I’m not ashamed to admit when I tell you that I like making money and I like making muscle. I love making money and I love making muscle. I believe that making money and muscle can only be achieved through consistent acts of discipline, determination and dedication.
Money can provide more freedom, more opportunities and more options in a person’s life. And muscle can provide more strength, more confidence, and better health and overall well-being in a person’s life. And in my opinion, all of these are crucial assets required if your goal is to become successful at anything you try to achieve in life.
With that being said, this is a sensitive topic for many. Some people will become annoyed and upset with your persistence for success. These will be the people who talk negatively about you behind your back. These are the people that don’t want to see you achieve your goals. These are the people who want to label you as “greedy” and/or “arrogant” because you are so focused on becoming successful.
However, you should never apologize for being successful. And you should never feel bad for showing confidence in yourself and your abilities to become the best person you can be.
But is it possible to make money and muscle at the same time? Do you have to sacrifice one to achieve the other?
Broke Bodybuilders
Eat, Sleep, Train, Repeat. This is the advice that most if not all Bodybuilders are told to follow if they want to become successful at their sport. Unfortunately this is also the very same advice that leads most if not all Bodybuilders to live on fairly limited/fixed incomes. I can tell you from someone who has competed at the amateur level and knows people who compete at the professional level – Bodybuilding does NOT pay the bills! Okay, maybe it does pay some bills. But when compared to other professional sports such as Football, Basketball and Hockey, the funds available to even the top 5 in the sport at the professional level today, would be considered to be a joke by most professional athletes.
Of course, there are many Bodybuilders who have found ways to promote and market themselves by offering Personal Training/Online Coaching Services. And if done correctly, this can be an incredibly lucrative career and business to operate. Unfortunately, only a small percentage of Bodybuilders become successful at this type of work. This could be due to multiple reasons however I believe it’s primarily because their client’s health and fitness goals will always take a back seat to their own physique and competition goals. Bodybuilding is a selfish sport. And as someone who competed in the sport for over 12 years, I can tell you openly and honestly that for the vast majority of those years, my training and diet took precedence over everything else (including my business).
Wealthy & Healthy
I have always admired people who have achieved financial freedom through hard work and dedication to their craft. Whether the person is a business owner who grew his/her company and scaled it to become profitable or an employee who invested their funds wisely and as a result, can now afford to retire early, it’s a skill set that few people have and one that I have always been intrigued to obtain. Fortunately for me, I have been surrounded by numerous people over the years (mostly clients) who have been able to achieve financial freedom at an early age. As a result, I have and continue to ask these very same people for advice when it comes to growing my business, investing in real estate, and managing my portfolio.
What attracts me even more to these people is that most of them have been able to fit fitness into their daily hectic work/life schedules. I have clients that own companies that employ hundreds of workers. These clients are answering emails and phone calls all day every day. They are in meetings that start early and end late. I have clients who are contractors/employees that begin their days at 5 am and sometimes don’t finish their work until 11 pm. Yet all these clients still find time to fit in a 60-minute workout 4-5x/week in the gym.
Not only is this inspirational, but it also motivates me to work harder at my business and train harder in the gym.
My Definition of Success
Being successful to me means living the lifestyle that I’ve always wanted to live. To be able to do a job that I love, make a great living at it, and continue to be able to focus on my health and fitness. When I first began my quest to become a bodybuilder I had zero balance in my life. Business, family and any meaningful relationships were never prioritized properly. All I cared about was building my physique and winning competitions. Over the years I learned though that it is possible to be healthy and wealthy at the same time. No, you most certainly do not and should not sacrifice one to achieve the other.
Work Hard.
Train Hard.
Enjoy The Results.
Yours in Good Health,
Nick Cosgrove
Forever Fit Performance