Joe Wicks - Changing Millions Of Lives in 15 Seconds!
Guests: Joe Wicks
Full transcript · Read the full conversation in order, with its original context.
§01Transcript — part 1
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Joe Wicks, The Body Coach. You know, I've met, interviewed, and had the chance to understand the motivations, personalities, and desires of hundreds of successful people over the last five years. It continues to blow my mind how different every individual is. We often hunt for the secrets that made a certain person successful. What made them succeed?
Interestingly, the more I've interviewed successful people, the fewer patterns I've been able to identify. Maybe that is the secret. Maybe there is no secret. Joe grew up on a council estate in London. His mom left school at 15 years old. She had her first baby aged 17, which is Joe's older brother, and then Joe arrived just two years after that.
She was always on benefits. She didn't have a clue about food or fitness, and Joe was predominantly raised on a diet of sandwiches, pasta, and chocolate. Joe's dad was a drug addict, and he was continually in and out of rehab. So, his home life and upbringing were far from the white picket fence and parental solidarity that you often see in movies.
Growing up, Joe aspired to be a PE teacher. But after eventually finding work as a teaching assistant, he realized that he wasn't cut out for it. It just wasn't for him. He switched lanes, borrowed money from his parents to buy kettlebells and a personal training course, and soon after that, he became a personal trainer.
After handing out flyers in his local area, outside tube stations, and anywhere he could, so few people turned up to his classes that he was unable to pay his parents back the 2,000 pounds they had lent him. He recalls being so upset by the lack of clients he had and by the prospect of not being able to pay his parents back, but he was not prepared to give up.
Soon after this, he had the idea to start posting short recipe videos on his Instagram. His now-famous 15-second recipe videos, called Lean in 15, exploded. Joe doubled down on social media, and he eventually became one of the most followed health and fitness channels on Instagram.
His first published cookbook, Lean in 15, was a best-selling book in 2015. Lean in 15 has been translated into 18 languages around the world and sold over 1 million copies in the first year alone. He is a Channel 4 television presenter with his own show called The Body Coach. Joe has sold over 3 million books and has the second best-selling cookbook of all time.
He sold 40,000 copies of his fitness DVD in a single week and he's allegedly responsible for a 25% increase in broccoli sales. He's worth tens of millions. He's an investor, a husband, a new dad, and quite honestly, one of the most genuine, real, authentic people I've had the pleasure of meeting. Joe was the same guy on and off the podcast.
He was sincere, and he genuinely wants to lead a health, fitness, and well-being revolution that will positively impact the lives of everyone, from your kids to your grandparents. So why do I think he's been so successful? I think he's the right guy at the right time on the right platform with the right message, fueled by real passion and guided by pure intentions.
You know when you meet someone and you think to yourself, "I'm so glad that this person became successful"? Joe is one of those people. His mission now is to get young people all across the UK fit and exercising. The world really is his oyster. So without further ado, this is The Diary of a CEO, and I'm Stephen Bartlett. I hope nobody is listening, but if you are, then please keep this to yourself.
Joe, an absolute honor to be in your presence. You're a heavily, heavily admired young man for a variety of reasons. I want to get right into it because there's so much for us to talk about today. The place I want to start is with context, and the context I'm looking for is the context of who Joe is and why. I guess a lot of that will come from your childhood and your early experiences. I think that's the foundation of everybody. So, what's the story of Joe Wicks' childhood?
Firstly, thanks for having me on the podcast. I'm a recent listener and I am well into it, mate. Honestly, your honesty, your openness, and your self-awareness of life learnings and business, I think it's really inspiring, so I'm buzzing to be on it. I was actually on a five-hour journey up to York and I listened to three or four, and I was like, "This is going to be a really good chat."
Which ones are your favorite podcasts from The Diary of a CEO? Which ones are the ones that you've enjoyed?
The first one I listened to was the Toby Pearce one, which is obviously quite close to me because I'm a massive fan of Kayla and what she's achieved. He's a very, very interesting guy and I was really just blown away by the growth and the dedication and the consistency with their brand. They never promote anything; it's just always the app. You can see where that effort has come out because I think they said up to 35 million people are using it.
Crazy.
I also love the chat with Ben Francis from Gymshark. He's very inspiring. I really believe there are two types of people in this world: people that genuinely, from their heart and soul, love to see someone succeed, and then people that just can't quite really truly be happy for other people. That may not be from a jealousy perspective or envy, but maybe they just wish it was them. When I see stories like yours and I see stories like Ben's, I just get fascinated. I'm drawn to successful people and I want to drill down and find out what it is they've done and what behaviors they've learned or implemented to achieve that success.
You know what? I think there's something remarkable, even from spending a couple of moments with you today, there's something remarkably authentic about you. I think this for me forms part of the picture as to why you've resonated with a lot of people because you've been on social media a long time. People are going to figure out who the real Joe Wicks is eventually, especially when you're constantly making videos and content. Just from the 20 minutes I've been here, your authenticity I think is part of the reason why people have been drawn to you.
I've totally evaded the first question. My childhood—that's the thing. If you had met me as a kid, you just would... well, basically I come from a pretty hectic, chaotic upbringing. I grew up in a council estate. My dad was in and out of rehab for drug addiction, so I was around a pretty chaotic home with lots of shouting and verbal abuse. I was very hyperactive. I had behavior issues, I didn't have a very good attention span, I wasn't academic, and I couldn't focus on anything for very long.
As a kid, I was very into fitness and activity and moving. I always used that as a release, I imagine, because I was just always on the move. I wasn't like an overweight kid, even though my diet was terrible. But you would have looked at me and thought, "He's going to end up in prison or he's going to end up on drugs." That's what you really would have thought about me because I was just climbing the walls, I was swearing, I was running about, and I didn't respect any kind of rules as such.
I was probably more like a class clown than an actual naughty kid, but I was just always attention-seeking and disruptive. So you wouldn't have looked and thought, "That's going to be an entrepreneur, and that's going to be someone who's going to go on to connect with millions of people and help other people with my business."
Did you ever see yourself becoming... what did you think you were going to become in your own head?
That's a good question. Like I said, I don't come from an ambitious family. We're not a family of entrepreneurs. My mom's a social worker who left school at the age of 15 with no qualifications. She had me and my brother by the time she was 19; she was really young. My dad's a roofer. We weren't pushed to go to university; we weren't encouraged to do anything other than be happy. My mom and dad always used to say, for all the drama and trouble I went through as a kid, one thing I always had was love and support.
I always knew that my dad loved me, I always knew that my mom was there for me, and she used to say, "I don't care if you're a dustman or a doctor, I'll always love you." Having that kind of feeling and that support behind you definitely made me feel relaxed about who I was going to be. I wasn't under pressure to be anything. But in my head, all I was ever going to be was a PE teacher. I thought I'd be a school teacher because I'd work with kids and I'd have fun, have summer holidays, and maybe get a mortgage and have a house one day.
It's really weird when you come from that culture of not much self-belief and no expectations. There's no one around me doing a lot and succeeding in a lot as a kid. My ambition and my motivation came really just through having fun and putting content out and realizing that I have an ability to connect with people on a really deep level.
There's this stereotype that entrepreneurs are so intentional, that they were selling sweets in primary school and they've always been hustlers, motivated, and they come from great families or they have money or some kind of advantage. That's a stereotype that kind of varies, but you really buck that stereotype and that trend. From what you just said there, not only didn't you ever think you were going to be an entrepreneur, people around you didn't really think you were going to be an entrepreneur either. It happened, I guess, through the love of something and the passion and that ability to resonate with people.
Honestly, from just meeting you for 20 minutes, the authenticity—because my job here and the reason why I travel and meet guests often is because I'm trying to figure out why they became successful so I can take a bit of that into my own life, but also I'm trying to debunk stereotypes. Your authenticity and how... like when I met you, I'm like, there's no other version of you. You're not going to walk out this door now and say, "Thank God he's gone, prick."
No, that's true. Like you said, when you live your life on social media through Instagram and stories every day, you can't hide. You can only put on a face and be a character for so long, and how far is that going to get you? I've always just been really honest and really passionate. Very recently, I've got into this thing where I never used to believe in The Secret and the law of attraction; I used to think it was a bit wishy-washy.
But in the last month or so, I've been putting out a lot of positive content. Really powerful, inspirational stuff. I've realized I've actually become a kind of channel for my philosophy and my energy. When I put positive stuff out there, it's coming back in waves and waves. I feel like I'm in this flow state where I'm putting out content, I'm reaching out to people and sharing their testimonials and their stories, and it's coming back in waves.
I'm spending so much time at the moment doing DMs and voice notes to people. I'm not just a fitness trainer anymore; I'm counseling these people, I'm life coaching them. I've realized I love it. People that have really deep stuff, like been suicidal, or in relationships, or going through depression or eating disorders. I used to find it really hard to reply, but now I take a moment to read them, I flag them, and when I've got the energy, I come back and I send them a voice note.
I always bring it back to the thing of getting yourself moving, maybe get out for some fresh air, do some exercise, and bring it back to exercise. I'm not trying to be a counselor, but I'm giving these people like a little bit of information or a tiny little catalyst or a nudge in the right direction to get them feeling happier, and it's so powerful.
Sometimes it's just letting them know that someone gives a f*ck about them, you know, or cares about what they've said, as opposed to the advice itself. It's just that, you know what? It's listening.
It's listening, yeah. I can never read one and ignore it. I just can't. I can't let them see that I've read it and not given them my attention. It might just be a 15-second voice note, but that means so much to people. I can continue doing that. My dad said the other day, "Be careful," because a girl came to... I did a meet-up and she was in recovery for cocaine addiction. She came to a hill sprint session at 8:00 in the morning on Richmond Hill.
She asked me to record a message for her group. Before I thought about it, I was thinking, "Right, I really need to think what I'm going to say." I had this really emotional feeling that she's gone from having a really tough struggle and she's been really struggling to get off of her addiction through drugs, and she's turned up at 8:00 in the morning to run up and down a hill with me. I found that so inspiring, so I shared that message.
Now, the last week or so, I've had so many people in recovery and with addiction saying how amazing that one story was. My dad said to me, "Joe, be careful, because addicts, they're love vampires. They want attention and they don't know when to stop and they'll keep asking." I said, "Dad, what you don't realize is they're actually giving me energy. I'm feeling alive and happier doing this right now than I've ever been." I think he didn't quite understand where that was coming from, but it's because I'm having an impact, I'm helping people. It isn't kind of draining me; it's actually, in a way, lifting me up. Like I said, I've become a vehicle for this positive energy and this message that I'm spreading. It's way more than just fitness now. I'm inspiring people to change their lives, to get out of relationships—not on purpose, but just by the way I am, people are really leaning on me and I think it's such a wonderful position to be in and it's really what makes me happy on a daily basis.
People will look at you and here's what they'll think: they'll think good-looking guy on Instagram, delivers great fitness advice, making a lot of money. I bet that his ambition or his motivation's coming from making all this money and looking beautiful. Is that correct?
It's so far from who I am and the truth. When I do get negative sentiment on social media, if it's about people calling me a sellout or saying he's just about the money...
What do they say? What's the stuff you hear?
The negative sentiment is like... I don't believe that the general population should count calories. I don't, and I just think people should focus on healthy cooking and regular exercise. By doing that, you naturally put yourself in an energy deficit and therefore you can get lean and stay healthy. Also, that I'm a sellout and that it was all about money and the whole thing with Instagram and Lean in 15 or any deal that I get is all about money.
I really think that the money is a byproduct of success, but the real success is that I've been able to talk to you, your mom, your nan, seven-year-old kids that turned up to my events. I'm talking to such a wide demographic of people. It does come from personal trainers. It's always personal trainers. I never get like a random mom or dad follow me saying, "Oh what a sellout," or "He's lying and keeping information from his followers."
It's fitness snobbery.
And you know that comes from a place of jealousy and envy. I actually used to get upset; it used to really affect me on a spiritual and emotional level. I would lay in bed thinking, "How can someone so positive, so passionate, putting out such a good message, still be getting dug out by these people?" But I know it comes from a frustration. When I was a personal trainer, running around doing boot camps, clients canceling on you, people not turning up... it's a tough industry. It's difficult, it's stressful, and it's hard to make a truly make a career out of it. So I'm actually more compassionate of people that attack me now.
How do you deal with it now? Someone says, "Joe, you're a piece of sh*t" or whatever, and they start coming at you for things that really matter to you, like your work. How do you deal with it? Talk me through it. You open your phone, you look on Instagram, there is personal trainer Ken, and he's said some stuff. What goes through your mind?
It used to affect me like... it would drain my energy and make me feel really low.
What about all the positive comments?
Now I've learned to basically... the positive stuff I'm doing, it drowns out the negative. I never engage in negative comments. I never reply. People do podcasts and videos about me and dedicate their time to slating me off and saying how bad my message is, but I always think, "Why have I sold 3 million cookbooks? Why have I got 5 million people following me?" I always come back to it's because my message... I've never talked about calories, I've never talked about people tracking this and counting that. So I'm doing something right. I've learned to just have a moment and read a positive comment and it drowns that out.
But one of the most hurtful things was when someone said, "I'm surprised he's not charging them kids for the HIIT sessions. All he cares about is money." But I actually traveled all around the UK with Nikki and my friend Dom and Glen. We took a cameraman. It was self-funded. I went to 15 schools in five days. I trained with 10,000 kids and I was knackered. We had brands offering to give us 100 grand to be a part of it, and I was like, "This is about me making an impact. I don't want any... I don't want to get paid for this."
So when someone said that, I was like, "How can you say that when I'm so passionate and I'm clearly on this mission and you think I'm going to charge the kids for the HIIT sessions?" It does hurt, it affects you, but it might be like a temporary thing, it might be a couple of hours. Whereas before it'd be a few days and it would affect me and I wouldn't want to do videos. I'd be like, it's kind of making me feel sad. I'd sit with Rosie and I'd be like, "Why are these videos there?" but now it might last an hour or two hours and I can go, "Right, back to work."
So what has all of that taught you about the nature of haters?
It comes back to that thing of I look at people like Ben Francis or Kayla and Emily Skye and amazing people doing great things, and I get excited by their success. It inspires me. Whereas for some people, other people's success makes them feel inadequate or unsuccessful, or they get green with envy and jealousy. I always think, "How can I learn from these people that are doing these amazing things and be a better role model or businessman?" So that comes down to that thing of can you accept other people's success? You might experience this—even close friends to you that went to school with. Some of them you can just tell are genuinely happy for you, and the other ones it may... they say they are, but they're just not quite the same. That is just something that is within people.
So I think anyone out there that feels that jealousy or envy or want to have a stab at someone, try and turn that kind of feeling into a positive inspiration and be like, "Right, I want to do a little bit more of what he's doing. I'm going to be positive, I'm going to put out a positive message and reach more people." I just think negativity, you can't... it won't breed success. So for all the people that do send negative stuff my way, I always combat it with more positive, more nice videos, more DMs, more voice notes, and then I get more back and I'm like, "I'm all right, I'm doing the right thing," and so I remember that my mission is still the same.
This is something we're all guilty of, including myself. I can go on a post, something that I've put online, and there could be a thousand lovely comments, but it's that one negative comment because as humans, I think we all have a negativity bias. I've got to the point now where all the positive things people say to me, honestly—this is just the truth, so I don't care if it sounds bad—it goes over me like water off a duck's back. I just don't absorb it.
The thing that's happened to me is I've realized that with me personally, I'm unable to accept some things in and not others. For me, it's either all or nothing. I think with people generally, their opinion of themselves is either created by external narratives or society or opinions, or it's not at all. So I think very early on, I decided that the good and the bad, I'm not going to let it form my opinion of myself. I'm going to try my very, very best to build my own opinion of myself based on my own thoughts and my own rationale and my own logic. Because I'm scared of if I let Jenny over here tell me that I'm amazing and that I was incredible for doing whatever I've done, I'm also going to let Dave here from Burnley, who says, "You're an asshole and a failure," I'm also going to let him in. So my sort of self-defense has been don't believe any of it. But I still fall foul of when Dave pops up and says something.
What is a negative for? I'm just trying to think why anyone would dig you out. What can they dig you out for?
Listen, this is the thing, Joe. Everybody gets dug out. A guy the other day, "You're an absolute fraud. There's no record of you ever making a million quid anywhere online." And there I am in my bedroom thinking, "Do I? Do I go at him?"
Do you reply? Do you engage or not? I never engage, never go into combat at all.
The older I've got, the more I've learned to just let them go. And if I do respond, it's with kindness now.
Years ago, would you have snapped and reacted badly?
Oh my god, every one of them. I would be like...
Publicly or just by DM?
I'd try and keep it as private as possible. Especially as my business got bigger and I became an employer of 700 people, I have to set a good example. There are people following me, and I have to set a good example. But you know, even when someone says something to you and they, as you said, they come at something which is the antithesis of the truth. When they say, "Oh, you're selling out to rinse kids," and you know you've just gone around the country and given to kids, and that's something that's very close to you, it's one of those things.
Maybe they know that, they know what's going to nudge you and you know what's going to affect you. They do, and they don't care. It is about hurting that person on an emotional level. It is. But like I said, I reckon 1% is negative; 99% of my content and my stuff coming in is positive. I'm so clear with my vision and I'm more purpose-driven over profit, and I truly believe in that. I believe in giving before you get given. I gave 10,000 tweets before I made a single pound on social media, hundreds of thousands of comments and tweets and replies to people. All the stuff I've given means that when I release a book in six months' time, it becomes a bestseller because the love is there and the attention's there and the respect and the admiration for what you do means that people will support your products. I think a lot of people assume, "Well, I've got a million followers, therefore a million people buy my book," but it doesn't work like that.
Of course not. You have to have a relationship.
Nurturing people, yeah. Some people will assume that I had a marketing degree and I understand social media and I did this big digital content course, but I was in my kitchen in Surbiton with my iPhone, shouting out "midget trees" and "broccoli" and "Lucy Bee" and all that. I had no idea I was building a brand. No idea.
This leads to my next question: why were you successful? So, here's the thing. There was a guy named Joe Flix and then there was Joe Wicks. Both of them were really into fitness and healthy eating and all of these kinds of things. Why were you successful and not this hypothetical Joe Flix guy? What is it about you?
That's a good question. I get asked that question and I always want to kind of spin it on the person and say, "Why do you think I stood out?"
I can spin it on you too.
First of all, there are obviously millions of trainers and lots of people with different philosophies and different ideas. I think if I had started today as Joe Wicks, doing the same thing on social media, I wouldn't have had the success that I've had because it was the right time with the right idea. 15 minutes was a good amount of time for people to get engaged, and it was a 15-second video. I think people's attention spans changed. People are even now busier, plus there's probably like a billion users on Instagram. So my growth was quite quick in the early days.
But it comes down to... I had an idea that was just simple that got people in the kitchen. You know when Jamie Oliver used to cook, he'd get you excited about food and made it fun and simple. All I did was I took a 15-second Instagram video and showed how to cook a 15-minute meal and I called it Lean in 15. That was the hashtag. But like I said, there was no real vision. I didn't think I was going to get a book deal off of Macmillan. Consistency, but also just me as a person. If you threw me into a room, into a party with people I didn't know, I'd come out with a few mates. I'd just... because I'm like that. I like talking to people, I like getting to know people, and I like listening to people as well. I think that's a two-way thing. Social media is a conversation. I've always been about, "What can I do to help you? What can my content do? Is it about me showing off my abs and building my ego and feeling great about myself? Or is it like, can I use this bit of content to make you want to go and do a workout and make you feel good?" It really, I think, is personality and a genuine passion when there wasn't really many Instagram fitness people monetizing it as such. You had Kayla who was a couple of years before me, but obviously, Kayla and me and some other big people have set the standard that you can make a lot of money through fitness content. So now, when you see fitness Instagrammers, yeah, they might really love fitness and want to help people, but they could also know, "I'm going to make a business out of this."
So, here's how I'd summarize it from your assessment there. I imagine it almost like a padlock. You know the padlocks where you've got to get four numbers in a row?
Yeah.
Right. And if you get the four numbers in a row, then the lock opens. Or like the lottery where you've got to get six numbers in a row to win. I think you got the proverbial four or five numbers in a row where you're the right person. When I say the right person, I mean aesthetically you're a good-looking guy, but you also have personality traits: consistency, passion. That's what constitutes my definition of the right person. At the right time, and I think not just in the evolution of social media, but in the sort of societal trend of getting healthy.
The demand for fitness, yeah.
Fitness, recipes, things like veganism and eating well and looking... I think that was a rising trend. I think the right place, in terms of the right platforms and things like that.
Yeah, being around at the right time. Getting on there early.
And the other thing I'd like to add to the right person is your personality because I think people really resonate with you. As you said, you can walk in a room and I believe you'll walk out with loads of friends because you're real. That's something that you just can't fake in the long term. And then the last one's the right message, delivered in the right way. So doing it in a concise way that's simple for Jenny in her bedroom or whatever. I think that combination is like getting the right number four times on a padlock and it opens.
I think that's a good analogy actually. When I go to some of my book signings or I do these random meet-ups I've got into recently... I'll say, "Right, meet me at Richmond Park and we're going to cycle around." There will be seven-year-old kids and there will be 65-year-old women. I really speak to everyone because I'm trying to make fitness accessible and fun for everyone. My brand, if I was to summarize my brand, it's like fitness for all, accessible, non-judgmental, and I really am on a mission to get people happier. It's not just about fat loss and losing weight and looking a certain way. I'm now way more in tune with the mental health benefits of exercise: elevating your mood, productivity, just general happiness. I'm more in tune with that now than ever, which is suddenly... I'm talking like the last few weeks since I've started doing the voice notes. It's really opened up a whole new world because I used to sit and do written stuff, but the power of a voice note has allowed me to engage. I now realize that I am on a mission so clear that I am actually working harder now than when you met me four or five years ago. If you met me when I was bang on my phone doing tweets, I was stuck in there, but now I'm doing more but more valuable, if you know what I mean. So it's not scalable in terms of I can't do a thousand messages a day, but I'm doing a hundred really good quality ones that are having a massive impact. So I'm working harder now than I ever have been.
I want to talk about that. There are a few things I want to talk about. The first one is the voice note thing, but the second is about the impacts of fitness. This is just a personal thing because I'm on a mission to try and get fitter. But on the voice note thing, a bit of context. Ahead of you meeting me today, you sent me a voice note on Instagram just saying like, "Hey mate, looking forward to it etc." and a few other things. That really caught me off guard.
Really? In what way? Do you not get voice notes from people?
People send me voice notes, but it's rare. And it's very personal and like... in a really good way.
It's like, "Wow, he's in my room, he's right now talking."
It's like, "Oh my God," and it's like you broke this wall because it was intimate. It meant that I had to send one back as well, which I liked and I would never have normally done, but it instantly was like I knew you, right? I think there's something so powerful about things like that that most people don't do that kind of break that wall that I just think is so... and it really inspired me actually. I thought, "Why do I sit there typing to people when I know my voice and them listening to me when I give them advice would be so much more powerful?"
Mate, I can't stress it enough. If you are someone on social media who's trying to build an audience or wants to engage and help people, by doing that, it's so much quicker, it's so much easier. You can read their message as you do it, you can refer back to what they've said. Because I'm getting some really intense, deep messages that it just wouldn't warrant a couple of texts. It wouldn't be really truly listening to them. So I listen to it, I read it, I digest it, and I send them a little 30-second... you can send a minute, sorry, a 60-second voice note. I sometimes do a couple, but the impact that has on people, firstly they cannot believe you've read the message. They think it's someone else. As I said, I will come in this living room and I'll do my workout, I'll put Indy to bed, my little daughter Indy, and I'll come in here and I get in here at 7:00 and I go, "Rosie, I'll be up in an hour, I'm just going to do an hour." I look at my phone, it's 11:00 and I swear to God in my head I've been doing it an hour. Because I'm enjoying it, I love it, and I'm getting voice notes back and people are like, "Wow, I can't believe you can do this. Thank you so much, you have no idea." And now I always ask the people, "Can I screenshot and share your little testimonial on my story?" I always get permission, but by doing that, it means there's more and more coming on a daily basis because people go, "He's reading it, he's listening, he loves it. I'm going to reach out to him now."
On my DMs, you've got a lot more followers than I have. On my DMs, it's out of control, right? So I get, depending on what I upload and what I'm doing in terms of my personal brand stuff, there are thousands of messages a week. Some of them, as you mentioned earlier, are very personal and really hard to read at times. How do you deal with the amount of DMs you get and how do you decide what to respond to and what to... and do you read all of them? Or do you ignore some?
I pretty much open my... so my little cousin Luca, he's my community manager, he kind of oversees because I've got a community of about 6 million across all the platforms. So he'll be the kind of eyes and ears, if you like. But in terms of the voice, it's always me. It's always me doing the voice notes; it can't be anybody else. You can't replicate that. So I have a system now where I'm bad in a way that I will do it all day long from the minute I wake up. So now I'm trying to sort of chunk it and do it in a certain period of time. I might come in the living room and do three or four hours of it. That does seem crazy, but that is my job, that's my work, that's my energy source. It's what I do.
How do you decide what to reply to?
In terms of... I don't want to give the game away... if it's a really little thing like, "Hey Joe, I just tried one of your workouts for the first time, I loved it," I might just send a little emoji and say, "Well done, have a great day, see you soon, let me know how you get on with the next one." But if it's a really intense paragraph of eating disorders or really tough kind of social issues at home or whatever, I flag it. I need to be in the right mindset. But before the voice note, I was doing videos. But what I realized is sometimes I didn't have the energy, the emotional energy in my face. So voice notes changed it because I can be really tired and be a bit lethargic, but I can pick up the energy through my voice and send them a really, really lovely message. So if it's anything where, "Look Joe, I know you might get millions of messages and I know you're not going to read this," I always give time to those ones because they're the ones that have really reached out. I almost treat it as if you walked past me in the street and you tried to stop me and say hi and say thank you or be grateful for something or say thanks for giving me some help. For me to ignore it, it's the same. I'm not just seeing screen names, I'm seeing people. And like I said, the last few months I've become so in tune with it and realized how powerful it is that I'm actually cranking up my energy levels. I'm doing more, I'm putting out more Instagram lives. Now what I'm doing is taking a collective of questions that I'm getting a lot of, like motivation. I did a little IGTV on motivation. So I'm taking what I'm learning from these questions and spinning it into a little 60-second video so that the general population that follow me can also learn from that.
I mentioned a second ago, I'm trying to get into fitness a bit more. I've been going to the gym quite consistently. Before Ibiza, I was doing a little bit better; went to Ibiza a week ago, kind of downhill since then. But the challenge that everyone has with fitness, as I'm sure you've heard, is the dedication and the commitment to stick at it and to keep going. What is the reason why people like me sometimes bottle it and we struggle to form a routine? Why is that?
The biggest challenge that people face is motivation. That's the thing that people struggle with, whether it's cooking or exercising. Really, I said today that you're not going to wake up tomorrow morning feeling motivated to work out, but the motivation is waiting for you at the end of the workout. So when you go for a 15-minute HIIT session or you go for a power walk or a cycle around the park, at the end of it, the physical endorphins that are released in your brain make you feel good. They give you energy, it makes you feel a little bit more focused, a bit more productive. So for me, when I get asked the question, "Why do you exercise?" it always comes back to the energy that I get through it and the kind of happiness that I feel from it. It doesn't need to be this long, hour-long session with a PT or going to Barry's Boot Camp or CrossFit. I really believe that the future of fitness is home fitness, it's home workouts. We're seeing that with Peloton, we're seeing it with lots of online platforms, and my YouTube channel's growing so quick. I get 2.5 million views a month of people doing the workouts. So make your living room... this is my studio, this is where I film my workouts, by the way. I have my tripod and camera there. I move the sofas, I film the workouts, it's me, I press record in real time, and people love that it's just anywhere, anytime.
But Joe, I need loads of equipment.
No, no, you don't need equipment. Your body is a great piece of equipment. You can do all sorts. I do 20-minute, 15-minute workouts. But ultimately, you want to be successful and that can be through all your business, but nothing's more important to you and your family and your loved ones and your kids when you're older than your health. So it's not about putting pressure on yourself to have this really crazy routine where you're doing hours a day, but 20 minutes a day. You might have heard and read some stuff about entrepreneurs and CEOs that most of the truly hyper-hyper successful people all have a fitness routine. Whether it's Tony Robbins or Gary Vee or Richard Branson, who plays tennis every day for the past 40 years, goes cycling and he's like 70 years old. These people fundamentally see the benefit of exercise, not just in the way you look, but the way you operate on a daily basis. I don't know what you're like with sleep, but another thing that's underestimated is the importance of sleep. It's all great being a hero, like "I'm running on this amount of sleep," but a good night's sleep is the best pre-workout and the best way of functioning and optimizing your day. Your focus, your vision. So really it comes down to your food, your sleep, and your exercise and your love life, yeah. I think it's just people have been confused by it becoming this complicated thing, but really it's like I said, just working out consistently, doing whatever you can—15 minutes here and there—cooking healthy food and consistently doing it and keeping it up.
First of all, you're not really out of shape. Some CEOs getting all the... and I've met a few CEOs with startups who go, "Oh Joe, you should have met me two years ago before I started my company." But it is, it's the hours, it's the work, it's the hours they put into their work. What stops you from exercising? What's holding you back?
Right now I've been doing... and I was asking that question more as a... I know that my audience struggle with that question and it's a... people ask me that question all the time. Right now I'm in a bit of a rhythm and a bit of a flow state, so I've...
With work or fitness?
With fitness. I've been going... I'll go every other day, if not every day. And if I don't go that day, it's because I'm on a plane or something.
And how much better do you feel after? Do you feel amazing?
Amazing. Amazing. In fact, when I got back from holiday recently and I didn't go for two or three days, I swear to God, my life felt like my life collapsed. Bear in mind, I had gone every day for five months from about February. And the three or four days I had off, it was hard to get out of bed. I wasn't motivated about much at all in life.
Ibiza's a comedown place. You don't sleep much as well. It's a tough one to come back from.
You're right. And I didn't even really party in Ibiza. I went out one night of the four that we were there, and I just lost that...
Momentum kind of thing.
And the endorphins or whatever it gives you in your brain, I just lost it. And then I went back to the gym a couple of days later and I felt great again.
You can almost reset it. I went to a wedding at the weekend, slept five hours a night in a teepee and was boozing gin and tonic, smashing the champagne and whatnot. I felt like death, but I got on my little Peloton bike, did 20 minutes, and it just reset me almost instantly. Within 10 minutes, it levels me out, it reminds me why I exercise. So I'm one of these people that can have a little blowout or a little party, but I can quickly switch back into what I want to be doing. I think that's the thing: it's not dragging it out for a week. You've done your Ibiza, had your fun, get back to work, get back training, and feel the benefits.
It's been amazing for me. It's been one of the biggest sort of productivity and success hacks I've experienced, definitely this year, is consistently going to the gym. And you're right, my sleep's been fine, but it's a lot better now.
Like an extra hour, even if you have an extra hour a night. That cumulative effect over a month and a year is so powerful. I think people just underestimate it as a health factor and a marker in your health that sleep is so important. You might have an extra hour... let's say you turn the TV off an hour earlier and that extra sleep means that the next day you can operate and reach more people.
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Something you said at the start of this conversation was that the household you grew up in was full of drama, and you referenced that it was full of shouting. The reason that triggered me a little bit, or resonated with me, shall I say, is because the household I grew up in as a kid was full of my mom in particular screaming in my dad's face for hours and hours and hours and hours on end. My mom will probably listen to this. My mom could scream in my dad's face for six hours and she's Nigerian so she can get real volume. My dad would sit there like a mannequin as if he was no longer with us, right?
I have said on this podcast before that growing up, that taught me that relationships were like hell. Because the only model as a young kid that I knew was relationships equal lady screaming in your face for six hours, no freedom.
So why would you want that?
Why would I ever want that? So when I was 14 years old and I fell in love with this girl as you do, the minute she said she wanted to be in a relationship with me, I told her all the reasons why we couldn't be. And I had chased her for two, three years or whatever. That story played out again and again in my life. I look behind you and I can see... is that your daughter up there?
That's my little daughter Indy, that's my wife Rosie, yeah. And then me and Nikki when we got antiqued with flour at a house party; someone threw flour in our face.
Yeah, I'm a family man now and I am... I'm very different to the child and I'm a different parent to the way I was parented. Because of that experience, I definitely had issues around trust and commitment because my dad would always be in and out. I'd always think, "Why is he off in rehab again? Why are we not enough? Why can't he stay at home with us?" It definitely used to upset me. But I don't want to be someone that shouts at Indy. I don't want to be impatient and snapping. I see that in my mom and dad.
I remember seeing holes in my door when I used to live in a council house. The doors were really thin and I remember seeing holes and it was like cardboard inside. I always used to think, "Why are them holes then?" It was only when I got a bit older I realized that was because my dad would have had a row and punched his hand through the door. I'm so much more calm and I've taken what I've learned as a child and rather than replicate that and follow that pattern, I've actually really done the opposite.
Now I really focus on speaking to Rosie calmly and politely and being respectful around her and also treating Indy like... being patient. It's hard when you've got a baby, they push your buttons, so you've got to try staying calm when they're having a meltdown. But I just have a few techniques that help me to not be that dad that shouts and that dad that throws stuff across the room. You definitely have to learn; it's something you have to practice and put into practice through time.
I just didn't want to be... I didn't want to get involved in drugs, I didn't want to be someone that wasn't there for their kids and their partner. So now, if you had met me a few years ago, I didn't believe in marriage. I just thought, "Nah, I'm never going to get married." I met Rosie and I fell in love and then suddenly I wanted to be married. It's made me actually really happy. It's made me realize that you can be in a relationship and be content and be faithful and loyal and not just run away when things get hard.
That's all I've learned, that you run away when things get hard. Even as a teenager, when things were tough, I'd slam the door, I'd run out of the house. I wouldn't come back for a few days or I'd go traveling when things got difficult. I'd always, always run away. That works to an extent, but then you get to a certain age and you're like, "This isn't working anymore."
I'm the exact same. My ex-girlfriend, if she's listening to this, which she probably is, she'll tell you the same thing. Because I learned that relationships were like prison, whenever my ex-girlfriend would basically say the same thing to me twice in a slightly aggravated way, I would literally get my stuff and go. I told her, I said, "If you ever shout at me or whatever, I'm never going to shout back at you, and I never ever have. I've never even gotten really emotionally moved by a romantic interest." I would just get my stuff and go.
You're quite calm. You're passive in your...
Super passive. I'd never, never... and I'd get my stuff and I'd leave. Because my dad never would. He would never get up and just go. So I used to stand there as a kid saying, "Dad, like, don't allow her to speak to you like that. Go." Whenever my girlfriend's upset, I just get my stuff... What is it about Rosie that made you change your perspective on marriage and commitment and think, "You know what? I'm going to settle down. I'm not going to keep running away."
Well, I was actually in a relationship from the age of 19 to 29, so I went traveling to Australia. I say I wasn't... I say I was frightened of commitment, but I wasn't. It just wasn't the marriage thing. That was the whole thing that kind of really intimidated me because my mom and dad never got married, and if they had, they would have been divorced over and over again. When that relationship ended and I met Rosie, I just felt instantly like myself around her. She's really open and loving and she's kind. When you're with someone that makes you feel like you're completely yourself, I suppose it just made me really settle into it.
It was a natural progression. We had Indy first, we had the baby before we got married, but it all moved so quick. I wanted to live with her straight away, I wanted to have a house, I wanted to... and before I was always fighting that. I was always like, "I'm too young to settle down, I'm 19," but then I'd still be there when I was 27, 28, 29, like still... and I definitely hung into that relationship too long. By the end of it, I was not the person I truly was. I wasn't being patient, I wasn't being kind, I wasn't being affectionate and loving. I just was kind of hoping that she would leave me, and it's just such a bad way to think.
There are so many people in that predicament where they're with someone that they're unsure about. That person has turned them into a worse version of themselves.
I truly believe that, yeah. I just remember thinking like, "This isn't my true spirit, this isn't who I want to be." I used to talk to my mom and dad, but I was with this girl from such a young age and we really grew apart. I actually went to have some therapy. I said, "I need to speak to someone who isn't someone I know," and I had a two-hour therapy session with a lady in London. After that, I walked out and I came straight home and I told her, "I'm sorry, I can't be with you anymore."
It was that simple. It was listening to someone that didn't know me that said, "Why are you still in this relationship? Why are you doing this to yourself? Why are you not being happy? Why are you holding this person back?" It was a two-hour therapy session and it changed my life forever. I think I might have... I could have potentially stayed in that relationship for longer and had a kid and... I done the right thing. I got help, and it was great. That was the only time I've ever had therapy, but I can say if you're in a position where you feel like you can't make a decision and you want to speak to someone, speak to someone who's completely impartial and unbiased. It really helped me.
Why had you stayed in that relationship for 10 years if you kind of deep down knew that this person wasn't making you the best person you could possibly be?
It's like that thing you talked about on your podcast when you said about the frog in the saucepan of hot water. You don't just jump out; it starts off really good and it's all warm and cozy and suddenly it gets a little bit hotter and then eventually, you know, a part of you dies and you're not being who you truly want to be. Being out of that relationship and being with Rosie and having Indy, I'm now way more content than I've ever been. It's really calm. It's quite a nice feeling to not be thinking the grass is greener, to not be wanting to get out of the relationship you're in and wanting to be running away. It just came through making that decision of let go of this person. You're doing a good thing for her, but you're also freeing yourself. All I think about is that she... I really hope that she is as happy as me and she's met someone and we don't speak or anything, but that's something I hope that's happening somewhere in the world.
You've talked about a lot of things that are great: love life smashed it, kid looks amazing, got a really nice house, you're successful in your business, you're growing, you're in a bit of a flow state at the moment and good things are happening because you've put a lot of good energy out into the world. What are you scared of?
What am I scared of? I'm scared of regretting looking back and thinking, "Did I spend enough time with my friends and family?" But I also know that I'm doing that. Instinctively, I'm not just driven to work constantly all the time. I have really amazing periods where I'll smash work, I'll work intensely for like a month or two, then I went traveling for a month to Costa Rica with Indy and Rosie and we're about to head to America. I already know the balance. And like I said, I'm now... I've got this clarity in my mind and this flow state that I'm in that I just feel like nothing can go wrong. If I keep doing what I'm doing, nothing can go wrong.
Are you scared of dying?
I'm not scared, no. I'm scared of... how do you feel about death?
I don't know, I just don't think about it really.
I'm scared... well, I'm scared of my mom and dad dying. I haven't had any family close to me die because they had me so young. Don't forget, my mom was 19, so all my family are quite young. My mom and dad are... and I think losing them's going to be tough. But it's all part of life, isn't it, I suppose.
What does your mom mean to you?
My mom's like... she's so wonderful, my mom. She's probably my most... I'm most connected to my mom more than anyone, I think. That's because of what we've been through. I really now want to take care of her and look after her. She's so wonderful. She's given her whole life basically dedicated herself to like helping raise me and Nikki, and now she helps people who've been through young offenders and through difficult stuff. She's a social worker and stuff. She is everything, you know. But I've also... my relationship with my dad, like it was difficult when I was growing up, but now, you know, we are... we're communicating a lot better, we hang out, we... I don't hold anything against my mom and dad. For all the madness, I just think that was what we've been through. That's our journey; that's you are who you are today because of it. I'm not someone who looks back. I think we've all had difficulties, but some people really hold on to that and it affects them forever, where other people can just let it go and let it just move on. It's done; that's what it was. Just love the person they are today, that's more important.
That's a really, really important point that for me appears to be the answer to a lot of the energy, the negative energy I experience in my direct messages from people: their inability to let go of someone that's wronged them. The real shame is because that person's wronged them once upon a time, they're then dragging that negativity through their life and letting it destroy their future and their present. I've got someone that's really close to me that had a really bad experience with their dad when they were younger, and they just won't let go. I see it damaging their adult life now, even though they don't speak to their dad anymore, but because they just won't forgive that person. How do you forgive someone more generally, not just your parents, but how do you forgive someone that's harmed you or done you wrong in the past?
I totally can hear that message and I can see where that's coming from because, you know, my mom and dad have... they've had their own trauma to such an extent that they've been in therapy all their lives and also with addiction, it's manifested in different ways. It makes me sad; all you want is your mom and dad to be happy and you want the people around you to be happy. But for some... sometimes I can see they've been struggling their whole life to let go of whatever it is that's hurting them and holding them back. For me, it's a case of I just believe you have to live for the moment, you have to enjoy the day. What's going on today? What can you do today to make yourself feel happy? How is it going to serve you thinking about what you went through as a child?
You can have... my mom and dad have had all kinds of therapy: regressive childhood hypnotherapy, you go back... my dad's even started doing Ayahuasca and plant-based medicine to go back and just to get it all out of him. But I just think you have to just take ownership and control of yourself on a daily basis. That's going to be done through exercise, eating healthy food, being connected. Some people are so disconnected from their family and friends and their community, whatever that may be. That's the most important thing. They say that one of the key factors in success is: are you connected? Are you helping other people? Are you giving, or you just taking off people? So don't focus on what you've been through and let that just be like the past and what is happening today. You can't even deal with the future; don't even get... some people are so... they're suffering anxiety from what could might happen in the future. But you have to just focus on today. What is the point of looking back? I just think it can really consume you and you could go your whole life without ever truly being happy because you're worried about the future or you're thinking about what happened in the past.
There's something crazy in this truth that to overcome your own struggles and your own pain, it seems to be the case that by helping others, you kind of help yourself. I've observed that with a lot of people that have been through tough times; they say that their recovery has come from just making content for other people or being there for other people. It's often the case that people who had the worst childhoods then focus all of their adult life on helping kids or wanting to support kids in some way. There's something in that which I think is quite profound and human.
It's not a cliché, it's not like some... it's an actual fact that when you are giving back, when you're helping others, it makes you feel good. It's tuning into that. I do that on a massive scale with a big community, but you could do that with a few people you know: your auntie, your cousin, your nan, whatever it might be. You can help other people on a smaller level and build your own community. That is so important. I think we're so detached from it and we're so focused on social media and having followers and engaging with people that we might forget people close to you, the real people that you grew up with and your family that raised you. They're also really important to stay connected to.
There's this... I don't know if you've read this book called *Lost Connections*, but I had the author of the book, Johann Hari, on this podcast. I asked him a question as to why people in the Western world, like the UK and the US, were so depressed and anxious and all these kinds of things. He said one of the really interesting things he observed from his studies abroad was that in other cultures, in Asia, when people are told to go and do something to make themselves feel good, their default over there is to go and help someone: their family members, their nan, whatever. Over here, in the Western world, because of society and social media, we go and help ourselves. We go shopping.
Do something for ourselves, yeah.
And he said that the marked difference in the impact it has on your happiness is just tremendous. Our default, because of advertising, is, "Do you know what? I'll go get my nails done, I'll go buy myself an iPhone or a new outfit."
Definitely, I agree on that.
And that's not the human way to help yourself.
You shared a really nice quote from it as well, saying that you can be around hundreds of people, but if you're not giving anything back or giving something that's going to help those people, you can still be very lonely. You can have millions of people around you or all this love as such, but you can still be very disconnected and not attached to people. I feel like I'm on a little bit of a spiritual... I'm not religious in any sense, but I feel like... and I'm not like Tony Robbins and NLP and all that stuff, but I'm on some kind of spiritual journey where I'm really learning about myself quite quickly and what does and doesn't work and what makes me feel good and what is helping others. It's a case of trying to tune into that. Obviously, with business, we sometimes often focus on the profit and the turnover and the growth, but sometimes the purpose, if you can focus on the purpose and what you're really trying to achieve, then it suddenly brings success. It kind of follows you and it pushes you like a momentum in what you're doing.
And what is your mission then? Let's look forward now. What are you working on? I know you've doing a lot more with young children as well and young people. What is Joe Wicks' mission for the future?
My mission is to... I want to be remembered as someone that just really, really, really got millions of people active and feeling good and exercising and eating healthy food. That's going to be from kids in primary school right through to adults. I really want to be someone that inspires. It's not just about how many books I've sold or how many Instagram followers I've got; it's like can I truly make an impact culturally? Culturally get families exercising together.
Why?
Because I'm seeing it happen. I'm seeing these parents with my YouTube workouts doing a workout with their five-year-old kid. It makes me so happy. The message they're sending is, "My little kid hasn't got off their sofa all summer and they've just done a workout and they feel amazing, and we're all eating a healthy recipe tonight." Now, that is important and it makes me happy. I think if I can do that millions and millions of times over, why wouldn't I? I can inspire. I've just got to work out how to reach more people. So the "why" is because it makes me happy, and secondly because I'm helping people live a healthier life. In 20 years' time, when you remember The Body Coach, like you remember Jamie Oliver, it's because not of his book sales or how many companies he's had; it's because he was the guy that got kids eating better in the UK or he was the guy that's always been on a mission to get people healthier. I do believe I'll be here in 20 years' time. I do believe that other trainers might fizzle out and might not be around, but I will still be doing this in 20 years' time. I'll still be sharing a message and being positive and evolving as I go with what I'm doing.
And you've gone from being a young guy that didn't have money, grew up on a council estate and didn't know sort of material things, to now having... you sold millions and millions of books. You hold records for your recipe book, I believe, right?
So my first book, the Lean in 15 one, is the second best-selling cookbook of all time after Jamie Oliver. Jamie Oliver's *30 Minute Meals* sold 1.6 million and my red one sold 1.4 million. So it's been mad. It's been mental. I remember like that's real people; it's not just book sales and revenue and commission on books. That's actual families cooking from my book, and it does really motivate me. It does really get me gassed and think, "Come on, let's do another book. Why not?"
It's a long process doing books though, right?
Yeah, it's a long process. It takes a lot of effort with the recipes and stuff, but I've got another three books in the pipeline.
Exciting. Can you let any cats out the bag yet?
The next one's called *Wean in 15*, which is a baby book for babies and toddlers. Because I've just gone through the process of getting Indy onto solid foods and it's fun, but it's also quite daunting; you're not too sure what to do. So I'm now building a sub-brand, if you like, and a separate audience on another Instagram called @weanin15, where I'm now sharing recipes and content for parents. The engagement on that's gone crazy; it's actually, I think, in a few years' time will be bigger potentially than what I'm doing on the Body Coach stuff.
So this is a question as someone that... pretend I didn't know this industry. It just happens to be the industry that I'm in. But one of the questions that a lot of people will wonder and ask is: how do you make your money? And what's your philosophy for making money? Because you've got a very big audience, very engaged people. You do something that a lot of people... brings a lot of value to people's lives. How are you monetizing this and living off it?
The first thing I did was launch an online fitness program. I've obviously got my free content, which is my YouTube channel. I make a little bit of AdSense from that; it's not massive, it's not my main thing. I've got obviously my Instagram and recipes and stuff. And then I've got my online fitness plan, which is a 90-day plan. You sign up through my website and you get tailored meal plans and workout... workouts.
And how much is that online plan?
It's 97 pounds, and we've had half a million people do it in the past five years.
Doesn't take a genius to do the math.
I'm really proud of that. And again, that was something... I just saw like not a gap in market, I just saw that I was getting all these questions, I was driving them to my YouTube channel, but I could produce a plan. So it was like I saw the demand and I created the plan, put it out to the world and didn't really know what was going to happen. But that is a... I'm really proud that I've got that many people to do that plan because it is changing their lives. It really does help and gets them healthier.
I've then got my books. The book advances were tiny when I signed up, but when you sell 3.5 million books, you can imagine the book advances grow exponentially and the royalties and stuff. So I've got the online plan, the books, I've got a partnership with Gousto, which is a recipe company box. And the interesting story to this is that I turned down a deal with a supermarket for 2 million pounds. I never talk about numbers, but when I get called a sellout, I think, "If only you knew all the things I said no to." All the brands with energy drinks and post this and do that. I say no to so many things. But when that supermarket deal came, it was like ready meals, it was fast food and microwave dinners and all that sort of stuff. I thought, "Look, I'm not doing it, there's no way I can do it." But I thought, "I need to find another opportunity in the food space." Gousto is a recipe box company; you still learn to cook, it's all healthy ingredients. So that kind of filled the void of the 2 million pounds that I pushed away. That's been so successful, it's been so well received because people...
If they still want someone to do it, then I'm joking.
Do you want to do the supermarket deal?
Me? No, I'm joking.
And so that was a big decision. So I've got the online plan, the books, the Gousto partnership, and then you've obviously got merchandise in terms of I've got pots and pans and a deal with my protein from the Hut Group. But again, these things aren't lighting up the world, but it's still things that I have chance to do and I have an opportunity. Sometimes it's good, sometimes you think, "Wow, that's going to go mad and you're going to sell millions of pounds worth of pots," but you know, that's a different kind of product. It's a slower burn. I definitely say no to a lot of brand partnerships because of the money I make through other things. If I wasn't, then obviously I'd have to be promoting your peanut butters and your jams and your energy drinks and all this sort of stuff.
And money. What impact... was there anything that you wanted to buy when you were broke, like I was, and you thought, and you went and bought it? Any toys or anything material that you...
I didn't... I wanted to just... I really always wanted to have a house, you know, like own a house. When you're in a council house and it's always rented, none of... not one member of my family has a mortgage. I mean, think of that. Not one of the people I know own a house. So for me to buy a house and own a house and be mortgage-free is amazing. So the first... I know this is super cliché, but you might feel the same that when you earn money, you want to take care of your mom and dad. So the first thing I did, I bought my mom's council house for her so she has that and she's done it up and she's super happy with that. And then I bought my own house. So that was the main thing: to have a nice place to raise a family. I like guitars, as you can see I'm learning to play the guitar. I've got an electric skateboard, I've got a Boosted board which I love. But I'm pretty low maintenance. I'm not someone who kind of as I got exponentially wealthy that I went and bought exponentially bigger and grander things. I love my holidays, I love experiencing things, I love traveling with friends and, you know, if we go skiing, I sort my friends out. If I go to Vegas, I get the hotel and pay for some of the booze and that. It's not like it's all the time, but I do love bringing my friends together. Some of my mates are skint, so I say, "Come on, we're going to go to Ibiza for a few nights," you know, things like that. But I'm not very materialistic. I did buy a nice watch when I turned 30, but I never wear it. I just got my Apple Watch on all the time.
What watch was it?
I bought a Rolex. Nice. And I never thought I'd ever want a watch, but I thought, "I'm 30, it's a big day, let's get something to remember it," and I bought it and I liked it and it feels nice, but I actually quite feel quite shy when I wear it. I feel like it's a bit showy-offy. So I wear it if I go to like a nice wedding or party or something, but I actually just... I'm an Apple man really, so...
I bought a Rolex and then I lost it.
Oh, you lost it?
Yeah, I thought to myself, "Stephen, you're a rookie, you should have had better security." So I'm not... I'm punishing myself. I'm not going to buy another one for another five years or something. But I did like it when I had it, and it was good for like special occasions, you know. I know someone who got bashed over the head the other day in London and they stole it off his wrist. So be careful with your Rolex.
Well no, this is actually part of the story. I came home one day and someone that works at Social Chain, my business, was staying in the spare room for a couple of days while they were sorting themselves out, and their car keys got taken out of the drawer. Their car got smashed around the corner and my Rolex went missing out of my room.
Oh no!
So but I thought, "Stephen, you're a rookie, you know, should have had better security," so I've not... I'm punishing myself. I'm not going to buy another one for another five years or something. But I did like it when I had it, and it was good for like special occasions, you know.
What's it like for you being a 28-year-old, just turned 28?
Just turned 27 last week.
God you ain't... God, you're even younger.
27 a week ago or so.
It's even more inspiring. What has it meant to you for you to become wealthy and have this huge company? Because you've got an empire essentially. And what does it feel to you? When you think about money, did it change your perception? Has it inflated your ego? If I met you five, six years ago before you were making serious dough, are you the same man now or has your ego and your personality changed at all?
You just got to ask my friends. My mom said the thing she's most proud of is that I haven't changed at all, and all of my friends have said the same thing. Because honestly, it just doesn't matter to me. In the same respect, the reason why I really don't have... I sold my Range Rover and bought a bicycle. Money... I've, especially as I've gone on this sort of self-development journey of really understanding what happiness is and where it comes from and intrinsic motivators versus doing things because you want to show off and all the... basically because of this podcast, I've learned what happiness is more and more, and I know that it's not amassing large amounts of money. I don't care about the wealth side of things.
Even with my... I said it, I said it in this podcast. When I was 21 years old, I was making 70 grand a month from being a consultant, from all these brands paying me just to tell them what to do with their businesses. I could not find the motivation to walk down the stairs in my apartment and respond to an email just to send an invoice that would make me 20 grand. I said to my business partner at the time, "If I go downstairs and send that email, we'll make 20 grand, right? Me and you. It comes into my bank account. I can't be asked to go downstairs." There was no motivation to make more money. 100... it would have had no impact on my life. I could buy everything. I was 21 years old, traveling the world, making 70 grand a month. What's 80 grand a month when you can fly however you want to fly, stay wherever you want to stay? I had no overheads.
Did you get flash though? Did you have a little blowout?
No, because I didn't even know how you got flash. What was I going to buy? I had two suitcases.
You're not into the clubbing scene and going like popping champagne and spraying in Ibiza and all that sort of stuff?
Oh, I was, 100%. When I was 18, I saw these guys buying all these bottles in clubs. So I thought, "I'll give that a go, see if that makes you happy." Did that for a whole year, just buying Dom Pérignon bottles in nightclubs. These nightclubs knew me, right? And I had... there was a little star by my name because I'd come in and buy five bottles of Dom Pérignon and spray your dough. It didn't do it. That didn't make me happy.
I've got a good question for you. So I know what you wanted to do at 18 and I know you as 28-year-old Stephen. What does 38-year-old Stephen want? Because you know, like Gary Vee, he's like, "I'm going to buy the New York Jets, man," and his whole life is built up towards that. What do you want in the next 10 years? What's your goal?
I can't say anything about another man's ambition. But for me, when I'm 38 years old, I... I get so much out of this philosophical journey of figuring out what happiness is and am getting smarter and wiser. I'm making... because I'm helping others, but I'm making decisions in my own life that are bringing me closer to feeling good every day. Feeling better every day. I feel good every day now.
So one of the big things I'm... I love this podcast because I get to unpick people's brains and learn more for myself. It's a very selfish thing, but I know it's selfless in the sense that you'll listen as well. What are my goals for when I'm 38? Honestly... do you have a couple of them? Couple of kids maybe? Yeah, I do. I want more balance. One thing I've always said in response to that question is more balance. So that means tying the knot potentially. I'm still in the place where you were where I'm not 100% sold on marriage yet, but I'm sold on having a long-term partner and I'm sold on having loads of kids.
Helping my family more, helping other people more. And then, you know what? I think the big thing is really going after some of the world's biggest challenges. And what I mean by that is maybe politics and really trying to disrupt politics as someone that is not a politician and has a very unapologetic view on the way things should be done. Or does that mean trying to go after the education system or something like that? I think that's... I want to put myself in a position where I'm f*cking terrified, and where the world... half of the world f*cking hates me because of what I believe and half of the world understands me.
Sounds like an amazing mission, mate. I love that you are very inspiring. The fact that you do a lot of stuff with schools, don't you? You did a project working with young children and inspiring them.
Yeah, we've just done that TV show with Channel 4, which was... which is still sort of feeling the effects of now and...
And I bet you love that. I bet I could just ask you and just know that that probably doing that, I bet it was exhausting but I bet it was also one of the things that you've probably enjoyed and got the most satisfaction from, right?
Yeah, 100%. You nailed it. Hated the process. Exhausting. Wait, I was just saying to the girls on my team, waking up at 6:00 AM and having to walk down the same street eight times just so they could get the angle. Sitting in a classroom for an hour where kids are just like telling the teacher to "f off" and asking me what five times five is. Exhausting when you've got a business to run, right? But the coming out the end of it, my perspective on education was transformed and I was inspired and I was in love with young people again.
I realized how important they are and also how delicate it is. Like, as you've said with your story, how a small thing that happens when you're younger can knock you either one side of the fence to believing in yourself or to not. And how malleable and influential young people are.
So yeah, so influential and so kind of... they're so impacted by decisions at a young age. If a child doesn't exercise through primary school and secondary school, you are really going to struggle to get them moving as an adult. They could be sedentary their whole life. So it's the same with anything if you can get the earlier you can get in there and into their mindset.
That's what I'm doing with the schools thing. It's like I'm teaching them that it's fun, it's quick, it's simple, and you're going to feel better. I'm changing behaviors and culture, the culture of exercise in the home and bringing parents... I keep saying to parents, "You're a role model. If you sit at home with your kid and you just watch TV and you don't ever do any exercise together, your child will never want to do it. You need to start demonstrating it." It's really having a nice effect on people. So that's kind of the big mission now: engaging families and kids through fitness and having fun with it and just keeping on the mission, really.
I think you're going to go a very, very long way.
I think you are too, mate. 27 years old. You're on the Forbes list yet? You should be.
§02Transcript — part 2
No, I don't care about the list.
No, neither do I.
So, I guess my last question then, which is what I ask all my guests... so if you've heard this podcast before, you've probably... you should have prepared an answer if you've listened.
Go on, yeah.
But no one ever prepares an answer to this. Dinner party.
This is one of those questions you always get stumped. The guests for the dinner party. I always think, "Oh, it's like who's your favorite musician or what's your favorite movie?" I always struggle. How many am I allowed to invite then?
Different ones. So there's a table there in this hypothetical room, right? I'm there because it was my idea to have the party. You're there because it's your house.
OK. I'd probably... I'd definitely have... I'm a massive fan of *The Office*, so I'd want David Brent there, but not as Ricky Gervais; I'd want him to be actually David Brent.
The US Office or the UK?
The UK one.
You don't like the US?
No, I tried it. It was just ripping off all the jokes.
Oh, I love both.
I'd have David Brent for the comedy and for the value. In terms of interesting subject matter to talk about, I'd probably say someone like Richard Branson. I think from a business perspective and just like his kind of the way he's built that company's incredible and he's very mission-driven as well. So I've got Ricky Gervais, I've got Richard Branson... it is getting harder, hang on. Can you have a musician to like sing music and stuff?
Anybody you want.
I'd probably have someone like Stevie Wonder singing some music because I love going to watch him.
I love Stevie Wonder. Have you seen him live?
I've seen him a few times, yeah.
Stevie Wonder's the last in a generation, I think.
Yeah, he is. I was at Hyde Park this summer, wasn't he? Incredible.
I saw him in New York briefly.
Could I have my mom there?
Of course you can.
Yeah, I'd like to have my mom there because I'd like to, you know, just because I'm proud of my mom and it'd be nice for her to be there if we're having this great dinner. David Brent, although he'd be really... you wouldn't want to introduce your mom to David Brent, would you?
In terms of food, what's on the menu? Right, this is my dream food, yeah.
Whatever, yeah. I'd have arancini and calamari to start. Nice. I'd have burger and chips with truffle parmesan fries and dessert...
People are going to think, "Joe, burger and chips?"
Yeah, this is my... but this is my dream like death row meal. And I'd also have for dessert, I'd have like a chocolate fondant with vanilla ice cream. So I love my food, but my favorite... if I go to any restaurant, if there's a burger on the menu, I'm always getting it. I'll always choose the burger.
And because we've just had a burger and chocolate fondant, we're going to have to do some kind of exercise, right? So what exercise would you make the dinner party do?
I'd probably do a little 20-minute HIIT session in between courses, yeah. Like few burpees, few squat jumps.
Is that your like go-to, like quick...
Yeah, that's... most of my content is just literally me in the living room with my body. No weights, no equipment, no kettlebells, because you can actually have a really good workout and have a good physique. I maintain my physique through bodyweight training really.
Really?
Yeah, I did lift when I was little, but I do pull-ups and dips and press-ups and things. So keep it simple, get yourself moving.
Amazing. And I'd love to see David Brent trying to do a little 20-minute...
That would be funny. My... a lot of, if you watch my stories, a lot of my humor, I just do like *Office* jokes and it goes over so many people's heads. But people now I'm like, "Look, I'm not making these jokes up. You need to watch *The Office* and then you'll get them."
Anyway, listen, thank you so much for your time. It's been an absolute pleasure. I don't have to tell people where to find you because they can type in The Body Coach, Joe Wicks anywhere and you'll come up. I'm sure there's no other impostors. It's been an absolute pleasure to talk to you and really sort of get to know you and I've come away with a lot because of how you are as a human being. I think that's probably really underappreciated. People can see things on social media, but of all the people I've met on this podcast, you're the one who certainly feel like there's no one more authentic than you and real than you. And also your intentions as to why you're doing what you're doing are unquestionable.
Oh thank you mate, thank you so much for that. For having me on, I'm genuinely excited to be on and I hope that I've added some value to the audience. But I also, I'm super inspired. I love being around successful people and it's rare because I'm in my own little world in my Instagram, my tripod, and just me in this living room. So to meet other people that are doing well in their field, it's incredible and I hope that people out there find it inspiring.
And one little challenge for you is this week, for the rest of the week, send voice notes back when you get the DMs. See the impact of you just doing it, and you might get some back, you might not, but you will... you'll realize within a week just how amazing and powerful it is and how much that person will love and appreciate that you've sent that. And it's quicker; it speeds things up. You can do way more. Just spend half an hour doing it and I'd love you to let me know how that had an impact on your audience and your personal feeling of like what you're doing. It kind of amplifies your mission and what you're doing. So when you put out something positive through voice note, it's way more powerful than a bit of text. So do that for a week and send me a message, yeah? And anyone else out there too, don't ignore the voice note function on Instagram DMs. Hit it up, send a voice note, and watch your community grow and you know, not just in scale but in depth. And that's so powerful in this day and age. It's all about engaging and caring about those people on a real deep level and you will grow your business and your brand or whatever it may be. So yeah, that's my top tip.
Amazing. Thank you so much, Joe. Appreciate having your time today. Thanks mate.
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