Why Endurance Athletes Need More Than a Training Plan with Jared Markiewicz

I realized over the course of my life in the athletics that I achieved relatively high levels of, but I kind of missed the mark. I felt like of what I was capable of is I was very, very hard on myself and I still am. But the reflection piece, like when I started hearing it and started to, to pay attention to what I was reading or listening to, I was going, you know, this is what most high achievers struggle with.

Hello and welcome to the Athletes Compass podcast, where we navigate training, fitness and health for everyday athletes. Today we're joined by Jared Markowitz, founder of Functional Integrated Training in Madison, Wisconsin, and now a speaker and performance coach with Fit Legacy. With a background in kinesiology and over a decade of coaching from youth athletes to busy parents, Jared focuses on helping people build systems of discipline.

connecting their motivation to what really matters in life and using reflection to carry the lessons of training into leadership, family, and work. Jared, welcome to the Athletes Compass podcast.

Paul, thank you for welcoming me and thank you for nailing my last name. That is not usually the easiest thing to do. So I appreciate that.

is luckily I've, I've thought about this a lot because it's been an evolution of, of my life. so when I was working at Gold's gym, which was my original personal training job and kind of where I got my, my feet wet and was coaching one-on-one training sessions for 40 hours a week, which if you've ever done one-on-one coaching in person, that's a lot. yeah, exactly. Exactly. Marjaana I was.

It's a lot a lot.

probably impacting 25 people on any given week because you can't, you you're coaching people multiple hours in a given, in a given week or multiple sessions. And I felt like I wanted to impact more. And so that led me to opening up my gym and for our gym, we've been doing this for now over 13 years and kind of have about a 250 person ebb and flow of memberships in our gym. And it feels awesome. We're, we're

10Xing our impact from where I was to where we are now. But same thing, you get to a certain point and you go, I feel like I have more to give to the community, to the world. And so I've, I've evolved that mentality to, want to now impact 2,500 people. so 10Xing that again. And the reason or the way in which I feel like I can do that is through podcasts like this, through getting information out there.

on social media, through my website, and then speaking. Because in those formats, I can impact a lot of people in one room and give them the information. And then obviously it's then on them to go and take and utilize it. But if someone stands up and says, hey, I'm close here, or I really, I love this stuff, but I need more accountability and guidance. That's when I can step in and say, great, now we can talk about my performance coaching and take you on as a client.

to work on that specifically with you.

So when did you realize that you wanted to coach parents and busy professionals on performance beyond the gym? What gap were you seeing in their lives?

Yeah, we really focus in our gym on strength. That's kind of where we hone in on and we say like, if we want to build this foundation of strength for all the other things you want to do in your life, whatever those things may be, then we're the place to go. But what I realized was as we're doing those things, we're still missing the mark a little bit because people are in our gym for let's say three hours a week. And if there's 168 hours in any given week, you know, there's a significant amount spent on sleep, spent on

on things regarding eating, not necessarily saying that I'm a nutritionist, but just how you approach that aspect of things, other forms of recovery, and then just mindset and even value associated with relationships in your life. And so I felt like the performance coaching piece, I had the ability to now layer in, you if we talk about the physical piece of it, that's one piece, but then the personal piece, and even to some degree, the professional piece, because

we all generally have jobs and roles we have to play in different parts of our lives. And I felt like the tools that we use in our gym and the ways that we approach specifically motivation, discipline, and reflection with people in our gym tied to their workouts, we could apply the same principles and concepts to other aspects of their lives and really make an impact more globally or holistically, if you want to use that word, as opposed to the really niche

area of strength.

our audience is, know, everyday endurance athletes and you talk about, you've mentioned motivation, discipline and reflection. And that's been kind of a part of what you do. But that helps people build a confidence to believe in themselves and realize their potential. Let's talk about those three in the context of endurance athletes. How does that play out? And we'll, and we'll kind of get more in depth into those as we go.

Yeah, certainly. ⁓ so the way I look at it is when we think about the human body and the existence of what we have and all the different nervous systems that are interacting on a minute by minute, second by second nano second level, and what we're learning about individual nervous systems right now, I mean, the, the enteric nervous system, right? So the gut and what's going on with that and the information we're learning about.

the microbiome and how complex and massively diverse, also plastic or the plasticity of it is just super, super fast. can change in a day or less sometimes if you change your eating habits. I realized that what we're talking about from a human perspective is that we as humans are accessing such a small percentage of our potential that

We have to find a way to simplify things because if we try and get as complex as our nervous system is, we don't stand a chance. We have trillions of supercomputers running through our bodies at any given time and then they're interacting with each other. So to try and understand that at this point is just too complex for us. So instead, trying to simplify things and go, okay, well, what do we know? Well, we know that if we can dial in on someone's purpose,

and what it is they're trying to accomplish for whatever it is they're working on, task it is they're trying to improve or skill, and then find a way to adhere some discipline and create some constraints around that so that we're kind of avoiding or not necessarily eliminating, but recognizing the perfectionism trap that a lot of us fall into. And then take that to reflection and go, okay, well, there's a negative bias for us as human beings. And we know that like we are, are

wired internally to focus on the negative, the threats that may, you know, in our history as a species kill us, where now the threats aren't going to kill us, but they're going to weigh us down and bury us in this mental fog, that there's got to be a better way to consciously override that. And so as you cycle through motivation, discipline, reflection, you keep going with that. I feel like you can take anybody. So let's say an endurance athlete who says,

You know, I'm a triathlete, but this year I really want to focus on like my power in cycling. That's going to be the ticket to me hitting my next PR on my sprint try. okay. So why is that? Like, what's the purpose behind that for you? And then how do we tie that into the discipline you need? And then ultimately, how do we reflect in a way that is focused on what you're doing well versus constantly focuses on where.

Am I falling short? And then that essentially creates this momentum that's similar to a flywheel. And I've ever heard of a flywheel and how that goes. Like a flywheel starts and it's this really, really difficult thing to get going. And it's just slow, slow going. And then as momentum builds, all of a sudden it gets faster and faster. And it gets to a point where you're pushing out with the same amount of force you originally did. But now we are just in this basically unstoppable

momentum. And that's what I felt like, okay, if we're going human, and we're saying we're here, but the potential is here is this motivation, discipline, flywheel is helping us achieve superhuman levels, but for ourselves, like, what do we want? And what's superhuman to us? And then using those principles to guide that and coach on that or teach on that.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I love that. I love that Jared. it's, mean, it's really, you're speaking to the heart and the core of what we're building in Athletica. someone comes in, they've got to achieve the, their own, they've got to have their own motivation. They're coming to us for, a certain reason. And just like you said, let's build our functional threshold power or, whatever it may be, but then, and then hopefully they, they stay on the plan.

with their own discipline, but then the reflection component is the key one as well. And this is really what we're building with our AI coach. We're allowing this reflective process to occur between the data that we're seeing and the user as well. I just, yeah, I love, your approach, your philosophy ultimately. that's, cause we just, yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Thank you.

your approach and philosophy is just right in sync with ours. It's cool.

Yeah, I love it. Well, I think that, the reflection piece was the piece that I, I felt was missing for a long time because for me, as, somebody who's naturally competitive and who was a competitive athlete and still I compete in things that currently sprinting is my thing. like actual sprinting, like a hundred meter dashes. it, that's my, my new sport as it were, but

Mm-hmm.

I realized over the course of my life in the athletics that I achieved relatively high levels of, but I kind of missed the mark. I felt like of what I was capable of is I was very, very hard on myself and I still am. But the reflection piece, like when I started hearing it and started to, to pay attention to what I was reading or listening to, I was going, you know, this is what most high achievers struggle with. And when you can kind of rewire that or, or almost

consciously overcome it or supersede it, then all of a sudden those other two pieces start to really kick into high gear and it becomes again a flywheel like effect.

Yeah. Yeah. No, exactly. that's again, sorry to keep going back to Athletica, but that's what we're building also with our conversational AI coach, which actually like, you know, we had Andrea on the podcast to the inventor of it recently. And it, you know, we're leveraging just like a coach does, we're leveraging that history of the database of what the individuals achieved in the past and able to reflect on that and then reflect in the present moment.

Mmm.

conversationally with our AI coach. And I'll just mention for both athletes and for coaches as well, this will be present. So in process, being built, but coming out very soon.

Yeah.

Well, I love that because I think that that's one of the things that we recognize also in our gym is that one of the things that we consistently do is when someone leaves a training session of ours, we are making a conscious point to emphasize something that we recognize they did well.

Thank

Mm-hmm.

Because what we've realized is when they walk in the door, if we smile and say, hi, Marjaana, how you doing today? you ready to train? Like there's a good chance that that person hasn't seen a smile yet today. There's a good chance people haven't been necessarily super excited to see that person yet that day. And that's even a possibility that they haven't had their name said to them that day yet. And so if we can be that environment and then leave them with.

this mentality of I work really hard. That wasn't necessarily super easy. I didn't feel like I made massive progress, but now my coach just reminded me of something I did well before I left. we like our hope then is that that carries through the rest of their day. And so in a lot of ways, like their best part of the day, even though it was difficult and uncomfortable was a training session.

Thank

You speak to so many aspects about what I've faced and met time and time again as a coach, but also a parent who has been watching from the sideline, my kids being coached and the lack of leaving the session with, you know, positive thing. Hey, you really nailed that one.

And it just eats me up every time. So I make sure, and I know a lot of parents fell into the trap of doing exactly the same on the way home in the car and just picking apart the mistakes that the kids did. I'm always so vigilant on talking to my kids after games and training. Like, what did you do? What were you proud of yourself of doing today?

Hmm.

Mmm.

Did you have fun? And I don't even mention the mistakes because I know they know where they did the mistakes. There's no point highlighting that. But when you talk about the motivation, discipline, and the reflection cycle, really, before I started doing Ironmans, I felt like I don't have the discipline. I would just do a workout, didn't follow a plan. I was just everywhere.

Hmm.

Mm-hmm.

And then

I realized that Ironman is such a big challenge that I really have to get disciplined. I can't, there's no way I can get through that day if I'm not disciplined in my training. And so I started reflecting. So here comes the whole triangle or the flywheel. So you have to, when you embark on a really big challenge, you have to know your motivation. So know your why.

Mm-hmm.

I will.

And then you need a training plan, right? So you need a coach or a training plan or both, and you need to find the discipline. And there are tricks how to, right? Maybe it's just the physical, you know, I had a paper on my fridge when I first started triathlon and I would just mark tick. Visible, like this is the milestones that I've done and it's taking me to my goal.

Yes.

Yes.

But oftentimes people leave it at that, right? So the reflection part, it's not there in the weekly training. So when I started coaching, I used to send them a note with the, it was kind of a little bit long, too long of a note, but I think I helped them start the reflection process where they...

Yes.

went through that week and they, you know, learned something from that week and how they did that week. So I think the reflection part is somewhere where people don't really do that because we're so busy. But how do you, how do you get your athletes to actually do the reflection? What's your trick?

Mm-hmm.

It's like,

well, so there's a, there's, there's so many rabbit holes I can dive down here. but, but what I want to speak to is to me, it starts the discipline piece actually is really where things are set up for reflection. because the people who I tend to work with from a performance coaching perspective are very much high achievers in other things in their lives and whether or not they realize it.

you

they treat training like I have to be perfect at this. have to do this exactly as the program states or I'm out. And, and that's such a hard thing to overcome because we often have a really hard time thinking back to what got us to be successful in other disciplines in our life that are currently at this state and not realizing that we missed the mark a lot. We failed.

Hmm.

and made mistakes or, or, or skipped a day or whatever a lot. And that still got us to a point of success. so realizing that I felt like I had to, make something I call it the elite formula because, it really is a formula for people who are high achieving perfectionists individuals to, to have a skill they're working on. let's go back to the whole power piece for cycling.

and have an elite level and say, okay, at the elite highest level, I am doing exactly what the training plan told me to do. At the exceed level, so kind of one step down from that, I'm doing a really good job. I'm not quite perfect, but there's some level of it that is that. And then elevate to me is the most important constraint. So I call it, and you all know this in training, so the minimum effective dose. What's the minimum amount that I can do

to increase my power. So for a parent who's got all kinds of other things going on in their lives, but they really, really do care about increasing their power for cycling for their sprint triathlon, when chaos is ensuing because of kids' sports schedules and PTA meetings and insert all the other stuff here, plus work, what's the minimum effective dose that I can do to keep progress moving forward? Number one,

So I know that I'm hitting that mark and I'm doing something. But number two, so that when I get the opportunity, because the perfectionist, when given the opportunity of time, will go back to that highest level. What do I need to be doing so that when I go back and I have a time to hit that level, that I don't just crash and burn. Because you go back to all of it and you've been doing nothing, it crushes you. But if you've maintained some level of training,

Totally.

Now all of sudden you go back to that and you're there and you're good. But then also when things go crazy again, you know that you can drop down to here again or somewhere in between and go, okay, this is going to keep working. It's not going to be perfect, but it's going to give me a framework to function within. Because then when they have that, then it makes reflection a lot easier because now all of sudden they can reflect on I wasn't perfect.

Mm-hmm.

But I know my constraints and I hit them and I found a way. And so now that's going to keep that flywheel going when perfect wasn't attainable.

Yeah, I just love that Jared. So I'm reflecting on my co-founder with HIT Science and my co-author of the book, Science Application, Intensive Interval Training, Martin Buchheit He just said it like, and this guy works for Paris Saint-Germain football club and all the big league teams and stuff for football, soccer. And he said like that in terms of like our, his biggest realization over the years, you being in at 20, 30 years and stuff.

is just how much the minimal effective dose is very, very real. And he can't believe how little he can actually get away with sometimes in some of the elite football, soccer players in the world. And it's just an important message for all of us. And it's why we built, one of the key reasons why we built this little feature in Athletica called Workout Wizard, because just to your point, you can somehow, you can sometimes just...

click on that little button and find something that's even just small, just to tick over, just like you're saying, well, can't do a Gold Star workout here today, which is exactly what's programmed, but I can hit a little bit. just doing something often will kind of keep you on track as opposed, and it hits with that whole key principle of consistency in your training. know, consistency of training, just at least doing something is often better than doing

Mm-hmm.

doing nothing at all in your day. I'm sure you've seen that as well in your practice, Jared.

100%. Well, and I even took that formula and said, okay, how could I make this relatable to every individual? And so I tied those, the elite, the exceed and the elevate to the grading system from school. So elite A plus exceeds a solid B and C gets degrees. Right. And the way I look at that is like people say, well, okay, but I don't want to be average C's average. And I'm like, yes, I understand what you're saying.

But if we're looking at this and going by that by that phrase of C's get degrees. Well, you're getting a graduate degree or a Ph.D. with those like you're not average. And by by attaining that level for a period of time, knowing full well, that's not what you're that's not what you're seeking. That's what you need right now. Then you will get to the A when the opportunity arises.

Nice.

So let's talk about motivation for a moment and kind of get back to that. And you have talked about novelty driven versus value driven motivation. How do you transition people between the two from the former to the latter? let's talk about kind of give us a background about motivation, first of all, and then talk about those two kinds of motivation.

Sure, I really, I think there's lots of, and I don't think, I know, there's lots of different philosophical and psychological principles regarding like what is discipline. For a long time, I've just really adhered to, it's always worked for me and felt right, but self-determination theory is a psychological theory on motivation. And it's tied around the idea that for a human to find motivation and move it from a novelty

Mm-hmm.

or an extrinsic level to a values or an intrinsic level, they need to feel like they have competence. They need to find relatedness to things that matter to them. And they need to have autonomy or have some control of the situation at hand. And so when it comes to motivation, and again, we'll use this, we've been rolling with this, we'll use the power for cycling

example for an athlete. And that person comes in and says, okay, I want to, to increase my power for cycling. so I can improve my sprint try and hit a PR and my sprint tries. That's awesome. Tell me more about, about why that matters to you. And as you start going down that pathway of, asking the questions and it's, it's the, it's the common practice of why. I think actually I was just listening to, your podcast last week, I think it was last week, Marjaana.

Mmm.

I'm talking about the guiding the goals for athletes and the why being really important. It's the same idea. It's the same principle. Motivation is purpose. And there are multiple purposes that we have in different facets of our lives. And recognizing that it's like we don't have one core purpose. Well, I guess we kind of do, but then it fans out into other things. But from a training perspective, it's just a piece of the puzzle. We're not the audience that you all have.

is an everyday endurance audience or not somebody who's getting paid to solely do this. And so if we can find purpose that ties into other aspects of their lives that matter to them. So yeah, it's power for a PR and a sprint try. ⁓ and also by the way, we're going to go on a family trip to Hawaii and we want to bike around Hawaii together as a family. And I want to have the ability to do that also. ⁓

Mm-hmm.

Okay, now we've got that

Yeah, nice.

emotional tie, that intrinsic piece of like this matters to you because it also impacts your family. So yes, we're gonna work on power. But when the chips are down, when stuff is going absolutely chaotic and you're going, I just can't do it, I can't keep up with training. Okay, elevate, minimum effective dose, why? Because you're going on this trip to Hawaii with your family. And no matter what happens in your sprint try,

Hmm.

You

care about that. And that purpose is going to carry somebody far longer than increasing power cycling.

100 % like usually any like transformation of any kind, even if it's like 10 more watts FTP, there's some powerful motivation behind it and oftentimes some trauma.

and

Hmm.

Right.

And that's why that's where we're all amateur psychologists as coaches, We should probably all have our, uh, uh, like a, uh, uh, associate's degree uh, uh, in psychology uh, it is part of our job uh,

Yeah. Yeah.

You

Yeah, totally. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

When you're talking to youth athletes, how do you, because you might be the first one actually an adult talking to youth athletes about motivation and how to become more disciplined and then the reflection piece. Don't be so critical about everything. Like see, find the one good thing you did today. Like where do you start? Is there a difference between the adults and youth and how do you kind of talk to youth about this?

Mm.

Yeah, so I'll use the example of the flywheel in the order that it is. And then I'll tell you a story because I have a story going back to what you mentioned with your kids.

For me, and really when it comes to competitive athletes in that setting of their in organized sports. So my girls play softball. They are doing tennis as well and they're into Brazilian Jiu Jitsu also. But right now, like softball is their primary competitive thing. And so the motivation piece is pretty simple. They wanna compete,

My one daughter Brynn wants to be the best pitcher on our team and have like the number one spot. My other daughter Natalie wants to be a catcher. So the motivation piece is easy and it's relatively extrinsic, but they're young, it's fine because they're playing sports. The discipline piece is also relatively easy because, hey, I'm not, I always say I'm not gonna force, but I will facilitate until I'm blue in the face.

So if you say to me, I want to go out and practice pitching, I want to go out and get on my, get on the catcher's gear and go practice catching happily. I'll, I love to do that kind of stuff because if you want to do it, I'm all in. So discipline piece is pretty easy that way also. And it's their choice at that point and they can choose to work hard or not and then reap the benefits. but the reflection piece I feel like is where I can have the most control and where that's where I can step in and make a change.

And so the story I have with this, so Brynn, they're twins, but Brynn is my pitcher. And we had a particular practice this last winter where she wasn't focused. There's a of kids around, but there wasn't that many players there with the pitching coach. The pitching coach was there. The ratio was pretty low. I felt like this is a great opportunity for her to demonstrate the work she's been putting in.

And, kind of show off and also get some like higher level cues and coaching tips from the pitching coach, but she wasn't focused and she was struggling going through all this stuff. And, and so I was frustrated. Like I got down to practice and I was, I was frustrated and I'm walking to my truck and I'm just, I got to talk to her about this. and just like what I'm feeling right now. And I stopped for a second before we got in the truck and took a breath.

.

We've got about an eight minute car ride to get home. And I've been working on some things and learning some things. So Dr. Nate Zinsser is a sports psychologist for West Point. And he wrote a book called the confident mind. And I had been reading that book and actually practicing his is called ESP. So it's effort, success and progress. And it's a reflection tool that he has. And so was like, okay, I'm going to try this right now and just see what happens. So I said, okay, Brynne, where did you have good effort?

and, and she, you know, said things that I was like, okay, yeah, like I, I agree with what she's saying. I felt like, her effort was there in certain aspects of this practice. And where did you have, so I'll go in opposite order because there's one that just kind of really stung. like where'd you have good progress? Well, I was working on this and I got better at this and I was like, yeah, you know, you're pretty much right and spot on. but the success one was one that got me. So I said, where'd you have success? And she said, well,

You told me at the end, so everyone's kind of packing up and going back to their, their bags and putting things away. And so she was the only pitcher left really pitching. And I said, Hey, Brynn I need you to throw me three more strikes. Which at that time was, you know, maybe three, four out of 10 pitches were strikes, for her and the pitching coach was watching and the girls were watching because they were not practicing anymore. And she dialed in and threw me three straight strikes.

And so she told me that and I was like...

Okay. And so by the time we went through that whole process, we were home and I never once talked about how unfocused she was or how unfocused I thought she was. And I was like, okay, like this can work because I just, it just happened. Right. And I, I've since told her because I've told the story more than one time, like what I was experiencing and going through. but in that moment, like.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Hmm

and

that did more for her to drive her motivation to do better than anything I could have done in regards to like you were unfocused, were, you know, all the things I wanted to say, it wasn't there. So I think for me and for parents, like you said, Marjaana, like if the coach isn't telling them, then you gotta be the one to consciously tell them. And I still do this with my, like, so my girls had a scrimmage in softball yesterday and on the way home.

We did ESP and each of them gave me their effort, success and progress. And then I gave them back my ESP for them. Like this is what I saw from you in terms of good effort. This is what I saw from you in terms of good success and progress and having twin daughters. Like they each got their own versions of that because that's part of it too for me is they're the same age. I could easily just lump them into the same person, but they're not. They're very different human beings. And,

Mm-hmm.

It's that kind of stuff that I see from the girls that I coach, the people that I've worked with, the people that we train in our gym. we're providing positivity in a world where it's mostly negative social media is negative and they're probably hard enough on themselves already. They don't need anybody else to be more, more hard on themselves than they are. And if we give them that chance, then maybe they'll start to recognize a positive in themselves.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Imagine if all called youth coaches knew their ESP, ESP effort, success and progress. So did she obviously like when she wasn't focused, there was something going on. Did she recognize that from her internal cues that when she at the end was able to focus that she was

Yep, it's being effort, success, progress. Yeah, it's really good,

throwing straight strikes.

Yeah,

I think contextually you have to understand that she was seven and a half.

⁓ okay. Yeah. See, but that's, that's amazing. Yeah.

Haha. Wow.

⁓ So, so, so probably not all things considered.

Yeah.

like they're, they're both nine now. and they're, they're, young, they're in fourth grade and they're nine, and young for their, class. So, yeah, it's, it's a, no, like I said, contextually, right. ⁓ if, if, if she was that aware, I would be blown away. she's still not really there, but.

Yeah.

I thought you were going to say 16.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

But again, and I think this is the case. I didn't, I didn't hear this, but I had a girl, say this to my daughter. And I think this speaks a little bit to the way that I approach coaching that team. so this is a girl who I've coached in a couple of different teams, but she said to one of my daughters, like coach Jared's more of a head coach than our actual head coach.

And I think what she means by that is, like that I go up to them individually and I say, Hey, I'm seeing you working on this. You're doing a great job. Keep it up. Or like, this is what I'm seeing. That's really good. I want you to focus on that when you go and you're at bat or you're out in the field or whatever it is. So I make a conscious effort. And again, this is things that we do in our gym that I do with my performance coaching clients too. But it's just what's most present and in front of me right now is like seeing that and having that imprint.

on a nine-year-old that again, even at that age, there's not a lot of positivity going around. So having that opportunity is, it's our choice as parents, as coaches, as leaders to see the good and then make it obvious to that person.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah. I know, know MJ has got a high level, son in, in baseball. So, and I know she's seen a lot of different coaching styles in her, history. And I'm sure she can reflect on, on what, there's, there's, I'm sure all the coaches mean well, but there's different styles that are out there. you say MJ?

sure.

Yeah, totally. Yeah. I can't help but like, just bring up the Nordic way of racing athletes where they give the kids a lot more responsibility. And now I've missed the word ownership over their own careers and autonomy. ⁓ It is front, right and center already from the early age.

Yeah, autonomy. Yeah.

Like autonomy,

That's what I've tried to give my kids as well. But let's talk about youth that don't necessarily, they don't have internal drive and their motivation is eccentric. Do you work with those kids differently to get them to understand the whole concept or?

Well, let's, let's,

let's get this clear. So I, I coach softball purely for the love of coaching softball. I volunteer my time. I coach my daughters and their youth travel team and the recreational team. The performance coaching that I'm doing is much more so with like high achieving adults in the professional realm, but I can definitely speak to, the, kind of the extrinsic focus on things.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

I don't think it's necessary for someone to start building a skill to working on something and needing to have a purely intrinsic, like deep seated emotional ties to whatever that thing is. I think that when you help the individual understand what it is that they're chasing after and finding just maybe a few layers deeper.

And, Nick Winkleman is somebody who put this idea first really in my head and he's now over coaching, I believe the Irish national rugby team, as like a strength and conditioning coach, but he, he dove into the whole self determination theory and extrinsic to intrinsic and kind of all the layers in between. And he was doing research on it for his PhD. And there was a, there's a piece in there where it was kind of this middle ground of it's not the purely extrinsic like.

I just want this for the purpose of getting this thing. There's some level of it's a little bit deeper for me than that. ⁓ It makes me feel good. ⁓ You know, for some kids like my parents, it's like I get positive feedback from my parents and makes them proud for me to do these things. Like if you can find those pieces of it and just start working it, it makes it easier to get that kid to then dial into the discipline necessary.

to start building that reflection piece. And then again, if you're not the parent and you're the coach, mean, I don't play this role a lot with my daughters, but there's some things now with tennis and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, like I don't have a clue with those sports. I can tell you how to play those things or do those things, but when it comes to like the skills of it. So I just make statements that are

relatively general, but like just things I see and observe of ways in which like you did great today with this. This look better. Explain that more to me and kind of be curious, you know, with the kid because when you're curious and you give any human being the opportunity to view themselves as the expert compared to you, that's going to be fun. You're going to enjoy that piece.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, there's a lot can be revealed there if you just ask.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah,

I was just thinking like back to even if we just go higher Google Earth kind of view like and I reflect on Peter Attia outlive book and philosophies and you know the science supports the fact that our happiness is reflected in having a sense of purpose. So we all as human beings want to have that sense of purpose. We want to work

Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

you know, there's got to be some reason why we're on this planet and having this life, right? So that's within all of us. And then I think that kind of comes back to this, motivation piece that you're talking about, Jared. And it's like, well, okay, so I have this purpose and we've been using the cycling example, but whatever could be the softball or the baseball, but it's like, you know, okay, I've, I've developed this sense of purpose. That's what I want to do. And I want to work towards it. and in doing so we, it's,

It is.

of living a good life. Like it's part of our own intrinsic happiness. And I think that, you know, again, it can come back to Athletica, it can come back to what you're doing, Jared, and everything. So yeah, it's pretty key. It's a big rock in life is to have this. Yeah.

It's a huge rock.

Yeah. Well, and as I was just having a conversation with a friend of mine, so we're in a mastermind group together and it's business focused primarily, but, expanding past that. And he kind of asked that question. We actually had a pastor who was, who was there sort of leading the discussion. and, he talked about like, like, okay, like, is my purpose tied to what I do? Like I do this work and he's kind of a concierge service, like high end.

luxury sporting event experiences. ⁓ And we were talking to him and just asking him questions like, well, tell me more about that. Like, why does that matter to you? What's that? What's the importance to you? And it came back to he just really loves to, to make people feel joy. Like he gets joy from other people feeling joy. I'm like, all right, Brad, like that, that's, that's this big thing right here. Now, underneath that your profession falls.

But I'm guessing there's other pieces of things you do in life and different aspects of your life that all tie back to this idea that I get joy by giving other people joy. And he's still like working through that. but yeah, I mean, that's the, that's the idea is that we all have multiple things that, you know, as we get older, we play all these different roles and your audience, if they're everyday endurance athletes, what that means to me at least is they still have a job.

Yeah.

They probably have some social obligations, whether it's to their family or friends and coworkers and that kind of thing. they probably have other interests outside of endurance sports and there's still some piece of it of like, Hey, just go have fun, enjoy life play. and that's that type of thing. And so all those different pieces are, parts of it and they can all have their own purpose. But when you work on that and figure that out, it's like, okay.

Now I see why I'm doing all these things. And it's hard when you get to that point to not smile. Right? When you get to that point, you're just like, okay, this is, this is who I am. This is what I was put on earth for.

Yeah.

That's right. Yeah, and we have a, you know, we're living through an epidemic of mental health crisis and, we had Pete on the podcast with Paul, talking about this and it's, I think everyone's aware of it, right? But if, you know, this is one of those potential solutions of alleviating that in a lot of individuals. And it's why people are drawn so many times to these new goals because it immediately gives them a sense of purpose in life.

whatever it may be and it's a real positive thing and that's why it's important.

Yeah. And really why I think movement is the foundation that I've always hung my hat on is that I think that with movement, we create, an environment where we're in control of the uncomfortable nature that, work at working out and moving provides, right? It's, it's difficult. It's hard. It doesn't, it never really feels that good. You, if you get a runner's high, it never feels that great when you're out there running, but you appreciate the work you put in because the process is.

yeah.

what we're all after. And we build resiliency towards stress and we give ourselves this ability to have more energy so that the rest of our lives feels less daunting. And it's all these other pieces that just ripple out from movement. That, I mean, that's why it's such a huge piece of, to me, it's like we get that right. And then the other pieces are easier to attack and figure out.

Yes.

You know, when we talk about reflection, you know, I think a lot of endurance athletes do pretty well with at least some kind of motivation and some kind of discipline. But I think that reflection piece really is something I don't think I do that much of. And I don't think, you know, unless it's a negative kind of thing, but what kind of prompts or questions can help us with these self-reviews?

first of all, just letting you know, this is still the piece that I have the hardest time with myself. So I know by no means am I perfect and sitting here telling you, yeah, like this is just really easy to do. I think that, that anybody who is competitive, who is pushing themselves is probably going to have the hardest time with this because it's the most consciously,

Yeah.

driven you have to be. You're overriding human nature. We are built to look at threat. We are built to recognize threat more than we are to recognize progress or forward movement. So we're working against evolution and we're working against the mentality that exists right now in our culture of social media where right now I could go on social media and I could find somebody who is just like me, someone who probably I know.

who's on vacation, someone who just maybe wrote a book or had this huge speaking engagement that I'm like, I would love to be able to do that. And somebody who is, you know, like their work week is reduced to 15 hours a week and they don't work on Fridays. And someone who just absolutely crushed a track and field event and go like, I want all those things for myself right now. And I'm not anywhere close to any of those things right now. I'm just go screw it. I'm done. And just go into a hole.

Mm-hmm.

you

So I think that number one, when it comes to reflection is it probably should happen daily. But understanding, if we go back to that elite formula, it doesn't have to kind of set your standard for what your minimum effective dose is for reflection. ⁓ Two, get specific on what things you're working on so it makes it easier to dig in and find it. Because if you go too broad and say, look, what went right in my day today?

That can be a kind of daunting task versus what went right for me in regards to my efforts at, I'll use my example of getting better at sprinting today. What did I do to better myself at sprinting today? and then go back to ESP and not because it's the only thing out there, but I just think it's, I love acronyms. threes tend to work really well for people and it gives you some, some broad context because between where did I put good or, or.

extra intentional effort in today. Where did I have successes, big or small? And where did I make progress on something I've been working on for a long time or something I just started working on today or this week or whatever it might be? You can find some way, or form in there where you go, yep, I got better today. And when you get better today, you win every day. Those things compile.

Yeah, I like that. I like that. I was reflecting myself on a, um, a saying And it's that, envy is the thief of joy. So it's, it's just not a good mental, cause you can, every single one of us can find someone that's better at something than we are.

Mm-hmm.

Everyone, every single person, believe me, I know this, right? Like I do this myself. And as soon as I find myself doing that, say, remember, envy is the for joy. It's not that helpful. back to your ESP, very much, much better mindset to kind of reflect on than

the opposite of that. So nice one, Jared.

we all have those days when we didn't get better and those are okay too.

Yeah,

Well, and I think, I think that even on that there is, there's always something. I think if you think long enough, you can always find something where you're like, didn't get better, but had I not done what I did today, despite not having my best, my HRV, not being optimal, whatever it might be, but I could have chose to do nothing instead. And I didn't, I chose this and therefore.

are.

Hmm.

That is something better, right? It's not going to be, because I mean, we all know this, you're in the game of, of athletics long enough. We can't PR every day. It's not a linear curve. mean, come on. That's absolutely absurd. it's ebbs and flows and it's in those, those dips that we find that's when discipline comes in. That's when reflection comes in that keeps us going. So the trend line is this.

Mm-hmm.

even though along the way it looks like this.

Yeah.

Yeah. Jared, we have a lot more questions. We also want to respect your time. How can, you know, there's a lot more that we can get into this, but how can people find you to learn more about your work?

Yeah. So I'm pretty active on Instagram and LinkedIn and Facebook nowadays. So my Instagram is coach J Mark. So I still get some people who think I'm my name is Mark, but J Mark is a, is a old acronym.

So coach J Mark is his Instagram. and then Jared Markowitz on, on Facebook and LinkedIn. and then I have, so our gym functional integrated training, the URL for that is fit mad town.com. and we're located in Fitchburg, Wisconsin, and that's where people can come physically to us and train with us.

But then the fit legacy piece is again, my legacy and where I'm going with that, which is performance coaching and the speaking. that's at fit legacy.co. c-o

Thanks for listening today to the Athletes Compass podcast. Take a moment now, subscribe, share, and let's keep navigating this endurance adventure together. Improve your training with the science-based training platform, Athletica, and join the conversation at the Athletica Forum. For Jared Markowitz, Marjaana Rakai, and Dr. Paul Laursen I'm Paul Warloski and this has been the Athletes Compass podcast. Thank you so much for listening.