1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:08,760 Okay, welcome to the AdaptX podcast where we have conversations with individuals who are building accessible businesses, advocating for inclusion or excelling in adaptive sports. 2 00:00:08,760 --> 00:00:15,760 Our intentions never speak on behalf of those with disabilities, but give them a platform to amplify their voice so we can create a more accessible world. 3 00:00:15,760 --> 00:00:22,920 Today, we are joined by Tommy Trout, an award-winning leader in the inclusive fitness space, notably for his for-purpose enterprise, WeFlex. 4 00:00:22,920 --> 00:00:31,280 WeFlex is an Australian disability service provider connecting people with a disability to mainstream fitness professionals, to whom it also educates on inclusive practices. 5 00:00:31,280 --> 00:00:41,960 Tommy is a qualified personal trainer and educator utilizing 18 years of experience in the sector from corrections, AOD, suicide prevention, disability care, as well as experience of having family with disability. 6 00:00:41,960 --> 00:00:48,280 He's now running an agency, Inclusive AF, which works to increase accessibility and inclusivity of health and fitness services. 7 00:00:48,280 --> 00:00:49,680 Tommy, thanks for joining me today. 8 00:00:49,680 --> 00:00:53,720 Couldn't have said it better myself, love you, bit. 9 00:00:53,720 --> 00:01:03,160 Alright, let's maybe start with what first got you into the space that we'll just coin as inclusive fitness. 10 00:01:03,160 --> 00:01:06,440 What were your first influences and motivations to do so? 11 00:01:06,440 --> 00:01:09,960 Obviously, just the loss for money and fame was the main thing. 12 00:01:09,960 --> 00:01:11,680 Exactly, I'm with you. 13 00:01:11,680 --> 00:01:14,600 So I think, probably using an advantage for my accent. 14 00:01:14,600 --> 00:01:22,960 So I guess the way I keep coming back to where it started for me was I was working in disability support and I was given a client file. 15 00:01:22,960 --> 00:01:24,680 The client file just had three labels. 16 00:01:24,680 --> 00:01:27,240 It was just autistic, psychotic, antisocial. 17 00:01:27,240 --> 00:01:28,800 When I go, go work with them. 18 00:01:28,800 --> 00:01:30,240 And that's all I knew about them. 19 00:01:30,240 --> 00:01:38,680 And so in my early 20s at the time, I'd get out there kind of terrified because those are big words, especially for someone with limited exposure to it. 20 00:01:38,680 --> 00:01:40,080 And I was just preparing for the worst. 21 00:01:40,080 --> 00:01:41,800 And then I met the nicest guy ever. 22 00:01:41,800 --> 00:01:45,680 But I also realized that this guy was completely isolated in his home. 23 00:01:45,680 --> 00:01:48,400 He only ever left his apartment twice a week. 24 00:01:48,400 --> 00:01:52,080 That was once to go to groceries, once to go to the center that I worked out of. 25 00:01:52,080 --> 00:01:54,480 And nobody in his life asked him how he was. 26 00:01:54,480 --> 00:01:55,920 That wasn't paid to ask him that. 27 00:01:55,920 --> 00:01:57,320 You know, no family, no friends. 28 00:01:57,320 --> 00:02:04,800 And little known fact is that a lot of antipsychotic medication leads to massive weight gain really quickly as well. 29 00:02:04,800 --> 00:02:05,880 It's pretty amazing. 30 00:02:05,880 --> 00:02:08,920 And he was putting on a lot of weight that was making him pretty miserable. 31 00:02:08,920 --> 00:02:12,240 And so on whim, I sort of said, look, let's go, how about we just go to the gym? 32 00:02:12,240 --> 00:02:13,240 There's one down the road. 33 00:02:13,240 --> 00:02:14,200 You know where it is. 34 00:02:14,200 --> 00:02:15,080 It's easy to get to. 35 00:02:15,080 --> 00:02:17,880 He agreed. Took a little prompting, but we got there. 36 00:02:17,880 --> 00:02:26,080 And I just watched this guy just love it, just get involved in it and just became part of the family child with everybody else at the gym. 37 00:02:26,080 --> 00:02:31,640 They actually were at a point where they refused to accept his money and I forced him to give it because you have to take ownership over it. 38 00:02:31,640 --> 00:02:37,720 And before I knew it, I had eight people with disabilities, pretty severe disabilities in that gym training together. 39 00:02:37,720 --> 00:02:39,040 I didn't know what I was doing. 40 00:02:39,040 --> 00:02:41,040 I was in my early 20s. 41 00:02:41,040 --> 00:02:44,440 If it wasn't like bench press and bicep curls, I don't think I understood it. 42 00:02:44,440 --> 00:02:45,640 But all the other equipment was. 43 00:02:45,640 --> 00:02:55,200 But, you know, I sort of was just there and just in that moment, I was just looking around at all these guys just working out, enjoying it, part of just a regular gym. 44 00:02:55,200 --> 00:02:59,600 And I was like, OK, this is what I want to do for the rest of my life. 45 00:02:59,600 --> 00:03:12,840 What was the what was the response that maybe the gym owners had or maybe even the rest of their client base had to this influx of people with disabilities in their space? 46 00:03:12,840 --> 00:03:19,280 You can put this a little bit before social media wasn't then what it is today. 47 00:03:19,280 --> 00:03:23,240 So the owner was a little bit nervous about it, but trust that I'd be there the whole time. 48 00:03:23,240 --> 00:03:27,320 But within one session, he realized that he couldn't almost tell. 49 00:03:27,320 --> 00:03:28,760 Like he was like, oh, no one cares. 50 00:03:28,760 --> 00:03:35,520 And then what happened was over time is that, you know, a lot of the clientele at the gym just love the guys. 51 00:03:35,520 --> 00:03:42,320 And it actually became a struggle because they had to keep breaking up conversations for them to get their workouts done. 52 00:03:42,320 --> 00:03:43,760 You know, and it was just funny. 53 00:03:43,760 --> 00:03:51,640 Like, I remember I was watching this this very little petite female that I was working with talking to this massive bodybuilder. 54 00:03:51,640 --> 00:03:53,240 And I was like, oh, God, what's going to happen? 55 00:03:53,240 --> 00:03:56,520 And I walked over and he's just congratulating her on how good she's doing at the moment. 56 00:03:56,520 --> 00:03:59,080 And he's been keeping an eye on them all and thinks it's great. 57 00:03:59,080 --> 00:04:00,960 And I was like, how good is this? 58 00:04:00,960 --> 00:04:01,880 It's just included. 59 00:04:01,880 --> 00:04:03,200 It's not, you know what I mean? 60 00:04:03,200 --> 00:04:04,120 It's not a special gym. 61 00:04:04,120 --> 00:04:06,080 This is just in the mainstream. 62 00:04:06,080 --> 00:04:16,520 And for them, you know, for a lot of people, you know, people with autism, especially, you know, you can have a very small world where you only have a few places where you feel safe, where you know how to get to it. 63 00:04:16,520 --> 00:04:25,360 You can regulate yourself in it by increasing that that range and adding a new place where they can be at home and feel good. 64 00:04:25,360 --> 00:04:29,440 You're making their world just so much bigger, which is awesome. 65 00:04:29,440 --> 00:04:35,200 And if you can do that and also give them the benefits of regular exercise, it's just a win win for me. 66 00:04:35,200 --> 00:04:42,360 So, yeah, yeah, part of that, like normalizing disability, you mentioned the bodybuilder and the petite female. 67 00:04:42,360 --> 00:04:45,400 It's like shared interest in recreation. 68 00:04:45,400 --> 00:04:49,320 Like that bodybuilder had probably no experience with disability. 69 00:04:49,320 --> 00:04:51,960 He was just like, oh, this is a person that's crushing it. 70 00:04:51,960 --> 00:04:53,800 We have similar interests. 71 00:04:53,800 --> 00:04:55,400 I'm going to have a conversation with them. 72 00:04:55,400 --> 00:05:01,880 So sometimes it's like unless you create the environment, those interactions are never going to happen. 73 00:05:01,880 --> 00:05:04,200 But they always happen around like shared interest. 74 00:05:04,200 --> 00:05:07,560 Yeah, it's just it's just yeah, absolutely. 75 00:05:07,560 --> 00:05:13,720 And what was great is that, you know, I'm in firm believe that there's obviously we know that social health is a real thing. 76 00:05:13,720 --> 00:05:16,440 Being in community is good for your health. 77 00:05:16,440 --> 00:05:20,680 And I believe that you can still get the benefits of that, even if you're not talking directly with people. 78 00:05:20,680 --> 00:05:24,400 But you're just in the same room as them, doing the same activities as them. 79 00:05:24,400 --> 00:05:26,680 You can still get that social benefit. 80 00:05:26,680 --> 00:05:30,200 I mean, you know, I mean, so being able to provide that, I think, is really important, too. 81 00:05:30,200 --> 00:05:35,840 So it's funny, a lot of them come for the exercise, but they stay for the community is what I've learned. 82 00:05:35,840 --> 00:05:45,680 Absolutely. You mentioned even that, like the gym owner offered for that individual to train for free, but you were adamant that they continued to pay. 83 00:05:45,680 --> 00:05:48,320 This is actually something I was writing about this morning. 84 00:05:48,320 --> 00:05:53,160 So it's kind of top of mind. Should programs for people with disabilities be free? 85 00:05:53,160 --> 00:05:59,440 And if not, what is the unintended harm of everything? 86 00:05:59,440 --> 00:06:02,640 Disability and inclusion oriented being free? 87 00:06:02,640 --> 00:06:06,160 It's tough because the title of the media wants to say everything should be free. 88 00:06:06,160 --> 00:06:14,960 But I think, though, for me, it's about ownership and also it's about creating a business case for inclusion in gyms as well. 89 00:06:14,960 --> 00:06:23,240 What my experience has been is that if you're doing something for me for free, but then as a business owner, other competing priorities that do pay money come up. 90 00:06:23,240 --> 00:06:26,600 I'm probably going to be the first thing that you have to drop. Right? 91 00:06:26,600 --> 00:06:29,880 Not because you want to, but because you just have an economic imperative to. 92 00:06:29,880 --> 00:06:32,640 I don't want that for people with disabilities. And I don't want that for the gym. 93 00:06:32,640 --> 00:06:36,880 I want the gym to be able to make money with clients by providing great service to them. 94 00:06:36,880 --> 00:06:39,960 I want people with disabilities to be customers with disabilities. 95 00:06:39,960 --> 00:06:43,680 So that's my new term now is quads. I want them to be treated as customers. 96 00:06:43,680 --> 00:06:48,640 That way they're always right. And that way gyms have an incentive to tailor and adapt to them. 97 00:06:48,640 --> 00:06:54,480 But the point that I gave to the guy at the time when it first happened, I said, mate, you're not a charity case. 98 00:06:54,480 --> 00:06:58,000 You've got it's three. It's two dollars. It's a gold coin in Australia. 99 00:06:58,000 --> 00:07:03,320 You can afford it. Take some ownership. Invest in yourself. 100 00:07:03,320 --> 00:07:06,720 You're not a charity case. And that was sort of the rule. 101 00:07:06,720 --> 00:07:12,560 So that's my view. I think that what I want and but it's also different here in Australia. 102 00:07:12,560 --> 00:07:22,720 So we've got a different system at the moment called the NDS, where there's a bit more consumer power for people with disabilities to access a government scheme that gives them funding to fund other services. 103 00:07:22,720 --> 00:07:28,120 So rather. Yeah, I like that you said that it gives gyms an incentive to adapt as well. 104 00:07:28,120 --> 00:07:42,000 It's like like you mentioned it. It's hard sometimes for maybe businesses to see the perceived value if they're investing a lot in modifications, accessibility without much ROI just from a straight business standpoint. 105 00:07:42,000 --> 00:07:45,760 But we're not expecting gyms to make sacrifices. 106 00:07:45,760 --> 00:07:58,200 So show economically, we're asking for them to see this large consumer base that is relatively untapped, probably not competing with a bunch of other gyms to train people with disabilities. 107 00:07:58,200 --> 00:08:00,960 Like, it's a way to stand out in the marketplace. 108 00:08:00,960 --> 00:08:03,680 So my experience is so we flex itself. 109 00:08:03,680 --> 00:08:10,640 We've got hundreds of clients with disability across Australia operating out of mainstream gyms, as well as parks and homes. 110 00:08:10,640 --> 00:08:17,760 We've never received a complaint from a gym about the effect that having a person with a disability in the gym is having on them. 111 00:08:17,760 --> 00:08:22,320 We've had quite a few people actually say, how do I go more full time in this because I really enjoy it? 112 00:08:22,320 --> 00:08:32,880 But the big issue or the big benefit, and I'm sure you can speak to it as well with AdaptX, is that a lot of the clientele want to train during the day when there's off peak hours for a personal trainer. 113 00:08:32,880 --> 00:08:37,920 You're busy before work, you're busy after work, nine to five, you're a bit more flat, maybe except lunch. 114 00:08:37,920 --> 00:08:45,040 Our experience has been that most clients with disability want to go Tuesday 10am, Wednesday 2pm when it's downtime. 115 00:08:45,040 --> 00:08:47,360 The gyms are a bit more empty. 116 00:08:47,360 --> 00:08:49,600 PTs are typically less booked out. 117 00:08:49,600 --> 00:08:53,360 So all you're doing is supplementing your existing income with more clients. 118 00:08:53,360 --> 00:09:00,720 And the other thing is that you don't have to invest tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of dollars to become accessible. 119 00:09:00,720 --> 00:09:03,360 Two percent of people with disability are like, we're in a wheelchair here. 120 00:09:03,360 --> 00:09:09,280 Accessibility is actually not even a scale, you know what I mean? 121 00:09:09,280 --> 00:09:15,600 It's a bit of a galaxy, but a lot of people don't need you to be accessible, they just need you to be inclusive and work it out with them. 122 00:09:15,600 --> 00:09:17,440 I think so. 123 00:09:17,440 --> 00:09:21,360 Yeah, there's a huge opportunity for gym owners to get in it. 124 00:09:21,360 --> 00:09:28,320 Yeah, we say you're not expected to have all the answers regarding accessibility, but you are expected to care enough to kind of find them. 125 00:09:28,320 --> 00:09:32,160 But that often comes through the conversations that you have with prospective clients. 126 00:09:32,160 --> 00:09:38,720 Yeah, and so our experience has been that one of the common misconceptions we had here was, 127 00:09:38,720 --> 00:09:42,160 oh, people with disabilities don't go to the gym because they can't afford it, right? 128 00:09:42,160 --> 00:09:48,960 And there is absolutely socioeconomic realities of having a disability, ability to work, living on government schemes and the rest of it. 129 00:09:48,960 --> 00:09:57,440 But we, WeFlex, did tons of co-design sessions, which is where basically all I did for three years is sit down with people with disabilities in groups, 130 00:09:57,440 --> 00:10:00,000 and one-on-one, and ask them dumb questions about everything. 131 00:10:00,000 --> 00:10:03,520 And the idea of it being too expensive almost never came up. 132 00:10:03,520 --> 00:10:08,400 In fact, what happened is that they don't go to the gym because the gym is not going to be able to meet their needs. 133 00:10:08,400 --> 00:10:12,640 The gym isn't tailored to meet their needs because the person with a disability isn't a customer, right? 134 00:10:12,640 --> 00:10:14,480 So it's a bit of that stalemate. 135 00:10:14,480 --> 00:10:18,880 And so it's about just bringing the people we knew can train straight away in. 136 00:10:18,880 --> 00:10:23,280 The gym gets a taste of it, then they sort of can create a little bit more accessibility, 137 00:10:23,280 --> 00:10:28,400 a little bit more inclusiveness and just build it up over time as they begin to tailor and adapt to new clients. 138 00:10:28,400 --> 00:10:36,560 But the idea that you have to be ready to handle every single possible client that can come through the door day one is a misconception, I think. 139 00:10:36,560 --> 00:10:38,960 And not there either. 140 00:10:38,960 --> 00:10:42,640 Yeah, my friend Eric Kondo calls that like incremental universal design. 141 00:10:42,640 --> 00:10:50,000 Like if you're running a business, you start with lowest hanging, lowest support needs, and then kind of work up. 142 00:10:50,000 --> 00:10:53,360 Okay, you can start to accommodate an above-knee amputee. 143 00:10:53,360 --> 00:10:54,080 What's next? 144 00:10:54,080 --> 00:10:55,120 And you just kind of stack. 145 00:10:55,120 --> 00:11:03,200 So from that lens, when you were making the WeFlex Academy and the resources, what did you start with? 146 00:11:03,200 --> 00:11:10,160 So we started with a co-design session, which was I made every mistake you can make starting a business. 147 00:11:10,160 --> 00:11:14,400 But in this one, I did a co-design session and I was like, this is for just the general principles. 148 00:11:14,400 --> 00:11:18,800 Like just what's the 101 teaching you how to suck X sort of stuff. 149 00:11:18,800 --> 00:11:24,160 And what happened was is we got a bunch of people with disabilities, but we got very different disabilities in the room. 150 00:11:24,160 --> 00:11:30,320 And the issue was that we had some people with a little chance of being neurotypical, some people with learning disabilities, some people with intellectual disabilities. 151 00:11:30,320 --> 00:11:33,200 And it was almost impossible to keep them on the same page the entire time. 152 00:11:33,200 --> 00:11:36,000 So it was a bit of chaos. 153 00:11:36,000 --> 00:11:44,080 But what we wanted to do, though, is just get a sense from them, like what do you actually care about in your personal trainer, especially in the first session? 154 00:11:44,080 --> 00:11:48,400 Like what is the fastest way you're going to sign off on someone as being good? 155 00:11:48,400 --> 00:11:54,960 What are the kind of behaviors or traits or things that you experience that make you go, I'm never talking to this person ever again? 156 00:11:54,960 --> 00:12:03,920 And the big part of it, they just want someone who's just willing to adapt, someone who's good at communication, someone who's patient and just is happy to work with them. 157 00:12:03,920 --> 00:12:08,240 The standards were pretty low, which is, I guess, a good thing. 158 00:12:08,240 --> 00:12:10,320 So we started with disability inclusion principles. 159 00:12:10,320 --> 00:12:13,440 And then I wanted to go into just disabilities. 160 00:12:13,440 --> 00:12:17,840 I wanted to start in autism because I've got family, my brother and my dad, both on the spectrum. 161 00:12:17,840 --> 00:12:20,880 And I was talking to a clinician who goes, you're going about it wrong. 162 00:12:20,880 --> 00:12:26,400 You shouldn't look at it as disabilities because that doesn't tell you an awful lot. 163 00:12:26,400 --> 00:12:28,080 Instead, look at support needs. 164 00:12:28,080 --> 00:12:33,520 So we actually then pivoted completely and all our academy was based on support needs instead. 165 00:12:33,520 --> 00:12:38,640 So the example is that I'd say, hey, Brandon, I've got a client, he's autistic, go work with him. 166 00:12:38,640 --> 00:12:40,640 That gives you no information. 167 00:12:40,640 --> 00:12:46,960 And you have other clients on the spectrum, maybe, but that only tells you about them, not about this new client. 168 00:12:46,960 --> 00:12:52,320 Instead, I'd say, hey, Brandon, I've got a client, they've got sensory needs and they've got behavioural needs. 169 00:12:52,320 --> 00:12:53,760 These are what they are. 170 00:12:53,760 --> 00:12:56,080 He's training on those two things. 171 00:12:56,080 --> 00:12:57,440 Now go work with the client. 172 00:12:57,440 --> 00:12:59,760 That puts you in a better position to succeed. 173 00:12:59,760 --> 00:13:04,320 But on top of that, you're now looking at the client not as someone with a disability. 174 00:13:04,320 --> 00:13:07,040 You're not looking at them as a label, as autistic. 175 00:13:07,040 --> 00:13:12,000 You're looking at them as a client with needs, like you would every and any client you would ever have. 176 00:13:12,000 --> 00:13:18,160 Like you would someone who's pregnant, someone with a bad knee, bad back, older, younger, first time. 177 00:13:18,160 --> 00:13:19,360 You're looking at them through needs. 178 00:13:19,360 --> 00:13:24,640 So we broke it up in the needs and that absolutely transformed the way that our PT's were able to engage. 179 00:13:24,640 --> 00:13:31,120 But it also just led to better service because a lot of the times courses on disability are like the stats, 180 00:13:31,120 --> 00:13:35,200 their criteria for diagnostics or whatever. 181 00:13:35,200 --> 00:13:41,200 It doesn't help you when the client's having a massive behaviour of concern throwing weights around the gym. 182 00:13:41,200 --> 00:13:44,400 Or is completely frozen up in a section of the gym. 183 00:13:44,400 --> 00:13:45,600 It doesn't tell you what to do. 184 00:13:45,600 --> 00:13:53,600 And so we wanted our work to be really targeted to what they're actually going to encounter in a workout. 185 00:13:53,600 --> 00:13:58,960 And everything we did was both clinically signed off but also co-designed by people with that experience. 186 00:13:58,960 --> 00:14:04,080 So we have autistic people telling us what to teach in autism in their autistic support needs courses. 187 00:14:04,080 --> 00:14:08,160 We have people who are blind and low vision teaching us about that, deaf, hard of hearing, about that. 188 00:14:08,160 --> 00:14:10,640 That's how we built it out. 189 00:14:10,640 --> 00:14:15,840 That's what I've always appreciated when we first had our initial conversation a couple of years ago. 190 00:14:15,840 --> 00:14:25,920 You kind of turned me on to that perspective in a way that like my course starts by saying understand the diagnosis but train the individual. 191 00:14:25,920 --> 00:14:28,000 And I'm saying what you're saying. 192 00:14:28,000 --> 00:14:30,880 Like the diagnosis doesn't really tell you much. 193 00:14:30,880 --> 00:14:32,560 Down syndrome doesn't tell you much. 194 00:14:32,560 --> 00:14:39,280 It may be universal hypermobility, universal language differences. 195 00:14:39,280 --> 00:14:42,640 But at the end of the day, it exists on a spectrum. 196 00:14:42,640 --> 00:14:45,200 Not only autism exists on a spectrum. 197 00:14:45,200 --> 00:14:50,480 Pretty much any condition does in the same way that any 45 year old male does. 198 00:14:50,480 --> 00:14:57,840 It's like the diagnosis or the criteria doesn't really tell you as much as that initial session does. 199 00:14:57,840 --> 00:15:05,280 So it's like because people will ask for assessments like, oh, what do you do for an assessment with someone with a disability? 200 00:15:05,280 --> 00:15:07,840 I'm like, it's relatively informal. 201 00:15:07,840 --> 00:15:13,120 You got to figure out what they like, what they want, what environment they're comfortable in. 202 00:15:13,120 --> 00:15:14,960 And then you can design it based on that. 203 00:15:14,960 --> 00:15:19,120 You're not measuring range of motion, measuring things in that first session. 204 00:15:19,120 --> 00:15:21,280 You're making sure they come back for the second. 205 00:15:21,280 --> 00:15:22,160 It's all about this. 206 00:15:22,160 --> 00:15:24,480 You can't do anything in one session, right? 207 00:15:24,480 --> 00:15:29,440 So the attitude we had and what we've always taught is that look, assessments can take place. 208 00:15:29,440 --> 00:15:33,680 But for some clients on the spectrum, it could take four workouts to get them in the room. 209 00:15:33,680 --> 00:15:36,800 It could take them five workouts to touch a weight, let alone lift it. 210 00:15:36,800 --> 00:15:38,640 You're working on their schedule. 211 00:15:38,640 --> 00:15:44,720 And the priority should be around building rapport and building trust and building an understanding of your client. 212 00:15:44,720 --> 00:15:45,920 The assessments will come. 213 00:15:45,920 --> 00:15:56,160 Chances are you're not going to get a client with significant disability that's also an elite athlete and really needs to achieve to shave off 0.5 seconds in their 40 time. 214 00:15:56,160 --> 00:15:59,440 They're probably there and they don't know how to do a squat or a push up. 215 00:15:59,440 --> 00:16:01,280 They've never been to a gym before. 216 00:16:01,280 --> 00:16:02,800 You're working with the basics. 217 00:16:02,800 --> 00:16:18,320 So technical skills are really important to a degree, but they need to be coupled with really strong soft skills where you can make sure that the client enjoys it, wants to come back, has great fundamentals and is also being coached on how to behave in a gym or in a fitness setting. 218 00:16:18,320 --> 00:16:21,600 That's not going to make them stand out or be a pariah either. 219 00:16:21,600 --> 00:16:24,400 So a lot of it is around rules like you have to wait your turn. 220 00:16:24,400 --> 00:16:25,520 You have to do this. 221 00:16:25,520 --> 00:16:29,760 That's where a lot of the stuff comes in where you sort of put setting them up to succeed. 222 00:16:29,760 --> 00:16:33,600 You're an ambassador for the fitness industry and make them fall in love with it. 223 00:16:33,600 --> 00:16:36,160 As a PT, I'm pretty poor technically. 224 00:16:36,160 --> 00:16:41,200 I'm a great fun foundations guy, but no athlete's going to ever come to me for help. 225 00:16:41,200 --> 00:16:51,680 But I'm really good at getting people who have zero idea and are maybe scared of the concept to fall in love with it, have really good fundamentals, know how to behave in the gym and then sort of graduate on to maybe more capable PTs. 226 00:16:51,680 --> 00:16:54,000 But that's where most of the clients are coming from. 227 00:16:54,000 --> 00:16:55,440 They're scared. 228 00:16:55,440 --> 00:16:56,320 They're anxious. 229 00:16:56,320 --> 00:16:57,680 They've never been there before. 230 00:16:57,680 --> 00:17:00,800 You don't see many gyms advertising disability. 231 00:17:00,800 --> 00:17:04,160 You don't see people in wheelchairs and marketing campaigns for any fitness brands. 232 00:17:04,160 --> 00:17:06,800 Or if they do, it's either inspiration porn or Paralympics. 233 00:17:08,560 --> 00:17:10,320 That's who's coming through the door. 234 00:17:10,320 --> 00:17:14,160 And so those soft skills are just vital to just get them to fall in love with it and come back. 235 00:17:15,680 --> 00:17:17,920 How would you define inclusion? 236 00:17:19,760 --> 00:17:23,840 I think it's treating everyone the exact same way unless there's a reason not to. 237 00:17:23,840 --> 00:17:28,320 And that's where the debate is, is that is there a reason why you're treating these people this way? 238 00:17:28,320 --> 00:17:29,200 And is it a good reason? 239 00:17:29,840 --> 00:17:37,360 So an example would be is that a lot of the times you see people talk about their clients and then say they've got a disability. 240 00:17:37,360 --> 00:17:38,480 Why do you have to say that? 241 00:17:39,680 --> 00:17:40,960 Like we all have conditions. 242 00:17:40,960 --> 00:17:42,800 You don't say, oh, this is my mate there. 243 00:17:42,800 --> 00:17:43,680 He's got a bad knee. 244 00:17:44,560 --> 00:17:50,880 So why is it that because they've got a disability, you do need to say that is an it's a inconsistently applied rule. 245 00:17:50,880 --> 00:17:54,960 So for me, inclusion is about treating everyone the same unless you have a good reason not to. 246 00:17:54,960 --> 00:17:59,040 And my job is to challenge people and why they think it's a good reason to do certain things. 247 00:18:00,480 --> 00:18:07,920 The only, I guess, maybe counterpoint to that, the example of specifying that it's someone with a disability. 248 00:18:07,920 --> 00:18:14,960 And obviously, when I'm introducing someone at my gym, it's not like here's Owen, he has spastic paraplegia. 249 00:18:14,960 --> 00:18:24,320 But it's like when you're specifying or when you're marketing to the population, you need to be able to demonstrate that you work with disability. 250 00:18:24,320 --> 00:18:34,400 So it's like that line between not overemphasizing disability, but also demonstrating that you are inclusive and welcoming. 251 00:18:34,400 --> 00:18:36,560 And I'd say that's a good reason to do that. 252 00:18:36,560 --> 00:18:37,040 Right. 253 00:18:37,040 --> 00:18:37,680 Yeah. 254 00:18:37,680 --> 00:18:42,960 But it's also not because it's all you're doing is you're advertising to a market, which you should be doing. 255 00:18:42,960 --> 00:18:43,440 Right. 256 00:18:43,440 --> 00:18:45,120 And so that's totally fine. 257 00:18:46,880 --> 00:18:52,080 I actually just wrote an article and it's called I think passion is overrated in this industry. 258 00:18:52,080 --> 00:18:55,600 So a lot of the times people are just like the most important thing is passion. 259 00:18:55,600 --> 00:19:00,640 And I've always said, no, the most important thing is actually just professionalism, quality service, quality care. 260 00:19:02,880 --> 00:19:05,520 That's the foundations of what clients come to expect. 261 00:19:06,400 --> 00:19:11,200 They don't need you necessarily to be super passionate about everything that they're doing. 262 00:19:11,200 --> 00:19:14,960 You just need to provide good service because just because you're passionate doesn't mean you're good at it. 263 00:19:15,680 --> 00:19:16,400 Right. 264 00:19:16,400 --> 00:19:19,280 Or that you have healthy attitudes and beliefs towards it either. 265 00:19:19,280 --> 00:19:21,440 And it's not about you or your passions. 266 00:19:21,440 --> 00:19:22,880 It's about them and their outcomes. 267 00:19:22,880 --> 00:19:25,840 And that requires quality service and professionalism. 268 00:19:26,800 --> 00:19:37,840 Is the passion not necessarily applicable to the consumer, but is passion for inclusion essential to the professional? 269 00:19:37,840 --> 00:19:38,640 I don't know. 270 00:19:38,640 --> 00:19:45,120 Like I think passion is a type of fuel, but not everybody has the same kind of fuel. 271 00:19:45,120 --> 00:19:54,800 Like if there's a business owner who owns a gym and they're trying to make more money and they decide they're going to open up to people with disabilities, they're not passionate about it, but they treat the customer with respect. 272 00:19:54,800 --> 00:19:58,080 They do great work to make sure everything is on the level and done properly. 273 00:19:58,880 --> 00:20:00,160 I don't think that's a bad thing. 274 00:20:00,160 --> 00:20:01,520 And I don't think that. 275 00:20:01,520 --> 00:20:02,640 And I don't think many. 276 00:20:02,640 --> 00:20:05,440 Like again, with all the co-design sessions, passion never came up. 277 00:20:05,440 --> 00:20:10,080 None of them said they have to really be in this for the right reasons and they better be passionate about my squats. 278 00:20:10,080 --> 00:20:13,520 Like, no, they're like, just make sure they do the right thing with me and they treat me well. 279 00:20:14,720 --> 00:20:15,120 Yeah. 280 00:20:15,120 --> 00:20:16,160 Don't know. 281 00:20:16,160 --> 00:20:18,320 And it could come down to semantics on the word passion. 282 00:20:18,320 --> 00:20:23,920 But for me, it's like, I don't know that you have to be quite passionate to provide a professional level of care. 283 00:20:24,800 --> 00:20:28,000 But a lot of people do feel like being passionate is a substitute. 284 00:20:28,000 --> 00:20:28,800 And I don't think so. 285 00:20:30,000 --> 00:20:30,880 Yeah, I agree with that. 286 00:20:30,880 --> 00:20:42,880 Cause I feel like sometimes I see people that are well-intentioned working with disabilities because they care about disability, but it's not the best training. 287 00:20:42,880 --> 00:20:43,360 No. 288 00:20:43,360 --> 00:20:45,360 And I don't always love that. 289 00:20:45,360 --> 00:20:50,560 So that's where like your comment at professionalism and good service is obviously addressing that portion. 290 00:20:50,560 --> 00:20:53,440 But I feel like a curmudgeon all the time. 291 00:20:53,440 --> 00:20:56,640 Cause I'm like, oh, that's not good. 292 00:20:56,640 --> 00:20:59,840 Everyone's applauding it, but that's not really a good squat. 293 00:20:59,840 --> 00:21:01,760 That's not a good push up. 294 00:21:01,760 --> 00:21:03,120 Like that person could do better. 295 00:21:03,920 --> 00:21:12,880 So it's like, I guess, how do you find the balance between holding to a high standard while also appreciating effort? 296 00:21:14,320 --> 00:21:15,280 Yeah, that's a good question. 297 00:21:15,280 --> 00:21:17,520 I think that's just your inner coach speaking there Brandon. 298 00:21:18,400 --> 00:21:18,900 Maybe. 299 00:21:19,760 --> 00:21:24,080 Is a gym that only trains people with disabilities inclusive? 300 00:21:24,080 --> 00:21:26,240 No, I think it's about, I think so. 301 00:21:26,240 --> 00:21:29,280 Would you turn someone away if they didn't have a disability? 302 00:21:31,040 --> 00:21:35,520 Not me, but I'm saying my program isn't only for people with disabilities. 303 00:21:35,520 --> 00:21:44,800 But if there's a gym that says we train people with autism and that's all they do, is that technically inclusive? 304 00:21:44,800 --> 00:21:47,200 If they say no to other people, then no, it's not right. 305 00:21:48,400 --> 00:21:54,960 As in it's okay to be specialized for sure. 306 00:21:54,960 --> 00:22:06,480 But the idea of inclusive, so I guess the argument I'd make is that I don't know if creating separate spaces is necessarily the best path towards where we want to get to, which is in that mainstream. 307 00:22:06,480 --> 00:22:16,480 And the more we make it a really, really specific skill set and then also say you need specific places for it, all we're doing is segregating. 308 00:22:16,480 --> 00:22:21,360 And I just don't believe that that's where, I don't believe that's the ideal outcome. 309 00:22:21,360 --> 00:22:26,320 I think we need to make it where it's more normal for these people to be in mainstream fitness centers. 310 00:22:26,320 --> 00:22:38,560 That being said though, like, you know, we both have, there are some people whose disability is so significant that they just require a very, very specific environment, set of equipment and the rest of it. 311 00:22:38,560 --> 00:22:43,920 So, you know, there's a part of me that also feels like maybe that is inclusive because that's the only place they can train. 312 00:22:43,920 --> 00:22:57,680 Yeah, I think the opportunity maybe to exist in whichever environment you feel a sense of belonging in is what makes something inclusive. 313 00:22:57,680 --> 00:23:00,880 So the opportunity to choose maybe. 314 00:23:00,880 --> 00:23:12,560 And I won't pretend that my gym at peak hours is the best environment for someone who has sensory needs because there's music going. 315 00:23:12,560 --> 00:23:14,240 There's a lot of people moving. 316 00:23:14,240 --> 00:23:19,080 So that's not an inclusive environment for someone who has high sensory needs. 317 00:23:19,080 --> 00:23:26,400 But we're going to give them the opportunity to train earlier in the day when it's quiet, if they desire. 318 00:23:26,400 --> 00:23:31,440 Yeah. And again, for me, it's always just treating everyone the same unless you have a good reason not to. 319 00:23:31,440 --> 00:23:37,920 And so if people have very specific needs and that's a good reason not to treat them the same. 320 00:23:37,920 --> 00:23:43,000 Can you explain what the role of NDIS is in Australia? 321 00:23:43,000 --> 00:23:47,840 Whatever. This is the part everyone's listening for, the Australian politics. 322 00:23:47,840 --> 00:23:51,280 I think it's interesting to see how other countries are structured. 323 00:23:51,280 --> 00:23:57,120 The way Australia works policy wise is that we're either operating in 1950 or 2050. 324 00:23:57,120 --> 00:23:59,160 We oscillate wildly between the two. 325 00:23:59,160 --> 00:24:03,160 So this is one of our better moments is the National Disability Insurance Scheme. 326 00:24:03,160 --> 00:24:11,960 So you're not sure what happened is that in 2011, no, about 15 years ago, we ran a review into disability services to be like, 327 00:24:11,960 --> 00:24:14,240 we're spending a lot of money, how's it going? 328 00:24:14,240 --> 00:24:16,560 Are people satisfied with the services? 329 00:24:16,560 --> 00:24:20,400 And it was pretty much just a completely anonymous like, no, this is just horrible. 330 00:24:20,400 --> 00:24:22,520 Like no one's happy. 331 00:24:22,520 --> 00:24:26,400 The way that it worked is I made it pretty similar to the way it works in the States, in most Western countries, 332 00:24:26,400 --> 00:24:32,880 is that government provides funding to not-for-profits to provide this service to these people in these areas and these conditions. 333 00:24:32,880 --> 00:24:35,160 I mean, then that provider then provides those services. 334 00:24:35,160 --> 00:24:42,080 What they found in our review, though, was that the people who lived a block out weren't eligible. 335 00:24:42,080 --> 00:24:49,400 If your kid was a year too old, year too young or diagnostically just separate enough, they didn't qualify. 336 00:24:49,400 --> 00:24:51,240 You didn't get to choose what service you got. 337 00:24:51,240 --> 00:24:58,840 It was take it or leave it, which also put providers in this position or the not-for-profits in a position where if they did a bad job, it's too bad. 338 00:24:58,840 --> 00:24:59,920 Like where else are you going to go? 339 00:24:59,920 --> 00:25:01,080 There's no consumer rights. 340 00:25:01,080 --> 00:25:04,320 Like we can do terrible work and that's just how it is. 341 00:25:04,320 --> 00:25:06,800 So we decided basically to flip it on its head. 342 00:25:06,800 --> 00:25:11,680 We use now an insurance model, very pioneering, both in the world and very much for Australia. 343 00:25:11,680 --> 00:25:17,320 And instead what we do is the government will assess everybody who wants to enter the scheme, so to speak. 344 00:25:17,320 --> 00:25:22,600 We'll decide, OK, so Brendan has this disability that will require this amount of support. 345 00:25:22,600 --> 00:25:24,320 We also work out what your goals are. 346 00:25:24,320 --> 00:25:27,000 So you could say, I want to get a job. 347 00:25:27,000 --> 00:25:28,240 I want to go to school. 348 00:25:28,240 --> 00:25:31,520 I want to be more involved in my community because I'm isolated. 349 00:25:31,520 --> 00:25:37,520 We'll then assign amounts of money to you achieving those goals with the level of support that you have. 350 00:25:37,520 --> 00:25:44,280 And then you could go and you basically use that funding to choose your own supports to engage those peoples. 351 00:25:44,280 --> 00:25:47,800 And what that does is that from a charity model goes to a free market model. 352 00:25:47,800 --> 00:25:52,200 So it's like instead not-for-profits all of a sudden have to compete. 353 00:25:52,200 --> 00:25:54,280 They've got to advertise. They've got to provide good service. 354 00:25:54,280 --> 00:25:56,920 They can get fired. People can take their money where they want to go. 355 00:25:56,920 --> 00:25:59,600 They can pay for what they want. 356 00:25:59,600 --> 00:26:03,000 Big part of it is choice and control, which means that people with disability, 357 00:26:03,000 --> 00:26:08,360 but the funds get to choose what they engage with and the supports have to be reasonable and necessary. 358 00:26:08,360 --> 00:26:13,400 So what that means for us is that a lot of people want to use their money not just to get fit, 359 00:26:13,400 --> 00:26:17,600 but they also want to use it to engage with the community because they're isolated. 360 00:26:17,600 --> 00:26:24,920 And they found that a gym was a really great environment for that because a lot of gyms can have their own unique culture and community, which is great. 361 00:26:24,920 --> 00:26:28,200 They're in the same location. They're open quite a lot. 362 00:26:28,200 --> 00:26:32,240 They're protected from weather, typically on easy public transport lines and people go there. 363 00:26:32,240 --> 00:26:34,320 So that's the Australian model. 364 00:26:34,320 --> 00:26:37,680 Plenty of floors, plenty of stuff, a lot of teething stuff as well. 365 00:26:37,680 --> 00:26:40,160 But that's the model in a nutshell. 366 00:26:40,160 --> 00:26:44,280 Yeah, I think it's comparable and this isn't an area that I'm well versed in, 367 00:26:44,280 --> 00:26:51,920 but I think there's something called agency with choice here in the States where once someone turns 22 and they age out of the school system, 368 00:26:51,920 --> 00:26:55,280 they get to determine how they want to allocate their funding. 369 00:26:55,280 --> 00:26:59,200 So many people just choose to go to a dayhab program, 370 00:26:59,200 --> 00:27:07,080 but others choose to apply their resources or their funding elsewhere. 371 00:27:07,080 --> 00:27:13,560 Maybe they pay for a job coach to get employed somewhere or some people pay for their gym membership with that funding. 372 00:27:13,560 --> 00:27:20,200 So, yeah, I wonder if that becomes more so the standard at some point, 373 00:27:20,200 --> 00:27:27,240 or even whether it's better to single out one or allow choice. 374 00:27:27,240 --> 00:27:28,840 Yeah, it's interesting. 375 00:27:28,840 --> 00:27:35,320 So one of the arguments the government had for it at the time is that it's sort of it's Keynesian in its approach in that it's something that 376 00:27:35,320 --> 00:27:38,440 it all the money goes back into the economy and grows industry. 377 00:27:38,440 --> 00:27:41,760 You know what I mean? It grows innovation, it grows high technology and the rest of it. 378 00:27:41,760 --> 00:27:47,480 So, you know, they reckon that in the NDIS, like every dollar spent, it's like $7 coming out of it, essentially, 379 00:27:47,480 --> 00:27:51,920 because it's providing employment, opportunity, you know, services, IP and the rest of it. 380 00:27:51,920 --> 00:27:57,080 So it's very cool. 381 00:27:57,080 --> 00:28:06,960 But it's also a multi-billion dollar national government scheme addressing a insanely complicated topic. 382 00:28:06,960 --> 00:28:11,440 So it's about as good as a government can ever do that. 383 00:28:11,440 --> 00:28:16,560 How much of Weflex Academy did you develop? 384 00:28:16,560 --> 00:28:18,280 Most of it, pretty much all of it. 385 00:28:18,280 --> 00:28:19,320 Most of it. 386 00:28:19,320 --> 00:28:25,880 And more recently, you've stepped away from Weflex into a different position. 387 00:28:25,880 --> 00:28:33,080 What led you to do so and maybe how have your goals evolved over the last few years that led to that point? 388 00:28:33,080 --> 00:28:39,360 So sort of Weflex. Weflex is very much a passion project for me, which I was really, really excited about. 389 00:28:39,360 --> 00:28:45,640 But as a founder, you know, I built Weflex on the back of a very of my personal story with my brother and my dad. 390 00:28:45,640 --> 00:28:54,360 And, you know, one of my biggest fears was you don't want to be the founder that is being rolled out to every event, 391 00:28:54,360 --> 00:28:57,280 telling the same story year after year after year. 392 00:28:57,280 --> 00:29:00,360 Because after a while, you kind of get in the way a little bit. 393 00:29:00,360 --> 00:29:09,080 You also can sort of it can become at risk as well as becoming a cult of that person and the brand sort of suffering or becoming second. 394 00:29:09,080 --> 00:29:13,360 So for me, you know, we were sort of redoing our leadership, redoing the board. 395 00:29:13,360 --> 00:29:19,840 And I was like, you know what, like, you know, I've given as much of my DNA into this business as possible. 396 00:29:19,840 --> 00:29:25,680 Now's a good time where I can sort of slink out the back and it can manage itself and go on to better things. 397 00:29:25,680 --> 00:29:33,560 And the reason the big, big reason why is because it's a storytelling organization and it has to tell other stories and it needs more stories to tell. 398 00:29:33,560 --> 00:29:36,840 And it just doesn't need me to do that. 399 00:29:36,840 --> 00:29:43,720 So walked away, of course, that is, you know, pretty intense experience, which, you know, 400 00:29:43,720 --> 00:29:49,040 I sort of took about two months off just sort of staring into the abyss, just like, wonder what I'm going to do next. 401 00:29:49,040 --> 00:29:50,280 And I really think of my next thing. 402 00:29:50,280 --> 00:29:58,920 But I realized, though, that supporting the fitness industry and health and wellness industries in particular to become more inclusive and accessible is pretty mammoth undertaking. 403 00:29:58,920 --> 00:30:01,680 And I was like, there's so much work here to do. 404 00:30:01,680 --> 00:30:08,200 I want to keep doing that. And, you know, I spent a few years specializing in it. I may as well continue on that journey. 405 00:30:08,200 --> 00:30:12,400 So at the moment, I'm working with a lot of big bodies and big brands over here, 406 00:30:12,400 --> 00:30:20,200 supporting them just to, again, incrementally increase and improve their accessibility and their inclusion. 407 00:30:20,200 --> 00:30:24,760 Working on accessibility tools, which I'm really passionate about and I've spoken about in the past, 408 00:30:24,760 --> 00:30:29,360 the notion that accessibility is in a binary and it's not even a gradient. 409 00:30:29,360 --> 00:30:34,200 You can be super accessible for one type of disability type and very inaccessible to another. 410 00:30:34,200 --> 00:30:37,040 So instead, I think it's about migrating to a badge system. 411 00:30:37,040 --> 00:30:43,480 You can be sensory, very sensory accessible, very wheelchair inaccessible. 412 00:30:43,480 --> 00:30:45,920 But that's OK as long as you communicate it. 413 00:30:45,920 --> 00:30:51,400 And then people can sort of opt in and opt out of where they can fit in. 414 00:30:51,400 --> 00:30:57,280 As well as continuing on the education as well, I just don't think you can have too much education in this space. 415 00:30:57,280 --> 00:31:03,000 Yeah, absolutely. I think education is one of the biggest barriers, not only for fitness professionals, 416 00:31:03,000 --> 00:31:10,680 but for the general public in terms of understanding, appreciating and including disability further. 417 00:31:10,680 --> 00:31:15,400 Yeah, I guess if you're tackling these bigger projects, 418 00:31:15,400 --> 00:31:22,840 did you think you could stay under the guise of Weflex and address these things or did it have to be separate? 419 00:31:22,840 --> 00:31:28,240 No, to some extent, Weflex is a business and it needed to focus its attention on its main mission, 420 00:31:28,240 --> 00:31:34,720 which is just bringing on as many clients as possible, matching them with as many fitness professionals across Australia as possible 421 00:31:34,720 --> 00:31:38,600 and supporting that dynamic relationship to thrive moving forward. 422 00:31:38,600 --> 00:31:45,000 All these other things for these other passion projects, I guess the shiny things I got distracted by and I really wanted to pursue. 423 00:31:45,000 --> 00:31:52,360 So it's sort of now a bit more of a advocacy, bigger picture space while Weflex really starts to just refine doing what it does best. 424 00:31:52,360 --> 00:31:58,120 And that is meet onboarding clients with disability, matching them with personal trainers that are suited to them, 425 00:31:58,120 --> 00:32:04,320 training that personal trainer to meet their needs, matching them and then coordinating the red-based payments from there. 426 00:32:04,320 --> 00:32:12,800 Yeah, I wonder how many different projects and interests of mine can fit underneath the Adaptex umbrella 427 00:32:12,800 --> 00:32:18,280 and whether some of them need to be separate and my gym's separate. 428 00:32:18,280 --> 00:32:23,160 My gym is a for-profit entity, Unified, and then Adaptex was our educational branch. 429 00:32:23,160 --> 00:32:31,360 But now there's the podcast, then there's the research projects, there's accessibility renovations for fitness facilities. 430 00:32:31,360 --> 00:32:39,760 It's like, I guess, how do you know which one stays with one organization, which one goes elsewhere? 431 00:32:39,760 --> 00:32:47,280 And maybe how do you take off the blinders and realize I'm the one holding the organization back 432 00:32:47,280 --> 00:32:49,800 from accomplishing what it needs to accomplish? 433 00:32:49,800 --> 00:32:55,720 It's hard to let go. It's really difficult, especially when, you know, I'm sure like me, 434 00:32:55,720 --> 00:33:00,000 you were also started on your own screaming into the void, you know, at night. 435 00:33:00,000 --> 00:33:04,000 Yeah, still screaming into the void often. 436 00:33:04,000 --> 00:33:07,600 It's just like, oh, you know, especially when you're in a pioneering space. 437 00:33:07,600 --> 00:33:12,400 And I'd argue that inclusive fitness is, I think it's that nice, the beginning phase. 438 00:33:12,400 --> 00:33:16,840 I think in 10 years time, the conversation is going to be a lot more evolved, a lot more common, 439 00:33:16,840 --> 00:33:20,000 which is great. I think both of us want that, you know, in a nutshell. 440 00:33:20,000 --> 00:33:25,160 But when you're kind of at the front of doing it, you know, it sounds really cool, but it's not, 441 00:33:25,160 --> 00:33:28,480 because there's no one to steal from, no one to copy from. 442 00:33:28,480 --> 00:33:33,360 You're working everything out for yourself and everyone's looking to you to work it out too. 443 00:33:33,360 --> 00:33:37,560 And it's just so you just spend all these nights just like, how the hell am I going to make this work? 444 00:33:37,560 --> 00:33:39,560 Like, no one's done what Weflex did, right? 445 00:33:39,560 --> 00:33:45,280 So I've got to work out everything, just scribbling on whiteboards all night until I work it out. 446 00:33:45,280 --> 00:33:48,040 You make all the mistakes, you know, to get there. 447 00:33:48,040 --> 00:33:51,840 It's really tough because you're so committed, you're so attached to it, 448 00:33:51,840 --> 00:33:55,640 to then the idea that other people can now pick up where you left off. 449 00:33:55,640 --> 00:33:58,080 It doesn't have to be Brendan solving it. 450 00:33:58,080 --> 00:34:01,480 You can hire someone else who's just as capable of solving it as you are. 451 00:34:01,480 --> 00:34:06,080 It's hard to let go and then to step back and to give yourself permission to do other things. 452 00:34:06,080 --> 00:34:10,760 You know, it's like getting out of a marriage to some extent. 453 00:34:10,760 --> 00:34:18,800 That was one of the biggest challenges with my brick and mortar facility was it was becoming my gym. 454 00:34:18,800 --> 00:34:27,160 And that kind of took all of my trainers and automatically put them on a lower tier. 455 00:34:27,160 --> 00:34:31,840 People would come in, work with one of the trainers and be like, oh, could I ask Brendan a question? 456 00:34:31,840 --> 00:34:34,600 It's like, no, they're perfectly capable. 457 00:34:34,600 --> 00:34:43,520 And so we're at a great point now where all of our coaches are well respected and knowledgeable amongst our membership base. 458 00:34:43,520 --> 00:34:50,920 But it's like the hardest thing was I basically just had to stop and it felt it felt like abrupt to a degree. 459 00:34:50,920 --> 00:34:58,120 And I still feel guilty when I'm not out there, when I haven't seen a member for a couple of weeks 460 00:34:58,120 --> 00:35:01,560 because I'm not here at a time that they typically train. 461 00:35:01,560 --> 00:35:08,960 But it was like it was a necessary step towards becoming unified health and performance, not becoming Brendan's gym. 462 00:35:08,960 --> 00:35:11,640 Yeah, absolutely, dude. Like I said, it was funny. 463 00:35:11,640 --> 00:35:16,680 I remember when I was especially when I first started out, I was talking to a mate of mine who had just given birth 464 00:35:16,680 --> 00:35:20,880 and we were both complaining basically about me and the startup staff her with the baby. 465 00:35:20,880 --> 00:35:22,600 And I'm not saying it's the same as having a baby. 466 00:35:22,600 --> 00:35:27,720 But what I'm saying though is that the complaints are very similar because we were both saying the same thing. 467 00:35:27,720 --> 00:35:30,400 I'm always tired. I always feel guilty. I can't take breaks. 468 00:35:30,400 --> 00:35:32,440 And when I do take a break, I feel bad for taking a break. 469 00:35:32,440 --> 00:35:34,680 And then I don't actually get the benefit of the break. 470 00:35:34,680 --> 00:35:37,160 Then I come back just as tired. You know what I mean? 471 00:35:37,160 --> 00:35:41,320 Like I want this to be independent of me, but I can't handle the abandonment of it. 472 00:35:41,320 --> 00:35:45,880 When it does leave me and does its own thing, I want to be there for every second of it. 473 00:35:45,880 --> 00:35:49,960 My mate came out laughing going, you two sound exactly the same at the moment. 474 00:35:49,960 --> 00:35:57,760 I was like my I guess my goals to with the gym have evolved a little bit towards. 475 00:35:57,760 --> 00:36:06,080 Yeah, like I get two boys under two years old and I want to make sure that I don't miss things over the next four or five years. 476 00:36:06,080 --> 00:36:13,680 But at the same time, I love working and I love the diversity of the projects that I'm working on to the point where 477 00:36:13,680 --> 00:36:20,760 I think if you gave me the option to hang out for a few hours or work on something, I would choose the latter. 478 00:36:20,760 --> 00:36:23,600 And I don't know if that's a bad thing or not. 479 00:36:23,600 --> 00:36:24,360 It is what it is. 480 00:36:24,360 --> 00:36:29,040 Because people are I mean, you always hear, oh, you got to relax, you got to do this, you got to do that. 481 00:36:29,040 --> 00:36:33,320 But I always feel better if I'm getting if I'm getting something done. 482 00:36:33,320 --> 00:36:36,280 I'm the same. I don't deal well with relaxation or nothing. 483 00:36:36,280 --> 00:36:42,720 Yeah, but but it's like it's been conditioned to and I'm not promoting like a hustle culture. 484 00:36:42,720 --> 00:36:45,560 I'll never really boast about that stuff. 485 00:36:45,560 --> 00:36:52,640 But I don't think necessarily the desire to work a lot and take on projects like this is inherently a bad thing. 486 00:36:52,640 --> 00:36:54,880 Maybe sometimes people want to feel better about themselves. 487 00:36:54,880 --> 00:36:59,040 So they're like, you shouldn't work so much. 488 00:36:59,040 --> 00:37:03,240 So it's I know it's been it's been an interesting thing to juggle. 489 00:37:03,240 --> 00:37:05,520 It's a deeply personal journey going through it. 490 00:37:05,520 --> 00:37:07,000 You love so much about yourself. 491 00:37:07,000 --> 00:37:12,360 For me, it was always about I wanted the brand to mean more than me. 492 00:37:12,360 --> 00:37:16,320 I wanted the brand to be something that people actually cared about that people bought into. 493 00:37:16,320 --> 00:37:21,800 I was so passionate about the brand being so the reason why I was we flex was because I wanted the way to be 494 00:37:21,800 --> 00:37:24,680 about we're all founders, we're all the people involved. 495 00:37:24,680 --> 00:37:29,120 Like it's all of us. It's a movement, not so much a company. 496 00:37:29,120 --> 00:37:36,720 I wanted to make it cool enough that our clients would want to buy the gear and wear it and wear merch and represent it and actually be proud of it. 497 00:37:36,720 --> 00:37:41,240 For it to be a cool fitness brand, not you know, because sometimes I'm sure you've seen it yourself, 498 00:37:41,240 --> 00:37:46,360 like there's all these super depressing names for businesses with disabilities in a way. 499 00:37:46,360 --> 00:37:48,680 You know, they use it where a special way too much. 500 00:37:48,680 --> 00:37:53,960 I think super, I feel I feel the Special Olympics because there's so much history attached to it. 501 00:37:53,960 --> 00:37:58,600 So I feel like they get they get a bigger pass. 502 00:37:58,600 --> 00:38:04,280 But the new new companies coming out, it's just like, oh, special fit buddies or stuff like that. 503 00:38:04,280 --> 00:38:08,640 It's like I've got a younger brother on the spectrum. 504 00:38:08,640 --> 00:38:13,280 But, you know, he's a one. He's he's he knows where he is. 505 00:38:13,280 --> 00:38:19,040 He knows what's happening around him and being involved in his program just makes him cringe so hard. 506 00:38:19,040 --> 00:38:21,560 And I just never wanted that for our clients. 507 00:38:21,560 --> 00:38:25,480 And so you want to create a brand, but then it has to be the brand, not you. 508 00:38:25,480 --> 00:38:33,320 And so it's about I'm going to do everything I can with my force of personality or whatever to get it to a point where others can start holding it up. 509 00:38:33,320 --> 00:38:37,960 And then I've just got to accept I've got to step away and just hope it continues to do the right thing. 510 00:38:37,960 --> 00:38:44,560 But at the same time, the idea that it has to be me or it's going to fail without me is not the point. 511 00:38:44,560 --> 00:38:47,920 You've got to build it to sustain. So you've got to build it with leaving it in mind. 512 00:38:47,920 --> 00:38:50,600 And so that's why I believe. 513 00:38:50,600 --> 00:38:54,640 How did you brand the new consulting project? 514 00:38:54,640 --> 00:38:59,600 Just want to sound more professional. So I started to call it Inclusive AF. 515 00:38:59,600 --> 00:39:07,760 Again, like, you know, I think it's about I think there's there's almost a weird taboo about having like cool branding in the disability space. 516 00:39:07,760 --> 00:39:13,240 It has to be super G rated Mickey Mouse sort of shit, which I don't like. 517 00:39:13,240 --> 00:39:17,640 So for me, it was just about making it a bit more fun, a bit more trendy. 518 00:39:17,640 --> 00:39:23,520 And, you know, everyone thinks that AF stands for AF, but it's actually accessible and fun. 519 00:39:23,520 --> 00:39:28,960 That's what it stands for. Perfect. Interpret it as you wish. 520 00:39:28,960 --> 00:39:31,480 If you're on the data, that's on you, not me, Brandon. 521 00:39:31,480 --> 00:39:50,400 So it's like, you know, what I want to do, though, is get to a point where I can, you know, Jim, if Jim's want to standard to set themselves to an accessibility inclusion, then I can give them a better say in their inclusive AF. 522 00:39:50,400 --> 00:39:57,760 What is the delineation between doing good for a business and making money? 523 00:39:57,760 --> 00:40:02,680 I think it's about for me. Yeah, it's hard. 524 00:40:02,680 --> 00:40:05,160 You know, my background is not for profit sector. 525 00:40:05,160 --> 00:40:15,640 So I was sort of almost indoctrinated with the notion that to make money is greedy or is in some our contradiction to your values, which has taken a long time to shake. 526 00:40:15,640 --> 00:40:21,000 I think that, you know, it's if it falls to say, you know, and Dan Pallotta has amazing talks on this, too. 527 00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:27,720 I'm sure you know who he is. So, you know, the notion that if I was if I was here as a banker and I'm telling you I made a quarter mill last year, you wouldn't think anything of it. 528 00:40:27,720 --> 00:40:37,400 But if I'm here saying I work in disability and I made half a mill last year, all of a sudden it's just that little suspicion on my ethics, my values. 529 00:40:37,400 --> 00:40:39,920 Why am I doing this? And I just think it's crappy. 530 00:40:39,920 --> 00:40:48,280 Like, if we want the best minds and great talent to make the industry more stronger, then there needs to be money in it, essentially. 531 00:40:48,280 --> 00:40:56,400 And I think treating people with disabilities like they could not or should not ever spend any of their own money, limited though it may be on good services, 532 00:40:56,400 --> 00:41:00,160 I think is also super condescending and charitable as well. Right. 533 00:41:00,160 --> 00:41:06,880 So I believe you can make money as long as you're providing the right the subsequent or the appropriate amount of value along with it. 534 00:41:06,880 --> 00:41:17,760 When I work with businesses, I charge what I think is a pretty fair amount, but I'm giving them a lot of value that's going to help them make that back and way more over the long term by having clients. 535 00:41:17,760 --> 00:41:19,800 You know, so that's how I sort of justify it. 536 00:41:19,800 --> 00:41:30,080 I'm giving myself a bit more permission to just look after myself because otherwise I'll just be paycheck to paycheck my entire life, creating value for everybody but myself. 537 00:41:30,080 --> 00:41:40,760 Yeah, that's very fair. I know in Pilata's TED Talk, he talks about how like how is a nonprofit going to attract the brightest minds if they can just go work somewhere else, 538 00:41:40,760 --> 00:41:46,120 make two hundred and fifty thousand, donate a quarter of their salary and be praised as a philanthropist. 539 00:41:46,120 --> 00:41:54,560 Like, why would they go work for a nonprofit for half the amount when they can make more and still be considered a giving person? 540 00:41:54,560 --> 00:42:02,360 Yeah, exactly. The rules are weird where it's like you can come here and work here, but you can't make money, but come and work really hard. 541 00:42:02,360 --> 00:42:06,000 Like, we're the only industry that asks that of people sort of thing. 542 00:42:06,000 --> 00:42:10,840 But it's the people who work in the industry, not so much the participants. Right. 543 00:42:10,840 --> 00:42:16,120 It's not so much the clients like again, all the co-design that none of them have a problem with it. Right. 544 00:42:16,120 --> 00:42:20,000 As long as you're providing good value, I will be a customer and I'll buy your services. 545 00:42:20,000 --> 00:42:23,280 Just do a good job. Be professional. Give me what I need. 546 00:42:23,280 --> 00:42:26,440 Like, just run a really good business and I want you to be successful. 547 00:42:26,440 --> 00:42:33,120 But so it's more it's not actually driven by the people that actually matter, like the customers and the end users. 548 00:42:33,120 --> 00:42:40,000 It's driven by just a weird I think it's a relic of old attitudes from the charitable back in the day. 549 00:42:40,000 --> 00:42:42,320 I think there's a lot of gatekeeping involved in it as well. 550 00:42:42,320 --> 00:42:46,600 Where it's like, well, Brandon, unless you have family with disability, you don't get it. 551 00:42:46,600 --> 00:42:49,600 You know what I mean? And you can't sit with us, which I don't think is fair. 552 00:42:49,600 --> 00:42:59,480 It's like, no, you can just be really good at it. And again, that's one of the things that's been tough about like the lived experience. 553 00:42:59,480 --> 00:43:07,440 I am my LinkedIn. My LinkedIn feeds a lot of people with disabilities, nothing about us without us. 554 00:43:07,440 --> 00:43:15,280 And I fully understand the premise behind that. And there should be representation in all the conversations. 555 00:43:15,280 --> 00:43:18,320 But sometimes it feels like a little bit of an echo chamber. 556 00:43:18,320 --> 00:43:23,240 They're just like shouting to each other and they're all confirming their own biases. 557 00:43:23,240 --> 00:43:30,640 But they're like, but you need to reach you to reach the key stakeholders if you want to make change. 558 00:43:30,640 --> 00:43:34,080 You need to reach the businesses that aren't inclusive, that aren't accessible. 559 00:43:34,080 --> 00:43:41,320 And the way of doing so, I don't think is to chastise them for currently not being accessible. 560 00:43:41,320 --> 00:43:51,840 No. Sometimes it seems like there's a lot of critiques and that's not really going to incentivise anyone from diving into this quote unquote world of inclusion. 561 00:43:51,840 --> 00:43:59,360 I just I'm not convinced that you can sort of shame and bully your way to a better place or a better world. 562 00:43:59,360 --> 00:44:04,280 I think what happens is that you sort of just people just try to is like people just become the kids back in the class. 563 00:44:04,280 --> 00:44:06,400 He just doesn't want to get noticed kind of thing. 564 00:44:06,400 --> 00:44:09,040 They just want to float through and avoid anything. 565 00:44:09,040 --> 00:44:14,800 And they don't want to even try. And instead, what we should be doing is just, you know, 566 00:44:14,800 --> 00:44:22,800 and that's the hard part of being an advocate, right, is that you have to have the same dumb conversation with people all the time, 567 00:44:22,800 --> 00:44:26,000 but not make them feel stupid for it. 568 00:44:26,000 --> 00:44:33,640 Thank them for asking the question, give them useful advice that can make them a little bit better or help them decide if they want to be a little bit better. 569 00:44:33,640 --> 00:44:38,480 But also have the conversation, you know, so I do I've done workshops for some of the bigger brands here. 570 00:44:38,480 --> 00:44:42,400 One of the things I say straight up is like you're allowed to have an opinion. 571 00:44:42,400 --> 00:44:45,480 You're allowed to use words if you're not sure if they're good or not, I'll tell you. 572 00:44:45,480 --> 00:44:50,480 But I'm not going to physically assault you if you say a word that's maybe not proper nomenclature anymore. 573 00:44:50,480 --> 00:44:59,240 Like just and you know, and one thing that's really interesting is, is that all the time I've spent working with co-design and I had employees, 574 00:44:59,240 --> 00:45:04,680 most like half the input my workforce was people with disability or psychosocial disability. 575 00:45:04,680 --> 00:45:10,400 And all of them always reiterated it's like the words aren't anywhere near as important as the meaning behind it. 576 00:45:10,400 --> 00:45:16,040 Like I've had conversation with people where I've said what I've now realized was what we don't say anymore. 577 00:45:16,040 --> 00:45:19,640 I used to say hearing impaired quite a lot, although you should say hard of hearing now. 578 00:45:19,640 --> 00:45:22,600 But I never got jumped on or attacked for that is always say that now. 579 00:45:22,600 --> 00:45:28,120 But I know that you mean well, like I can tell you just using the words, you know, 580 00:45:28,120 --> 00:45:31,280 and I think we should not shy away from using the word disability. 581 00:45:31,280 --> 00:45:33,960 Like I want to tell us all my favorite. I love this. 582 00:45:33,960 --> 00:45:44,760 So I watched I watched a woman try and talk to this other lady who was in a wheelchair and she was so painfully trying to not say the word wheelchair 583 00:45:44,760 --> 00:45:48,480 and disability to this person when explaining it, describing her condition. 584 00:45:48,480 --> 00:45:52,680 And I just watched it for three real time minutes, which took like a year. 585 00:45:52,680 --> 00:45:57,760 Dancer round, trying to find the words to say it without saying wheelchair and disability. 586 00:45:57,760 --> 00:46:02,080 And the woman in the wheelchair just got the shit and was just like, I'm in a wheelchair. 587 00:46:02,080 --> 00:46:04,520 Why are you making me awkward? 588 00:46:04,520 --> 00:46:11,320 Yeah, that that person that I connected you with a few weeks ago, 589 00:46:11,320 --> 00:46:16,520 the former intern of mine who's now in Australia studying for school, 590 00:46:16,520 --> 00:46:22,640 she she texted me and a friend of ours and she was like, is this conversation happening in the US? 591 00:46:22,640 --> 00:46:32,280 And she's like, we just had a lecture on person with disability versus person with a disability, one being temporary, one being permanent. 592 00:46:32,280 --> 00:46:35,040 And I was like, oh, like, I don't think that's really happening. 593 00:46:35,040 --> 00:46:42,600 And the more conversations I have with people with disabilities, a lot of them don't mind being called disabled. 594 00:46:42,600 --> 00:46:46,840 Again, it's like the connotation of the word, are you putting them down? 595 00:46:46,840 --> 00:46:53,160 Do you even need to specify that they're a disabled person or I don't know. 596 00:46:53,160 --> 00:47:01,760 Sometimes I put that like language and the inconsistencies and the potential fear of being critiqued for a lack of accessibility, 597 00:47:01,760 --> 00:47:10,320 I think is that that concoction of fears is what prevents people from even making the effort to interact with someone with a disability. 598 00:47:10,320 --> 00:47:12,680 Yeah, instead of just talking to them directly. 599 00:47:12,680 --> 00:47:18,240 So yeah, little echo chamber where they just they're just talking to themselves. 600 00:47:18,240 --> 00:47:23,120 I think and again, it's just never come up to me is actually important. 601 00:47:23,120 --> 00:47:25,320 But there's a few that there's words that grow out. 602 00:47:25,320 --> 00:47:27,520 You should learn them definitely and stay in touch. 603 00:47:27,520 --> 00:47:30,360 But people within the community will tell you that. 604 00:47:30,360 --> 00:47:34,760 And they're just happy to be spoken to, like just talk to them directly. 605 00:47:34,760 --> 00:47:41,200 So cut out. It's just people with that disability in the industry just taking up all the oxygen. 606 00:47:41,200 --> 00:47:47,400 You know, so again, one thing I loved about your intro is like, you don't talk on behalf of I think that's really important. 607 00:47:47,400 --> 00:47:50,720 And that's something I teach all the brands is like have an opinion on fitness, 608 00:47:50,720 --> 00:47:54,160 have an opinion on inclusion and accessibility and philosophy. 609 00:47:54,160 --> 00:47:55,400 Just don't talk for them. 610 00:47:55,400 --> 00:48:00,640 But if you if you if you have a customer with a disability, they tell you something, you can share that. 611 00:48:00,640 --> 00:48:06,400 But you can you can report back conversations you've actually had even better as if you highlight or let them say it in their own words. 612 00:48:06,400 --> 00:48:09,600 But that's what you should do. Just go straight to the source. 613 00:48:09,600 --> 00:48:12,960 That's all you have to do. Yeah. That's what I've loved about this podcast. 614 00:48:12,960 --> 00:48:18,120 I mean, this is going to be episode thirty three by the time it publishes. 615 00:48:18,120 --> 00:48:28,760 And I find myself when I'm making content, writing pieces, referencing things that guests told me. 616 00:48:28,760 --> 00:48:33,840 Brad McAnnell from the Rick Hansen Foundation talking about accessibility and he's redesigned airports. 617 00:48:33,840 --> 00:48:39,240 And well, he talks about he talks about how accessibility can benefit some people and hurt others. 618 00:48:39,240 --> 00:48:46,400 They put carpet down the middle of the runway, which reduced some of the hearing and the echoes for people who are hard of hearing. 619 00:48:46,400 --> 00:48:50,120 But at the same time, it made it hard for wheelchair users to navigate the airport. 620 00:48:50,120 --> 00:48:54,920 He's like accessibility isn't like a checkbox. It's not a state of being. 621 00:48:54,920 --> 00:48:58,320 It's a commitment to addressing people's needs. 622 00:48:58,320 --> 00:49:05,560 So just stuff like that. But hearing that from the individual with disability weighs a whole lot more than me saying it. 623 00:49:05,560 --> 00:49:09,960 Yeah, that being a platform. Yeah, I love that. Accessibility is a state of mind. 624 00:49:09,960 --> 00:49:14,720 It's like this is amazing. She's not only with us, got to rest her soul. 625 00:49:14,720 --> 00:49:18,440 But we had an amazing disability advocate in Australia called Stella Young. 626 00:49:18,440 --> 00:49:25,280 And she has this great point, though, where she was like, you see all these memes and posts about the only disability in life is a bad attitude. 627 00:49:25,280 --> 00:49:30,760 And she was like, no amount of good attitude is going to turn stairs into a ramp. 628 00:49:30,760 --> 00:49:34,600 Exactly. Absolutely. 629 00:49:34,600 --> 00:49:46,920 We've wrapped up most of these episodes with kind of the overarching prompt or theme of what do you think needs to be done to make fitness or the fitness industry more accessible for people with disabilities? 630 00:49:46,920 --> 00:49:53,240 I think what I've learned is just to not overthink it and not be scared of it either. 631 00:49:53,240 --> 00:50:01,960 So if you if you want to get into the space, if you just started getting into the space, it's OK to like make mistakes. 632 00:50:01,960 --> 00:50:09,240 As long as you are trying your best, you are constantly communicating, getting feedback from the client with disability. 633 00:50:09,240 --> 00:50:13,880 But just get stuck in like and just get going and you'll just get better. 634 00:50:13,880 --> 00:50:19,640 I know both I've no doubt me and Brandon have made all kinds of mistakes with our earlier clients in earlier days. 635 00:50:19,640 --> 00:50:24,360 And you just get better at it. But a lot of them are still our clients because they don't expect you to be perfect either. 636 00:50:24,360 --> 00:50:27,280 They just want you to try and get. 637 00:50:27,280 --> 00:50:30,040 Yeah, I've learned a lot from you over the last couple of years, too. 638 00:50:30,040 --> 00:50:42,120 And that's why it's it's like tough to be stuff to have a growth mindset, but also be an authority figure or perceived authority figure. 639 00:50:42,120 --> 00:50:48,560 Like, I'm supposed to have all the answers, but I I completely understand that I don't have any of the answers. 640 00:50:48,560 --> 00:50:55,160 No. So it's like it's like, I guess, how can I how can I teach if I'm if I'm learning every conversation I have? 641 00:50:55,160 --> 00:50:58,520 Yeah, I've completely rejected the term expert. 642 00:50:58,520 --> 00:51:01,880 I don't even know if that's possible in this space. 643 00:51:01,880 --> 00:51:05,320 But, you know, one thing you learn is that the education journey. 644 00:51:05,320 --> 00:51:11,080 So going from knowing nothing to knowing something, it isn't it isn't up is that it's just a plummet. 645 00:51:11,080 --> 00:51:16,040 Because the second you start with the client, you realize all the things you didn't know you didn't know. 646 00:51:16,040 --> 00:51:18,920 And you're just like, oh, man, I am out of my depth. 647 00:51:18,920 --> 00:51:22,160 And then you just start at that very bottom, the real bottom. 648 00:51:22,160 --> 00:51:24,640 And then you just slowly just build your way out of it. 649 00:51:24,640 --> 00:51:26,760 You know what I mean? So it's tough. 650 00:51:26,760 --> 00:51:28,120 It's like what's it what's it called? 651 00:51:28,120 --> 00:51:31,480 The Dunning-Kruger effect where you learn a little bit and then you think you're an expert. 652 00:51:31,480 --> 00:51:38,200 And then the more you learn, the less you realize, you know, and that's kind of how this experience has been for me. 653 00:51:38,200 --> 00:51:45,520 And now I've made this commitment to, I guess, quote unquote, like learn in public through these conversations. 654 00:51:45,520 --> 00:51:47,400 And through our course revisions. 655 00:51:47,400 --> 00:51:53,480 And yeah, it's been I think that's, I guess, maybe what makes the best educational experience. 656 00:51:53,480 --> 00:51:57,200 You can't just take my course. You can't just take your course and be ready to go. 657 00:51:57,200 --> 00:51:59,960 That's like the that's the ground level. 658 00:51:59,960 --> 00:52:05,840 And then the hands on experience is the is the expertise or maybe not expertise, but at least the knowledge. 659 00:52:05,840 --> 00:52:10,080 Well, if there's an expert, it's the customers themselves. 660 00:52:10,080 --> 00:52:15,040 Exactly. Yeah, that's why including their their voice has always been something that I've valued. 661 00:52:15,040 --> 00:52:18,240 And in your educational materials as well as is that co-designing piece. 662 00:52:18,240 --> 00:52:22,000 So Tommy, glad to have you in our network. 663 00:52:22,000 --> 00:52:23,080 Glad to have you as a friend. 664 00:52:23,080 --> 00:52:30,360 If the audience wants to learn more about what you do or benefit from your services, where should they find you? 665 00:52:30,360 --> 00:52:32,440 Just inclusive AF dot com. 666 00:52:32,440 --> 00:52:34,840 It's a I've had to just start that website. 667 00:52:34,840 --> 00:52:36,120 So it's pretty cringy at the moment. 668 00:52:36,120 --> 00:52:37,400 But there's a contact form. 669 00:52:37,400 --> 00:52:39,080 I'm also just opened up my socials. 670 00:52:39,080 --> 00:52:41,720 So LinkedIn, Instagram, Inclusive AF. 671 00:52:41,720 --> 00:52:47,080 You'll find me it's pretty it's a standout brand. 672 00:52:47,080 --> 00:52:52,720 You know, inclusive, inclusive, accessibility and fun. 673 00:52:52,720 --> 00:52:55,000 Tommy Trout. Thank you, Tommy. 674 00:52:55,000 --> 00:52:58,520 I look forward to sharing this with our listeners. 675 00:52:58,520 --> 00:53:00,800 And I have always appreciated what you've shared with me. 676 00:53:00,800 --> 00:53:03,520 I appreciate you. Thank you, Brandon. 677 00:53:03,520 --> 00:53:05,880 Thank you for listening to the AdaptX podcast. 678 00:53:05,880 --> 00:53:10,480 Our effort to amplify the ideas of our guests and create more inclusive and accessible industries is futile 679 00:53:10,480 --> 00:53:12,880 unless these episodes reach a larger audience. 680 00:53:12,880 --> 00:53:17,880 If you enjoyed our discussion today, please leave us a rating or review on whichever platform you use. 681 00:53:17,880 --> 00:53:21,920 And if you would like to learn more about AdaptX, the course that we teach to health and fitness professionals 682 00:53:21,920 --> 00:53:26,640 and the projects that our organization is working on, you can subscribe to our newsletter through our website, 683 00:53:26,640 --> 00:53:29,040 www.adaptx.org. 684 00:53:29,040 --> 00:53:41,040 Until next Monday.