Dieting From The Inside Out
- Apr 24

How to Change Your Life FOREVER with Cavan Valance | DFIO Ep.265

About Today’s Episode:

Man, are you guys in for a TREAT today!

I have my friend, Cavan Valance, on the show and I wanted to get Cavan on because not only did he go through an amazing transformation of his own—once weighing 300lbs—but he has also overcome alcoholism, drug addiction, and built a 7-figure coaching business on top of it all.

Cavan has so many incredible stories to tell and, just from hearing about his journey, I know you will pick up some practical takeaways that will help you change your lives forever.

Let’s get into it!

TIMESTAMPS

00:00 Intro and About Today’s Episode

02:01 Our Sponsors

07:25 Cavan’s Journey

29:22 Keeping Your Success

37:53 Quitting Is Not An Option

50:35 What’s Next for Cavan

56:10 Outro—Freebies & How to Apply for Coaching

Transcript (click to expand)

DFIO265 Cavan Valance

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How to Change Your Life FOREVER with Cavan Valance | DFIO Ep.265

0:00:00.0 Cavan Valance: I ran outside throwing like a fucking hissy fit, in my drunk stupor and I punched a hole in my own car window. And I pulled my arm out and it was just bleeding everywhere, I just instantly broke down. And in that moment, my aunt came up to me and she was like, "We've all fucked up before too, you need to make a decision of what you are gonna do for yourself, because right now, it's only up to you."

[music]

0:00:27.1 Jared Hamilton: What's going on, friends? Welcome back to a brand new episode of Dieting From The Inside Out. If you're new around here, my name is Jared Hamilton, welcome to the show, I am your host every single week. This is a dope episode for you. I just got finished recording the interview with my friend Cavan Valance. So Cavan and I have grown our relationship over this past year quite a bit. He's one of my favorite humans, he's such a good dude, but I wanted to get him on to really show you how to change your life forever. That's what we're gonna get into on this, because Cavan has had, and I'll let him get into it, has had the biggest transformation on every level you can think of, going from had been weighing 300 pounds, struggling with alcohol, doing drugs, not doing anything great in his life, fast forward to now, he looks like a fucking Greek god, competing in the CrossFit games, doing all sorts of crazy stuff. And on top of it, built a seven-figure coaching business, helping other people change their lives. So you wanna talk about rags to riches or you wanna talk about hopeless to overcoming, it's Cavan.

0:01:35.2 Jared Hamilton: And I'm beyond proud of him. I learned... There are some stories on this episode that I learned that I'd never even known about him, so I was really grateful he was so open to sharing those. So I know if you are sitting there looking to change your life in any capacity and wanting to know how to make that transformation and that change stick, 'cause the last thing we want is for you to change your life and then sabotage back to square one, this is the episode you'll wanna listen to. So I know you're gonna get a lot of value out of it. Now, before we get into that, big thank you to the sponsors of the show. Sponsor number one is FlexPro Meals. You guys know I love my FlexPros. I never have my fridge without them in it, because it's one of those things, convenience is everything. If what we're doing is not convenient, for most people, if we're talking in practicality, they're not gonna execute, and that's the thing is in the day in age in which we live, when you're taking kids to soccer games, dance practices, you work a full-time job, you gotta keep your house clean, you gotta do all these things, a lot of times nutrition go south first, you know what I mean? That's when we're popping into gas stations and getting a snacker, or we're just going to the cupboard or going through the drive-through, and those kind of things.

0:02:38.4 Jared Hamilton: Well, FlexPro not only makes... Is the food fucking amazing and tastes good. Like people hit me up and they're like, "Bro, dude, does the food actually taste good?" And it's fucking fantastic. So not only does the food taste amazing, it's made by a chef, it's delivered straight to your front door. And it's also priced really competitively, like in a good way, as in you're going to spend more on per meal going into a Wendy's drive-through. Like last night, I was after jujitsu and for something about... If I'm hungry post jujitsu nuggets, just slap, like they're so good. But still that's the thing is going through Wendy's ordering like a fucking like a... Or a number like 10 or 11, whatever chicken nuggets are. You're going to spend more on that than you are a FlexPro meal, especially after my discount. So it's one of those things that not only will this help you get to your goals, it's another way you can invest in yourself and make your life way more seamless because the mental bandwidth that you have going on on the day to day about your life is valuable. And you don't want to ruin that by any means with just constant stress and chaos. So if that's kind of up your alley, go check out FlexPro meals, just go to flexpromeals.com. There's a link below or... But if you do go, I like saving people money.

0:03:44.8 Jared Hamilton: So just use my code HamiltonTrained and it'll drop 20% off instantly, which is pretty cool. Now the second sponsor of the show and I'm attaching a gift with it. I've never done this before. So the second sponsor is 1st Phorm. So you guys know that supplements are not the end all be all, but they absolutely have their time and their place. Supplements are exactly what the name is. It's a supplement. It's to supplement what you are not getting with real food because the reality is no one's getting everything they need with real food. No one's getting all their micronutrients. Very few people are getting all their protein from food. Very few people are having enough salmon or fish in their day to get their omegas. Most people are not eating like five servings of fruits and vegetables every day. If you are dope, but most people aren't, most people are overstressed, under-slept way overworked and aren't getting them things that they need. So this is where supplements can really come in handy to help fill those gaps. But I just don't like the idea of you going to Amazon, finding what's most tolerable to eat or to ingest. That's the cheapest because that's not what you need. That's when your stomach's going to get upset. That's when your digestion is going to be out of whack. And that's when you're not going to get the good result year that you're looking for.

0:04:51.5 Jared Hamilton: So I want to fix that. So go to 1stphorm.com. I'm sorry, don't go to 1stphorm.com. You can, but I have a special link that does support me. So if you do that, it means a lot because here's what I'm going to do for you. I'm going to give away some products. So I heard this on a podcast the other day and I'm like, "Why didn't I never think about doing it here?" We're going to do a review contest. So what I'm going to start doing, we're going to test it out at least this week. So what I want you to do is go leave a review wherever you're listening to this on. I know Apple does reviews. I believe Google Podcast does reviews. And I think Spotify just launched reviews. Either way, I know Apple, like iTunes Apple Podcast does podcast reviews. So what I want you to do is go... If you leave a five star review, tell me what you love most about the show. Let's just leave me an honest to God review and then screenshot that and email it to me. And what I'm going to do is actually, yeah, even what I'm going to do is... And I'm going to pick a winner to let you pick any 1st Phorm product.

0:05:48.5 Jared Hamilton: I'm going to send it to you just completely for free. And I can tell you right now, it's hard enough getting people to fill out surveys or testimonial stuff in general. So your chances of doing this are ungodly high, because I've never done this before. And most people are going to go, "Oh, yeah, I'll do that" and never do it. So if you're like... If you want some free fucking supplements, milk it for all it's worth, go leave me a review, screenshot and email it to me, jared@hamiltontrained.com. My email's below as well. And you can get... I'll let you pick any 1st Phorm product that you want and I'll send it to you on me. But just leaving me a review, that's it. So it means a lot. It would mean a ton to me in general. I really, really appreciate it. I'll be watching the dates on it and stuff. So that's for this week. If this goes well, I very well may just do this every single week, having to have a review contest every single week and give away some 1st Phorm or maybe anything else depending on what you guys want. I saw another friend of mine who has a podcast do this and I'm like, "Why didn't I think of that?" But with that being said, massive thank you to 1st Phorm for being a sponsor of the show, but just they've been amazing.

0:06:47.7 Jared Hamilton: And I like having a spot I can send everyone to go to where I know they're taking care of getting the best supplements out there, that are great for your goals, that are safe, that are effective, that the labels are accurate. That's a big issue in the industry. And it's going to help you get to where you want to be. So if you want to use my link below, it does support me and I appreciate that. But yeah, that's a sponsor to the show. Now let's get into the actual interview with Cavan. I'm sorry, this intro went on a little bit longer. If you haven't already, be sure to subscribe to the show, subscribe to it on YouTube as well. If you want to actually watch Cavan and I talk, it's pretty dope. Otherwise, let me get him... The clip of him on the interview and I'll talk to you soon.

0:07:26.5 Jared Hamilton: Well for those that don't know who you are, give a little bit of a backstory where like who Cavan is and what all your stuff is. 'Cause I have a few specifics I wanted to talk to you about, but just to give context, share a little bit about your story.

0:07:38.9 Cavan Valance: Yeah. So I'm Cavan, I'm a nobody just kind of. [laughter] But I mean like... And seriously, like I'm a normal dude. I'm the oldest of four. I grew up on Long Island, New York in a little city called Glen Cove. And all of my brothers and sisters and I are two years apart, played sports. Our school was small. So we did everything: Band, theater, sports, business clubs. And then, you grow up and then you're like, "Go to college." And I was like, "I don't know what I wanna fucking do." Like honestly, can we just pause for a second, and if there's a good guidance counselor out there, I'd like to meet them because our guidance counselor was nice, but they didn't prep me for shit. [chuckle] So I go to music school and go to the Aaron Copland School of Music. And while I was pretty talented with music in high school, you go to this conservatory school and it's like, I'm playing on the Fisher-Price keyboard and everybody else's fucking Mozart.

[laughter]

0:08:42.9 Jared Hamilton: That's hilarious.

0:08:43.0 Cavan Valance: So needless to say, I played in my rock band more and started hanging out with the wrong people, and we'll get into that. But I didn't graduate with a music degree. Transfer schools, go play college lacrosse after losing some weight. Because I got into some... The thick of it with wrong people, no fitness, no focus, no goals. And I just needed something to set me on a path and had an opportunity to go play college lacrosse. If my grades went up, my weight went down and ended up transferring to this small, very expensive school in the Bronx where I was like, "Yeah, this sounds great. Let's just spend 50K on this education that I'll totally use." And I graduated with honors a few years later after playing lacrosse for a while. And me, I'm just a normal dude who has been on a journey and I didn't know where you wanted to go with that question. If that was the goal...

0:09:43.2 Jared Hamilton: That was beautiful. That was beautiful.

0:09:45.5 Cavan Valance: That's like chapter one.

[laughter]

0:09:50.0 Jared Hamilton: Chapter one of Cavan.

0:09:52.5 Cavan Valance: But there's so many different things that happened along the way, but today, like I went from running and building New York city's largest CrossFit gym. And then we were in New York during the pandemic and the whole city shut down as well as the world. We had it pretty bad over there. And with that, I got furloughed a couple of months later. Thankfully, I started this little thing with my brother called Hidden Summit. And when they let me go, I decided to go all in on that. And now here we are in 2023, where we have a team of nearly 30 people helping... We have about 450 one-on-one clients with thousands of people inside of our free group. And we service people in North America, Europe, Asia, South America, Australia. And it's pretty cool to see the reach that one little guy had a couple of years ago to help people think clearly and then change their life because of those thoughts.

0:10:50.8 Jared Hamilton: So real talk, is it trip... 'Cause I know how people like you and I are, where we get so in the trenches, we forget what's around us or where we're at. We're so like, "Let's kill shit now." It's like, "Oh wait, how'd I get here?" At least that's for me...

0:11:05.0 Cavan Valance: Dude, I was thinking about this before the call and we've been getting on calls together for the last year, right? I have no idea where you fucking live. [laughter] And I thought like... I was going to be like, "Where do you live bro?" Because like, no, to your point, exactly, I don't fill my fucking brain with shit that doesn't matter. 'Cause it doesn't matter where you live. It doesn't matter where I live, but I know you're a good fucking dude who's changing the world and I want you to be around, right? That might sound crazy to some people.

0:11:36.7 Jared Hamilton: I don't think so.

0:11:37.4 Cavan Valance: But that's what it comes down to for me, man. I'm like, "Okay, we have a fucking mission and we have people that want to come on this ride. Let's fucking go." And I'm at the front, right? So it's hard for me to be like, "Oh, let's see what's happening over here. Let's see what's happening over here." Like sometimes I do that, but it's more of personal gain or like personal in the sense of me and my personal life: My family, my brothers, my sisters, Lacy. I categorize my whole life into health, business, relationships. And my relationships, it's really like family and Lacy, but no, to your point, exactly, I don't even like... Lacy didn't believe in the other day when she was talking about the Kardashians and I was like, I couldn't pick out a fucking Kardashian in a line...

0:12:17.3 Jared Hamilton: I couldn't either.

0:12:17.4 Cavan Valance: With a gun held to my head, I was like, "I have no fucking idea what they look like."

[laughter]

0:12:19.3 Jared Hamilton: I couldn't either.

0:12:21.4 Cavan Valance: And she's like, "You're bullshitting me." And I was like, "No, I have no fucking clue." Like, I'm just so out of it.

0:12:25.6 Jared Hamilton: Yeah, I feel you dude. So with that being said, Is it weird if you stop and think like, "Wait, a year and a half, two years ago, I was this fat nobody that didn't have his shit together. I had all this weight, all this stuff." And now, fast-forward to now, you run a seven-figure coaching business that's literally changing the world. Is it weird to think about that?

0:12:46.6 Cavan Valance: Well, I wish it was two years ago, and that would be a really cool story, but it was like... It was 15 years ago when I was at my heaviest.

0:12:53.0 Jared Hamilton: Well, even if it was 15 years ago, is it weird to think like, "How did that become that"?

0:12:58.7 S21: I mean, if we have that much time, I mean, we might have to break this into two episodes. No, honestly the easiest way I can explain that is that we are taught a set of values early on. And my family, if anything, taught me how to love, right? They taught me you can be a good fucking human being and with that, build relationships and move forward. And I had lost that along the way because I felt like I didn't know who I was on the journey. Like lacrosse was my identity. And then there's this story about how one... Alright, we got time, so I'll say this.

0:13:34.5 Jared Hamilton: You're good, bro. You're good.

[chuckle]

0:13:36.9 Cavan Valance: My brother and I were playing lacrosse in high school and then we were also the leads to the show that the school was putting up. And it was a normal, regular season practice or a dress rehearsal for the show that was happening the next night. So obviously we were trying to balance both. So we went to the dress rehearsal because we committed to doing something and if... Our parents said like, "You don't quit something, you finish what you started." And then with that, word got back to us. Now, I don't know if this was fabricated or not, but like word got back to us that the coach called us a derogatory term. Because we were in theater and you can kind of put the pieces of the puzzles together of like where that term is heading.

0:14:21.1 Cavan Valance: So we didn't... We finished the season, but the next season we didn't come back. And I lost a part of what I thought was my identity because I had been playing lacrosse in second grade. If there was a... Everybody was like, "What sports did you play?" We played everything, but lacrosse was who I fucking was. And at that point I was like, "I'm gonna go to school, I'm gonna play lacrosse." My grades were fine, an honor student and everything. Now that I'm talking about this, it's weird to see how the flow of life goes, but I leaned into music because I liked playing in bands and it was cool to go to fucking rock shows. I'm like, "I'm gonna be a rockstar." Little did I know that I... The amount of times people said like, "That's not gonna happen," got to me.

0:15:07.2 Cavan Valance: So I went to music school and I kinda just fucked up in school. I started failing or just not going to class for the first time. So that whole... I lost myself in trying to fit in with the people around me and went to the cool kids and then they started doing drugs and bucking around and wasting my time, putting on a lot of weight, not taking care of my body anymore. To answer your question about how does one get from A to B? You gotta go through life experiences and in life experiences, you can let them guide you or you can realize what these experience can set you up for in the future when these choices happen down the line. And this all led to this moment where I... It was 2008 Thanksgiving, we had all of my family over at my house and I had been... I had hit fucking rock bottom dude.

0:16:07.6 Cavan Valance: I was working at a Ruby Tuesday to make money to go buy drugs and hang out with my friends and go to band practice and drink. I was sleeping on a futon in my parent's basement. I remember one night leading up to this day I was... We were drinking essentially a different version of Four Loko because they were cheap and we're like fucking like, "Let's get an energy drink that gets you fucked up." And I remember my mom waking me up with throw-up all over myself and it was this moment of like, "Fuck, what did I do?" But still, I didn't know who I was, so I just kept going down that line and saying this is who I am. Thanksgiving comes, I'm drinking a lot, getting to an argument with my father, don't even know what we were arguing about. It was probably like, "Cavan, you're drinking too much." And I was like, "Fuck you." Anyway, if I'm being honest.

0:17:00.0 Jared Hamilton: Sure.

[laughter]

0:17:03.7 Cavan Valance: And I ran outside throwing like a fucking hissy fit in my drunk stupor and I punched a hole in my own car window. I drove an orange 2005 Honda Element or whatever it was. And I just blasted a hole through the back passenger window and I pulled my arm out and it was just bleeding everywhere, and I just instantly broke down. And my whole family was there, dude, they were scared, but they weren't mad. Nobody fucking yelled at me. And in that moment, my aunt came up to me and she was very straightforward, like, "We've all fucked up before too, and you're at a point where you need to make a decision of what you are gonna do for yourself, because right now, it's only up to you. We love you, but this your choice and nobody else's." And at that moment, like that, I was like, "Mother fucker, what have I done?" And that "what have I done" turned immediately into, "What am I going to do next? How am I going to do this?" Because the why became crystal clear; if I go down this path, I'm a loser and I stay at home and I just don't do anything, or I can start working towards something that's important.

0:18:26.0 Cavan Valance: And at that time, I was, "Don't be a fuck-up." I always tell people like, "Just choose your why. Why do you wanna do this? Why do you wanna do an eight-week challenge? Why do you wanna join Hidden Summit?" It doesn't matter what your why is. Like my why has evolved into like help as many fucking people as possible change their life, but in the beginning, I was like, "I don't wanna be a fat fuck anymore." My brothers were Abercrombie models. Like I didn't wanna deal with that juxtaposition of where I was versus where they were. I was like, "I wanna feel good taking my shirt off at the pool. I don't wanna embarrass my family anymore. I need to do this because if I don't, then, I don't know, I don't like the path," which is as simple as like, "I don't like this option as much as like the unknown," right?

0:19:03.7 Jared Hamilton: Sure. [laughter]

0:19:05.4 Cavan Valance: So as I went through life, it wasn't like this perfectly awesome story, like things work out along the way, but to answer your question, I got to this point because I know what it's like to be on the other side, right?

0:19:21.4 Jared Hamilton: That's so good.

0:19:21.5 Cavan Valance: Like the unknown and the anxiety and the change that's to come, however tough it's going to be is worth it compared to that moment of embarrassing my family and not knowing who I was. And trust me, I still dealt with identity issues along the way, like trying to find myself. I mean, do you know the Enneagram at all? Have you ever taken the Enneagram?

0:19:50.4 Jared Hamilton: It's been a minute. I can't remember what I am. I've actually been wanting to do it again, but I'm familiar with it.

0:19:54.2 Cavan Valance: Yeah. So I'm an eight, [chuckle] so like I'm very direct, and I like to lead...

0:20:00.3 Jared Hamilton: You don't... You don't say.

[laughter]

0:20:02.9 Cavan Valance: Yeah, weird, right? [laughter] However, part of being an eight is like pulling the best out of other people. And it was really hard for me to figure out who I was along the way because I had this notion for a very long time of what was more along the lines of a three, which is kind of like, "How do I appear to everybody else?" And then once I started actually looking inward to see where I wanted to go, I don't know if you know Joe Dispenza at all, but like, dude...

0:20:32.6 Jared Hamilton: I love Joe. I dive into his work hard. [laughter]

0:20:34.8 Cavan Valance: Dude, whoever's listening to this, like Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself is top two books for me.

0:20:40.8 Jared Hamilton: Really?

0:20:41.5 Cavan Valance: Have you... Oh please, I'll send it to you. That means that much to me. Have you...

0:20:48.0 Jared Hamilton: I've read... I've listened to a lot of his work, and I love Becoming Supernatural, but I haven't read that one yet.

0:20:53.1 Cavan Valance: Yeah, I will send it to you for inviting me on this, and I just think it will opt... It will change your life and everybody's life you touch thereafter. Because it's not... Everything that has happened is done, everything that is around us is just around us, it doesn't mean it is who we are. However, where we want to be is where we need to focus. Because to my point, everything that happened in my life affected me emotionally, because I thought it and I held on to it. And your body, when you start to change, it's going to do everything in its power to keep you right where you are because of that comfort. No matter how much of a catastrophe it is to stay in that spot, that little dissonance right there, once you get past it and start to see who it is that you want to be and don't let what's happening around you affect you, your thoughts begin to change about what type of life you can live. So I'll send it to you.

0:21:56.8 Jared Hamilton: That's huge.

0:21:56.9 Cavan Valance: But to get back to where we are, the reason why I was able to build a million dollar business and change thousands of lives is because no one else is gonna fucking do it. And I told myself I was gonna do it, right? I mean, when I got furloughed in the middle of the pandemic, when I was in a terrible relationship at home and we were buying a house, 'cause it was like, "Let's save this. Let's buy a house. [laughter] This will make it all better," right?

0:22:26.9 Jared Hamilton: "Let's have a baby and fix our our shitty relationship. Let's... " Yeah. [laughter]

0:22:30.3 Cavan Valance: I mean, we could have a bunch of these talks. [laughter] How many people need to hear that statement, and obviously know you're being sarcastic, is a large number. So when all these things happened, I chose to go all in on me, and I realized... And this happened in 2020, right? To your point, like a couple of years ago. When my back is up against the wall, that's when I'm at my best, and I know you are too.

0:22:57.6 Jared Hamilton: Yeah.

0:22:57.8 Cavan Valance: When you have nowhere to go before to put food on the fucking table, that's where we win, that's where we change the world. And I try and... Like I self-sabotaged myself to do that.

0:23:09.9 Jared Hamilton: Just to get there?

0:23:10.7 Cavan Valance: Dude, I bought a fucking Tesla so I'd work harder. [laughter] It wasn't because I needed an $80,000 car. I was like, "No, because bitch, you're gonna pay for that thing and you're gonna work harder, get it done." I'm crazy that way.

0:23:22.0 Jared Hamilton: I'm about to pull the trigger on a mid-engine Corvette. I totally get where you're coming from. [laughter]

0:23:28.1 Cavan Valance: Dude, like... And I think that's not for everybody, right? That's not what I want people to walk away with, but what I do want people to walk away with is like... And I literally just had a call. I was texting somebody who can't commit to admitting that she is the problem in her life to sign up, and this is like the third conversation that she's had with somebody in our ecosystem, and I was like, "So what you're telling me is like, you're more comfortable being right here, that it is uncomfortable to commit to the process? And you're saying that you can't afford this, so that means you can afford the health changes in a negative light that are gonna happen to you a year from now?" And she was like, "Fuck, you're good." And I was like, "So we're gonna do this thing?" And she was like, "No." And I was like, "So then you're saying you're okay."

0:24:20.9 Jared Hamilton: Yeah.

0:24:21.9 Cavan Valance: Right? And that's what it comes to. It's like those little...

0:24:24.2 Jared Hamilton: Absolutely.

0:24:24.8 Cavan Valance: Those little moments, like to take ownership of... Like I could have just soft and be like, "Oh, I'm a fuck-up. I didn't graduate college. My band didn't work out, like what was me," but I needed the break in 2008 so I could set a goal and see what that was and then start literally take one step at a time. We gotta crawl before we walk, and walk before we run, and that's just how we got here today.

0:24:50.7 Jared Hamilton: Yeah, I love that, dude. I had no idea about half of that story. And dude, I know like you're way further ahead than I am, but I'm so proud of you, dude, with all that you've been able... I had no idea about any of that. That's incredible, so.

0:25:06.3 Cavan Valance: Well, I don't think it's like a way further ahead or behind type of situation, it's like... How old are you?

0:25:13.7 Jared Hamilton: 31.

0:25:14.4 Cavan Valance: 31? Yeah, I mean, I got five years on you, so I mean like just five more years to fuck up and figure it out, I guess. [laughter] But it's like it's an experience thing. Like your path is different than mine, so they're like, they don't run totally parallel. Yeah, we're trying to do similar things, but we all get to this moment for however we get here. I think losing my dad along the way was part of that too, because... I'm sorry.

0:25:45.4 Jared Hamilton: You're good, dude.

0:25:45.9 Cavan Valance: I've been thinking about him a lot lately.

0:25:47.9 Jared Hamilton: I bet, dude.

0:25:48.5 Cavan Valance: Jason fucking got me over the weekend, man.

0:25:50.6 Jared Hamilton: Yeah.

0:25:50.8 Cavan Valance: I sort of just... I was sitting right behind you. I was fucking balling.

0:25:54.6 Jared Hamilton: For those that don't know, Cavan and I were at the same coaching event this past weekend, like a 700 person giant ass event and stuff. And we share the same mentor, and he was talking about... On the stage about losing his dad and whatnot. So dude, like that thing is... I have my dad. My dad is still here, and that story got me. You know what I mean? It's a lot.

0:26:18.1 Cavan Valance: Yeah, and I think, you know, like now, it's just like you stack... you stack experience and you stack reasons to do what it is that you do or don't do, like subconsciously you're stacking excuses or purpose-driven reasons to move forward or stay exactly where you are. And one of them is like my dad hasn't seen anything that we've done. But I wanna do it so like he's proud.

0:26:47.6 Jared Hamilton: Yeah.

0:26:47.9 Cavan Valance: You know, like he was 59 when he died, and that was a really big... Originally, I posted about it the other day, he was... I just like... I had a weekend of getting drunk with my brothers and being there and hugging them. And then it was like, "Okay, that's never going to be me," because of health reasons. And we don't why he... Excuse me, why he passed, but I do know he was over 300 pounds and he worked overnights and he was totally stressed, and it was something I knew that I was never gonna walk into that world. And it hurt me because I couldn't help him, and I don't know what I know now, but what I can do is help every other single person out there that that could be if I don't connect with them, if we don't connect with them as Hidden Summit. And the other half is like I have my dad's wake, there was two services morning and afternoon. There was a line of people for the eight hours of the entire wake. And my brothers were like, "Hey, let's wear Hawaiian shirts at the wake," because Dad always liked to wear Hawaiian shirts. I mean, like you know I rock those Hawaiian shirts all the time.

0:28:09.5 Jared Hamilton: Oh yeah, I see you do. [laughter]

0:28:12.3 Cavan Valance: It's not just because I live in Florida. [laughter] It's like a... It's an owe to the man who raised me and the man I argued with all the time and learned how to communicate with because we're Irish Catholics, so what we do is we yell then, we yell at each other.

0:28:31.7 Jared Hamilton: That's right.

0:28:32.3 Cavan Valance: And I don't really need to yell anymore, so he's taught me so many lessons since he's been gone, that part of why I do what I do is to leave my mark on this world and just have some... Like they don't have to even remember that I was the one who helped them, but if they can help someone in their life and pay it forward, that's really the whole entire thing.

0:29:00.4 Jared Hamilton: Yeah, I love that, dude. It's so powerful. Fucking love it. This is why I wanted you to come on, bro, 'cause I knew we'd get into shit like this.

0:29:05.8 Cavan Valance: Oh yeah.

0:29:06.4 Jared Hamilton: So... [chuckle] So let me ask you this, and this is why I wanted... You made a post about it, and I chimed in, I don't know, like three weeks ago. You made a post about whatever you did, how much you've lost and kept it off and how much you changed your life, and I like hop on Instagram like, "Can you come on my show and let's talk about this or whatever?" So how does someone keep their success? 'Cause we see so many people, and it's one of my... Like it's one of the things that breaks my heart so much as I see so many people get whatever their success looks like and then they lose it. And I think that is arguably more detrimental than never reaching success because you got to this pinnacle of like, "Oh fuck, I did it," and that was... Then that's the cliff you jumped off of. You know what I mean? But you've gotten your success, especially in your journey, like most people listening to this are trying to change their life or trying to transform their body and their mind, but a lot of people do it, but then don't keep it. So how do you... I mean, now you teach this for a living, so how do someone keep their success?

0:30:01.7 Cavan Valance: Sure. There's a couple of things I'd lean into here, and the first thing I wanna tell everybody is that this never ends, because a lot of the time, you maybe get this too with people that you work with, they ask like, "Well, what happens after I lose those 50 pounds? What happens after I'm able to run that mile? What happens after... " Whatever their goal is, 'cause a lot of people get lost and they lose it. So number one is that when you understand that this is an infinite game and it doesn't have a set of rules for like you win and then it's over, then you'll keep winning, because the day it's over is the day that you leave this earth. And it can change, right? Because my goals today at 36 are different than they were at 22 when I was 300 pounds. So start slow and then pivot as you grow, because if we're not growing, we're dying, right? If we're not learning, we're losing. So the more we can do to shift the needle a little bit is going to allow you to find victories in every single day.

0:31:17.2 Cavan Valance: No, I had no ambition of going to the CrossFit games at 22. I just didn't wanna be fucking fat anymore and I didn't wanna wear size 40 inch pants. You know what I mean? So how did that come to be? Through experience and finding something that I loved. I didn't start doing CrossFit. I started just figuring out what I did in high school and trying to do that again, because let me tell you, I lived a mile and a half from the YMCA where I worked out. And I would run there and I would get at like up the block, 'cause we front down a little block and then up a fucking huge block to get to the main street, and I had to walk, and it was embarrassing, 'cause I was a captain of lacrosse team. And I just thought about like that, like, "Don't stop, keep going, keep going," and that's what it was in the beginning. Now, today at 36, I'm like, "Okay, I have 45 minutes. I'm running a business. Let me get in what I can." And I work with the coach in fitness too, so I don't have to think about that, but all along the way, you go through seasons. So any time we work with a client, we say like, "Well, what season are you in? Let's get to that goal. And once we start to get close to that goal, let's try and think about where we wanna go next so we can plan for that along the way."

0:32:24.6 Cavan Valance: The main thing I would say, and the parallels, like the goal side of it is, why do you wanna do this? Because if you... Like, "He who knows their 'why' can live to bear any 'how'," Nietzsche. Another book I'd recommend is Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. Really heavy book, but man, life changing.

0:32:46.9 Jared Hamilton: I don't get out of bed for light. [laughter]

0:32:51.0 Cavan Valance: You're right about that. [laughter] If you're like me, you're up for the sun's up anyway.

0:32:56.6 Jared Hamilton: That's funny. [chuckle]

0:32:57.1 Cavan Valance: So like the why is selfish, and that's okay. I always talk to people, and they just happen to work with us most of the time. They all have a servant's heart. They wanna put other people before their own. And selfish gets this bad reputation. However, I truly believe that to be selfless, we need to be selfish, and we have to hold on to our why, and the way I help people do that is two-fold; one, it's organizing your day, so what can you do for yourself today. As Andy Frisella says, write a power list down. And that's not like, "I gotta do the laundry today and make sure that the kids get the school on time." Like, no, you're gonna fucking do that anyway. And if you don't do the laundry today, that's okay. And if the kids are like five minutes late for school, guess what, they're probably still gonna graduate. [laughter] Let's just call it how it is. But what are you doing for yourself? And it doesn't have to be a huge task. The people who do 75 Hard, when you look at the tasks of the day, none of them are that difficult, but it's the amount of times you do them over and over and over again which creates this organizational character of your life so you can pursue progress. So know what you wanna do today. So the why is the big picture, go like, "Where are we going?" Visualizing that and seeing yourself in that position, the how is the power list and like getting shit done today, but then how do we organize that.

0:34:27.5 Cavan Valance: So I always ask people to know what's important to them, what is a priority. As I said earlier, it's my health, my business and my relationships with my family and Lacy. Everything else doesn't fucking matter. Like I could have just told you no for this podcast, but I feel like this is important because you're a friend of mine. And I told you like, "Well, I'll flex some things around to make it work," so being flexible instead of like this immovable object is important too. So for those people who see success and then fade, maybe your why wasn't in order, maybe you didn't organize your daily tasks to invest in yourself every single day. Maybe you just thought that it would be easy. But I promise you, it's always going to be hard, because as you get better, guess what, the challenges just become more challenging, but you become more prepared in how to do them when you take care of your foundation. You can't build a house without a foundation. You must start there. If you're like, "You know what, I'm just gonna design the kitchen first," like, cool, you're gonna have the coolest kitchen on the block, but your house is gonna fall into itself. Foundation is key, and then we can set new goals to get the glitz and the glamor and the kitchen that we want for the house of our life. I don't know.

0:35:38.7 Jared Hamilton: Yeah, I love it, dude. No, I totally agree. We're gonna pull such good clips out of this episode. I'm so fucking pumped. Like every time you open your mouth, I'm just sitting back like, "Just keep talking, bro. This is gold." [laughter]

0:35:54.7 Cavan Valance: Get a little clip. [chuckle] I think Lacy gets... She loves it. She's the same way. Like I'm just dialed in when she talks, and when I talk too, I'm the same way. But like we... So we're one-to-one types, right? So like you could have like social type, one-to-one type or a survival, and this one-on-one connection, I love so much. Like I've spoken to 500, 600 people at a time in a room, stepped up, stood up, no problem talking to 800 people or however many people it was over the weekend, but we can get into it. We can get into the thick of it and have a real conversation like, "This is what changes the world. This is what moves the needle of life forward." Well, some people just love the socialization setting, some people are just like, "I'm gonna do what I do for me, and I talk to anybody." So when we talk, and like the same thing when you talk too. Like I love the way your brain works and how you ask questions, but then when you articulate what's happening inside your brain to create a statement and create this, whether it be a business plan or we're in a business meeting or you're helping somebody out, like you're so well put together, so like glad I got you, dude. Like everything that you put out...

[chuckle]

0:37:01.8 Jared Hamilton: Appreciate that.

0:37:02.2 Cavan Valance: Everything that you put out is fucking fire, so.

[overlapping conversation]

0:37:05.4 Jared Hamilton: Thank you, dude. Sometimes, I feel like a psychopath that's just like in a corn maze just like, "Ah, let's see where the..." you know, like whatever, but stopping isn't even an option, you know what I mean? It's like, "Well, quitting," that's why I don't even get, maybe we could touch on this, is like when it comes to this kind of stuff, I feel like so many people feel like they have to have it figured out perfectly, and then because they don't, they're like, "I'm just gonna stop. It's whatever." But my thing is like I'm such a logical-brained person, like my wife and I talk about this all the time like almost to a fault. You know like the stereotypical husband wife walking on the sidewalk, someone smacks your wife on the ass and it's like, "I'mma beat his ass." For me, I would go, "Well, no, they're not going to jail," so I would just go, "Hey, let's not do that again," and then we go the other way 'cause I wanna beat his ass, but logically, I would go to jail for 20 years because I would really beat his ass. So I'm like, "Oh, let's not do it. Logically, it doesn't make sense," which is why I don't understand so many people leave quitting as an option on the table.

0:38:00.5 Jared Hamilton: Quitting has never... You've got, like you said, when your back's up against the wall is your favorite time to make shit happen, but it sucks, it's scary, it's overwhelming, and it's anxiety-ridden. But quitting never got us anything we ever wanted, but so many people, I'm sure you see it in your stuff with people who, especially who aren't clients, they're just dropping the hat, willing to drop, just throw in the towel, I just don't understand. Do you have thoughts on that?

0:38:22.7 Cavan Valance: Yeah, I've got a few. I agree with you, though. For me, quitting is not an option here. Like I said earlier, our parents said like, "You're gonna finish what you started." However, when you decide to start a business and you don't know what the fuck you're doing, like me and my brother were like, "Hey, let's do this thing," or we're like, "What do we do?" "I don't know." [chuckle] There has not been an easy day since we've begun. And I think you were in the room when I was talking to Jason about it and he said that he was with his mentor and they were out to dinner and they were like, "You know, entrepreneurship is just a bunch of shitty days with a couple of great days sprinkled in." And when you...

0:39:09.2 Jared Hamilton: That hit me so hard. [chuckle]

0:39:10.1 Cavan Valance: I was like, "Fuck! That's so right." [chuckle]

0:39:13.3 Jared Hamilton: Yeah.

0:39:14.0 Cavan Valance: I was like, "This is my life." A, I use gratitude to figure out what I'm gonna do next because there have been many days where I'm like, "Fuck it, this is... We're done." This is like, "I don't wanna do this anymore. This is dumb," but that's the emotional side of me coming out because then, I... You know, for me, I'm not instantly logical. I'm like, "Ah, fire and rage. I'm an eight, go with your gut," like, "This is... " And then I'm like, "Wait a second, there's probably more to the situation." And I get excited about figuring it out. And what has helped me with that with quitting or like the subject of quitting and not actually quitting, is having a no problems, only solutions mindset. And do you know Jarrett Bond at 1st Phorm?

0:40:10.0 Jared Hamilton: Yeah, I believe so.

0:40:10.1 Cavan Valance: Yeah. Yeah, if you don't, I'll introduce you to him when we're there in a month. But he said that to me once, and just not in passing, he was talking to somebody else, and then it just like, it hit my soul. I was like, "Fuck, you're right." And the reason it's right is just because you didn't figure it out today it doesn't mean that there's not another path to get there. There's a million paths to get to the same destination. So it's helped me think more on the toughest of days to zoom out and have that 30,000 foot view on my life and say, "What can we do to move forward? What can we do to get closer to being as fit as I want, to lead my community a little bit better, to provide more value for the community, to affirm my love for Lacy more, right?" Like, "These things are really important to me, and I know that I'm not the best at them all the time, so I'm not gonna quit my relationship, I'm not gonna just total my business and put it underground, and I'm not gonna just be a fat slob again because just because I don't have the answers today doesn't mean that I won't be able to figure them out."

0:41:18.6 Jared Hamilton: Yeah.

0:41:19.0 Cavan Valance: And when people... If you're out there and you're like, "Man, this is really hard. I don't wanna do this," ask yourself, it's like, "If you don't," like, "If you don't wanna do it, ask yourself why," right? Why did you start? Why do you feel this way now? So there's those thoughts of quitting are coming in, and guess what? You're putting them in your brain. You are the same person who put the thoughts to start this job, this relationship, this career, this fitness plan in your brain. So you are the only one to convince yourself one way or the other. So if you can zoom out and kind of reflect on why those thoughts are there and write down some notes or think through it, then you can start to ask questions on those, right? And once we start to ask questions, we could have that conversation with ourself, which I talk to myself a lot, maybe out loud, maybe not, you know? It's okay, we're all friends here.

0:42:14.0 Jared Hamilton: That's right. [chuckle]

0:42:15.1 Cavan Valance: But then, you can go to your logical brain and kind of see what the benefit or the downfall is for each. And that might just be enough to help you move forward. Or if it is a situation that is catastrophic, then you might have peace and understand that that's okay. And the reason why I bring that up is because in September and in end of August of last year, I was supposed to go with my brothers and their significant others and my fiance at the time away on a weekend trip to the Berkshires in Massachusetts. And the night before, she and I had gone out for a dinner, and it was an excellent, excellent time. It was very light, fun, we laughed. But leading up to that, things had not been good for going on three years.

0:43:13.0 Jared Hamilton: Wow.

0:43:14.0 Cavan Valance: Just we were... She's an amazing person. She's really smart. However, our lifestyle was the same, and it was just it kept us together, but our visions and our values changed. And that doesn't mean that either one of us is a bad person, we were just bored for one another. So we woke up that Friday morning and I said, "Hey, what time do you want me to have everything ready? I know you're coming back for work, I'll just make sure everything's packed so I could drive up and you could relax in the car." She said, "I'm not going. And we're done." And I went numb.

0:43:51.3 Jared Hamilton: Wow.

0:43:52.5 Cavan Valance: And with that, emotional came first, and I had the weekend to myself 'cause I still went with my brothers 'cause I love them and I wanted to be there.

0:44:05.0 Jared Hamilton: Sure.

0:44:05.1 Cavan Valance: I knew if I was gonna be around anybody, it would be around them and that would be great. But before they got there, I had a whole day to myself. And on that day, you know, it's like, "Why do... " Like as if there were someone who was like, "You don't need to go for a hike in the woods to find yourself," but I happened to be on a hike in the middle of the woods. And I just continued to think on everything. I realized that it didn't happen to me, it happened for me because when I was able to zoom out and see that we were just living together and we didn't love one another the same way, right? I cared for her and she cared for me, but we weren't moving forward together. It was a lot easier for me to have peace and go, "This is going to be okay. I've gotten through more challenging times," and that was another moment where I was like, "Lean in to who I am. Do what I need to do for me. Be selfish here, and don't fight this, but just do what you have to do to move on." Long story short, I meet Lacy a little while after this, and I think I found my match, someone who balances me perfectly, who has lifestyle visions, values all aligned. And you know, in the moment of like... We were together for 10 years, right?

0:45:27.0 Jared Hamilton: Right.

0:45:27.5 Cavan Valance: So when that happens, like you just think of everything that went wrong and how terrible of a person that you are and all the bad things, but then when you pause and you zoom out, and you can think logically, I'm like, "I'm only 35 years old," which timeline is weird now. [chuckle] I'm like, I was 35, I'm 36 now. "I'm only 35 years old, which means that have," hopefully, 35 more years to live, right? There's so much more I could do."

0:45:56.5 Jared Hamilton: Yeah.

0:45:57.0 Cavan Valance: And like, "Don't I deserve someone who supports me endlessly, relentlessly, consistently on that journey?" I didn't know what was gonna come. I didn't know it was gonna happen so quickly. But damn, I'm sure fucking glad that it did. So that's my...

0:46:13.0 Jared Hamilton: Sure. That's huge, dude.

0:46:16.0 Cavan Valance: Yeah.

0:46:16.5 Jared Hamilton: I have two takeaways from that. Well, number one, I had the pleasure of meeting Lacy, and she's fucking incredible, so that was dope, but from... There's two things that I took from what you just said. Number one is I really love and respect how highly you still talk of your ex because a lot of people with... When things just don't go well, it immediately goes from like, "They're the best person ever," to they're like, "They're a fucking bitch piece of shit, da-da-da," but you didn't do that. Even if, of course, I'm sure there were things that you could talk about, but you're choosing not to, that just shows your character, which is incredible. But my big takeaway from this is, I think we can really tie this together beautifully, is the amount of thinking and reflecting and self-questioning you do because in so many areas, we see so many people go, they're so quick to believe everything they think, and they go, "I'm a lost cause," so they instantly assume it's actually true and their actions are congruent. One of my first influences in personal development was Bob Proctor, I don't know if you're familiar with him or not.

0:47:17.1 Cavan Valance: No.

0:47:18.1 Jared Hamilton: He was mentored by Andrew Nightingale. Andrew Nightingale was mentored by Napoleon Hill, and then Carnegie. So he's like, he just passed away, he was the only one alive in that lineage for the longest time. But he has this percentage breakdown he does and it's like X many people think anything, think they think, this many people, you know, whatever, but then it's like 97 people, or 97% of people rather die than think. But like with how much you said, you talk to yourself, you reflect, and you go through these scenarios in your head, and then you get clarity. But I think so many people listening to this right now, they have life go not their way. Could it be something at the surface level? It's the scale spiking. And it could be something as heavy as their partner of 10 years breaking up with them. It could be their loved one's passing away, whatever it may be, but they don't reflect and sit with those thoughts and then work through them. It's like, "Oh no, I," like within under a minute, a decision's made. And I think in a lot of cases, we need to have and allow that reflection time and thought process time, which I feel like you're like the king of doing.

0:48:19.4 Cavan Valance: Well, again, it's like working out or hitting your protein every single day. It didn't happen overnight. Way back when I was just doing drugs and drinking beers every single night, I didn't think through all that. I was like, "Let's just do it." And through life, you learn, have the ability to learn that you create your thoughts, good or bad, and that good or bad is a reflection on how you see the world 'cause nothing is either good or bad, it just fucking is, right?

0:48:46.5 Jared Hamilton: Yup.

0:48:49.0 Cavan Valance: Going back to the Dispenza reference, when we have a thought, a thought becomes an emotion, an emotion becomes a mood, a mood becomes a temperament, a temperament becomes part of our identity, and that's how we identify, it becomes who we believe we are and our belief, right? So if you could change your belief, you have to change your thoughts. It doesn't just happen one-to-one, it goes through the repetition, and I don't think affirm... Affirmations are fine, but taking action on those thoughts are what's going to, like Hormozi says, have an undeniable stack of proof to show who you are who you say you are. So at the end of the day, if you are not where you want to be, how are you thinking about where you are versus where you want to go? And then we can carve to shift how we go about that, what does that person do, how did they act, how do they act around other people, what do they believe? And then guess what? You're probably gonna have a little bit of this thing called momentum that allows you to see the consistency of it all take place every single day.

0:49:57.8 Cavan Valance: And it's always gonna take work. Goes back to the infinite game, it's all fucking connected, dude. The moment we stop is the moment like those thoughts start to creep back in, 'cause I have my days, too. I'm not like 100% happy, go-lucky all the time. There are some mornings where I'm like, "Oh, how the fuck are we gonna do this today?" [chuckle] And then I lean on gratitude. I'm like, "I get to do this today. I get to talk to you and share this information and hopes that one fucking person uses it."

0:50:25.3 Jared Hamilton: That's gonna be a whole lot more than one, I can guarantee you that, so podcast is doing really well right now, so it's gonna be a lot more than one. [chuckle]

0:50:32.7 Cavan Valance: Let's go, let's go.

0:50:35.7 Jared Hamilton: That's incredible, dude, I fucking love it. That's huge, dude. I can't believe we've been talking for like 47 minutes already, it's absurd. So final question. This is something I like to ask all my guests: What's next for you? What are you most excited about right now? What are you fired up about right now that you're looking forward to the most that you're working on?

0:50:54.0 Cavan Valance: Yeah, so there's a few things. Number one is we're making a couple edits to the team, and I've already mapped out the what we're gonna do for our community through September, which is really exciting, so it's great to have a plan, a map for that, a GPS. Now, it's about implementation. So Katie and I, who runs the company with me, have decided that we'll take on the roles that we prefer, versus trying to do everything together, which has already allowed us to see progress, so that's number one. So we don't wanna do anything like crazy this year. We had a lot of growth over the last two years, so we just wanna do what we do better, so that's really cool. And then we're actually putting on our own event in August, so we're gonna...

0:51:47.3 Jared Hamilton: Really?

0:51:47.7 Cavan Valance: Yeah, we're gonna do a Hidden Summit seminar. And if you wanna come down, speak, or hang, I'd love to have you there.

0:51:53.8 Jared Hamilton: I would love that.

0:51:54.0 Cavan Valance: Calling you out in front of everybody, that would be badass to have you hang with us.

0:51:56.4 Jared Hamilton: I would love that so much.

0:51:58.4 Cavan Valance: So it would be down here in Naples, Florida. I'm solidifying the dates next week early, and then we'll announce that to everybody else. So it'll be a meet-and-greet, a day of seminars and talking, and then a day of working out on the beach, doing ice barrels on the beach, and then doing a little party at the end of the night, so...

0:52:15.3 Jared Hamilton: Hell, yeah. I love that.

0:52:20.0 Cavan Valance: The whole goal when we started Hidden Summit was to change people's lives. And people always asked me in the beginning like, "Cavan, when are you gonna open up your own gym? We'd love to work out with you in your gym." And I was, "I don't wanna be ball-and-chained to a gym." Because when you run a gym for five years and you're the one that's in charge and the lights don't go on at four o'clock in the morning, you're stuck there. So I said, "I wanna go to the people and I wanna bring the people together in other ways." So this is gonna be the first of many events that we do, bigger events, we've done a couple smaller ones before. So I'm really excited to educate and teach people on mindset, nutrition, and movement in the weekend, and then celebrate, have a few drinks with them and work out together, that'll be a blast.

0:53:00.2 Jared Hamilton: Hell yeah.

0:53:03.5 Cavan Valance: And then Lacy and I are doing a lot of travel. Hope we're in Jacksonville this weekend. We're going to Georgia, Orlando. We're gonna do a little cowboying in Wyoming with my dude, RC, at Carter Country Meats in June. We got Summer Smash. So it's really, this is a wonderful year to see how I can stay on track with everything while traveling. And oh yeah, training for the CrossFit games next year, so we got a lot.

0:53:33.2 Jared Hamilton: Fuck me! We may have to do a part two and talk about how Cavan balances that life and still looks good naked.

0:53:41.9 Cavan Valance: "How Cavan Valance balances his life." There you go, that's the whole podcast to itself.

0:53:46.0 Jared Hamilton: Right, I love it. Well, dude, not to open up another can of worms, my big thing that... One of my favorite parts of the event we were at was just the one phrase harmony over balance 'cause I think everyone's searching for balance, but what we're truly searching for is harmony in different areas. Harmony is going to look very unbalanced, but harmony is about alignment, and I think that's where the magic actually happens, so.

0:54:11.0 Cavan Valance: Yeah, I mean real quick before we get off: I think balance is bullshit. You go work your nine to five Monday through Friday, and then have your nights and weekends off and call that balance. You can crush it for 12-hour days Monday through Friday and work on Saturday and Sunday morning and call that balance. Or you could just relentlessly do what you need to do for 10 years and never work a day in your life after that, and that's also balance. So people have this like, "Oh, I have to balance everything else so it's perfect." But for me, again, going back to what's important to me: Health, business, family, my relationships, when those are in order, I have harmony. When those are not in order, I have dissonance, and dissonance is chaos. So again, zoom out, kinda gain perspective on how you can move the needle forward and be flexible through it all. You could find harmony wherever you are.

0:55:00.0 Jared Hamilton: I love that. Where can people find you? And learn more about you, Hidden Summit, Katie, the whole nine yards.

0:55:05.8 Cavan Valance: Yeah, for sure. So you can follow me at @cavantv_, that's C-A-V-A-N-T-V-underscore on Instagram, and that's because my middle initial is Thomas, by the way, not just like... [chuckle]

0:55:19.5 Jared Hamilton: I was wondering. [chuckle]

0:55:22.0 Cavan Valance: Yeah. And then you can go to hiddensummitgroup.com if you wanna know more about us. We're developing our YouTube, so we have a lot of free information, mindset, huddles, nutrition talks. We have our documentary, Disciplined, on there that was featured in the NOBULL Project Film Festival, so you can learn about, a little bit more about how we started. And then you could always follow @hiddensummit_ on Instagram as well, that's really where we are on social for the most part, trying to expand that as we learned over the weekend, but we're doing pretty good.

0:55:55.6 Jared Hamilton: There you go. Hell yeah, dude. Well, dude, thank you. I know you're busy, so thank you so much again for doing this. Great seeing you this last weekend, and then I'm excited to see you at Summer Smash and stuff, so I appreciate this.

0:56:05.5 Cavan Valance: Yeah, dude. I'll send... Send me your address and I'll get you that book and we'll chat. We'll chat before Summer Smash, no doubt.

0:56:08.5 Jared Hamilton: I will. Beautiful!

0:56:11.2 Cavan Valance: Thanks for having me, dude. See ya.

0:56:12.8 Jared Hamilton: Talk soon!

0:56:14.2 Jared Hamilton: And we are back. Thank you so much for tuning in once again to Dieting From the Inside Out. It means a ton to me that you're here. Just the fact you can be anywhere on the Internet right now, and you're choosing to chill out here with me is pretty legit. And definitely go check out Cavan's stuff. If you got a lot of value out of this, I want you to message him. Like go hit him up on Instagram and be like, "Yo, I heard your episode with Jared. It was fucking crazy. It was a fantastic... It changed my life." Go do that for me. The other thing that would mean a lot is if you share this. One of the things that means the most to me that helps the most amount of people is if you're listening to this episode and you got a lot out of it, screenshot it and throw it on your Instagram story and tag me and Cavan in as well because we did the interview today. Sorry, my nose, it's just so fucking bad. [chuckle] Would mean a ton, for real. Cavan's a great dude. We actually, like we mentioned on the show, we connected again in person at an event last week. I was speaking at Coaching Con, our mentors' big event, and he got on the stage as well, and it's just always great connecting with him, and I'll be seeing him here in like a month at 1st Phorm HQ for Summer Smash. It'll be dope. But yeah, that's it for today's episode.

0:57:16.5 Jared Hamilton: Now I do, before you go, I do have a few things for you, depending where you're at, 'cause there's a few ways I can help you from here. So the first way I can help you, the easiest way right now that isn't in the freeway is just keep subscribing to my content in the podcast. So be sure you're subscribed everywhere, the YouTube, the show here wherever you're listening to it on Spotify, Apple, whatever. Be sure you're following me on all my other socials. If you're not following me on Instagram, TikTok, those platforms, be sure and do it.

0:57:41.4 Jared Hamilton: The other spot you can go to to get some of the best help and support ever is get a home base. Go to my free Facebook Group, it's called Fat Loss Simplified. The link is around here somewhere in the show notes, wherever you're listening to it at. Here's the truth: You need a home base. It is scientifically proven and psychologically proven that you need a support system. You need a place you can go to to get around people who get it 'cause the truth is, your family and friends don't get it. You may feel like you're the outcast. You may feel that as soon as you start changing your life, everyone's like, "Oh, Becky's on a dieting kick again," or whatever the case is in here, you are just wanting to change your life and your family's life. But yet, you feel like an outcast. Your husband or partner doesn't get it. Your friends don't get it. You feel kinda secluded. Well, that's the worst feeling ever, and you need people who fucking get it. So definitely go join my free Facebook Group. I've put some of the best content in that group for free. It's where I can help you the best for free, where you can just get the love and support from myself and my team. We built this dope ass community. So please go join that if you haven't already.

0:58:43.0 Jared Hamilton: And then the absolute best way I can help you is if you apply for one-on-one coaching 'cause here's the truth: Like Cavan and I were talking about, so many people just aren't gonna get there on their own. So many people are in that place like he was talking about, that example with someone who was trying to apply for coaching where their life is so fucking bad and it's like, "Well, we can change that right now," but it's like, "I don't know if I'm in enough pain," and I would just hate to see you not be in enough pain. Sometimes, I'll tell people, it's like, "Well, like maybe you need to go gain 30 more pounds before it hurts bad enough." You know, some people just aren't in enough pain.

0:59:14.0 Jared Hamilton: So I would just hate to see you hit another rock bottom before getting the help that you need because the hard reality is most people are gonna take their struggles to the grave with them, and that's the last thing I want because that's the thing is I've helped hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people get on the other side. I know exactly what it takes, I know exactly what it looks like, and I've built the best coaching program around it that guarantees results, so it's a no-brainer to do it if you're struggling, to apply to see if we can help you, 'cause that's the cool thing is if we don't think we can help, I'll tell you no. I'll literally send you somewhere else politely if I don't think I can help you. We wanna work with the people... We only work with people we know we can help, you know what I mean? So it's one of those things where you deserve to have the life that you want, you deserve to be happy, you deserve to love the way you look and feel about yourself, you know what I mean? You deserve that, and there's no reason you can't have that.

1:00:05.0 Jared Hamilton: So if you wanna apply for coaching and stop doing this back and forth on your own, I'll leave a link below where you can get right on our calendar to apply for coaching because like I said, we wanna get to know you first. And then if you do get accepted into the coaching program, because you're coming from the podcast, I have a bunch of stuff to give you. I have about $4,000 worth of extras that people pay for that you won't, completely for free. So that's what we have on the table today. Otherwise, if I can ever help you, please let me know, my email's below as well. Otherwise, yeah, I appreciate you tuning in, and I will see you next week.

[music]

Cavan’s Journey:

Cavan grew up in a small town on Long Island, doing everything from music to sports. His favorite sport—and personal identity—was lacrosse, but Cavan ended up quitting his high school lacrosse team due to a problem with the coach.

After quitting lacrosse, Cavan leaned into music. He enjoyed playing music and going to concerts, and eventually, when it was time for college, he was accepted into a music conservatory school.

Unfortunately, he ended up falling in with the wrong crowd and didn’t end up finishing his music degree.

Cavan was directionless. He was working at a Ruby Tuesday’s, living in his parent’s basement, and he spent his free time going to band practice and drinking or doing drugs.

He didn’t know who he was.

Cavan’s wake-up call came on Thanksgiving in 2008. He was, of course, drunk when he got into an argument with his Dad. He ended up running outside in a hissy fit and punched a hole through his car window.

When he pulled his bloody arm from the wreckage—he broke down.

That’s when his Aunt told him, “We’ve all fucked up before, too, and you’re at a point where you need to make a decision for yourself—because it’s only up to you.”

Cavan immediately realized he needed to figure out what he was going to do with his life—he needed to work toward something important.

He wanted to make his life better, he wanted to look and feel good, and he didn’t want to embarrass the people he cared about. Those were Cavan’s ‘why’s’ in the beginning.

His ‘why’ has evolved over the years—to now, where he wants to help as many people as possible. In the beginning, though, he really just didn’t want to be a fuck up anymore.

Cavan was presented with the opportunity to play college lacrosse at a small school provided his grades improved and he lost weight, which he did. He ended up graduating with honors a few years later.

Later on, Cavan worked for (and helped build) New York City’s largest CrossFit gym, but was furloughed during the pandemic.

After being furloughed, Cavan decided to go all-in on Hidden Summit, a coaching business that he had started with his brother.

Hidden Summit now has a staff of nearly 30 people and a client roster of approximately 450 people worldwide.

Cavan has come to realize that everything that happened in his life affected him emotionally, and he held on to it. However, if you’re able to push through the dissonance—and not let the things happening around you affect you—you can change your thoughts about who you are and what type of life you can live.

Cavan is the type that likes to push himself and he performs best when his back is against the wall.

He admits that this style is definitely not for everyone, but he is an advocate for taking personal responsibility when it comes to changing your life.

People find reasons to either push themselves or hold themselves back.

Keeping Your Success:

Cavan first makes the point that, “this never ends. Achieving your goal is not the end, it’s an infinite game.”

He says to start slow and pivot as you go because, “if we’re not growing, we’re dying—and if we’re not learning, we’re losing.”

At the age of 22, Cavan just wanted to not weigh 300lbs and not wear 40” pants. Now, he is 36 and his goals have changed considerably—he is running a business and helping other achieve their goals.

Cavan likes to ask his clients what season they are in and as they approach the goal for that season, he has them start to think about where they want to go next so they can plan for that along the way.

Secondly, Cavan says you need to know your ‘why’. He says the ‘why’ is selfish—and that’s okay. He believes that to be selfless you have to be selfish and hold onto your ‘why’.

Cavan helps people do this in two ways—first, it’s organizing your day, creating a ‘Power List’, and figuring out what you can do for yourself today. This doesn’t have to be a huge task.

Next, you have to figure out what’s important to you.

For Cavan, his health, his relationships, his business, and being flexible are all important to him.

Cavan believes that you have to take care of your foundation to maintain success. Your goals can evolve, but to maintain success you need that solid foundation—figuring out your ‘why’, the how, and identifying what’s most important in your life.

Quitting Is Not An Option:

Jared and Cavan both find that many people leave quitting as an option on the table.

For Cavan, as a business owner, quitting is not an option. He does get emotional sometimes—and logic is not the first place his mind goes—but something that has helped him is having a ‘no problems, only solutions’ mindset.

There are a million paths to get to the same destination and, for Cavan, zooming out and looking at his life and thinking about what he can do to move forward in the areas that are important to him is immensely helpful.

Just because you don’t have the answers today, doesn’t mean you won't be able to figure them out.

Cavan says if you want to quit and you “don’t want to do it anymore,” you need to ask yourself why.

Write it out and think through it.

Then, you can go view it through the logical side of your brain—you can see the benefit or downfall of those reasons.

If you do find that it’s something catastrophic, you can find peace and realize that it’s okay.

Cavan recently had an experience in his own life where this process helped him.

A 10-year relationship was ended by his then-fiancée, but through reflection, he was able to realize that they had not been moving forward together, that he had been through more challenging times, and that he was going to be okay.

Jared finds that thinking and reflecting the way that Cavan does is extremely important for personal development, but most people are quick to believe whatever they think—without reflecting on and examining those thoughts.

Cavan says this reflection is a habit—like working out or hitting your protein every day.

Through life, you have the ability to learn that you create your thoughts—good or bad—and ‘good’ or ‘bad’ is a reflection of how you see the world. Nothing is ‘good’ or ‘bad’, it just is.

To change a belief, you have to change your thoughts. It’s more than just affirmations—you have to take action.

If you aren't where you want to be, you have to think about where you want to be, how the person you want to be acts, what they do, and then you have to act.

Cavan leans on gratitude. When he has a hard day, instead of thinking, “How am I going to do this today?” He frames it as, “I get to do this today.”

What’s Next for Cavan:

Cavan is restructuring the team behind Hidden Summit. There has been a lot of growth in the last two years and, currently, Hidden Summit is looking to do what it does even better.

They will also be having a Hidden Summit seminar. This will be the first of many future big events for Hidden Summit.

On a personal note, he will also be traveling with Lacy, his significant other, in addition to training for the next year’s CrossFit Games.

CONNECT WITH CAVAN:

‣ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cavantv_

‣ Website: https://www.hiddensummitgroup.com

‣ Hidden Summit Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hiddensummit_

‣ All Other Links: https://stan.store/hiddensummit

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