A Peek at In This Lifetime: The New Coffee Table Book

< Full Episode

Transcript: A Peek at In This Lifetime: The New Coffee Table Book

Season 9, Episode 2  | September 10, 2024

[MUSIC]

Welcome to Life Time Talks, the podcast aimed at helping you achieve your health, fitness, and life goals. I’m Jamie Martin, editor in chief of Experience Life, Life Time’s whole life health and wellness magazine.

And I’m David Freeman, senior director of Alpha, one of Life Time’s signature group training programs. We’re all in different places on our health and fitness journeys, but no matter what we’re working toward, there are some essential things we can do to keep moving in the direction of a healthy and purpose-driven life.

In each episode, we break down various elements of healthy living, including fitness and nutrition, mindset and community, and health issues. We also share real, inspiring stories of transformation.

And we talk to experts from Life Time and beyond who will share their insights and knowledge so you have the tools and information you need to take charge of your next steps.

Before we get into this episode, a quick reminder that Life Time Talks is available in the complimentary Life Time app, as well as on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you like what you’re hearing, we’d love it if you’d subscribe to Life Time Talks and leave a review. It’s the best way to help us reach even more listeners with this healthy living information.

And with that, let’s get into the show. Here we go.

[MUSIC]

Welcome back to another episode of Life Time Talks, everyone. I’m Jamie Martin. My colleague David Freeman can’t be with us today, but I’m really excited about our guest. I am with my colleague and friend, Jill Palmquist, and we are talking today about a really fun project that Jill has been working on for several years at Life Time. It’s a book called In This Life Time, and I just want to take some time to congratulate you, Jill, first and foremost for the work on this book, but then also to be able to delve, take the time today to delve into it with you and just learn more about it, learn about the creative process. So thanks for coming on with me.

Thank you for having me. I’m excited to be here. It’s going to be so fun.

So a little bit about you as you’ve been with Life Time for quite some time, but I want to talk a little bit about your origin story with Life Time. You were a freelance copywriter and you got a call to work for Life Time. was like one afternoon while you were picking up your daughter, who was like two years old at the time. She’s now 22. So 20 some years later, like you’re still kind of with Life Time. You met our founder, Bahram. You realize you have some things in common with him, even though initially you didn’t know that or realize that, but you came to see how you describe it as his beautiful heart. And you realize that your desire to help people see the magnificence of their lives was completely aligned with his. So I just love hearing like that alignment that you have with Bahram. It’s such a unique relationship that you’ve been able to develop in a unique way. So tell us a little bit about that coming to Life Time story, and then we’re gonna get into the book.

So it was quite a while ago, and my memory might be foggy, but it was pretty fun. You know, the whole thing has been fun. So I started as a freelancer. Life Time was just another client. It was purely transactional. I have a room in my house that I have a plaque that says, “paid for by the generous donations of Life Time.” Because there’s just always a lot of work. Met a lot of fun people, started to understand what the company did and what the company stood for, and just kind of kept getting closer and closer. At about that same time then, I did have an introduction to Bahram. And a good friend introduced us and said he needs some help with some things. And so we met one day in the elevator bank, and we had to walk to his office, and it was really long walk, and I was wearing a fur hat and fur boots. He’s kinda looking at me like what’s happening here and then all these people are popping up and looking at us and I got nervous and was just like, they’re gonna think you got a new bodyguard. Here comes Shrek and the donkey. I just started talking, but we just hit it off. And you know, I’d heard about him for years as I’d been freelancing. I was probably there 10 years and before I met him, you know, cause there’s just so many layers and so many different divisions in department. And you know, you hear stories like, Bahram said this or Bahram wants that and it wasn’t fear, but it was always such distance from basically the man behind the curtain or the Wizard of Oz. And I met him and I was just so delightfully surprised at how fun he was and how easy it was to talk to him and about the things that we did have in common. So I think it’s just a classic case of hitting it off and then taking it from there.

And now in your role, your job title is, I call it a job title, but I think it’s a passion title as well, as your Chief Storytelling Officer at Life Time. And tell us a little bit about that, because you are a words person.

Yeah, I like words. I’m a writer. I’ve always been a writer. I loved my life as a freelance copywriter and advertising. At Life Time, the storytelling has evolved considerably. And I think for a long time, we’ve really been focusing on telling the story of the company. And that’s taken a really long time to actually to put out into the world the idea of what Life Time is. And so that’s the story I’ve been focusing on along with this kind of initiative with this book. So those two things, they’re finally coming together. It did take a long time to get us all kind of aligned to tell that story. within the business too, people are always like, well, what do you do there? And Life Time, for those that understand it, they know that it’s an experience. There’s an energy. It’s like a sixth sense, and it’s really hard to describe. And it’s even harder to describe when it’s on a spreadsheet or in some kind of operational manual. So I think my role has been to help the company translate what the programs are, what the business is internally as well as externally. Like to put emotion or feeling and words to that human experience that maybe the business part of it doesn’t do. That infrastructure is super healthy and good, but how do we talk to people about that then? Right, great. And because so much of what we’re all dealing with is shared human experience, how does that come together?

So tell us about this book, In This Lifetime. How did the idea for it come to be?

Again, my time at Life Time was an evolution. At first I was just showing up and taking in whatever money they wanted to pay me. It was a transactional thing. But then as I got closer and closer to the company and understood what it was trying to do, my love grew too. And people ask very frequently, well, did Bahram inspire this book? And I have to tell you, Bahram is probably one of, if not the most inspiring person I know. He’s so inspiring. But the inspiration for this book didn’t come from him. It came from our members. came from the people that come in and out of the club every day, from the friends that I have there, the stories that they tell, the changes that happen in their life. And as I saw all these happening in different places with different people, it’s like that collective story, even though there’s all these different individual pieces of it that make it so beautiful, that collective story is that something that Life Time supports and empowers people to do, to live these beautiful lives. So I wanted to tell that story and got the support that we needed to get that done.

Yeah. And this has been a dream and a project you’ve been working on for quite some time. I mean, you know, what was the process of writing it like for you?

Long.

How many years has it been? Like, how long has this been kind of like a work in progress and then now coming to fruition?

It’s been about nine years, almost nine years, and I like to call it a gestation, I mean, because it has been a labor of love. And actually, the writing of it didn’t really take that long. It was something that came together very naturally. There was an abundance of material. It was more like how do you put it together and the structure just kind of revealed itself, like this kind of life through time that I didn’t have to invent anything new. It was just kind of more of filling it in. The production of it was a little bit more difficult. Actually, a designer and I put it together and Bahram loved it. He said, go, get it done. But what I didn’t realize, I was extremely naive. It’s very visual, and there’s a lot of photography and typography. And I put it all together with scrap. And I took it to a publisher and they’re like, it’s fantastic, but who’s going to pay for that? Well, we have a very generous benefactor and somebody that would, but I didn’t know how to get it done by myself. And so a few things happened at Life Time where there was some shifting of roles and responsibilities and a door opened and I was able to take my dear friends, Nic Berglund and Amy Demarest, and this became a priority for us. I mean, how lucky is that to have this as your, we get to do this every day, but that was perfect. I mean, that’s where it got done then because Nic could put it together design wise in a way that took it to a whole other level and Amy just knows how to get things done. You know, like, so that got done. The final kind of chapter of this book story though is the day we went, we got it done. And then the day we went to ask for the money to get it published was the day that the clubs closed for COVID. And it wasn’t a good, I like to say we tabled the coffee table book. And so it sat there for a little while longer. Then as the company started to thrive and really get healthy again, it seemed like it was a good timing. So we pulled it out again and actually there it is. Here we are.

We’re coming up on, this is out in the world. It’s going to be out. So you mentioned it’s a coffee table book. It’s a big book here. Like you said, there’s the story, there’s the words, but it’s woven through in such a beautiful way with the visuals. So tell us a little bit about the structure of the book, if it’s life through time. How do you move through this book without giving it all away, of course?

Well, it begins and ends kind of in the same way. You know, like the way that we arrive into this embodiment and then the way we depart. You know, it’s like, I hope that that’s kind of just very simply illustrated in this book. But then life itself is just such a surprising aggregation and curation of people and events and perspectives and way to look at things. It, so you can’t, to have just one narrative when you’re trying to represent so many different people and desires just seemed wrong. So it is kind of not a hodgepodge, but it’s like a cornucopia of just like different, different things for, that can appeal to different people at different times. Right. I think what’s really important about it is like you talk about this embodiment. And I think part of that, and one of the things when I’ve looked through the book is like, we start with kind of understanding, the wonder that is our body and why that’s so important. Because I think with the work we do at Life Time, it’s like we want people to understand how their bodies work, because that’s what inspires and empowers us, hopefully, to then take care of them and to do those things. So we kind of start there, and then it gets into some of these, you know, the movement, the nutrition, the feeding, not just feeding our bodies, but feeding our souls. Exactly, yeah. You know, there’s, for a long time, I mean, I know you remember this, but there’s been kind of an underlying philosophy and it goes something like this. This is something that Life Time believes. Sometimes it’s outward and member or consumer facing. A lot of times it’s just internal, but it’s something that’s really, I think, been part of the way the company works. that’s like, if you know how your body works, you know yourself and understand how your body works, and then nourish it with the food, exercise, sleep, all the friendships that you need, that you will move through your life healthy and happy, awake and alive. It’s built on that too, just trying to remind people of that, going back to the end. Going back to that.

And then just kind of coming back to the connection with Life Time is such an important factor here. How does that different, or how do you think that connection differentiates this kind of book or this from others in the category with Life Time? Like, why is that connection so important?

Well, I think that things have gotten really complicated in our world, that there’s all sorts of options and different choices. I think one of the things that Life Time does so beautifully is that we’ve, I don’t like the word packaged, but we’ve put all these things together. Our definition of a healthy way of life is, it’s a perspective that encompasses all aspects of your health, physical, mental, spiritual, social. And what Life Time is able to do is not just talk about it, but we can offer it. You know what I mean? It is a place that you can go. It’s people that you can talk to. If you go to Experience Life magazine, it’s knowledge that you can learn. We don’t just talk a talk. We’ve got this walk, and it’s from 30 years of learning and understanding and gathering the right people and the information and innovating and evolving. We’ve got this beautiful product in this company right now, this brand. Those don’t even seem fair words for it because it’s more than that.

Absolutely. Just going back to the human experience, it’s like so often we get caught up in the things that make us different from one another, but in the reality we’re more alike than different. I think one of the things that’s really beautiful is you make that connection in this book. No matter who we are, no matter what we are, we come into this world. In many ways, we experience similar things, though in our own unique way, and then we all leave this world, right? And so I think how do we, I think it’s celebrating the commonalities that we have, and then just calling out some of the unique ways that we can all individually experience the wonder or the awe or those pieces. So speak to that a little bit, because I think you did a beautiful job. There’s a couple of examples of individuals in this book, but also just these commonalities, like no matter who you are, you’re like, I connect with that. And how was that through you talking to people? Like when you came up with some of those stories, those connections, was it just partly inspired by your own life experience or tell us a little bit about that?

I can’t summarize it much better than you just did. I mean, that was beautiful. And thank you. Thank you for like understanding this book and being able to articulate it like that. That means just the world to us, you know, that, that you can evangelize it like that. Cause I think it’s so important, but we all, like you said, we’re all so much more similar than we are different. We’re here, again, today my word is incarnated. We’re embodied, we’re these physical creatures. We’ve got these crazy, curious minds, like we’re inquiring. David Brooks talks about our yearning souls, and we all really want the same thing. We want to be happy, you know what I mean? You can define happy in so many different ways, but at the end of the day, you wanna get to the end of the line, so to speak, and be able to look over your shoulder and say, I kind of nailed that. You know what I mean? Like, I lived a good life. I’m thrilled with what’s happened here. And so these, you know, we all encounter pain and loss unless you’re really lucky, you know, or like that you’re living some crazy charmed life. But I don’t even think a charmed life is devoid of pain or loss or suffering or hardships or obstacles or challenges. And that’s like actually, that’s part of the beauty of it because what they provide you then is the opportunity for growth and becoming a better person and enjoying the life more in a different perspective or empathy. So it’s just about changing that perspective or that focus on what we encounter.

You know some of my personal story. think I’ve shared bits and pieces here on the podcast, like when my nephew was sick, now a decade ago, you know, one of the, at that time, a word that had come across my radar was this, it was from Glennon Doyle. was, “brutiful.” Life is both beautiful and brutal. And it’s kind of what you, you know, what can you take from that? You know, in those moments they, can be both and it’s not one or the other. It’s often those things and it’s those experiences that give us resilience and the ability to kind of move forward and move on. And I think that is what life is. I mean, if we come out of this life unscathed, that’s the rare story, I think. mean, I think most of us are going to and change. It’s like you say, it’s not really a matter of if, but when the hard thing happens for us, and then it’s how do we navigate it and go through it. It’s like, what is the story? You can’t go over it, you can’t go under it, you gotta go through it. It’s a children’s book. Going on a bear hunt, I think, is what it is. But like you can’t avoid those things. That’s life. You go through it. And then it’s like, what do we learn along the way? And what do we appreciate that in even a greater amount once we get there?

That’s like, it’s what forges us as humans.

Well it makes us who we are, right, ultimately. And hopefully, if we can have that perspective, like you’re saying, to kind of think of each thing as a lesson or a learning, and then we keep going.

So it’s interesting because, you know, there are some, you know, like there’s a narrative that’s threaded through here and then there’s a few different stories. And I actually approached these people because I thought their stories were interesting. When I got the book back out after a certain time and looked at it, I did realize that there was a common denominator of some sort of loss or some sort of shift. But what I was drawn to or why I wanted to tell that story was because of their perspective or their attitude or how they approached it more than what actually happened because I just was so full of admiration, you know? And they tell the story better than I ever could, you know what I mean? And that’s what’s so beautiful is just this mix of all these things.

Yeah. One thing I don’t want to overlook in all of this is one thing that you and I have talked about, and just so everyone knows, and I are colleagues and friends, and we have spent time together. And so I’ve had a preview and behind the scenes look at this process. You, this book isn’t really about the journey through life, but you describe it as a timeline. And I want you to talk about that for a second, because I think that’s a really unique differentiator of this too, and how you thought about it.

Well, I just don’t like the word journey. And so I try — that’s actually probably the best word for it, because we are like these little pilgrims going on this adventure. So it is a journey, but it’s like, to me, it’s more how we move through life, you know, in that timeline. It’s just the way that I’ve always kind of perceived life, you know, like I didn’t really do it when I was super young, but like, you know, from beginning to end, it moves from left to right, you know, it’s like this continuum or spectrum and that you go along the path and sometimes you’re here and there, but you’re always kind of moving forward into, don’t know what, but you can call it a journey if you want to. The other thing though is that it’s not just about, it’s about life and it’s about time, but there’s also a few maybe tips or tricks or it’s like a little bit of a guidebook, just some suggestions on how to make the most of the time that you’ve got.

Yeah, I love that. Do you have a favorite part of the book? Is there one part that you gravitate toward every time you get to that page, you kind of makes you stop and, just pause for a moment?

Well, you know, of course there are little scraps and pieces of me and my life and perspective and my parents are both in it, probably in places that you wouldn’t expect a place that my mother wouldn’t expect is I’ll spoiler alert. I’m going to tell you about a spread. There’s a really sexy shot of a girl holding herself like this, you know, it’s kind of a boob shot. But the tattoo says, “wear life as a loose garment.” And that was my mother’s saying. So that’s like something, you know, how to kind of thread those kind of things in there. So I like that, it’s just a little wink. But then I also just really like it as you turn the pages and kind of arrive at the back page and my father’s in there in a couple places, but it’s pretty blatant at the end. And I think that he set a very high standard for a fulfilling life, and I wanted to share that, so that’s in there.

I can’t wait to read that part more closely or revisit that part. So what do you hope anyone who opens this book will take away from it? What’s your goal with it? What’s your dream for it with that in mind?

I hope that they can recognize that life is very beautiful, it’s very brief, that in a world that seems super complicated, it can be simple, that you can just kind of prescribe a few simple little things that can make impactful changes, and that we all have been given the agency to make those changes, and we can ask for help, and then that Life Time empowers this improvement and experience. And so whether you’re a member or not, just to understand what this company has been able to do in a world that really needs it.

Yeah. And I think that’s one of the, mean, you and I have talked about this, like how lucky are we that we get to work for a company that really is about helping people change their lives for the healthier. And then hopefully that also means for the happier too, you know, and all those things and like to be able to show up every day and to be able to put, you know, to show that in words or in pictures or in products or programs, like what that looks like, how amazing. Cause this is really can make a difference for people. And you just got to give them the information and inspiration as we often talk about.

So. Exactly. OK. So I have one, you know, this, like there’s always a mic drop moment here at the end of the podcast. before I get to that though, was there anything else you want to make sure people know or you know, just understand about the book before we get to that. I’ll get back to that.

I just, I mean, I hope they enjoy it. Like I hope that they all pick it up. They’ll see it somewhere and pick it up, whether it’s in the club or if they put it in their homes, it just serves as a reminder. Like that’s kind of the goal of it and that they enjoy it and that they see themselves in part of it and can appreciate, you know, the moment and like what we’ve got here. This really cool life and that it can be really fun. That.

Alright. I’m going to get you to the mic drop moment now.

I just want to say thank you for trusting me on my podcast debut.

I’m so excited you’re here. We get to do this in person together.

Fun.

My gosh. I love it. Is this your first podcast?

It’s my first podcast. My gosh. I know.

We get to do this together. I got you. I made it easy for you, I hope. Hopefully it was easy.

It was so easy and it’s been super fun. So you are the best.

My gosh. Thank you.

I’m going to keep saying that until the cows come home. You are something, Jamie Martin. I love you to pieces.

I love you too, Jill. OK, so I’m going to ask you this question. You have to just kind of go off the top of your head. if there was a song that kind of represented this book out in the world, what would it be?

A song that represented the book out in the world? Well, probably the ultimate goal. And I alluded to this briefly, don’t know if I’m being repetitive, but it’s OK if I am, I guess. That you get to the end of what I see as this line, that you’re just kind of moving through life. And if you’re lucky, you’re up there in your 80s, 90s, hitting 100, and that you can just kind of take a look back over your shoulder and say, knock that one out of the park. And so the song that hit me the other day, I heard it for a Olympics kind of promo, was The Killers, All These Things That I’ve Done. So I think it’s kind of like all the things I’ve done, all the people that I’ve loved, all the experiences that I’ve had, but all these things that I’ve done might work.

Well, Jill, first and foremost, congratulations. I know this was, like you said, a labor of love to get this out in the world. It’s finally out. It’ll be available kind of early to mid September for people to get. You can learn more about the book at inthislifetime.life. And you can keep up with Jill herself on her Instagram, which is, @ohthatjill, just like you’re saying, Jill, that Jill. So, and you’ve got like great photos of your dog and your adventures and your life and your daughter Millie is on there. It’s just kind of fun, but I hope we get to see a little bit of this book come to life there as well.

I think you will.

Awesome. Thank you.

I had so much fun.

Me too. Alright. Come on again sometime.

Well, OK!

[MUSIC]

Thanks for joining us for this episode. As always, we’d love to hear your thoughts on our conversation today and how you approach this aspect of healthy living in your own life. What works for you? Where do you run into challenges? Where do you need help?

And if you have topics for future episodes, you can share those with us too. Email us at lttalks@lt.life or reach out to us on Instagram @Lifetime.life, @jamiemartinel, or @freezy30 and use the hashtag #LifeTimeTalks.

You can also learn more about the podcast at ExperienceLife.Lifetime.Life/Podcasts. And if you’re enjoying Life Time Talks, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcast. If you like what you’re hearing, we’d love to hear from you by rating and reviewing the podcast and share it on your social channels too.

Thanks for listening. We’ll talk to you next time on Life Time Talks.

Life Time Talks is a production of Life Time Healthy Way of Life. It takes an amazing team to pull together each episode, including executive producer, Molly Kopischke, audio engineer, Peter Perkins, audio and video editors, Kevin Dixon and Riley Lester, and podcast coordinator, Sara Ellingsworth. A big thanks to Coy Larson for sound and video consulting and George Norman for project management, as well as the rest of the team at Life Time Motion who supports and provides feedback for Life Time Talks.

[MUSIC]