Episode 37-The Child Whisperer: Unlocking Confidence & Resilience Through Martial Arts with Jeremy Jackson

00:02
Gentlemen, welcome to the War on Dads podcast. Today, I've got a very special guest. I'm here with Jeremy Jackson, aka the Black Belt Runner on Instagram, aka the Child Whisperer. You've heard of the Dog Whisperer.

00:14
This guy works wonders working with kids. Big question for today. What happens to the kids who don't fit into traditional sports, the ones who don't make the team, who don't get much playing time, or just don't connect with sports?

00:28
Where do they go to build confidence, discipline, and resilience? Jeremy Jackson is the Black Belt Runner, the Child Whisperer with 30 years of martial arts coaching and has a remarkable ability to help kids and adults achieve their goals.

00:42
As the owner of Black Belt Leadership Academy since 2008, he's guided tons of students in self-defense while organizing community drives, feeding families over Thanksgiving, and hosting charitable events like the annual Ninja Wrapping Party.

00:55
We have to come back to that. After overcoming a major knee construction in the early 2000s, Jeremy proved the power of resilience by completing Tough Mudders, marathons, and ultra-distance races. Ultra-distance races, huh?

01:09
Nice. Often training in ice baths and studying mental performance, including NLP and unbeatable mind coaching. A lot of good stuff there. The co-author of the Amazon bestseller, The Collective Heart, he continues to lead by example, inspiring others to push past their limits, stay active, and give back.

01:28
Whether he's teaching martial arts or running trails in sandals, oh wow, you must have read Born to Run. Jeremy's mission is clear so that anyone, regardless of size or setback, can achieve peak physical and mental fitness while maintaining a positive impact on those around him.

01:43
Jeremy, welcome to the podcast. Thanks for being here. Man, thanks for having me. This is going to be great. Yeah, so can you kind of bring us back to what inspired you originally to get into martial arts training?

01:55
Man, all through elementary school, I can pull out several different memories of being bullied, being picked on. on always being the last kid picked for a sport. I was the one there, but I was like, all right, I guess we'll take Jeremy for it.

02:09
And finally, about third or fourth grade, I can't remember exactly which one it was, my parents heard about a martial arts instructor and it's one of those, this is back in the 80s when it was a little bit more, I don't know, sketchy or what's the language they use today, a little sus, because it was a preacher teaching martial arts out of the basement of his church.

02:28
And I showed up, the class was two hours long and it had everybody in there from like ages, like seven year olds up to the older adults that were like in their fifties and stuff like that, which I'm not far from now.

02:42
But it was everybody just kind of, it was like a mix for all, but I just fell in love with it then. I was like, I went back every night I could go there like on Tuesdays and Thursday nights and it was just something I could not get out of.

02:55
Wow, what do you mean you could not get out of? Because it was like fun, it was addictive. It was fun. It was challenging. It wasn't like I was getting, you know, picked on. It was like something like, like people were actually stepping up to help me out, you know.

03:10
It wasn't like I was standing there with my hands in my pockets waiting for someone, you know. I remember a guy, his name was David, and me and him became friends for years. We still talk to this day, and he'd come over and like help me with my first set of katas to learn, and I remember looking at him.

03:23
I was like, dude, I gotta catch up with that guy, you know. So it's like those relationships and those bonds, or some people I probably haven't seen since then. All of a sudden, I'll run into them on the street, and it was almost like we never stopped talking, even though it's been 15, 20 years or something like that.

03:39
Wow. So kids that like don't get picked first or don't become great athletes, they sometimes don't get a chance to play on the team and to get that bonding experience. Yeah, they miss out on that chance of actually like social connection, you know.

03:53
One of those things of like being able to meet with other people, seeing how they respond, being able to work with others, and finding out there is someone that actually cares. They help lift you up a little bit, and they don't get a tap into that energy that they have inside of them with it.

04:08
So you've spent a long time coaching these kids, and I have this question about what's something with only someone, what only your experience would know, and you talked about being the child whisperer.

04:20
That's a fun one, because it's like I've had a great opportunity since we opened our school like in 2008. And I remember I started teaching back in like 94. And my instructor back then, there was no, what's the word I'm looking for?

04:34
There probably was, I shouldn't say there wasn't, but there probably was, we just didn't know about it, of like an actual protocol to go through on how to learn to teach. You know, it was all right, he got me a part time gig of working at daycares after school teaching martial arts.

04:51
Whoa. And he warned me at 16 years old, he's like, look, dude, the kids are going to try to challenge you a little bit. They're going to try to see like how much they can get away with and then they're gonna try to get away a little bit more and I'm like no they're not they're not gonna do that no I learned the hard way it did and over the years I was like trying to find different ways to teach like how can I reach them you know how can I talk to them how can I was attacking it all wrong cuz I said it just then how can I reach them how can I talk to them I was missing the connection part first you know it's like when a kid falls down and they get in not injured but let's just say they start crying because it hurts right most parents most people attack the problem the same way oh are you okay and you see the kid look at you like you're dumb no I'm not okay I just fell down didn't you see that versus a different approach of connecting it it hurts doesn't it yeah yeah it hurts well you know what you're doing it hurts we try a different way of approaching it because now we're connecting at the state they're in right now versus trying to take them out of I'm crying I'm upset we get on the same page with them and then we start opening those subtle shifts So it's that empathy first,

06:00
connection, acknowledging who they are, what they're experiencing in the moment. You see that a lot. It's interesting that you actually learn that experience doing it. When you first start a group of kids, so let's say you could go back and you've got day one, you're 16, you've got day one with these kids.

06:20
Instead of going out and trying to read some of the way you did, what would you do differently on day one, sort of to kind of set the tone so they know what to expect. Some guys will go in with this really disciplined look and like, we've got hard rules here.

06:34
And so the standard is like the expectations really high and then they're not so mean after all. That's a great question. I love that. Thank you for asking it. Because what I would do different is I would go in and ask them, what do you think we're gonna do today?

06:47
What do you think is gonna come out of this? Because if I tell a group of 15 kids, hey, we're doing karate today, and I just leave it at that, you'll have 15 different ideas of what karate is. One kid is thinking, oh, I gotta do pushups.

06:59
Other kids are like, oh, I gotta do splits. Another kid is like, we're gonna do backflips off the wall. I didn't say parkour, all right? We're gonna be breaking boards and it's another about carpentry, you know?

07:08
And all of a sudden it's like, what do you think we're gonna do today? And then I tell them, all right, here's what it's gonna look like. So this way there's not that misconception of what the classroom routine looks like.

07:19
Well, inevitably something will happen and you'll have a kid that gets upset or he starts crying. How do you resolve that? Now, that depends on what happened to cause them to start crying or start getting upset.

07:34
You know, are we talking about the fall down issue where they look like they got hurt or something like that? Or are we talking about the crying and upset because I can't get it? Well, go through both of them.

07:45
Okay, perfect. So with the one that I can't get it, you know, I tell them, and it sounds funny saying it sometimes, because we get used to saying other things different ways. All right, so this is what I say.

07:56
You're not supposed to get it. And it's like, what do you mean I'm not supposed to get it? Well, you're not supposed to. All of a sudden you get them thinking. Like I said a second ago, it just changes that little shift in their mind right there on the spot.

08:08
And now that they're open for more better suggestions, you're not supposed to get it. So let's try it a different way. And all of a sudden they're shifting just a little bit. I'm not trying to overdo it because that little shift, like everybody wants to go from, I'm upset, I'm mad to let's make them happy.

08:25
There's so much in that middle right there. It's hard to get that chasm going. Well, cause people are trying to get, we're trying to get our needs met. Like I need you to stop crying. So stop crying.

08:34
And like, that's not what they need in the moment. No, and it comes back on us because we feel like we're supposed to do that flip for them. And then if we're not doing that flip for them, there's been times in my past where I'm like, oh my goodness, this kid's crying is upset cause he can't get it.

08:48
This looks bad on me. I got to get them happy again. All right, that's the wrong mindset there because now it's all about me. And as you just said, I'm forgetting about them. And then there's no connection.

09:00
And then some people make a trouble of connecting with the crying. And then all of a sudden, now they can't stop crying. What was the toilet paper trick? That's the one if they fall down and they're like hurt, not injured.

09:14
You know, the feelings were hurt or something like that. And what I do is it's like I immediately go to the bathroom and I grab out a roll of toilet paper. And I bring the toilet paper out because everyone already knows what you associate toilet paper with, right?

09:26
It's either A, blowing your nose or wiping your eyes or B, it's potty time. And just doing that little shift right there, it throws, I kind of interrupt on it right there. Like almost like when you watch videos on Instagram and there's a hook, go it, that's my hook.

09:41
I unroll the toilet paper out and I give it to them and they're still crying. They might be in mom or dad's lap crying. And I give them a toilet paper. I'm like, here, I need you to wipe your nose. They know they're gonna do that.

09:50
That wasn't part of the plan, but that's what they gotta do. So they wipe their nose. Now what do most people do? They let them keep the toilet paper. You're okay, it's all right. I do something different.

09:59
I go, I need the toilet paper back. And you see them, that little shift, that them eyes go side to side. Like this isn't part of the regular schedule program. What's going on here? So they'll hand it back to me and I'll fold it in half.

10:10
Yeah, it's kind of gross, but it's all right. And then I give it back to them. I said, all right, wipe your eyes. And you'll see them, they're looking at me now. They're wiping their eyes, trying to figure out what's gonna happen.

10:18
And it's like, all right, I need it back. And I'll fold it again. All right, now you gotta wipe your ears. And you see them like a little bit taller now. They're wiping their ears. And I'll take it and get back one more time.

10:26
I said, all right, I'm gonna give it back to you. I gave it back to them. I said, you got two things to do. One, you can eat it because it's got all the tears and stuff in it, or you can flush it. And like I said, about 95% of the time, they're giggling about it, they go flush it, and they're back in the game.

10:40
Because after I give them that option of eating it or flushing it, I walk away. It's done. Yeah, wow. So you really get distracted the hell out of them. You've gotten them engaged in something totally different.

10:52
And you reset their thinking completely. And then now they get to go flush something. And then it's like, okay, now what do I do? I don't know, I'll get back in the class. It's back in it because I tell some of my parents because I got looked at really bad by a grandma one time because she brought her child, her grandchild to his first class.

11:09
And you know, some kids are just overly anxious about starting something new, right? Even adults are anxious about starting something new. That's why they don't do it a lot of times because it's like, what do I expect?

11:18
And this kid comes in and he's like, I'm not going out there. I'm not doing, I'm doing. And grandma is doing exactly what everybody does. And it's totally fine. And she's like, go ahead. You can do it.

11:27
It'll be okay. No, I don't want to do it. I don't want to do it. And they're caught in this little whirlwind of a loop. Go do it. I don't want to do it. Go do it. I don't want to do it. So I tell him like, dude, I don't want you to do it.

11:37
He's like, you don't want me to do it. I'm supposed to go out there and do that. In my head. I'm like, yeah, you are. But you know, we're not saying that right now. And he'll look at me. I'm like, just sit here and watch for a few minutes and you let me know what you think about everything.

11:50
If you're ready to come out there, we'll do it. And usually same drill. It works about 90 percent of the time they'll be out there on the floor in five minutes. It's just about. alleviating that pressure.

12:01
Well, like I've read some books on like kids and the sequencing and the principles and how to handle these situations. But you've got like, that's what I want this podcast to be about is someone who has actual personal experience figuring it out.

12:12
And you really put these pieces together beautifully. It's a great examples. I appreciate that. That's that. That's that whole child whisperer thing. I got some more questions. Is there anything that you personally have changed your mind about in the last year?

12:33
In the last couple years, it deals with how we're doing our martial arts training, you know, for several years dealing with 2015 2016, we weren't doing a lot of like partner drills, there was a lot of solo drills, there was some sparring.

12:49
But in the last couple of years, I've seen a stronger push from inside of me, maybe it's a pull then of a better, stronger, safer self defense curriculum. So now the kids are working more with each other, the kids are working more with their parents on the floor, because a lot of places like you know, you know how it goes, you take your kids to a sport or a dance, gymnastics, karate, anything like that,

13:15
usually the pants are sitting in the lobby playing on their phones, you know, maybe they're sitting in the car or something like that. And some of the younger kids, I get their parents on the floor with them.

13:23
And we actually get to work on self defense techniques of what to do if an adult grabs a hold of you. So what's the difference between a kid grabbing and adult grabbing? Well, you got to figure out how to use your whole body.

13:34
And I love this one. I learned this one a long time ago, I heard it from a buddy of mine, but a cat, a cat taught me this technique first. All right, I used to have this big cat, he's like 20 pounds, right?

13:44
He loved to be rubbed on everything like that. But as soon as you went to pick him up, he would just fall down to the floor. He didn't want to be picked up. And then a guy brought up a point of he goes, Look, when someone grabs a hold of a child, teach the kids to fall down.

13:57
Now the adult has to lean over to pick them up, their head gets below their hips, it's easy for them to tumble over. And you know, if you have kids, you know how hard it is to get a crying kid up off the floor.

14:08
All right. So I teach them that if an adult grabs you by the arm, fall to the floor, wrap your body around their leg. That's the second part. Because now if you've had your kid lock yourself on their leg, it's almost impossible to peel them off.

14:20
You know, so my belief is this though, you didn't send your kid into food line by themselves. All right, to the grocery store by themselves, you are close by this is about buying time and buying attention.

14:31
Yeah. I mean, that's a great protocol for safety. But these poor parents who are trying to get their kids to leave their house and the kid will just now drop to the ground. Yeah, that there is that other side of that sword.

14:44
That's interesting. That's useful to what are some people that adults that want to get started with any kind of martial arts training or training in general? Are there any limiting beliefs that hold them back from getting started?

14:59
A lot of times is I'm too old to do this now, you know, and that's and it's like crazy cuz like I say it's crazy They believe it. So it's true in their 20s or their 30s or I don't have enough time or what is another one?

15:11
I need to start training. I need to get in shape before I start training, you know, you hear all those excuses but it's the same thing as the kids we want to teach our kids how to do something and One of my beliefs is I picked this up from Sean Stevenson years ago is people are looking for examples More than they're looking for advice, you know, so if you're telling your kids hey go clean your room up But your garage is a mess That little congruency isn't connecting now,

15:39
you know, so I help bring it up to them I look, you know, we've got to set that example. So just by stepping onto the map That's a great win right there whether you do the whole class or not, you know If you feel like you got to be in shape, don't worry about it You want to talk about the self-defense principles?

15:53
No one's gonna be like, oh you're not in shape I can't attack you today, you know, so we've got to be able to do it with every level Yeah, that's great. Um So can you tell us a story about You tore up your knee in 2004 the long rehab process and then I mean it sounds like it's simple You made it to ultra running it for people that don't know ultra run.

16:16
Is this a hundred mile races? So ultra ultra marathons is usually considered anything over twenty six point two miles, which is your marathon distance So if you do usually the what's considered the baby ultra is a 50k in 2004 ish I think I got that year, right?

16:35
I was showing up for grappling classes and this guy shows up that night Me and him have grappled many times before and dude is just a beast I mean, he's like, I don't know 510 210 pounds He looks like a cruiserweight wrestler from WCW back in the day Part of the reason was he was a cruiserweight wrestler, but just not WCW at that time And he's like man, I'm mad tonight.

16:57
I gotta do something. So I was like, alright And I'll go with him. I'm a buck 55 at the most weight soaking wet at the moment I'm like i've never tapped him out or anything and long story short there He threw me and when my leg hit the ground it basically just popped my knee out.

17:11
All right, I go in Um, I get today. They take me to the emergency room. My knee gets popped back into place before I get there And i'm the way I remember it. I was kind of calm and collect about i'm like, all right we'll just we gotta see what happens with this and um I go in the next day for an MRI.

17:29
I go back to see the doctor And i'm sitting there talking to this doctor and the doctor's like, you know Anytime you're sitting there talking to a doctor, it's never a great time, you know They're not like excited to see you type of thing and he's flipping through the papers And he's like dude, if you were a football player your career is over He says you'll this was his quote that sticks in my head to today He says you'll be lucky to have a functional knee again Well,

17:50
I didn't like that doctor very much after that Um, he tried to do one surgery on me. He didn't like what he saw in there He went in orthoscopically And he's like, I gotta send you somewhere else. Cause when I came out of that surgery the first time, I was like, yes, it's fixed.

18:03
All right, we're on the road to recovery. No, this story just got even longer. It took me from date of injury to surgery six months before I got the surgery. I was like walking around in a brace. I was on crutches.

18:18
I think part of the problem was I had no insurance. I had no way to cover this thing. And I was just getting doors shut. And I finally broke through with, there was a program called Vocational Rehab.

18:30
And they were able to get me in with the doctor, get the surgery and get moving. So what did I end up doing for rehab? It was six months of going in and doing like basic stuff. And it was so crazy because I go 80 miles an hour.

18:44
I am caught. So I was like always on the go. I was moving, I was kicking, I was punching. I was being at the gym. I was a roofer extraordinaire construction cop person. So everything really depended on this leg and hitting that brick wall.

18:58
I remember sitting in a single wide at the time that I was written. And I was like, this cannot be the end. This has got to be a stepping stone to something else. I just didn't know what it was going to be too.

19:07
And I started doing more tai chi with one of my instructors kind of slowing things down, redeveloping that balance. I was in a physical rehab with a lady for six months, just like working small things that in my head were small before it.

19:25
But afterwards, dude, I'm like trying to lift my knee and straighten it. I am like beating in sweat. And it was so funny. They put me on this machine to help make the knee bend. And I still can't get it past 95 to a hundred degrees to today.

19:39
It's still got lots of bending issues. But I was like laughing and my physical therapist looks at me, she's like, why are you laughing? I said, I can either cry or laugh right now. So I'm going with laughing, okay?

19:50
So she goes, you're doing great marketing for us then. Cause everybody else is watching you laugh instead of cry over here. Sometimes the experience that the nervous system has is just so ridiculous, like, we get to be quiet about it.

20:05
But yeah, it's a lot of it was slowing down and I love the compliment that she gave me because of all the martial arts training I had was just that core stability of being able to pick my leg up and work on the balancing of pushing and stepping onto things.

20:17
Because if I didn't have that core strength, then we'd have to develop the core strength to get into the leg development. That makes sense. I want you to take us all the way through the ultras. But I want to go back for a second, Tai Chi.

20:33
So he did Tai Chi probably at first just because it was one of the few things you could do. How much time did you end up playing with it and how much did you connect with it? So when I first tried Tai Chi, I think I was like 20 years old.

20:47
And the guy teaching it, I swear he about put me to sleep, but this is before the knee injury and I did not like it whatsoever. doing it again, um, connecting with it through martial arts. I didn't do as much as I would like to say I did.

21:01
It was just enough to play with it, to practice with it. And it was just about slowing down and connecting with my body again. Um, do I have a great background in it? Not really. It was just enough to kind of like go through a lot of the moves that I knew and just redevelop that balance.

21:16
And there's an old phrase that says something about you have to slow down to speed up, and that was the whole thought process behind that one. Yeah. Um, all right. So now the knee is on its way to rehab.

21:30
Um, you're laughing in the PT room. Um, I started getting back into my training for martial arts the way I wanted to. I'm still doing some training. Like I remember showing up to try to do a class on crutches and braces on a cane.

21:46
And then when I realized that the knee was coming back strong, I started teaching again and I opened up. I'm going to say I opened up. I got a group of friends together and we started working out of my dad's garage and just trying to get it going.

21:59
I was like, all right. So we're going to work this was doing good in our training. And it hit me. I was like, let's give this a shot again about trying to open up, um, black martial arts school. Cause I haven't really taught in one probably since, uh, around the nineties, 98 to early 2000.

22:16
And the other place I was teaching at was like a little small area in a gym. So I was like, let's, let's just give this a good run. All right. Um, the leg feels great. And I remember grappling again in the garage with my buddy had Joey and he wraps his body around my left leg is the leg I met I injured, right.

22:33
And I felt my whole body to shift and freeze up like that little nervous response system. And I was like, okay, is it all right? Is it all right? It was, it was okay. And that let me know, like we can go one step further.

22:44
And that was all it was about just trying to figure out how to take it one step further. And then you want to like jump into it. Like how we got into the whole running thing. That was that was insane because I tried to run like we opened up the karate school and I sponsored a 5k, you know I was like i'll be a sponsor for it I was like i'll show up y'all gonna let me run for free and I was not a runner None whatsoever and I get to the start line I'm like hanging out with some people and there's just one girl name Um,

23:12
her name was christie that was there and she's like, oh you're in shape. You do that kickboxing. You'll be fine and I was like, yeah, i'll be fine I'm gonna do great and though they said go and I took off like a bat Which is what you're supposed to do when you don't train for running and I probably made it Half a mile and i'm like hacking i'm coughing I started getting dropped foot thing because my tibialis muscle wasn't picking my foot up like it was supposed to And my foot started going numb and I remember walking up this hill And i'm getting passed by everybody and here and I hear little feet like And I'm like,

23:49
what is that noise I turn I look behind me there's a mom coming up the hill pushing a stroller, but her little four-year-old that was in the stroller isn't in the stroller. They're running beside mom and they all pass me.

24:03
I'm like, I am never doing this ever again. This is not, this is not, I don't like this. I let them go, I'm like, good for y'all, keep going. I'll be there in a little bit. And about 2012, I think it was, 2011, I had some blood work done.

24:19
I was, one of the ways that I did for boosting our martial arts school up in the community was I would go to health fairs, I would set up a booth and I would just talk to anyone that would listen to me.

24:28
And one of the health fairs we were at was actually doing, taking blood and testing cholesterol, triglycerides and all that fun stuff. Now at the time, I done got poofy. I was about 207 pounds at five foot five, but I thought I was still in shape and my blood work come back bad.

24:44
And I had just met a guy named Chris Canoodle, a amazing fellow there, he's a character. And I showed him my blood work. I was like, what can we do with this? I should have realized what I was doing by asking him.

24:56
He says, you could run. And I laughed about it, I was like, dude, I don't run. He goes, well, you could run. Cause he was a runner. I mean, he did like crazy marathons like every weekend. He was off doing a 50K or something like that.

25:10
And I was like, I don't know if I can do this. So he started training me and my wife at the same time to do a, it's called the Krispy Kreme challenge, all right? So for a poofy guy running and donuts, that sounds like a great mix.

25:23
Looking back, it wasn't a great mix. Cause you have to run like two and a half miles to the donuts and then eat a dozen donuts and then run back. Oh, wow. Yeah. But it's one, I will say it's like one of the biggest runs in North Carolina, it's held at NC State University.

25:41
And I guess you don't have to get the donuts. They're not gonna hold you down to make you the donuts. Oh no, they don't hold you down to do it. It's just part of the fun challenge of it. You'll see some people just put the box of donuts under the arms and they're kind of cruising back.

25:53
Others are like, cause it's done for, I think it's. what's the fundraiser for? St. Jude's Children Hospital. Keeping these donuts for later. And I kind of fell in it for that. And then this is where the story gets really interesting.

26:06
And it wasn't really training hard for running. And my coach, he got me signed up for a marathon. He's like, let's go to the Outer Banks Marathon. I say, dude, you're taking me from five miles to 26.

26:16
I don't know about this. He goes, I'll get you there. It's one of those things like, believe in your coach before you believe in yourself because he believes in you type of thing, right? And I was like, all right.

26:26
So I wasn't training. It's about a month out. And he's like, how's your training going? I'm like, it's horrible, dude. I'm not going to do this. And I'm going to head back out of it. He goes, come with me this weekend.

26:35
We're going to go to this 24 hour race. I was like, I'm sorry, do what 24 hours? I got to run for 24 hours. He goes, no, no, no, you don't have to run for 24 hours. It's a mile and a half course. Just do what you can do.

26:46
He goes, you'll probably be surprised. And I'm like, okay, I don't know what's going on here, but we'll, I trust you. I trust you, dude. A lot of faith going into you. I get there and I'm set up and like I said, it's a mile and a half course.

26:58
It was a lot of fun. I ended up walking away that night or that day with 43 miles, I think it was. Overall, wow. Something like snapped. It was weird. It was like, I realized I didn't have to stop. And that was mind blowing for me at that event.

27:20
So every year it's an annual event. I've been going back since two, I've been going there since 2012, either age just to do some laps with friends, some years just to push the distance to see what I can get.

27:31
And the most distance I've ever got at that event was just over 72 or 73 miles. Wow. So you just got there and you just keep running and I'll just do one more and I'll just do one more and I'll just do one more.

27:45
It is a mind screw out there though, because it's a mile and a half loop and you come by your campsite, your tent, your plate, your food, your chair, and there's a chance for you to stop every time. And if you stop for a minute, if you stop every lap, those minutes add up really fast.

28:01
So you've got to like be, kind of have a game plan going into it. But I've been taking people to that event for years and it's amazing watching what people realize they could do if they want to, because it's like a big running party.

28:14
Everybody's having a good time. It's a mile and a half loop. So you might share a lap with a few people and then never see them again for a while. You might find some other people to hang out with and you're talking, you're cutting up and you're just having a great time.

28:27
Well, that's cool because like, it's just an interesting way to like shatter that ceiling, that psychological, you know, like I have to sign up for a 12K, I have to sign up for a marathon. No, just go out and let's just see with like no backend expectations of how far you should be running.

28:42
You just do what you can do and then wow, it's always gonna be more than you thought as long as you just test yourself, challenge yourself. Yeah, it's one of those events I go to every year, whether I'm been training.

28:54
for it like I was supposed to or not. So like, I think it was not this past year. But last year, we broke the 100 K second or the third time. Last year, we had just went and did like 15 miles to hang out with some friends for a little bit before we call it a day.

29:07
And the goal is we're shooting go back again this year for the 100 K. Well, speaking of fun family parties and events, tell us about the the annual ninja wrapping party. Alright, so the ninja wrapping party is pretty crazy.

29:22
So what we do is coming up in October is when we first start our late September, we start getting everything geared for the end of the year. So we go into our feeding families for Thanksgiving. And then right as we're done with that, we start talking about Hey, everybody, we need you to bring in either new toys, or slightly love toys.

29:42
All right. And you got kids bringing in these toys, everybody's bringing in that and the school starts to look like it almost looks like a thrift shop, you know, I gotta go pull some pop some tags. But um, When they're coming in on Saturday, I think a week ish before Christmas or a Friday night or Sunday, just being on how the schedule rolls.

30:01
I tell everybody, look, bring the kids out. Let them wrap the presents because we're telling everybody I'm also asking for people to bring in empty Amazon boxes. Right. Because I need boxes for stuff that's slightly loved.

30:13
And then I have kids come in and I supply all the wrapping paper, the hot chocolate, the marshmallows and snacks. And the kids come in and it's not about the kids wrapping the presents because they don't, they're not going to be great rappers.

30:25
A lot of adults aren't great rappers either. That's why we buy those little bags and put the stuff in it with the little tissue paper on top because we're always in a hurry. But when we wrap something, it's like we're putting a different energy into it and seeing the parents and the kids, they're slowing down to actually wrap it together, having a good time with it.

30:42
We will stack the presents up all against the wall. And it goes back to that first thing we talked about earlier. Connection. Not necessarily connection with the people, but connection with what you're doing.

30:54
And connecting the contribution with the connection, these are two deep coordinates that all humans have. When you can do that in a positive environment where it's good for everybody involved, everybody that's going to get the presents, wrap the presents, donate the presents, it's a lot of really good symmetry, a lot of great energy.

31:13
And the cool part is everybody's like, well, how do you know who to get the presents to? I'm like, that's not my specialty. My specialty is coordinating the event and getting people involved with it.

31:23
And so I reached out to a couple of churches that I know and they know the families that need the extra help. But it was so funny. I have to say this. I had the guy show up and I call him on the phone.

31:32
I'm like, dude, we just did a present drive. I hear you're the one to talk to. Can you come pick up the gifts for me? He goes, yeah, I'll come out. I got a nice SUV. I'm like, I don't think that's going to be big enough.

31:43
He goes, we should be fine. And he pulls up and he had like remember the movie Jaws. He had that experience. He goes, I think I'm going to need a bigger boat because his whole face like dropped a little.

31:54
bit when he realized the whole wall was just filled with presence at about like four foot high and three foot out just all the way down the thing. So he had to go back and get a trailer and a truck and a couple people to help him so he could lift it all up in there.

32:09
Awesome. And which city are you based in for people that might want to do this? I'm in Sanford, North Carolina. So like if you look at the map of North Carolina and just put your finger dead center of it, that's where you'll find me.

32:20
Yeah. Because that's another thing, you know, and I don't I haven't even mentioned this before, like in the 90s and 2000, early 2000s at a martial art school I was at, it really wasn't about getting out into the community.

32:32
It was about just staying inside your little area. And a lot of schools still do that, you know, some will show up for events to like help sponsor and things like that. One of my beliefs is this, if you can show someone that they can make a difference in someone else's life, you see their confidence come up with the power that they have.

32:49
And my goal is with the fun drive with the food drive with an interwrapping party. I want the kids to see that they can make a difference in someone else's life because like when we do the food drive for Thanksgiving It isn't about just collecting food and dropping into a box We've all done that at walmart and we never know what happened to the stuff The kids get to go shop for the food box the food up Go with me if they want to to the food drive place to see uoc and pass the food out to the families You know so they can be involved as much as they want Or if they don't have that time they can write their check out and do a donation which is totally fine as well That's that's got to be that's got to leave me with a great feeling every year,

33:27
huh? Every year man. It's it's we've been doing that food drive probably since 2000 this way since 2013 or 2012 Well, what what many years what's the thing that inspires you or motivates you or like what do you use to to personally?

33:45
Um, you know uses leverage to get excited about waking up and doing stuff every day With stuff like with everything along what we've been talking about right now Is that leading by example, you know?

33:55
Like you see a lot of people are talking about that lead by example lead from the front and everything like that And I think a lot of people miss one part of it is you're always leading by example Your example may be good.

34:06
Your example may be bad. Okay, but you are leading by example And if I want to tell people hey, you should challenge yourself. Hey, you should help out in the community Hey, you should do this. It isn't about Uh practice what you preach I flip it.

34:21
I believe it's about preaching what you practice. So I put into practice what I preach about Practice versus preaching preaching what you practice there you go Yeah, so practice it first then preach it live it first then teaching Right Um, all right a lot of stuff would ask you shit.

34:45
Oh, yeah a bunch of stuff You um, you mentioned in the intro I mentioned nlp do you remember that training or with the biggest thing you took from that NLP training, I've always heard about it and never really learned about it.

34:58
So, you know, I worked under Michael Burnoff for a few of his workshops and seminars, everything he goes through with it. And it deals, you know, with communication. And part of the communication deals exactly what we just got through talking about.

35:10
It's like congruency of who you are and what you're doing. Like I mentioned, this one guy a minute ago, Sean Stevens, and he and he talked about congruency in who you are and what you're doing. So do, yeah.

35:22
So live in an alignment with your values. Yeah, exactly. Because like, you know, a lot of people love, like you'll see some people that are teaching things out there, right? Like you've got people that are personal trainers, financial advisors, people that do different things for like how they want to keep their life going.

35:39
And the reason they always constantly do that because it reminds them of who they need to be and who they are. Otherwise, they would fall off of it, like financial people that really do all the workshops, teaching about it, talking about it consistently.

35:51
They know if they didn't do that, they would fall off the edge with it oftentimes. So they're always sticking into that thing that really pushes them, motivates them to be better in that area of their life.

36:03
Before we go to some rapid fire questions, I want to ask you about AI because everyone's using AI right now seem to be taking the world by storm. How have you incorporated AI into your business, into your daily life?

36:16
I use it a lot right now, because I'm still like just kind of like brushing the top of it, I guess you would call it, of a brainstorming session. And I'm going to tie that back into what you asked a minute ago about the NLP.

36:29
And part of that is like communication isn't what you say, it's the response that you get. If you don't like the response that you're getting, change with what you say. So if I'm putting information into like, let's say AI, like chat, GPT, cloud, Gemini, or anything like that, and I'm not getting response back, or it's robotic, is a lot of people have that trouble with it, or like, it doesn't work,

36:49
it's too robotic. Well, that's because the way I'm talking to it, I'm trying to make I'm trying to sound robotic, talking to a robot, and I'm getting a robotic response. It came back to me. But if I talked to it, like, it's a person, and I'm like, hey, here's what I need you to do.

37:05
Here's what I'm working on right now. What are some ideas or questions I haven't thought of yet? And all of a sudden, it'll spit some things out at me, like, have you thought about, you know, with your training and your class schedule, are these classes the best at this time?

37:18
You know, this isn't something I did with AI, but it's something that hit me just now. As like in the olden days, I would have like a five year old class happening around 6pm at night, 630 at night. Well, the problem with that is the five year olds, they're pretty much wore out by then emotionally, mentally, physically, they're still running on fumes.

37:36
They're just like, like zoomies where they're trying to resist. falling asleep. They'd be crazy people at that time. Yeah, if there was hard for them to retain the information, you know, but being able to go into something like the AI field and ask it questions like, Hey, what have you found that works?

37:51
It's been phenomenal. Like I even threw something in there. Like I do I do something now weekly through a chat GPT, I ask it to look up what are the ongoing trends for self defense, krav Maga karate that people are searching for for like small group training, real estate agents, corporations, and give me the key buzzwords and 10 points of headlines that you can come up with it.

38:16
So each week on a Monday morning at 9am, it does the search for me, it throws the stuff together, it sends me an email says, Hey, come check out what we found. And you can just copy and paste the same prompt every week and get that information.

38:29
Well, with chat GPT right now, it's actually I've got it scheduled as a task. So each week it does it for me. So I didn't get to think about it. And they could schedule tasks. If you have the at least a $20 a month one you can do the schedule task got that I didn't look into that Yes, like a beta thing.

38:46
I think you only use the 4.0 with it right now that I know of but that's all I got on that one That's pretty useful Yeah, but I'm playing with the projects as well because with the projects what you can do is because usually Yes, you can have the information saved in the conversation But a lot of people don't know depending on which conversation or which model of chat GPT is only got X amount of memory to use but if you go into the projects I just learned this you can actually upload files to it and then give it directions So that when you put a piece of information into it there tell it basically the files and the directions are the filter That it'll run everything through for you versus you having to always put the filter in or ask it to please confirm What your role of this part is?

39:34
exactly Wow, all right, you're the two pieces of chat GPT. I wasn't using That's it. All right, Jeremy. Are you in Chewbacca ready for some rapid-fire questions? Oh, yes You want to talk about Chewbacca and why keeps making the same expressions back there man?

39:50
He is on a loop all the time. I feel like he's done to me He's like you just running your way too fast. Remember to take a breath every once in a while Gosh all right Time for rapid-fire questions. All right, let's go Jeremy.

40:08
What was your favorite food when you were a kid? Oh, man, that's easy country style steak Which is like cube steak with gravy with mashed potatoes with the same gravy with black-eyed peas and corn that meal right there It's just perfect If you could have a meal with anyone dead or alive who would it be and what would you eat?

40:27
Right now I would pick Shawn Stevenson. He passed away a few years ago I had just got us started working with him and I think sitting down with him. I would have a cup of coffee There's something very laid back a great conversation to have there.

40:41
What does he achieve or what does he do? He was known as the four foot giant. He was born with osteoporosis imperfecta, which is the brittle bone disease. And like when he was born, if I remember the story right back in the seventies, they didn't think he would live 48 hours.

40:57
Um, you know, he broke like 200 or something like that. It was a crazy amount of bones just being born. But he grew up to become like a great motivational speaker. You know, he was an NLP, a practice learner as well.

41:10
Um, he worked at the White House for a little bit during the, um, I think it was the Clinton administration. Um, he like, he did a lot like he was all over the place and he, he was one of the ones that I didn't work with him as close as I would like to have, only just because of like time, distance, everything like that.

41:25
And I was just starting to work with him before he had passed. You guys check out Sean Stevens, but I'm sure he's got some motivational stuff on YouTube. And his, his story is like, it'll bring a tear to you out.

41:36
He is one of the few people I've met. that like when I looked into his eyes and was talking to him at one point in time, but when I was working with him, like he like his eyes are very sincere is like the whole story of like the eyes are the windows to the soul.

41:50
Like he can melt you just looking at you talking with you. Yeah, we're going to check out Sean Stevenson. Have you read any, have you read any books in the past that really jumped out and excited you or just were memorable?

42:06
Anything influenced you? There's two of them. One would be The Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman and it was a great book. It was kind of, it's kind of wrote out like a story, which a lot of great books are where they actually got the points hidden inside the story.

42:20
So you don't realize you're picking it up because the story brings you in so deep, but it was also slightly based on his life. And he was in a motorcycle accident where he busted his knee up and it was like almost like the same thing with me when I watched the movie before I found the book.

42:34
I was like, this is me. I busted my knee up. He busted his knee up. We're getting back into that right there. It's like there was all these little nuggets inside the book. And if you were to ask me to repeat the nuggets that are in there, I probably couldn't do it.

42:47
But I just remember that feeling that it really brings to me out of that one. Was he really committed to rehabbing his knee? He was because he was like an expert gymnast. And if you watched the movie, his gymnastics was like on the rings.

43:01
If you read into the book, it was more about trampoline and he still runs like coaching events and everything today. But it was so cool about how he met his mentor and his mentor worked in a garage. It was like the old eighties and nineties movies of martial arts training was always the janitor that knew how to do everything that no one thought could really do it.

43:19
And he walked him through all these things about paying attention to what's going on right now. Like one of his quotes was there's no such thing as ordinary moments. There's never nothing happening. He always doing like those double negatives to kind of really have the brain circle around to pay attention to what was going on with it.

43:37
Oh, wow. That's interesting. that was the first book. What was the second book? The second book was done by Augmandino and it was called the Spellbinders Gift and in that one like it was this guy that was searching out uh he was a uh what do they call him um a scout um a talent agency not agency a talent person that looked for motivational speakers and he finally found one and he had retired from it for a while he was getting back into the game and the guy that he found there was one part in there him and the guy were walking side by side down the street and there was this homeless guy there that was kind of like you know begging for money or something like that and the new speaker stopped gave him a couple of dollars and kept walking on and I loved the response to happen next was the agent scout guy asked him he goes why did you do that he goes I don't understand it he goes you know he's going to do something with it you know probably not a nice thing and the response the guy gave was just perfect he goes I'd be willing to bet when he was a kid drawing pictures on the wall of what he wanted to be when he grew up this wasn't it you know,

44:38
he really wanted something else for it, whether it was his choices, his challenges, his environment, whatever it could have been. This wasn't what he had planned. And if I can help in the moment, I'll do what I can.

44:50
And if I were to pinpoint something with that, I think that part of that book really stuck out with me with helping out what we do in the community events as well. That was the spell binders, spellbounders gift.

45:02
Spellbinders gift, like spell, S-P-E-L-L-B-I-N-D-E-R-S. What is your all time favorite podcast? Do you listen to podcasts? Oh, man, I don't listen to as much podcasts as I probably should. What would be my favorite podcast if I had one to pick out of?

45:23
First one that popped up in my head was Joe Polish's I Love Marketing. He's got a really good one, yeah. He's famous for starting these big networking groups. Yep, he's in charge of the Genius Network group.

45:35
I've had a great honor and privilege to work with several people that have been a part of that group from Sean Stevenson and Michael Burnoff. And I'm probably sure there's a couple others that don't come to mind right now, but it's been great to kind of get the, what do you want to call it, the little droplets that come from it through them to us.

45:53
When you work out, what is your favorite hype song? My favorite hype song? Oh, that's a good one. It's called, how do you, what is it? It's, there was a movie called Southpaw. And I think it had Jake Lindenhall in it.

46:06
He was a boxer. And The Hustle Standard did like a remix song of, of a beast. So it's like a hardcore, like almost metal-ish with a rap hip hop influence inside of it. And I can't remember if it's called The Beast or if it's just called Beast.

46:26
I was gonna say I've turned that one on a couple of times when I've run races and I know I'm like less than a quarter mile from the finish line. And I need to like pull out that last little bit. And it's like, Hey Siri, play this song fast for me.

46:38
And it really like, all right, starting to wrap this thing up. I'm going to get this out to your email. If people are seeing this in your local email, what is their call to action? What can they do if they want to get involved?

46:53
Where do you want to send them to get in touch with you? So easy peasy. They can go to our website, which is just www.sanfordbbla.com to look us up, you know, or they can reach out through any of my social media platforms.

47:05
You can find me like as a black belt runner. And the first thing I would say is like, let's just set up a call and talk about what your needs are, what you're interested in doing it. Because what will happen is, you know, if they can make that decision just to reach out to me, we've already made the right decision in the good direction.

47:21
Yeah. And as you can tell, Jeremy is going to really help you out. Very thoughtful way, very caring way, very experienced way. Now, if anybody outside of Sanford wants to work with you, they have any options there.

47:34
Is there anything that you offer online? As of right now, I don't have that much online yet. We wanna build up some workshops and seminars for people that we can do because like back during, what was it, during COVID back in 2020, I remember doing a self-defense seminar virtually.

47:53
And I thought it was gonna be kind of like what is going on right here, like you see me and I see you. Oh no, it was a webinar. So I'm in here trying to explain like self-defense techniques to people I can't even see on how they're doing it.

48:03
But just after years of going through it all, I know what usually is the mistakes or the steps that are gonna happen. So it was so great, I got good feedback that it was the most interactive workshop they had planned for that whole time.

48:17
Well, all right, so can we, to stay in touch with your Instagram, people should be following the Black Belt Runner, that's Instagram? Yep, a Black Belt Runner is Instagram, it's TikTok. I think there's the YouTube is excess martial arts if I remember correctly.

48:31
Or they can drop me an email at jeremy at sanfordbbla.com. All right, before we wrap it up, is there any last message you wanna leave the crowd with before we finish up here? Yeah, it's my favorite quote that I keep with me at all times.

48:48
It's every breath you take is another chance at life. Wow, every breath you take is another chance at life. Literally heard, Jarek Robbins was a coach of mine. He was telling this story about this woman who was born with really bad lungs and then got a long transplant and lived this really challenging life, but she was always optimistic and always happy and then he told this long story and the accident in the hospital,

49:14
if she was happy and she's like, I just took a breath, of course I'm happy. Kind of puts things in perspective. It does, it's one of those things that most people don't think about breathing until they can't.

49:28
And when I heard that quote, I was doing like a breath workshop and most of the time you hear about breath workshops, it's very calm, it's very quiet, it's very subtle. No, this guy was engaged. She's like, breathe hard, breathe in.

49:40
You know, and you're like really, you know, overloading the nervous system. And he's like, every breath you take is another chance at life. And I'm like, I was like, don't forget that one. Put that in the back of your head.

49:49
Do not put that in the back of your head. I've been there. So I use that, I use that in the self-defense classes too. You know, like, hey, if someone's putting you in choke and you still got a breath, you still got a chance.

50:00
If you're smothered underneath the guy that's wrestling with you and you can still breathe, you still got a chance. Yeah. It's not good, it's a chance. That's what we're looking for. That's a great place to wrap it up.

50:11
Thanks a lot, Jeremy. That was awesome. I appreciate that.