Unbreakable Mind & Body

Strangers to Family: The Magic of Power Monkey Camp

• Tiana Gonzalez • Episode 41

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Have you ever found yourself yearning for an experience that challenges you physically while simultaneously nourishing your soul? Something that takes you away from the daily grind and drops you into a community of like-minded individuals who quickly become family? That's exactly what I've found at Power Monkey Fitness Camp, and in this episode, I'm pulling back the curtain on why I'm about to return for my ninth visit.

Tucked away in the woods of Tennessee, about two hours from Nashville, Power Monkey brings together people from across the globe—from fitness beginners to professional athletes, from studio owners to weekend warriors. 

 No matter your background or fitness level, you'll find yourself immersed in a supportive environment where vulnerability becomes strength and strangers become lifelong friends.

The week unfolds through rotating sessions - all taught by world-class coaches. But what happens between those sessions might be even more valuable: spontaneous games, fireside conversations, and the kind of genuine human connection that's increasingly rare in our digital world. 

By the end of the week, the transformation is palpable. People who arrived as strangers are in tears at the thought of leaving their newfound family. It's an investment that pays dividends far beyond improved fitness, offering a reminder of what it means to play, to connect, and to grow together. 

Whether you're seeking professional development, community, or simply a reset, I invite you to consider what Power Monkey might offer you on your journey toward an unbreakable mind and body.

Check out the Camp Details here: https://www.powermonkeycamp.com/ 

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Disclaimer: This show is for education and entertainment purposes only. This is not intended as a replacement for therapy. Please seek out the help of a professional to assist you with your specific situation.


Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Unbreakable Mind and Body podcast. I am your host, tiana Gonzalez, a multi-passionate, creative storyteller and entrepreneur with a fierce love for movement. This is our space for powerful stories and actionable strategies to help you build mental resilience and elevate your self-care practice. Together, we will unlock the tools that you need to create an unbreakable mind and body.

Speaker 2:

Welcome back to the show. I am your host, tiana, and on this episode I want to share with you my experiences with Power Monkey Fitness Camp. Now I have done an episode regarding camp previously and if I'm being fully transparent with you which I always am I wasn't in love with that episode. The way that the narrative unfolded and, as I went back and listened to it a few times, to me my previous camp episode kind of feels like not my best work and for some reason I struggled piecing it together, trying to fit in all of the juicy details, the things that connect us, why we come together twice a year in Tennessee, and so on and so forth. So this is going to be my second take, sharing with you my experiences at Power Monkey Fitness Camp. Like sharing with you my experiences at Power Monkey Fitness Camp, if you follow me on social media then you know that I've been there many times and at the time of this recording I am preparing to return to camp for my ninth time in a couple weeks. Super exciting, and it's really a privilege to be there. So let's talk about camp. Power Monkey Fitness Camp is a fitness retreat. It's a week-long experience in the middle of the woods on a beautiful piece of property about an hour and 45 minute drive, close to two hours away from the city of Nashville, and the area is Lake Francis and the closest town is a small town called Crossville. Super fun experience. It's basically a property that is a sleepaway camp for young gymnastics athletes, and they do these intensive experiences throughout the year. Obviously, during the summertime, when school is not in session, they're very busy at the camp, and then throughout the year, there are some special experiences, such as Power Monkey. Now, power Monkey has a long history in the world of functional fitness, better known or more widely known as CrossFit, but it's so much more than that. And no, not everyone who attends camp or who works at camp or who shows up as a camper is someone who does functional fitness. As a camper is someone who does functional fitness. In fact, we have a ton of people who come for all sorts of reasons that vary. Perhaps they want to meet new people, perhaps they want to open their own boutique studio, perhaps they want FaceTime with the incredible staff and coaches that are present and engaged. And the really fun thing about the whole experience is there's plenty of time for play, there's time for exploration, there's time for learning. There's opportunity to get your continuing education credits if you are a fitness professional and that is something. If you're not, in the fitness industry as a trainer and a coach, you do need to maintain current accreditation to keep your certification status. So that is something that's really powerful and it's helpful to be able to not only get your requirements completed in one week, but also to have fun doing it.

Speaker 2:

Now, within the world of CrossFit better termed functional fitness, because CrossFit is a brand functional fitness there's 10 major modalities and I'm not going to bore you with all the details, but here's the high level. We have different aspects of the sport and for someone who's a beginner or perhaps very experienced in one type of sport or fitness, you may need help in the other areas. So there is gymnastics related work, such as working on your handstands. There's ring work. There's bar work, where you're hanging from a pull-up bar. There is also weightlifting, so you would have the clean and jerk the snatch. There is also rowing, running and, of course, you want to work on your mobility. So the week is spent tapping into all these different corners of the functional fitness realm, and everyone's at a different level.

Speaker 2:

The beautiful thing about it is this whole experience is?

Speaker 2:

It's a complete journey, from the start to finish.

Speaker 2:

It's a group of strangers.

Speaker 2:

Many don't know each other. Many are coming for the first time and, believe it or not. There are a ton of return campers, but there are so many people who come together and it's a little scary. It's like when you were in kindergarten or first grade and it's your first day of school. And you are kindergarten or first grade and it's your first day of school and you are excited and nervous. You're not sure what to expect. You've only heard about things. Maybe you've seen content on social media or you've heard other people talk about their experiences at camp, and now you're here for the first time and it's an opportunity to meet new people and to be vulnerable and to explore, to try something new, to remember what it's like to play, to connect with people, to break bread with people that maybe you've only ever seen on the internet that you have looked up to. There are people who are professional athletes, we have influencers, we have people who have owned multimillion dollar companies, and at camp everyone is equal and it's a really beautiful thing. So I'm going for the ninth time and I have to tell you that every time camp is approaching, it's a time that I'm filled with excitement and a little bit of anxiety, there's a little bit of stress.

Speaker 2:

I'm definitely a diva when it comes to my lifestyle. So as far as my sleeping, my nutrition, when I get to work out, those things are top priority for me, and if you followed me or listened to any of my previous episodes for any amount of time, you know that I definitely take care of myself at a very high level. Some may call it selfish. I quite frankly don't give a shit what you call it, but I believe that by filling my cup first, it allows me to then give to others with what my cup runneth over with. You cannot pour from an empty cup, right? So, knowing that about myself sometimes having that uncertainty of who's going to be my roommate at camp this week coming up, or you know, I hope that my roommates understand that I'm a creature of habit. I love to go to bed early, I need quiet time. I also wake up very early and you know we just have our comforts, our creature comforts, and so I always try to make sure that I'm as best prepared as possible. But also I want to be a good roommate too.

Speaker 2:

So when people come to camp, it starts off with introductory games, where we take all of the people who have signed up to come as campers and we break them up into groups and each group will travel among the coaches, who are also split up, and they play introduction games. And it's really a nice time to do some icebreakers, to get to know the people in your group, because once the week gets underway, which starts Monday morning of that week away at camp, you're with the same group of people for the entire time, so it would behoove you to be paying attention to remember people's names, and then the friendships start to form. Now I did skip over the reason why I go to camp, because I actually am not a camper. I work as a subcontractor for this awesome company, xfit Lab, which does metabolic testing. The testing is an add-on service that we offer to people who are already coming to camp for the week long experience. So it would be, you know, an additional charge to whatever they have paid for for the camp week and they can decide if they want to participate or not, and I help facilitate the testing. So how lucky am I, because I get to go to camp and I'm doing work that I am so passionate about that. I strongly believe in that. I love the data and the science. I love staying on top of what the current data, research and science is showing us about the health and wellness space, and also, specifically, cardiovascular training, muscular hypertrophy, power space, and also, specifically, cardiovascular training, muscular hypertrophy, powerlifting and strength training. Those are the things that really butter my bread and I get to share that with people at camp.

Speaker 2:

My first camp experience was in the fall of 2021. And I did quadruple duty and it was damaging to myself, to be fair, because not only was I working, you know, as a consultant early morning, midday and sometimes at night, depending on how many people wanted to be tested on a specific day, because we could only do a certain number of people within a certain timeframe I also was participating in the camp experience with a group, so I was going to all of the stations throughout the week. I also was trying to maintain my own training program, because I do have a remote coach who writes my workouts for me, so I wanted to do my best to stick with my program and then adjusting to the food that served at camp, the schedule, getting the lay of the land, acclimating. It was a lot and, I have to say, by the third day I was extremely tired, totally tapped out, exhausted and just ready to call it, and I did skip one station because I was just very, very tired. I do tend to put an inordinate amount of pressure on myself. Also, whenever there is something that has my name on it and it's work related, I take a lot of pride in the work that I do. So, being at camp, especially my first time, I wanted to not get out the park. I wanted to be sure that I was doing everything right, that I was open, receptive, vulnerable, connecting and also doing a fucking amazing job like five stars all around. My personality type. I am a people person and so being able to connect, being able to communicate, overall that was not challenging for me. But energy management was definitely something where I screwed up because I was trying to do too much.

Speaker 2:

And, as with anything in life and just like I tell my one-on-one clients every day, you have to envision your time as a pie or a plate. Okay, so visualize that. And then you have slices and within those slices, each slice of the pie is something different in your life. So you will have nutrition, you will have exercise, you will have work responsibilities, family bills, chores, cleaning, self-improvement, education, chores that require you to leave the house, driving around, running errands, et cetera. So you can do this exercise for yourself. Take a piece of paper, draw a circle on it and then start breaking up your pie and then labeling it. And then what happens is when you add something new to the pie or you need to cut another slice, you are taking away from something else, but you're not adding to the pie. We're not making the pie bigger. The pie is already cut. I'm sorry, the pie is already baked. You're just changing the size of the slices because now there's someone new that has come to dinner and they want a slice of the pie too.

Speaker 2:

So how do you manage that? And that's what I had to work with when I was away at camp the first time. I didn't allocate my slices properly. There was a huge part of it related to food and me having an unnecessary level of stress and concern around food options. I have some food sensitivities, I have food preferences, don't we all? And I remember feeling not adequately prepared for that, and so I had a stomachache the whole week. I wasn't going to the bathroom, because I typically have issues when I'm traveling. I get a little backed up and then I was chugging water so I was constantly peeing. I mean, it was just a hot mess and it did impact my experience and I did try to be a great actress and just you know stifle that I also was pushing the professionalism above and beyond also was pushing the professionalism above and beyond. And the thing is that I don't really have to try with that. I do love work, I love being of service, I love helping others. So the work aspect was easy. It was all of my own personal shit that I had to navigate. Now I'm definitely going on a tangent because I'm not really telling you too much about camp itself.

Speaker 2:

Within the week at camp there is a schedule that's laid out and there is time allocated for learning at each station. So the stations there's 10 and they're the 10 foundational, I wouldn't say movements, but principles of functional fitness. Each station is two hours. So within the day there's a few breakout sessions. So let's say Monday, tuesday, I believe there's three. So that's six hours of learning. Sprinkled in is a break for lunch. Sprinkled in is also a break for some play Sprinkled in is also fun. And then at night there's some games and each night there's different things that can be you can join or you can just choose to chill out. You can stay in your room, you can go to a campfire, you can play a pickup game of pickleball or basketball.

Speaker 2:

Some weeks, because camp is not always the same, every camp is a unique experience, with the general format being the same, but sometimes there's also time for working out at night, if you choose to, which is great for someone like me who is typically working when the people who are campers are on their breaks and then when they're actually in their learning portion of each day of the week, the gym is off limits because they're actually using it. They're learning. It's a hands-on, very engaged type of learning environment and the 10 groups are all spread out all over the camp property. It is such a transformative experience because you show up as strangers and the friendships that form and grow day after day after day. By the end of the week people are crying, people are so sad to be leaving each other and, yes, of course, we've got to get back to our normal lives. We've got to get back to work and kids and family and the routine, but it is very much.

Speaker 2:

It reminds me so much of a film called Armageddon. So much of a film called Armageddon. And in the beginning of the film you see people from all sorts of walks of life getting a phone call that they're needed, their specialty is needed, and they show up, no questions asked. They say yes, they come together and it's this unusual group of people who may never have come together under any other circumstance, but yet here they are and in the film Armageddon they're together to save the planet truly from a giant asteroid that's headed right towards earth, truly from a giant asteroid that's headed right towards earth. Now maybe we could frame camp as a way of saving the planet also, because it is an experience where you are enriching your soul, filling your cup, opening up to meeting new people. People from all over the world come to camp. I have met people from Germany, from Italy, from Greece and even from India. Imagine someone traveling all the way from India overseas to a quiet little town in the middle of nothing in Tennessee. It's just greenery and trees and a Walmart and a Buc-ee's and it's amazing.

Speaker 2:

So I'd love for you to check out the website. This is a plug and I am going to include it in the show notes Power Monkey Fitness Camp. The specific website will be in the show notes. Okay, I'd love for you to check it out. There may be time for you to sign up for the next camp and reserve your spot.

Speaker 2:

Of course, it is an investment, but it is the best investment that you can make for yourself, because what you leave with is worth its weight in gold. It will enrich your life in a way that nothing else can. I am so grateful for you listening to my story, to my rambling, to my yapping, all about Power Monkey Fitness Camp. It is a very, very special experience, one that I hope I get to participate in for the rest of my life, because it is such a privilege, it is such an honor to be standing side by side with some of the best coaches in the world in the fitness industry, and the impact that we have collectively and then as individuals, is something that can't be fully explained in words or replicated. You just have to be there. I appreciate your time and attention. Thank you for being here, thank you for listening and, as always, I'll catch you on the next one.