Transform Your Body NO MATTER YOUR AGE! Jaw-Dropping Results! with Tony Horton

Alex Ferrari 0:03
I'd like to welcome to the show Tony Horton, man, how you doing, Tony?

Tony Horton 0:06
I'm fine. Fantastic. Oh, that was too much enthusiasm. Hold on. I'm great, man. Great to be here.

Alex Ferrari 0:13
Thank you so much for being on the show, brother, I really appreciate it you are. You've been an inspiration to so many people around the world with your amazing programs like p90x and your books and everything. And I wanted to have you on the show, to not only talk about the physical part of what we our journey here on this planet is which is extremely important. Because this is our car. This is our vessel. This is what we walk around in. And the healthier, the better. But also the mind and how powerful the driver is of this vehicle. And you, you have very specific techniques. And also just just experience with that. So I wanted to kind of delve into that. So I wanted to ask you, how did you get started on this journey? I mean, I'm assuming this is your life's purpose, because you've been doing this for a couple years now. So how did you find this, this path for yourself? Because I know it wasn't originally your idea. Like to go down this health trainer path, right?

Tony Horton 1:12
No, not at all. Um, you know, I mean, I was I was a wee lad. I was an insecure kid. I had a speech impediment. I was a tremendous procrastinator, and one of my favorite things was to do nothing, where to put things off, and that's just the nature of who I was as a kid. And Hold on, I'm gonna hang that up. And it wasn't important. President Biden looking for advice. Oh, crap. But yeah, but here's the thing, you know, my father was a super jock. And when he was going through the rigmarole of, of getting himself to be a great athlete, it was not a fun process. I mean, his coaches and his father were just driving them into the ground and it became this really arduous, hideous win loss column lifestyle, you know, and he just, so when I came along, he just kind of left me alone. He just figured, you know, so I would have liked a little bit more help in the journey. I wanted to be a great athlete, I wanted to be a good ballplayer I loved hoop I loved I played I played baseball as a kid but I didn't start I sat in the bench mostly was on the football team. I was a tackling dummy really during the week. That's what was my use as a as a player. I didn't know anything about training, I didn't know anything about like, Okay, if I did all these different things, plyometrics and yoga and weightlifting and functional fitness and hit training, and whatever existed at the time, I would have been a better athlete. And I wasn't really good at asking the right questions to the right people. You know, I didn't have like the high school football coach. You know, he didn't care about me, he just I was on the team. So the other good players could have somebody to run over Monday through Thursday, you know, that kind of thing. And then not till I came out to California that I you know, this is 1980 when I had finished college, I wasn't graduating graduated still six credits short, you'd think they'd give me a diploma by now. You know, whatever, three books a billion and a half millions worth of sales and workout still no diploma Come on. But so I came out here and I just fell in love with the lifestyle. I mean, they were gyms on every corner. They weren't that wasn't like that back on the East Coast, the gym was at the high school. And it was you know, the size of a bathroom and more at the University where I went to school, but I didn't like I'm going to go down to the gym and lift weights forget that. I didn't take a weightlifting course in college just because I was curious about it and I and I really enjoyed it, I felt I found that my GPA went up that month. And I didn't realize at the time that you know, norepinephrine, dopamine, serotonin and all these really fantastic drugs as a result of regular exercise start to appear inside the brain. It's like Miracle Gro for the brain. So but for me, I was just trying to get packs and ABS and biceps so I could meet girls I wasn't really doing it for any other reason. But I did feel more productive and I had more energy and I felt sharper I didn't have to sleep is is long, you know, I got over hangovers, quicker things like that. It was kind of an amazing thing. But I just thought it was coincidence that I came out to here and I read a couple of books did a lot of personal development, which if you look behind me, that's mostly personal development books, you know, Deepak Chopra, and Andrew Weil, and then Gary zouk off and Tony Robbins and Richard Carlson and you know, and they're all back there. And I came out here for a lot of reasons I came out here to be an actor and and I did some of that and I was in little small parts in movies and did some commercials and a couple little TV shows, but I happen to get one gig working for this guy, Harlan Goodman, who was used to be in the music industry and he was working with a gal by the name of Julia Phillips. And Julep Julia was insane. I mean, she was insane. She She co produced the staying in taxi driver and Close Encounters of the Third Kind with her husband, john and they split up and then so she and Harland tried to make movies over 20 Century Fox and and you know, I was done being a pantomime at the pier in this in the assistant manager of the oak tree men's clothing store and a handyman and a carpenter and whatever like a dude pay my, my rent, put some gas in my car. And so I had a real job I was over at Fox I was you know, it's just, you know, you know, this town, you're from this town, you know, with this like businesses like and so Oh look, there's the loan and there's Robert Redford and there's all these people, but I'm still feeding the cat and hiding the pot and making the coffee and delivering the scripts and doing all the shit jobs. But at that time as a young actor, so what was cool about the gig was, if I got everything done, they would make time for me to go on my audition, which was perfect, right? And so, um, I went for I was a skinny fat kid. Excuse me. so skinny fat is sort of a, a term that says, You look skinny, but you got a lot of subcutaneous fat. So my, you know, I fit I was, you know, I was a size medium and a little Pudge had tiny little arms. You know, I was drinking a lot of beer smoking pot and eating pizza. You know, that's how I got by Dr. Pepper was one of my favorite beverages, and that's fine. But But my agent at that point said, Hey, man, you got to get yourself into some shape because you're not, you know, you're not really looking California, you're looking more like pasty Connecticut kid, which is what I was. So I took this, I took my agent very seriously. And I joined a local gym. And that's where all the women were. Anyway. So this was perfect. It was a plus plus, and not that I met anybody there but but I got into it. And I remembered a lot of the things that I learned from that college weightlifting class. And the gym was the sports connection on Ocean Park in Santa Monica back in the day, and it was massive. And there were these classes. I never aerobics classes, and I look in the window and I go, it's all women. Can I go in there? Sure. And I did you know what I mean? And, but I just got into it. I just really got into it. And then Harland who was my boss noticed, he was seeing my, my transformation over the course of like three or four months. And he was struggling, it was super stressful. I mean, making movies in this town. It's not an easy thing to do, you know? And so there's no, I mean, it's so and Julia was pretty crazy. And you know, she had a pretty good reputation having made those three major films, you know, I mean, I had I have those two of those posters from those I have close encounters in taxi or, and, and Raging Bull, which was not one they made. But, you know, these are people that she had dealt with. And I was a big fan of those films. And, you know, even though I got fired every Friday and rehired every Sunday night for whatever, I forgot to change a light bulb or something that was usually why I got fired or didn't put enough gas in the car. I'm like, you know, whatever. Yeah. So, being a runner is you know, but it's a cool way to sort of learn things fast. Anyway, so I was getting in shape and Harlan noticed that I started training Harlan in a in a buddy's garage. And he lost about 3540 pounds, you know, just just I told him to eat better, you know, he was he I got him to get off the hooch a little bit too and and he looked amazing and incredible. And at that point, I started training not only hand but you know, I didn't have a certification of anything. I was just at that later on. I was a member of four different gyms one was kind of an aerobics gym. One was kind of a you know, you name it everything gym. One was a bodybuilding gym, which was world gym down in Venice. And then Lou Ferrigno and Arnold Schwarzenegger and guys like that there was there was Gold's Gym, which was kind of a freak show, you know, further up the street, but worlds gym is where Arnold settled, and Luther it settled. And I would, I would work out with Lou Ferrigno once in a while, and, you know, I mean, I would spy on these guys and I go, alright, 47 sets of chest seems reasonable, I get an event. We're gonna do biceps, if

Alex Ferrari 8:19
I only do 42 so that's probably why I'm not looking

Tony Horton 8:22
like one more set man. And you would be and so I had all this different input from these different kinds of gyms and, and I tried to apply a lot of that to Harland and and then I started taking on other clients, I had a, there was a couple that I trained on the Wilshire corridor north of Westwood, a lot of people don't know what I'm talking about, but I know you do. And they were doctors and you know, I would like to have these boxes, dumbbells up to their house, they could have afforded dumbbells, I should have just told them to buy them. But, you know, here I am dragging this equipment around a mat and dumbbells and stuff. And before you know what I had three or four clients and it didn't have to do as much carpentry and and I had to make a decision whether I wanted to continue to work for Holland and and i don't you know, I just got tired of getting fired all the time and really hard, you know, the following weekend, and I said, you know, I'm going to continue with the acting thing and see how that goes. And I'm going to begin to you know, I'm gonna start this training career. And I write I write about this in my book, the big picture, but you know, Harlan, quit, couldn't work with Julia left Fox start and went back to a place called Easton management, Eastern management used to be on Sunset now it's in the valley and they handled Tom Petty Billy Idol, Tracy Altman, a couple others think that even had a couple actors to like Rob Lowe. And so Harlan was walking down the hallway of Easton management with his brand new, you know, felt body. Tom Petty's smoking a cigarette walking down the hall in the other direction. He looks at Harlan he says holy crap. This is my Tom Petty and we think very much your real way. I'll be doing my Springsteen before you know, I'm I got I'm going on tour. like four months and I'm fat, nobody likes a fat rocker. How did you get in shape you said called Tony Horton. And so he said, Who's Tony Horton? You know, it's Tony Horton's. The guy that got me in shape. So a day or two later phone rings in my crappy little two bedroom apartment in Santa Monica with the view of the convalescent home. And Tom Petty calls up my roommate Bob, who I came out here in 1980 with says, Hey, man, somebody says, Are Tom Petty on the phone? And so I said, hang up, because it's Tom Petty is not calling my house not calling our apartment. So he hung up on Tom pay. And then the phone rang again. Tom goes, Hey, I think we got disconnected. This is Tom Petty and so bad goes, dude, this sounds a hell of a lie. It's a hell of an impression. We have some buddies down below live below us. We're real pranksters, I thought it was them. And so I said, Give me a phone. I said, Hello, who is it? It's Tom Petty. And my friend, Harlan Goodman, and I'm fat and I'm going on tour and can you help me out? Holy crap. So within the next day live in Woodland Hills, he had this rockin little incredible pad, you know what I mean, as any rocker would have. And I go in there, and just gold and platinum records on the wall. And Tom comes down, he puts out his cigarette. And he goes, I don't really exercise. But I apparently according to my management, Tony Demetrius was, was his manager and was all it was his manager job to the day passed away back in October 2017. And so, you know, he didn't have any equipment. So it was this kind of was his consultation, maybe do some push ups and crunches, but I got him a heavy bag and got him some dumbbells and got him a bench. I got him a mat. And I remember the first time we had all the equipment. I talked about this on stage, sometimes I talk about in the book. So you know, here's a guy who never, you know, he just played guitar and sang and you know, and had a pretty good life. And so I put them on the life cycle, the old life cycles, which were, you know, back in the day, those things are relics now, but I put it on level three went to level one to 12 right. And I used to do levels 6789 or whatever. I put them on three and his legs when like barely got around, so I put it on one nothing so I just turned it off, took the tension off and he looked at me like oh yeah, that's better. You know, and literally it was

Alex Ferrari 12:04
I remember when it was off cuz I used to do that too. When I first got

Tony Horton 12:07
Yeah, as a kid. You know, you look like you're doing something right Hi, girls. I am on the lifecycle levels zero IQ the panel is blank, right? Any lasted for a minute? 32 seconds or something? I don't know that often. I mean, oh my god, I handed them a couple of 12 pound dumbbells as a bench press and his arms went, Oh, in every which direction. You know, I thought I was gonna dislocated shoulder. But you know, it was it was rough go there. I mean, he had to start from scratch. But at the end of four months, he's mentioned 45 sets of 12 and 15. He's on the life cycle level six for 25 minutes, you know, doing spin kicks on the heavy bag. And, and, you know, got lean because he was an ectomorph you know, ectomorphs are naturally thin guys, probably from cigarettes and weed whatever else he was doing. But I got him yoked. I mean, I got him stride and and vascular. And I got I got his heart, lungs and legs in shape they have never been before. So he went on tour then I caught up with him for the for the for the Madison Square Garden jersey, Long Island part of the tour. You know, in July again, I you know, just he said hey, I'm getting fat again. Come and join me on tour. So that was that was awesome. Just to be up in the rafters with my laminate. You know what I mean? Like, that was? Right. What do you do? Well, I train Tom, you know, so it was really, it was easier than

Alex Ferrari 13:24
and then. And then. And then after that, of course, then everybody noticed Tom and then everyone started calling you and your life changed for the better.

Tony Horton 13:31
Yeah. And then Billy Eilish called and Bruce Springsteen, and then Stephen Stills couldn't help him. Any Linux who was just, you know, phenomenal. I mean, there was a period there and I've told the story more than once, but when Bruce was in town, Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays, on and off, I have Billy for Billy Idol. First Tom Petty. Then I go to any length, English, any Linux, this house, which was around the corner from him, and then I go to Stephen Stills, and then Bruce, after that, or sometimes, Steven and Bruce would interchange. So I was keeping rock and roll from the 60s and 70s alive. You're welcome. Okay, literally, literally, and it was a blast. But you know, I mean, whenever you're training one person at a time and you're spending an hour and a half with them, and then you got to go from wherever you Century City to Malibu, Malibu to Beverly Hills. It was awesome. But amazing times. I mean, I wish I had, you know, there was no phones, no internet. It was that's how far back that all went. I wish I had because I could do chapters chapter I could do. I could do a 50 page chapter on Stephen Stills alone, man, it was amazing, crazy stuff. Right? just fun. Really fun.

Alex Ferrari 14:38
So that's how it all got started. And then I think the thing that kind of really changed your trajectory was p90x. How did p90x come into the world because I remember hearing it I bought it. My friend bought it he went he went all in like he bought the supplements from Beachbody and he became a seller of of the process of the product. Yeah, yeah, he became a coach and he was like hardcore in it. So I saw him change. I'm like, Well, what is this? And then I got it. And then I started taking it. And he's like, Dude, it's no joke. I'm just like, you know, it's no joke. This is like, it's for serious people. And after that, first that first workout, you just like, on the floor just can't move. But as long as you keep, just keep going, it It worked. But, I mean, everybody heard like, I mean, p90x was like, it almost became like Xerox or zoom. It almost became the word for an intense workout, like, Oh, I got p90x this or I got it like it was. It was such an almost cultural in the Zeitgeist.

Tony Horton 15:39
It became part of the lexicon. Brian, everybody knew about it. It was weird because you know, I was having a long neck a long story good. You know, I mean, here I was, I just met the the now CEO of Beachbody Carl daikeler through a mutual friend and we started training and hanging out together and, and this this call was working for this guy, this mutual friend, Ben Vander Bunton they were working for gothy rancor now got the wrong rancor at that time was pretty well known infomercial company, probably the biggest in the world at the time. And Carl was doing infomercials for things that he didn't really want to do. And then it as we became friends, he just turned to those guys. And he said, Hey, I want to do some fitness. And I want to work with Tony and we want to do this thing called great buddy guaranteed. And it was a short little 1580 minute routines. And in the infomercial world, you know, it's as brutal as anything because you know, you got 100 people that want to create whatever it is Ginsu knives or Total Gym or zoom? Bah, whatever heck it is, is I

Alex Ferrari 16:37
think what was that thinks was in somewhere sold? The thighmaster?

Tony Horton 16:39
I was actually I was in that commercial?

Alex Ferrari 16:41
No, you were

Unknown Speaker 16:42
in the thighmaster. I'm in the commercial where I'm using it? No, no, I'm using it as a bicep. Right? Right. And I'm looking at this girl and she's using it as a bust enhancement thing. We're looking each other we're about to do it, you know, I mean, it's like a product she's entered. Okay, with that segment, yes, has ended, okay, with my many acting games, you know, way back in the day. And so a lot of it was crap. You know, there's a lot of stuff out there that was just a means to make money and no try to fool people into buying silly crap that ends up at the bottom of their driveway in a garage sale, or whatever, six months to two years later. But crowl you know, Carl had worked out with me, and he had seen what I had done. And he had seen what I had done with Petey and Ireland, and Bruce and others. And, and he said, I think there's a way that I can kind of configure a show that that we could tell people that hey, if you do the real thing, it'll work now, great body guaranteed was an abbreviated mini version of what p90x eventually was, it was regular exercise in a diet plan. But it wasn't really more than that. And in the infomercial world, if you've got 100 people trying to sell something, one or two will, will get into the second week. You know what I mean? Because you got to spend money in that media every week, whether they're local spots, or like national spots are crazy expensive. Especially a lot of these infomercials are 27 minutes, you know, I mean, it's not like a half, half a minute spot or something. Right. So they're really expensive. And, you know, usually they're four o'clock in the morning in Poughkeepsie, New York, and then you know, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and in Phoenix, Arizona, that's like, okay, you take the dice, you're gonna roll it. And every time we rolled the dice with media, it worked. People just saw that it was it wasn't. It wasn't bullshit, it was a real thing, you know. And so with some success there, everybody said, like, Who's this Carl daikeler got, you know, I mean, he was the creator of eight minute abs. He was the original eight minute ad guy. So we had a reputation in the industry. And they said, Let's, let's do like what do you do with petting an idol? And these guys like, Can you can you explain these routines to me and why they got great results and your other clients? And I said, you know, we spent, we spent about 45 minutes to an hour and a half Boston Essen working hard. And I tell him to get on the fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean proteins and healthy fats and get off the hooch and get off the fat, sugar, salt and chemicals and processed food and fast food. That's what we do. And he said, Well, let's come up with something that so we came up with power 90 Now keep in mind at that point in my life. I was living in the same apartment for 21 and a half years in Santa Monica with a view of the convalescent home, right like when my car got broken into every Thursday night whether it needed to be around him, it was

Alex Ferrari 19:08
rent control, right?

Tony Horton 19:10
rent control. So my

Alex Ferrari 19:12
only only only way that could happen. So everyone listening can't live in Santa Monica for 21 years anymore.

Tony Horton 19:19
No, no No man things have changed dramatically since but um so yeah, we came up with it. I said you know, it was his ID he called it power 90 it was a 90 day program. This is before p90x right and so you know, I'm $65,000 in debt I got two broken down cars. The only reason why I have two cars is because when we break down on it have to go to you know, get the other one to go drive all over town chain my train my clients and stuff. So we made the thing and for the first I don't know nine months to a year didn't do much because people saw Wow, this is working out five to six days a week I'd eat right and a lot of people got turned off by that. But this is the advent of the Internet. Now. Think about it. The people were they weren't shooting videos here anymore. They were shooting videos in their hands. They are communicating, you know, via chat rooms and stuff. And they were communicating with us to saying, hey, look, this thing works, you should see these before and after pictures and they're submitting their videos in their, in their before and after pictures. And so we stopped using the test group footage and before and afters and we're just using regular people's stuff just integrated that into the infomercial. And so no, here I was, I had a gig power power 90 was different than great body guaranteed because I was getting I was getting royalties and I had an attorney and I was doing grownup stuff. And the first royalty checks were you know, 150 bucks, you know, 380 bucks. So out of the blue like amount like well, this is money for nothing in chicks for free as a as dire straits, said, Dire Straits said thank you. And, and then, and then once the before and after pictures in the video started coming in, and we were using that in the infomercial. It was, you know, kind of flatlining, and then it went through the roof. And I bought a house and I bought a car and I got out of debt. And you know, I mean, I went from a craphole to a five bedroom place on sentinelle, you know, with a view of the Hollywood sign from Santa Monica. I mean, I was I didn't have any money for furniture. So every time you walked in a room, it was like, hey, hey, hey, this this is the Bedroom Bedroom better. I mean, it was then then we did p90x you know, we saw that the the, you know, we saw the effective power 90 and then p90x again. Same thing harder, longer, tougher six days a week, more restricted diet. Like I told Carl, I said, I think you're on your mind. We're powering it was hard enough, you're gonna make it harder. I mean, you know, day one is 24 sets of chest and back. And then the next day is plyometrics. And then the third day, it's in the mail back to us quite often, you're gonna be

Alex Ferrari 21:41
on. The refunds are coming in at that point

Tony Horton 21:44
two days in a row. What am I What am I a marine? What are you out of your mind? A lot of people were like, wow, I can do this much work. in my basement, in my garage, in my living room, watching my television and my boxer shorts. And I don't have to get in the car and go to the gym and sit on somebody else's sweaty, sweaty sweat. I can do all this stuff. And look at all the variety, the Pilates, the yoga, the plyometrics, the hit training, the bodyweight training, the weight training pull ups, I mean, pull ups in a home workout thing was a total anomaly anomaly brand new. And so that thing happened. And you know, good night, Irene. It was

Alex Ferrari 22:18
and then went and took off from there.

Tony Horton 22:20
Global.

Alex Ferrari 22:21
Oh Yeah, absolutely. So you wrote a book called the big picture? Can you tell me a little bit about that book, and why you wrote it?

Tony Horton 22:28
Well, I mean, you know, like I said, if you look behind me, it was personal development that really helped me understand how to be a better, better man. Financially, Fatah's relationships, as far as you know. And when I say personal development, I learned partway through that, you know, self help is when we look at, but really, when you when you really delve into personal development, you learn over the course of time that it's not about you at all, it's about you learning how to get your act together enough. So that it's really about whatever whatever you can offer to other people based on your experience and your knowledge and your in your life. And so that's how I got to this point. And that's how I was able to find the woman of my dreams, that's, that's how I was able to get my finances together, even during hard times. It was based on a lot of this stuff back here, it was learning about mindfulness. You know, I mean, a lot of blood with personal development books I did, we're very esoteric, whole spiritual, ethereal type stuff, not only not only the nuts and bolts of how to make more money, you know, I mean, it was so I was trying to show how to find balance, you know, as a human being, because I was, you know, I went from a lazy procrastinator who never got anything done, who could barely feed himself when I came out here to a super stress, pretty successful guy. And so, you know, it's been a long journey. And and, and I understand that exercise in general and maintaining a good diet is very, very difficult for a lot of people even if they have all the tools I can hand you the entire toolbox, but you have to use it. And so there are elements that were missing in the average person's journey when it came for them to eat better and exercise for the rest of their lives. Because most people are it's a kind of a hit and miss or it's temporary and it's too much about ego and there's too much about aesthetics and is too much about the before and after pictures and not about you and the quality of your life so that you can be a better human being for other people. Right? So that's really what why I wrote the big picture. I mean the title says it all right, so and so there's a lot of nuance in there that didn't that are literally stolen from half of the stuff back here but but but in my you know,

I sprinkle bad luck out and so the first one is do your best and forget the rest right? And you know, I made a whole chapter based on a single single trademark phrase that I came up with years and years ago. And do your best and forget the rest is about well what is today going to bring you know, the biorhythms are going to be different it's storming outside and your kid just put a tattoo on his forehead. I mean life changes instantly based on traffic. And circumstance and, and the temperature outside any number of things. And so what do you need to do? How can you process all this stuff and still show up for your workout and still manage to eat pretty well and, and still have some fun once in a while? And where does mindfulness fit in? And where does supplementation fit in? And what kind of diet do works best for you and who you are, are you an ectomorph, mesomorph and endomorph. I mean, you know, your parents had sex they made you, you're going to be one of these three things or a combination of that. And so if you know if you're trying to be this big, strong bodybuilder guy, but you're really kind of custom made to be a runner, then you should understand that about yourself and know that there are limitations based purely on your genetics, but our the quality of our life, the longevity are alive, that the the ability to avoid the aches and pains and fatigue and, and self imposed problems that we have our our, our relate to three things, it's your genetics, it's your behavior in your environment, those are the three things that are going to product kind of dictate how your how your day, your week, your month, your life is going to go. And so I talked about all those things in the book to help people understand that if you really want to thrive, as opposed to survive like everybody else, then this lifestyle, this thing that involves regular exercise, healthy food supplementation, and a mindfulness practice has to happen all the time, like people say, Well, how often do I all the time? Often you go to work all the time, because you want to get paid all the time? How often do you go to sleep at night, kind of all the time, so that like oh, take 48 hours and not sleep, it's gonna go to shit. Alright, I'm going to skip the next day and a half all. So there's a bunch of all the time stuff that we do to survive, right? I can pay my bills, and I can get by and I can have a couple beers and watch the game with a kid. But you know, tick tock, you're 50 6070s and 80s are common. And and you know, as a 63 year old. I practice what I preach, unlike a lot of people in my field who do it temporarily because they got a gig or going to shoot something so their weight fluctuates like everybody else. I like feeling good. I mean, the joy of the pursuit of happiness is in the frickin constitution. So I do this because I am a happier, higher functioning who have less pain, less fatigue. I'm more in the moment. And it's it's not about you, it's about me. I mean, come on.

Alex Ferrari 27:26
No, no, I get it, I get.

Tony Horton 27:28
It's really about, I love meeting people anywhere in everywhere, who say, hey, you changed my life. And you know, my answer is always the same. The Hammer doesn't build the house, I handed you the toolbox, and you use the damn thing. And there were other toolboxes that were handed to you in the past and you didn't use them. So I'm doing something right because finally it's starting to sink in. And, and so when I see people who go from the survival stage to the thrive stage, and they stay that way for for years and decades, then man oh man, I've done my job.

Alex Ferrari 27:58
I mean, the one thing and this is for everyone listening, you know, when you're younger man, you just do whatever you want, because you think that this road is gonna just get this car is just gonna keep going this way. And Baryshnikov has one of the greatest quotes about this is when you're young, you challenge your body. And when you get older, your body challenges you. And it's such an amazing quote, because I mean, I'm 46 and I feel pains and I feel aches and I feel things and I'm not you know, I've broken my ankles 1000 times. So that's where my pains are. But, you know, I can't even imagine what these NFL guys are, you know, they walk up, they can barely move because all their cartilage is broken stuff. But even if you just just the standard state you like, you see someone like yourself at 63 I remember looking at my grandfather at 63 or my or my uncle's at 63 they didn't look like you. You know, that's generally not the way they looked.

Tony Horton 28:53
I have good lighting in here.

Alex Ferrari 28:56
Obviously, we're and I'll fix it. I know it's all it's all fuzzy. So kinda just really looks good. So don't worry about

Tony Horton 29:05
HD Not a fan.

Alex Ferrari 29:07
No, no, not that 4k. Okay, it's gonna kill us.

Tony Horton 29:09
I am as strong as I am. They're still creeping in various places. What am I gonna do? My bag and I go I got a friggin moisturizer.

Alex Ferrari 29:17
We will fix it a post that we're about it. But as but as you get older, these things change and only as you start hitting your 40s like I felt I felt things in my 30s that like that you could do in your 20s I talked to 25 year olds now I'm just literally sometimes I'll talk to a 25 year old and also have this conversation. I'm like, do you feel like you did when you were 18? He's like, No, I don't. I'm like, it's gonna get much worse.

Tony Horton 29:46
Oh my god. Yeah. 25 year olds complaining about 18 Exactly. Like, are you kidding me? But here's the thing. Here's the thing. I mean, it's 63 there's a whole bunch of things that I do now to me mitigate the aches and the pain fatigue that I that I didn't need to do when I was a kid. Absolutely no. And that's, I mean, I've been vegan here. Now again, this is my third attempt and this one is working well, because I've done vegan before and cheated and did too many carbs and ended up malnourished and sick and tired. But now I've got it kind of wired. You know, I mean, it's a big salad every day. It's a certain kind of shake in the morning and shake in the afternoon and just freakin vegetables like vegetables that I like to eat that I cook and I eat them so that's part of it. Of course, you know, there's there's foam rolling and Thera guns and, and Epsom salt baths and infrared saunas. And you look at you look at LeBron James like why is he still so frigging yolk and so strong and so powerful, is because for every hour that he trains or plays ball, there's two hours of rehab that goes into that, you know, I mean, a lot of young players like and they just do it purely based on, on on athleticism and skill and, and having been great athletes. I mean, I work with a football player and NFL guy for a while, a couple years ago, genetically so gifted, but man, he liked the party, like it was 1999. You know what I mean? And so he his career ended and it didn't have to, I mean, he could have been in a Hall of Famer, but he just too much using party as a verb, man, I get caught up time. So, it like that what you said that Baryshnikov quote, at 63 I challenged myself more than ever more than I did in my 20s 30s and 40s. I mean, I'm doing a chaise on a ninja course in the backyard last Sunday, like swinging from crap and releasing and flying through the air and grabbing really hard things to grab. And you know that I fall on my back four or five times? Yes, but I had I had pad and so you know, that's what's cool. A lot of people my age. Like I see, I you know, I'm not gonna say whatever, but I meet peers. And I go, oh, how are you assuming they're gonna say 77 or something? And they go on 1661

Alex Ferrari 31:51
I'm 52

Tony Horton 31:54
I mean, shocking. You know, I mean, like, you don't have to you don't

Alex Ferrari 31:58
have I mean, I've been I've been vegan for about 10 years, and it's, I've been able to make it work comfortably. I need to balance that a little bit more as far as the, the carb aspect of things, because you could eat Oreo cookies every day and consider yourself a vegan or vegan, maybe still vegan french fries, vegan, you know? So there's, there's there's the junk food vegan like white bread vegan. So it's all about eating the proper nutrient dense foods and balancing it out and things like that. But to what you said something earlier about mindfulness, what is your definition of mindfulness?

Tony Horton 32:38
Wow, it could be any number of things. I mean, most people think mindfulness they think of meditation is kind of the one of the first things are Yoga is mindful, you know, different kinds of like a yoga practice or something. But mindfulness is anything and everything that puts you in the present moment. You know, you're not thinking about the past, you know, making comparisons to yourself in your head and not wondering about your expectations in the future. It's literally something where you feel so present, you can be jumping rope and be mindful, you know, even though it's intense cardiovascular exercise, your heart rates up and you're sweating your ass off, you know, so, you know, mindfulness is walking your dog or going for walks or meditation or breathing exercises or, or in the garden, you know, just hanging out or playing, you know, some just kicking back and, you know, listening to music or reading a book, you know, I mean, I'm reading this book breath by by James Nester right now and so fascinating, fascinating book. And so, anytime you read, you're being mindful to a certain extent, you know, it's really whatever it is that you're doing. That's the opposite of something that is physically mentally and emotionally stressful. So exercise, even though it's physical, it's affecting you in a positive way mentally and emotionally instantaneously, because of the norepinephrine, dopamine, serotonin brain derived neurotrophic factor that goes into your temporal lobe that changes your perspective, your cognition, memory, your sex drive, all of that stuff. That's what exercise does. Most people are exercising with a hope they end up with end up with some sort of aesthetic, ego based physical appearance shift. But a yoga class or cardio or any kind of weight training literally changes the way your brain functions 1015 minutes into the process of doing that, right. So that's kind of

Alex Ferrari 34:21
the endorsements

Tony Horton 34:21
side it can be can be mindful to a certain extent,

Alex Ferrari 34:24
right.

Tony Horton 34:25
But the pendulum most people's pendulum is living over here, right and stressed Outland right, and so the candle is burning out at both ends and you can't figure out why you ended up with shingles in your ear. You know, I mean, it's just because you didn't learn to chill, dude. You got to learn to chill, you got to learn to laugh, you got to learn to relax. You got to go out by yourself damn hammock and lay in it. You got to, you know what I mean? You need to get in the tub. Like I've had seminars here at my house. How many people have had the tub in their house? And most people don't. But most do. When was the last time you were in? it? Never been in been live in my house. 13 years. You've never been in your flippin tub. Are you freaking kidding me? Like people are so freaking uptight. But then they're so impatient that the thought of filling a tub with warm waters and Epsom salts and lying there for 15 minutes seems like they're wasting their time. And so LeBron James, LeBron James is on my, my, my meditation app, he's on my comment, like he gets it, you know what I mean? And more and more people are understanding that. Because exercise in general, it's part of breaking down muscle and, and, and putting pressure on joints and bones and things. So you sleeping is truly for most people, the only mindfulness practice they have, and usually, their their circadian cycles are so out of whack because they don't go to bed at the same time, and they don't go not dealing with the stuff. So they got their head is filled with all this crap. And they lie in bed. And so they're, they're wide awake, and then they have to get up and pee and their mouth breathers so their mouth is wide open. So there's tooth decay and gum, erosion and all these things. So when you learn the basics about the balance between regular exercise, good nutrition supplementation that helps with the healing process and the recovery process, and learning how to chill out like those are the i'm gonna i'm doing a program now called a power of four. And in the past, it's just been sort of the power of to diet and exercise. And now we're adding supplementation as part of a lot of my programs. But the mindfulness thing is kind of new. And it's, it's an important leg to keep to keep you, you know, from getting hurt. And from you coming back and having enough energy and keeping your stress at bay. Do you meditate every day, sometimes four times a day.

Alex Ferrari 36:31
And how long do you normally meditate for?

Tony Horton 36:33
Mmm hmm. The longest all goes a half hour, but sometimes five to 10 minutes.

Alex Ferrari 36:39
Okay, so you just just something to kind of just Just stop it

Tony Horton 36:43
in the morning and at night. I mean, I have something called bilateral vestibular hypofunction because I had Ramsay hunt syndrome in October of 2017, which is singles in my ear. So I had nerve damage in my brain. So I had, I had Bell's palsy. And I had, I had hearing damage, vision damage and, and I had, like a lot of people who get COVID they lose their their their taste and smell. All I could taste was dirt and smell cigarettes four months from this written thing, which was weird, like, Who's smoking? Nobody's smoking? How come this? How come this oatmeal smells like tastes like dirt. It's just this the way the nerves are fried. And they're pissed off, because you got shingles in your ear. And so, so as a result of the, and I'll have bilateral vestibular hypofunction for the rest of my life. Will it ever be an eight nine or 10? Again, God, I hope not knock on wood. It hasn't been. But sometimes it's a level 123 last week after my vaccination, it had an effect on me a little bit. And for about four days, I was loopy. I mean, I was like a drunken sailor on a cruise ship in a hurricane. You know what I mean? Like, oh, people now, you know, I mean, so it comes and goes. But meditation really quells up quite a bit.

Alex Ferrari 37:53
Now, in your book, you also talk a lot about being fearful. You were very fearful, young man and growing up and it was almost your default, a default emotion on almost everything, which I found fascinating. Because obviously your public persona is very, you know, strong and confident and energy. I know. It took you a minute to get

Tony Horton 38:13
there. I'm frightened to death right now.

Alex Ferrari 38:15
I'm terrified. I'm terrified of my shadow. No, I understand it took it takes you a minute, especially when you're younger. When you're younger, you're afraid of what people think and how do I look? And can I, I don't want to be picked for that for the I don't wanna be the last one pick, then does that girl like me? And there's all of those energies. As far as a guy is concerned, I can't talk for a female perspective on that fear. There's other fears on the female side of things. But as a man, I get all that. And but you you took it to another extent because you were like, literally like everything was fearful to you. How did you confront those fears? And how do you confront fears today, because we still all have fear. Fear is one of those diseases that the human experience that we have to deal with fear and still get to where we're gonna go, because I'm assuming that was fear with all the stuff that you did. Like, I'm assuming when you went to go train Tom Petty, there was probably some fear involved, especially when you almost busted his shoulder open. Like, like, I'm assuming, like, I couldn't kill Tompa. And I'm the dude, that's gonna kill Tom Petty like, I'm sure there was some fear. So how did you break the rules for how do you confront fear in general?

Tony Horton 39:16
Well, I mean, it came back to the personal development, you know, honestly, there were there, I didn't have any tools to deal with anything. And so when I read a lot of these books, I mean, if you every one of them that they're all rabbit eared, and there's underlined and highlighted and everything else. And I would just, I would write, I didn't have a dream board. But it was a board filled with little quotes from various authors that were really kind of blowing my mind blowing my mind. And so I, I practice that, you know, deal with my speech impediment, and when I get going around a little bit tired, it'll happen again, I found techniques to help me slow down. And the reason one of the reasons why I had a speech impediment is a, I didn't have a big enough vocabulary to be able to express myself the way I wanted to. So quite often, I was searching for words that I didn't have. And so I worked My vocabulary and number two was I would, I would take an old tape recorder and I would read whatever, anything newspaper magazines, books, and I would read out loud in the end of the tape recorder, and then I'll still be on stage and I'll have a little fumble, and then I'll just do a joke, right? If I say and then then hold on everybody, Ziad Lee, the what I meant to say more articulately and more succinctly goes like this. Right. So, and I think the number one thing that really helped me to was, was being a young actor and, and getting up in front of other, you know, in front of the teacher and in front of other other actors, and in learning those lines and, and taking on a character, you know, whether it was, you know, a scene from Raging Bull or whatever it was, would be, and I was I was doing improv comedy. So you have to kind of think on your feet. Yeah, right. I was with Second City LA for about a year, and did a fantastic Columbo tell you

Alex Ferrari 40:58
today that it's a job just just that and Kojak. You're doing a Kojak to

Tony Horton 41:06
Google that guy. And I was doing stand up comedy for two years, right? Yeah, it was tempting to do stand up comedy for two years, which is an absolute butt kicking. I thought I was I would, I thought I was a screaming laugh, factory. And then you get up there and you're the Oh, you show up at night and you get the list and you're on at 1:15am you're outside everybody smoking cigarettes, a bunch of wannabe comics, I'll try to make sure the laugh and watch Oh, you just you just want to kill yourself. Like I'm out here with these friggin angels. Right, then you get your spot, there's four people left in the audience and they are wasted and they're throwing crap at you, you know, that'll thicken your skin. That'll thicken your skin. And so I took the personal development, and I took, you know, and moving from Connecticut and being around that whole energy and vibe, and you know, the tri state area, New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, and I'm all the way out to California. Everything just felt different here and felt more optimistic here. And I felt like I could reinvent myself here. And so this is decades and decades of personal development. And there were a lot of opportunities that came my way when I first came out here. And I blew them. Right, there was a really cool project where these two young entrepreneurs met me, they knew me from the gym. And, and I was I my first real gig was with Nordic track up in Minnesota where I would go back and forth between here and there. And I was, you know, I was a trainer at that point. And I was a young actor at that point. And I could walk and chew gum, meaning I could, I could look fit, I could talk about exercise science, and I could read the teleprompter without too many takes. And they liked that, you know, because actors didn't look the part they know what they were talking about. And then a lot of fitness folks couldn't learn the lines or read the prompter and hit their mark, it was a hellscape for NordicTrack. So they hired me quite a bit. And that's how I got more comfortable in front of a camera. And then I got a show on playboy on the Playboy channel called 360. And I was fully closed by the way, but well, we were we were kind of like an entertainment tonight for the Playboy channel. And you know, they would do these we do these little segments and then Tracy tweed, who Shannon tweed, you know anything about they were I remember, she was very funny and very animated. And we would do these sketches to open up the show. And so and that was a three camera show, right? So all right, Tony, you get to start on camera one, you're gonna turn Tracy then you're gonna go to three, then back to Tracy go to whether you're going to finish on one again, oh, whoa, whoa, what is happening here. So these are just all skills that happened over the course of time. So when it finally came to doing penile power 90 people great buddy guaranteed which I was still a little bit green, I wasn't really quite sure and of those was different. And then by power 90 more confident by p90x in x two and x three and 22 minute hardcore. You know what I mean? And doing workouts in front of 10s of 1000s of people. It all just got easier over time.

Alex Ferrari 43:48
Now, how do you change? How What advice do you have for changing mindset? Because that is the most powerful thing you have to make any sort of transformation in your life, whether that be physical, mental, spiritual, whatever that is. It's mindset. It's all about mindset. Like you've just said, I've given people the tools, but if they don't do it, it's it's your mind that stops you. It's that voice inside your head. Like, you're never going to look like Tony. I mean, why are you gonna do this? Like, after the first one, like, this is too hard. Just go back to eating Twinkies. I mean, why are you even doing this? That voice is always inside of us fighting. So how do you change that mindset? Yeah. What advice do you have for that?

Tony Horton 44:23
Well, you know, and it's funny that you bring up mindset because when you look at the power of four, even though there are four, right food, fitness, supplementation, and mindfulness mindset is really sort of the youngest brother of it. You know, I talk about mindset, a lot and mindset, it's just attitude. Like, why do you believe what you believe? Like what what has gotten so ingrained inside of your noggin, that you believe that you're not going to be able to look like me or be as fit as me or like, so what we will what what I had to do, I had to break that down through push personal development, and understanding that that a lot of this has to do with not only your upbringing, and your peers and the things that you've learned from, you know, from when you were a little kid right up to the present is how do you abandon these things that no longer serve you? And so that's one thing and that that takes that takes, like, for example, me it's about abandoning certain things that don't serve me and understanding that and seeing that. And that involves people. Like I learned a long time ago that why would I want to have boneheads and finger pointers and wannabes and naysayers in my life? Like, I got no problem. Oh, oh, you're hung over again. And you're not going to make the workout. Guess what, when you get your act together, and you're off the hooge, and you've been through a, you can come back, because I don't need I don't need you're an anchor in my world. Bye bye. Right. So that's one thing and you know, you aren't, you're one of the five people you hang around the most you've been you are your, your company. So hang out with bad asses and rock stars and superheroes and go getters. And, and, and people who want to take that hill soldier, you know what I mean? And that's how I have in my life. So a lot of it has to do with just, you know, and if it's your sister and your brother and your father and your mother, then you just have to figure out ways to, to say no to them awesome. And to tell them how you truly feel about about their bullshit. You got to stand up for yourself, you know, and I had a conversation with a dear friend of mine, who they're using his image to make money and he's getting like Butkus bubkis. And I said, I said, How much? How much does the shirt cost? How much are they getting? And how much you're getting? To answer that question? Because I mean, are you kidding me? You're an adult male, and you don't you're making you did a deal with the guy just because you want to have your picture on our T shirts, so people could wear it? Like, dude, no. I said, guess what, you get to come back here workout with me again, when you've answered those three questions, and you've made a better deal for yourself. And if you haven't, then you're not invited back here again. So I never had people like that in my life. I never had some hardcore, direct mentor teacher coaches. So that's what I become. But I had to learn all this stuff on my own. Because my dad was on the road Monday through Friday. Right? And, and with his business, and on the weekends, I carried his golf clubs, you know, I mean, so that was whatever I mean, he did when he could, he provided a great life, he paid for my college, he took us skiing, we were kids, but he didn't know how to mentor me and show me so these are these are all self taught stuff. But mindset is everything. It really it's about as much it's, it's learning from, for me, it was books, teachers and coaches, taking on those strategies, hanging out with them, reading as many autobiographical stories, books, people as possible, like, who the superheroes in the world, who are the people who have kicked ass, who the people came from nothing and really achieve great things, just do what they did, what did they do? Learn from them, and if they happen to be in your life, and if I happen to be in your life, and you can learn from me great. Otherwise, you got to figure that out. And you also have to figure out what you need to eliminate it no longer works. And then you have a brand new mindset, you have truly reinvented yourself at that point.

Alex Ferrari 48:03
Now, you were talking about, you talked about a lot about physicality, and mindfulness and mindset and all this stuff. How do you balance everything? Like what advice do you have for people on how to just create balance in your life. So like a perfect example of what you're saying with LeBron, like, he works out for an hour, but then, you know, balances that offer to a horse of rehab. And that's how he's able to keep that body in the shape that he's that there's a balance there where there's that other NFL guy, you were saying like he had no balance, he'd worked out he was gifted, but then he just burn himself out by party. There's no balance in his life. What advice do you have for people to try to maintain some balance in their life?

Tony Horton 48:42
purpose, plan? priorities? Right, if you if your priority is to get high, guess what, you'll probably get high a lot. Like, oh, wow, I just want to get high because my life sucks. And I don't want to deal with things and nothing wrong with getting I mean, it's legal. I think it's certainly better than alcohol for a lot. But people abuse it, you know, I mean, like, it alters your state, if you're using a source outside of yourself, whether it's weed, or AR or alcohol or, or food or, or porn or whatever your thing is, man, then then that's going to take away a lot of your, a lot of your opportunities, because you're you're just using these sources outside of yourself. If you if you're the source, to generate the chemical shift that's happening inside of your brain, then you're going to have, you're going to have more energy and enthusiasm. So there's a lot of peas and a lot of ease. You're gonna have enough energy and enthusiasm to be able to do the things that you want to do, you'll be able to prioritize, you know, where do I want to put my time and energy? You know, like, I want to thrive? What does that look like? How do I prioritize? What are the activities Who are the people? What do I need to read? What do I need to do? What time I need to go to bed with high No need to get up? What are what kind of foods what kind of supplements Do I need to take to be able to prioritize and regulate basis and a purpose is like you know, you can find you can find balance. If you know who you are, you know why you're here? I mean, if you're, there's a great story of a guy who had a fan, a wife and three kids, he was an accountant. He was a numbers guy. He worked for this big firm. And he worked in a cubicle looking at a wall with a fake firm. I mean, that's, that was his life. You know, I mean, but he, you know, he had a nice car and a nice home and they went on vacation. It was all pretty fun. But this guy was a bike freak mountain bikes, feet, bikes, beach bikes, he loved wheels and gears. And he was, he was typically on Saturdays and Sundays, for part of the day. And his wife was cool about it. He was at the bike shop, the local bike shop, and, and he'd people like, you know, people that bike shops busy to Saturday and Sunday, and the employees are busy. So he started giving everybody advice. They thought, Well, do you work here? And he goes, No, no, I'm just a bike freak. And I come down and say hello, and meet people and talk about bikes. And then the manager said, Dude, do you want a job because you're here almost long enough on a Saturday or Sunday to get paid, and we need the help and you know, more than half of my employees. And so he asked his wife, his wife said, you're down there anyway, you might as well get paid. And five years later he on the place, right? So it just goes to show you that, you know, a lot of people have kind of crummy crappy lives, and they want to be in shape and everything else outside of exercise. And isn't that great? and relationships suck. They're overweight, garbage, right? They don't know how to they're not prioritizing, and they're in there, and their purpose sucks. So I always tell people,

if you're kind of stuck where you are, it's not what you can do because it's going to affect you negatively financially. What's your hobby? Go read go read Keith Ellis's book the magic lamp. Because Keith Ellis's book the magic lamp shares with you the techniques to help you understand who you are and what you're really supposed to be doing. And if you're not able to do really, you know, like, I want to fly. Alright, well, it's expensive and I got this other job is full time. Well, then, what are the steps like, you know, how do you reverse engineer something? I want to climb Kilimanjaro? So what do you do you just throw your shit in a in a suitcase and fly to Tanzania? No man, and then start walking. You're probably gonna die. Alright, so when you reverse engineer thing, you see yourself on top of Kilimanjaro right? There they are. Who's there? Like, what are you wearing? Like who the people around you? What's the temperature? That is no the night before, like, create this image in your head. Just fantasize, what the day before? Look like day before? Like wig? Yeah, we got to like 1000 feet to go over the base camp. And here's the 10th I'm in and here's what the tent, you know, I mean, all the way to the point where you go, you know, I want to climb Kilimanjaro, how many steps before that. And then you know, when you try to duplicate that ain't gonna go the way you reverse engineer it. But it might be close. Because in the meantime, party of reverse engineering is talking to everybody ever knew or whoever climbed the mountain, right. And so that's, that's how you I know I'm kind of going long winded here. But But, but it's it's prioritizing. Fitness is the foundation. If you eat right and exercise, you take supplements and you get enough rest. So your stress is down and you're dealing with your stress, then then your oyster opens up. Otherwise your overall, if you're overweight, you're overwhelmed. You know, I mean, it's just too hard. You just barely get into your day. So if you figure out this is who I am, now, I got this cool hobby. Tony showed me how Keith Ellis showed me how to read the book, the hobby could become the accountant, the turn into the guy who on the bike shop or the hobby, you can keep your job because it's okay. But you you've got this joy in your life because there's this other thing that you do, maybe it's quite collecting, maybe it's opening up a coffee shop on the weekend, who the hell knows. But the book tells you how to get there. And then And then last but not least is accountability. You know, I mean, I think accountability is really important. How do you stay accountable a lot of people are self accountable, they can figure out their plan. You know, because we know what time we're gonna get up. We know what we're gonna go breakfast. We know what time you have to get into traffic. We know what time we need to be at work. We know we have deadlines at work. So we have the deadlines because if we don't have the deadlines, we get fired and then we can't pay our bills and we got to move into a van down by the river. Okay, so we know what the consequences are rest and peace Chris Farley, for screwing up. I thank

Alex Ferrari 53:54
God it was so good. I was

Tony Horton 53:57
watching the other performances cracked up because they

Alex Ferrari 54:01
were referring to an SNL skit that Chris Farley did was which was called the man living by the van living in a van down by the river, which is one of the most classic. So as

Tony Horton 54:10
a motivational speaker, he was the ultimate motivation. That's right. Now, yeah, so good. Everyone's

Alex Ferrari 54:17
but I wanted to

Tony Horton 54:18
plan priority, and accountability. These things are all in the book. They're all in the big picture.

Alex Ferrari 54:24
I'll tell you, I'll tell you what I mean, when I you know, for my most of my career, I was a director, I've been director in the film industry, but I also had a post production company, but the post company was really what kept me alive. You know, I would direct every once in a while, but I would do post Oh, we do have clients, clients clients, and I was never happy doing it at the beginning you are because you're young enough. But after you know, 1015 years you start getting and then you start getting angry. And you're like, I don't want to do this job. But if I don't pick up this gig, I'm not going to eat and and I was still in control. I was as my company. So it was like the set false sense of control, but I was still asleep. To my clients, not a slave to a boss or a company, but to my clients, which I didn't want to do a lot of times every one out of 20 projects I enjoyed, till I finally decided, like, you know, what I really want to do is I want to, I want to, I want to give podcasting, as weird as and then as as like, like, kind of like ridiculous as that sound like I want to podcast, I'm gonna open up an online business, I want to help people doing that. And the moment that happened, everything changed. In my entire life. I started, it took me a while I've been to avid at this six years podcasting, and having a blog and creating online courses and educating people and trying to help people along the way. And it is open doors, and I'm happy I wake up in the morning at 430 every morning to come and work. My wife's like you work like 12 to 14 hours a day. I'm like, but I'm happy. I'm happy doing it. And she's like, and I've been doing it for years. And she's like, I've never seen he was happy as I've been with you for many, many years. You're never been happier than what you do not you found your thing. And I'm like, Yes, I found my thing. It took me into my 40s to find that thing. But when I found it, I went all in and now I'm trying to help other people do it. So you're absolutely right is like, it's not about the money, man. That's just not. And now I do this full time I finally got to a place where three years ago, four years ago, I was like, I think I don't need to post anymore. So I shut my company down. Now I just 100% do this. I've been doing it in LA, which is not the cheapest?

Tony Horton 56:33
No, it's really, it's really interesting what you're saying there because I'm I'm in the midst of transition now. I mean, I left Beachbody, the lower two and a half years ago, two years ago, whatever April now, January, March, April. And you know, it was a big trend, it was really hard because that way was rock. And that was a beautiful wave right on top. You know what I mean? It's like a neck project after project. Huge fan base. You know, the house I'm in now, I never would have thought I would have lived in a place like this ever. And then I have another joint in Jackson Hole. And of course, you know, but now I'm a slave to the overhead. A little bit of all of this stuff. Right? So because when you're making, you know, cuckoo money, you know, I'm buying $550 product shirts, like half a dozen at a time. You know what I mean? Like I was pulling a whole westney Wesley Snipes MC Hammer. What, how many features can I get on the most expensive car that manufacturer makes? Yeah, I mean, I put that on there. You know, I mean, and then like, Oh, you know, and then the wave came in. And the reason why, you know, I left Beachbody, like why did why did Tom Brady leave the Patriots just just wasn't working anymore. You know, simple. And, but like, oh, you're looking over your shoulder. But fortunately, you know, a lot of new gigs have come my way. So it's been really it's been hard, like much more work. Because before it was, hey, here's what here's what we want you to do. Go develop it. Take your time. Oh, okay. And then, um, yeah, that looks good. Let's put through some test groups. Terrific. Everybody's getting results, because you've been doing this shit for 1000 years. So you're not to get results other people. And then let's cast it, and then let's shoot it and then you're done. And then you kick back and you wait for the royalty checks to come in. This is hiring and firing and, you know, micromanaging and, and then lawyers, so many lawyers, lawyers are so many said that Yeah, I need a trademark lawyer. I thought can't the regular No, I don't do that at all. And then there's another lawyer that does another thing that you didn't know you needed. You know, I mean, like, Wow, man. And so it's been a great learning curve. And I think to myself, do I want to downsize and mine that point, my career, now I really like to sell so I'm going to keep busting my ass but but in the other things that you know, the place in Jackson, which, you know, now I got renters in there, because I have to, it's like, you have to sort of adapt to your situation. But I feel like right now, I'm, I'm in that place that you were in three years ago, Where, where, you know, I mean, I'm 60 I'm going to be 63. And a little while and I want to kind of be done. I mean, I don't want to be I don't I don't want to be found on on on the internet. For years. Literally, I want to that's my goal. No Instagram, no Twitter, no Facebook, see later, if you and I'll figure out a way to communicate with people like the phone and stuff.

Alex Ferrari 59:12
Email.

Unknown Speaker 59:15
If I have a live event, we'll figure that out too. But, but yeah, it just kind of feels like I'm a slave to the overhead right now. And not that I don't love what I'm doing. I mean, I'm working with total, which is amazing. I have my own supplement line, which is just I never in my wildest dreams that I ever thought I'd have something like that. And it's super high quality stuff. And total lets me kind of do what I want to do, which is pretty amazing. Yeah.

Alex Ferrari 59:35
Tell us about power power life. Tell us about that.

Unknown Speaker 59:38
Well, you know, um, the whole time I was Beachbody. I had my picture on one of the products, which means I got used to get a little royalty check from that. Then they took my picture off and then they kill the product and it's like, Wow, so we've gotten this far. Now moving backwards. It's one of the most popular supplements that they made, and they just stopped making because they didn't want to pay me royalties. I never really found out why Just a lot of that was happening. And you know, and there was so many other trainers in the quiver over there that like if one trainer got too much, you know, privilege than the other ones would all bitch and moan it was this whole infighting thing. So it was this kind of time to go. And then one of the first conversations I had, and this is just after I got sick, so I was looking for supplements that had the type of nutrients and ingredients that kind of helped me come out of my illness, I lost 25 pounds. I mean, I was weak as a chicken. And I had leaky gut. I didn't know what that was what I did you know what I mean? So, epstein barr leaky gut bilat, obviously, you're gonna have hyperfunction. I mean, I was just I was even shot, I looked like a sharpei. Man, I was just a skin hanging off me, it was pretty hideous. And these guys really worked on formulas that would not only help me, but a lot of other people who are aging who are into their 50s 60s 70s and 80s. And these these products is HMB and vitamin D, and all these chromium and all these interesting ingredients in the protein powders help anybody and everybody that wants to start exercising and build some muscle and mass and stuff. And it's all based on some pretty new science. And then we came up with a foundation for it, which was really designed for me and my leaky gut. So probiotics and prebiotics and sun fiber and three servings of vegetables. And, you know, really interesting mix of ingredients. There's my wife, there's my wife calling me. Hi, honey, I'm on a live podcast with Alex right now. No, we're having a great conversation, we're gonna talk. She's like, I thought you'd be done by now. So you know, when they came along, and now we've got nine products, we got four or five in the quiver that are gonna be coming out soon. And it's doing really, really well. And I'm really, really proud of it. And, and I take it all I take it all I mean, cuz it was designed for me. And as a 63 year old yet this the sarcopenia, which is a, also known as age related muscle loss is a real thing. Like it's very, you know, it's very rare that you see jacked 18 year olds, because when the body gets older, it's just harder and harder to build muscle and if you tried muscles will tear, right? I mean, I have a torn torn biceps tendon that I did about seven or eight years ago because I did something stupid. So I tore it but and you know, joints and tendons and ligaments and even muscles get pretty brittle. Even for people who do everything right. So when you get the right compounds, the right nutrients that are in the right combination, you can still train pretty hard. I mean, I'm doing a chaise on my ninja course last week, which means I'm flying through the air and grabbing on to something else, you know what I mean? Which is not something people who are 63 usually do. And a lot of it has to do with you know, my mindfulness practice my you know, all the other things that I do the infrared sauna, the aerosol bads, the foam rolling and good sleep and mindfulness and like the meditation and everything, but the supplements are key, and they're key for me and I want to keep going I want to keep challenging myself. You know, I still I'm a skier man, I want to heli skiing in my friggin 90s because it's the most spectacular feeling I know of so I want to keep doing

Alex Ferrari 1:03:05
so what what are the what are the because I you know, I've been taking some of your your supplements which are amazing. Your protein shake, and your your greens, your complete greens package, which are super nutrient dense, I've done a lot of research, they're very nutrient dense. Like we were saying before we got on there, you know, you can get protein on protein shake, and there's like there's literally 1000s of protein shakes plant based and whatever other base you want. But there's very few that are really nutrient dense that tastes good, that have a lot of nutrients, but it tastes good. So between the protein and the, I mean if you take just the protein and the greens, you're you're better than 95% of the US population.

Tony Horton 1:03:46
Those two are the base product. I put them both in the same shake in the morning. Now you were telling me earlier use it use a shaker bottle. I put frozen blueberries, sometimes blueberries and strawberries. That's my base in the blender. I'll put pecan raw organic pecans raw organic walnuts in there. And then I'll put a organic raw kale in there. And then some ice cubes make it frothy. And that's my base. Then I put unsweetened vanilla flaxseed milk. Who knew you could milk a flaxseed? That's gonna be hard, but these guys work hard to do that.

Alex Ferrari 1:04:19
flexing the flex you'd have a teat?

Tony Horton 1:04:25
Well, I haven't. I haven't. Why?

Alex Ferrari 1:04:29
Milk me?

Unknown Speaker 1:04:31
Oh my god. Let's see my buddy wrote that movie man. Funny, funny movie. He wrote the original original screenplay and sales got credit but he wrote what was the second one the follow up for Meet the Fockers or Oh

Alex Ferrari 1:04:45
yeah, I forgot that it was me I got you anyway. So

Unknown Speaker 1:04:49
with that, that's it talk about nutrient dense then I put the in right now I've been doing the vegan thing for about a month and a half. So in the morning I use a chocolate vegan formula and then later in the afternoon, kind of A couple hours before dinner or a couple hours or an hour or so after dinner, depending on how many calorie dense by dinner is. I go with a vanilla night so and then I put the I put the foundation for in twice a day, you know, because why not you can't overdose on magnesium and, and sun fiber and probiotics and probiotics and and more servings of vegetables. So I double that especially because I trained so hard I just need those nutrients. Even as a vegan You know, sometimes I do the the cauliflower pretzel cheat too, you know what I mean? You know, it's

Alex Ferrari 1:05:32
vegan, exactly. Like we said earlier Oreos,

Tony Horton 1:05:36
but there's a there's a performance formula, which is a pre workout formula, which is really great. It's time released energy, it's super low. And it's like really low. It's like a half a cup of caffeine, or half of half a cup of coffee worth of caffeine. And it's distributed throughout the day, not only throughout your workout, but throughout the day, which is just genius tech on a pre workout. And then we have an endurance formula, which is what you take over time that really helped what like so performance is kind of for hip training and plyo. And in right here and right now I need that energy. But endurance is for long term a lot. A lot of runners, people who run a lot just love the fact that they don't bark partway through the runs. there's a there's a digest, there's a peak advantage formula. So there's a lot of different stuff and then we're gonna have post workout and one that helps with hydration and others coming.

Alex Ferrari 1:06:24
Now do you what would you suggest? older guys like like myself, let's say I have a friend named Bob Bob, who's 46 What would you suggest you make a pop? Yeah,

Tony Horton 1:06:35
you're a young,

Alex Ferrari 1:06:37
a young punk kid. No,

Tony Horton 1:06:39
but I'd love to be neutral. But I know Oh, no, no,

Alex Ferrari 1:06:44
but his regards to just like not only supplementation, like what the products we just talked about, but just minerals and vitamins. What are supplements that you should take like I know I mean, our our friend that we have in common Zach he suggested magnesium at night. He's been doing it for a decade like taking a little extra magnesium at night collagen, I found a vegan collagen that has helping with just the skin and the hair and the bones and all that kind of stuff. What are some other things that you would recommend besides a multi a good multivitamin, as well as the other supplements?

Unknown Speaker 1:07:15
Well, some of my favorites are ginkgo biloba, which is really important for you know, just for your mind for cognition and memory and things like that can cause really pretty powerful, simple, you know, the Ginko plan people, California, they're growing right in their yard, you know, but it's easy if it comes in a pill or powder. co q 10 is another one that's really kind of important for a lot of people. Now, what I would do, you know, when it comes to thing is the one thing about a fitness trainer giving supplement advice is that I have to be really tricky, because everybody's different. Everybody's chemists, sure, like I just had, I just had a genetic test. based on the fact that my you know, it's different than like blood work, or urine or poop or something where they kind of check, you know, your deficiencies or what you might need, nutritionally, you know, so in a genetic thing, there's a lot of markers in my genetics that say, even though I'm doing really, really well, when it comes to my diet, and my exercise and supplements, there are certain things that I have to double and triple up on purely based on my own genetics. So there's a markers, it's usually a plus or minus sign that shows up on these various elements that are part of your genetics. And for me, I've got it, I've got to take in three to four times more fish oils in the average person, because my blood platelets are sticky. And you want you don't want it to be sticky. I wish I could give you the science behind that. So that kind of helps lubricate that for me. Also, I have I have markers for possible early onset Alzheimer's based on these tests, which is super awesome. Yeah.

Alex Ferrari 1:08:50
For those of you not watching this video, Tony's face is fantastic.

Tony Horton 1:08:56
Everyone thinks, well, what is your name? Who are we?

Alex Ferrari 1:09:00
Where am I?

Unknown Speaker 1:09:01
Am I am I the walrus? I might.

Alex Ferrari 1:09:04
Exactly you know,

Unknown Speaker 1:09:05
so my whole thing is about being Johnny sharp and on it quick and snappy and funny and hello and thinking, you know, you can communicate and disseminate. write and write in a didactic way. Yeah, not in a pedantic way. And I cannot be a it's not the last thing I need to use a mallet. Okay, say

Alex Ferrari 1:09:27
that was at least $1.50 worth of words right there sir.

Tony Horton 1:09:30
That's two and a half bucks right there with the nonsense I don't even think I think I was made a complete mess of whatever I say. So you know, I mean, so I have to be really careful. I have to do I get my wife and I get bloodwork every six months they take out a lot a gallon and a half of blood out of us, like a vampire just comes in and fills up you know, right and so what I learned from that is how do I need to adjust what were what are my what what are my hormone issues, what is my estrogen, testosterone, feet free testosterone and it ebbs and flows based on On any number of things even though six months earlier, she gave me X, Y and Z to take, but biorhythms age, barometric pressure, altitude, physical mental

Alex Ferrari 1:10:11
environmental

Unknown Speaker 1:10:12
changes those formulas for months and she goes out you don't need that anymore. You can you can get off of that but you're going to have to double up on your, on your officials because of x, y and z. So that comes from all these genetic tests and these blood tests and what do

Alex Ferrari 1:10:24
you get the genetic test because I know blood test you can get pretty much anywhere but what do you get the genetic test?

Tony Horton 1:10:29
I get this to my nutritionist slash endocrinologist this woman's Heather Fitzgerald here in town dude, I'll tell you she has helped me so much this woman her and this woman Tammy Tammy Murphy out of upstate New York did the same thing she did 138 page marker on on on food and allergies and stuff. So for three months, no wheat, no soy no corn, no dairy still, two years later, no wheat, no soy no corn, no dairy and people look at me go what's slept well, there's a lot of really amazing foods out there. You just got to avoid those things. Plus for three months, no sesame seeds, no onions, no cashews, no walnuts, no tomatoes. You know, it was a really interesting because that

Alex Ferrari 1:11:12
night shade like night trade.

Tony Horton 1:11:14
Some of it was night shades, but some night shades I could have it was really that these this amazing bloodwork, and that top of eliminating certain foods. And this is because of the leaky gut, mostly leaky gut and epstein barr, so epstein barr is just on tie it to me, and for who I am and what I do and the energy that I need. Taken, you know, naps in the afternoon just weren't ideal. So I just had to solve those problems. So between Heather and Tammy and a lot of blood work and some peeing in a cup and, and then adding new new supplements into my diet to help heal my leaky gut. Now, if people don't even know what leaky gut is, it's super important because if you look at your intestines, right, if you look at the liner, your intestines, they're very porous. They're like these little fingers, right? It's not like the solid wall. And leaky gut is that whenever you eat food, it doesn't make it's all the way it doesn't make its way through the large and small intestine and out the back end, it starts to leak through your intestines into your bloodstream, which causes inflammation everywhere from athlete's foot to to irritable bowel syndrome to arthritis to tendinitis. I mean you would think there's I'm I'm doing 20 bicep curls. No, you got leaky gut and how that affects, you know, joint pain and fatigue and you name it across the board. So once I healed me heal my leaky gut, you know, through all these different things. I then eventually I was able to have sesame seeds and tomatoes and other things again, but the no wheat, no soy, no corn, dairy, wheat, soy, corn and dairy, which is basically gluten in that mix. And the veganism for me right now. You know,

Alex Ferrari 1:12:51
it's working

Tony Horton 1:12:51
really good. Really good.

Alex Ferrari 1:12:53
And I'll ask you one last question, sir. Why do you think we're here is a general statement. As human beings, this is a large question. In your opinion. Why do you think you're here? If it's not for the whole humanity? Why do you think you're here? And your mission?

Tony Horton 1:13:11
Look at you, Johnny deep.

Alex Ferrari 1:13:15
I mean, the show is called next level soul, sir. I mean, we have to kind of like figure out why

Tony Horton 1:13:20
I'm telling you a story. Okay. It's gonna take me maybe three minutes. Sure. Go for it. I was living in Santa Monica and I was broke. And I was going to I went to the food Co Op, and I went and got some food and I came back and it was a flyer in the bag. And typically what you do you take the flag in the trash and the little voice, tiny, weak boy said, Go back in the trash and pull up that flyer and see what it says because you don't know. I mean, it's literally like a five minute banter with myself like, no, yes, no, I pulled it out. And it was about a meeting with a guy who wrote a book called Romancing the shadow. His name was Steve Wolfe free seminar and then you could join this group. And I went, you know what, screw it. It was free. It was walking distance. It was a week later, I showed up is a circle of people. And he was in a circle, all the chairs are in a circle. And there was a, there was one seat left in the circle. And I guess that's my seat. I sat down, I listened to this guy. And then I went through a 12 week process. I mean, like, think about that. I went through a 12 week process of learning how not to be a bullshitter because Romancing the shadow, the book was about the fact that we have there's the true self. And then there's this persona that we create for others because we didn't want other people to think that we're idiots or losers or, or lazy or anything, right. So we what happens is, is that you don't know who you really are, and you get caught up with the bullshit version of who you are and you can never grow because you can't get rid of the the the false hoods and the exaggerations and the lies that you go through, to try to present yourself in a certain way to everybody else powerful. And I learned a lot, you know what I mean? And then we formed a group. And there was this one doubt in the group that I fell in love with her and she was amazing. We did it for the longest time and she introduced me to this one Crazy goo of hers because I had chronic shoulder pain in this right? I had arthritis bursitis turn, you know everything. And she said, this guy's a heat guy, right? Like he doesn't touch he just the heat in his hands. He's a healer. Alright, so I wasn't I would leave region in the garbage can. And now I'm going to a guy with a guy with hot hand to the healer in a strip mall in Culver City. And I see this guy and he looks looks like Jim Carrey. And he's Goofy, like Jim Carrey. And he's doing wonders for my shoulder. And I kept like, how do you do this? He goes, I just figured this out a few years ago. I mean, I was the mechanic. And then I just worked out my sister, my mother and I had these, this powerful healing thing. And one day I'm laying there and this is before p90x, or I was anybody, you know, I mean, I was still in that apartment trying to figure things out. And I'm laying there and he says, Hey, you know, I have some other interesting abilities. And I think I know you well enough after our conversations, and I want to share one of them with you. And I said, okay, because you know, because I can read past lives, and I can also, I said, Oh, okay, so now that I bullshit meters, like, wow, okay, I think you're fixing my shoulder. So awesome. Okay,

Alex Ferrari 1:16:09
I'll give you that. But All right, go ahead. Let's move on.

Tony Horton 1:16:10
He says, There are seven cycles on Earth, if you believe in reincarnation, they're seven, and you're number six. He said a number you still have one more to go. And then you'll you know, hang out that the hand of God after that, and after that, like whatever God is for you, it's whatever, but you're in number six. And he says the last ones have been really interesting. And you've come a long way. And in this lifetime, you're going to have an effect on millions and millions of people you're going to become, you know, he said very successful, you're going to be able to you know, change your lifestyle quite a bit. You're gonna affect millions and millions of people. All right, so I'm broke. Okay, I'm

Alex Ferrari 1:16:44
How old are you? How old? I'm having?

Tony Horton 1:16:46
What's, uh,

Alex Ferrari 1:16:47
how old are you?

Tony Horton 1:16:48
It's nice. Early 90s and I are late 80s. And I'm training Tom and Billy Idol and a couple others really, but you know, I am millions. I'm helping five people right now. And so I started sobbing, sobbing like uncontrollably sobbing, as in this guy's telling me this thing he says, which was a real reaction is I thought I would say you're not stupid. Let me out of here. And anyway, he was right.

Alex Ferrari 1:17:12
And that, and that, and that was and then you've did that voice that that guy's voice continuously pop up in your head,

Tony Horton 1:17:19
as a story, as my life would shift. Like, I would make these you know, there'll be these broke, broke, broke, made a product could pay off my bills, buy a house, buy a new cup, you know what I mean? Like, wow, like people would come to my new house compared to where I lived. One of my clients looked around and went, dude, this is a freakish cartoon like upgrade dude, for you understand, like most people buy a little tiny ranch join kind of a funky part of town. And then they did that, and hope and maybe that's as far as they get. And maybe you skipped like five steps. It and just this one little success. And I think about him all the time. I thought is that just some goofy guy that made something up? And I got lucky. But I guess the short answer is, you know, I'm on this, I'm on this earth to help other people understand that, that they can really transform their lives completely, physically, mentally, and emotionally through exercise and eating better. And maybe some mindfulness. And if that is truly the foundation of who they could be if they want to be that. And I've seen examples over and over and over and over again. I'm constantly reminded by I mean, you know, I'm Larry Fitzgerald, who played for the Cardinals probably the number two top receiver of all time behind. Who's the guy in San Francisco who everybody knows rice? Right? Yeah, rice. Like, you know, he said, You extended my career. What, you know, I mean, and and was the interview that I had podcasts that I just did with Ray Lewis. He goes Agrippa Rex extended my career and made me a better football player ever breaks. I did Brent ever breaks twice a day, for for the majority of my career toward the end, that single routine affected my career more than anything else. Like what? You know, really crazy thing. A kid from Boston hanging out with his buddy. He was day at nine of p90x, he was on the third story. Third story I'm an apartment building. Last disbalance fell off into an alley into the pavement. He broke every bone in his upper body face crushed shoulder collarbones ribs, punctured lungs, everything else was given his last rites three times survived. And the doctor said the only reason your heart wouldn't die, your heart kept pumping. Your brain kept working and and they said if it wasn't for your musculature and your strength and you're just who you are. And he said if the doctor, he goes, like what do you do? Are you an athlete? He goes, I've been doing p90x Well, that p90x thing is the reason why you're still on this earth dude. Stuff like that. Like one guy, one gal overweight had five kids obese her whole life lost 120 Five pounds has changed and kept it off. This is like 20 years later. Still like she is the icon within her family and her friends like they look to her for advice on how to get because they saw where she was and they see where she is. And you know, Jeremy Yost guy went on military tours with he was he worked for he worked in Kentucky for Toyota or Datsun or I can't remember which he was a he had a shattered ankle from football in high school. clinic I Whoa, so big, he couldn't see his job. You know, I mean, like, massive 380 pounds, he lost 180 pounds and went on tour with me. And, you know, I mean, like, there's just there's just 1000s of stories that are out there.

Alex Ferrari 1:20:38
Well, I'll tell you what, man you have definitely affected millions of people's lives around the world and continue to do so. through everything that you do, man so I do appreciate your your souls journey and what you've been doing brother and what you can continue to do a helping people around the world, man, where can people find you and this new stage in your in your life and your career?

Tony Horton 1:21:03
Well, wait, we got it. All right, now, hold on. Cuz like, you know, because I'm 63. And I don't know about these things. If you want to find me on Twitter, it's at Tony underscore Horton, on Twitter, Instagram at Tonys. Horton, on YouTube. Tony Horton that should be easy. And of course, Tony Horton life. That's my website. For any and all events. We do events in Jackson Hole every winter. It's a yoga ski retreat. And then our Paragon thing our next one's in October. already here it is April, we're half sold out. We only take 30 people and there's already 16 people that have signed up. It's an amazing four day event from from Thursday to Sunday. It's life altering for a lot of people top speakers. You know, we had Brendan Brendan brazier from Florida Vega, who is here as a friend of mine and great experts in every field hopefully we might get Sanjay Gupta here for October got our fingers crossed on that. And then if you want if you're interested in power life, it's my power life.com my power life calm TonyHortonlife.com and my powerlife.com

Alex Ferrari 1:22:04
thank you again for coming on the show brother and doing what you do, brother. I truly appreciate it.