162: Q&A: Fitness Advice for New Dads, Am I Done with Preps and Races?, Hiring Insights, Phone Disciplines, & More

In this episode, I’m answering your Instagram Q&As. I talk leadership, hiring with the three Cs, fitness tips for new dads, and setting boundaries with tech. I lastly address racing after The Last Dance. CHAPTERS: 00:00 Why This Q&A Episode Exists 10:17 Q1: The Mentor Who Shaped Me (Captain Angove) 17:51 Q2: Hiring Red & Green Flags — The 3 C’s + ‘Energy Vampires’ 27:07 Q3: Fitness Advice for New Fathers (Routine vs Responsibility) 34:54 Q4: Leadership Lessons From the Last Year 46:20 Q5: How BPN Operations Evolved: Vision, Focus, Systems, and ‘Unpurposeful Activity’ 52:42 Q6: Phone & Tech Boundaries: Social Media Fasts and App Blocking 01:00:52 Final Q: Are Races/Preps Over? The ‘Last Dance’ Mindset + Wrap-Up ORDER MY BOOK HERE: ⁠https://www.amazon.com/Go-One-More-Intentional-Life-Changing/dp/1637746210 FOLLOW: Become a BPN member FOR FREE - Unlock 25% off FOR LIFE ⁠ https://www.bareperformancenutrition.com/collections/performance-nutrition IG: ⁠instagram.com/nickbarefitness/⁠ YT: ⁠youtube.com/@nickbarefitness

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:06Nick Bare?

  Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of the podcast. Today's episode is a question and answer that I prompted on Instagram a few days ago. Some really good questions and things that I've wanted to touch on, but haven't been able to find a way to naturally and organically incorporate them into an episode up until this point. You know, I was just talking to Matt, who is the podcast producer, runs the entire show. And there's a lot of conversations that I have on a daily basis, whether that is talking to the BPN team.

• 0:48Nick Bare?

  We're in one of our leadership or brand meetings. I'm on a call with somebody or a group of people. And when I leave these meetings or these calls, I typically just take notes of things that were said or thoughts that I had that I wanted to retouch on at some point. They left a lasting impression. And this episode is one of those opportunities to incorporate some of this content. Like this morning, for example, we had one of our all hands meetings with the BPN team.

• 1:27Nick Bare?

  And we do this once or twice, sometimes three times a month here at BPN.

• 1:37Nick Bare?

  And this morning, which is a Thursday, the team arrived at 9:30 a.m. We kicked off a team lift, which was awesome. We all went into the gym. And we threw down. Everyone was training in their style. We had people doing strength workouts. Me and some of the guys did a back and biceps workout. There were people on treadmills. Oz is training for his first half Ironman. So he was on his bike doing an hour endurance bike session. There were some high rocks, circuits going down. So we trained for an hour and then Eric from El hombre taco pulled his truck up behind HQ,

• 2:23Nick Bare?

  served tacos to everyone. And then after that, we had about an hour meeting talking about some initiatives we're working on here at BPN and just some, some thoughts that I wanted to share with the team. And, and some of those things that I share with the team are incorporated into today's question and answer. I also had this realization this past month. And I just, I just felt called to share this. It's, it's been an observation at most. But I think what's been so interesting, or one of the things that's been very interesting about

• 3:05Nick Bare?

  building this organization and sharing my life online since 2014. You know, I've been documenting everything for the last 12 years. I started BPN in 2012. And as many of you know, those first couple of years were brutal. In 2014, I picked up a camera and decided that my, my last resort to try to grow this business was just to start documenting and creating content. And I filmed everything. And I had no clue where to get started, but I just started filming my workouts, what I was eating, behind the scenes of building

• 3:49Nick Bare?

  the business, my experience as an infantry platoon leader at the time stationed at Fort Hood, leading a platoon. And that changed the entire trajectory of my life, truly, picking up that camera. I spent the last $500 of my name on a Canon T3I, a 50 millimeter lens, a Rode microphone, and I was editing on my laptop at night with all the compiled footage I had from the previous day. And I've shared a lot over the last 12 years.

• 4:28Nick Bare?

  Everything we've done to build the business, races, preps, competitions, training, meeting staff, getting married, having kids, you know, everything, documented everything. And I've shared it in real time, which is, is unique. You know, typically when someone shares their life, it's a reflection of the time, the past. Someone might share a journal or write a book or make a film, a documentary.

• 5:10Nick Bare?

  But in this case with myself and BPN, we had been sharing in real time as it's been happening, what we've been learning, experiencing, winning, losing, succeeding, failing along the way in real time. So oftentimes, what I hear from people is, you know, I thought Nick was focused on X, Y, and Z, and now it's this. Or here's the next Nick Bear chapter or era. Or even sometimes I hear that what I'm doing is, is flip floppy.

• 5:54Nick Bare?

  You know, one year I'm, I'm focused on strength training, the next year I'm focused on endurance training. One year I'm sharing certain leadership principles that I'm implementing and the next year I've eliminated those leadership principles and I'm trying new things. And while it might look flip floppy from the outside looking in, it is just the, the evolution, the growth, the transformation that I and we are experiencing in real time. That is the pro and con of sharing growth as it's happening with everyone. Growth,

• 6:37Nick Bare?

  learning, scale, transformation. It is not linear. It is not neat. It is not perfect. It is messy.

• 6:49Nick Bare?

  It is messy the entire way through.

• 6:54Nick Bare?

  And I've loved that we've been able to share that in real time. Cause you can watch the transformation, you can watch the growth.

• 7:03Nick Bare?

  I oftentimes go back and watch old videos from 2017, 2018, 2019. And it's so amazing, but at the same time, cringey to watch what we were doing, what we were saying, what we felt we knew.

• 7:20Nick Bare?

  How ignorant and naive we actually were, we thought we had it figured out.

• 7:26Nick Bare?

  It's uh, it's humbling to say the least. But that's one of the best parts about documenting the last 12 years is that we get to go back and, and relive it and re-watch it.

• 7:41Nick Bare?

  And, and so humbling. You know, there are, are moments in time historically that we thought, I thought, had it all figured out. I knew everything. Prideful, ego-driven, and then quickly humbled.

• 8:02Nick Bare?

  And have come to realize that you never have it all figured out. You never arrive.

• 8:11Nick Bare?

  It is this uh, consistent transformation and growth.

• 8:18Nick Bare?

  That is so awesome.

• 8:22Nick Bare?

  Because you have the realization that growth doesn't ever stop, doesn't have to stop. It keeps happening. Like right now, as I'm sitting here talking to you, I'm 35 years old. This summer in August, I'll be 36.

• 8:41Nick Bare?

  In 20 years, I'll be 55. What am I going to learn and experience? And how am I going to grow and adapt? In these next two decades? My daughter will be almost 24. My son will be almost 22. College, post-college. Like, what's life gonna look like? But more importantly, like, how am I going to grow as a man? As a father, as a husband, as a leader? That's exciting. Because where I'm at right now,

• 9:23Nick Bare?

  if you make yourself really small and humble yourself, where I'm at right now is is so naive and ignorant to where I'll be in two decades. The wisdom that I'm going to gain, the wisdom that we get to experience over time is powerful. So I just wanted to share that. Just that realization and observation in this last month that drives a lot of just what goes on above my eyes

• 10:07Nick Bare?

  and my brain on a daily basis on some of these early morning runs. Just thought provoking and producing. So diving into the question and answer that was opened up on Instagram. The first question I'm going to address is, and I thought this was a great question. Who is someone that has left a lasting impression on your life? And I've been asked this question before.

• 10:42Nick Bare?

  And to be honest, I never had a really strong response.

• 10:48Nick Bare?

  I don't know why. But a few weeks ago,

• 10:53Nick Bare?

  we were back in Pennsylvania for the Pittsburgh Marathon kickoff run. Because we are, BPN is the on-course nutrition sponsor and partner of the Pittsburgh Marathon on May 3rd. So I'd love to see as many of you guys there as possible. We'll be out there for the Pittsburgh Marathon.

• 11:13Nick Bare?

  A few weeks ago, there was a kickoff run in Pittsburgh that we were at. And because where I went to school, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, also where I started BPN, is about an hour from Pittsburgh, in this town called Indiana, Pennsylvania. We made the trip over to IUP. While we were there. And it was the first time I was at IUP since graduating, 2013.

• 11:42Nick Bare?

  And we went and saw, and I showed the team, the apartment where I started BPN out of. We walked around college campus and we went to the Army ROTC building. Where I participated in the Army ROTC program. I commissioned out of IUP as a second lieutenant in the Army. Spent a lot of time at that building. It's called Pierce Hall. Lots of memories about Pierce Hall.

• 12:17Nick Bare?

  And just the people that I was surrounded by on a daily basis and the instructors, the cadre, being on the Ranger Challenge team, PT, like just a lot of, a lot of great core memories.

• 12:34Nick Bare?

  A lot of character defining and developing

• 12:40Nick Bare?

  moments in that building. And as we were walking around Pierce Hall,

• 12:47Nick Bare?

  I had this realization and I was talking to the camera. We filmed the video there. We launched it on my YouTube channel a few weeks ago. And I had this realization that there was an instructor, there was a cadre member there by the name of Captain Angov at the time.

• 13:06Nick Bare?

  And he had a remarkable impact on my life.

• 13:14Nick Bare?

  Captain Angov was the epitome of the hybrid athlete before the hybrid athlete was a thing.

• 13:23Nick Bare?

  He was such a strong leader and role model and mentor and athlete.

• 13:34Nick Bare?

  I mean, he was a stud at PT.

• 13:38Nick Bare?

  Tall, jacked, strong, fast, crazy endurance.

• 13:46Nick Bare?

  We'd show up for Ranger Challenge PT

• 13:51Nick Bare?

  at 6:00 AM and he was already done with a 10-mile run. You know, he already did one training session before he even showed up for morning PT.

• 14:04Nick Bare?

  And I would, I would watch him train throughout the day. I mean, he would find these just moments, these pockets of time during lunch, after work, in between PT and breakfast to get in additional training sessions or work on himself personally and professionally.

• 14:24Nick Bare?

  The definition of if it matters to you, you will make time. Truly a stud athlete, but even more important than that, more than being an athlete, a great role model, mentor and leader. Extremely positive and optimistic.

• 14:44Nick Bare?

  His energy was electric. Like he changed the thermostat, the temperature of a room that he walked into.

• 14:54Nick Bare?

  And he never let you see him tired, annoyed, distracted, or stressed, even when he was. But he was, at that point in my life,

• 15:11Nick Bare?

  the best leader, mentor, role model that I ever experienced up until that point.

• 15:22Nick Bare?

  And still, until today, I mean, like, someone who had such an impact on my life.

• 15:30Nick Bare?

  And I don't know if I recognized it or realized it in the moment, or even the years shortly after.

• 15:40Nick Bare?

  But being back at Pierce Hall and being able to reflect on those years, like realizing the impact that Captain Ango had on my life.

• 15:52Nick Bare?

  He demonstrated what it meant and looked like to be a man, to be a leader, to be a selfless servant to others,

• 16:08Nick Bare?

  to bring the energy, the tone, shape culture and an environment.

• 16:20Nick Bare?

  And I believe he was extremely instrumental into the man I am today.

• 16:31Nick Bare?

  Left a lasting impression on my life forever.

• 16:39Nick Bare?

  I'm extremely grateful for that and for him.

• 16:45Nick Bare?

  And one of the reasons I share that is because I want to have that same type of impact on people in my life, friends, family, coworkers, peers, people that work with and for me. It's a responsibility that we have. We can shape and shift the trajectory of somebody's life, not necessarily for what we tell them to do or things that we give them, but for the example that we set.

• 17:29Nick Bare?

  Captain Angov set a really strong example for me to model and live by. Physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, you know, very holistically, was an excellent leader, mentor, and role model. The next question was, what are some red and green flags when hiring and building a team? In this past week, I had the opportunity to speak to an entrepreneurship class at

• 18:07Nick Bare?

  the University of Tennessee, and there was a similar question asked when I was speaking. So a few notes to share. Sometimes you won't know you're making the right hire, the right decision with a person, with people, until months later. You know, everyone's going to put their best foot forward during the hiring process.

• 18:38Nick Bare?

  You have to trust, but verify. Do your due diligence, ask the right questions. And I was talking to Trey Freeman, who's our brand director, yesterday about this. And he shared with me the three Cs. And I believe these are super important. It is competence, character, and chemistry. And he was provided this insight when he started hiring people from a mentor of his. When you go in the interview and you start evaluating someone if they're right for the role, but also right for the organization and the culture. Do they have the competency? Do they have the skill set?

• 19:23Nick Bare?

  Do they have the ability? Do they have the experience? Do they have the resume? Like, can they do their job and excel? Truly, are they a specialist in the role that you were hiring them for? Competency, essential. Second, character. Do their beliefs, values, goals, and purpose align with the culture and the organization? If not, it's going to be a really hard, nearly impossible fit. Character has to match, it has to be there. And chemistry. Do they fit in? Do they vibe with the team? Can they hold conversations? Are they collaborative?

• 20:07Nick Bare?

  You have to have a strong chemistry amongst the people to have a strong culture and organization. Competency, character, chemistry. The three Cs. And like I said, sometimes you won't know if you made the right hire until months later. We have hired people before who, on paper, absolutely perfect. And they passed the competency, the character, and the chemistry test during the hiring process. And even for those first couple of weeks, and then months. But then, something changes. Altsentimes, not all the time, but...

• 20:51Nick Bare?

  In our case, it's been pretty rare that we've experienced this, but true character is exposed over time with how people handle success and failure. When they're hungry and fed, strong and weak, rested and tired, tested and tempted.

• 21:13Nick Bare?

  Let's take this back to Ranger School a little bit. When I was going through Ranger School, in the beginning of that course,

• 21:24Nick Bare?

  everyone was ambitious, was driven, could work through hard challenges,

• 21:32Nick Bare?

  could meet the physical requirements. Tough, tough individuals.

• 21:38Nick Bare?

  But the longer that school and that course went on,

• 21:42Nick Bare?

  people became hungrier, more tired, desperate,

• 21:49Nick Bare?

  restless. True character started to become exposed with certain people. And we got to a point in the Mountain and Florida phase of Ranger School, which is the second and third phase, where each phase begins with a week of techniques, teaching you the skills and the tactical requirements in which you will be evaluated on when you go into the field. And then after that first week of techniques, you go into your field training where you are evaluated based off of your ability to execute a mission within the leadership position that you are given.

• 22:33Nick Bare?

  And it's hard to lead people, harder to lead people the deeper you get in that school because they are tired and they're hungry.

• 22:44Nick Bare?

  And before you go into the field, they give you all of your meals, all of your MREs, your meals ready to eat, and you throw all of them in your rucksack.

• 22:55Nick Bare?

  And we would eat, you know, typically in the field once a day, you know, we'd eat like two of our MREs. When we reached the patrol base in the middle of the night, eat your food, bed down for a little bit, and then start the mission the next morning. Well, what ended up happening was people weren't

• 23:19Nick Bare?

  rationing out their food. And they were eating more than they were supposed to. So towards the end of the, the time in the field, they were out of food. So we had people who were stealing MREs out of other people's rucksacks. And it became this big issue.

• 23:36Nick Bare?

  Lack of integrity. Character, true character was exposed. They got hungry. They ate the food they weren't supposed to. They ran out of food, so they stole other people's food. It became a big issue. The deeper we got into the school.

• 23:54Nick Bare?

  True character is exposed. Over time, with how people handle success and failure, hungry and fed, strong and weak, rested and tired, tested and tempted. So what's a green light when hiring? Like I said, competency, ability, it's fundamental. A green light is someone who shows humility over pride and ego.

• 24:23Nick Bare?

  Like I talked about in a recent podcast, pride is your greatest enemy. Humility is your greatest friend. A red flag for me is someone who thinks and has the perception they have all the answers. They have it all figured out. A red flag is someone who has a hero mindset. They're going to solve it all and they're going to do it all by themselves. They're not a team player. They're not collaborative.

• 24:49Nick Bare?

  They have all the solutions.

• 24:52Nick Bare?

  Another red flag, which is a more long-term red flag. You're rarely gonna identify this early on, but maybe in some situations. One of the books I'm reading right now is, uh, it's by John Gordon. It's called The Energy Bus. I highly recommend it. And John Gordon talks about energy vampires. A red flag is an energy vampire. If you identify someone as an energy vampire, you gotta get rid of them ASAP. We have had energy vampires here at BPN over the years.

• 25:32Nick Bare?

  And they have either been let go, or they have self-selected to leave themselves. I have found that oftentimes when you have a really strong culture, the culture polices itself. An energy vampire is an individual who sucks the life or energy out of you and your goals. Behavioral signs, they often play the victim, refuse to take accountability, are consistently negative, demand attention, and use guilt to manipulate situations. The impact is you end up spending time with them, too much time, and it leads to severe

• 26:16Nick Bare?

  exhaustion, anxiety, and feelings of being drained. You might hear this and think, wow, that's an extreme. Do those people actually exist? Yes. Yes, everywhere. Energy vampires exist, and they suck the energy and life out of everyone they are around. You have to get rid of energy vampires. And I said, you might not identify that as a red flag early on, but eventually, if you do, if you don't get rid of it, it's like a cancer and it overtakes your entire organization, and it's extremely dangerous and detrimental.

• 27:00Nick Bare?

  So those are some of the red and green flags that we've identified when hiring or even post-hiring. Question number three. What fitness advice do you have for new fathers? And how to balance training with a change to a routine?

• 27:20Nick Bare?

  I'll be very honest, when Charlie was born, who was our first child, I struggled with this. And it took me a long time to adapt. As someone who is very rigid and structured with routine,

• 27:37Nick Bare?

  I did not want to break my routine. Like, routine for me has always been comfort,

• 27:47Nick Bare?

  consistent,

• 27:50Nick Bare?

  and it makes me feel good. It makes me feel like I'm doing the right things. I'm checking off

• 27:57Nick Bare?

  things to do. A routine allows me to stay on track. Having a child definitely disrupted my routine. And what I've learned over time is that

• 28:10Nick Bare?

  I have to, we have to place our responsibilities over our routines. So some of my best fitness advice for new fathers, how to balance training and being a father in your new routine, is to have a plan. Always have a plan. But you have to be okay with that plan getting disrupted and going out the window.

• 28:37Nick Bare?

  Like, this is one of the reasons I wake up at 4:30 a.m. every morning. To either run or lift.

• 28:46Nick Bare?

  Most days, our kids don't wake up until 7:00 or 7:30 a.m. Most days, but not every day. There are days where I wake up at 4:30 a.m., I start getting ready to go for a run, and one of our kids is in a sleep regression and wakes up before I go out for that run, or shortly after I start running, and I have to come back home or not run. And this used to really...

• 29:14Nick Bare?

  Hurt me and anger me and stress me out because I had a plan. It was part of my routine that that plan and routine was disrupted.

• 29:28Nick Bare?

  And it sounds so selfish to say that, but it took me some time to have grace for myself and to realize that our life responsibilities, especially our family, our spouses, our kids, are much more important than that five mile run that I was gonna do. I can find time later in the day. And if I can't find time later in the day, maybe I'll do it at night. And if that doesn't work, I'll do it the next day. I'll get back on track. One day isn't going to disrupt and ruin all of my fitness progress.

• 30:08Nick Bare?

  But I have a plan going to every day.

• 30:13Nick Bare?

  And I wake up extra early at 4:30 a.m. so that I can be running or lifting by five, done by six, 6:15, have breakfast, do my Bible reading, get caught up on some work. Most days before our children wake up.

• 30:35Nick Bare?

  But some days, it just doesn't go as planned. And you gotta give yourself some grace and be okay with that.

• 30:45Nick Bare?

  You know, one of the ways that we stay on track within our household with fitness and nutrition, and I want to have Steph on the podcast here soon to talk about this, our morning routine and what works for us based off of the season and chapter of life that we're currently in. But I'm constantly trying to find ways to be more efficient, to make our lives easier

• 31:14Nick Bare?

  and less stressful. Example, if I wake up at 4:30, I'm training by five, I'm done by 6:15, breakfast is done by 6:45, the kids aren't up yet.

• 31:32Nick Bare?

  I know what we're gonna be making for dinner that night.

• 31:38Nick Bare?

  Yesterday is a good example. I knew we were going to be making baked sweet potatoes and chicken and broccolini for dinner. So I try to find these small pockets of time to be more efficient, to make the day easier, the more complicated and chaotic it becomes. So before the kids woke up, I was done with all my stuff. I diced up all the sweet potatoes. I marinated the chicken, threw it in Ziploc bags. I cleaned up all the broccolini and got it set up. So we just had to throw it in the oven when we got home at night. Everything was prepped. So when I came home later in the day and Steph picked Charlie up from school and we're

• 32:23Nick Bare?

  all getting ready for dinner, it was super simple. We threw the diced sweet potatoes on a pan, threw those in the oven, threw the marinated chicken on the grill, threw the broccolini in the oven in the last 20 minutes. And dinner was done in 40 minutes. All the prep work was done, seamless. We could sit down at the dinner table, have a family dinner, and it made our lives easier. So it's planning, preparing, finding these small pockets of time to be more effective and efficient. But at the end of the day, responsibilities outweigh routines.

• 33:05Nick Bare?

  And you gotta be okay with the plan going out the window and give yourself some grace. But what I found is that it can't be an excuse for why you don't train, why you don't work out, why you don't eat healthy, because they are both doable. But I received this Instagram message last week, and I wanted to share because I think it's a really important message for parents, especially new parents, new fathers. And the summary of this Instagram message was that...

• 33:49Nick Bare?

  There was this dad and they had one kid and he wanted to start training for an ultra marathon. That was very time consuming. And they had a second kid on the way and he asked me a question.

• 34:08Nick Bare?

  And just the way that it was positioned, will this second kid coming ruin my ultra marathon prep? And I read that, I was like, ah, I hope you didn't mean it that way. But

• 34:25Nick Bare?

  that's placing routine above responsibility. That's having your priorities misaligned.

• 34:37Nick Bare?

  There's no way that a kid can and ever should ruin a fitness prep because the kid, the child, your family is much more important than the race, the competition, the fitness prep. Okay, fourth question. What are some important leadership lessons you have learned in the last year? I love this one. I have a few that I'm going to share.

• 35:06Nick Bare?

  Some that have been shared with me from mentors, advisors that I have. Some that I came across in reading, listening to podcasts, audiobooks.

• 35:21Nick Bare?

  The first one is that our inner circle often needs more than we think. And our outer circle often needs less than we think. Our inner circle, the people in our inner circle.

• 35:41Nick Bare?

  This might be two to six people.

• 35:46Nick Bare?

  The people in our inner circle need us more than we think.

• 35:53Nick Bare?

  And the people in our outer circle, the world,

• 35:58Nick Bare?

  people we aren't closely connected with, maybe acquaintances,

• 36:04Nick Bare?

  people who follow us on social media, they need us less than we think.

• 36:13Nick Bare?

  It's important to prioritize our time and energy to the people closest to us.

• 36:21Nick Bare?

  And if you spread yourself too thin, you can't go deep and narrow and create significant impact on the people within your inner circle. And the reason I think this is a really necessary leadership principle and lesson,

• 36:39Nick Bare?

  and I'm at fault of this myself.

• 36:43Nick Bare?

  It's really easy that when the people who are within our inner circle typically and generally

• 36:53Nick Bare?

  are spatially close to us on a daily basis. So because we see them, we're around them, it might feel like we are giving them the attention they need and desire, but we're just in their presence.

• 37:10Nick Bare?

  We might not be asking them, like, how are you really doing? Do you need help? What can I, what can I do to support you? Like truly having those conversations. Because it feels like we are with them, in their presence. So we're, we're giving them what they need. And the people who aren't closest to us,

• 37:33Nick Bare?

  that aren't in our, our inner circle, they're in our outer circle,

• 37:39Nick Bare?

  our time and energy might be.

• 37:43Nick Bare?

  Directed and prioritized to them because we automatically think that our inner circle is good, go, check.

• 37:53Nick Bare?

  Said, "Good morning, saw them, I'm around them, I'm in a meeting with them, I had breakfast with them, so on and so forth." But the reality is that our inner circle, the people who are closest to us, who are the people that you could call at 3 a.m. and say, "I need your help," and they get out of bed, throw their shoes on, hop in the car and drive over to your house right away, that's your inner circle. Our inner circle often needs us more than we think, and our outer circle often needs us less than we think or believe.

• 38:32Nick Bare?

  Second leadership lesson is that there's no upside at all to burning a bridge other than a very short-lived emotional victory.

• 38:47Nick Bare?

  I was just talking to the BPN team about this in our All Hands, and why you should never

• 38:58Nick Bare?

  fight hatred with hatred.

• 39:02Nick Bare?

  But we should fight hatred with love and compassion and care.

• 39:12Nick Bare?

  I myself have burned bridges in the past.

• 39:19Nick Bare?

  In most cases, because I was prideful and my ego was driving my emotions, and it was a very short-lived emotional victory. Somebody hurt me or told me something that I didn't want to hear, even though it was true, and I responded in a way that burned a bridge. And for me, in the way that I responded, it was a win. Ha! Take that.

• 39:54Nick Bare?

  That's emotional immaturity. There is nothing more hateful and unprofessional than emotional immaturity.

• 40:07Nick Bare?

  The way that you start something and the way you end or transition out of something are both equally important.

• 40:17Nick Bare?

  And many will begin, fewer will commit, less will persevere. But the strong will finish, finish well and finish strong.

• 40:31Nick Bare?

  Never burn a bridge.

• 40:35Nick Bare?

  Because the only win, the only victory is a very short-lived emotional one.

• 40:43Nick Bare?

  You also never know when you're going to have to walk back over the bridge that you burned previously.

• 40:52Nick Bare?

  I've experienced that on both sides of it many times in the past and it never feels good. You really got to swallow your pride and arrive with the most utmost humility possible.

• 41:11Nick Bare?

  The third realization and leadership lesson is except from the fact that we are not in control of the world.

• 41:22Nick Bare?

  I heard this from a Tony Robbins podcast recently. He said, "We are not in control of the world. We're not and never will be. So don't even try to be. But we are however, or we do have however, have the ability to influence it through positive leadership. We can influence the world, but we cannot control the world.

• 41:49Nick Bare?

  We can only control what is above our eyes, our minds, our thoughts, our perspectives, our ideas, our opinions, the way that we show up with either positivity or negativity. We can't control the world. We can influence it. The only thing we can control is our thoughts, our minds above our eyes."

• 42:12Nick Bare?

  And he ended with, "Freedom comes from growth, not from control."

• 42:21Nick Bare?

  This can be applied professionally and personally. There have been many times in my life where I'm stressed, back is pressed up against the wall. I want to white knuckle and just control every part of my life. And whenever I do that, things get worse. Because I learned that I don't have the ability to control every part of my life. There are things that we are completely out of, out of control. We cannot control the world. We can influence it. But freedom comes from growth.

• 43:03Nick Bare?

  Personal, professional growth, not from control. And the last important leadership lesson I'll, I'll share that I learned last year. This was, uh, shared with me yesterday, actually, from a mentor. Probably my favorite one I'm going to share. "A man or woman on a mission has dirty feet and a battered back." This is also something I shared with the BPN team. I'll reference a Lewis Howes quote. "People without purpose and a meaningful mission are dangerous people,

• 43:44Nick Bare?

  not only to themselves, but to those around them." When someone is on a mission, they know who they are, what they believe in, what they stand for, and where they're going. That's how you create culture. That's how you create a tribe. That's how you create community. That's how you create a movement. And when you stand for something and you're bold in that, it also means that you don't stand for other things.

• 44:24Nick Bare?

  And that's gonna rub some people the wrong way. And that's okay. When you're on a mission,

• 44:33Nick Bare?

  you have dirty feet and a battered back.

• 44:37Nick Bare?

  A man or a woman on a mission, visually, the way that I see it,

• 44:43Nick Bare?

  they're, they're

• 44:45Nick Bare?

  dredging through mud and thorn bushes and uncharted territory. And there's thorn bushes that are cutting them. And there's brush and thicket and trees, they're, they're breaking through. And it's, there's no path. There's no road in which they are going. They are leading. They are trailblazers. They are pioneers on a mission. And people are gonna see this. And if they don't align with

• 45:25Nick Bare?

  who you are, what you believe in, what you're pursuing, where you're going, how you're getting there,

• 45:32Nick Bare?

  they're gonna stand behind you and shoot arrows at your back to try to bring you down. And there's that man or woman on that mission

• 45:42Nick Bare?

  pushing through the mud, pushing through the brush, making a path, trailblazing, and people behind just battering the back of them.

• 45:54Nick Bare?

  And that's okay. You gotta accept that. Someone's gotta do it. If not you, then who?

• 46:04Nick Bare?

  Being bold, standing for something, knowing who you are and where you're going, it's going to attract the right people and it's going to deter the wrong people.

• 46:18Nick Bare?

  What else could you ask for? Next question is, what has changed the most in the way that you and the BPN team operate the business over the last couple of years?

• 46:30Nick Bare?

  There's a lot of things that we have changed, but I will focus on the fact that we have defined

• 46:39Nick Bare?

  and shared and been disciplined within our execution of our vision, focus, alignment, and systems.

• 46:54Nick Bare?

  Years ago, and I've talked about this before, the vision of BPN was in my head, and I would loosely share it with the team. But as the organization grew, the team grew, our initiatives grew, our responsibilities grew and became more complex, I learned how necessary it is to define your vision and then share that vision. Vision is made up of three components: core values, purpose, and goals.

• 47:31Nick Bare?

  Core values and purpose don't change more than once every 100 years. Goals are 10 to 25-year targets. And I learned this from chapter four of BE 2.0, which is Beyond Entrepreneurship 2.0. It's a book by Jim Collins. If you haven't read chapter four, the vision chapter, it's extremely important. But defining our vision

• 47:58Nick Bare?

  and defining it by core values, purpose, and goals, and then sharing that with the team has been extremely beneficial.

• 48:07Nick Bare?

  It has created focus.

• 48:10Nick Bare?

  It has allowed us to say yes to the right things, but more importantly, no to the wrong things. And it has created alignment within the entire organization and team.

• 48:23Nick Bare?

  One of my favorite quotes from Greg Kershaw, actually, is all about having focus. He talks about some of the habits that leaders make. The bad habits that leaders make that can destruct their ability to lead in an organization. And one of those is that leaders do too much. And he says, "Doing too much doesn't just rob you of energy, but it suffocates your productivity." One of the things we've changed in the last couple of years is just focus. Doing more with less.

• 49:05Nick Bare?

  And we have a handful of key initiatives for 2026, and we're hyper-focused on those initiatives. And we say no to a lot of things. A lot of opportunities, but also a lot of distractions, so that we can stay focused. Because you and your team can only do so much. You can only do so much. And if you spread yourself too thin, you don't just rob yourself of energy, like Greg Kershaw says, but you suffocate your productivity. We have given projects and initiatives more time and attention to maximize their effectiveness. And to be honest, we used to set ourselves up for failure by taking on too much, doing

• 49:49Nick Bare?

  too much, and not giving projects and initiatives enough time to breathe and really do them right. And we fell into this bad habit for years. And it felt like we could never get out of it. Where we threw so much onto our marketing calendar. We had events and product launches and initiatives and campaigns and...

• 50:15Nick Bare?

  All these different things. And we thought we could handle all of them within a given year. But when push came down to shove, I mean, he was back up against the wall, just like trying to keep up month after month after month. And we finally realized, okay, we are unproductive because we're trying to do so much and we're exhausted at the same time. We're exhausted and unproductive. So we made a change. Do more with less. I'd say one of the other changes that we've implemented, and this has come with hiring more specialists as opposed to generalists,

• 50:57Nick Bare?

  is we've implemented implemented more effective systems into the business.

• 51:04Nick Bare?

  I think there's, there's a point where you can over systematize a business, where it becomes a robot and it's just like, everything is automated. I don't think everything should be automated, but building appropriate systems within a business allows for better communication, collaboration, productivity. Having the right amount of systems in a business is important.

• 51:31Nick Bare?

  There's a difference between being busy and productive. I recently had Colonel Ed Arntson on the podcast and we were talking about this. I don't think we shared it on the actual episode, but we talked about it off air.

• 51:50Nick Bare?

  It's this concept around what he called unpurposeful activity. And it's something he's identified and eliminated over his, you know, 20 plus years of military leadership and service. And it's when people spend their time doing too much of unproductive activity.

• 52:20Nick Bare?

  And it's detrimental to the individual, but also the organization.

• 52:26Nick Bare?

  So vision, focus, alignment, systems, and then eliminating, identifying and eliminating unpurposeful activity has been game changing to the way we operate VPN in the last couple of years.

• 52:42Nick Bare?

  Next question is, what disciplines do you and staff have around technology and/or your phones? I thought this was a great question.

• 52:56Nick Bare?

  I think it's safe to say many of us struggle with a technology phone addiction.

• 53:07Nick Bare?

  And I even, I hate to admit it. I think back to growing up in the 90s.

• 53:17Nick Bare?

  I was born in, in 1990. It's like late 90s, early 2000s before the iPhone was a thing. I mean, I remember when text messaging first became a thing. And that was a distraction to us. Now we're, we're carrying around small computers in our hands on a daily basis. I, I remember in high school,

• 53:49Nick Bare?

  our house growing up was like the house to be at. My friends would, would sleep over in our basement almost every night, every summer. There'd be like six of us that would sleep over in the basement. We'd have Halo parties. So we would link up all these different Xboxes and play Halo. We'd play capture the flag outside. We'd ride our bikes around town. We were always outside.

• 54:16Nick Bare?

  And we had this one friend who was dating this girl and they were texting all the time. It's when texting first became a thing. And we'd always get mad at him because he'd always be on his phone texting.

• 54:31Nick Bare?

  And it was even before like phones had the full

• 54:36Nick Bare?

  like screen of all the, the letters. Like one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, zero. And each number had three letters. So you had to press the number on the phone.

• 54:51Nick Bare?

  To pull a different letter up. I mean, text messaging back then took forever. You know, if like one was A, B, C, you pressed one three times to get C to populate on the screen for the text. And we get so mad at this one friend for always be on his phone texting. I can only imagine now what it's like for groups of friends to get together in high school if they do. And what role phones and technology play? I'm really fortunate and grateful that when I was in middle school and high school,

• 55:35Nick Bare?

  phones just weren't the distraction that they are today. But they're a distraction to all of us. It's pretty disgusting. I always say at some point in my life, I'd love to get to a point where I have a flip phone again. Right now, based off my role in the business and just what I do for work, I don't know if it's doable. But that's the vision for myself in the future and my family. We get back to living off flip phones. There's this one phone actually I've been thinking about buying. It's called the Light Phone.

• 56:15Nick Bare?

  And essentially, all you can do on it is text, call. It has a calculator, has like a notes section, maybe a calendar and I think directions and music, like you can import songs onto it. And I've been thinking about buying that and maybe leaving my iPhone to the office and then using the Light Phone when I'm home on the weekends, the mornings, the evenings.

• 56:49Nick Bare?

  Because I hate the fact that my phone steals my presence. And we can incorporate disciplines and boundaries as much as possible. But we are weak humans and we will find ways to break those boundaries.

• 57:07Nick Bare?

  But some of the disciplines that Seth and I have around technology and phones. Something that we've recently started doing actually is utilizing this app. It's called App Block. We use it for our phones. So what we do right now is, and we recently started incorporating this. We do a weekend social media fast. So we turn on this app and within the app you can set timelines and

• 57:41Nick Bare?

  like schedules essentially to be able to use certain apps in your phone. So right now, the way we have it set up is that we can't access any of the social media Saturday and Sunday on our phones. And then during the week, the way I have mine set up is that I can't access social media on my phone from 4:00 PM until 7:30 PM. I typically leave the office at 4:00 PM. And then we get the kids down around 7:30 PM. So my social media is blocked during this time. This is family time.

• 58:21Nick Bare?

  And then it also is blocked from 9:00 PM until 6:30 AM. This is Monday through Friday. So I have accessibility on social from 7:30 PM to 9:00 PM. If I have to check stuff, upload something, but not until 6:30 AM the next morning.

• 58:43Nick Bare?

  And I've had to activate this mode within that app. It's called strict mode. Where like you can't just turn the app off. You have to open up the app. You have to wait five minutes for it to deactivate. It's ridiculous, like the type of boundaries that we have to incorporate to keep ourselves from being addicted to.

• 59:05Nick Bare?

  Technology, social media, but it is what it is. We have found that the weekend fast is amazing for just our presence in our attention on the weekends, and we're going to keep doing that. And then using the, uh, the scheduled blockings during the week has been beneficial as well. And activating strict mode so we don't go in there and turn it off. But other than that, I mean, we don't watch much TV, movies or television. It's not that we don't want to, but we just really don't have time to. By the time we get the kids down, normally in the evening, we get the kids down, 7:30,

• 59:48Nick Bare?

  8:00 PM, we will sauna and then shower, get ready for bed, and we try to be asleep by 9:30 PM most nights, so we shoot for. So there just really isn't time for movies and TV shows and series or any of that kind of stuff. And to be honest, when I'm on social media, I actually don't consume much content on social media. I'm posting and engaging with my content, VPN's content, but when I do consume content on social media, it is for recipes. I get a lot of recipe ideas and inspiration.

• 1:00:31Nick Bare?

  And I just love, um, seeing the creativity that people incorporate into their food and cooking and things that we can easily incorporate into our meals for the family. That is quick, simple, healthy, nutritious and delicious. And the last question I will touch on. This is in response to the Iron Man film that we released on January 29th, 2026. It was called The Last Dance. The question is, are you done with races, preps and fitness competitions forever? And not necessarily.

• 1:01:19Nick Bare?

  I'm sure at some point I'll get the itch to

• 1:01:24Nick Bare?

  prep and train for a competitive marathon time again. Or maybe an ultra, or maybe a high rocks, who knows?

• 1:01:34Nick Bare?

  But the intent of that film, the message that we wanted to get across, the message that I wanted to share is that for the last

• 1:01:45Nick Bare?

  seven, eight years now, I have gone from fitness prep to fitness prep to fitness prep. Marathons to Ironmans to ultras to bodybuilding competition, to high rocks, to marathons, to ultras, to Ironmans.

• 1:02:05Nick Bare?

  For the last seven to eight years, it's been prep to prep to prep and

• 1:02:12Nick Bare?

  you know, we document these preps and we film all of it and it's extremely time demanding, energy demanding.

• 1:02:23Nick Bare?

  Doesn't just take away from from my physical and mental energy, but it takes away from my physical and mental energy for my family and the team. And

• 1:02:38Nick Bare?

  I love training. I love competing. I love racing. But I found that my identity became rooted in performance, in these preps, in achieving. And I didn't want that any longer. And I didn't need that to be my identity any longer.

• 1:03:02Nick Bare?

  And I learned a lot of these last seven, eight years.

• 1:03:06Nick Bare?

  I love training, love training. I'm still getting after it every day.

• 1:03:12Nick Bare?

  This morning I ran five miles and then I lifted with a team, like I said, during the team lift, did a back and biceps workout.

• 1:03:20Nick Bare?

  Health, fitness, training, doing hard things, pushing myself will always for the rest of my life be foundational, fundamental, instrumental.

• 1:03:36Nick Bare?

  But the chapter and era of me going from race to race to race, competition to competition to competition, because my identity was rooted in those preps, in the performance, is over. Not to say that I'll never do a prep again, or a race again, or a competition again, but I don't need them to justify my worth and who I am. Because I know who I am and what I'm rooted in is much greater than the fitness prep, the competition, the race.

• 1:04:16Nick Bare?

  I found myself needing those things to consider myself worthy of anything. And I see a lot of athletes and other people, other men, doing the same thing. And I wanted to be a leader and a role model to share that you don't need the race after race after race, the prep after prep after prep, the performance constantly to be worthy of anything. And this film, The Last Dance, was a story in showcasing the transformation, the renewing

• 1:05:00Nick Bare?

  of my mind, of my soul, in this realization. The work doesn't stop, it's not slowing down, but it's not sacrificing my time and energy, physical and mental, for the prep, because there's other people that deserve that, that energy, that are much more important and prioritized in my life.

• 1:05:32Nick Bare?

  So that's why it's called The Last Dance.

• 1:05:37Nick Bare?

  Not saying I'm never doing a race again. But in the near future,

• 1:05:43Nick Bare?

  it's not on the schedule. It's not a priority.

• 1:05:47Nick Bare?

  I got some other cool goals I'm pursuing at the moment.

• 1:05:55Nick Bare?

  So I hope you guys enjoyed this one. I appreciate you sharing and asking questions that facilitated and sparked some of these responses. Love you guys. Appreciate you. And as always, go one more.