About James Boria

My name is James Boria, and I am from Long Island, New York. I am a former collegiate baseball athlete who played at Franklin Pierce University, located in the Southern portion of New Hampshire. Through athletics I have built a love for fitness, mindset, and pushing past my limits.

My mission is to motivate, inspire, and support individuals to push past their limits. I am a major believer in the habits that we create, and an even bigger believer that these habits can help us achieve anything we set our mind to. I enjoy pushing myself past my limits so others can understand that they have the power to do the same. Through community, culture, and connection, I am looking to inspire others to look deep within and bring out there fullest potential.

I believe each human lives by actions and standards which can be summed up into three words. My words would be resilient, accountable, and supportive. Each decision we make is a reflection of those three words, and through whatever path that may be, my goal is to help you find yours. I wish to connect with each and every one of you, and if you ever need anything, please do not hesitate to reach out.

The Behavioral Corner

Hi, and welcome. I'm Steve Martorano. And this is the Behavioral Corner; you're invited to hang with us, as we've discussed the ways we live today, the choices we make, the things we do, and how they affect our health and wellbeing. So you're on the corner, the Behavioral Corner, please hang around a while.

Steve Martorano

Hey, everybody. Hi and welcome once again to the Behavioral Corner. It's me the chief hanger on the corner, Steve Martorano. What we do here on the Behavioral Corner is we are very fortunate to bump into very interesting people, at least we find them interesting, we hope you do as well. They come here armed with some particular story that we think will help you in what we really look at here, which is called behavioral health. And put simply, that's everything. This is a podcast about everything. Behavioral health, that we're the choices we make, the way we live, and how it all affects us mentally and physically and emotionally and spiritually. So it's a big topic. Incidentally, we're grateful and proud to have as our underwriter Retreat Behavioral Health, you'll hear about more of them later on in the program. Okay, so we've got what I just occurred to me as a kind of counterintuitive story for you today. And it's counterintuitive in the following way. Most of us, if not all of us, consciously or unconsciously, are in pursuit of a place where we can feel safe. And a path that seems possessed of the least resistance with a term for that maybe your "comfort zone." Nice enough goal, right? Who doesn't want a comfort zone? Where everything is relatively easy, and whatever obstacles you come upon, you know, you're pretty much prepared to handle that. That seems like a perfectly logical way to approach one's life. And it probably is for most people. Is there a benefit, though, to going wonder what's beyond my comfort zone? I wonder what's out there and is it worth pushing the envelope to find out what it is? And that's what our guests are here to tell us about James Boria is a former college athlete who is still very involved in athletics and fitness. It was because of his I guess, collegiate career, he began a lifelong love affair with fitness, and its ability to inspire us. And he's here to talk about just that. There are places you can go if you put your mind to this, that may have some remarkable benefits for you. So as one of the world's great sedentary creatures, I'm going to listen to this with an open mind and find out what Jim is actually talking about when he talks about taking it to the limit. And beyond that I get most of that, right? Is that what you're about? You're about saying, yeah, you could do more, we can do more.

James Boria

Absolutely. And that's kind of what I based my whole life around right now. Every area of my life -- whether it's fitness, family, business-related everything. Every day, you can always do more.

Steve Martorano

Were you one of those kids who you know, you wanted to run faster, you wanted to jump further, you wanted to climb the tallest tree? Did it come to you naturally? Or did you develop this desire to go looking for new mountains to climb?

James Boria

Yeah, it wasn't obvious, as extreme as it is now. But as a kid, I definitely have had a very competitive nature. When I came from a background where sports was kind of the only thing that I had. So being competitive and pushing my limits was really the only area there was no kind of distractions. And then I lost it. I went to college kind of fell to the influence of...

Steve Martorano 

College. 

James Boria

Right, exactly. As college came to a close, I kind of realized I wanted differently again, and that is what led me to this path. So I hadn't lost it and found that again.

Steve Martorano

Yeah, you know, college is an interesting thing. It's the great American dream and notion that that's how you get to a better place. And most people who send kids off to college know, that may be true, but as I just said, sometimes college gets in the way. What was too much fun? Too much leisure time. What was it?

James Boria

Yeah, it was definitely too much fun. I was a big partier, to say the least.

Steve Martorano

Alright, you know what, again, what I call this counter-intuitive is because I think you'll agree with me, most people don't wake up in the morning -- most people don't wake up in the morning and say, Is there something I haven't done yet that's really, really hard. Let me go do it. Okay, they get to that by all kinds of means, but let's put that aside for a second and talk about why do this? I mean what's wrong with finding your safe place your comfort zone, identifying the things you're good at and are able to achieve them, you know, relatively easily? What's wrong with that? Put another way, what are the benefits of pushing through your limits? I have a couple down here. And I want you to react to that. I've been reading up on the notion of pushing your limits. And some of the things I've come up with, I'd like you to respond to. If you're an accountant, how do you become more successful by pushing your limits? What's the relationship between that and success?

James Boria

Yeah, I think it comes down to looking at everyone that's around you and kind of seeing where you could do more. And it differs in every aspect, like where you said accounting, but it goes into anything. And I don't know much about accounting, but in fitness, what I did, I looked around at everybody, and I said, okay, there is more. And usually when you start to look around and you start to analyze the people around you realize, okay, maybe everyone's not as happy as I thought they were. Maybe everyone's kind of just going through the motions. Is their intention behind their work. Is there a meaning behind their work? And most times there isn't. And that's where it started with me with pushing the envelope for success was like, am I kind of just floating through the motions here? I'm looking around at everyone else, and everyone else seems to be pretty complacent. What they don't seem to have the answers to be happy. So maybe I do have to push the envelope and see what I'm made of what really drives me and my meaning and my purpose and happiness.

Steve Martorano

You know, you mentioned intentionality. That's really interesting. I mean, most of us don't -- as we move through life, we think there's purpose and intent to what we're doing, but it's worth re-examining that, correct?

James Boria

I would agree. Yes.

Steve Martorano

Yeah, you're basically talking about this in terms of physicality. By the way, we are moving to an event that I've just been astonished about, I can't wait to hear more about it. Jim is involved in something called a bear crawl. And when I first heard it, I thought, yeah, no bear crawl, you get a cup of coffee and a bear claw and you go to work. No, "crawl," Steve, not a bear "claw." And he's doing it for a very specific purpose, we'll find out but to bear crawl is. But tell us about improving yourself worth

James Boria

I think, when you attach some type of like, what, like I said, intention or meaning behind your work, and you mentioned accountant. So let's use an accountant as an example. How can I make my client's life better, right? How can I push my limits with work in the boundaries that I set, right? To improve my client's life. And when you start to push the envelope in that your self-worth comes up, okay, I'm making someone else's life better by pushing my own limits. So I'm growing and they're growing. It almost seems selfish. But there's the meaning behind it, and you're making someone else's life better. Also, when you push your boundaries, your self-worth will increase, because you're not putting limits on yourself right now you stand for something. Now, with the meaning behind your work, you believe in something. You believe in what you're doing, you're doing it for a reason. So you can say no, now. You can say no to certain things that don't coincide with your growth. Doing that by saying no, you people will respect you in turn and respect, your self worth will grow comes from many different directions, I believe.

Steve Martorano

During this process. Did you find for yourself when you were working athletically and physically, that the further you push the envelope, and the further you push the limits, that new opportunities presented themselves to you that you hadn't expected? 

James Boria

Absolutely, and recently, the biggest thing I've noticed like we mentioned with this bear crawl, is when you start to take these risks, and you start to push the envelope, people become drawn to you. And people will seek you for new opportunities. And it did happen in athletics. And I think the harder that you push yourself, the more good will come your way. But it's not a direct relationship. But I think a lot of people don't understand that there's a lot of ups and downs. So it doesn't always correlate to opportunity. But when it does, the opportunities are much larger than what you would have received staying within your perceived boundaries.

Steve Martorano

Yeah. What's the old story of it's the journey, not the destination? You don't know where you're going to wind up, but it could be a new place. Yeah, it's fascinating. We've mentioned bear crawl twice people are going to hell are they talking about? So tell us what the bear crawl challenge is.

James Boria

So I will be bear crawling a marathon, which is 26.2 miles on October 7 of 2022 -- about a year out. And I've been doing it for mental health. I'll be doing it to raise money for children that grow up without any kind of influence or role models. That is a similar background to what I went through as a child and I feel very passionate about it but I will be the second person to ever complete it. There's only one person that's done it before. So it's been a whole new world of discovery.

Steve Martorano

Well, first of all, I'm going to put you on the spot here. I should have mentioned this before we began. Are you able to move your camera there on your computer? Can you show me what a bear crawl is?

James Boria

Oh, yeah, sure. Definitely can. Can you see? 

Steve Martorano 

Yeah.

James Boria

A bear crawl is going on all fours. Basically, your hands are shoulder-width apart and your knees are under your hips, and you'll be elevated. And then just from there to crawl like walking like a bear. So, obviously, you go back and forth. So you're moving forward. Kind of in sync with the opposite arm opposite leg forward, crawling like a bear or dogs kind of the same thing. It's just called a bear crawl, really, but...

Steve Martorano

Yeah, well, even a minor athlete like myself had, as some experience with that maneuver. As a, you know, high school football player on, you know, the third string. We did those as punishment. You had to do laps, or bear crawls if you screwed up. So as I hear you say it now, you'll be the second person to have bear crawl for 26 miles is that that's what you're saying?

James Boria

Correct? I'll be the second person.

Steve Martorano

First of all, who's the first person? And how did you find out?

James Boria 

So, this is a very interesting story. So the first person is this guy, Devon Levesque. He is a savage. His father committed suicide when he was younger. So he did it for mental health and suicide prevention. And he did the New York City Marathon. And I didn't know at the time that he was doing it. I didn't know about it. But I found out a couple of months afterward and became very interested in the event itself. I've always been big into endurance events, whether it's ultramarathons or marathons, triathlons, Iron Man's things like that. And I was fascinated by it. So I did some research. And I came across a couple of podcasts, where he would talk about what he went through. And there was one podcast where he mentioned four minutes in, he said, somebody's going to break this record the world, it's a world record, he said, somebody's going to break it and I'm going to be excited to cheer them across the finish line. And at that moment, the first thing that popped into my head was, "I'm gonna do this." Like, that's going to be me. So I drove to my buddy's house, and I think we sat down and I said, listen to this, and tell me what you think. And he listened to it. And I said I'm going to bear crawl marathon. And he challenged me to go a 10th of a mile further. So who knows if we're going to do distance yet, but I have to bear crawl 26.2 miles and under 20 hours, 48 minutes to have the world record? 

Steve Martorano

Under 20 hours.

James Boria

20 hours. Yes.

Steve Martorano

Okay. All right. I guess if you're predicted the belief that -- correct me if I'm wrong -- I have no doubt you'll do it. But it really doesn't matter whether you do it or not. You're going to try to do it. That's the point, isn't it? 

James Boria

Yeah, I will finish it. Whether I break the record or not, it will be completed, I can guarantee that 100%. But yeah, it isn't about the record. It's more about who I became by pushing my limits. That's really what it's about. And like you said, the new opportunity. Just the people I've attracted in my life, the relationships that I've built through pushing my limits have been, I can't even compare it. I can't even put a price on it. And just the quality of my life has increased so much. My mindset, how I feel, in my own mental space with, I feel good, I feel confident in the things that I'm doing. I feel like I'm serving a purpose. I feel like I'm helping people. That's what it's about. 

Steve Martorano

Yeah. 

James Boria

It was it started with the record, and it became about something else. And I'm so thankful for that. Because it's given me a world of opportunity and a world of relationships that I couldn't imagine -- have imagined before.

Steve Martorano

Where are you going to do this 26 miles?

James Boria 13:42 

So I live in Long Island. I haven't picked the exact course yet. I think I'm going to do the outline of the New York City Marathon. That's what I would like to do. 

Steve Martorano

Really?

James Boria

Yeah. Which is going to be tough. Because a bunch of traffic and you know

Steve Martorano

Yes, you could get run over on the Verizon on arrows, right? 

James Boria

Yeah.

Steve Martorano

You do have some support with you here some teams, right? 

James Boria

Oh, absolutely. 

Steve Martorano

Just so people understand. Is the technique that you never get out of the crawl? Could you stand up at some point stretch your legs or are you always in the crawl?

James Boria

I can stand up and rest. I just can't make any forward motion. You have to be in a crawl. So I can stand up and stop and I'll probably take a couple of steps backward to make sure I don't go over.

Steve Martorano

Alright, so your friends are familiar -- by the way you help train other people in all kinds of physical events. So they understand you to be a physical guy and a guy who sets high bars but has anybody -- your friends who have no you go, "Yo, Jim, 26 miles at a bear crawl? Come on?" Does anybody present that to you? They just know it's foolish.

James Boria 14:44 

I can't say people haven't thought it but no one said it to me.

Steve Martorano

Right.

James Boria

I think they kind of know where my head's at, so, they're not gonna get me off the path. You know, maybe they'll tell me after and I hope they do. But I'm sure people have thought it.

Steve Martorano

Well because it is remarkable -- it will be remarkable. Maybe you know, ESPN, 3 or 4 will show us. I'm sure you will. Definitely. This has gone viral written off all over it. And it's good. So how do you raise the money for this? What do you advance for donations for, for distance? Or how's it work? 

James Boria

Yeah, so I'm coming up with a bunch of different ideas. I'll have a general whether it's a GoFundMe or something where people can donate and then I'm going to do a bunch of sponsors. So I'm going to be hoping to partner with some companies in the future that will sponsor the bear crawl, whether I make shirts for the crawl that people can buy. Anything that I do bear crawl-related will go to charity, for the charity that I choose. People can sponsor a mile or maybe every two miles Well, we'll have a donation. I'm trying to brainstorm some other ideas on how to come up with money yet, but those are just kind of be the foundations. Those are the definites.

Steve Martorano

That's great it's a great idea. We're talking to Jim Borja, he is about taking it to the limit. And beyond something that a lot of us should think about. Even if we can't imagine a bear crawling for 26 miles. This is the Behavioral Corner. Stick around. We got more with Jim right ahead.

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Steve Martorano

Jim Boria is going to get down on all fours and sort of crouch like in a bear crawl and go 26 miles. He's doing this because he's dedicated his entire existence, it seems, to raising the bar on his activities. Looking for another place to breakthrough. There is a barrier out there, though, isn't there? Jim? I've heard long-distance runners talk about I don't care how well you train and how strong you are and say, a marathon situation or triathlon guy, there is a barrier you hit. It's like a "wall." When you go through it, then -- not that it's downhill from there -- but it's achievable once you get through the barrier. Do you experience that every time you do say a marathon?

James Boria

No. And I have different areas -- it depends. A lot of things go into it. There's a lot of variables. And I think that comes with pushing the limits. There's a certain kind of mindset that comes with it. Where even if we do find our limits some days, how do we go back to the drawing board to make sure that we can make that limit even further next time? So it's a never-ending cycle. 

Steve Martorano

Yeah.

James Boria 

It's more of a mentality than a lifestyle, really.

Steve Martorano

Let's talk about the mental aspect of this thing because the other thing I read that claims when you push the envelope and go beyond your limits, there is a strengthening of your mental faculties, your mind literally gets stronger. I've also heard athletes talk about that. They call it the "zone." They're in another -- almost another plane of consciousness. That's sort of the goal, isn't it? The clearing of your mind by pushing as hard as you can?

James Boria

Yeah. And it bleeds into every area of your life. And when I bear crawl every day, I usually do it every day. There's a certain point in the bear crawl, where I go into it with a lot of my mind, I leave with two things that actually matter. And those are the two things that I want to focus on the rest of the day. And I use it as kind of my filtration process where we get caught up in a lot of different things in life, a lot of things which deserve our attention, but they don't deserve a lot of our emotions. And that's hard to differentiate. When you put yourself in a mind state where it's very survivalist and you're pushing your limits and your mind can only focus on one hand in front of the other, right? I want to make sure I keep crawling, and there are still one or two things on your mind. You know, okay, I'm in the trenches right now. And that's still on my mind, I should probably address that. And that's what being mentally strong is, is, in my opinion, is being able to go at the right things with all of your energy. Because we all have a million different things on our minds. But if we can hone in on the things that actually matter and put all of our energy into those, then that's what really matters.

Steve Martorano

It's interesting, it just occurs to me -- let me know if you agree or disagree. You just spoke about a mental state achievable through incredible exertion physical exertion, but the same effect is sought in meditation. Which is as you know, still and quiet. It would seem to name where people would go okay, I'm gonna try that. But I think I'll try it the meditative way, rather than the physical way. Put another way there are barriers that stop us from pushing past our limits. How do you break down that barrier and say, I'm going to try this?

James Boria

Do you mean, getting to the point of meditation or...

Steve Martorano

No physical part of this. It's easy to say, I'll try to meditate. There's no exertion here. Okay, what do I have to lose? I try that. But if somebody says, "Oh, you think you could run 26 miles, you know -- you're a recreational runner -- "You think he could run 26 miles?" "Well, I don't know, it's 26 miles and never did a marathon." You start -- your mind starts telling you why you can't do it. Okay? Or why it will be difficult. Those are barriers in front of this all day long. How do you break through those?

James Boria

Consistency is big for me. And I think the first day is always the hardest day. But also, the goals that we set for ourselves are often very ambitious. I didn't say I was going to bear crawl a marathon and bear crawl 26.2 miles the next day. I still haven't reached that distance. I set a goal. And I said I'm going to crawl a mile. And it absolutely laid me out on the floor. But I kept showing up and I reevaluated my goals. I said, Okay, that might not be good from a longevity standpoint. I need to find something or find a distance where I can win. And find a small win in that distance, and then go to the mile. So I would crawl for 30 minutes. And I would only worry about how I felt during those 30 minutes. Can I no matter how fast or slow I went, there's no distance? I'm not competing against anything except myself. I think when people try and get into physical activity, they need to go zero to 100 like that.

Steve Martorano

Yeah.

James Boria

Snap of the finger. They don't realize they need to ease into it, you need to find small wins, otherwise, you'll be discouraged to go back. There's kind of a -- you're tricking your mind in a way. You're playing a game against your mind where you're setting a goal, which you know, in hindsight, or in the future, won't be very great or pleasing to look at or say out loud but now, it's where we're at now. And, and where we're at now is not where we want to be but we have to do that to get to where we want to be. And I think looking at the big picture is very crucial.

Steve Martorano

Yeah, it's interesting, and anyone who's done even modest exercise, or weightlifting, for instance, or sit-ups, which is a good example comes to understand that it's not the first 10 or 20 setups that you do. It's the last two or three that means more than the preceding 15. 

James Boria

Right. 

Steve Martorano

So I guess what you say when you say about setting goals Be realistic at the beginning. And then each time you achieve a certain plateau there are two or three more setups out there, right?

James Boria

Yeah, they'll always be two or three more setups. 

Steve Martorano

There's always right?

James Boria

There is and that's why it's a very daunting thing to think about. But when you think about in terms of small wins and small growth, to eventually reach large growth. It's worth it in my opinion.

Steve Martorano

Yeah, yeah. You mentioned earlier that you gravitated towards this because you thought I understood you to say something in your childhood was missing. And this filled the spot for you. There weren't any, you have any mental health issues as a child did you

James Boria

No. So I'll go into a little bit about my background. I come from a divorced family or have divorced parents I should say. And in two different states. I lived in Long Island with my mother and my dad lived in New Jersey. So the way the arrangement was set up was, I would be with my mother on the weekdays and Friday would hit after school, we would get in the car drive to New Jersey, be there till Sunday, come back Monday for school. So I was never able to develop kind of friendships that would not want to say distract me, but give me something else to do. So when I was at my father's house, and I didn't have those relationships, where I was at home where I didn't form those relationships, so everyone else was out doing their own thing. I had sports, and I had my mind and I was I had no other way to push myself. And I became obsessed with baseball. I would be in the cages -- I love the idea of being in the cage on like a Thursday night, like nine o'clock at night for some reason when I was 12 years old. I just loved it. I loved the environment. It didn't matter what happened to that, during that time. Didn't matter how well or bad I did it. It was just I liked doing what other people weren't doing. That was enough. 

Steve Martorano

Yeah, and that's the attention you want to bring with your effort to bear crawl, raise money for kids who find themselves similarly lost or looking for something. 

James Boria

Yeah. 

Steve Martorano

So it's a fantastic, fantastic idea. Gee, you know what what's the projected date for when you're going to do this bear crawl?

James Boria

It's October 7 of 2022. 

Steve Martorano

Yeah, well that gives us plenty of time to have you back here. Maybe you could video, I'm sure you videotape or you've recorded some of your training sessions. So maybe we can have some of those and take a look at it. And we'd like to keep an eye on your progress. This is a terrific thing. As I said, everybody's looking for a kind of eco pose equilibrium in their lives. And so because life is crazy, so why look for trouble? But it's not trouble you're really looking for its higher plane and Jim's an example of that. Thanks so much. I got a quote here. I want you to react to I can't attribute it because I don't remember where I heard it. But I remember somebody a high achiever, saying that the only thing that separates me from greatness is me. 

James Boria

Yep. 

Steve Martorano

And I guess the other thing is, when you push past your limits, all those sorts of excuses, fall away.

James Boria

Which is a scary thing for people. We love excuses. It makes life excuses. easier, but he says that's where the growth lies.

Steve Martorano

Yeah, that's where it's at. Jim Boria, thanks. Good luck. Let's stay in touch. We'd like to have you back on the corner and chart your progress. And we and we look forward to you breaking that record.

James Boria

Yes, absolutely. That will be done. 

Steve Martorano

Terrific. Jim Boria, thanks so much. Don't forget to Behavior Corner. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook and all those other things. We love hearing from you. Give us some feedback. Tell us what you'd like to hear us hang with you're on the Behavioral Corner. Take care till next time.

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