Getting moving this winter to improve your mental health

Our defending champion of upbeat and movement Victor Brick returns to discuss tough Ravens losses, huge Orioles changes and getting a strategy to improve your mental health and live a happier more productive life this year.

SPEAKERS

Victor Brick, Nestor J. Aparicio

Nestor J. Aparicio  00:01

Welcome home we are wn S T A in 1570, Towson, Baltimore and Baltimore positive. We’re doing the coolest thing that I think we’ve ever done next week we’ve done 27 radio rows from Super Bowl. We’ve never done a crabcake row next week. We’re doing five consecutive days. We’re gonna kick this thing off right here because this guest was out of town. He couldn’t come join us. We’re trying to get to 100 charities next week about 60 or 70. signed up. We’re doing nine to five live radio beginning on Monday at the new fade these Tuesday will be at cost the seven Dundalk I’m wearing the shirt today. Wednesday will be Coco’s laurelville. Thursday, we moved to State Fair in Catonsville then on Friday, all day long at Pappas in Cockeysville. Raising awareness for 100 different charities but more than that, we’re offering you because we didn’t make the Super Bowl, we’re offering you a cup of soup or bowl of soup. In exchange for some goods for the Maryland Food Bank. We’re going to be raising food donations for the Maryland Food Bank all next week. It is crabcake row featuring charities featuring friends out in the community. This guy knows about that, because I invited him next week. He’s like, Well, I got this place down in Miami now and my daughter’s out on the West Coast. And oh, and we’re opening places in Australia, Victor brake is always jet setting or ravens games or whatnot. Certainly, he and Linda keep a home here, but you’re out on the road. And I’m sorry, I couldn’t have you’re expected to be in Las Vegas next week. Let’s be honest. That was the plan.

Victor Brick  01:23

Oh, I had not only had I booked flights, I had rooms and I had invited a bunch of friends. I was ready to park. And I certainly was expected to be there and had put my money where my mouth was. So matter of fact, you just reminded me I hope I cancelled those rooms. They weren’t I had

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Nestor J. Aparicio  01:40

I had to cancel Luke’s room the other day too. And I’m like, Yeah, you know, like before we get to John W break and everything. It’s going to break bodies. Everything’s going to plan a fitness. We appreciate the partnership, I invited you for the charity thing, but I I really didn’t expect that these were gonna be giant purple pep rallies, you know, I want to do this every year and get and I thought what better way to kick it off to Lamar at the Super Bowl. We’re here we’re doing all this awesome stuff by Friday at Pappus. It’s gonna be 1000 people there. Man it happens quick swimming. Look, your daughter played sports, you plan your sports family, you know, from the Orioles in October it ends very, very abruptly. But when it ends and you’re expected to win, I don’t know that we’ve we’ve been at this a long time three decades being fast. I don’t mean playoff games, we really got on the bus with Joe Flacco and thought we can’t lose. There was a feeling we can’t lose this year.

02:26

Oh, they before the kickoff. And you know, we got a sweet Raven state and we had a 40 they only give you 24 tickets, then you got to pay for as part of the deal. And then you got to pay for x’s we had 47 People in the suite. For some people in our suite.

Nestor J. Aparicio  02:43

Bathroom. No still one.

02:46

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But anyway, one of the kids, one of the kids, one of my son’s friends came up to me he goes, I heard where somebody said that we have one of the best teams in the history of the NFL. And I said to him, I think we do. I said Did I still think we do we just didn’t play live chat, unfortunately.

Nestor J. Aparicio  03:01

Yeah, it’s it’s a it’s such a downer for the community in a lot of ways. And you know, I always say we do purple group therapy here for a little while. Then historical thing happens, like Tuesday night, clearly orchestrated clear. They were putting this they put $1.7 billion deals don’t come together overnight. And certainly, when your thoughts on that, because you’ve been here a long time you watch a lot of losing baseball, you know, of my relationship with Mr. Angeles, and many others, that the fact that there’s going to be rush oxygen, you know, for the city for baseball for the brand. You know, this is obviously overdue, but welcomed, welcomed.

03:40

Definitely. Well, I have always been one that has said always, never give up on the franchise. Look at the Red Sox 88 years 78 Well, how many years they were and now yeah, they had a down season last year. But let’s face it, they’re in the upper echelon and a ton of wood for World Series. And they’ve won more World Series in the 2000s. I looked it up the other day, more World Series in the 2000s than any other team. So you know, before you know it, the franchise, whoever it is gets back on track gets it right. And all that bashing you did and all that naysaying and all that heartbreak and disappointment is replaced with dancing in the streets. Ravens are a quality franchise. We have won two roles. It’s not like we’re Detroit. What’s that, that the six years and never won when Cleveland and there was a couple of guys still out there. And we’re going to come back and we’re going to end the Orioles have a history and we take great pride in that. And let’s hope that they build on last year success and I think the thing that was the undoing of both the Orioles and the Ravens was lack of experience. Let’s face it, the Orioles rolling into the playoffs were on paper one of the favorites but they just didn’t have the experience. They were a young team and it kind of showed Texas had that experience and you know now all of a sudden year older a year you’re wiser and we’re looking for great things and that’s what the that’s the great things about spooler It’s get them next year. Yeah, it’s that famous line. But guess what? It’s it’s life, isn’t it? You just get them next year. What do we all going to do? Just stop rootin and mope around the whole time now we move on to the next sport, or the next season and I’m looking forward to the next sport, which is how you like I actually funny because couple of my buddies that especially out of towners were literally texted me condolences about the ravens, and I would text back how you liked them. Oh, yeah. Well, we

Nestor J. Aparicio  05:30

have two seasons here. For anybody our age, I mean, the Orioles and the Colts before that really set up a lineage and apart where sports matters more here than it does in other places. And I think we take it much more personally. We lost Brooks Robinson last year, right? Like the athletes of our youth cow is in this ownership group. Every person I’ve talked to today has at least mentioned that that there’s a level of confidence that cow wouldn’t get in business with Mr. Angeles he got in business when he got in business with this group, because it feels like the right thing to do. And to your point. It’s it’s a dormant brand. And I said that for that it has all the assets that our community has has the stadium has the freeway has a fan base has a history, we get to play the Yankees and the Red Sox. I mean, I I everybody believes it can be turned around quickly from a brand standpoint.

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06:26

Well, I’ll tell you how much I believe in the O’s. And the Ravens for that matter is that Planet Fitness my planet is good sponsors both teams now it’s easy with the Ravens. They’ve been in the upper echelon, the NFL forever, but they always have not been. And all of a sudden we went from Why are you sponsoring the other stuff? You’re sponsoring the O’s? Right and for looking for a big bang for our buck,

Nestor J. Aparicio  06:47

you might need 47 seats in at Sky box. Victor Breck is here I brought you on to talk John W brick and obviously, brick body, first of all, as a family as your wife and how’s everybody because I can’t live on at some point. She used to be the famous one, you know,

07:00

she is still the famous one for sure. i That’s why I tried to do these that are because she outshines me when when we were on together. But she’s doing great, you know, Vicki’s got some health problems, but we’re working through those and it’s, you know, the challenge whether she has cancer, you know that right?

Nestor J. Aparicio  07:17

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I didn’t know that. And I, my heart to you. And I know, this has been a multiple time struggle, much like my wife’s was a decade ago. She’s in the other room doing great. There’s hope. I mean, modern science is amazing.

07:28

Yeah, of course, your wife and Vic are pals and they shares support each other. And you know, it’s a daily challenge, but it’s kind of like, kinda like professional sports. What are you gonna do? You put pads on and show up for the next game?

Nestor J. Aparicio  07:40

That’s what you do. She’s an athlete. So she knows the fight. Yeah, exactly.

07:44

So we’re blessed. And we were thankful for our many blessings. And we’re doing great, thanks. Thanks for that

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Nestor J. Aparicio  07:53

heart up there in the corner. So I’m doing you know, I was thinking about the radio row week. And I, every time I would go out to the Super Bowl, wherever it was, yeah, Joe Montana would sit down or somebody famous or whatever, they would always have a cause. They would always say I’m here on behalf of this sponsor, that you doing this good turn for kids, for pets for the world, in a way. And I thought, well, this is something we should do with radio. And it was things like and I’ve had you on multiple times, most charities I did a whole community charity series that Bill coal and coal roofing sponsored years ago to start this thing, tell everybody about John W. Brooke has a mental health awareness. And I think we all slip from time to time. I mean, I’ve had my own struggles, through time saying, Do I want to be here? How much do I want to be your course I want to be here. But we all have those moments. And and you have a family story of that’s a sad story. But you’re trying to pick this up and say, we deal with things differently than we used to in regard to mental health. And that the awareness of that even the 988 number, the things that we can do to take care of each other.

08:54

Well, we believe London myself believe ultimately, very strongly, and that ultimately you will be judged by what you give back to society. Ultimately, you’ll be judged by what you give back to society. We own 100 health clubs 20 in Australia, 80. In the United States, we got well over 1000 people working for us 700,000 members around the world, we’re not going to be remembered for that. Hopefully, we’ll be remembered for the John W brick Mental Health Foundation, and the dent that it put in the universe for mental well being. And it all started with my brother John, my older brother who suffered and schizophrenia his entire life has never once put on all the best hospitals in the world and treatment in the world that never wants to be put on a fully integrated program that includes such things as exercise nutrition, in mind body practices, as well as the traditional big three, you know what the big three are in the treatment of mental illness, psycho analysis, medication institutionalization. And to a great extent unfortunately, they’re still the big three. We’re trying to change that what we’re trying to do with the John W, brick mental health and lesion in John ultimately died from complications of the disease with schizophrenia itself is not terminal, we believe that it was the medication that simply wore out his body. And he needed medication. I’m not anti medication. But I think it could have been a much better integrated program. That’s we’re about integration of lifestyle, self care practices and the traditional medical practices. So the mission is to have salutogenic, which means holistic, self care approaches such as exercise, nutrition, and mind body practices, integrated into the treatment of mental illness and the promotion of mental well being. So even if you don’t have a, quote, mental illness, you certainly can maintain or improve your mental well, being who can’t be happier, who can’t feel better, who doesn’t have times of have good good feelings in times of difficult struggles with mental or with your, your emotions. And this was all that this foundation was started with years ago, but really has started to gain momentum because of COVID. And COVID basically pushed the entire society not just in the US but worldwide into a mental health pandemic. And they literally the medical profession refers to it as a pandemic. Why because pecks 40 to 50% of the population is struggling with some sort of mental well being and mental health issue. The thing is that not only everybody knows about the metal pandemic mental health pandemic, what a lot of people don’t realize is that we’re in the middle of a the beginning, the beginning of a mental health Renaissance, a rebirth, where people are starting to consider other ways of treating emotional well being and mental health issues other than the big three. And that’s where we come in to John W. Brick Mental Health Foundation. So that’s it in a nutshell, as far as what we’re doing. Now, originally, we started as a Research Foundation, we’re going to do these studies with Hopkins and universe California, Santa to San Francisco and substantiate the benefits of movement, exercise, nutrition and Mind Body practices, and how they affect well being and mental health. But there’s so much out there already. That shows that that what we’re really focusing on now and we’re getting ready to launch in March, and it’s so appropriate, we’re on this show, because in March, we will issue we will launch the first ever first ever nationwide in universal never been done before. fitness professionals mental wellbeing certification, so we’re going to certify fitness professionals, I don’t just mean trainers and aerobic instructors, I mean people in the fitness industry, people at the recreation centers and young college universities and fitness, anybody that has anything to do with fitness on mental wellbeing, and we’re going to follow that certification up with a k a primary certification for teachers, administrators, people in the primary k one through five, we’re going to follow that up with a secondary six through 12. And then follow that up with a higher education. So we’re going to come up with a series of certifications, we’re gonna have one for first responders, it’s endless and what we’re basically going to do is teach people how to employ self care approaches not psychoanalysis, not medication, that’s the health profession, but how you can take care of yourself better and make your your me become more resistant to life’s challenges and how you can help the people you serve such as members and health club students in the classroom. Family friends so that’s why wasn’t

Nestor J. Aparicio  13:47

a class at Dundalk high. I don’t know where you went to high school where we can sign up for I’ll have mental health for second period today. And we’ll talk about being happy and things that make us happy and why it makes us happy and and do some self actualization. Folks don’t do that. And in the case of for your brother and for John and by the way, Victor brick is here. On behalf of the John W brick Foundation, we’re talking all things mental health and the schizophrenia piece of that. I we were talking about the 70s the 80s we were going back that far where you’re diagnosed with I mean, I guess they made One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest my famous movie right? In regard you’re diagnosed with it, it was thought to be terminal right? Like he’s not just what we would say you’re not and we can’t fix that. We got to give him a pill and put him in a rubber room and exactly that. That is that’s that’s it’s dangerous. It feels like it’s futile colony stuff. It feels like it’s not in any way the way it ought to be. And I would think take this pill and I think I’ve told you this my my father’s sister, my aunt, my pop sister, not not blood, but through adoption, had some serious and I didn’t understand it was 1970s she had little red pill she He took when she took them. She was kind of okay. Not normal, but okay. And then when she didn’t take them, it was, it was a very bad scene for our family. And she lived with us. And, you know, so I grew up in this state where I was around someone that I would say 50 years later probably had some schizophrenia or some some issues. I, this person I’m talking about was institutionalized and was out of an institution. And my father felt that he needed to care for her. So I grew up in and I don’t know that I’ve ever told you that, but no notion of schizophrenia at that point was take a pill and keep them away from people. Right. And they didn’t know anything else. How is that? Vickers, your brother was here right now, what? And diagnoseable? My brother, my child, anyone? What do we do in 2024 when someone like your brother is a current case?

15:51

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Well, I have a concrete example of that because I have another brother, my younger brother that suffers from schizophrenia exactly what my older brother gets suffered from. And when my mother and father both passed within six months of each other, we gave my brother six months to live there. We felt there was no way that we he would survive after his caregivers had gone, but he was living in their house and didn’t want to move out. So we got a full time caregiver. And then we had made a promise to my mother Mom will take care of about. So we started to get him involved in the things we knew he needed to do to have a fighting chance. My brother Mara wanted to buy him a bike so he could ride I said, No, Mara, we’re buying him two bikes and you’re riding with him. My brother would call me back. I said, How you doing Bob? Good. veck wrote a mile today. That was 10 years and 60 pounds ago. He’s had a job for 10 years. He is flourishing. We got rid of the housekeeper after six months. We got him we got the the the butter sandwiches, not peanut and peanut butter, butter sandwiches off his menu, we got the beer out of refrigerator. We took him to the meals, we took him to church, we rode bikes with them, we took them to Planet Fitness, we took him to his job. We did all the things, but we did it with him. Unlike with John, we made the mistake of telling John, you should do this. John, you should do that. John had schizophrenia he wasn’t capable of following a schedule with Bob, we made it fun, Bob, let’s go bowling. Bob, let’s go play tennis. Bob, let’s go to dinner tonight. And we’d make sure it was a healthy dinner. And 610 years later, my parents passed 10 years ago, he’s going on 11. He’s living in the same house by himself. And he’s happy and he’s productive. And he’s well adjusted. He’s still on his medication. Don’t get me wrong. This is not alternative. It’s integrative. He has an acute illness, and he needs his medication. If you don’t have an acute in those, you may not need any medication, you might have just been struggling because of your lifestyle, didn’t have goals, didn’t know how to handle stress, didn’t know how to didn’t have a network engaged in destructive activity like smoking and over consumed consumption of alcohol. And you get a family behind you a support system doing the right things, then if it’s really lifestyle, it’s causing your mental well being issues, you could be totally dependent on pharmaceuticals. So

Nestor J. Aparicio  18:35

we all need a support support system to some degree,

18:37

I think, to some degree, the exactly that’s the point. Well, and I

Nestor J. Aparicio  18:42

so for anyone that wants to get involved with what you’re doing, obviously Victor Briggs and all the Planet Fitness and Brick Bodies, you know, but the John W brick foundation and things you’re doing the basic advice if you’re just giving the five sense speech to folks about their mental health, and if they’re struggling, not just the 988 number, but if they want to do something, I know you’re going to talk about movement. I know that that’s, that’s so important to you. And it’s something all of us can do even if it’s just walking from here to there. I’ve even gotten to the point I live on a two floor for the first time and since I was a boy, I have two floors, I lived in a condo forever. I will literally just go up and down the steps to get one little item just to make the movement because I realized living out in the county I’m not moving as much as I was when I lived downtown and I moved around. I need to move more now I’m doing yoga, I’m involved with Planet Fitness. I’ve been out to the Reisterstown I’ve seen the the black card I’ve seen the massage tables. I’ve seen the pod that’s a wellness pod where you sort of work your way into getting yourself ready or wind down. You guys are doing a whole lot more even with Planet Fitness than just Nautilus equipment and there’s the treadmill and there’s the TV and sweated out as a towel. There’s a whole integrated part to what you’ve taken a lot what you’ve done with John W breaking Planet Fitness is involved in that as well.

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19:59

Oh god I believe literally, literally globally as a country as a company, but here’s the advice I would give the antibody, and that is every single day, regardless get a dose of happiness. And the dose DLSE of happiness stands for the hack for happy hormones that are released when you get 30 to 45 minutes of moderate to vigorous activity. And those four hormones, the DOS, the D stands for dopamine. The O stands for oxytocin. The S stands for serotonin, and the E stands for endorphins, look it up google it, Google happy hormones, they will list those four hormones, and they are all released with moderate to vigorous activity, a 30 minute walk after dinner. If you’re going to walk your dog, don’t let your dog walk you, you walk that dog and get a moderate moderate amount of movement to get your dose of happiness. And most people you have what’s called this positive stress. Most people don’t get enough stress or they get too much stress. So that is not productive. Not enough stress is walking 20 minutes at a very low pace with your dog stopping every three minutes. And you basically get nothing out of it other than the joy of walking your jog which is beneficial but you’re not getting that dose of of happiness. Too much stress. Best example Simone Biles greatest athlete in the world. Too much stress placed on even her world champion, and she suffered a breakdown. Now, how many people know because we met some of miles at a recent conference. How do people know that the last World Championships, she had the highest score ever in the all round and his back as the world’s greatest gymnast, because she learned how to cope with that stress. You want to be in this positive stress and every day, stretch your body just a little bit and benefit from that dose of happiness. So that would be my biggest thing. And here’s the thing. What do you do? Whatever you’ll stick with, remember what I said about Bob that

Nestor J. Aparicio  22:09

I like hot yoga. That’s my thing. I like to I like a mat. I like quiet. I like bonding everything. Only Follette, Bob

22:15

likes bowling. And Bob likes tennis so we get him out with bowling tennis. And I already told him he likes riding his bike. So here’s what we do. We ride his bike. We ride it up to the coffee shop because he likes his coffee. So he’s riding his bike. He’s going to get a coffee. How’s it going? Right back? I got my coffee today. Yeah, to ride two miles to get the coffee two miles back. Got the dog got

Nestor J. Aparicio  22:37

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the food when the bell rang, so I didn’t go. Exactly. Hey, it’s always great. You made me smile you give me Yeah, I mean, well, I probably smile because yours is gonna be under not because I’m thinking about the Ravens right now. So you at least got me out of the doldrums got me where I’m going. I’m glad things are going well for you. And I’m sorry you can’t make it next week. But this is sort of the kickoff for John W brick. foundation can be found JW brick foundation. That’s correct. that.org. John, John W brick foundation.org. Correct.

23:07

You got it down to make sure I get it right.

Nestor J. Aparicio  23:09

I’m not reading it. Remember it off short memory. And anything you want to say about PF? Because I mean, I know

23:15

you’re really been Have you been in the Planet Fitness lately? Yeah.

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Nestor J. Aparicio  23:20

I went four months ago to the new Reisterstown Road.

23:26

You gotta come down, right? We raised the sounds don’t phenomenal, by the way. But and if you’re up that way, that’s your club. But if you get a chance to go to the flagship, the big club off of Madonia Road, we’ve put in a recovery center with the things that you’re talking about. We’ve put in a pure raw juice, which is a local provider, I think a Maryland University Maryland guys spend civics. And that club has without a doubt the best functional training of any club I’ve ever seen anywhere in the world. And I travel all over the world. It is really our, our pride and joy. It’s all Vic’s creation and I go in there and and I keep keep trying to do more than I’m capable. Because everybody else in here is just going to town. And it’s great. But I gotta tell you this talking about Lynne, you have to get lean on to take everybody through laugh yoga. She just got certified and laugh yoga. laugh Yeah. laughter yoga and laugh.

Nestor J. Aparicio  24:24

I got one yoga know about that goat yoga. I’ve done yoga with kangaroos, I guess

24:30

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is beyond that. It’s beyond that. And Nesta, you would excel and you probably did a B plus not about an A but a B plus with laughter yoga. And she just got certified with a master’s originator, the program from India. And the thing about laughter. You get this exactly what it says it is this last yoga. It’s not so much the poses of a yoga but it’s laughter with its own movements. But the thing about laughter whether it’s real or fake, you get the exact same result your body doesn’t know Oh, so you get this uplifting you’ve heard laughter is the best medicine it really is why? Because it gives you the for happy hormones it gives you the dopa happiness. So anyway the next time you we get on either just her or both of us. You gotta let her turn you on the left yoga my friend.

Nestor J. Aparicio  25:16

Well I’m gonna let her come on at some point here. We’ll get with it. You know what, after the Super Bowl, I’ll circle back with y’all. I’ll give you a little little tally on how we deal with our cup of Super Bowl. So Maryland crab cream of crab I know you’re healthy sorts you eat

25:29

big time. Are you kidding me? Big time. Yeah, I am healthy. But I enjoy myself and I enjoy good food. Good company. Good wine. Good times. And I am not one of these purists. Why bother why worked out and do everything you can and you can I live down here in Miami and you guys promised everybody listen here’s travel and they say Maryland this Maryland that now rain in Maryland don’t do doesn’t stack Stone

Nestor J. Aparicio  25:57

crabs don’t don’t they don’t they don’t think the brick is here Planet Fitness John W brick foundation you go to John W brick foundation.org and find out all the things they’re doing their big news in March little becoming in a couple of weeks. Appreciate you Vic take care of you. So next time I see you will be in the winner’s circle and opening day. Yeah man you got it. Victor break joining us here I am Nestor we are wn st am 1570, Towson Baltimore and we never stop talking Baltimore positive