IAM2248 – Author, Coach and Speaker Helps People Build a Healthy and Happier Life

00:00 - 00:14

Jerry Snyder: And I do things a little differently because most coaches in high school are going to, they're already in the weight room, you know, they're learning their fundamentals, but you'd be surprised how many kids come out of high school and don't have just basic physical strength and agility.

00:16 - 00:40

Intro: Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresham Harkness values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of. This is the I Am CEO podcast. Hello, hello,

00:40 - 00:50

Gresham Harkless: hello. This is Gresh from the I Am CEO podcast and I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Jerry Snyder of All In Health and Wellness. Jerry, it's awesome to have you on the show.

00:50 - 00:51

Jerry Snyder: Hey, thanks for having me.

00:51 - 01:20

Gresham Harkless: No problem, no problem. And what I wanted to do was just read a little bit more about Jerry so you can hear about all the awesome things that he's doing. And Jerry Snyder is the author of Confidence through health and owner of All In Health and Wellness. He holds a degree in exercise physiology from Texas A&M University and is a certified life breakthrough coach. He is an active volunteer in the central Texas community. He serves as the cross-country and track coach at Eagle Christian Academy, is a member of the city of Hewitt's Park and Beautification Board,

01:20 - 01:39

Gresham Harkless: serves in a church and volunteers for several community events each year. In 2017, Jerry created the now annual event running for readers, all with Jerry to raise money for the Hewitt Public Library by running all 250 plus streets in Hewitt, Texas. Jerry, are you ready to speak to the IM CEO community?

01:39 - 01:40

Jerry Snyder: Sure am. Let's go.

01:40 - 01:51

Gresham Harkless: Awesome. Let's do it. So I half expected to do this interview while you were running or something, but I'm glad you took a break and decided to talk with him. So I wanted to hear a little bit more about your CEO story. What led you to start your business?

01:51 - 02:16

Jerry Snyder: My CEO story goes way back actually. About 20 years ago when I was just graduated from college and I was sitting in the back of a car with a good friend and his dad and I had this idea for business and presented it to them and both of them went, that'll never work. And, you know, and they said, Oh, you have a business plan. I said, no, I've got a degree in exercise physiology. I don't know anything about business. I don't, Oh, it'll never work. So I just put it, filed it in the back until really

02:16 - 02:44

Jerry Snyder: about 3 or 4 years ago, after job hopping management positions every 3 or 4 years and getting burned out and moving on to something else. I finally said, you know what, I want to go back to this and just see. Now I've got some business experience. I know what the P&L is now. I know how to do a budget. Let me just go and see if this will work. And, you know, I think any entrepreneur will tell you, you go into it thinking, oh, it's gonna get big straight off. And it rarely does. So it's been

02:44 - 02:57

Jerry Snyder: a journey. But I wouldn't change anything now for anything. There's no way I could go back to working for somebody else. It's all about doing it the way that I want to do it. And so, been going at it for over 2 years now, and it's not where I want it to be by any means, but it sure is getting

02:57 - 03:15

Gresham Harkless: there. Awesome, awesome. Well, that's great to hear. And I think for any like driven person, even probably if you had it where you envisioned having, you'd probably be like, I wish I would have raised the bar even higher. So I feel like anybody that has an entrepreneur drive, it's kind of never that satisfaction is always like, I want to keep pushing and pushing push cause you have this massive vision for what you want to do.

03:15 - 03:42

Jerry Snyder: Yeah, exactly. And I work with a lady from the Small Business Development Center here locally. And I meet with her probably once a month. And interestingly enough, I first met her when I first like I was probably 2 weeks into filed my DBA. And I'm like, Hey, I know what I'm doing. And she was, you know, I said, Hey, let's meet. And she was like, yeah, you're not ready. And I was like, what? So it took me about 6 months or so. And I reached back out to her and she said, yeah, OK, now you're ready.

03:42 - 03:59

Jerry Snyder: Let's go. So I meet with her about once a month. And she loves it because every time we meet, she's like, you have a brand new idea, you have something new you wanna experiment with or test. And so she loves meet with me because I'm always pushing those new things, which when I was at least working for somebody else, I never had that kind of inspiration.

04:00 - 04:21

Gresham Harkless: Yeah, that makes perfect sense. And that's usually why a lot of people, you know, take that path to kind of create their own product because they have this idea. It isn't necessarily blessed by I guess, the managers or the bosses or whatever. So you decide to kind of chart your own path. So it's great to hear that you're doing that. So Now I want to hear a little bit more about what you're doing about this awesome project that you have going on in your business. So could you tell us a little bit more on how you're

04:21 - 04:22

Gresham Harkless: serving the clients you

04:22 - 04:53

Jerry Snyder: work with? Sure. I actually do several different ways. 1 way is strictly online. And so what, and this was the idea I had 20 years ago when the internet was, you know, in its infancy was to provide training programs and nutrition programs, so meal plans, things like that for people strictly online. I rarely physically talk to them. Some of them I've never met. So it's strictly people find me online and say, hey, I want to try your product. I want to try you out. And so I send them stuff based on the program that they sign

04:53 - 05:19

Jerry Snyder: up for, whether it's daily, weekly, monthly, or even a one-time deal. I've got a product that I'm rolling out that I've sold a couple of times to test it out. And it's basically just a you buy a 90-day program and you're on your own and you go for it. So that's 1 way. Another way is, which I think most health and wellness people, fitness people started out with is your in-person training packages, your in-person client. What I do is a little differently though is that I focus because I was an athlete in college, I focus on

05:19 - 05:47

Jerry Snyder: those high school athletes that really like they either are, you know, hey, I don't want to be the bench player, I want to be the starter or the starters that are like, I need that extra coaching to be able to get me you know, that college scholarship or get me seen by the recruiters. And I do things a little differently because most coaches in high school are going to, they're already in the weight room. They're learning their fundamentals, but you'd be surprised how many kids come out of high school and don't have just basic physical strength

05:47 - 06:11

Jerry Snyder: and agility. And so that's what I coach on is, you know, I don't need a weight room. I don't just give me a park and you and a pair of tennis shoes and you're going to get a workout you've never heard of before. So, you know, and then surprisingly enough, I wrote a book, which I'd never thought would ever happen because in the past, well, before I started my business in the 18 years or so from college, before I started my business, I read, I think, 4 books. So books were not my thing. But 1 of

06:11 - 06:41

Jerry Snyder: the things that I, 1 of my secret sauce from secret recipes to being able to do my business is I looked at what are the things that those really huge successful guys are doing? The Branson's, the Gates, what are they doing? Everything I came out with was they're reading books and they're reading all the time And they're reading, they're reading, they're reading. And 1 guy, Garcia, I can't think of his first name, but I saw Charlie Garcia, I saw an interview with him. He used to be the head of the Air Force Academy. He's been in

06:41 - 07:12

Jerry Snyder: Congress. He reads like 3 newspapers a day, 2 books a week. I'm like, when do you have time for anything else? You're reading all the time. But what I've done is that in the past 2 years now, I've read over 36 books. I'm on my 37th right now. And it's made a huge difference in my ability to understand, 1, what I actually have to offer people and 2, the ability to keep going on those days when it's just those down days when it's, you know, hey, nobody's going to buy anything from me or, you know, my

07:12 - 07:21

Jerry Snyder: clients don't like me or, you know, any of those negative thoughts you have, those self-loathing thoughts that we all get, how to get past those and reading all these different books has been huge for me.

07:21 - 07:29

Gresham Harkless: Yeah, I can imagine. And I think too, that a lot of times when you are, you know, trying to reach a certain level or trying to be successful, like you mentioned

07:29 - 07:30

Intro: the gates and people like that,

07:30 - 07:47

Gresham Harkless: I love the fact that you kind of reverse engineered, which is always a popular term where you say, okay, this is what these successful people are doing. So I'm going to figure out what formula they're doing. And I'm going to implement that into my daily activities so that I can reach that level. So I think that's exactly probably how they did it. And it's great to hear that you're doing that as well.

07:47 - 08:18

Jerry Snyder: Right. And the other piece that was difficult at first was breaking the 9 to 5 and realizing that it's OK if I said this at my kid's career day. And they're in elementary school still, but they, you know, I went for career day last year. And 1 of the fourth graders says, you know, hey, what do you do all day long? I said, well, actually, you know, usually I go to the store at like 10 o'clock because nobody else is there. But then I'm working, I usually get up at 05:00 every morning. And so I'm getting

08:18 - 08:45

Jerry Snyder: work done by 530. And I'm working and seeing clients at 630 at night, 07:00 at night, 08:00 at night. And so, and when you write a book, I was writing a book at 03:00 in the morning. So it's, there is no 9 to 5, which is great, because there's so much more that you can get done. And somebody asked me a couple months ago, like, you know, do you think you're working 40 hours a week? How about you think you're working 60 hours? I said, I have no idea. And I don't put track of it and

08:45 - 08:45

Jerry Snyder: I

08:45 - 08:46

Gresham Harkless: don't care.

08:46 - 08:47

Jerry Snyder: Cause I'm having fun.

08:47 - 08:52

Gresham Harkless: Yeah. Yeah. And it seems like whenever you run a business, you're always on. So even when you're off

08:52 - 08:52

Jerry Snyder: at

08:52 - 09:08

Gresham Harkless: the grocery store, you're probably thinking of different ideas, different perspectives, and things like that. So you're kind of always on. But it helps if you're passionate about what it is that you do. And I know Richard Brunson brings that up a lot where he says that, you know, pick something that you are passionate about that you do love to do because it's a lot of work to do it.

09:08 - 09:09

Jerry Snyder: So often you have to

09:09 - 09:14

Gresham Harkless: be that insanely passionate and driven towards something in order to kind of work that hard towards it.

09:14 - 09:40

Jerry Snyder: No, That's very true. Yeah, I'm never off. And 1 of the things that because I do run a lot, you know, I mean, I'm running anywhere between 40 and 60 miles a week. And so I'm running a lot and there's a lot of different little clips on my phone where I'll have a thought, pull my phone out, do a little text, talk to text and jot down like, Hey, here's a new product idea. Here's a new thought idea. You're something to put in a video online, you know, here's how to handle a client situation. I probably

09:40 - 09:50

Jerry Snyder: daily when I'm running come up with those things while I'm running. So, so yeah, you're never off. You're never you're never stopping. But that's the passion side of it is, I don't wanna be, because it's just too much fun.

09:50 - 10:00

Gresham Harkless: Exactly, exactly. Well, awesome, awesome, awesome. So I wanted to switch gears a little bit and ask you for what I call a CEO hack. And this might be an Apple book or a habit that you have, but

10:00 - 10:03

Intro: it's something that you feel like makes you more effective and efficient as a business owner.

10:03 - 10:27

Jerry Snyder: Well, I think 1 of the big things that I do is stopping every day and spending a few minutes in meditation. So, you know, and sometimes I start off my day if I wake up and I'm not feeling it. And then I'm like, Okay, well, I got to meditate for a few minutes. Sometimes I wake up and it's just like, let's hammer it out. Let's go, go, go. I've got ideas already. But at some point in the day, you know, it's okay, the stress is getting there. Let's stop. Let's meditate for a few minutes. And I

10:27 - 10:58

Jerry Snyder: think what's great about that is it's not necessarily, it is the emotional response that you get from stopping everything and just breathing slowly. But it's being able to clear my head and go back to, all right, I started the day with 3 goals. Where am I at on them? And are those still the 3 top goals I should have for today? Has something changed in the first couple hours of the day where that's not as important anymore as this issue over here? I think it's funny because I had the last job that I had, I tried

10:58 - 11:24

Jerry Snyder: to do that once a week. I would stop and just have a clear schedule in my end, just say, you know what? I'm in a management position. I just need to stop and think about the next week and think about the next month and think about the future. Just spend 30 minutes thinking about that. And my boss came to me 1 day and I'll never forget because she said, you know, I heard this that we should be stopping and thinking about the future, but I don't have time to do that. That's the problem with why you're

11:24 - 11:32

Jerry Snyder: stressed. Yeah, you have to make the time to do it to be able to think about those things. So that's, you know, meditation is big for me.

11:32 - 11:52

Gresham Harkless: Yeah, that makes sense. And being able to check in and make sure, like you said, that kind of like a temperature check to see if you're too hot or too cold, whatever it is so that you can make sure that you can configure whatever you need to do so that you can get to where you're wanting to be for a day, which ends up being a week, which ends up being a month, which ends up being years. So definitely awesome that you do that. And now I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO

11:52 - 11:58

Gresham Harkless: nugget. And this is a word of wisdom or piece of advice, or if you can hop into a time machine, what would you tell your younger business

11:58 - 12:23

Jerry Snyder: self? Well, and it's something that I know. It's actually a quote that I used to attribute to Abraham Lincoln. And then when I put it in my book, my editor was like, oh, no, somebody else said that. I can't remember who it was. Abraham Lincoln apparently stole it from somebody. But you can please some of the people all the time and all the people some of the time, but you can't please everybody all the time. And so, not everybody's going to get me. Not all my clients are going to get me. Not everybody that calls and

12:23 - 12:45

Jerry Snyder: asks for help is going to get me. So at first, when I started out, it was just simply sign a client up and let's go. I got to get money coming in. And now, you know, I have a different approach in that, let's talk about this. Let me tell you exactly what's going to happen. And you know what? I'm not going to have... You're not going to get this, this and this, but you will get this, this and this and make sure that that's what they want and that's what they're looking for. Because if not, I

12:45 - 13:04

Jerry Snyder: know plenty of people that, you know, the health world is buzzing with coaches and buzzing with trainers. So I know plenty of people, both in the area and throughout the US where I could send somebody else if it's not a fit for me. And I think that's the biggest thing that I would go back to and say, hey, stop trying to just please everybody and stop trying to take everybody on as a client because not everybody's a fit.

13:04 - 13:26

Gresham Harkless: Yeah, that makes perfect sense. And it's kind of like this. I know I started to look at things in more of an abundant mindset where sometimes, especially early on, you're like, okay, if I don't get this client, then how am I going to pay my bills? How am I going to do S, Y and Z? But you start to realize that your tribe, your clients, whoever is going to be attracted to you is going to be for you. They're not going to be for anybody else. And like you said, there's no reason why that person that

13:26 - 13:31

Gresham Harkless: necessarily wasn't a good fit for no particular reason might be a fit or the perfect client for somebody else.

13:31 - 13:32

Jerry Snyder: Right. Exactly.

13:33 - 13:43

Gresham Harkless: Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. And now I want to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is the definition for what it means to be a CEO. And we're hoping to have different quote unquote CEOs on this show. So what does being a CEO mean to you?

13:43 - 14:09

Jerry Snyder: Well, you know, and it's interesting because when I first started out, it took me a while to get my wife convinced of this. But at first, it was like, okay, this is my job. And then I went from that to being like, oh, I'm self-employed. And then to going, no, I'm a business owner. I'm a CEO. I'm a business owner. I'm a high-level executive. Yeah, it's a small organization, small company, but still that doesn't mean any different. And so, but what it means to me is, is the freedom to do what I want to do and

14:09 - 14:32

Jerry Snyder: build this the way that I want to build it, you know, in not, not being stuck behind, you know, I'm definitely a person that says, you know, hey, it's sort of like I said to the last question, if you don't like my services, then you don't have to pay for them. You can go somewhere else. You know, I'm not trying to fit everybody into my little box. And so, you know, it to me, it means the freedom to be able to do things and build things the way that I want to do them.

14:32 - 14:51

Gresham Harkless: That makes perfect sense. And I think that's a great definition. And often, you know, sometimes, especially with entrepreneurial type CEO type business owner people, easy work cut from a different cough and have a different grain that we're kind of working on. So it makes perfect sense and that resonates well. So I appreciate you for sharing that with us. And Jerry, I truly appreciate you for taking some time out. What I wanted to do was pass

14:51 - 14:54

Intro: you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional you

14:54 - 14:59

Gresham Harkless: want to let our readers and our listeners know and then also how they can get a hold of you and of course get a copy of your book.

14:59 - 15:25

Jerry Snyder: Well, I mean, I think the only thing I would say is that what's important in what a lot of the books that I've read about being the CEO or being the self-development things and going on your own is find that thing that you're passionate about, because there are going to be those down days and it's going to be tough. It's hard to look at the bills coming in and go, where am I clients gonna come from to be able to pay for this, to be able to have that passion to go, no, but you know what?

15:25 - 15:53

Jerry Snyder: I'm helping these clients here that I'm already working with. And so that's why it's, that's why it's what I'm doing. And to know that as long as it's your passion, you're going to build, it's going to build and it's going to happen. Just keep at it. But no, as far as getting in touch with me, you can reach me at my email address is jerry at allinhealthandwellness.com. And yes, after I created that, I went, you know, I should have made something shorter, but it's what it is. And or my websites all in health and wellness.com. And

15:54 - 16:02

Jerry Snyder: the book is confidence through health. And you can get that you can find a link through my website, but you can also look it up on Amazon available on Amazon in Kindle.

16:03 - 16:11

Gresham Harkless: Awesome, awesome, awesome. We'll make sure to have those links and information in the show notes, but Jerry, truly appreciate you for taking some time out and I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

16:11 - 16:12

Jerry Snyder: Hey, thanks Chris.

16:12 - 16:41

Intro: Thank you for listening to the I Am CEO podcast powered by CB Nation and Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at imceo.co. I am CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Check out the latest and greatest apps, books, and habits to level up your business as ceohacks.co. This has been the I Am CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless Jr. Thank you for listening.

16:45 - 16:46

Jerry Snyder: Thanks for watching!