Allan Misner on Aging Strong, Staying Independent, and the Power of True Commitment | Anew Ep 63

 Welcome to Episode 64 of the ANEW Body Insight Podcast with your host, Dr. Supatra Tovar—clinical psychologist, registered dietitian, and fitness expert. This week, we’re joined by the incredibly inspiring Allan Misner: personal trainer, health coach, author of The Wellness Roadmap, and host of the long-running 40+ Fitness Podcast. Allan shares his powerful story of personal transformation—from a self-described "fat, unhealthy executive" at age 39 to becoming a physically and emotionally strong coach, now dedicated to helping others over 40 reclaim their health, independence, and vitality.

In this conversation, Allan opens up about the mindset shift that changed everything: commitment. He describes how a phone call from his daughter ignited a realization that being a spectator in her life wasn’t enough—he needed to participate. That moment led him to take consistent, focused action: changing the way he ate, moved, slept, and thought. His story is one of full transformation through daily, intentional choices that honored both his physical needs and emotional values.

Allan introduces listeners to his expanded SMART goals framework—with an extra “A” for Action—emphasizing the importance of realistic, behavior-based changes that prioritize whole foods, consistent movement, sleep, and stress management. He shares the deeply emotional reasons behind his drive: being there for his daughter, walking her down the aisle, and preparing for a future where he can fully engage with potential grandchildren.

From Tough Mudders to torn rotator cuffs, Allan also dives into resilience—how setbacks like injury can be navigated with clarity, self-compassion, and commitment to long-term goals. He and Dr. Tovar explore the critical role of feeling “safe” in the body and how that inner sense of safety is key for releasing fat, building muscle, and healing—physically and emotionally.

Whether you’re starting your own midlife transformation or supporting others on theirs, this episode offers a roadmap of wisdom, practicality, and inspiration. You’ll walk away with tools to reconnect with your body, redefine your health journey, and reject unsustainable diet culture narratives once and for all.

Here are Allan Misner social media channels:  https://40plusfitness.com/  ,  https://www.linkedin.com/in/coachallan/  ,  https://www.instagram.com/coachallanm/  ,  https://40plusfitnesspodcast.com/author/allan/  ,  https://www.amazon.com/Allan-Misner/e/B07KFQ3KJD/ref=dp_byline_cont_ebooks_1  ,  https://www.y

Thank you for joining us on this journey to wellness. Remember, the insights and advice shared on the ANEW Body Insight Podcast are for educational and informational purposes only and do not constitute medical advice. Always consult with a healthcare professional before making any changes to your health routine. To learn more about the podcast and stay updated on new episodes, visit ANEW Body Insight Podcast at anew-insight.com. To watch this episode on YouTube, visit @my.anew.insight. Follow us on social media at @my.anew.insight on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Threads for more updates and insights. Thank you for tuning in! Stay connected with us for more empowering stories and expert guidance. Until next time, stay well and keep evolving with ANEW Body Insight!

Transcript

Dr. Supatra Tovar: 0:00

Hello and welcome to the ANEW Body Insight podcast. I am Dr. Supatra Tovar, and I am very excited to have 40 + fitness podcaster, author, and personal trainer, Allan Misner with us today. So nice to have you here with me, Allan. His journey began with a personal wake up call at age 39, leading him to transform his lifestyle and ultimately lose over 55 pounds. As part of his own transformation. Allan became certified as a personal trainer and health coach launching the podcast in 2015 to support others in reaching their fitness goals. Through hundreds of episodes. So, we want to talk about the transformation. This was a very, very pivotal point in your life and it is very inspiring. I invited you on this show so we could really delve into motivation and mindset. And so I want to know what mindset shifts were crucial for you when you decided to commit to your health and wellness journey.

Allan Misner: 0:03

Well, because I had always seen myself as a participant in my daughter's life and not a spectator The difference was me. The difference was I had never committed. To actually do the things that were necessary to get healthy and fit because to get healthy and fit, I had to change who I was and I had done that many times in my life, but I'd never committed. And so I started on that path and as I went through it, I learned a lot about myself. As, as you would on any kind of journey like this, where there's a self discovery and change. I got to a point where I realized I was, I was kind of, I felt like I was spinning my wheels. I wasn't quite getting there I've, I've evaluated that a lot over the years and with a lot of my clients and recognize that I had a particular mindset the time that required me to have a big, scary goal in front of me. You're trying to run through this in a race type situation. And then they throw in 25 obstacles just to make it fun. Yeah. And, and these would deal with like different things that were like, so it was heights and water and cold and darkness and tight spaces and electricity. Just different things that would kind of like frighten people or slow them down or keep them from wanting to do this. So it tests you. The initial test for me was knowing that I was nowhere near in shape enough to do one of these things. And because again, that mindset of wanting to be a participant and not a spectator, I didn't want to go into something. And then my daughter feel like she had to hang back with me Okay, I will do this. I will put everything into this. And that, that drove me to, be able to do the things I did. So I changed the way I moved. I changed the way I ate. I changed the way I slept. I changed everything in, in order to be ready to do this. And the finish of that race goes down for me is one of the top., You have these moments, you've had a child, you'll have these moments with the child that are just like, they're just, they're magic. this, they're stressed and they're this. And it's so we're going to give her a little rest and then we're going to go through it again. so while she was resting, I'm standing over next to her and I've got my hand there and she reaches up and grabs my pinky, her little fingers just

Dr. Supatra Tovar: 0:09

How would you have described yourself before? I mean physically, mentally, emotionally, and mindset, and how do you describe yourself now?

Allan Misner: 0:10

I literally like I said sitting on the beach at 39 and all the way through. That was, that was my identity. I was the fat bastard. I was miserable. I was unfit. was unhealthy. I was obese and I didn't even like myself. I was in toxic relationships. I had let my relationships with my family, other than my daughter, kind of fade away. And I, I had nothing but my job. I was really good at my job and I was getting paid well. I had done the thing you're supposed to do. I was a, C suite executive at the age of 39. Fortune 500 company, vice president, nice office, nice pay package, the whole deal, but I was completely miserable. And then, yeah, I, I did the Tough Mudder and I had those experiences with my daughter. And at this point I look at fitness in a very different way than I did then, because for me then fitness was, what is, what do I need to be for my daughter? What I need to do to, to do the things that are going to bring this relationship closer together? Now I look at it and I say, okay, I need to be fit. For me, what do I need? What do I want? And so as I look at fitness, particularly as I age, cause I'm now I'm 58. I'm going to want a lot of the same things I want when there's grandkids, there's none yet, but when there's grandkids involved, when I want to be a participant in their lives. I don't want to be the grandpa sitting in the rocking chair, watching the kids on the floor. I want to be on the floor with them. I don't want to be the grandpa who's sitting on the bench at the entrance of the zoo, waiting for them to come out and tell me about the experience they just had. I want to be running through the zoo with them. Having the experience with them. And so, I need to be in the shape to make that happen. Um, I live on an island. Our healthcare here is okay. It's not the best.. The best no ambulance. So if something happened to my wife, to a friend, anything, I want the capacity to be able to do what's necessary to get them where they need to be. I literally like I said sitting on the beach at 39 and all the way through. That was, that was my identity. I was the fat bastard. I was miserable. I was unfit. was unhealthy. I was obese and I didn't even like myself. I was in toxic relationships. I had let my relationships with my family, other than my daughter, kind of fade away. And I, I had nothing but my job. I was really good at my job and I was getting paid well. I had done the thing you're supposed to do. I was a, C suite executive at the age of 39. Fortune 500 company, vice president, nice office, nice pay package, the whole deal, but I was completely miserable. And then, yeah, I, I did the Tough Mudder and I had those experiences with my daughter. And at this point I look at fitness in a very different way than I did then, because for me then fitness was, what is, what do I need to be for my daughter? What I need to do to, to do the things that are going to bring this relationship closer together? Now I look at it and I say, okay, I need to be fit. For me, what do I need? What do I want? And so as I look at fitness, particularly as I age, cause I'm now I'm 58. I'm going to want a lot of the same things I want when there's grandkids, there's none yet, but when there's grandkids involved, when I want to be a participant in their lives. I don't want to be the grandpa sitting in the rocking chair, watching the kids on the floor. I want to be on the floor with them. I don't want to be the grandpa who's sitting on the bench at the entrance of the zoo, waiting for them to come out and tell me about the experience they just had. I want to be running through the zoo with them. Having the experience with them. And so, I need to be in the shape to make that happen. Um, I live on an island. Our healthcare here is okay. It's not the best.. The best no ambulance. So if something happened to my wife, to a friend, anything, I want the capacity to be able to do what's necessary to get them where they need to be. Yeah. You can't hire a personal trainer and just work with them one week in a month and get anything done. So that was a fundamental problem I, I was facing. And again, when I get that, I will not fail mindset. I had to solve it. There were no podcasts for people over 40, there were no online trainers. That, did this so I told her what my goals were, we sat down and she pulls out this notebook and she said, this binder, she says, do you know what paleo is? And I had no clue. I'm like, no. And then, cause that wasn't a part of the education. I was, the education was the, My Plate, so. I'm like, okay, so she brings it up. She talks about, I'm like, okay, well that that's interesting. It's, there's some reasoning behind it, whether it's right or wrong. It, it, it was a thing. I'm like, okay, this will obviously change the way I eat because 90 percent of what I eat is not this. Meat, fish, eggs, and some vegetables, not a lot of fruit. And I said, okay, I'll give it a shot. So I started eating that way. Um, and I was losing some weight. I said at the beginning, I was like, I lost some weight, but I kind of felt a little stalled. Eventually just kind of the food choices that I made ended up having more of a meat with a little bit of veg rather than the other way around. It could have been the other way around, but for me it ended up being, I'm eating a, eating a fair amount of meat and fish, eggs, and then some vegetables, mostly like leafy greens and cruciferous. Now, if you, if you sit down and think about what the macros of that would end up being, it ends up being low carb. Okay. That was an accident. I ended up in ketosis. And for my body, ketosis worked wonderful. I don't recommend everybody do it. It's a tool and people will argue, okay, maybe it's not sustainable. So I can understand that I can understand. in a healthful way so find the way that works that you can keep doing and that's probably the right way for you to eat. So focusing on whole food, which means if it's in a box, bag, jar or can, that's one of those things you want to ask is this serving my body?

Dr. Supatra Tovar: 0:18

You're also tending to your emotions in a non nutritive way. You really get these powerful messages from your body. And yes, I think that your body is really, obviously tends to get happy and zingy with whole foods. It's not used to chemicals, it doesn't really understand how to assimilate that and it certainly is toxic to the body, especially certain preservatives and additives and it does not help us.

Allan Misner: 0:19

Yes. So the way I like to think of it is like this. Okay. I want you to imagine that there's a being inside your body. Okay. And it can't see the outside world. It only knows what you tell it. And the only way you can tell it is through nutrition, which is information,

Dr. Supatra Tovar: 0:20

Yes. Yeah.

Allan Misner: 0:21

If you're laying around all the time, if you're sedentary, why are you staying in the cave? It doesn't care if we don't look good in the mirror. It doesn't care if we have more body fat than we really need because we haven't told it what it needed to hear to feel safe and say, Oh, it's okay. I can let go of some of this body fat. And we get this gift to live in this wonderful machine that we can heal, we can make better. No matter what age we are, no matter what's going on, if we give our body what it needs, Well, one of the things I want you to be thinking about is when you start thinking about where you need to be. This is never going to be a straight line. There's always going to be zigs and zags. played golf practically every day. He lived on a golf course. He traveled around, played golf with all of his clients, his customers. So he was playing golf all the time. Well, I would go visit the family there for Thanksgiving. And so I came in and this one time, what would do is I'd go to lunch with them. With him and my uncle and all, and then after lunch, they'd all go play golf. That's hard. But now you flash forward to when he's 90 and he's in this apartment. He has his own apartment, but there's a little care desk. So if something's going on, he can call. can't make it from his chair to the bathroom when he realizes he has to go. So he has to call down to the desk to clean him up because he can't do that either. And so, as, as I look at fitness and I say, okay, well, what will I need? I want to be able to wipe my own butt when I'm 105. I did a 50 mile run when I was 29. Then I did a Tough Mudder with my daughter when I, when I was basically 47. I don't know what they're going to be doing 20 years from now. My grandkids are around that age. But I'm going to be the crazy 80 year old out there doing it with them. You Well, you can't tear something that's already tore. It's there's certain things that happen and you're like, it's, it's done. There's no partially done. It's done. You can't do worse if this is done. So I knew this was going to be hard. I knew it was going to hurt. And I did do the race cause I'd signed up for it. I wanted to do it. And then as soon as it was over, I went to the surgeon and I talked to the guy and okay, I tore the rotator cuff. He's oh, well maybe it's partial, but no, it's tore. He did the stuff, he's yeah, it's it's tore. And yeah, he's so, they're going to want you to do. The P. T. said, that's not going to do anything. He says, no, that's not going to do anything. And at this point, I guess I knew enough because of my training the anatomy, I knew exactly what had happened. Okay, I continued to move and train the way through until surgery because I knew having as much full range of motion as I could have, I wasn't going to just put it in a sling and avoid pain. I didn't do things that could hurt me, that would hurt while I was just, I couldn't do any pressing movements, but that didn't mean I couldn't do any pulling movements. We don't see a lot of that. I'm like, well, I don't want to be hurt by this. I want 100 percent capacity.

Dr. Supatra Tovar: 0:31

And to be determined, all of that comes from the mind. And one of my most favorite sayings is, "Whether you think you are, or you think you aren't, either way, you are right." So it really does depend on what you think. So we're out of time for this half of this episode. I can't even believe it. And I still have a million questions for you.