Today we’d like to introduce you to Sanjay Raja.
Hi Sanjay , we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Currently I am the Executive Producer, Creator, and Host of the TV series “Recipe for Wellness”. I also am a professional SAG actor, national speaker, and pubished author. I say currently because I always joke with my kids and friends that I have had so many careers and it took me 40 yrs to find out what I was meant to do until something pulls me to do something new again lol.
In college I bounced around from engineering to compuer science and then landed on pre-med. I took the MCAT(medical college admissions test) 3 times before I finally got acepted in to med school. Afer I recived my admissions letter I made the decision to not go because I realized I wasn’t doing it for the right reasons. I just wanted to see if I could do it but I wanted to experience life and not be locked in to just one thing for the rest of my life. I then took jobs in IT and then took a hard turn and went into combat sports(martial arts) and came out of that with a lot of injuries. I then worked for a variety of medical device companies and did well but realized I wasn’t happy. I decided to start a small side hustle in 2011 in the form of my personal training/nutrition company called “Team No Excuses Fitness”. The goal was to really fix my health from years of competing through the knowledge I have gained from being an athlete, working with surgeons and MDs in my corporate job in medical device.
Not only did I fix my health but others starting noticing the change in me both physically, and mentally and I started to gain clients to train them on nutrition&fitness. So fast forward to 2014 and I am still working my corporate job, and my fitness company is gowing as its evolving into more than a side hustle. I was invited in 2014 to an MMA fight in madison square garden hosted by a close friend of mine and he said for me to put together a commerical for my company as he will air it during the fights. I hired a professional camera man and we shot a makeshift commercial for my budding company which then aired at the fights in madison square garden. Nothing really came of it for a while but then I got a call from an acting agent who saw it and asked if I ever thought about acting and if I was interested in doing more in this field; I am all about experiences and said yes.
In 2015 I landed a recurring role on House of Cards on netflix, a number of TV shows, commercials, and films from that point which accellerated my journey into acting. In 2017 I finally left the corporate world as my fitness&nutrition company was doing well thus I focused on acting and my company all the while raising my two beautiful twins(boy and girl). I took it as a personal mission to teach my kids about health&wellness at an early age to make sure they didn’t go through the challenges of obesity I did when I was growing up so I started working on a book to help teach parents on how to help their kids enjoy health&wellness from an early age.
In 2018 my first book “The Food Talk” A Parents’ Guide to Teaching Kids of All Ages was released. The release of this book led to me to getting on various stages and podcasts to speak about health&wellness and my book which led to me adding the career of professional speaker and being a co-host and guest on a variety of podcasts. This is the same year I pitched the idea of a TV show based on my book to my close friend who is a director and producer in LA and he loved the idea. We put together an episode for the show idea and shopped it around with 0 interest from networks but we knew we had something.
So for the next 5 yrs nothing happened with the show idea but I continued to build my brand and reputation in the health&wellness space, took various acting opportunities, speaking opportunities and build my nutrition&fitness company. It was only till late 2023 that we had the opportunity to pitch the idea with the decision makers at PBS. They loved the idea of show not focused on health and wellness for kids but challenging people’s long held beliefs about health&wellness through the power of storytellng. Thus I quickly started a production company in Disruptive Productions LLC to create the show which has evolved into a show about telling interesting stories about health&wellness, nutrition, fitness, travel, and lifestyle by sharing stories from experts in health&wellness, medical field, chefs, athletes, celebrities and more.
It’s now 2026 and we are in post-production for season 2 and pre-production for season 3 of our show “Recipe for Wellness” as we airing nationwide on PBS and we will be airing very soon major streaming channels as they have taken noticce of our show and see how we are resonating well with audiences with our message through stroytelling. We are speaking with other large platforms that want our content, the production company is now discussing and producing other content, in addition to getting cast for more TV&film and speaking opportunities.
The journey to get here has been long and took many unexpected turns but I would not change anything about the journey to get us here and I am excited for what is to come!
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Worthwhile things in life never come easy as there were so many challenges on this road. While I was raising 2 kids and buliding my acting career and writing my book I went through a very unexpected divorce in 2018. This put a stop on my acting career which was ascending as I didn’t have any family in FL to help me watch my kids when I was taking auditions in NYC, LA and ATL at the time. I decided I would only do local acting opportunities and video auditions which completely slowed my progress in the acting world. In addition I had to reset my finances as I was essentially starting over from the divorce and had to make tough decisions about which speaking&acting opportunities I could take because being a present single father was my most important focus. I continued to build my nutrition&fitness company very slowly and hit a lot of rejection regarding the idea of our tv show based on the my book for the next 5 yrs while trying to be a present father.
I am big believer of the saying that “life happens for you and not to you” as every hardship that has happened and that could possibly happen down the road only has helped to make me more resilient and able to look at challenges as opportunities. Once I took this mindset in late 2023 everything changed for me as everything accelerated for me professionally in my career path in entertainment and personally as I was more present in each moment with my kids and being a better listener for them.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I am proud to have created a variety of creative outlets for myself to help share my message of health&wellness for a better world, and entertain audiences though my acting and speaking career. I am most proud of being able to create careers that allow me to share what I have learned on my journey in health&wellness to help as many people as possible.
I think what sets me apart from others is typcally people like myself of east-asian descent don’t enter the entertainment industry so one of my goals is breaking down the barriers of stereotypes and showing audiences around the world we belong in the entertainment field to share and showcase our talents and hopefully inspire a new generation of entertainers.
Current projects:
I am the host/creator/Executive Producer of the nationwide TV show “Recipe for Wellness” airing nationwide on PBS and soon to be airing on major streaming channels.
www.myrecipeforwellness.com
I am the host of the nationwide podcast based on the our TV show “Recipe for Wellness” that can be streamed on all major podcast platforms.
www.myrecipeforwellness.com
I am professional SAG actor with credits in TV/Film/Commercials with films set to release in 2026.
https://pro.imdb.com/name/nm7578668?ref_=nm_menu_shr
I am also a national speaker and work with organizations large and small on implementing health&wellness plans across organizations to help increase productivity, retain top talent, and boost empoyee morale..
www.sanjayraja.net
We love surprises, fun facts and unexpected stories. Is there something you can share that might surprise us?
I believe what people find most surprising about my work/brand is before I started my nutrition&fitness company I was in combat sports (martial arts) as I have trained in martial arts since I was 13yrs old.
I also have taken roles in acting that are a complete departure from the traditional roles of doctor or engineer people would expect me to take. I have played the role of a strip club owner to a transsexual female as I wanted to challenge myself as an actor to take roles outside the traditional sterotypical roles most people wouldn’t expect me to take,
Pricing:
- Keynote Speaker Fee in person ($20K)
- Keynote Speaker Fee online ($5-$10K)
- Corporate health&wellness services(Contact for pricing)
- Podcast Sponsorship(contact for pricing)
- TV show Sponsorship(contact for pricing)
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.myrecipeforwellness.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/recipeforwellness2024?igsh=MTRrOXl4cHY3OG91ZQ
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/14rEevFWYo
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sanjay-s-r-925682b2?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=android_app
- Twitter: https://x.com/Recipe4wellnes?t=PZae_X0UJHyXzOl89ctQAQ&s=09
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@recipeforwellness?feature=shared
- Other: https://www.sanjayraja.net
