Todd Burrier by any real definition of the word is beyond successful. He has an amazing and loving family. He’s a fitness enthusiast who embraces and lives the fitness lifestyle. He’s highly liked and respected by everyone who knows him. He does important work that helps countless people which he is extremely passionate about.
Todd is a health and wellness entrepreneur with over 30 years of experience. He’s a corporate coach and leadership trainer and a multi-published author and course creator. His latest book, “3 Circles Living: Achieving Your Richest Life Possible” is genius and based on finding the balance between health, relationships, and money, principles he teaches and lives by.
Todd coaches and inspires others to develop their own level of success while helping them to become more fit and healthy and pursue the life of their dreams. In addition, he gives them the opportunity to help others while they learn to better themselves and their own lives. At 59 years of age, Todd has seen first hand the benefits of fitness and also witnessed too many health-related tragedies. Endeavoring to be like Todd in as many ways as possible would serve all of us well. (ToddBurrier.com)
Fit Club: Where are you from?
Todd: I grew up outside of Annapolis, MD, went to school at Univ. of Maryland, and spent several years in the DC Metro area and now live in New Bern, North Carolina. Married to my soulmate for 32 Years with two grown children.
Fit Club: When and how did you first get into fitness and exercise?
Todd: From a staying healthy and fit perspective it began when I was about 25 years old. I was working in banking and had begun putting on weight. It wasn’t something I thought about or noticed, it was just happening while I was working and partying. One weekend I was with a group of friends at the beach, and one of the guys says to me “Dude, you’re getting fat!” That hit me like a ton of bricks. I started running the next day. The truth is that it was purely vanity at that point. Three years later when I was married and had our first child, this is when I really started getting serious about it from a true health perspective. I have a horrible family history health-wise. My father died of cancer at 48 and my brother died from complications of lymphoma at 42. When I started having a family, I was committed to reducing the risk of this happening to me.
Fit Club: How often do you work out each week?
Todd: Formally 6 days per week on average, meaning I am in the gym. But most days I also do something active and outdoors in addition. I’m on the water a lot, so I am rowing a boat, kayaking, paddle Boarding, and also playing with my dogs.
Fit Club: What types of things do you like to do in your fitness program?
Todd: I do at least 30 minutes of cardio 6 days per week and usually it’s an exercise bike that I ride interval style. The other 30 minutes is dedicated to resistance training and core work. Most of what I do is bodyweight oriented at this point. 3 days a week it’s an intense pull up/chin up session and the other 3 days it’s dips and a variety of push-ups. I mix in some light leg work a few times per week as well. I do mix in machines, free weights, and cables as well, but just for the occasional change of pace.
Fit Club: Obviously fitness is important. Has that been easier to appreciate over the years?
Todd: Most definitely. The older I’ve gotten the more I appreciate being in good shape because I can do everything I want to do, and I just don’t get tired easily. It becomes more and more noticeable around people in my same age demographic, who aren’t attentive to their health proactively and it’s visible.
Fit Club: I know that you’re a big advocate of using the highest quality nutritional supplements (we even use the same brand). How has this made a difference for you and why do you feel that this can be critical to people as they grow older in terms of fitness and overall health?
Todd: This question would take many pages to do justice, so I’ll give my short answer. It’s vital to anyone, of any age, in today’s world to complement their diet with nutritional supplements. It’s simply not possible to get enough nutrients through food, especially today’s food, for the body to deal with the bombardment of toxins and chemicals. It’s magnified as we age because the body is less efficient, and produces less of the substances that keep us vital, like enzymes and hormones. I started supplementing the basics in my late 20s. Primarily, I was focused on risk management because of family history. Through self-education, I learned that the common-sense reason for the overall increase in health issues in the population was lack of nutrients for the body (from poor food or depleted food) and abundant toxicity in the environment. It’s pretty obvious once you see it…and by the way, this was 1989-90 time frame…it’s gotten much worse since. I already had a myriad of health issues by the time I was in my mid-20s…autoimmune, upper respiratory problems, allergy issues, borderline high blood pressure…some of that was self-inflicted because of a bad lifestyle, and some were genetic predisposition. Eventually, I eliminated all of it, and at 58 I’m generally healthier than in my 20s, and fitter than most people I work out around…many of which are much younger. I attribute a major portion of my current health to the right supplements. I work a lot, workout daily, and my work is awesome but requires substantial emotional energy, and the bottom line is that I just don’t feel tired very often until around bedtime. And by the way, it’s not just me. There are many people in my peer group, who are my age or older that can run circles around many younger people who are not yet doing the basic things and feeding their bodies what it needs.
Fit Club: What advice would you give someone who struggles to prioritize taking care of themselves through following a fitness lifestyle?
Todd: This might seem a bit harsh, but if you don’t prioritize health now, you will be forced to later. Unfortunately, that will mean there is an issue so you will already have a diminished quality of life, and now have no choice but to do whatever you can, and it will be very very expensive. There is nothing on earth that is more important personally than your health. It is at the center of everything you do. You cannot be the best for the people you love without taking care of your health. And they deserve that from you. These are the people that support you and also rely on you. You can not be your best self without taking care of your health, and you absolutely cannot be your best in your job, business, or anything else you pursue. Once you truly grasp this, prioritizing isn’t nearly as hard, because it becomes non-optional. The issue is mindset, not time. Once you have the proper mindset, then the time challenge can be tackled. I teach all of this very deeply with my coaching clients, corporate clients, and in my own organization, and am releasing my book that teaches this quite soon.
Fit Club: Why is fitness such a good area for people who are interested in building a business?
Todd: Fitness or anything in the health and wellness field is a growing market. This is being fueled by multiple things but I’ll just talk about a few. Over the past 20-30 years, the baby boomers have led the charge that they will not get old without a fight. They began looking for ways to stay younger and active longer. As a result, there are a lot of 50-60-year-old people who have been exercising, eating more healthily, and using good supplements over this time. And guess what? They look, act, feel, and live a lot better than the people who didn’t make this choice. This has created a self-evidence that is undeniable. Social media has made this more noticeable and created higher awareness that you can be healthy and vibrant and look younger by doing the things I mentioned, regardless of what the media might be saying about it. You simply cannot hold the truth down. It will come out. This awareness is driving a market that is booming but is still early in it’s potential. On the other side, the state of health, in general, has continued to decline especially for those who just rely on the medical system for health care. They have misinterpreted this system. It’s really a “sick-care” system and it’s not working statistically, and definitely becoming massively unworkable financially. Health care costs are breaking people. It is so much more financially costly to NOT take care of yourself. It won’t be long before the only thing to do is have catastrophic insurance with huge deductibles and invest the rest of the money in self-care, like high-quality supplements, good food, and exercise. We are only seeing the tip of this iceberg.
Fit Club: Is there anyone you would like to thank or acknowledge who has helped you throughout your journey reach your current level of personal and/or business success?
Todd: There have been many people who have played a role in some fashion over the years, but very few that have been a consistent positive influence in my life over the long haul. The one constant, to whom I am forever grateful, is my wife Melanie. She has always believed in me and encouraged me. Being someone who has fought against low self-opinion for most of my life, having someone who knows me well, and loves me, consistently demonstrating a belief in me, when I was struggling to believe in myself has been a huge factor in where I am today.
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