasted money, or you just pee it out. Okay. Well, great. Talk to any high school [00:26:00] collegiate Olympic or professional athlete, who's busting their ass five to seven days.

Not taking supplements now. There's no such, there's no such human

Zach: being

Tony Horton: that I'm aware of. I haven't met him yet. So, you know, if you're a monk mountain with organic vegetables and chickens and pigs and things, and you sit there and you all day, you don't need supplements because you live in a place that doesn't exist. You're not a person that's real, but, but the rest of us, you know, and out there, it's crazy out there. And if you have kids and you have a job and you got a boss and you got a wife or a husband that's, you know, and family and coworkers and, you know, you just gonna, you know, and that's what the mindfulness part of the power for you.

Is it, the mindfulness is. When I was, , in the process of developing my supplements and everything else, I read a book by a full, catastrophic living by Jon Kabat Zinn,

Jeremy: Yup.

Tony Horton: man, man, all 9,700 pages of that monster. Also, David Nestor's breath. I don't know if you guys breastfed that

Jeremy: Yeah, that's

Tony Horton: Oh [00:27:00] yeah man.

Fantastic. 5.5 breathing, you know, body scan meditation, just, you know, you can, you can do it on the car, you can do it on the John. You can do it anywhere you want. If you do well, having breakfast, you know what I mean? Anything that takes your mind away from, and it, and like I tell people, I don't want my meditation.

I'm like Christian, come on, man. Just yoga is a movie. Meditation simple movement. Right? You do the, you can do the breath. We don't have to, but walking your dog, listening to music, dancing, you know, in your boxer shorts, whatever it is, reading, these are all, these are all mindfulness.

I talked to people. What was the last time you were in a, in a bad. Um, since I was five, well, when then why you own one? Yeah. Well then put, put store socks in there, plant a tree. Cause that's what that thing's for. They're in every, almost every house in the country and get in the tub, pour in the two cups of Epsom salt and shut up and just play music.

Wow. It's double whammy. And these things, you know, these are the, these are the simple stuff, [00:28:00] and, you know, th this new program is we had 2,500 people in the beta group and they were, you know, usually like P90X had like a 12% success rate because it was hard, eat, eat foods.

Do these exercises, see ya. Right. We're trying to do more than that. I mean, it was an amazing program. 11 million copies, I believe 4 million of those 11 were pirated. Good luck. I went to, I used to go, uh, I D I've been at 62 military bases around the world and I used to go to the Pentagon and do workouts there and stuff. And I used to go to the congressional gym and train some of those clowns. And. And they're all pulling out like pirated copies, excuse me, Senator. Uh, this is I'm going to have to arrest you because this is don't.

You have laws against this didn't you pass a loss and

Jeremy: should do something about

Tony Horton: the sign doesn't happen. Okay. Whatever, man. So, you know, case Sarah, but what the power of four is neutral. Exercises supplementation and mindfulness, man, it's just, you know, add [00:29:00] live events. And, uh, and you know, I

Zach: did a, uh,

Tony Horton: a session the other day for our, you know, we have base program premium program and in VIP platinum pro.

And people just, they just they've been stopped. They've always been stuck. And so we're trying to give people multiple options. We're trying to basically give them in 90 days, everything that we've been talking about, access to me, access to two time Olympian, Tasha Danvers, access to,

Zach: Jessie Graff.

Who's, you know, the first woman

Tony Horton: ever to, , she's on our team, which is like, you know, she's cooler than me. I

mean, come on. Um,

Zach: so yeah. That's awesome. I have a, I have a question for you that I, I talk to people about it and, and I just want to hear your take on it because I've done a lot of your programs and, , you have a couple of workout programs.

He helped me by this joint. Thank you, dude.

Tony Horton: Nice power for, I got bills to pay buddies. Come

Zach: on. I will get right on that. Um, but my question for you. I go to the gym and I lift weights and [00:30:00] I do cardio. Like, I, I like the, the weightlifting aspect. I also liked the cardio aspect, but what do you say to the people who are, you know, again, going back to the, what's the one thing I can do, the people who are just doing cardio, they're not lifting weights.

I would love to hear your take on your new program and whether lifting weights is a good thing or a bad thing for you.

Tony Horton: Well, it depends on how you're lifting the weights. You know, how many repetitions you're doing, how much weight you're lifting, is your ego involved when it comes to doing this process?

You know, I mean, form and function is priority one. It should be, and if you haven't done it in a while, then you get to go, okay, well, whatever memories you have of your glory days, you're going to have to, you know, bury those for a second. If you want me to get through the process, , if you look at the power of four powerful.

And everything. There's two martial arts routines. There's three separate ad routines. , there's chest and back there's, , chest and [00:31:00] back recharge. There's triple trouble challenge. If you have you know what the challenge is in the challenge, you go back and forth big pull-ups and push-ups and you have to guesstimate.

The exact number has to be the same for being in the beginning to end well, triple trouble. It's all by the way, man. There's, you know, getting to the debt wakes at a second. It's three sets of pushups in a row, three sets of pull-ups in a row. And those numbers have to be the same. So you better choose wisely.

All right. It's just, that's how you, you know, like you got shocked, the body joking, you got a shock and you got a shock. It, I don't know what I'm doing. I'm not doing Arnold.

Jeremy: That might be the first impression injury I've ever witnessed. That was

Tony Horton: I know, I know I don't, basic. They're shocking. Right. So, and, and, you know, Justin back recharge is sometimes bodyweight sometimes using dumbbells, sometimes using extra little Akumal like [00:32:00] med balls and stability balls. , there's a routine called primal flow, which is, you know, it's, it's animal flow.

If you're not on it, it makes yoga look like napping. Okay. Boredom entries, plateaus. Right? We want to make sure that we work on our weaknesses as much as our strengths. Now, the one thing I would say to you, Zach, you like the weights, you like the cardio. You come to my house on a Sunday and get on my ninja course, you will be destroyed.

It will be destroyed because it's, grip strength and lock off strength. And, you know, we climb ropes upside down 20 foot ropes upside down, we'll climb 20 foot Robeson and Nell, and do, do maximum levers, which is a skill. It took me four months to learn how to do a rep. And then we come back down the rope.

Oh, I'm sorry. No feet. No. You know what I mean? So one of the moves, uh, you know, Jesse loves is we go up. Right. And then we climb a beam that basically supports the patio. So the beam, so you know the table and you go up the beam and then you have to ring a bell and you go down the rope and you go up the rope, you have to ring the bell and you go down the beam, you go across the bag, a pegboard and they [00:33:00] do maximum pull-ups.

Jeremy: I'm exhausted, just listening to it.

Zach: You know what I mean? And

Tony Horton: so, um, yeah, I mean, there's two kinds of. Or there's the original, when it comes to exercise and fitness and behavior and nutrition, there's the things that you are naturally gravitate to. Like, I'm, you know, I'm a weightlifting guy or I'm a cardio girl, or I'm a, you know, I like my Peloton or whatever, there's that kind of thing.

And of course you want to have that in your life, right? And then there's the other kind of love, which is the stuff that you suck at that it's really hard for you. And it's frustrating, but you should love the fact that you're doing it because the overall outcome for your general fitness will be 10 times that of anybody who just keeps doing this.

And over and over again, all right. People just want to go for their walks. They just want to go for their runs. And, you know, they don't want to lift any weights. And so, I mean, I have a different objective than other people. I love the ninja course. I train my legs three days a week hard so I can go out there, uh, into where is it?

Where is it out there? [00:34:00] And that's where the snow is. That's why. I'm glad I'm talking to you guys as a stowed here in 10 days. So hard, hot on the legs. Don't love legs. Don't love cardio. Don't love plyo. We have a routine on Fridays called balls and boxes, just jumping on plyo box. They used to be metal boxes.

My shins looked like somebody hit me with a hatchet. You know what I mean? Finally got the soft ones. Like those spent my whole life. You know what I mean? So now when I run into the plyo boxes, you know what I mean? And that's all stability balls and courts rib cage down. Right? So, um, I have pretty strong legs, , three days a week and the other four days a week, maybe on a day off it's upper body stuff, you know, yoga is head to toe. And then sometimes while I have a total, um, and I'm, uh, one of the total trainers and, um, you know, I get in that tunnel and that's the resistance, it's not dumbbells. but I have a rack of dumbbells that go from five to five

Zach: to 75 and that's

Tony Horton: enough. And, um, I mean, I was in the gym yesterday. I went from bodyweight to cable to [00:35:00] barbells, to dumbbells, and I just did a circuit.

I would just look around and like, I'll go do that. Okay. That's just, when I'll go over there, I'll do that lap pump machine. No, I'll go over there. I'll do four belt pushups. I'll go over there. That's the one thing maybe Zack, that you're missing, a lot of people are missing. And it's kind of, you know, one or two dimensional and you want to be multi-dimensional when it comes to maybe all aspects of

Zach: your life.

Jeremy: Yeah.

Zach: Yeah, I agree. I actually go to a CrossFit gym just because of. And I don't have to think about it when I go into the gym. Right. The workout is there. I don't look at the workout because if I look at the workout and see something I'm weak at, I might skip it.

Um, and it, you know, it, it covers so many different areas, but yeah, I've, I would totally come and do your, do your course at your house if you ever invited me. Cause that sounds amazing. Where do you live? Zack. Where do you live? I live in New York.

Tony Horton: All right. Well, yeah, I'm a plane train or automobile LA. I'm a few of the four. In the woods [00:36:00] above Brentwood and, uh, the whole backyard I have, I have a gym that I have a regular indoor gym. Number one, I have an area that's a high bar, 20 foot rope, but parallel bars, gym number two. And then I have my pegboard beam, 17 foot rope pull up bar gym, number three. And then I have my ninja course, which is gym number four.

And I'm building a platform for number five, which is all the shakes. This is going to be. I'm saying where you swing and grab us when you grab

Jeremy: Oh my gosh. That sounds

Zach: That's awesome.

Jeremy: Tony. Thank you so much for all of this time. We really appreciate it. Where can we learn more about you and the power of four and the supplements and all the.

Tony Horton: Well, I appreciate that question very much. It's been a pleasure hanging out with you two young men as well, and hopefully there's been a thing or two in here that not only inspires and motivates you, but all of your listeners. And, uh, so that's a good thing. If you want to find just Tony Horton. Uh, you go to Tony Horton, life.com.

That's Tony Horton, life.com. And that's my events and my [00:37:00] T th fitness line, my T H care hair and skin line. You know, all the, all the things in all my events and all the things that I'm involved with. If you want to know more about power life supplements, you can go directly to my power line. com that's my power life.com. And you put in that code, Toni 30. And if you really want to join the revolution and join the folks in power nation, I highly recommend that, man. It's just an amazing 2,500 people went through the beta over 15 months of COVID and now there's another. Almost like 2,800 that have signed on, which is really great.

We want it. We want more. Of course. So it's power nation, fitness.org. That's power patient sickness. Don't go.com. I think it's important site. So be careful.

Jeremy: Or don't be careful if that's what you're into. I

don't know.

Zach: I

Tony Horton: mean, if that's not going to get fit though,

Jeremy: All right, Tony. Thank you so much for your time. We really appreciate it.

Zach: appreciate it, guys.

All right. That was Tony Horton, the creator of the best-selling fitness series P90X, and [00:38:00] more recently the power of four, you can find all of those links. He mentioned in the show notes for this episode@thefitness.com. Jeremy, I just want to throw this out there. And Tony, if you're still listening, I basically heard him say that I could go to his house whenever I wanted,

Jeremy: Yeah, I think he can just show up, just knock on the door anytime.

Zach: yeah, no, I think, I think I'm going to try that.

Yeah, I should do

Jeremy: I'm sure that'll go. Well, let me know how that works out for ya.

Zach: Well, if the, if the course doesn't kill me, I suspect I won't make it out of there anyway.

Jeremy: I think that may be right. That may be true. All right. A ton of great takeaways in that interview. I hope you got as much out of that as we did. That was a big deal for us. We're very excited to have had that opportunity. , but just remember, you know, if, if whatever you've done up until now, it hasn't worked, do something else.

Almost anything will be better because you know, the results of what you've done and. You also know the result of not doing anything. So just try something else, but as Zach mentioned earlier, definitely worth getting a coach for something like this, because you want to make sure [00:39:00] that you know what you're doing, that you have a plan and you have some accountability.

Zach: So we both know that I move a lot. Like I, I go to the gym, I go to yoga, I do a whole bunch of stuff and I have a plan and I know at times I'm going, and I know where I'm going. I don't know what I'm going to do. I'll find out when I get there. But last week I had a little bit of a change in my schedule. I had to go into.

The office for work, which is down in the city. So I stayed there for a few days and I didn't plan. I didn't find a yoga studio. I didn't find a gym. I didn't carve the time out to go work out. So guess what I did. I got to the office at seven 30 and then I left the office at eight or nine at night. I eat something and immediately went to bed just three days of that.

Three days of that, my neck pain came back my body. I had no part of it. It was terrible. So again, consistency here is really important. And if you're going to take a break or you have to go do something, really just try and figure out another way to get that movement in.

Jeremy: It's just going to help you go [00:40:00] so much further in this process. And again, you know, he likes to say all the time, I know this because I've been doing his workouts every day. Aging is for people that don't know better. And he is living proof that dude is skiing down mountains, running ninja courses in his backyard.

He's 63 years old and still as active as ever because he takes care of his body. This is something that I'm just, again, learning over and over again. And so I can't stress enough how important it is for you to do whatever you can to make sure that you're taking care of your.

Zach: And if you're still not sure where you want to start, you don't have to do any of this alone. You can connect with your friends with similar goals, hold each other accountable. Also, we have a Facebook group where you can come in, join the community and we can help point you in the right direction if you need it.

Jeremy: There, you're going to find monthly challenges, accountability from fellow group members and also just a really supportive community. So I hope you'll join us there. The link for that is on our website, the fitness.com where are we? We'll be back next week with a brand new episode. Thanks for listening.