Mike Bledsoe “Barbell Shrugged”

DS:
Welcome to the board meeting. Super excited, I’m out here with Mike Bledso. Good friend, amazing person, really just truly a great, great person. Very well known in the fitness space, his fitness podcast is ranked number 1 which is a pretty big deal. It really is, especially for a aspiring blogger like myself. I’m just super stoked to be out here with you. I think that you’ve impacted thousands and thousands of lives with the work that you do, and have done, and told about. I just think that that’s incredible, I really do. For my friends that don’t know you, there’s probably a couple people, tell us a little bit about yourself and tell us about Barbell Shrugged.

MB:
Yeah, appreciate it. First I want to say I just love being out here on the water. This is the dopest idea ever. Yeah, I run the number 1 fitness and nutrition podcast, that’s what iTunes says. We have the most positive comments, five star reviews, all that kind of stuff. We started that show almost five years ago.

DS:
Wow.

MB:
It started because I was running a CrossFit gym with a couple of my partners and we were doing it really, really well. We were coaching really, really well and it was apparent to people in the region. I was getting a lot of phone calls.

DS:
Nice.
MB:
Two podcasts, I listened to Robb Wolf’s podcast: The Paleo Solution, and then I was introduced to Joe Rogan in two days.

DS:
Wow. Okay. Have you met him?

MB:
Joe? Yeah I’ve met him just briefly a couple times. I look forward to one day maybe doing a show with him if possible. We have a lot of mutual friends so only a matter of time I’m sure.
DS:
Well I hear you’ve been hanging out with one of my aspiring heroes in the sporting world, Larry Hamilton.

MB:
I haven’t hung out with him yet, I’ve been hanging out with one of his business partners.

DS:
Yes!

MB:
That’ll probably be the first time. Yeah, it seems like… I’ve been hanging out with Brian Mackenzie, they’re working on this XPT Experience thing together. Yeah, I’ve been hanging out with him a little bit and talking business, and seeing where I might be helpful to those guys. Yeah, because those guys, Larry came up on my radar when I was like 15 years old, and he’s this guy that invented this paddleboarding thing and he was this incredible surfer. That’s when I started surfing, when I was on vacation when I was like 15. The idea of potentially meeting him at some point didn’t even cross my mind. Now at the age of, I’ll be 35 on Monday. [inaudible 00:04:25]

DS:
That’s so cool.

MB:
Yeah I’ve put myself in a pretty incredible spot, making a series of choices over time. Saying yes to the right things, saying no to the wrong things, and over time getting better about putting myself places where I have these really crazy opportunities.

DS:
Who’s your show for?

MB:
Barbell Shrugged podcast is mainly targeted towards CrossFitters and weightlifters.

DS:
Okay.

MB:
It’s really a strength and conditioning podcast, but the largest strength and conditioning audience in the world is CrossFitters.

DS:
I never knew that.

MB:
Yeah. Before CrossFit was around, strength and conditioning, I was into that but it was like the underworld of fitness. There’s strength and conditioning coaches that trained football, and so the gym was serving their sport. CrossFit came in and took a lot of things that were popular with strength and conditioning, and kind of turned strength and conditioning into a sport.

DS:
That’s pretty cool.

MB:
Which is interesting. The whole concept, a lot of things that are happening in CrossFit have been done for a really long time, but they packaged it in a way that was really phenomenal. Being a strength and conditioning guy, the smartest move is to serve CrossFitters because it’s the biggest strength and conditioning audience in the world.

DS:
We were talking about something earlier about balance in fitness and health. Tell me a little bit about that because I definitely have some opinions there.

MB:
What’s funny is, when strength and conditioning became a sport, you’re now living at the gym. I know people who were at the gym 5 hours a day. It’s cool, I mean there’s strength sports out there: Strong Man, Power-lifting, Weightlifting, those are sports within strength and conditioning but they’re fairly narrow in comparison to CrossFit. What CrossFit did was interesting, and it kind of turned that into a sport. What ended up happening is you had a lot of athletes that are very talented, very strong, very agile, had a lot of endurance, and it still relegated to the barbell and the rings. The expression of that strength is still fairly narrow. I think a lot of people might get mad at me for saying that. Look at us out here is, “Yeah you should definitely hit the gym, do CrossFit.” Their entire day revolves around what is happening at the gym that day, versus the other way around.

DS:
I’m not wrong for lifting and doing yoga so I can surf better?

MB:
You’re not wrong for that, not at all.

DS:
By the way we are in nature, and in nature sometimes things change. We might be in the surf line at some point, so if I stop you and we grab this camera, we could do the rest from the water but it could happen. That’s part of it.

One of things I love about hanging out with you, is that you make things that other people would think are difficult easy. It’s kind of like you just have this way about you where, “Oh yeah, you want to go do that thing? Let’s go, it’s done. Here, you want to [inaudible 00:07:38] along the way?” Maybe it has been.

MB:
It’s been a cake walk the whole time. It’s interesting, it’s still not easy. I tell myself that when it’s hard you’re doing something wrong. The truth of the matter is, I’m an experimenter and I’m a seeker of truth and so I never want to go where someone else has gone before.

DS:
Wow. Wow.

MB:
I seek really novel experiences. For instance paddleboarding, it’s fairly new to me. For me, every time I get out here and I paddleboard I’m practicing, but it’s like being some innovation happening there. Yeah. I’m a truth seeker and I like to push boundaries. It’s my favorite thing to do in the world, and because of that I live a fairly uncomfortable life at times and it’s uncomfortable somewhat to the people who are closest to me at times. That is what allows me to show people the way.

I think my primary motivation for seeking truth and doing things that are different than what other people are doing, and just trying things out is so that I can then tell people, “Hey, it’s okay.” This path is okay, or holy shit don’t do that. There’s been a few of those where I was like, “I’m going to try this, I think it’s going to work.” Then it didn’t work at all, and it was painful and it hurt. There was nothing good that came out of it other than the lesson of don’t do that again. Then I go, “Hey people, hey guys don’t do that, but you know what, you should try this our over here.”
DS:
I have something that I’ve been thinking about. You’re so good at many domains, but obviously internet marketing is a domain that you’re really good, at which is kind of unusual for a buff fitness guy, right? You’re an anomaly there. Is it because you have a passion to learn it, or do you surround yourself with people that are really smart, or how did that come to be?

MB:
I did not have a passion to learn internet marketing in the beginning, I had passion for getting the message out, and then I had this realization that that’s all marketing is, is actually being intelligent about how you send your message out so it hits the most ears. I think a lot of times people think about marketing and they’re like, “It’s this business term.” I think business school kind of ruined it for everybody, but marketing’s just like, “How good can I get at telling people what I think they should hear.” The better I am at that, the more people are going to live better lives, and that’s all the motivation I need.

For me I’m not naturally good at a lot of the tactical stuff around marketing, I kind of split things up between strategy and tactics. Strategy’s the bigger picture, this big brand type of thing. I understand a lot of tactics because I surround myself with people who are good at it. The tactics are more of like what are the headlines, how does the headline need to be fitting in? The stuff that people don’t like to think about a lot of times. Man, I’ve spent a lot of money and spent a lot of time surrounding myself with people who are actually really good at that stuff. Just by being around the best in the world at internet marketing, I learned it. I was part of the conversation, I’ve been part of the conversation. I have a lot of people on my team, that they’re really good at it.

DS:
Yeah.

MB:
I can say, “Hey, this is a big idea, this is what we need to happen.” My business partner Doug, as well. I have people on my team that are like, “We know exactly how to get that message out effectively.”

DS:
That’s awesome. It’s so important. So many entrepreneurs think they can either do it themselves, or hire someone without understanding it themselves.

MB:
You got to understand yourself before you can even try to understand anybody else.

DS:
Absolutely. When I think about social marketing for business, I think it’s about finding a group of like minded individuals and adding value. I think that’s what you do. Barbell Shrugged is great content. Waking up every freaking day, you said you woke up at 6 in the morning, what time today, and did a podcast?

MB:
I woke up early so I could do my morning routine, so I wouldn’t have to sacrifice my morning routine before I did a podcast. Yeah we started the show at 9 AM, so I woke up extra early so that I could do my meditation, run to the beach, hop in the water, drink my morning smoothie because I will not be rushed. You won’t ever see me in a hurry, you won’t see me rush.

DS:
Come to think of it I have never seen you in a hurry, that’s pretty interesting.

MB:
Yeah, because there was a time in my life where that was how everything got done, and I’ve shifted. You know what, nothing is worth being in a hurry over.

DS:
I made a pack with myself to never rush to yoga, so that’s a start. I used to find myself, “Oh my god it’s starring in 10 minutes.” I’d be speeding, and I’m like, “Wait a minute, why am I speeding to go into like a movement meditation of yoga?” Isn’t it crazy the things that we do?

MB:
Yeah.

DS:
Then you recognize it one day, I’m like, “Wow.”

MB:
It’s like you missed the point.

DS:
“Stop that, don’t go.”

MB:
That’s hilarious. Yeah. I refuse to rush, so if I didn’t wake up in time you know what I would do? I would just cut my morning routine in half.

DS:
Smart.

MB:
I would just do less. What I don’t do is try to move through it more quickly.

DS:
I think one of the things you touched on is, when we brought up the subject earlier of balance, like nutrition and rest, and not rushing, and getting things done in their time, right? It’s interesting that the people that tend to focus on that tend to be way more effective. It’s not interesting, it’s a commitment, right?

MB:
Yeah.

DS:
You make a commitment to being the best you and taking care of all of the facets: mind, body, spirit.

MB:
Exactly.

DS:
Without that, it’s like you may be the best CrossFitter in the world, and if you don’t sleep or eat right –

MB:
Well you won’t be the best for long.

DS:
– you won’t be the best for long.

MB:
Yeah.

DS:
It’s so awesome out here with you, and we got another couple minutes before we’re actually in the surf line, maybe a few more.

MB:
We could ride them in maybe.

DS:
Yeah. One of the things that –

[00:14:30]
MB:

That’s one of my favorite things.

DS:
What’s that?

MB:
Being out on the water, and seeing hot air balloons.

DS:
Are you serious?

MB:
Yeah. You look down this way, and it’s just mountains. You look down this way, and then you can see La Jolla down there, and then out here there’s hot air balloons.

DS:
That’s so rad.

MB:
Just people enjoying nature.

DS:
The think that I love out here, is just that. I’ve been paddling in the mornings and there’s this seal, and I’m pretty convinced it’s same seal everyday. It follows me along, or I’ll seem him for like 30 minutes, super inquisitive. We’re just in whale season, starting whale season. I saw the first one last weekend. It actually starts in another 3 or 4 weeks and I saw one last weekend. I just know it’s going to happen one day. We’re going to be here and it’s going to be close enough that we see it, or I’ll see him from the house and jump out here.

MB:
Yes.

DS:
It’s going to be epic.

MB:
Hit me up if that happens, I’ll get out here early

DS:
Definitely, definitely. For me, it’s about being in nature. There’s no phones ringing out here, there’s nobody coming in, there’s no internet. There’s no nothing other than –

MB:
These cameras.

DS:
– us and these cameras, right? Thank you Go Pro I love you.

MB:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

DS:
I’m going to imagine that someday there’ll be a drone flying over us that is following us around out here.

MB:
That’s totally going to happen.

DS:
Yeah, yeah.

MB:
Never know. You said there another question or no?

DS:
Yeah.

MB:
Before I derailed us.

DS:
No it’s okay, it’s okay. I think that if I had to ask you, what advice would you give to an entrepreneur? Not necessarily a gym owner, although they’re absolutely entrepreneurs.

MB:
Sure.

DS:
What advice would you give as far as learning what you do, or learning to kind of create an audience online?

MB:
If you’re wanting to create an audience online, it has –

DS:
Asking for me.

MB:
– everything to do with consistency. I don’t know how many podcasts I’ve seen where they posted 10, and you never see it again.

DS:
One and done.

MB:
Yeah or one and done, or they post once every 3 months. The thing that I think has given us the most, helped us out the most, is that we made a commitment to every single Wednesday.

DS:
For how long?

MB:
We have every Wednesday for 4 years.

DS:
Shut-up.

MB:
Then we took a 5 month break.

DS:
Wow.

MB:
Then we came back.

DS:
After 4 years you could do re-runs.

MB:
Yeah, we did some re-packaging for sure. The thing about podcasting, is we kind of got, we go in there. We went hard in the beginning so we really established ourselves. It was all about consistency, every Wednesday. There was show that was similar to ours that started at the same time, and they were doing as many shows but their consistency was not good. The other thing that we always did that they were not doing, is we made sure that we asked ourselves the question. There were shows that we didn’t post, because it did not achieve this, was “When someone gets done listening or watching this show, did they take something away that will make them a better person or help live better?”

DS:
Love it. Love it.

MB:
If that didn’t happen we just wouldn’t post, because that was our standard. Our standard was, can it get better? It was actually something that we learned from Evan Pagan. I think as a whole, as an industry, I think we’ve kind of found where that sweet spot is, but for a long time people bartered their information way too heavily. The people who were giving away more for free, and giving away the best stuff for free were seeing huge returns on that investment. All I’m going to say is don’t be afraid. Even a month ago is not my best stuff now, because I’m always learning. It’s a great way to keep your ass in gear and always be learning. There should be no fear of that if you’re surrounding yourself with great people, and always pushing yourself. I think that’s really helped pushed me forward is knowing that. I said,”I gave you my best stuff last week, what do I got to do this week? I got to come up with my best stuff again.”

DS:
It’s not what you can do for me, it’s like “What can I do for you?”

MB:
Totally.

DS:
If you just go into it with that attitude, like, “What can I do that’s going to be a value to you?” If it’s not a value, don’t do it.

MB:
That and we studied communication. We studied learning. We studied human behavior, and the main motivation behind all that was how do people learn? That’s how we’re going to teach.

DS:
What’s really cool as an entrepreneur in our community is, there are so many bad asses here. To start to do a video podcast, and then have frickin MB: come out here with me and chat for 45 minutes, it’s just frickin awesome man so thank you so much. Thank you very much.

MB:
Thank you for having me.

DS:
Yeah.

MB:
It’s a real pleasure.

DS:
Yeah. That’s awesome. Thank you. We’ll see you next time.

MB:
Later guys.

DS:
Thank you.

Find out more about Mike and Barbell Shrugged on his website.