Burnt lobster skin, pot belly, beer in hand

Jonathan Goodman
Aug 23, 2017 · 4 min read

The scene is vivid, scarred into my memory.

It was my first winter away. Working on my computer in a Starbucks as whales swim in the ocean in front of me at the Marriott Hotel in West Kaanapali in Maui, a man approached:

“What’s the deal?” He said.

–He was a tourist. You know the type: burnt lobster skin, pot belly, and omnipresent beer in hand. He continued:

“I’ve been here for 4 days and every day I see you sitting in the same spot on your computer. It’s vacation pal. Take it easy and don’t work so hard.”

–I thank him. He leaves. Two days later we meet eyes again. He let’s out a guffaw upon seeing me, sips a beer, and continues walking.


It was 2013 and I had just made a scary decision to stop personal training.

Training was my career. The only one that I’d known.

My clientele was steady, I loved the job, and money was good enough for the time being. But still, I always knew that training clients in a gym was going to be hard in the long-run. Early mornings, late nights, and never being in control of my schedule or destiny.

–Is this what my life is going to be like?

Maybe one day I’d want to have kids (foreshadowing) or travel a lot?

Still, My in-person training was steady and it was safe and leaving it was scary.

Sometimes you need to do the scary things.

Flash forward to today. It’s 6am right now and I’m writing this to you in the hotel lobby of the Bahia Principe resort in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. It’s my sister’s 40th birthday so Alison and I surprised her and her family, showing up to greet them at dinner on their first night with my baby boy, Calvin.

I woke up early to write this to you.

Once done I’ll do one last check of the upcoming Highly Wealthy Online Trainer two-book limited edition box set before giving the OK to print. (It’ll be available in 2 weeks.) I set my alarm on vacation not because I had to, but because I wanted to. The lobby was empty this morning except for one guy that looks like he is still passed out from maybe enjoying himself a bit too much from last night.

–“¿Dónde puedo conseguir un café con azúcar por favor?” I ask the lobby attendant in my cave-man Spanish where I can get a coffee. He hears me butcher Spanish and responds in English. Figures.

The attendant tells me that I’m too early and have to wait 30 minutes for the first restaurant to open. Too early for coffee … that’s a first.

You ever been so excited to work that you were too early for coffee? (That’s a good name for a self-help book …)

Seth Godin in Tribes wrote,

It’s four a.m. and I can’t sleep. So I’m sitting in the lobby of a hotel in Jamaica, checking my e-mail.

A couple walks by, obviously on their way to bed, having pushed the idea of vacation a little too hard. The woman looks over to me and, in a harsh whisper a little quieter than a yell, says to her friend, “Isn’t that sad? That guy comes here on vacation and he’s stuck checking his email. he can’t even enjoy his two weeks off.”

I think the real question — the one they probably wouldn’t want to answer — was, “Isn’t it sad that we have a job where we spend two weeks avoiding the stuff we have to do fifty weeks a year?”

It took me a long time to figure out why I was so happy to be checking my e-mail in the middle of the night. It had to do with passion. Other than sleeping, there was nothing I’d rather have been doing in that moment.”

Getting close to the end here, people are beginning to mill about, reserving chairs with their towels on their way to breakfast.

Truth is: I’m writing this to you because I want to. And that’s the point.

My goal is not to help you do less work, it’s to help you find the work that you love without sacrificing spending time with the people that you care for.

Online training is the first step and who knows, maybe one day you’ll be lucky enough to have a burnt-to-a-crisp lobster-tourist with potbelly and beer in hand tell you to ‘take it easy and not work so hard.’

Please send me an email when it happens to you.

-Coach Jon

P.S. This story is a bit personal but really the only place where I share personal stuff is on Instagram, so feel free to join me there and when you do, be sure to say hi. (Instgram tag: Jonathan_goodman101 or here’s the link: https://www.instagram.com/jonathan_goodman101/)

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Jonathan Goodman

A nomadic family man running an international education company for fit pros. www.theptdc.com, @jon_ptdc

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