#117: The Silent Battle With Reality TV Fame (Garret Miller from Siesta Key)

0:00Garret Miller, welcome to the show. Happy to be here, man. Thanks for having me. We just did a breathwork and you mentioned that breathwork came into your life in an interesting time. Did breathwork help you? Absolutely. 100%. I feel like during the height of my anxiety, breathwork was probably the most important thing that I incorporated every single morning, maybe in the middle of the day, depending on how I was feeling. and actually the breath work that we just did was the exact breath work that I did every single morning, Wim Hof, and he was a lifesaver, honestly, during that time that I was going through.

0:39A lot of people don't know too much about the anxiety that I had. I don't really talk too much about it, nor have I really opened up about what I was going through and how, I guess, severe it got, But it was at a point where, you know, I didn't want to leave my apartment for the longest time. I mean, like there was times that I just felt heart just pounding palpitations kind of set me in some spirals where it was like I felt like I needed to go in like a bath, sit in the bath and try to breathe and relax just to calm my heart rate down. At the time, I think I had an Apple Watch, constantly would check the heart rate, see what that was at.

1:19If it was high, anxiety would spiral even more. And then breathwork came into my life. Wim Hof, I learned a lot about him and how he's been able to alter, you know, anxiety and panic through breath. And ultimately, I started doing it. And it was a huge game changer for me. when you go back to those times was there a thing in reflection that was the catalyst to the anxiety was there a thing that you feel like built up over time in your life that made you feel anxious I think a few a few different things uh combined all into one one being you know I was on a I was on a reality show and reality is one of those things where you don't get prepared for it you kind of get thrown into it.

2:08And as the years went on of doing it, the more anxiety kind of built up because I was put in a lot of high stress environment situations, you know, being around people, getting arguments, whether it's fake or real, you don't really ever know. So you wake up that morning and you know that you got to go film and you don't know what's going to happen. You don't know what producers are going to try to, you know, make something, you know, nothing into something and that can create a lot of different anxieties and panic. And, you know, then I caught myself at the time I lived across from a brewery, you know, I'd go across the street, have a, have a beer with the guys.

2:47And that kind of slowly, I feel like kind of became more of a regular, a regular thing. And that wasn't me. And I felt like I was starting to get a little bit lost. You know, I started doing things that I feel weren't necessarily true to who I am and like what I believe in. And, you know, that was a telltale sign for me that something's wrong here. And I think a lot of that kind of stemmed into one big breaking point. And I remember like, I remember to this day, there was a day that the anxiety was so bad, I ended up getting palpitations, which never had those in my life. And that's where you can feel an extra beat in your heart, but you can actually feel it not only in your chest, but in your, in your throat and in your mouth.

3:32And it feels like you can almost feel the heart skip. And it is a really awful feeling. I don't ever recommend it to anybody. So do your breath work. Um, but when that happened, I was just like, this is something's, something's wrong here. You know, this is something, And something's telling me that I got to make a change. And ultimately, that's kind of what I did. I started doing a lot of different things that I know I needed to do, such as breath work, getting back in the routine of exercising, cutting out alcohol, limiting myself from going out. I think even at the time, to be honest, I was even, you know, smoking weed.

4:13I was doing all that. And I think a lot of that just kind of tied into the anxiety. You know, it wasn't helping it. It was more of fueling the fire. Hmm. Yeah. Would you say the reality TV is not really reality and it maybe can make it harder for you when you're outside of that? Maybe there's like an added pressure that you felt because maybe they're, and this is all assumptive, but perhaps they're making you look a certain way that you're not. And so then people are liking you for someone that you're not potentially. And then there's maybe like an isolation you feel. Do you feel like that might've been the case?

4:50I mean, in terms of, you know, obviously when it comes to reality, of course, they can make you look any sort of way, you know, when it comes to editing. I think a big thing for me is when I got onto the show, I told myself I wanted to stay true to who I am, no matter what the situation was. Whether it was at a party, they were offering drinks. I knew that there was consequences that came after it, such as if you drink, obviously that leads to you getting drunk. you being drunk on camera leads to thousands and millions of people seeing you on national TV. I already had that in the back of my head.

5:28So I was very aware of that. And I was very strategic when it came to filming to where I was actually lucky enough that the show, you know, it, it made me look kind of who I am, you know, just being humble, being a good person, and not being like, I guess, like an asshole or something like that. And I was aware of that. And I wanted to make sure that I kept that image. But at the same time, you do get put in sticky situations. You do have the whole world looking at you. It creates a lot of, you know, stress and anxieties when you're going out in public. You know, you have people coming up to you.

6:07You almost got to look and be at your best, you know, possible behavior because you never know who's watching. and, you know, they see you on TV and then they see you in real life, they could be like, well, I saw Garrett in real life. Maybe I'm out having fun with my friends at a club, you know, just enjoying myself. I get put on video and I think I'm like some crazy party guy or, you know, I'm just like absolutely just doing something wrong. They can kind of twist it in any way that they want to. And that was something that I always thought about as well, which was kind of tiring at times because it was just like, you know, you want to have fun, you know, you want to be a human.

6:42And when you constantly have that pressure, it can kind of add up over time. Take me back to before reality TV. So you started filming the show when you were 21? 21, yeah, it was when I started. And so what was life like before that? Teenage years, growing up. And yeah, take me back to your childhood before kind of getting thrown into the spotlight. Yeah, you know, sports were kind of the bread and butter in my life. football and baseball particularly that those are the two that I played and really succeeded and did well in. Childhood was great. I had tons of amazing friends and I'm still best friends with two today.

7:24You know, I still see them, still talk to them. Had a great childhood growing up with all of them. Sports was huge. You know, unfortunately for me, sports created injuries. I had a lot of injuries, you know, that I had to deal with, what ultimately kind of built me to the person that I am today. Playing football and baseball throughout high school, I had three major surgeries back to back to back three years in a row. I think they started sophomore year, junior year, and senior year. I tore my labrum and my right shoulder playing baseball, sliding headfirst and had surgery. Fast forward the next year, playing football, I tore my ACL and meniscus playing football.

8:10Next year, tore the same labrum and the same right shoulder, senior year. So that in itself was also a huge impact on me, you know, in my childhood. You know, I was only, you know, 15, 16, 17 years old going through major surgeries. And obviously sports were kind of life, you know, like I thought I was going to the NFL. I thought I was going to the MLB. That was obviously the goal. That was the dream. Had a great career playing in high school that maybe that could have been possible, but God had other plans. And, you know, I kind of went with that. And I never, I never kind of got down on myself about them.

8:52Obviously it was tough, but I've always been a person that I think you need to persevere through those times. I think it helps you grow as a person. And I think every time that I had one of those surgeries, I came out a better person. Um, even during the times that I couldn't walk, you know, it's just like, you're grateful for the times that you can walk and you look at life in a different perspective. Um, so that was kind of like, you know, growing up, I would go to the beach a lot too. Um, being from Siesta Key in Sarasota that the beach was 15 minutes away from our house. So that was kind of the hangout.

9:26I was always outside playing manhunt with kids at night, just enjoying life as I think kids should do. There wasn't so much of the technology that there is nowadays. I think I got my first iPhone or maybe Instagram came out when I was a freshman in high school. It's kind of crazy to think about now and see where the world's at. But yeah, so that's kind of what childhood was like. Yeah. So sport was obviously a big part because I'm relating to this. I was playing high level sports back home in Australia and it becomes your life, right? It's the dream. It's what you want to do. And it's a cool thing to strive towards too.

10:09I think it's also something that's supported it a lot of time, like parents are probably more willing a lot of the time people playing sports and maybe starting a business or something like this. And so it is that supportive thing and, and it's good fun and it's great. When was the turning point where you stepped away from sport and what was the, what was the reasoning behind that? Yeah. So I still know to this day that when that day came. I actually went to a school. It was Warner University was the name of it. I was in Lakeland, Florida. And I had some buddies that played on the team for baseball.

10:48And I drove. I got a tryout. I drove two hours to go do the tryout. Went there. Did great. You know, they offered me a scholarship to come play for the team. And it was one of those things where I was at a point in life where I had obviously gone through all those surgeries and the school itself, I didn't know if, I didn't know if it was a fit. You know, I didn't know if I necessarily saw myself being there for the next, you know, two to four years. And ultimately I was like, I love training. I love working out. I love still being involved with sports. and I had a real one-on-one conversation with myself on the drive home after that tryout and I was like, gosh, do I, is today the day that maybe I walk away from playing or do I do it?

11:45And ultimately, I decided I want to get into training and being a trainer for athletes. I was like, how can I still be in the same world and still do the same kind of training and still kind of get that competitive edge without having the injuries and being somewhere where I necessarily don't feel at home. And ultimately that's what I did. You know, got certified in sports nutrition, strength and conditioning, and did all that. And there's still parts of me that look back on that day of a little bit of regret, you know, not trying to maybe go play. But then also, I believe everything happens for a reason.

12:24Because fast forward, I want to say maybe three to four months after I decided to take that leap and leave sports, I got the call for the reality show. And that was like, kind of like I felt God speaking to me like, hey, you have something else to go do now and i kind of looked at it like that ever since yeah yeah it's cool i love the lens of of everything's meant to be there's so much it's so freeing like embodying that because then you have trust in the highs and lows right like it's all it's all kind of meant to be i think when i look at at my life i i find the the moments where I can have the most peace of the best moments.

13:12And I think when you have trust, it can unlock peace a lot more. Like you can feel this level of just trust that it is all meant to be. And so for you in that time, it's fascinating to know this like pivot in your life because as we alluded to earlier, you kind of like got thrown into this different life of reality TV. talk to me about those early stages of that and when your life really started to change you know you started getting stopped on the street and how long was this process and how are you feeling and navigating through that early phase of of being public and being this figure yeah um it was uh it was weird yeah it was weird um it really was i remember sitting i remember sitting on the night that the first episode came out for Siesta Key.

14:07We were all at a house watching it together. Obviously, we were on Instagram, you know, doing our stuff, going live, like, you know, creating, you know, people to tune in and things like that. And I just remember the episode ended, and I looked at my phone, and my following went up, I want to say, 40 ,000 to 50 ,000 followers in one night. something like that and I was just like what just happened you know and not only not only that it was also very weird for me to see myself obviously on on tv I never you know what's funny is when I when I did the show we filmed even my parents were the same way um you know I told them about it and I was like oh yeah I got this cool thing uh it's called Siesta Key MTV's buying it.

14:59They're going to publish it and put it on MTV and on the air. And they're like, oh yeah. And even myself, I didn't really believe it. I'm like, I'm not going to believe it until it actually airs. So even now, all throughout summer as we filmed, I still had this weird feeling. I'm like, I still feel like this isn't real. I'm like, I don't see this coming out and being on actual TV. And then sure enough, July of 2017, I think, is when that first episode air and to see it actually being on TV was very surreal. You know, I felt almost awkward still. You know, it's just weird seeing yourself for the first time.

15:39Like I was just like kind of thrown off by it. So when that happened, it was kind of like a trickle effect. Like every single week, new people were tuning in, more people were finding out about it. And I think it wasn't for the very first, like when I fully experienced, I guess, being out in public where people, I guess, noticed and knew about the show. Um, I went to Tallahassee, there was a hurricane in Florida, um, back in 2017. I think it might've been Irma, maybe was the name of it. And so me and my brother packed up my car, got my car, we went to Tallahassee just to go hang out and have fun in Florida state since that's where I went for a year for school and I had a lot of friends that still live there.

16:25So we get there. It's Friday, a happy hour. You know, we're all going to go out. I'm getting ready just as I normally would. As soon as I get there and step foot into the happy hour, a bunch of people came up to me and were asking for photos, saying, oh, you're from Siesta Key. and here I am like I don't even I'm not even thinking about that I'm just like I'm there with my friends I'm like not even like it's just it was weird you know and it really it was kind of weird to to deal like not to deal with but to go through you know it kind of took some time to adjust to that um and for the most part I love people you know I love talking to people so I talk to everybody that comes up to me and it's always cool to hear you know they obviously want to hear from me, but I like, it kind of striked conversations for me to get to know other people as well, which was really cool.

17:22Um, so that was nice. You know, I got to meet a lot of great people. Yeah. It's an interesting frame that you being able to, okay, I'm going to get to know other people. I find that's actually a more of a difficult thing to obtain being put in the limelight because you're getting so much attention. Naturally, a lot of people can struggle with that from an ego standpoint and like a i'm better than you standpoint right and so like getting to know the other person is is like more of like a they isolate themselves by gaining gaining and there's like a level of isolation because like i'm doing this thing i'm getting all this notoriety and then they like inflict this pressure onto them it would be a cool world to if everyone could adopt that same mind of going like yeah i i'm just a normal guy like let me chat with you did you struggle from from an ego standpoint being put in the limelight and really things like blowing up very quickly was there any part of you that that really struggled with that um in terms of just like the ego and letting it get in the way um you know for the most part, no, which I'm very grateful for.

18:35You know, I was always, I was always more giving, you know, like I've always been a person that gives and I always look at and put myself in, if I was in somebody else's shoe, like I like giving people the time of the day. Like I don't like to just rub my shoulder off and be like, oh yeah, nice to meet you. You know, like, and also I thought about people invest their time into watching the show that I was on. So I'm like, you know they're taking time out of their day to watch that and and ultimately they're fans you know which is crazy to say um you know and I never I remember when I would be out people would always say the one thing that I just never got on board with um and I'm sure people like you said had egos and they embrace that stuff but when I would be out and people knew who I was or anything like that they'd be like oh he's he's Gary he's a celebrity the word celebrity I just didn't like I didn't like hearing it.

19:27I didn't like people saying that about me because I'm just like you said, I'm a normal guy. I'm a human being. I was lucky enough and blessed enough that I got the opportunity to be on the show. And I'm forever grateful for that. And I think it's amazing, but I'm also a human and I'm just like everybody else, you know? And I always, I was told that to myself, like, I'm no better than you. You probably have crazy cool things that you can do that I can't do. And I just never liked that word. You know, I just, it wasn't for me. Like, you know, it wasn't me. Where did the anxiety stem from then? Because if you think one of the main things was the show itself, but then you didn't have that ego and pressure and, and you didn't have that extreme feeling as much from that, what aspect of the show brought the anxiety and what was the pressure built up from?

20:21I think a lot of it came from on set situations. So ultimately I was on the show and I did have relationships on the show as well. You know, and so you get put in situations where, you know, you get in arguments with that person or they try to have another person come in and manipulate the relationship that you're in. And so to deal with that, it's a lot of, it's a lot of thinking. It's a lot of like, you have to be on your toes of like what you need to say, what you need to do. And I think over time, it just kind of got worse and worse. Like, you know, just going through situations where you're getting like backstabbed or, you know, you're getting put in high tense, you know, verbal situations where you're just like, is this real?

21:17Like, did they actually do that? And you start second guessing yourself. And that was kind of hard, you know, because it was a constant thing that I had to wake up and know that I had to go to set. And I'm almost like, what's going to happen today? You know, and it's constant pressure of you not knowing. And your real life is obviously put onto the show. So you have to be careful. And I feel like I was always trying to be careful. But then if something got out, you know, say in real life the thing is is like outside of cameras whatever you did they would find out and then they would try to bring that they would try to bring that into the show so that made it you know hard so how often were you shooting so for each season we would shoot for i want to say what was it like two to three months maybe so and then and so every day for three months not every day so it was usually five days on two days off and out of those five days though you might not shoot all those all five you might maybe shoot three depending on how busy let's think depending on how much drama you're giving them the more drama that you have the more air time you get.

22:34So that was also another big factor when it comes to reality TV is like, the more drama you're giving, the more the producers want to see you on camera, the more that you're offering, the more that they want you to be there, the more, you know, air time you're going to get. So for me, that was difficult because of course, that was another thing. The more air time you get, the more that you're seen in the episode that also ties into you getting paid so you know if you're not giving drama they could cut you out of the episode you don't get paid for your time that you were there so that was tough damn okay so the whole the whole reality tv scene comes down to how much drama you can bring a lot of it because i guess the reason people are watching it because they love drama of course and so you strip away the drama then no one's in motion it's boring right so so the whole aim of the game to win in reality tv is just to bring the most drama so to have the most amount of a character and then you win practically so to do that you need to overextend yourself and you can't really be yourself you kind of need to you need to go outside of the you need to like put yourself up on a bit more of a like amplify everything that you're doing in order to make it reach.

23:55Yep, exactly. And that was tough for me because I didn't want to, like I said in the beginning, I had this like image that I obviously want to keep, which is being who I am. So that was such a hard thing for me to constantly like worry about, but give enough to where I'm giving enough drama to still be apart and on the show but not too much to where it's like then i'm going down a different route and allowing them to make me look a different way than i don't want to look you know tell me about that line and what's actually going on in your mind during that phase i'm just what i'm drawing it back to now is when i was uh and did you leave the show on your own accord did you get kicked off the show how did it work uh so essentially yeah it was kind of like a a parting ways of you know going a different direction yeah so i think back to my conversation with mtv jesse um from nelk uh yeah yeah so when i was speaking with jesse and he was talking about his struggles and challenges of being a part of nelk and he would like hide in his room and he created like an apartment in his room in the mansion they lived in because he didn't want to be out with them and he had really bad anxiety right and uh he was talking about this line he was going how do i incorporate myself into the pranks and into the scenes whilst at the same time not overextending and going too far like we were and it's not me anymore like how do i keep myself but also keep myself in it and it was this very very blurry line it was very hard how did you manage uh like knowing how far to extend yourself so that you could keep your job in a sense yeah whilst also not like going against who you are and your character right so i think for me like you said it was obviously it was a fine balance that you had to keep and i tried to keep that so like i said i did have like relationships on the show that was i think a big part of why they liked me was that I had that going on for me because some people were single and they were just trying to mix in people with them.

26:13But because. Were they real relationships or were they? Yeah. So I actually, yeah, was in real relationship. And you met them on the show or did you meet them and then bring them into the show? First relationship was before the show. So we got onto the show together. And then the other one was I met her on the show. Right. So yeah, it's, it was both yeah both I guess and uh those were sticky situations because then you're put in situations where you're around your ex then you're around your other ex and then they're with another guy vice versa like you know it was just like a whole a whole thing and I think that was like a huge part on why they really enjoyed still having me because it was like there was still the dynamic of those type of things.

27:05And there's storyline, you know? And I think that's another thing. If you have storyline, that's what they really like. So for me being on it since the beginning, there was still so much storyline that they could like, not me make, but they could make and manipulate into something. So that's kind of what they would do each season is like, we still have Garrett. There's still this person. Now there's this person. How can we like shake this up a little bit? so it was constantly like that damn yeah and so was there a point where you realized like i can't keep doing this for too long was there was there a part for you where was there a turning point at all ultimately there wasn't drama anymore um there wasn't drama on my end and ultimately they saw that from a producing side of things and that's kind of where the roads went separate ways you know, once you don't have drama, you don't have a storyline they don't want to follow anymore, they ultimately can just be like, we want to move forward, you know, and that's kind of what happened.

28:14You know, I got a call and obviously it was one of those things where it was tough because it was five years, five and a half years of my life of giving so much to obviously them, time, scheduling, you know, tons of different things that tied into how much I gave them. So when I got that call, it was, it was hard, you know, it was, it was something that I wasn't really, I guess I kind of knew, but also didn't know if that was actually ever going to happen. Cause I remember, I remember when I started on the show, I just never knew would it ever end, you know, it feels like it wouldn't. And it feels like you could do it forever.

28:52Cause it's just so good you know things are going well uh but then that happened and it was a turning point in my life because then I was like what do I do now you know what what do I do and how can I go from this and still you know I guess be on the path of like still doing fun things and having success with whatever it is because it was like that had so much to tie into a lot of things like I had my online coaching business course being on national tv helped so much with that because it's like you're getting free advertising so I had to really start thinking about what it is that I needed to do ultimately kind of sat with myself for a while um and eventually was like you know hey, you have this following on social media.

29:45You built up a great, you know, you built up a great following that people want to see your life. They love you for your fitness stuff. So I'm like, you know, I could still, you know, take that and make something of it. And I still have my online coaching business to this day. You know, it's on the app store, still helping people worldwide, you know, and that's been successful for the last seven years or so now. So that's been amazing to see grow and as well as obviously the social media stepping into more of like, you know, content creation. And I think once the show, once I left that, I really dove deep 100 % into content creation.

30:28And that was really cool to see like how that could keep elevating your presence and, you know, showcasing inspirational and informative stuff to people. And, you know, I love being able to make stuff that I can share with people and they feel good watching it or maybe it's helpful for whatever they're going through. You know, I think that's where I really like to try to make my content is how can I make this helpful for somebody? You know, of course, there's the fun stuff that you make, but ultimately it's nice to hear maybe you change someone's life through like my injuries when I make videos on my, my, my comeback or how I dealt with, um, you know, just the challenges that that brought.

31:12And, you know, I have had people come up and say like, you know, Hey man, that inspired me. And that I really like that hits, hits right here super hard. Cause I'm like, wow, that's crazy. Like you, you watched it and you felt that like that. I don't think about that necessarily until someone says it, you know? So it's really, uh, heartwarming to hear that yeah we were just chatting about it with michael earlier uh around how powerful impact is and the feeling you get from making an impact how how cool that feeling is over a lot of other feelings like it it trumps the money that you make it trumps the fancy things that you have the feeling of when someone like says that you've changed their life yeah it's pretty powerful it is so so you said you would film for three months of the year and then you mentioned that the anxiety was coming from the stuff and the drama going on on the show was the anxiety mainly in those three months or was it a year-long thing and it kind of bled out into your life as a whole and I guess the time frame like how long did that extreme anxiety persist for so it definitely so when I was younger on the show I didn't have really I didn't have much anxiety.

32:28I was just a young, naive kid. You know, I was kind of like, I didn't even know what anxiety was. I was just like, when someone said they had anxiety, I didn't know how to help them. I'm like, I don't know what that is. And I didn't really think about it then. And then as I got older and more aware and more things to do with, you know, business and everyday life things, like I started, I guess, becoming more of an adult and having more things to take care of. I feel like that was probably maybe the last two seasons of the show when it really started to really came into my life even outside of the show.

33:11Even when we were done filming, I still was having anxiety. I don't know if it was because I knew that I was still on the show and knew that obviously a new season would be coming up And I was constantly thinking about being put in those situations, I guess, again. And that's obviously to say, like, the show wasn't always just all anxiety. It was it was fun, you know, like we had great times and so many memories. And it was it was a blast, you know. But I think as I got older and had more responsibilities, it started to affect how I felt. And like I said, when I was going out drinking, you know, partying more than I typically would.