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Getting After It
This isn’t just a podcast—it’s a relentless pursuit of growth, grit, and getting after life on your own terms.
Every week, we break down what it takes to push limits, embrace discomfort, and turn ambition into action. This is where wisdom meets execution—because knowledge alone doesn’t cut it. You have to apply, refine, and outwork your own self-doubt to see real results.
We bring on guests from all walks of life—entrepreneurs, athletes, creatives, adventurers—people who have battled through resistance and come out stronger. Their stories aren’t just inspiring; they’re roadmaps for anyone looking to level up.
The mission? To fuel your fire, challenge your thinking, and equip you with the mindset and tools to chase down your biggest goals.
This is Getting After It—not just a podcast, but a movement for those who refuse to settle.
Getting After It
151 - The Marathon of Life: Lessons Beyond the Miles
Running is more than exercise, it’s a teacher.
In this episode, I explore the lessons running offers far beyond the trail: how it strengthens the body, sharpens the mind, quiets the noise of the modern world, and reveals truths about discipline, resilience, and perspective.
I share how running has shaped my everyday life and the way I face challenges. Along the way, we’ll reflect on insights from Stoic philosophers, modern endurance athletes, and thinkers like Chris Williamson, Jocko Willink, and Seneca.
This isn’t just an episode for runners, it’s for anyone seeking a way to face discomfort, train resilience, and reconnect with their inner voice. Because whether your “run” is on the road, in your work, or in your relationships, the lessons are the same: keep going, endure, and find freedom through discipline.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
- Why the physical benefits of running are just the beginning.
- How chosen suffering prepares you for life’s unchosen suffering.
- The role of silence in finding clarity and perspective.
- Life lessons about discipline, resilience, and pushing beyond imagined limits.
Running is a metaphor for life—and the road is always waiting.
–– Keep Getting After It.
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I hope today’s episode sparked something within you to pursue your dreams and unlock your true potential. If you found value in it, consider sharing it with someone who might need that same push.
Getting After It is for those who. want to silence their self-doubt. Refuse to be owned by comfort. Understand their limits are man-made and breakable. We live in a time of constant comparison. Social media drowns us in highlight reels and overnight success stories. But what most people don’t see is the grit behind it all. The reps. The quiet mornings. The sacrifices. The failures.
You are just getting started.
Keep Getting After It.
Welcome back to the getting after a podcast. Everybody, thanks for spending some time with your friend Brett. I know you got a bunch of other stuff that you could be doing, and so it means a lot that you wanted to take some time to hang out with your pal. So thank you, and if you're listening on Spotify or Apple podcasts, if this podcast is helpful at all to you and you feel like you want to leave a rating, that helps and it goes a long way. So thank you for that and excited about today's topic. This is something that I am very passionate about, and I'm sure there's probably a few things that you could guess I'm going to talk about today and you'd probably be right, but I want to talk about something that's been one of my greatest teachers. That's running. And now don't check out if you're not a runner. I don't want you to feel like you have to relate to me as a runner If you're listening to this podcast.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of lessons that I've learned through running that you can apply to other facets of life, and the reason being is because running, at its core, is one of the purest metaphors for life. It really is. You learn a lot about adversity. You learn a lot about pushing your limits. You learn about what it's like to have runs where you just feel like you're dying the whole time and other runs where you're feeling great, just how like in life you sometimes you feel like you're on top of the world. Sometimes you feel like you're rock bottom. Running is almost like life condensed into a very short time, if that makes any sense, and if you're a runner you might relate to that. But I've realized that once you lace up and you're about to go on to a run, if it's in the mountains or if it's on the road, it doesn't matter. You're not just training your legs, you're not training your body, you train your mind and you train your spirit. And if you pay attention, if you listen close enough, you start to hear lessons that go far beyond the trails. You have to take the time to ponder and think when you're running, or you don't have to do that, but for me that is what makes it such a beneficial practice in my life. It gives me great benefits on the physical side of things, but also mentally and emotionally. I feel like it trains me to become a better person. It helps quiet the noise and, like I said, the larger life lessons that carry into kind of everything that I do. So I want to break it down for you all. Not a dance move. I wish maybe I can throw in a clip right here of me dancing. There you go. Didn't think you'd see it in here, did you? Anyways, I want to talk about something very easily understood when you talk about running, and that's what it does to the body, because there's a lot.
Speaker 1:Since I've started running, my endurance has completely transformed. My heart it beats stronger, my lungs have higher capacity and my body has learned to be able to carry me further. What's crazy is this doesn't just show up in my runs, it shows up everywhere. Like I said, with those principles of how it ties into everything I do in my life, like lifting weights. It's not necessarily easier, but I feel like I'm able to go at it longer, like my endurance is higher because I run, because I test myself in this cardiovascular way, not, you know, walking up the stairs. I don't feel winded. Uh, chores around the house go a lot smoother and I have more energy to do those kinds of things because I train my body the way I do, and so that's one thing that I would say is very important about running is it gives me endurance in all things of life. And so you know, you might hear the thing of man. He's a runner, like he must just be so tired all the time. That might be true, physically I might be tired, or mentally I might be tired, but if I didn't run, it would be worse. And because I run, because I train my body the way I do, like I said, I'm able to endure things longer. I'm able to be patient. Uh, running teaches you how to be patient, and sometimes you expect these great big results to happen and it's not until, you know, six months down the road when you finally see it through. Uh, we'll talk more about that in a minute. But, um, one thing I want to talk about with with the body and what running does to the body, is, if you run, if you decide to run, you will learn very quickly how to break your limits. And let me give an example here.
Speaker 1:So when I first ran my first marathon, I first ran my first marathon, when I ran my first marathon, I uh hadn't really trained very long distances to that point. Like, I think the furthest training run I had was 16 miles, so an extra 10 was going to be needed to add onto that. And I do remember after the 16 miles I was beat, like it was tough and I was like I don't even know if I want to do the marathon because I feel trashed right now. But you got to understand that this was the first time I ever ran 16 miles, so of course I was going to feel trashed. My body didn't know how to recover, how to process it, and it wasn't easy. But once I got to that 16 mile mark on race day, it wasn't easy. But once I got to that 16-mile mark on race day, every step after that was a new PR for myself in terms of distance that I've run. And so I was at 16, and I was expecting my body to fully shut down. I was like, okay, this is as long as I've gone before. I don't know what to expect on these next 10 miles, so I'm hoping I'm okay. And then I made it to mile 17,. Made it to mile 18. I had some fueling issues, so around mile 18, I kind of hit a wall, but I still finished the race. I finished that 26.2 miles and, like I said, it was not easy but it was possible.
Speaker 1:And that's when I realized that our limits a lot of the times are not physical, they're mental. We put ourselves in these situations where we expect these certain things to happen. We go for the worst case scenario when we don't have any evidence that that's going to happen in the first place. But when we try and break those limits, when you try and step outside of them by doing things like running further than you've ever have, or maybe it's you're a writer and you maybe just need to sit down and write longer than you ever have, don't get afraid of big goals in front of you. If it's, you know you want to start a business and you're going to have to work harder mentally than you ever had. You can do these things, you can break these limits. Just because you haven't done it yet Doesn't mean you can't do it in the future or do it today, like those limits are all mental and once you see that and once you kind of understand that you have the power to break through these limits, you become someone that you didn't know you could become.
Speaker 1:And it sounds very cliche and self-help like, but there's a reason why cliches stay around it's because there's some truth to it. So I want you to try that. I want you to try and push your limits, to try and see how far you can go. And I do want to mention really quickly, because the body is taxed a lot during running. You use a lot of energy, your muscles get tired, your joints get sore, so there's a lot that your body is requesting you to do, and, especially if you're going up a mountain, you're going to be burning a lot of calories with elevation, whatever it is.
Speaker 1:And so recovery plays a big role in running, and I've learned that listening to your own body is a non-negotiable Like. That is something if I wish I could go back and tell myself earlier when I started. My running journey is not to compare myself to other people who have been doing it much longer than myself on social media. It's to understand that the journey I'm on is my own unique journey and with that, my body is its own unique body. No one else out there has a body like Brett Rossell. I'll tell you that much. I mean look at this, yeah, sexy.
Speaker 1:Anyways, that's the thing is, everyone's recovery needs are going to be different, and so now I'm at the point to where I can run 13 miles or 15 miles and then the next day I'm running again and it's not that big of a deal, but it used to be. I want to make that very clear. That used to be something that was difficult for me, but it's only because I've been consistent and it's only because I've stayed disciplined that now it feels like it's kind of a little easier to keep going. So feels like it's kind of a little easier to keep going. So that's just one thing I want to make sure that you understand is you need to eat whole foods. Comparison is poison. Make sure you're getting a good ratio of protein, carbs and fats. Just the basics.
Speaker 1:And I will tell you this if you ignore your body, it will break down. But if you respect it, it will carry you further than you thought. And I came across this quote from this guy named Emil Zatopek. This is a great quote, but he was known to be the Czech locomotive that's what they called him. And this guy trained in army boots and pushed his body to the extremes like he was nuts. But anyways, he has this quote where he says if you want to win something, run 100 meters. If you want to experience something, run a marathon. So the body is a doorway, but real transformation happens deeper, and I think the reason why marathons are so valuable at least to myself is because it is a chance for you to really see what you're made of, for you to push all that negative self-talk away, to dig deep, to fight when it's hard and to celebrate when you finish. Marathons are not easy, but they're great teachers. They really do help you understand where your weaknesses are, or, if you're going through something, it helps you at least take a moment to pause and think, and that's what we're talking about.
Speaker 1:Next is the mental and emotional benefits that come from running, because for me, running is an outlet. It doesn't necessarily erase your problems Far from it but for me, it gives me space to process them Out. On a run, you can ask yourself what do I want to do today? How do I want to make myself better than I was yesterday? How can I improve my situation? If you're going through something, maybe that's a question you ponder. But don't just have that thought. Really think about it when you ask yourself how do I want this day to go? Well, think about your day. Visualize what you're going to be doing at each hour of the day really get into it, because that's going to help you feel like it's going to go a lot smoother through that day because you already have a plan in your head of how you want it to go.
Speaker 1:And running itself just gives you that chance and that opportunity to really put things aside, because you're not going to be texting, you're not going to be scrolling social media on a run, you're going to be in your head and I think sometimes it's good to not run with music or to run with podcasts or books that help you think about things. But I mean, sometimes music is great, like sometimes I need music to get through. You know, give me that extra pump up to push through. But I really do think that if you treat running as an opportunity to think, you'll start to see it differently. It won't become a chore anymore. It'll become something that you look forward to. At least this is what happens has happened to me. It also makes it easier for me to handle the trials of life, and this is something I've brought up before on this podcast.
Speaker 1:But Chris Williamson's idea of chosen versus unchosen suffering I love this idea and for me running is a chosen suffering Every mile I run on or every mile I do is a voluntary hardship that I'm willing to put myself through. And what has happened to me since I choose to suffer daily is I'm a little more prepared when unchosen suffering arises. So when things don't go my way at work, if something happens in the family, whatever it is, my car breaks down, like I'm a little more able to handle the unchosen suffering. And if you don't understand what I'm trying to say, maybe you need something like that in your life. Maybe you need something that is going to push your limits, to test yourself. That way, when other life challenges come up, you know how to deal with them a little bit better.
Speaker 1:Because every run I do there's always a chance for me to quit, but I tell myself I'm just going to take a few more steps and if I feel this way, maybe I will give into that voice. But that's never the case, because every time I tell myself, hey, let's just go another mile, I'll get that extra mile and those bad thoughts will be left a mile behind and I'm just cruising and then I just try and keep that going. I keep the momentum rolling. That is power, and you can apply that to unchosen suffering in your life Like if you lose your job and now your full-time job is applying to other places or maybe it's. You want to start an idea, then you need to go hard, like send a bunch of applications out, research the companies you're applying to, and then maybe, when you're done, you're tired, you're exhausted. You tell yourself I can do one more because that'll set my odds. Just hey, one more in my favor. So you try and test yourself, you try and push a little bit further than you did in the past and that'll get you in a better place in the future. And so find something that is difficult for you to do.
Speaker 1:I would also say that running almost every time it leaves me sharper mentally. I can think a little bit more clearly, my emotions, they feel lighter. Some people call it a runner's high, but I just think it's satisfaction of my effort really Finishing, even if it's at 50% of my best. It gives me confidence. It proves that I can face the day or prove that I can, you know, push myself when I'm tired Depends on when I'm running that day, but either way, it's always a chance for me to prove to myself that I can show up for what I want, what I'm passionate about and it's hard. But when I first started running I would say I probably ran for the physical benefits of it. But somewhere along the way I understood that running was less about my muscles and my endurance and now it's almost a way for me to think of peace, like have peace of mind. Now I run just as much for my mental health as I do my physical health and it's been quite a blessing for me. I do my physical health and it's been quite a blessing for me.
Speaker 1:But bringing in a quote here, I love this quote from Dean. His name is Karnaziz, dean Karnaziz, but I'm sure you've heard this quote before. But he says run when you can Walk, if you have to Crawl, if you must Just never give up. So for me, running trains my body, but it strengthens my mind and that brings us to something a little bit deeper, which is silence, quieting the noise and quieting your inner voice, especially on a run. That's when it's going to be the loudest is when you're out on the trails and you're going up a hill and that voice in your head is saying why are we doing this? Let's turn around. We can easily do a one 80 and run down this trail, it's a lot easier, but you have to learn. If you have goals to hit certain distances or become the runner that you want to be, you have to learn how to push past those thoughts. And quieting that voice is very difficult in today's world. We have deafening noises from notifications, comparisons, from the demands of our own lives. It's constant and running doesn't erase that noise for me, but it gives you some distance from it to be able to be with your own thoughts.
Speaker 1:And the trails, the mountains have become kind of a sanctuary for myself. Nature has its own quiet. It's beautiful and the trees, the mountains, the sky, the little creeks out there running feels less like exercise and it's more like I'm and it's more like I'm meditating, almost Because you're out in the quiet, you're with your own thoughts and sometimes you have to be disciplined with your thought. But it's peaceful in a way that few things are to me. There's few places in my life that I feel at peace, but one of them is the mountains. Even when I'm, I'm huffing and puffing and I'm I'm struggling to get up a mountain or get up the trail, to keep going. You know there's still a lot of peace about it because I'm out in nature. It's beautiful and At least I'm just by myself.
Speaker 1:Like that is something that is, uh, really meaningful to me as being able to have that time to yourself to think, to decompress in a way like, yes, you are working out, but it's a way for you just to emotionally decompress. You don't have to think about life's challenges, you don't have to think about you know what you're going to be doing. Um, with a certain problem, of course, I think it's. It's important to think about those things when you're running, but you don't have to. It gives you distance from the noise of the world, which I need a lot of the times. Sometimes I bring podcasts, sometimes I bring music, like I said, or audio books.
Speaker 1:But when you are in silence on the trails even if you don't choose to do it often like I don't choose to do it very often but when it's silent, when you don't have anything in your ears, you hear something else. You hear your breathing, you hear your footsteps, you hear your heartbeat sometimes and you hear your thoughts unraveling themselves Like what have you not been thinking about that you probably should be? What have you put aside that you haven't wanted to think about because maybe the idea of it is intimidating. It gives you a chance to step away from life's noises and to think about what's important to you. I wouldn't say that running gives me clarity to every single problem that I have in life. That would be a lie. But it's given me something just as valuable and it's a buffer.
Speaker 1:Like I was saying, you don't have to think about the problems in your life, but at least you have the chance to not think about them. You can be focused a hundred percent on the trails. You want to make sure that your footing is good. You want to make sure that you don't step on a snake or trip over a log. You want to make sure that you're being intentional with every step, and that intentionality brings a sort of presence that's hard to find somewhere else. So I would say, if you struggle with just comprehending the challenges that are in life, maybe just lace up some shoes, leave your phone at home, don't bring any headphones and just walk. If running is not your thing, walking is a great alternative.
Speaker 1:Marcus Aurelius, someone who I always talk about. He even he's an emperor of Rome and he would walk around the palace grounds at dawn, just carving a little solitude for the chaos that was going to come into his day. So if you're a mom, if you're a dad, a parent, if you have huge responsibilities at work, maybe this silence in the morning will become a daily practice that you didn't know you needed and it will help. You see that you can push yourself, that you can in fact handle the day's challenges that are about to come, and it gives you a sense of meditation first thing in the morning. And so I would say, just find ways that you can be alone with your thoughts, to have that silence. Running is a great way to do that, but there's also other ways that you can and other different avenues you can achieve this thing with. So silence is important. You, you should be silent a few times a day and just sit with your thoughts, and for me, running has given me that opportunity. But running has also taught me quite a bit about discipline, resilience and even perspective. Running doesn't just make you fitter or calmer. It teaches you lessons that spill into every corner of your life. So this is where we're going to talk about the more applicable life lessons that we can take from running and put them into our life.
Speaker 1:For example, when I, when I, qualified for Boston. It was one of the hardest runs I've ever done. It was bitterly cold, the rain was pouring down on us, it was February. Um, there were moments where I thought I'd lost the pace, that I needed to finish the race, but I decided I wasn't going to let that slip behind, because I put so much work into this moment that I wanted to go sub three and I was doing well. But I was a little bit behind and so I had to dig deep. In that moment I had to put aside the fact that I was feeling cold, the fact that I was wet, the fact that I was tired and my legs were starting to shake, but I had to keep going. I had to find where that was coming from, where I could find that discipline to push myself, and I did. I decided I wasn't going to waste all that work and so I I really dug as deep as I could and I ran as hard as I could for the remainder of the race. I came in at around two 56 for that time.
Speaker 1:But that day taught me resilience, because resilience doesn't wait for perfect predictions. Wow, let me retry that. That day taught me resilience does not wait for perfect conditions. It shows up precisely when things are not perfect. So that day there were so many things that were wrong. I don't even think I was feeling as good as I should have been on the actual race itself. But I had to learn how to be resilient, how I was going to bounce back, and that lesson has applied into every aspect of my life.
Speaker 1:Career is obviously one easy one that we can all probably relate to a little bit, but being resilient in my career means that in sales you have to be resilient. You're going to be told no a lot. You're going to get told that the timing doesn't work or that they found a competitor that they want to go with instead of you, like. There's so many things that can demoralize you and really break down your spirit to want to go out and try and keep selling to other people, and so you have to learn how to be resilient, how to how to bounce back when things don't typically go your way, or when they don't go your way, because odds are they won't most of the time, and it's important for you to be able to distinguish between when you're feeling hopeless and when you're feeling like you can change your situation. But the work in front of you is intimidating, because a lot of the times we're not hopeless, we're just afraid of the work that we need to do.
Speaker 1:And that's what running has taught me is you can push yourself further than you thought you could. And so whenever I am in that, that down state where I don't feel like things are going my way or I maybe I worked hard on something and it didn't come out to the way that I wanted to, it's in those times when you have to say, hey, I'm going to work as hard as I can to come back. I'll come back from this. I know I can do it. I'm a human being. Humans are resilient. Resilience shows up when conditions are not perfect. That's when you have to be resilient. And running has also redefined discomfort for me. I used to see it as a wall and now I see it as a conversation. I talked about this when Ali was last on the podcast. But discomfort will ask you do you have what it takes to keep on going? And running has shown me that the answer is almost always yes.
Speaker 1:Our limits are imagined and discipline this really might be the greatest gift that running has taught me, because discipline in running isn't isolated. It seeps into everything. It seeps into your work. Like I said, your relationship, your faith, creative projects. Running has shown me that I am someone who can endure, who can go farther, who can keep getting after it when it matters most. And that requires discipline, and it's been one of the guiding principles in my life is discipline. If I know that there's something that needs to be done that's not easy I try and tackle that thing first. I just try and get it out of the way, try and get it done, because I know it needs to be done and that requires discipline a lot of the times.
Speaker 1:But each time you get the opportunity to exercise discipline and I want to make that clear you get the opportunity to exercise discipline. Not a lot of people do, but if you're deciding to go out on a run, be very grateful for that opportunity, because there's people out there who don't have that ability, who might be sick, who might be old, who might not have a body that works as well as yours, and so the opportunity to be disciplined is something you should take and be grateful that you have. Like I said, there's so many others out there who don't have that opportunity and you do, so make the most of it, and I know it's hard. But that perspective change will help you at least understand that discipline is not the enemy here. Discipline is going to get you to where you want to go, but it's not going to be a comfortable journey. It almost never is a comfortable journey, and that's fine. You should expect that. But don't expect yourself to be able to go do something once and have the ability to go do it again. No, every time I run it requires discipline to get started. Even on days when I'm tired, you still have to have that discipline. But you will quickly learn that you can apply that discipline to every facet of your life and you'll become a person that you didn't think you would be.
Speaker 1:I'm not saying this because I think it's it's a nice thing to say. I'm saying this because I think it's it's a nice thing to say. I'm saying it because I think it's true, because I think if you apply yourself in one area so aggressively and so dedicated to this pursuit of running or whatever other thing you can insert there, you're going to learn things that can apply to other areas of your life. Like that is why getting after is so important to me, not because it's some nice thing that I say getting after it is not a nice thing that's supposed to be written on t-shirts and or put on your wall Like, obviously it's a. It's a nice phrase getting after it. But getting after it is a blessing. It's an opportunity to be able to test yourself. It's an opportunity to be able to see what you're capable of doing, what your potential is in this life.
Speaker 1:And it's all through doing small, disciplined decisions every single day. And they can be small, disciplined decisions, like it doesn't have to be some huge, drastic change you make overnight. In fact, I would argue the smaller ones are what make that lasting, large change, because consistency compounds and the smaller you can have your habit, or the the most basic way that you can have your your habit. Be like, if it's just you're going to run a mile a day, if that's your goal, then you do that. You show up every single day because you have the opportunity to run one mile every day and when that voice in your head says, hey, this sucks, this is hard, you need to tell that voice to shut up. And you need to tell that voice, hey, this is a gift, this is a blessing. I'm going to make the most of it, you'll be able to see that perspective switch and that change.
Speaker 1:And, like Jocko always says, discipline equals freedom. When you start living it, you will begin to see it everywhere. It's not some nice thing that I'm telling you. I believe this to be true. If you're disciplined in all aspects of your life, you will be free from so many things. You'll be free from obesity, from financial issues, from relationships that are damaged by ego. Take ownership of all these things. You're the one that can control them. It's not your wife, it's not your husband, it's not your parents. It's you. You have your own destiny in your own hands and you have the decision. You have the opportunity to figure out what you want to do with it. It's all on you.
Speaker 1:I want to leave you with this, because running isn't just about running. It's about life to me, and it strengthens your body, it clears your mind, quiets the noise and it teaches you lessons that ripple into everything that you do. You don't have to be a runner to take these lessons. Maybe for you, it's lifting could be writing, painting, painting, parenting, building a business. The point is you need to find, whatever your run is, find the thing that pushes you find the thing that humbles you and teaches you, because in the end, that's really what runner running is. For me, it's a teacher, it's a mirror, it's guide, and the road is always waiting for me. The trails are calling my name. Whatever that thing is for you, find it and hold on to it, because that is a gift. Finding whatever passion you have is a gift. It might take some experimentation, you might have to get out of your comfort zone, but that's what life's about. It's not about sitting in your comfort zone all the time. You're meant to grow, you're meant to become better, you're meant to become stronger and you're meant to get after life.
Speaker 1:I firmly believe that If today's episode resonated with you at all, I'd encourage you not just to listen to it, but to apply it. Lace up your shoes, go out on a run, test what I'm talking about. See if it resonates with you at all. If it's not running, maybe it's go for a bike ride. Whatever it is, do something that's uncomfortable to you, because the lessons are out there and they're waiting for you to claim them. So I appreciate you guys for listening to today's episode. Running is very important to me. It's taught me a lot. It's made me a better person, and I know I can do the same for you. Start slow, but get after it and, as always, keep getting after it. Thanks, guys.