Why Health and Fitness Need to Matter to You in Your Leadership Journey

We live in a culture where people spend their health trying to make money, and then they spend all their money that they earned trying to buy back their health - and it’s not working. It’s hard to prioritize your health and fitness, but it’s necessary - not just for you but for all of the people who need your leadership.

Today, I talk about the importance of health and fitness. I talk about why it matters and I share the story of my personal journey. I share the practical things that I’ve implemented in my life that I think you’ll find helpful. I share my definitions of health and fitness, I talk about the importance of focusing on what’s in your control (thereby reducing the risk of contracting health problems that are out of your control), and I offer four key takeaways.

“If you don’t start where you are, you’re gonna stay where you are.” - Doug Smith

Key Takeaways this week on the L3 Leadership Podcast:

●       You have to get a personal vision for your health and fitness.

●       You have to discover the price you’ll need to pay to optimize your health and fitness

●       You have to make that price the new standard in your life

●       Never give up

Mentioned Resources:

●       Beratung Advisors

●       Henne Jewelers

●       P90X

Welcome to the L3 Leadership Podcast!

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

But as soon as you don't have it, you realize how important it was. And we live in a culture where people spend their health trying to make money, and then they spend all their money that they earn trying to buy back their health and it is not working. Hey, podcast family and welcome to another episode of the L three Leadership Podcast where we are obsessed with helping you grow to your maximum potential and to maximize the impact of your leadership. My name is Doug Smith and I am your host. And today's episode is brought to you by by friends at Bear Tongue Advisors. If you're new to the podcast, welcome. I'm so glad that you're here and I hope that you'll enjoy our content and become a subscriber. And if you've been listening to us for a while, thank you so much. And it would mean the world to me if you would leave us a rating and review on whatever app you listen to this podcast through. That really does help us to grow our audience and reach more leaders, which is our whole goal here at L three. So thank you in advance for that. And in today's episode, you're gonna hear a personal lesson from me on why you need to prioritize your health and fitness and your leadership journey. And I think it's gonna add a ton of value to your life. And I've certainly had quite a journey, uh, myself, to optimizing my health and fitness and I share that in this lesson. And so if you've ever struggled prioritizing those things, I think this is gonna add a lot of value to your life. But before we get into the lesson, just a few announcements. This episode of the L three Leadership Podcast is brought to you by Bear Tongue Advisors. The financial advisors at Bear Tongue Advisors help educate and empower clients to make informed financial decisions. You can find out how Bear Tongue Advisors can help you develop a customized financial plan for your financial future by visiting their website@beartongueadvisors.com. That's B E R A T U N G advisors.com. Securities and investment products and services offered through WA Reid Inc. Member FINRA and S I P C, bear Tongue Advisors, WA Reed, and L three Leadership are separate entities. I also wanna thank our sponsor, he jewelers, they're jeweler owned by my friend and mentor John Henny and my wife Laura. And I got our engagement and wedding rings through Henny Jewelers. We just had an incredible experience and not only do they have great jewelry, but they also invest in couples. In fact, for every couple that comes in and gets engaged and gets their engagement ring through the jeweler, they actually give them a book to help prepare for marriage. And we just love that. So if you're in need of a good jeweler, check out he jewelers.com. And with all that being said, let's dive right into the lesson. Here's my lesson on why health and fitness need to matter to you in your leadership journey. Enjoy. Hey Leader today I'd like to talk to you on the subject why health and fitness need to matter to you in your leadership journey. And I'll lonely be sharing why it's important. I'll also be sharing my personal journey, which has been a long one, as well as some practical things that I've implemented in my life that I think will be extremely helpful to you in prioritizing health and fitness in your journey. But let me just start off this lesson by saying why I think this matters. I believe that a leader's greatest, greatest blessing is their health. Cuz here's what I know. If you're not healthy as a leader, you can't do what you were created to do. You cannot lead and you will never make it to your finish line. Your health is your greatest blessing. If, if you have it, it's easy to take for granted. And, but as soon as you don't have it, you realize how important it was. And we live in a culture where people spend their health trying to make money, and then they spent all their money that they earn trying to buy back their health and it is not working. And we need to learn to take care of our health and fitness, which I'll define in a second. I love what Jim Roh said. He said this, he said, take care of your body. It's the only place you have to live. And if you've been listening to the podcast for a while, you know that last fall and, and the fall of 2020, I had a very, uh, difficult season experiencing anxiety and panic and, and all kind of things related to that. And part of it was I wasn't taking good care of my body. I was working out, I was exercising, but I wasn't giving my body the proper rest that I needed. And I realized very, very quickly that if I'm not healthy, I w I I actually had to stop producing the podcast for a while and I wasn't able to do things that I would normally be able to do, all because I neglected my health and it was the scariest thing I've ever experienced. And so now more than ever I've realized I have to get this right and leader, let me just tell you that you do too. Cuz if we don't get this right, we're gonna end up paying a price and we'll never again do what we're called to do and make it to our finish line. So let's start off the lesson with just defining what I define as health and fitness. And again, I'm not a doctor, this is just my definition for me when I think about fitness. Fitness is being able to do what you'd like to do when you'd like to do it. Very, very simple. Fitness is simply being able to do what you'd like to do when you'd like to do it. What does that mean? Well, for me, an example is my wife and I and our family. We love national parks and we love hiking. We love biking, we love running. And so for us, we wanna be able to do all those things. If we wanna go hike a mountain with our family, we wanna be able to do that. If we wanna go for a bike ride, we wanna be able to do that. That is what fitness means to me. We're able to do what we'd like to do when we'd like to do it. Health, I define health as the ability to feel great every day and to live a long life. Very, very simple. The ability to feel great every day and to live a long life. And let me just say this, that I realize that in life there's certainly things that affect our health that are out of our control. I totally understand that. But the goal of this lesson isn't to get you to focus on what is out of your control. We can't do that. It's to get you to focus on what is in your control. And hopefully by focusing on what is in your control with your health and fitness, you can help prevent some of the things that could be long-term out of your control. That's the goal of this lesson. So before we get into the practical things that you can do to prioritize your health and fitness, I thought it would be good for me to share my personal journey to health and fitness. Just to give you context for the lessons that I learned and I'm about to share with you. See, I grew up the heavy kid in, in school. At my peak I weighed 250 pounds. I had broken 100 pounds when I was in kindergarten. I broke 200 pounds when I was in fifth grade. And let me just tell you, you know, someone who grew up the heavy kid in, in their grade, it was not fun. You know, I, I got teased all the time. Uh, one of my nicknames growing up was chunky d a nickname that I was called Forever was Bubba. And again, it was a, it was a fun nickname, but it was really born out of me just being heavy. Kids were actually kids made it up to call me Bubba in third grade because Bubba is rushing for grandma. So kids were basically calling me a fat grandma. And then I, I remembered an experience, you know, I had a crush on a girl in our class and I went to the pool with a bunch of friends and it was the first time I ever took off my shirt at the pool. And I remember her looking at me. Uh, she saw me and she screamed at the top of her lung. She screamed, ah, he is bigger boobs than I do. And I just remember being devastated. I I went into the locker room, put my shirt back on and turned on the shower and just cried for, you know, two hours. And I was devastated. And it was so hard as, as a kid because I genuinely wanted to be healthy and fit. I, I did, I tried, but the, but I just never learned what it actually took to be healthy and fit. And so I continued to struggle with my weight going into high school. And fortunately when I was in high school, I joined the wrestling and football team. And through that, those experiences, I was able to lose a decent amount of weight. I wouldn't say that I was healthy or fit, but I was able to lose some weight. And so I graduated high school and I, you know, I would continue to work out, but I, I never really felt content with where my health and fitness was. Well, in 2008, someone introduced me to a workout program called P 90 x. It was, it's a program that Beachbody created and I fell in love with this program. And I, I would say that I did the whole program, but I only did the workout portion of the program. And so I finished the 90 days and I literally thought I was in the best shape of my life again, it's an excellent program. And I was dating my wife Laura at the time, and I went to the pool with her and my future father-in-law. And again, I had always been, uh, embarrassed to take off my shirt at the pool cuz I was never comfortable with how I looked because I was always heavy. And so here was another time that I took off my shirt at the pool. But only this time I was really excited to take off my shirt cuz I thought, man, my, you know, Laura's gonna see me and just say, just put a ring on me now let's go. And I thought my father-in-law would look at me and say, wow, you've lost so much weight, you look so ripped. Like, I'm proud of you. Instead, neither of them said anything, which was disappointing to me. And then the next day we went shopping at a local outlet store and my Laura went off shopping on her own and my father-in-law and I went shopping and my father-in-law, his armpits were a little sweaty and he said, Hey, we need to talk. And, and he seemed a little nervous and I said, well, what's going on? And at the time he was mentoring me in the area of boundaries and he said, Doug, you know, I know I've been talking to you a lot about boundaries and one area you need boundaries in is what you eat. Because you know, if you think you look like Tony Horton, the the creator of p90x, you don't. And my translation was, you're fat<laugh>. And that certainly is what he meant. And he was having that conversation with me in love. Um, he knew that I desired to be in shape, he knew that I how I wanted to look. And all he was telling me was, listen there, you're, you're missing part of the equation here and let's figure out what that equation is. So I went home after that conversation and I didn't let it beat me up, but I thought, okay, what am I doing wrong? And then I learned, dun da da da P90X came with a nutrition guide. W whoa, mind blowing. And I, I started reading the nutrition guide. I said, they probably put this in the program for a reason. I wonder if there's a correlation with how the program, what results I got with the program and with me only doing the workout portion. Well certainly that was true. The nutrition guide was extremely helpful. I started implementing things in my diet and I learned the diet is really about 80% of, of your results and working out is only about 20%. And so that was the first time in my life that I started studying what it actually took eating wise to get the results that I wanted. And, and that really changed my life. And uh, and I would say from that time on, I got in the shape that I wanted to be. And, uh, I've done, I've been pretty consistent for more than a decade now. And I, I can tell such a major difference in my energy level how I feel, my confidence level and how I look. And lemme just say this, that I still struggle, you know, with, with my weight. I joke that every October fat Dougie comes out and unfortunately every fall from October to December, I'm always committed. I'm saying I'm not, I'm not gonna gain weight this holiday seasons, I'm not gonna do it. And unfortunately, to be honest with you, there's not been a holiday season where fat Dougie hasn't beat me. I've always gained weight in that October to December timeframe. And then in January, from January to June, I spend getting in great shape again. And then I'm usually in good shape for the summer and then I repeat the process over. And to be honest with you, one of my major goals of my health and fitness journey now is to maintain that consistency year round, not just January through October. But that's been my journey and, and I just wanted to share it with you. You know, you may be struggling like I did, you may have been the heavy kid, you may be unhappy with where you are now and that's okay. What I want you to know is, is you have to start with where you are. And if you don't start where you are, you're gonna stay where you are. And so wherever you are in your journey, I want you to know that you can start today and literally transform your life. I share this quote all the time, but I love it. John Maxwell said this, he said, although you cannot go back and have a brand new start, my friend, anyone can start from now and have a brand new end. And that's the reality for your health and fitness journey. So let me just jump into the practical part now of how do you actually prioritize your health and fitness and how can you actually transform your body and be healthy and fit so you can make it to your finish line as a leader? Here's my thoughts, number one. Number one is you have to get a personal vision for your health and fitness. This is huge. You have to get a personal vision for your health and fitness cuz here's what I know, the more reasons you have for doing something, the more likely you'll be to do it. And so if you have a health and fitness goal, I want you to make a list of reasons why you want to be healthy and fit. Here's my list of reasons. This is what wakes me up and fires me up about working out and eating right every single day. Number one, I wanna live as long as possible. I don't know about you, but I'm really grateful for every day that I get to live here on the planet. And I i, if I get to live to be 99 or a hundred, that's incredible. I wanna live as long as possible on this planet and I know that my health, prioritizing my health and fitness will help me get there. Number two, I wanna make it to my finish line. As a leader, being in excellent health, having the energy I need to have every day to sustain whatever I'll be doing when I'm older, I wanna make it to my finish line healthy and strong. I wanna be able to do physical activities with my kids and hey, not just my kids but my grandkids. There's some grandbabies coming my way in 20 or 30 years and I wanna be ready for'em. I mentioned earlier, but I love hiking mountains and national parks. And Lauren, I have it on our bucket list to visit all the major national parks and hike and climb all the major hikes there. I wanna be physically able to do that. I have a bucket list goal of running at least 10 marathons in my life. I've run seven. I want to look good all the time and be complimented for the con my consistency in staying in shape. I consistently run away between 178 and a hundred eighty eight five pounds for the rest of my life. And I want to fit into clothes that I feel great about fitting into. And, and those are just some of the reasons. That's some of my vision on why I prioritize my health and fitness. Again, I just wanna say the more reasons you have for doing something, the more likely you are to do it. So when I wake up and, and don't feel like working out on a day or don't feel like eating right, I go back to those reasons. And so keep your wise in front of you and anything you can find to inspire you, keep in front of you. You know, there's a quote that Tony Robb shared one time that I loved. He said this, he said Nothing Taste is good as fit feels so good, nothing tastes as good as fit feels. And can I just tell you how many times I tell myself that or have told myself that to stay disciplined when I want to veer off of my nutrition plan, Hey, this is not gonna taste as good as fit feels. Again, keep the vision before you as much as you can. And so again, my action step for you is what is your why? Take a few minutes and write down your why. Cuz if you don't have a strong why and you don't have a big vision on why you wanna stay healthy and fit, it's not gonna be sustainable. So the first step is you have to get a personal vision for your health and fitness. Number two, after you have a vision for it, then you have to discover the price you'll need to pay to optimize your health and fitness. And this is huge. Now, I've shared this story before, but a story that greatly impacted my life by John Maxwell when I was 17 or 18. He said that a young man came up to him in the middle of a, of a conference and said, can I talk to you for a second? And John said, sure. And he said, John, I wanna do what you do. And he said, what do you mean that you want to do what I do? And the young man said, well, you know, I, I wanna be a speaker. I want, you know, people paid x amount of hundreds of dollars to come hear you speak, you get to sit up front and and add value to people and laugh with people and, and I wanna do what you do. And John smiled and he looked at me, said,<laugh> young man, I understand that you wanna do what I do very much. I, you know, I wanted to do what I'm doing when I was younger too. And I'd look up to other leaders. And he said, but the question isn't, do you want to do what I do? The question is, do you want to do what I did so you can do what I do? And he said, cuz whatever dream you have, the bigger the dream, the bigger the price. Small dreams have small prices and big dreams have big prices. And so all you have to to do is figure when, when you have a dream is figure out what the price is and then determine whether or not you'll pay the price to go after that dream. And that's exactly what you have to do when it comes to health and fitness. You could want someone else's health and fitness, you can be inspired by it. But if you're not willing to do what that person did and pay the price they paid to get that physique or to get the results that they had, then you're never gonna get the results that you want. And so what I would encourage you to do is think of three to five people who you look up to that inspire you in the area of health and fitness and ask them out to a learning lunch and just say, Hey, I really look up to you in these two areas. Can you just talk to me about the price that you pay to get the results that you're getting? Because I, I wanna do something similar in my life and what advice would you give me? And you'll be shocked at the game plan you can walk away with just by simply having those lunches with people that you admire. Now, for me personally, I'll share with you a little bit about the price that I've learned that I have to pay to get where I want to go health and fitness-wise. And it's very, very simple. Number one is I realize that I'm gonna have to educate myself on longevity, healthy eating and fitness for the rest of my life. And so that's me setting up learning lunches myself with people that I look up to in those areas. It's reading books, it's listening to podcasts. But I constantly need to be feeding my mind ways that I can continue to get healthier and more fit throughout my life. Number two, it's gonna require me to work out five to seven days a week. Now again, that's what I have found works for me over a 10 day period for you, maybe you need three to five days, but for me, five to seven days a week works really, really well. Number three, it's gonna require me to eat healthy at least 80% of the time. That's always my goal. You know, I may have a cheat meal once or twice on a weekend, but in general I try to eat well 80% of the time. Number four, it's gonna require me to get coached and to have regular doctor visits. Again, that's just part of the game plan. And then lastly, number five, it's gonna require me to get proper rest. And I alluded to this in the beginning, but I've learned how important rest is. So I aim for, you know, six and a half to eight hours a night of sleep. Um, I try to have a weekly sabbath, you know, a weekly day off. I try to get away on a two-week vacation at least once every year. And again, rest is such an important part of optimizing health and fitness. So those are some of the prices that I am willing to pay and I'm currently paying in order to optimize my health and fitness. And let me just say this, you know, can you make it to your finish line and not pay a price and not prioritize your health and fitness? Sure, you can not eat healthier your whole life and not work out. And you know, I know people, uh, that smoke and drink every day and eat whatever they want and they live in their seventies and eighties and I'm just shocked,<laugh>, but I don't know about you. That's a risk I'm not willing to take. I I would rather take care of myself and, and put the odds in my favor that I'm gonna make it to my finish line rather than hope. So number two, you have to discover the price you'll need to pay to optimize your health and fitness. Number three, once you've discovered the price you have to pay to optimize your health and fitness, you need to make that price the new standard in your life. You have to make that price the new standard in your life. Tony Robbins said this, he said, people don't get what they want in life, but they absolutely get their standards. And so for me, what is the new standard in my life? It's just what, what I shared with you, those prices that I pay, it's a standard in my life that I work out five to seven days a week. It's a standard in my life that I get six and a half to eight hours of sleep. It's a standard in my life that I have those rhythms of rest, build out, et cetera. You have to make the price that you're willing to pay for to optimize your health and fitness to do standard in your life. And once you do that, I love what Mike Tomlin, the coach of the Pittsburgh Steeler says often. He says, the standard is the standard. And that's just what you need to tell yourself. Hey, I set the standards in my life and the standard is the standard and that's how I'm going to live. So make the price that you're going to pay the new standard in your life. And number four, never give up. Never give up. The journey to optimizing your health and fitness is probably gonna take longer than you think it will. It'll certainly take longer than you want it to. You know, we all want results now, but here's what I know. If you won't give up, it'll be worth it. Cuz here's what I know and I've learned from personal experience. You can go from being in the least shape of your life to being in the greatest shape of your life. If you'd simply like to, you can go from being in the least shape of your life to the greatest shape of your life if you'd like to, if you'd get a vision for that, if you'd keep that vision before you keep your wise, before you, if you would discover the price it is you need to pay. And if you would make that price the new standard in your life, I promise you you'll be in the greatest shape of your life in no time. And I wanted to mention this earlier, but I didn't. But let me just tell you this about working out. If you hate working out in dreaded the best workout, I tell people the best workout is the one that you'll actually do. You know, if you hate running, don't try to be a runner. Maybe you should try lifting or cycling or racquetball or or swimming something else. But try different kind of workouts until you find one you love. Try working out from home. Try working out in a gym. Find something you love and, and don't stop until you find a workout that you'll love. Cuz the best workout is the one that you'll actually do. And here's what I know. Once you find something you love to do and you start paying the price, you'll get to where you want to be. You'll get the results. And when you do, your health and fitness is something you simply manage on a day-to-day basis. And oftentimes when you're in the management phase, you actually enjoy and love everything that you're doing to manage your health and fitness. It's a beautiful place to be. And you could get there if you just won't give up. And so I hope this lesson encouraged you. You know, I know that this was a challenging area for me in my life for so long, and I'm so grateful for the lessons that I've learned in. I hope that you were encouraged by this. I hope that you were equipped by this and I would love to hear your health and fitness journey stories. And so, you know, if you start to implement some of these principles and it changes your life, let me know if there's anything I can personally do to help you. If you would like to talk, feel free to reach out to me and leader. Let me just end by telling you this, that there are people counting on you to prioritize your health and fitness because they need your leadership. Not just now, not just a year from now, but 10 years from now, 15 years from now, 20 years from now. And if you don't learn to prioritize your health and fitness, you may not make it there. And there are people that will go without your impact and your leadership on earth because you didn't prioritize your health and fitness. So this matters, I hope that you'll take it seriously and I pray that you'll make it to your finish line and impact all the people that you were created to impact and do all the things that you were created to do. Well, hey, leader, thank you so much for listening to my lesson on why health and fitness need to matter to you in your leadership journey. I hope it added value to your life. And you can find links to everything that I mentioned in the show notes@lthreeleadership.org slash 2 82. And as always, if this episode helped you, it would mean the world to me if you would share your key takeaways on social media and share this episode with other leaders that you think it could add value to. Again, that helps us to grow our audience and reach more leaders, which is our whole mission here at L three Leadership. So thank you in advance for that. And leader, I just really wanna challenge you like I do in every episode, that if you really want to 10 x your growth this year, then you need to either launch or join an L three leadership mastermind group. Mastermind groups have been the greatest source of growth in my life over the last six years. If you're unfamiliar with what they are, they're groups of six to 12 leaders that meet together for at least one year on a consistent basis to help each other grow to their maximum potential, achieve their goals, keep each other accountable, and to do life together. So if you're interested in learning more about launching or joining an L three Mastermind, go to L three leadership.org/masterminds. And as always, I like to end every episode with a quote and I'll quote, carry New H who said this? He said, the idea that God would use you and me is pretty amazing. He had other options. Never take your journey for granted. Leader. I hope you enjoyed the episode, Lauren, I love you so much. Keep leading, keep making a difference. Don't quit and we'll talk to you next episode.