• New training goals are here!
• Tonal announces partnership with Spartan Race.
• Coach Ackeem hosted a Live Q&A about Ultimate Arms.
• There’s also a new Tony Horton program – Upper Body Inferno.
• April Community Challenge is with Coach Ash.
• New content including Quick Fit: Press 101 & Total Body Balance, Lower-Back Unlock, Max Gain/Minimum Time, and more!

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Watch the episode here

 

Listen to the podcast here

 

Coach Woody Talks 30-Minute Muscle

Welcome to Episode 63.

We should jump right in. What do we have in store for people?

We’re going to talk about these new training goals that dropped on the Tonal Trainer. We’re also going to talk about the new partnership with Spartan Race, the live Q&A that happened with Coach Ackeem in Ultimate Arms, and then also the brand-new Tony Horton program coming up.

People get so excited for Tony Horton.

They love the Tony Horton.

At first, I thought it was Canadians because of Hortons. Isn’t that the donut place they like so much or coffee? I don’t know. I’m not Canadian.

It’s Tim Hortons. Isn’t it?

There you go. Horton here is a who.

They both start with a T.

See how close I was?

You were real close.

Remember when we went to Canada and I was invisible?

Yes, everyone ran into you. I have never seen anything like it.

We were in Canada and people would plow right into me like I wasn’t there.

Only you. It didn’t happen to anybody else in our group. It kept happening to you.

I felt like Burt Campbell in soap. There’s a little reference for the over-50s. I’m like, “What is happening? Am I wearing a shirt that’s secretly offensive to Canadians?”

It happened a lot at the airport. I don’t know why but I agree it was weird.

It wasn’t in my head.

Even the kids were like, “What?”

“Why do people keep doing that to him?”

Not even brushing my arm as they walked by. It was full-on chest-to-chest running into me. I was like, “What are we doing?”

We’re not there anymore. It’s okay.

I was having a flashback. Who are we talking to in this episode?

We are talking to Coach Woody.

She’s not Canadian, is she?

I don’t know. Does that mean we can’t talk to her?

We already did so that was okay.

Plus, she’s delightful.

As Canadians typically.

That is true. On the whole, they are very nice. They’ll say sorry about everything.

I didn’t get a sorry.

You didn’t. I don’t know if it was because of where we were.

We were at the airport.

I mean what city were we in? We were in Vancouver. That hotel room though was gorgeous.

It was pretty nice and not cheap. We were going on a cruise. We flew in for the day because we didn’t want to miss the cruise. We stayed at the hotel at the airport, which was the Fairmont. It was very nice. Our room overlooked mountains and the runway.

It was quite a dramatic background.

It was pretty spiffy. Shameless plugs. Don’t forget that we’re available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, TuneIn, and iHeart. Wherever you find a podcast is where you can find us. While you’re there, be sure to follow us so you never miss an episode. Maybe leave us a review if you like the show. That is super helpful. You can also find us on Facebook at Facebook.com/SupersetPodcast or watch all of these over on YouTube. There’s all that. Let’s dig in, shall we?

Let’s do it.

New training goals are here.

Back when we first got our Tonal machine, there were four goals. They then redid them and made three goals.

Whoever had that fourth goal must have been upset.

I don’t even want to get into it. What they did is there are still three main goals but you can then further emphasize almost a major and a minor with college. Which goal do you want to go in?

This makes sense because I didn’t graduate from college until I was 45. This tracks my fitness journey.

I’ve been playing around with it a lot. I like the fact that there are so many different kinds of options. Let’s say that you’re a person who wants to do weight loss. Once you choose weight loss, there are still a couple more options that you can choose. You want to lose weight but do you want to also work on increasing your lean muscle mass while you do it or you’re trying to hit it hard and double down on the weight loss? Whenever you do something like let’s say build muscle, instead of building muscle, are you trying to build lean muscle mass or get stronger? Those are two different things.

Do you want to get jacked? This is great because whenever you ask somebody what their goals are, it’s always like, “I want to do this.”

There is never not that.

Everybody’s always afraid. “If I do the first thing, I’ll never do the second thing.” It’s like, “Maybe do one thing and get some traction there. Don’t get worried about it.” I do think that that’s good. Part of me is like, “Even if they’re not doing it, it makes you feel good about it. We’re doing that.” I’m sure they’re doing it.

The cool part is they’re going to be making it more robust but whenever you choose these, it filters on the workouts and programs based on what you chose for your goals. With that, I’ve been having fun changing things up like, “What do these workouts look like?” For instance, I was looking at improving fitness and then I went with mobility for every day or something like that. It was funny because I was like, “I don’t want to do any of these workouts.” It was a bunch of yoga and stretching.

Don’t get me wrong, those have their place but it wasn’t what I was looking for to build out my next workouts. I was looking for something a little tougher. That’s great because it gives you, the person doing it, “What is more important to me?” It starts to make you think of it backward. It can be a conversation that happens the way you start thinking about it but then when it gives you the feedback, it’s like, “Did it match what I expected or not?” I found that very helpful. Have you played around with your goals at all?

When I logged in one time, it was like, “What do you want to do?”

It is important to diversify your fitness regimen in any way. Click To Tweet

What did you say? Do you know?

I don’t remember what my choices were.

Improve athletic performance and lose weight or fat loss. It might’ve been the way they said it. Build muscle. Those are your first tier.

I probably did build muscle with a minor fat loss. It’s what I said. Does that surprise you?

I thought it would be build muscle, build muscle. When you get to build muscle, it’s like, “Do you want to make the muscle bigger or get stronger?” I thought you would be build muscle and make bigger muscles.

Maybe I did that. You gave me 2 options and I picked 2. You gave me three and said, “Pick two,” I picked two. After I picked two, you told me there were different options to pick.

That’s not what I said. You had the first tier of options and then there’s another set.

I started with the muscle and then I might have said that.

I was just curious. I can always dig around in your app later. Better not have anything crazy in there.

I don’t think you can have anything crazy in there.

I don’t think you can either. I was just being silly.

Tonal has announced a partnership with Spartan Race.

This kicked off back in February 2024 at the Spartan Race in Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. We talked about this a little bit with Woody during the interview. Tonals were set up on the course as an obstacle and then participants were challenged to complete reps of the rotational chop. Coaches Joe and Woody were on hand to guide and encourage racers. In total, the racers lifted more than 3.3 million pounds in a single day of the competition. Isn’t that amazing?

That’s a lot.

There’s also another race coming up for May 18th, 2024 in Tampa. I don’t know if there’s going to be more coaches there. I suspect there will be.

It seems like there could be. It took me 4 years to lift 3.3 million pounds.

It’s one of you.

That’s true.

There are all the racers combined.

I am singular.

You’re right. Look at all the people that were together that had to race.

Before Tonal, I was closer to plural though.

You have lost an entire person.

A young person. Young people are people too.

It’s very impressive how much weight you’ve lost.

Coach Ackeem hosted a live Q&A about Ultimate Arms.

We’re going to be interviewing Coach Akeem coming up on a future episode and we will be talking about Ultimate Arms as well. Tom, you’ve been taking that program. Do you have any things to share as a forward-looking program?

I’ve been doing Ultimate Arms. The real question is, have you noticed anything about my arms?

Your arms look great.

Are they ultimate?

Your triceps are very tricep-y.

I’ve been doing that for a while. I’ve been taking this one slow because I’ve been having some arm pain before this. I don’t want people to think this workout caused my armpit. I’ve been probably going at it a little bit slower than I would normally. I feel like I’ve been in this program forever.

You whip through them pretty quickly.

If it’s 4 days a week, I’ll do 5. In this one, I’ve been doing four days a week and then a core in between.

It is good. We’re going to get you on some of those balance exercises though.

I hate them so much.

That’s why you need to do them.

I’ve been going at it a little bit slower. I’m entering my final week.

Do you want to share with them what’s going on with your arm?

It’s tendonitis.

Specifically how it hurts. I find it interesting that when you raise your arm, hurting is the wrong word to use because it feels like the strength goes away.

There is some pain to it like muscle ache. When I try to lift something like a jar of peanut butter, if it’s on the floor because that’s where we keep our peanut butter and I go to lift it, when I get about even lower my arms, perpendicular with my body, I lose power. It takes a lot of effort to keep lifting it and get it on the counter.

Your days of doing the claw machine are over.

I get to Frankenstein. I get up there and then it doesn’t want to go up higher. It feels pain. There’s no power to it.

I have experienced that but on my knees whenever I’m going upstairs. That’s annoying. It’ll be like, “Your knee no longer works. Goodbye.”

Front raises are one of the hardest things for me.

That’s when you should put on the old recovery mode while you’re recovering.

I did last time. I dropped the weight a little bit because I was like, “This doesn’t seem like I should be doing this much.” As much as I always feel like a failure when I drop the weight, I’m like, “I don’t want to cause more damage.” I did the right thing. We will be talking to Coach Ackeem here soon and getting the full scoop about Ultimate Arms. Tony Horton has a new program, Upper Body Inferno.

It dropped on March 15th, 2024 and it has supersets, drop sets, and trisets to maximize time under tension. It’s all about your arms, back, and chest. It’s another very upper-body-focused program. I’m sensing a theme.

Everybody wants to get jacked for summer.

Sometimes, we become a little bit too comfortable with our fitness regimen. The key to growth is to step into temporary discomfort. Click To Tweet

Don’t skip the leg days, boys.

Ultimate Arms does have leg days in there. You won’t skip them. You’ll still do them. The April Community Challenge is with Coach Ash.

I believe this one is called Everyday Athlete. It’s her new program that’s dropping in April 2024. It’s going to be intermediate. You’re going to be able to use it whenever you’re like a person who’s working on endurance goals. It’s for a person who chose, “I want to improve my fitness. I also want to work on my endurance so I can go harder for longer.” That would be the person who would want to look at that Everyday Athlete program.

As always, Tonal has tons of new content for people and we will discuss it. The first item up for bid is Quick Fit: Press 101 with Coach Ash.

This is another upper body workout. I like these little fifteen-minute ones because they’re nice to squeeze in between your off-program days or if you’re not in a program at all. This one is all about locking in your form for pushing exercises. We have the Quick Fit: Total Body Balance. This one is with Kristina Centenari. It’s also fifteen minutes. This one is going to do the entire full body and you’re working on the stability pathway.

We also have Lower-Back Unlock with Coach Shelby Hicks.

She’s one of the new guest coaches. That is a lower body fifteen minutes. Weak core muscles, tight hips, and hamstrings, all of those can contribute to lower back pain so addressing those root causes with yoga can help loosen up your lower back, and this class will do that.

There’s also some new mobility stuff with Lower Body Rollout with Coach Woody.

It’s another great fifteen-minute workout. This is going to be perfect for sore and stiff legs, a slow-moving ten-minute session.

You could also check out Max Gains Minimum Time Chest.

I love these. This is a very short but intense Custom by Tonal session. It’s all about the chest. You’re going to do advanced muscle-building techniques that are going to make sure you get the most out of every rep but the rest periods are short, which are 15 to 30 seconds. You’re going to get in, get out, and get your gains without wasting time.

It’s a series so you can also check out Max Gains Minimum Time Back.

It is the same kind of process but this one is for your back. There’s one for shoulders. You do the same thing for fifteen minutes. Those rest periods are short for this one as well. They also have one for the arms and the legs. Both are very short. The way that you could stack this is to do 1 each day for 5 days of the week. You had a whole workout but it was very minimal. It’s perfect to add to cardio.

You could also drop them in with other workouts. If you’re doing Ultimate Arms or Tony Horton’s Upper Body Inferno, you can hop on and do legs for fifteen minutes and not feel like you’ve ignored them.

That’s a great point. It’s a nice way to round out your workout.

I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.

It was okay.

Great points are not my job so I will try to keep those to a minimum.

You did good, though.

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In this episode, joining us is Kendall Wood but you call her Coach Woody.

It’s so good to be on the show.

Training Program

It’s good to have you back. It’s been a while. I’m so glad to have you here. We appreciate you being here. One of the things I wanted to talk to you about was that I heard that you have a new program coming out, a 30-minute muscle level-up. What does this program consist of?

This is the second iteration of the 30-Minute Muscle Franchise. The first 30-minute muscle chapter or iteration was my first program on Tonal. That program is several years old. It has remained at the number one spot in my program rankings forever. It cannot be kicked out. The people continue to go back to 30 Minute Muscle OG. I saw that and said, “I got to give them the next level. We have to give them the updated second iteration.” I have evolved as a coach. My programming style and members have evolved. It’s time to give them the next iteration. That’s what 30-Minute Muscle Next Level is.

When you go back and do a second iteration of things, is that intimidating? If people loved it that much, is there a part of you that’s like, “What if they don’t love this one as much?”

Crystal, the three of us were chatting about the idea of getting started at something and not holding back because you think that you can do better but getting started and putting it out there. With that 30-minute muscle, the first one would be my attempt at getting started. The second iteration is I’m looking at that first one and going, “I know that they love this and I still love this but I know that I can do it better.” I’m putting a little pressure on myself because I want to meet my new standards and live up to the standard that the first one set. It’s been so much time and I’m confident in the way that I have evolved in what I’ve learned since then, I knew that this one wasn’t going to disappoint.

Everybody wants a godfather two. Nobody wants a godfather three. The pressure is high.

Two-Week Program

The pressure continues to mount as I look forward to the next iteration. I’m hosting the community challenge for February 2024 in the Official Tonal Community. Everyone is already asking. This is a two-week program. I stacked on another program for the second two weeks. It’s a superb follow-up to the 30-Minute Muscle Next Level. As soon as we finished this two-week program, everyone was like, “When is the next one?”

They always want more. What’s different with Next Level from the original?

The Next Level is more intense to put it in one way. We’re leveling up in intensity by increasing volume and movement progressions and advancing the whole program in terms of pace and how we go about it. I’ll dive into how I went about programming this. My whole thought process behind that original 30-minute muscle was I wanted to give members a peek into how I love to train. It’s a high-intensity interval training. That is what I love to do. I love to pair heavy resisted movement with hard-hitting body weight plyometrics.

I did that in 30-Minute Muscle Next Level. You see a lot of, on Tonal, hard-hitting long intervals. We’re accumulating volume on Tonal. We take what we’ve done in producing power and accumulating volume on Tonal. We bring that into plyometrics off Tonal, which also involves powerful movements. What I’ve noticed is that members look at this program and get intimidated by it because HIIT isn’t for everybody. A lot of people run for the hills when they see HIIT.

We don’t run but we walk briskly. If we were going to run, we might do the HIIT.

What I enjoyed seeing that has been gratifying for me in this challenge is that members of this community are surprised at how they’re able to take these sessions down and what they’re capable of. More often than not, we underestimate our abilities. Even if HIIT hasn’t been the direction that you’ve run in, you should give it a try. It’s important to diversify your regimen anyway but you stand to surprise yourself.

It is easy to do what you’ve always done. Working out doesn’t feel simple or easy. When you’re working out, you can fall into a complacent role where you think you’re working hard and going outside your comfort zone but you’re doing the same thing over and over again. You’re not going to see results that way to your point.

Progressing your regimen or program can manifest in a number of ways. Progressive overload is the key to manifesting or eliciting change. You’re right that we can sometimes fall into this comfortable area and the key to growth is stepping into temporary discomfort.

Adding Volume

Besides progression, if you’re adding more volume to this one, is there a benefit to that?

Another way to say that would be when we consider progressive overload, we can manipulate that in a number of ways. When you look at volume, volume is the overall load. We can do that by increasing our reps and time under tension, which might mean applying eccentric mode on Tonal or performing eccentric reps. Time under tension is king when you’re chasing hypertrophy. When you look at progressive overload, you want to consider those factors that fall underneath it. Am I challenging my muscles and body in terms of the weight that I’m lifting, how many reps I’m doing, and how much time I’m spending under tension?

What would you say to people who are like, “It’s only a two-week program. How am I going to get a benefit out of only two weeks?”

First of all, dare I say that the ending of this program is bittersweet. On one hand, you’re like, “What a relief.” My team in the community is like, “Where’s the next one? We need two more weeks of this.” We talk a lot about cycling. Cycling our years’ worth of a fitness routine would look like a macrocycle. You’ve got your whole year lined up but within that macrocycle are microcycles and mesocycles. These are big words for how you break down your time and approach a program.

A program is going to benefit you in any length from 2 to 8 weeks. A two-week program is massively beneficial, especially one of this intensity level because depending on your fitness level, this level of intensity might be one that you have a capacity for at only two weeks. It’s time to switch gears and enter the next phase. Rest assured, these two weeks are going to challenge you. Within these two weeks, we’ve packed in and made sure we have progressive overload. You’re going to see the benefits and reap the results.

I’m curious. This one is more intense than the last one. If you haven’t done the previous one, can someone jump in here? Before they get to the next level, you have to do the first one.

We had a conversation about how we would lay out this February 2024 challenge. The initial thought was, “Let’s put the first iteration of the 30-minute muscle in the first two weeks. We’ll fall into this new one in the second two weeks.” My only rebuttal to that was that the program is a few years old. I wanted the excitement factor to hit right out of the gate for this community challenge. I opted to put the new iteration in the first two weeks and followed up with a program that came out in 2023.

The thought process behind that was it is a few years old. The programming and I have evolved. This challenge is intermediate advanced. Jumping into the second iteration of the 30-Minute Muscle Franchise is doable if you consider yourself an intermediate-advanced fitness person. If you feel like you need to backtrack, you want to work your way up to the next level and start with the first chapter of the franchise because it will set the foundation and expectations of what’s to come when things get a little bit more intense in the next level.

You can approach it either way, depending on how you feel comfortable.

You can also flip that. We did the second one. If you want to go back and do the first one, why not?

You’re still getting a benefit from it. There’s this way in our brain that things have to go in order. If you do 2 and then 1, you are messing up people’s orders. We don’t even know how to process that, Woody. You’re giving us permission. We can do 2 and 1.

You can and I get it. In our minds, it’s ingrained that we go in order. I understand that. If you want to try the fresh one and go, “I liked the fresh one,” why not go to the OG? It’s the same approach to programming and formula but set in a different way without certain movement progression. You’ll still see results.

Motivation and Discipline Tips

You’ve been talking about this February 2024 challenge but I want to back up. You finished up the Four-Week Fast Track. That means that, in February 2024, a lot of people are dropping off their goals for 2024. What advice do you have for people who are looking to stay motivated and disciplined so they can keep the momentum going?

Something that we did in this Four-Week Fast Track in 2024 was introduce a number of different training methods every single day. I could see that being a little cognitively overwhelming. They all appealed to the same goal that we had at hand and contributed to that goal. The same movements were set under a new formula. The idea there was that even though we were revisiting the same movements to establish movement proficiency, see progressive overload, and progress over the course of four weeks, we wanted to keep everybody engaged.

That idea of being engaged is the thing that I want to hinge on here. We introduced all these different formulas. The hope was that you would find the one that you were like, “I loved that. I want to do that again next month.” With that in mind, even if you didn’t do the Four-Week Fast Track or you’re not sure of what all these formulas mean, the key to sticking with a fitness regimen is finding that one thing that floats your boat.

Every time you go back to it, you say, “I enjoy this. It’s hard at the moment. I can tell that it’s challenging me but I love the way it feels and I feel afterward. I want to keep doing it.” Included in that is not only the formula or style of training but how many times per week. How does this fit into your schedule? Finding out what works for you and not just adopting what works for everybody else is the key to sticking with your goals and routine.

Think about a two-week program. If you have identified which style of training works for you, dive into a program that applies that style of training. Maybe it’s only two weeks. You’re not getting bored. You’re staying engaged. You’re not overwhelmed like, “This is a four-week program. I’m ready to jump ship after week one. I can stick with it for two weeks and then I’m on to the next.” Whatever helps you in your mind, like swallowing that pill that seems less overwhelming, is the key for all of us to stay connected and in tune with our goals.

Look into the next month thinking about how you can spend it with the most valuable and fulfilling experiences without breaking the bank. Click To Tweet

I like that you call out that some people need different things. We all need different things to keep us motivated. You see comments where people say, “I only like this or that.” That’s fine. Everybody has a different style. It’s important for people to remember that’s why you have such a huge variety of content and these different durations of time because you’re trying to appeal to as many different kinds of people as possible. I love that because Tonal can meet people wherever they are. That’s important.

I could have said it better myself. It’s both a blessing and a curse that we have such a wide variety of content. It’s hard for you to choose what’s right for you, especially if you read a description that says, “This is German body comp training founded by Charles.” In 2024, you’re like, “Does that apply to me? I have no idea.”

It’s like you’re standing there while I’m reading these things. I’m like, “What does that mean?”

We offer so much and continue to produce incredible content but our next step is clearly outlining how to choose which programs are right for you and how to keep that going for an entire year or macrocycle. We’re guiding you and holding your hand the entire way through.

Half Marathon

When you have very specific goals, it is so hard. I always have FOMO. Whatever I am working on, as soon as you put it out, I’m like, “It’s a shiny thing. I want to try that.” I’m like, “Focus on the goal.” It’s hard because I want to try the new shiny thing. I also wanted to ask about your resolution that you started in 2023, which was completing your first half marathon. I’d like to hear about that. How did that happen?

I had never completed a running goal for myself. It’s never been a thing that I was like, “I’m going to run all these miles for funsies.” Every year, Disney has multiple races. A couple of friends of mine had done the marathon in Disney. My sister has two kids. They are big Disney people. They take the kids there every year. I’m like, “I’m going to pitch to her that we do a Disney marathon.” It started as a marathon. I was like, “Sis, should we do this marathon?”

Immediately, she said, “No.” The next day, she came back to me and was like, “Let’s do it but start with a half and see how it goes.” She went out and bought herself an Apple Watch. She acquired a free treadmill on the Facebook marketplace and hit the ground running with training. She was showing me up every day over the course of our training. We set our date and held each other accountable throughout the entire course of training. This was three months of hard-hitting training. Every day, I was like, “Did you run your miles? Did you do this workout?”

The driving factor was having this experience with my sister, which was the coolest thing ever. She’s four years older than me. We always missed each other in school. When I was going into high school, she was leaving. When I was going to college, she was leaving but I was only always falling in her footsteps. She was a cheerleader. I was a cheerleader. She played softball. I played softball. She went to Penn State. I went to Penn State. I always went after her rather than having the opportunity to do these things together.

We finally got to do this thing together. It was cool and awesome. I documented the whole training process and the half-marathon race, which started very early. There was another 3:00 AM wake-up call but it was super cool and gratifying. I won’t lie. My joints don’t love running long distances. After we completed it, we waited a few months. We were like, “There will be another one in our future but let’s table it for now.” She then was like, “Should we do another half?”

We’re going to stay tuned because those are hard races to get in. Those are notoriously hard. The lottery on those is over in seconds. It’s crazy.

The day they opened registration, it was her on her laptop, computer, and phone, and me on my laptop and phone. Who can get in first? We nailed it.

Do you get to hit all four parks in a half? How does that work?

We started and ended in EPCOT. We ran through Hollywood Studios. With the full marathon, I would imagine you run through more parks and have the ability to do that because some of them are quite spread apart. It was super sweet. EPCOT might have to be my favorite park.

I had a friend who did the full marathon at Disney. This might convince you and your sister to do it because it got me. She’s a big person who loves Disney. When you go through all the different parks, you run through the castle. They play When You Wish Upon a Star as you come through. She was bawling as she went through. I was like, “That would be me.”

It’s an emotional experience. The Disney races are super cool because they provide entertainment along the way. They had live bands, DJs, and characters. You can imagine that people are stopping. They want to take pictures with the characters and engage with whatever entertainment is happening but I remember we were nearing the finish line and there was a high school choir. They were singing. I can’t even remember what the song was but it was beautiful and fitting. I’m like, “I’m tearing enough. I’m going to cry. I’m about to cross the finish line with my sissy. We’re doing this thing.”

Goal-Setting Process

While we’re talking about resolutions, you also made a list of what’s in and what’s out for 2024. What’s your process for goal setting and holding yourself accountable in 2024?

The whole what’s in and what’s out trend became a trend or a thing on Instagram. I saw it and was like, “I love that.” I love the idea of ushering in themes and pushing out themes that maybe are no longer serving you or you don’t want to see more of in the next year rather than setting these set in stone big lofty goals that we inevitably are like, “How am I going to work towards this?” I liked the idea of thinking about it in terms of, “How do I want to feel? What do I want to see more of?”

At the end of the year, what do I want to look back on and say, “I made the most of this year?” In the past, I was like, “What have I done at the beginning of a new year? I’m not sure.” I’ve set lofty goals. I haven’t looked at the calendar year as a whole and have been like, “This is what I’m going to do over the course of 1 month, 3 months, or 6 months.” In 2024, I approached it differently. I’m dubbing it the Year of Enrichment.

My thought process there is that I want to add value in terms of experiences. Who do I want to spend my time with? How do I want to spend my time? Time is our most valuable asset. At the end of the year, we look back and go, “That year flew by. What did I even do?” I’m looking at each month like, “How can I fill my time with the most valuable and fulfilling experiences?”

It doesn’t have to be something costly. I want to make sure that I’m looking at my time and going, “I haven’t seen this person in a while. I’m going to make sure that I reach out and spend some time together. I’m going to see my family at least once a month.” Here comes the costly portion. I would like to travel more in 2024.

I’m going to Europe for the first time in my entire life. I’m very excited about it. I cannot wait. I’m going to start in London, make my way to Paris, and finish in Amsterdam. I’m thrilled about it. I’m a little bit overwhelmed because it’s my first time going overseas. It’s going to be incredible. That’s how I’m approaching the year. Each month, I want to have something to look forward to. It doesn’t need to be some big travel goal but how I’m spending my time is becoming paramount to me in 2024.

I feel like EPCOT inspired your travel. You’re like, “I want to go to the real places.”

I loved what I ate when I was in Germany. How can I get that?

Travel Stories

Are you traveling alone? It’s not that you need to say who you’re traveling with if you are but are you going by yourself or with other people?

I will be traveling with a friend who has already been to 2 or 3 of these places. She’ll be my guide, companion, and travel buddy. It’ll be great.

We went to London for the first time. Everyone speaks English there. It’s not intimidating in that sense but there are a lot of things that are different. I was thinking about how intimidating that would be if I had gone by myself. Walking around is different because how they get up in the morning is different. The feel is much like New York but not in the morning. Everyone sleeps super late. I was going to visit Peloton Studios.

I’m walking down the street and it’s 6:00 AM. There’s nobody out. I was walking down these little alleyways the first morning I was there. I had no idea where I was going. There were no lights. It was terrifying. It was like that every morning. It’s a beautiful city. I had no problem. There was no crime and I don’t mean that at all but it was intimidating when I was walking there. I was thinking, “If I had to do that whole trip by myself, how scary that would’ve been, especially going into other countries.”

Suddenly, I felt like London was where I should live without these early morning starts.

You would like that. Breakfast is so different there, in my opinion, because they eat light food. They don’t have a big breakfast. There’s no Denny’s. That’s not a thing.

There are no giant-sized pancakes. What do you mean?

There are tiny cafes. Nobody opens before 10:00 AM. Starbucks is all you have. There are no breakfast places to sit down and have a big breakfast. It was weird. Crepes were the only thing I saw.

It’s something that I’ve considered because I look at the map to map out where I want to stay or how I want to approach each day that I’m there. I’m gaining all this knowledge of how the grid of the city is laid out. Once I’m there, I’m going to feel like an ant. I have no idea where to go. In New York City, I imagine everybody feels that way when they visit here for the first time. I live here. I’m like, “I understand the grid fully.” If I walk out of a building, I know exactly which way to turn but when I am in a new city, it’s not going to be easy. I’m trying to mentally prepare myself for that but we’ll see how it goes.

You’ll do great. London was a lot easier to navigate than New York. I get lost everywhere. You need to know that.

If you felt like it was easier to navigate than New York, I feel like I’m set up well.

Vlogging

I also noticed that you seem to be making a new commitment to vlogging. What can we expect in that world?

That goes under the umbrella of the year of enrichment, Crystal. I started a YouTube channel in 2020 when the world stopped spinning. I loved it. I found that having a way to express myself and a creative outlet was very fulfilling for me. Even if I put up this video that I had worked so hard on and got zero views, I felt a sense of pride in how I committed to filming and editing it. Ultimately, it reached publishing. It was fun for me to document my life and put it out there for people to see and hopefully enjoy. After I started working for Tonal, that fell by the wayside. My priority shifted. We have all these things that we want to excel at.

Inevitably, we stop excelling at one of them in favor of the other. Here I am picking it back up. I’m reinvigorating my YouTube channel and trying new things. I’m back on the theme of evolution and growth. I’m getting started with something and seeing how it moves and grows. I see how I can do things so differently several years later. I’ve been doing that. I get to tie Tonal into it rather than keeping it separate. In my travels of the year of enrichment, there will be many vlogs for those. The YouTube channel is for me. One of my goals is to have that creative outlet because you know that it makes you feel good, happy, and fulfilled. It’s a goal to keep that going in 2024.

Go-To Snack

While we’re on the topic of your social media, your handle is @WoodySnacks. What’s in your snack door? What’s your go-to snack?

I’ve been eating a lot of BjornQorn. Have you heard of this?

No. What is that?

I found that at Whole Foods. BjornQorn, if you’re reading, please sponsor me. It’s a bag of popcorn with delicious seasoning on it. I get the spicy one. In one sitting, I could throw back this whole bag of BjornQorn. My stomach will be gurgling for an hour afterward. It’s okay because it’s good. BjornQorn is high on my list. In keeping with all of the activities that I’m doing on Tonal, this is not as fun but I’ve been trying to increase my protein content.

In the community, some of my friends have asked, “What are quick ways to get some protein?” I created a video for them. I included hard-boiled eggs. There’s no denying that. Chicken sausage is delicious. A good macro is in most chicken sausages that are already prepped and fully cooked. I get a lot of chomps, which are good old-fashioned meat sticks. You can order those on Amazon in bulk and they have a taco one.

I have a sweet tooth. I’ve been trying to combat my urge to reach for a pint of Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey because the pint will be dusted in no time. I’ve been getting these Koia pre-made protein shakes in chocolate banana. I look forward to this every day. At night, I put it in the freezer but not for too long and it gets a milkshake. It is so good.

You also might consider sugar-free Jell-O and adding almond milk to it. That’s a good one.

I’ve never heard of that.

I love the banana. It’s weird. I wouldn’t have chosen banana pudding but whenever I have it with the almond milk and whip it up, I get the powder and mix it in with the almond milk myself, something is so refreshing about that. I don’t know. I love it.

Closing Words

Crystal might have to change her IG handle to @CrystalSnacks. Woody, thank you so much for taking time out of your day to join us. Do you want to remind people where they can find you in all the places?

@WoodySnacks on Instagram or YouTube.

Thank you again for all of this.

Thank you both so much for having me. It’s always a blast. I appreciate you so much.

We have all these things we want to excel at and inevitably fall short at one of them in favor of the other. Click To Tweet

Thank you.

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That brings this episode to a close. Where can people find you?

People can find me on Facebook at Facebook.com/CrystalDOKeefe and on the leaderboard, @ClipOutCrystal.

You can find me on Twitter @RogerQBert or Facebook at Facebook.com/TomOKeefe. You can find the show online at Facebook.com/SupersetPodcast. While you’re there, like the page and join the group. Don’t forget that you can watch all of these over on YouTube. That’s it for this one. Thanks for reading. Until next time. Keep lifting.​

 

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