what does it mean to live life to the fullest train to your potential and perform at your best, leave nothing on the table. That's a non negotiable is that I strive to be better every day because if I'm not on top of my game, how is anybody else going to follow me down the road? Keep demanding more of yourself to live up to that potential and to stay hungry. Training is progress. You know, when I look at the word training, I think of steps, baby steps to get somewhere that you want to be and that is basically your life journey. That's a mindset and itself man, it's like, it's not just about I know that for you, a lot of that's about the physical, but we're constantly in training, whether it's growing our skill sets, whether it's growing our physical bodies, whether it's growing our relationships, whatever and all of that is a training ground and that kind of goes back to the mindset that we just talked about. You underestimate yourself and you don't even start, but then once you start, you often surpass what you thought you could do perform at your best money. That's that's sort of what life is all about. You know, I don't have the knowledge and have the fitness, the healthy ambition and drive that no matter what comes along when that next phone call comes, I can just say yes, I don't have to worry, just go and do it.

What is up guys, welcome back to the live train performed podcast? I'm your host, Sean Cobra and I'm here with magic Marlon Mariah's mate, I really appreciate you sitting down with me and having this conversation, former audience can give them a quick introduction to who you are. My name is Marlo Morris, I'm a UFC fighter, I'm ranking the top 10, I fought for the UFC title, I've been the champion in the World series of fighting and I'm not leaving the best moment of my career and I just, I just think everything happens for a reason and now I know why everything happened the way it happened and I'm, I found myself and I want to speak a little bit about everything that, you know, and how I found myself again and how the taste for training for victory, for the to learn, get better and everything else came together, you know, and I think Thailand johnny boy and all seeing these guys every day in this atmosphere out here help it, you know, and it's still pushing me through my goals, A lot of things to unpack.

Their first thing I want to talk about is um you said, I found myself, I wanted to find myself again, What do you mean by that? Like what made you, what made you lose yourself, you know what, when you're winning, you were always fixing, you're always learning, but and end the day something you still can't see, you know, you still don't see the mistakes you make and everybody always says in general, you only see the mistakes when you lose, you know, But at some point, I think it's right, you know, you are Winnie and everything is happening and you're just like, man, I'm the man, you know, But yeah, but I think helps a lot because you, your confidence, you know, you're confident everything you do, you throw a function, the guy goes out, you throw a kick, the guy goes out, you know, and things just happen, you know, and I'm just at the point of my career, that things are not happening, you know, and I was humble enough to to look back to everything, every fight and see what was happening, you know, and to try to get something different, you know, I'm with my family all the time in florida, you know, I love my wife, I have two boys and there they are my my engine, you know, they pushed me, you know, I would say they are my my gasoline, you know, I do that for them, you know, But still when you went home, you think that um you're doing everything you can, but it's hard man to manage it all the time and see in this business it's a cruel business, you know, fighting business, you either are 100 10% or you're not, you know, if it's missing a little bit at some point you're gonna pay for and I paid for at some point, you know, I'm not regretting, I'm not saying blame coach a coach, be coach d or myself, you know, on the way I was training and you always I've been always pushing myself.

I've been always the first, the last, I've been always trying to get better every day, but it's still not enough, you know, and you only see that you are not doing everything that you could, when you change a little bit, you make a little tweaks, you go see new people, you go to a different training camp, you see how people train and I think this is important for me and the fact that I came here to Thailand for this camp and how everything happened, you know, and here I am, you know, I'm fully motivated, you know, I am ready and I can't wait just to get him in in the octagon and and fight, you know, that's what I love to do and I know I'm prepared for anything. I'm prepared for a war and I'm prepared to finish him in the 1st, 1st round, if I have to, you know, and that's how I'm going to this fight. Yeah, awesome man. Um we'll circle back to, you know the decision to come out to Thailand based yourself at Tiger muay thai how you got here, the connections you've made here, how fight camps gone, we'll go through all of that in a moment, but I still want to dive into a couple of those things because you know, you were on a roll man, you are one of the top fighters, still are one of the top fighters in the UFC Bantamweight division, um you know, fought for the title, beat some of the legends of the sport and it was just dominating, then you had a couple of losses, you kind of lost your mojo a little bit, was that one of those kind of turning points that made you take a step back and have a look at how you were going about your training and the people that you had around you and how you were going about business.

Was that one of those reasons? Yeah, definitely. And I can say about my decision before, mentioned about john, you know, about johnny boy boxing guy, john Carson and we met in, in florida when he was there with Peter, I've been, I've been always, yeah, I've been always a fan of Peter, I watched him a c a C B. He fought one of my guys, I used to train with Maga. Maga had a good fight with him. The first one, the second one he lost, I was watching him, I knew he was the one day he was going to get to the top and I know the base that he has is a great boxing base, you know, I love boxing, I love to get better and the connection with john was just an opportunity to learn a little from the background that Peter is from, you know, and learn a little about his method of training, you know, and john, he made me an invitation, you know, he said, I could come here started, came here, you know, he welcomed me.

You know, Peter is the champion, I am top 10, but you know, I'm kind of a way, you know, from that picture and nothing could like, uh, stop me from coming here and you know what, we are brought professional, if you have someone just as good as you, you're going to get better, you know, it doesn't matter if one day we're going to have to fight or not, we're going to get a legitimate Yes, yes, it may be a legitimate thing, man, Yes, and we're going to, especially if you go on a little bit of a role now, yes, you start winning fights, man, there is potential and you will be fighting in the future. We, we were about to fight, you know, it was a little like, and we end up not fighting and you know, he's one of the best and when I moved to the UFC, that's what I want, I want to fight with the best and and until the day I caught a career, I want to say, man, I fought with the best of the best, you know, and that, that was the decision I met with john and I, he said, oh, you can come here to target, you know, it's the doors open to, you can come here a couple of weeks.

But then I came here and I saw how good it was. You know, when I saw that I could focus on the training here and I bring that, bringing me back to the beginning of my career. I'm in the room, small room, my bed, my tv, I didn't get to watch more thai tv but I try, you know, just talking with my family a little bit and 100% in the fight, walk to the gym, walk home, home gym, home gym and that's what I did for the last eight weeks. It's a simple life in Thailand man. And I think this is one of the reasons why a lot of people do come over here and they based themselves at Tiger Muay thai for their fight camp for 468 weeks or whatever because it does remove the distractions that you do have at home, you know, with your commitments being, you know, a husband, a father, a brother, a son, a family member, a friend, whatever. Like all of those, all of those, it's not like those commitments are then taken away, but they minimize, you know, so you've got less distractions out here and it's like literally man like you're on the street, you literally wake up in the morning, you go to the gym, you do your work, your sleep, you stretch, you recover, you go back and do another training session.

Yeah, that's, that's what I thought about. You know, this is a very important fight. It's a turning point. I want to turn it into a positive, you know, and I'm just starting and that's, that's the first one from my next couple of fights, I believe that I'm ready for that and I found that here, you know, and I didn't leave my team back home. American top team, I'm still on american top team. And when I came here, the plan, the initial plan was coming here for a couple of weeks and finished there. But unfortunately I got the Covid and my camp got short, so me, yourself as my coach, john, we, we decided to be here. You know, I think that was the best choice I made it and I feel unbelievable ready and I just can't wait. That's cool man. Um, and just a little bit more from my end on that back story. I remember ah, john boy came back from that trip to the States and you know, obviously I'm not sure if it was before the l jermaine fight or before the Jose Aldo fight.

I think it was Jose Aldo fight, your name was mentioned, potentially you and john fighting for the bantamweight interim title, is that correct? Yes, that's right. I remember, I remember johnny was like, hey, we had a fight, we signed for the fight, we're supposed to be the main event for, you have seen Kazakhstan, but then the fight got canceled because the Covid started and then I was like yes. And then, and then we, and then we, we got to talk about my name and Aldo name, but we had a fight, the fight was canceled. That was the only fight I only had two fights cancer in my whole career. That one and one fight that one guy pulled out and I never stepped back from the fight. You know, I always made weight. I try to be professional and and respect the sport, you know, and respect my opponents and I think this is very important for us nowadays. You see a lot of people missing weight, you know, now showing up for the fight and this is this is really bad for the sport.

Um talking about this training camp, how has this camp been for you? How how different has it been to be at Tiger, be away from your normal team at american top team. Have you know, your main coaches around you? You haven't obviously had that opportunity here. You've got a completely new team around you, you're in a completely different environment. How has this change in circumstances either works for you or not work for you. I think, I think the biggest point at this whole trip, this whole training camp, it's about the confidence, you know, how you get the confidence, how you build your confidence. It's not about psychological, it's not about who's going to tell you what to do, You have to close your eyes, watch the fight 100 times in your mind, of course it does gonna help you, But man, it's all about the work, it's all about the training, the daily be uncomfortable and work hard every day, it's about getting there and get the extra session, you know, if you're tired, you just get another round, get another skip around, you know, if you drew a little bit, get better drill again and this will help the fighter, the doctor, anybody in all areas, you won't build your confidence if you're not working hard, if you're not drilling enough, you know, it's how you get better, this is how you get confident, you know, and I think harder work better, you're gonna be for anything.

That's a good point. But I also see the other side of it where people are just grinding themselves to the bone and they're doing too much, You know, this is this is a common issue that I see with young fighters particularly up and coming, man, is they just want to get into the gym and they're training, you know, 2, 34 hours a day, man, they're grinding grinding themselves to the bone, like, you know, that's too much, there's a dose response relationship, we need to provide enough stress and then rest, recover, so we are actually getting better and this is something that, you know, you've, you've said this during this interview already, you're like, man, I'm feeling this, feeling great. This is like this is why it's so important. You will be surrounded by people like yourself, john the good cultures, the people that man, somebody gotta pull you back. Not you, you know, because if you see someone all the time man, I feel sore, I feel this and that and that man, you should never complain. You gotta have the right people around you because those people, they want the best for you.

You have to listen, I listen to you. I listened to john, I listened to everyone that tiger because we have to be humble enough to recognize to people, you know and how, how, how many days you've been on the books studying, you know what you're talking about, john he was a pro boxer, he knows about the punch how to throw the punch. I respect him every time he said, man, you're doubling man wobbling. Watch your step man. I know he's right, but sometimes I'm doing it and I said, man, I think I did right. I'm gonna tell you the truth. Maybe he tells me 1000 times. I'm wobbling 999 I think I'm not wobbling, but I just try to fix you know, and if he's saying he's right and if you if you're working with someone that you are doubling what he's telling you, you should not work with, you know, that's what I think, you know, and when you tell me about the hip man, your hip is man, I believe you, I don't need the mirror to show me, you know, you were saying, I believe you 100% but a lot of people don't, a lot of people have a little ego, I'm not just saying about the hip about that, but I'm saying general, you know, like some people, they just think they are always right, but me as a fighter, if you want to get better, if you want to win, you always need to think you are wrong.

That's a great point man, Something that I always think about is I'm forever a student and this is why I'm like, this year in particular, I'm really focusing on learning the craft myself, you know, I'm going into the mixed martial arts sparring sessions on monday, I'm going to jujitsu twice a week and going to the box inspiring, you know, I want to know how you guys feel, I want to know how you guys are moving, I want to know I know what I'm doing in terms of strength conditioning the theory and the practical, but can I apply that to a fighter and I have been doing that for four years now since I've been at it for almost five years now, but for me, the next stage is to get in move, like you guys move, feel what you guys feel so then I can take, you know what those other coaches saying, if I'm going into boxing session, johnny's coaching and I feel a big link already, you know, I don't know if you, you have a big link with the grappling and the wrestling, but I feel like the boxing department, you and john you are guys are Lincoln, you know, and I like to see that I like to see because a lot of people have ego, you know, the coaches and they don't want the conditioning guy to give an advice to the boxing guy and the boxing, I don't want the conditioning guy to give them an advice, you know, and I, what I first saw here that I like it, it's that you guys talked with each other all the time.

You guys give each other opinions all the time, that's cool. And I see yourself expiring, you know, like, and I will see a conditioning called that spine and telling me things that makes sense, you know, and it's, you know, like for me, I am in this game for a long time and I see it all and I know when someone is telling you things, but like they have no clue, they just want to be the one saying stuff and, and I, and I felt in you that you were telling me meaningful things and I said, man, that thing, that was his saying means something to me, it's it's working. You know, he's not here bullshitting me, he doesn't want to be the one saying ah some guys, they just know I'm here, I'm telling him things, but I felt you were there because you want to see how is that going and at some point you feel like you can say, you just say, you know, and me as a fighter, a lot of people don't think like me, but I do think if someone's outside, he's seeing things that you don't everyone, we watched a fight, MTV and sometimes man, that guy is dropping his hands, can we do the same?

I don't know. But we see that I try to pick up things from people outside all the time. Yeah, I appreciate you saying that man. It really means a lot and that's one of the reasons why I am getting into learning some of the martial arts because one I want to feel what you guys are feeling. But to you know, it gives me credibility as well. And then I also get to hear, you know what john is saying in the boxing classes and I hear the way that the words that he uses when he's talking with you and he's like, hey, do this, this this And then I'm like all right, well when I'm looking at strengthening auditioning, we're talking about stability, we're talking about force production, we're talking about force transfer, we're talking about force application alright, We're literally talking about the same things right? But johnny's using different words for that. So then I start taking his words and I start using them in our session. So you're like I've heard this before, it's all connected. Exactly man, and it has to be broke and the same thing with joseph and I'm going to ju jitsu sessions, he's saying do this, this this this this I think this morning when we did our Turkish get ups, I was like hey pull, push, you know use those leave, leave the system and I'm just taking those those words and the verbs that are being used in different training sessions and I'm like alright cool, how can I start applying that to my strength and conditioning sessions?

So everything's kind of tying in for you as an athlete. So it all makes sense. And that's that's the thing man, this is something that I'm I'm doing at Tiger is building out this team environment because at the end of the day like you know it is a team man, you know, you are an individual athlete but if you've got the right team around you man like it's as much as I've seen this before, like people work in the gym but they will only support the guys that they trained directly, you know and man, we are a team if one guy from the gym is winning, we all are winning, you know, and sometimes it's easier for the one that's not working with him, he's gonna get the credit and he didn't have to work for, you know, and I think this is important, I seen that here and the way Tiger and all the coach street every fighter, you know, it's it's it's really amazing and even the youngest guys, you know, some guys have bad days, they lost, you know, but doesn't matter, they are still tiger, we will support them and I think this this means a lot, you know, because we know if we're on this side we're going to have a team and if you're on the other side we're still going to have a team, I think that's such an important element man and something, you know, I want to give massive credit to you as well, you've been like such a good addition to Tiger over the last couple of months that you've been here, because I see how you are with with everyone man, like people come up to you in the sparring sessions or in the drilling sessions and they want to talk to you and you're always, You know, hanging around for 15, 20 minutes afterwards helping people out and giving them pointers giving them tips, um you know, you're always talking to other people in the gym and you know, sometimes it's not about.

you know, this is this is why the team environment is so important man, you know, there's gonna be people like you who's peeking for a fight, right? But then there's gonna be other people that are outside of fight camp. They need to be good training partners in that time and come in and you know, give you what you need to really build you up and then when it's time for them to go into fight camp and they get into that last you know, 4 to 6 weeks where they start picking, you don't have a fight coming up, then you start helping them out a little bit more. That's how the team environment works, man. Exactly, and a lot of people don't think like that, but man, we need these guys, we know the gym full because if you think the gym is only you, how are you going to have partners? You know, and we are individual sport but we need a team around us, A lot of people don't think like that, but we need that team, we need it, you won't win if you don't have partners, the coaches are very important, big portion but what are you going to do if you only have the coaches, not the training part of the training partners is so important as well. And this is I think in my mind this is why I like tigers such a good place to change because you do have a number of good training partners.

You know, some of them aren't here long term, a lot of them aren't here long term, a lot of people are just coming and going, it's very transient, but you know, you do get a lot of bodies on the floor and you can pick and choose and um you know, all right, this guy is he's a little bit taller, he's a little bit ranger, he uses his distance really well, he's quite evasive a I'm gonna, I'm gonna Yeah, they go from everywhere and you see like the best of strikers, maybe you don't have ah some of the top calibers fighters in bellator and UFC we do have, but I'm just like saying, but we hear grounds with them, but we got the best wrestlers, the best strikers because they're all here man, we are in Thailand the strikers, the best strikers, we have the best kickers, we have restless, all those Russians, all those people from the Dagestani killers from europe, they are very good wrestlers, you know, so it's it's a great, it's a great thing to have in the camp and and sometimes you don't find it back home, it's hard to put it all together.

Yeah. Um obviously being in camp for a couple of months now and you've said numerous times like I'm feeling good, I'm ready. Like this is this is our last week, you fly out when we're recording this Wednesday 23rd, you fly out 20 eight to go over, get prepped. Um you know, go through the final weight loss, wake up process um sharpen the ax, you know, peak week, How are you feeling now after the last couple of months, 6-8 weeks you've been in camp. I feel great man. The confidence there, you know we always talk about the weight, that's a big point to you know, we have always to be connected and like I always I always I told you about the way the weight is great and you just told me keep eating you know enough carbs to replace it and here it's hot. You know my weight is amazing. I'm gonna get there and just finish, you know one week, finished training, get their speed and get get a recovery week, fight week is gonna be recovered And then let everything go on March 12.

Yeah man, I'm excited bro. Um something we spoke about one of our very first sessions that we had, we went through a little bit of the health metrics stuff with uh you know, heart rate, variability, waking heart rate, etcetera. Have you been using that stuff and if so how have you been using it to track your workload, track your recovery, track your and adjust your days. Yes I am. I am tracking and I haven't tell you every day how I feel but every day it's looking okay, you know I bet early have a day like under the 87. So I'm doing good. You know I tracked my heart rate at training and I'm recovering better and sleeping good. That was, that was the question I was going to ask man is because you know, if you do have a couple of really hard training days in a row, your heart rate variability is gonna drop, Your waking heart rate's going to, you know, start elevating, tells your body under stress, right? So then you can make smart decisions about what you're doing, aspiring alright?

We're doing five rounds of stand up today and then we're gonna do two rounds of grappling. Maybe you don't go hard for those five rounds, maybe do three difficult rounds standing up and then do one round on the ground and that's it. You're constantly adjusting your training session, right? Yeah, I've been tracking and I think we're just doing the smart way. You know, here we are training fine because I never felt like exhausted. Like man today, I think I'm gonna tell culture that my body is hurt, you know, and I feel good and I just, I never told you because I really never felt that tired. And that's the thing, man, like I, I didn't need to ask most of the time because I could, I can tell the way that you walk into the gym the way that you present yourself. Everything is an assessment for me. As soon as you walk in training one of the boys this morning and I see you walk in, you know, you've got your coffee and chatting to your kids and I'm like alright marlins here early, must be ready to go if you get that on time and with the head down, you know, like you, you always say this is important.

Body language, body language, body language, john got that from you, he always tells me that to body language, body language, I know it's yours, the way he says, you know, body language, body language and I just, I'm happy, you know, I'm doing what I love and when you do something, you like it, you just enjoy every day, it's still, I'm away from the family, but everything is working the way it should be cool man. Um it's been great to get to know you, it's been great to train, you have this fight camp together and you get to work with another extremely high level guy and I'm looking forward to seeing you go out there and do your thing, March 12th, so I really appreciate you sitting down giving me this time man sharing with myself with my audience this story, um the name of the podcast is live train perform this stands for live life to the fullest train to your potential, perform at your best. What does that mantra mean to you, mayor, I want to thank you for the opportunity to work with you and let you know that when I, when I told one of my friends, I don't know if you know him, but he knows you, He's a black belt, like probably 5° in black belt, Jujitsu MMA fighter, he's been here in Thailand and I'm not even gonna say his name because he don't care, he just wants the best for me and he said man, when you go to Thailand make sure you train with Sean because I think he's a big, big pilot, pilot on the Yankees game and all these guys, you know, I think he's a great professional and you should train with him and when john mentioned your name, I just meant I want to work with this guy and being great, you know, you are a really professional guy and I think people, when people come here to Thailand, they got to reach out to you, they can get good training and my time here being amazing, a tiger, it's just my first time, you know, I know I'll be back after this, we're gonna come here and get prepared for more fights, more challenges and I just want to tell the people that listen to you and they've never been to Thailand they should come here, come to Tiger, train a tiger.

And I think the training here, if you come to Thailand for white, I training, you have to go to tiger because that's the gym, you know, we have everything here and if they don't have a place to stay, they can reach out to the gym, the gym will provide everything. They even have a rough story outside when you see on the picture, you think small, but when you get here it's like a mall, you know, never ends, it's like three floors and they have everything, you know, and I've been so happy to be here with this experience and I think a lot of people, they gotta come here and and feel that man, there's healthy food, that's healthy life, you know, you know, of course if you want to go to the beach, everything's gold, everything you can make it happen and the fighters to the fighters wanna come here, I think it's such a great opportunity. If you were a fan, you're going to train with the fighters, you're gonna have the same training or if you are a beginner, if you are a guy that want to be one of the UFC fighters one day, come here for an experience trained with, with us, you know, and also if you are a high level, I don't think you're not gonna find high level fighters here because you're gonna always find guys that are better than you come here and you see.

Yeah, that's it, man, I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much, my brother have a good day, we look forward to building man, Looking forward to seeing you back in the cage. Yes, it's about, it's about it's about that time man, it's about that time, on the right time. Let's go brother, cheers mate. Thank you appreciate it bro. Okay, This episode was brought to you by Swiss eight which is a proactive mental health program designed by veterans initially for veterans that has been pushed out to the wider community that allows you to structure in and schedule their eight pillars of health and wellness including nutrition, sleep time management, discipline, fitness, personal growth, mindfulness and minimalism. This episode was also brought to you by be spunky which is a male hormone optimization supplement that I've been taking for about a year and a half now. Absolutely rate. It's a TJ listed nutraceutical, meaning that it's made from all organic produce to help you manage and optimize your stress levels, which in turn increases your ability to improve testosterone production levels naturally.

User code codes 10 at checkout for your 10% discount. All of those links will be in the show notes. If you've got some benefit from this episode, please make sure you pass it off to your friends and family. I'd appreciate any shares on social media platforms. If you tag me or if you share it to your stories, make sure you tag me so I can share that as well. Any five star ratings and reviews are much appreciated, much loved guys. Peace