I was sitting in a coffee shop sometime in July waiting on some friends and I saw a flyer for
canfitpro's World Expo. Now I'm familiar with canfitpro and their annual event, but what really struck me about the flyer was that Tony Horton and Shaun T were staring at me from the front.
I NEED TO BE THERE.
I have a passion for health, fitness and wellness, but these were my people! And I wasn't going to pass up an opportunity to see Tony and Shaun here in my hometown!
The world fitness expo is Canada's largest fitness expo and an opportunity to hang with 15,000 other fitness enthusiasts, trainers, instructors and vendors.
I scored myself a ticket, planned out my day and the next thing I knew I was gearing up to interview one of my favourite Beachbody trainers - Tony Horton! I was persistent about getting this interview and felt so lucky to be able to make it happen bright and early on the Saturday morning. What do you ask someone who you've been following for years and who you recently spent 8 weeks for 22 minutes a day?
Tony and I talked about motivation, his favourite workout program, letting go and more. Check out our interview below!
You’ve
trained celebrities, people in the military, everyday people like myself
Tony:
you’re not an everyday people, you’re an extraordinary people and you know it
So what is
one struggle that you see among all people – is there any common challenges that you see?
Tony: Is there one? We always want that one, when it’s really about a dozen.
But if anything was to pop into my head I would say that motivation and diet
are the two biggest issues in people. I think if they’ve figured out a way to
stay motivated, and their reason why is rock solid and they were able to make
healthy food taste good, then I think the problem would go away. It really
comes down to those two things.
Obviously hydration, sleep and the company
that you keep – these are all things that matter as well, but really just
understanding why you exercise, how often you exercise and the kinds of
exercise, and you should have a variety of exercise and you shouldn’t be so
attached to the outcome of exercise. You shouldn’t focus so much on your
appearance and your ego and what people say about you and all that nonsense,
and just focus on what you need and do whatever you need to do and do it poorly
– but poorly is a helluva lot better than not doing it at all. And then the
second part of that equation is just eating well. I mean there’s a healthcare
crisis because people can’t eat well. And it seems so simple – it’s crazy.
Tony: yah,
a lot of them think they do. And they tell me “I’m doing everything right” and
then I’ll just kind of be at an event and watch them eat and I’ll think “Are
you out of your mind? This is garbage” Because
they’re avoiding bacon at three meals a day, they think they’re killing it.
But
all the fruit juices, and all those sports drinks and all the chemicals and
salt, and the sugar and the garbage, and saturated fats that’s really where
people are getting into trouble. I had an event recently where I asked a room of
800 people who ate 5-6 servings of vegetables a day – breakfast, lunch and
dinner, and of the 800 people maybe 12 hands went up. So HELLO!
It’s easy when we get excited and we have a goal, but then it’s making it a habit. What would
you say to someone who has been working out for awhile and they’ve started and
they’re stoked, but they struggle to keep that momentum and motivation going.
Tony: Without [health, wellness and fitness], you’re surviving just like anyone else. But with it you thrive and it gives
you the energy and enthusiasm to take on more in your life. And so if you
understand that and you want to take on more, and have the energy and
enthusiasm to really get outside your comfort zone, think outside of the box,
have more experiences, have more adventures, improve the quality of your life
today, avoid the illnesses that occur as we get older, that’s why I do it.
The
whole idea here is to try and stay as youthful as you can. If you train
every day, you will stay as youthful as you can and if you don’t, you’re going
to slip. And you’re going to age at the typical rate.
I have this expression
that people give me a hard time about, and that’s ‘aging is for idiots’ and
what I mean by that is aging is for people who aren’t willing to do the work to
prevent the typical form of aging. It can’t be
sporadic and it has to be for that reason –
not for the typical reasons that we do it. For the inches, the weight and the
dress sizes and for the compliments. Those things are nice, but if you’re
living and dying by that, then you’ll never succeed.
You’re
known for saying ‘do your best and forget the rest’ – so often we dwell on ‘the
rest’ – how do you let go of that.
Tony: Well
you know a lot of time, the rest doesn't have to do so much with our thoughts
of what we can or can’t do and how we compare ourselves from the past and how
we hope to be in the future; A lot of
it has to do with our expectations.
If you have very low expectations you’re
going to succeed. Just have really low expectations, but show up. But don’t try
to knock it outta the park or concur the world. "I want to go rock
climbing so I’m going to start with Mount Everest". You know, for a lot of
people 22 MHC or P90x is Mount Everest. You have to kind of start with the
modifiers – I’m the modifying king. But the rest also has to do with the
company that you keep.
I talk about it in my book – new haters and blockers. And
sometimes we’re a new hater and what I mean by that is we don’t like new
things. New things intimidate us, they scare us and so we avoid them even
though that new thing is going to improve our lives – say like, a smart phone –
that’s a new thing in the last couple of years, but everyone is willing to
figure it out so that we can participate in the process of communication better
than they used to. That’s what P90x and 22 MHC is – they’re a new thing and you
have to figure it out. And you have to be willing to do that because you care
about who you are.
And then the other group of people are blockers. And
blockers and new haters are pretty much in the same category. New haters hate
new things and they’re always going on about how much this sucks and that sucks
and times are changing. And they’re afraid to learn and they like it the good
old fashioned way. Whatever the hell that was. They’re walking around with a
horse and buggy? No. Forget it. Catch up with everybody else and participate in
the modern world.
You are the company you
keep. Can you imagine if your best 5 friends were world class mountain bikers
or rock climbers or surfers or snowboarders and that’s who your peeps were?
Then you’d be really good at one of those things and you wouldn’t have a health
issue, you’d just be kicking ass every day because your environment is awesome.
But most people’s environment – their friends, their family, their bosses,
their coworkers, siblings or whatever are bitching and moaning about how shitty
life is and you need to run from them. Run away from them and find some really
cool people. And if they’re not in your immediate area, you can go sign up for
a class or go on the internet and find people who are doing neat things and
join them or you know, that’s what Beachbody coaching is – it’s an opportunity
to find like-minded people online or at events in your area, like Super
Saturdays or Summits so that way you know, there’s a change in mindset because
there’s a change in physical environment and who you’re around. You can do that
if you’re willing to do that, and you’re willing to be a little bit
uncomfortable and a little bit scared, then life will get better. Yay!
Do you have
a favourite one of your workouts or is that like picking between your children?
Tony: My
favourite right now is 22 Minute Hard Corps
Tony: It’s
so good. And here’s what’s so great about it. There’s a bunch of new people
coming into the fray who would have never done one of my programs. A lot of
people look at my programs, like P90X or P90X2 or X3 and they think they're too
extreme. And for a lot of people who have 100 pounds to lose, they took an
approach that allowed them to get through it. But a lot of people don’t even want
to go there.
And so 22 Minute Hard Corps gives a lot of people who are maybe doing 21 Day Fix
or maybe just going on walks an opportunity to participate in an intense 22
minute workout. That time frame – if people can’t do 22 minutes then you just
don’t care.
But P90X is what brought me here, that’s my first born child and 22 Minute Hard Corps is my youngest child. And you always have to have a strong feeling about that.
If you look
back at your career what’s the biggest risk you’ve taken?
Tony:
Probably stand up comedy. That was a major stepping stone for me – getting up
onstage with my shtick and trying to be funny in front of people and it’s such
an immediate thing.
Unlike if I’m developing a program, I have a lot of time to
look at it and see what it will be like and even all my “jokes” are not
predetermined. They’re spontaneous. And having been an improv actor and liking
comedy, I’m just a fan of laughing. Making people laugh, it takes your mind off
the pain and the agony. But just getting super comfortable in front of large
groups of people and interviews like this, on camera with 3 cameras and a cast.
That’s what acting did and taking those classes did, you know it’s all about
presentation and delivery. It’s about creating a persona that is interesting
for people to watch.
Why is anything popular? If it were somebody else in P90X, would it have been as popular? I don’t know – maybe. Maybe they would have had
to bring their own persona to that equation. But that’s it – just making this
whole process fun, that was a big stepping stone for me. Learning that it was
okay and I could do it my way, using my style and my technique.
One of the
things that I talk about a lot on my blog is mental health, depression and
anxiety – is that something that you’ve faced in your life and in your career?
Tony: Hell
yah. I mean anyone who is eating poorly and not exercising is going to
have some sort of that, especially if they’re lacking purpose. People who are
fired up on what they’re doing then they don’t have as much of that.
What ends
up happening when you’re depressed or sad or frustrated or overwhelmed is that
you’re usually spending most of your time thinking about you. Like “woe is me and my problems and I don’t have this going” and then
there’s a combination of that and a lot of finger pointing, typically. Like “oh
my life sucks and I’m not doing well, and I don’t have enough money and I don’t
have a boyfriend” and yadda yadda yadda – it’s his fault, her fault, their
fault and mom and dad’s fault. Yah – you gotta stop doing that.
There’s two
things you can control to help turn that around. And that’s what you eat and
whether you exercise or not. And so when you eat well and you exercise, you
create a chemical shift inside of your brain. Because all those feelings that you
have are chemical reactions inside of your head. It’s lack of dopamine,
serotonin, brain drive, neurotropic factor – these are chemicals that occur
when you breathe heavy for 20-30-40-50 minutes. And the harder you work and the
more you breathe and the more often you do it, then there’s a dumping of these
chemicals inside the temporal lobe. And so you read John Ratey‘s book Spark and you think “Oh wow, I
have to work out today because I’m not in a good mood". If I work out today
there’s a sort of a shift that goes from “I can’t” to “I can” and that’s what
physical exercise does.
You have to combine it with food because food is
another form of chemicals. You’re not going to see the physical,
mental and emotional shift if you’re not eating well. Both of those things are
hard. Both of those things require discipline. And they both require a plan.
And they both require you to hang around the kind of people who are doing it as
well.
And if you can figure all that out – then you just feel fired up, and you
feel like you can try things and you’re less fearful. And you’re less anxious.
You’re less frightened. And you’re less scared. And it’s purely because you
worked out. I mean – most people don’t know that. They just think that working
out is something they do so that they can run faster or lift more or look good.
And those things occur as well but those are just ancillary after effects. They
aren’t as important as exercising purely for the purpose of becoming a happier,
joyful person. That’s what really it’s about.
I loved chatting with Tony! He's got lots of fun stuff coming up including a cookbook, a couple of TV shows / web series, and continuing to travel across the globe sharing his awesome workouts and approach to life with the masses.
I can't wait to share more with you from my time at canfitpro world expo!
