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Philip Pape 9/15/23 Philip Pape 9/15/23

Ep 105: Strength, Power, and Vitality for Women at Any Age with Cheryl Ilov

Today, I am speaking with Cheryl Ilov, a dynamic force who challenges the misconceptions of aging, fitness, and the power of the female spirit. She is a physical therapist, martial artist, dancer, and author. With over 20 years of experience in private practice, she has helped thousands of clients recover from pain and injuries by integrating the science of physical therapy with the art of movement.

Cheryl is also a second-degree black belt in an ancient Japanese martial art called Ninpo Tai Jutsu, which she began training at 47. She is the author of two books: “Forever Fit and Flexible: Feeling Fabulous at Fifty and Beyond,” and “The Reluctant Ninja: How A Middle-Aged Princess Became A Warrior Queen.” She hosts The FemiNinja Project podcast, which is about overcoming obstacles, personal empowerment, restoring human dignity, and alternative health and healing.

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Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:40] Cheryl's passion for self-mastery
[7:15] Misconceptions about aging, fitness, and being a woman
[10:43] Definition and significance of the somatic movement
[13:27] Your perspective on vitality
[17:14] Top 3 recommendations for enhancing vitality
[22:44] Starting martial arts training at 47
[29:05] Your unique challenges as the only woman in your martial arts class
[35:09] Breaking gender barriers in martial arts
[41:39] Comparison of Ninpo Tai Jutsu with other martial arts forms
[44:30] Overcoming intimidation for women in martial arts
[49:45] Practical application of martial arts in real-life threats
[54:37] Safety and empowerment techniques for women
[59:59] One question Cheryl wished Philip had asked
[1:01:01] Where to learn more about Cheryl
[1:02:37] Outro

Episode resources:

Website: cherylilov.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/cherylilovvitalityconsultant
Podcast: The FemiNinja Podcast
Books: Forever Fit and Flexible: Feeling Fabulous at Fifty and Beyond and The Reluctant Ninja: How A Middle-Aged Princess Became A Warrior Queen

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Transcript

Cheryl Ilov 00:00

We talk a lot about training our spirit. So it's not just training, you know this even with what you do in the fitness industry, it's not just physical. You know, you're actually strengthening and growing your entire being. And especially as a martial artist that's really really important to us and I could feel my spirit starting to rise, I could feel my spirit getting stronger.

Philip Pape 00:25

Cheryl Ilov 02:37

I thank you, Philip, it is an honor to be here. I really appreciate it.

Philip Pape 02:41

So you've got quite the background. We were talking about that before we started. And we're going to dive into some of that it. This is a time when people are always seeking shortcuts, right? This is a time when people get complacent as they age, this is what I see at least. And here you are you dive into martial arts at the age of 47. You're a dancer, physical therapist, you talk about unleashing strength and power. One term that I've often used on this show is is self mastery, specifically physical self mastery, but even in general, and it's something that I really admire about you and your story. So what is the driving force behind your passion for this mastery?

Cheryl Ilov 03:17

Oh, wow, what a great question. Honestly, Phillip, I think what it is, is my incomparable stubbornness, and my resilience or not my resilience, but my resistance to accepting the status quo. You know, as we mature, some people might call it age, but I say we mature. As we mature, we start to hear things like well, you're never going to be able to do this again. Or you have to be careful. You know, I just spoke with a retired orthopedic surgeon yesterday for my podcast, and talking about, you know, like bone density, bone loss and the fear that comes along with aging, because we're told that all of these horrible things are going to happen to us. And it's not necessarily true. Because what we believe is what we become. And if we hear that those labels when you're getting older, you're getting frail, you're you're gonna lose bone density, you won't be able to do these things. Eventually, we believe that and what we believe is what we become. So I think it's really important for us, as we get older to flip the script and kind of look at what do we want our life to be like, over the next 510 years, you know, project ourselves see ourselves as in our 60s 70s 80s. And that, to me really kind of lights a fire underneath me, especially because I've been told so many times about the things that I wouldn't be able to do. I was a chronic pain patient when I was in my mid 30s. I went through another really difficult time when I was in my 40s and both times I had people almost I felt like they were patting me on the head and saying Don't you worry it's going to be okay and we are going to take care of you. And that was just what I needed to hear here because I don't want anybody taking care of me. And I don't want anybody telling me what I can and cannot do.

Philip Pape 05:07

That stubborn streak is relatable to me at the very at the very least, it's funny, my wife and I both have that sometimes they say opposites, opposites attract, but we're actually very similar. So it kind of butt heads in that way. But it's always fun. Because you're right. It's like why, why do we need to accept where we are? Why can't we do what is physically possible, mentally possible. And many of us, we don't discover that, until we have some of that wisdom of as you said, maturity age, whatever it is, that we may have been afraid in our 20s, or people been telling us things for years. And at some point, you just listened to it because you don't know any better, perhaps. And then the wisdom starts to reveal itself as you try things right. And as you take that action, so I love that idea of just doing it and saying forget what these people say. The other thing is Cheryl, right. Outliers tend to be the ones that that make progress. I don't know about you. Have you found that that just, you know, the status quo is where the complacency lies, and that outliers are the ones that are kind of changing the world.

Cheryl Ilov 06:07

Absolutely, and the ability to go out of your comfort zone. And there's a reason why we don't like to go out of our comfort zone, because it's pretty uncomfortable. So we do like what's known. And we do like to kind of stay in the status quo. But I think along with the incomparable stubbornness comes that once and the wisdom as we get older, it's, it's the adversity, you know, we all have a lot of issues and obstacles in our life and challenges, and how we deal with those adversities. And come out through it on the other end, is basically how we are setting ourselves up for the rest of our lives. Yeah,

Philip Pape 06:47

for sure. And part of that adversity, for many of us comes in the physical world, right with when it comes to fitness and health. And I always argue that health is the most important thing you have, because it enables everything else in your life, no matter how important all those other things are. So we focus on getting stronger. We talked about movement, nutrition mindset on this podcast, and then cultivating that agency to constantly improve to bust through the status quo. So I want to set some context here in your journey to feeling fabulous at 50. Right? What are the most commonly spouted misconceptions you that you alluded to that do hold people back about aging and fitness? And feel free to add being a woman to the mix?

Cheryl Ilov 07:30

Okay, well, you know, I think being a woman is not that much different, I guess, then, you know, men go through the same experiences as well, just maybe in a different way, but that we are being told that, you know, the experts, the from media, from the health experts, of what to expect, when we're aging, and again, using air quotes, that of course, we're going to be losing our bone density. So we have to be really careful, you know, it's natural to start losing your balance, you know, you're going to need these medications. You know, all of these things that we have to do, it's almost like it's a prescribed course of action that is inevitable,

Philip Pape 08:10

inevitable. Yes.

Cheryl Ilov 08:12

That's not true. And as you said, in my introduction, I am a former chronic pain patient. And that happened when I was in my mid 30s. And I was a chronic pain patient for two and a half years. And I was a medical professional. At that point. I was not a physical therapist, I was a respiratory therapist. So I was doing everything that I was supposed to do, according to the western medicine model. You know, I went to all the PT appointments, I took the medications I did the stupid exercises and stretches that the PTS gave me, went to all the doctors appointment, my life was just a mess. It was horrible. And you know, I'm sure I was depressed back then I couldn't even identify it. I was in too much physical pain. But after two and a half years, I finally realized, Hey, I'm not only not getting better, I'm getting worse. And this regimen that I was following, I think was keeping me in that pain spasm cycle that I couldn't get out of. So it wasn't until one of my doctors told me that I would never be able to do my laundry in my grocery shopping all in the same day. Because the arthritis in my spine was so severe, I would end up being bedridden that it was just like whoa, wait a minute, you don't understand I'm planning on going back to ballet class. And she actually laughed in my face and said wait a minute, you don't understand you are a chronic pain patient you will always be a chronic pain patient. You will never have the life you wanted or the life you had before. Even if you couldn't go back to ballet. You can't do that. You're way too old. And she knew that one of my goals was to go to physical therapy school, get my master's degree and she says you can forget about PT school because you are way too damaged. You are way too broken. And even if you could do the work, which you can't, you are way too old. I was 36

Philip Pape 09:57

that that is unbelievable. And you mentioned and all of those things like bone balance, no bone density and balance and medications being inevitable. And it's almost like the cause and effect are flipped, right? Like, these things get that way, probably because we're not doing the things that we should be doing and could be doing. And now we want to do those things. And the medical establishment is kind of stuck in there, what I call sick, sick care mode, rather than healthcare mode. So that so that that's fascinating. And being a physical therapist, I'm going through left shoulder therapy as well. And you kind of see those messages, even in that industry where don't do too much like don't take it too fast, you know, take it easy. And here I am wanting to train and get stronger. And you got to have the right to the right mix. So let's segue into the somatic movement, because I want to understand more about that. I think about it in your book, which is up behind you, forever flexible. My personal association with that is like the mind body connection, at least in the context of strength training, but maybe that's a narrow slice of what you mean. So what is somatic movement? And why is it important? Well,

Cheryl Ilov 11:04

absolutely, it is the mind body connection, and the somatic movement, it's like taking that mind body connection and really fine tuning it and taking it to a much deeper level. As well as being a physical therapist. I'm also something called a Feldenkrais practitioner. And it's a it's a four year training program. And it is basically a very highly sophisticated form of neuromuscular reeducation, based on the scientific principles of neuroplasticity, that our brain and our nervous system and our bodies, our mindset can change, all during the course of our lifetime, that we are incredibly malleable beings, starting with our nervous system in our brain. And the funny thing is, Phillip, you're gonna love this when I was in physical therapy school, we were taught and that wasn't really that long ago, I graduated in 96. We're taught in all of our neurology classes that this incredible miracle of nature's want to call it this neuroplasticity disappears at the age of 14 that has that point. You know, we're so hard wired that we can't change anything. And how depressing is that you want to think about it. But of course now neuroscience has finally caught up with you know, the idea that yes, this neuroplasticity, not only is with us forever, as long as we have a pulse, but it's incredibly powerful. And that we can use this power of neuroplasticity to change our lives and to keep us going in the right direction until the day we take our last breath.

Philip Pape 12:31

It's an empowering thing, right? Like you said to to better your agents. It's like when when some when I get the question, well, I'm over 50, how can I start strength training? Like I'm over 50 It's like this block of once you hit a number or even 40. I mean, I'm 42. And I'm like, I'm not old, come on, you hear that, like, I'm a woman over 40 Is it is XYZ possible. And it's like, you know, you can be 75 and you can lift a barbell and deadlift for the first time, it doesn't matter. And that's why I love your story. Because you're going to talk a little bit about it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter. The bringing the brain into us is really fascinating because the idea of adaptation. Beyond something like evolution, right? We often think of like species and things like that, but in real life in your life as as a biological creature that you can change so many things about your body, with your mind and change your mind itself is really fascinating. So I want to talk about vitality, in that context thriving and kind of link it all together. What is your perspective on that? Right? You talk about this at every stage of life? That's what we're talking about? And what is the most important component for that vitality? You know, if you had to choose just one? Well, first

Cheryl Ilov 13:44

of all, I love the fact that you brought the biology into it, because we can change our biology. And it has even been proven that we can change our DNA. So but that's another long story. But it all does start with your mindset. And that's, I think, where the vitality comes from, as well. Again, we've all had a lot of really terrible things happen in our life journey. Life isn't meant to be easy. I wish it were but it's not. And it's how we deal with a lot of those adversities. I think that really has a lot to do with Vitality. If I look back at some of the horrible things that have happened to me in my life, you know, I could be incredibly angry, I could be bitter. But you don't want to do that, because it's really bad for your complexion. So you know, ladies, don't be bitter. It ages you very quickly. But if you could look at some of those things that have happened to you along the way and kind of flip the script and say, you know, okay, it was really terrible that that happened. And I really struggled mightily as I was going through it, but look at where I am now. And look at where all the opportunities come from those adversities. So to me, that's what vitality is. It's a positive energy. It's a sense of you know what, life really is amazing and it does provide it so many wonderful opportunities, even thinking of look back at the pandemic, that was horrible, really horrible. But look at all the positive things. Well, the few positive things that did come out of that is that we didn't become a lot more connected, you know, through the internet because we have no choice. So now, you know, there's a lot more telemarketing or not telemarketing telemedicine, you know, the podcasting community has just exploded, I get to talk to you, I met you through another podcasting connection. In a couple of weeks, I'm going to be talking to a woman in Israel. It's just amazing how many wonderful things have opened up? Yes, as a baby boomer, I'm here to say the technology is terrifying when you're learning it for the first time. But like everything, you know, change is inevitable. You can either fight the change, or you can go along with it and figure it out.

Philip Pape 15:51

Yeah, right. It's like a like a, like a ship on a wave. You know, a lot of what you're saying reminds me of positive psychology. I remember reading something, how the vast majority of people have positive thoughts, right, even though we out loud, don't necessarily talk that way. In social media. And, for example, cancer patients will often think about how other cancer patients had it worse than them in whatever way that they're going through treatment, and therefore it by comparison, makes things seem better. So you kind of alluded to that of like, bad things happen. They're going to happen. They have happened. And where are you now? And this is the future. And you know, we're always looking forward to what's going to come from that. It's like the question, what would you tell your younger self to change? And, like, often the right answer is nothing, right? Because you won't, you wouldn't have gone through those experiences. So I'm just, you'll find that when I ask questions, share, I go off on tangents and just start talking and thinking out loud, because I love this. The philosophy of all of this.

Cheryl Ilov 16:53

Actually, I love tangential conversation.

Philip Pape 16:56

Good, good, good. Yeah, so vitality in the context of it, starting with your mindset, because again, neuroplasticity, and the physical manifestation of what we think otherwise, we can't do it, right, we can't get healthy, fit, eat better, whatever it is, martial arts without starting there. So if we're going to get very specific and actionable about it, right, so people have something to walk away with, what would you say are, say three things a listener can do to improve their vitality in that context?

Cheryl Ilov 17:26

Okay, well, starting off right now, I would say, three things, turn off your turn off the TV, and the radio, don't listen to the messages that we are receiving, you know, through a lot of the advertisement, because it's just, it's gonna mess with your mind, don't let anybody else influenced you. Second thing is go outside. Even if it's hot, even if it's cold, even if it's raining, take the time just to go outside, be in nature, have some time with yourself and really have that, that moment where you can access your inner being your inner child, if you will, you know, your your deepest thoughts, your desires, you can't do that when you're distracted by, you know, the barking dogs, which of course, we both love, or the television or the radio, you need to do that in absolute silence. When I say absolute silence, I'm not talking about you can hear the birds singing, you can hear the wind in the trees. Those are the things that really help clear your mind. A lot of people will say meditate, I can't say meditate, because I can't do it myself, I would be there

Philip Pape 18:33

to there. I have

Cheryl Ilov 18:36

failed meditation miserably. And I've had so many people, the meditation gurus that have had a lot of them on my podcast, you know, you're doing it wrong. And you know, let me help you, I will help you do it the right way. So I hear that and I say, Huh, one more thing in my life that I'm doing wrong. No, thank you.

Philip Pape 18:55

I don't want to do that. It's an added stressor. Right.

Cheryl Ilov 18:59

So what I do is I will do some movement patterns, I'll do what we call key home, practice, just some martial arts movement patterns, then I can clear my mind, that works for me. So for your listeners, find something that really resonates with you and does work for you. Whether it's, you know, a walking meditation, whether it's just sitting outside and silence, just find what works for you. And that is incredibly powerful. Because that way you can get rid of all the junk, all the stuff that's in the back of your head, you know of what you're hearing those subliminal messages from the media, from other people from the experts, and really figure out what you want for yourself and what you need for yourself at that moment in time.

Philip Pape 19:44

This is really great advice. I mean that let's break these down. The first one about not just turning things off. I mean, I would add social media to the mix. Right? Absolutely. Which I know you were implying that too but just even think news like I used to be a news junkie. And the only news I look at now is like the local paper just to kind of get the headlines. And so my daughters are aware of, you know, I've got two young daughters, they wouldn't even be aware of what's going on. But beyond that, it's just a bombardment of, of trash. It's just like, terribly mixed messages. And not not even mixed. They're highly biased messages, right? Like you said, they're trying to sell you something, fitness industry IgE, all that same thing. So getting away from it is a great idea. You know, go lift weights, go for a walk, or whatever. And then the other thing of having time with yourself, I also, I will tell people, hey, breathwork and meditation are two options to reduce stress, but I don't do them. So you know, I lift weights to reduce stress, I go for a walk to reduce stress, I will walk around the house and just start talking and getting my thoughts out of my brain to do you're talking about of like, unloading things off my mind. So all great advice, I think people going outside and just getting their steps and getting their son is part of the whole beauty of what we have as humans here on the earth. So

Cheryl Ilov 21:07

and I do want to add something else to that, because you gave me a great visual, when you're talking about listening to the news and all that trash just being thrown at you. And it is it's like all of these little torpedoes in a being launched at you. And I got this image of what we do at the dojo, one of the first things we learn as a new martial art student is to evade an attack how to get out of the way. And it's, you know, quite simple. If somebody's going to punch you, and you see it coming, you just step out of the way. And all of that negative energy goes past you, and the person actually goes right into the wall or off a proverbial cliff or whatever all of that negative energy goes back into them. So that's the same thing with the messages that we're getting not only from, you know, the media, social media, maybe even society and our friends and even family messages that they might be telling us that you just get out of the way, just move and just kind of like, you know, duck, you know, bait and switch, whatever, just get out of the way and pay no attention to it. Because words have a lot more power than we think they do.

Philip Pape 22:10

Yeah, yeah, I'm often accused of being too nice a guy when it comes to not taking the bait and kind of jumping into an argument because in the fitness world, there's all the all the camps and all the misconceptions and myths thrown around. And often it's with an attempt to sell something and some people some people's style is to go after that, or even post videos of like, here's why so and so is wrong, and I just don't do that. And I don't even engage and I like that. What you said kind of validates probably why I do that is just to let it brush by you. Just I don't need to waste my time on it. Yeah, okay. So like, I want to talk about the black belt stuff in the mental jujitsu, this this ancient Japanese martial art, I do want to understand what's involved like, what what do you compare it to, but you started training in 47, you got the black belt, 10 years later, you're getting higher levels of that. So you were, I guess, 57 at that point. Most of my clients, probably a lot of people listening are between 30 and 60. On this podcast, I'm guessing. And I've seen, I alluded to before, I've seen the power of somebody who's like 55, they never lifted in their life. And then they start and they start getting these winds of like, Hey, I'm stronger, hey, I can do this thing in my life I haven't been able to do before, not even the building muscle part, which then starts to come as well, and their physique improves and everything else. So I'm on board with your philosophy 100%. The listener still wants to know What were you thinking? When you started martial arts at 47

Cheryl Ilov 23:34

I was thinking I had lost my frickin mind. Pretty much. I did not go willingly. I'll be perfectly honest. Martial arts was never in my on my radar. It was not in my DNA. This is not anything that I would ever in my entire life thought that I would be interested in doing. And my father was a black belt in karate. I have four sisters. So as a father of five girls, you could well imagine since you'd have to. He wanted us to learn a few techniques. And he would always try and get us to go to the gym with him to work out and it was like, too icky. No, you know, that sounded disgusting. And no, none of us took him up on it. I was more of a fussy girl ballet tutus, tiaras, you know, pointe shoes. That's that was my thing. And I met my sensei. He was my acupuncturist, before he became my sensei. I don't know if you've heard this story on any of my other shows, but I'm sure

Philip Pape 24:29

I have but the the audience may not have. Okay.

Cheryl Ilov 24:31

So it's a really interesting story. One of my clients, I needed a new acupuncturist and one of my clients recommended this guy, and she was really picky. So I thought, well, she likes him that he must be okay. So the very first time I went to him and he started putting needles in my legs, he got a very faraway look on his face. And he said to me, you know, with your legs and my coaching, I could teach you how to kill with these things. And I'm thinking all Right, who thinks like this, let alone says it out loud. And I'm laying there on the table going, I think maybe I need to go. But I was literally stuck. I was pinned to the table. I had needles all over me. So unless I wanted to, or try

Philip Pape 25:13

to relax, right, like what was kind of trying to, but he's telling you how you can kill me. Okay.

Cheryl Ilov 25:20

That's my legs. And you know, I mean, I was really shocked and horrified. Well, he did have a martial arts school right next to his clinic. It was like a little duplex. And finally I said, well, thanks a lot. But no, I'll just save my killer legs for ballet class. And I almost thought about not going back to him. But there's something about him I really liked. And you know, I felt so much better after the acupuncture, acupuncture treatment, so I thought I'll stick with him for a while. Well, what he did not know is right before I met him, I had a really traumatic experience. And as traumas go, a lot of times when you know, you try and get help, and you try and report it, a lot of times, you know, people just don't listen. So that's basically what happened to me. So I just stuffed the trauma deep down inside, pasted a big smile on my face and pretended everything was fine. Well, it really wasn't. And mark in the meantime, that was my acupuncturist kept trying to get me to take classes with him. And I'm like, No, this No. So about a year later, the trauma came spewing out. And he was the first person I went to, because I don't know why. But I knew intuitively that he would listen to me and he wouldn't judge me. And he would believe me, which of course he did. So he started treating me for PTSD with needles and Chinese herbs. And she got Sue, which was lovely. And then his campaign to get me on the mat went into high gear. And he kept saying there was such a healing power in martial arts, Cheryl, you need to do this, blah, blah, blah. And I kept looking at him saying, I don't understand how hanging out in a smelly Dojo with a bunch of sweaty men whose goal is to attack me is going to make me feel any better. I'm sorry, I'm just not making this connection. So he never gave up talk about incomparable stubbornness is about three, it took him three years. And after three years, I finally said, you know, he wore me down. I said, Okay, I will take a few classes just to prove to you how much I'm gonna hate it. And then I'll quit. Now,

Philip Pape 27:15

did was he doing this to everyone like this? Was this a sales pitch? Or did he see something in you? Maybe in hindsight, you learned this that where he kept persisting?

Cheryl Ilov 27:24

Well, I don't think a lot of people ask me that. That's a great question. Because when people find out that I ended up being his first female black belt, you know, in 20 years of teaching, he never had a female achieve that high of a rank. You know, people say, Oh, he saw something in you. He saw that inner warrior, he saw this. And I said, No, that's not true. He saw a person who was really suffering, he saw somebody who was struggling. And we had developed a really warm friendship. And he just sincerely sincerely wanted to help me. He had no idea, you know, that I was going to rise up through the ranks the way I did, I had no idea. My goal was to teach him that, you know, he couldn't tell me what to do, because I was going to hate this, this martial art thing. But no, it was just truly amazing. And I'm very grateful to him, you know, to this day, and like I said, I'm getting ready to test for another belt level. And it's been 20 years since I walked into that dojo.

Philip Pape 28:24

Well, I mean, tell us more about that experience, right, because your perspective as a woman, the only woman there in the class, people listening to the show, I mean, we do talk a lot about the, you know, empowering people, men and women, but especially the traditional avatar, I guess, in the fitness world is, you know, a lot of movement. Dhoni, you know, a lot of restriction, you know, lightweights you can't build muscle, you can't be strong. It's this and that. I don't know a lot of is shifted, and hopefully shows like this and others have shifted about your strength is important performance, fueling, building, right abundance, not worrying so much about whatever the ideal body image is, as how do you feel great and empowered yourself? And that's going to give you the image you want. So tell us about your perspective?

Cheryl Ilov 29:08

Well, as far as you mean, being the only woman walking into class,

Philip Pape 29:11

yeah, you're in the fitness world, in general, in the class, all of that, yeah, we will start

Cheryl Ilov 29:17

with a dojo, because that was really weird. You know, I knew I would see a lot of marks students going in and out when I was waiting for my treatment sessions. So I would see the guys they all seemed very nice. And you know, they'd see me through the glass and a lot of them would either smile or wave and some of them would even bow in my direction on going on. That's kind of corny. But so I knew, you know, these guys going in and out. And when Mark, when I finally said, started thinking about maybe taking some classes, I said, you know, I'm really worried about being the only woman in class and he goes, Oh, don't you worry. I have plenty of female students, and some of them are even higher ranking and they would love to take you under their wing and teach you the art of the ninja, and what it's like To be a female ninja and blah, blah, blah, and I'm going, Okay, well, maybe this will work out. But I didn't realize that I never saw any of these women coming in and out of the dojo. So you know, okay, I don't know why I believed him. And when it came time for me to take, I signed up for classes and I said, Okay, I'm going to try this. And he says, Don't worry, there'll be you know, somebody, another woman in class. Well, my first class, not only was there no other woman in class, there was no other woman with like in a three or four mile radius.

Cheryl Ilov 31:16

So there was me with all of these guys, I had just come straight from ballet class, my hair was still in a bun. And I'm looking going, this isn't going to work out so well. And I felt so out of place, and so incredibly uncomfortable. Talk about getting out of your comfort zone. But of course, the men were very gracious, you know, they greeted me, they showed me where the woman's dressing room was, which did not go hand at all to myself. And as awkward as it was, you know, I managed to stay through the whole class. And I even got the opportunity to kick a black belt, which I tried not to, because I'm like, No, I'm not in this for the long run. I don't want to kick you. I've never kicked anybody before. And this black belt is saying, Come on, kick me, you can do it. You can do it. And I could tell he thought I was really adorable. And I'm like, I've never kicked anybody in my life. And I'm not about to start now. And he's up twirling my ponytails. I'm talking to him. And then I says, besides, I don't want to hurt you. And that's when I really thought, you know, he thought I was just absolutely priceless. And he got this big smile on his face. And he said, Don't worry, it's okay. I can take care of myself and you can't hurt me. And I'm like, okay, and then I'm looking like where his belt was located. And I'm looking like in that direction, kind of south of the belt, if you know what I mean. And I says, I don't want to get you in the sensitive parts. And he nodded, and he says, I don't want that either. Just make sure that you aim above the belt. Just kick me you'll be fine. And I'm like, okay, so I didn't know how to kick. So what did I do? I did what I knew. I pulled my right leg up. And I pointed my toes and I drove my point of foot right through his abdomen as if I was dancing and doing a grunt attack. Again, I did what I knew, well, apparently I could hurt him. Because he actually flew backwards and landed on his butt. And Mark, my sensei now have walked over. And he was just looking and Wescott up and said, Wow, that was pretty good. Where did you learn how to kick like that. And Mark was standing next to me. And he looked down at me. And he said, How many years of ballet and at that point, it was only 27. So I said 27. And he's talking about

Philip Pape 33:38

on toe and everything formal. Okay,

Cheryl Ilov 33:42

feet, legs, killer legs. And he looked at the black belt. And he said, Don't let the package fool you. She's a lot stronger than she looks. And it was like, boom, mental head smacking moment. I realized at that moment, I was stronger than I look. And I also realized, and I think is really is very important for the audience to hear, especially for those women out there, that we have life skills, that we can carry on into a lot of different situations that we don't even realize, who knew that the ability to do a grunge day could basically maybe even save my life someday. I had no idea.

Philip Pape 34:24

Transferable life skills, that this is good, because it reminds me of so when I have a new client, one of the questions I asked him are what are your strengths? Like? What are your strengths that we can build from and oftentimes it's a mental strength, right? Or it's a personality kind of strength, but it reminds me of that because what you're saying is, you know, you didn't karate or not karate, the martial arts was brand new to you. But you had effectively worked for years on things that would carry over, right. Similarly, people listening probably have strengths that they are not aware of, or haven't exercised as much and you going into a new venture is the exact place they can exercise those skills. And it's one, you know, it's one less thing to learn one less thing on the learning curve. I think it's a great message. And I'm wondering like, what is that? You know, how can people discover that? Like, do you have any ideas on how can someone discover that? Was it one of these things where you just just try things just just be open to anything? And you never know?

Cheryl Ilov 35:21

Well, you just said it. Yeah. And that is to get out of your comfort zone. Because like I said, I was way out of my comfort zone. And for those of your listeners, who are thinking, Well, you know, I haven't gotten off the couch, or I haven't been exercising. I have a really dear friend who does not exercise. She hates exercise. And she was telling me about it one time on the phone. And she says, Well, I just don't exercise and blah, blah, blah. And I says, Wait a minute, didn't you tell me that you and John went out dancing last night? And she says, Oh, yeah, well, you know, country swing and line dancing, blah, blah, blah. And they danced nonstop for four hours. I'm like, Ronnie, that's exercise. You know, moving is exercise any kind of movement. And for those people who are still maybe a little skeptical, you know how to move. You know how to exercise, you know how to play because you did that when you were a baby, when you were a child? You know, you go back to using like, the environment is your playground. And not worry about am I doing this right? Am I doing it wrong? Just when we were kids, we didn't worry about that. We just moved.

Philip Pape 36:30

It's true. Yeah. But play play should never end no matter how old you are. It's I mean, having kids I definitely see that, you know, when they want me to play with that my, the answer should be yes. As much as it can be, you know, when I'm when I'm not like just like slammed with work or something. Oh, that that's really good. Because what something else came to mind. If I can still have it in my brain. You were talking about movement and dance? Yeah, I guess, two things come to mind. One is the idea that if you can do things that you're already doing in some extent, but but shift shift that in a new direction, it's much lower friction, right, much less resistance to doing something else. The other thing is trying things you've never done before, despite thinking you will, quote unquote, won't like them. Give yourself a chance, because you really don't know until weeks months, and it depends on what we're talking about. But even when you talk about exercise, it's like, if you've never done it before, try it. And then if if you do it right, and you get results that they actually cause you to like it, that like creating that feedback loop. So is that what you found that? I guess how long did you resistance last getting into martial arts before it was like, Oh, I actually love this.

Cheryl Ilov 37:43

Boy, that's a really great, great, great question. But I want to go back to the play. Because you know, when that is really an important part of my martial arts training, and that might sound like really crazy. But just when you're playing, that's the best way to learn. And it takes a lot of pressure off of you. So even when it you know, for those of you who might want to try you know, you know, a dance class or something, be okay with being really bad at it. And be okay with making mistakes. Because that's how we learn is by making mistakes. And whatever you do do it in the spirit of playfulness. And that's the one thing that even on my very first day of that that class even before I kicked Wes in the in the gut, that I was very, I was impressed by how well first I thought it was really stupid. All of the bow wing and the cloud, you know, some of the ritual buying in and stuff. I thought God these people are grownups, I can't believe they're doing this. I'm so silly. But after that all after all of the formal re in how much everybody laughed, and seem to be having a good time, even though they were beating the crap out of each other, which made me incredibly nervous. But they were really having fun. And that's a big part of our training is that we play. So after that first class, I giggled the entire way home. I had no idea why I was giggling. I do know that I had not giggled in a very long time. But there was something about it. I just felt like somebody had lifted a weight off of me. And I felt younger than I had in a very long time. And it wasn't until I but I still wasn't all in. Okay, let's be clear about that. I still wasn't all in this was a temporary gig for me. I was just gonna take maybe a month of classes and then quit because I didn't want it to interfere interfere with my ballet schedule. So I was shocked when I found myself writing a check for the next month's tuition because I thought man, I should be you know, check it out by now. Well, at the end of the third month. While I was still training, one of the guys came up to me and said you need to test for your yellow belt. And I said, Oh no, you don't understand. I don't want to yellow belt. I'm never going to test. I'm just in it to learn a few things. I'm going to quit pretty soon. So there's no reason for me to test. And so this guy badgered me until finally, it was like, just to get an A Shut up. I tested for my yellow belt. And I mean, it was terrifying. I mean, I almost passed out. I was so nervous. It was just absolutely, I'm sure it was an absolute mess. But I passed. And so I got my yellow belt. And I again, I giggled the entire way home, I'm looking at this stupid yellow belt. And it was just like, why am I giggling? Why is this cuz I don't really care. You know, I mean, I don't want this belt. But it was just such an amazing experience. The next day, when I went to the dojo, I couldn't even come out of the dressing room, because I tied my belt. And every time I looked at it, I burst into giggles, it was just I figured at that point, I was kind of liking it, but I still probably wouldn't stay much longer. Three months later, the same guy badges me into going for my second degree yellow belt. You know, you are way too obsessed with all this testing, one or two, just lighten up a little bit. So finally, I tested for my second degree yellow belt. Well, three months later, I got the idea to test for my orange belt. Nobody had to talk me into it. Didn't have to badger me to do it. It was my idea when I realized I know all this material. And at that point, I realized I was all in. However, I never expected to go all the way to Black Belt. Never. Right?

Philip Pape 41:34

That's I'm sure the questions that come to the listeners mind are like, well, if if you kind of found a silly on the way, and these were resistant to doing the testing, why did you keep going from one to the next? Was there something deeper that was like, you know, driving you toward excellence, even though you didn't quite accept the rituals? You know, what I'm getting at? Like, what? Yeah, because he wants to know, like, what, what is the secret? You know, if they have a thing that they want to achieve? Maybe it's some simple thing for their health, maybe it's a workouts whatever? Where does that momentum start to overtake the friction? And what gets you there?

Cheryl Ilov 42:12

Boy, that is a great question. And I'm thinking that momentum and the friction Boy, that describes me to a tee, I really honestly believe what kept me going was the fact that I didn't want a black belt. I didn't care about climbing up the ranks. I cared about living to see another day, or get through another class for the first two years. And a lot of people don't know this. But the first two years that I was taking classes, I would sit in my car and have to talk myself into going into the dojo. And by that time, I knew the guys really well, we were friends. They were we had a wonderful time training. But there was always in the back of my mind, what if something goes terribly wrong today. And I would just kind of force myself once I crossed that doorway. So this is another important message for the listeners. Sometimes you just have to walk through the door. Once I would walk through the door, and I was in the dojo, the smelly dojo, I knew I was okay. And I just wanted to be better at the art, not because I wanted to be a great martial artist. But I wanted to understand the movement patterns better, I started to become really fascinated with the history and the philosophy of the art itself. It's an ancient Japanese martial arts. And so there is an awful lot of, you know, the history and the philosophy in there. As well as the Spirit, we talk a lot about training our spirit. So it's not just training, you know, this, even with what you do, in the fitness industry, it's not just physical, you know, you're actually strengthening and growing your entire being. And especially as a martial artist, that's really, really important to us, and I could feel my spirit starting to rise, I could feel my spirit getting stronger. And you know, it just there were days when, even like today, it's like, I don't think I want to go to class today. But 1130 is going to come along and I'll be driving to the dojo. And sometimes you just have to do it. Sometimes you just have to take that first step. And once you're there, you know, it'll change your whole perspective for your whole day. It can change your entire week. You can change your life.

Philip Pape 44:31

I think what you're saying is really important, because you've been doing this for so long, and yet still there is that thought of am I really going to walk in today, right? And I think people can relate to that because we all want it to be this perfect thing where once you fall in love with the process that it takes no willpower and you just do it and you're on autopilot. And we know that's not the case. I know. I love working out go to the gym. I have a gym at home. And yeah, there's always something about it. Like if it's squat day, I'm just like no Because, but but at the same time, there's so many things pushing you. And, and I know you say it's like forcing yourself, you just have to do it. But I also see that there is a lot of momentum, you mentioned, the knowledge that you are gaining the understanding the movement patterns, you are fascinated by all these different things, the mastery of the material, the history of philosophy, the art, the spirit. So there were enough things where you're like, This is just a fun, you know, part of my life, that if one piece of it is a little bit hard, that's okay, because the rest of it is just, it wouldn't be worth it to skip out on all of that. And so that kind of like, you know, when you set the balance there of momentum versus friction, you've kind of tilted it, which is answering the question that I asked what,

Cheryl Ilov 45:41

right, well, okay, but that this was really haven't touched on this. But the other thing is, the guys once I learned how to communicate with them, because the other was I was 47. I haven't had male friends since college. And you know, ballet class, yeah, there's a few men in class, but it's a completely different energy. And none of them were interested in trying to attack me. And, you know, they're just, it was a completely different energy. I mean, it's not that these guys were so macho, but they were, you know, they were all American men, and, you know, with families and everything. And it's like, I don't even know how to talk to these guys. And eventually, you know, we got to be really good. They didn't know how to talk to me, either. Because the women that would come into the dojo along the way, were a lot less girly than me, you know, they were really wanted to kick butt and all that stuff. And they wanted to be black belts. And it was like, I'm just here for, you know, short term. And, you know, I had to excuse myself and step off the mat. So I could fix my lipstick and my hair. And they're like, No, and, you know, they would try and attack me. And I would just run screaming off the mat going, No, don't don't touch me. And they're like, what was this creature? You don't? Exactly, but it was probably once I got that second degree yellow belt, and they started realizing it started taking me more seriously. And, you know, I can hardly blame them because I didn't take my own self seriously. But they started to help me and give me little hints and tips about how to use my feminine wiles to be able to train better. They also started whispering this word as they passed me Khun Ichi. And I'm like, Well, that sounds kind of dirty. What is that, and it's actually the female warrior. Okay. And so they were playing off of my feminine femininity, and my feminine wiles to help make me a better martial artist. And I have to tell you, this, it's really kind of funny. Of course, you know, I said, I have five or four sisters, you know, three girl cousins ballet class for over, you know, now for 40 years. So all of this feminine energy around me, didn't know how to talk to men. And the first time one of them called me to see if I wanted to meet him, you know, off class time to do some training. And you know, so it's like, okay, and after he says, Okay, see you then and he hung up. And I'm holding the phone going, Oh, my goodness, I had no idea that you could carry on a complete conversation in 30 seconds, with a few mono syllables, grunts and a See you at the end of it. And it was like a choir of angels began to sing because I thought this is so liberating. Where's the drama. And it was just like, wow, the way that men communicate is so different and uncomplicated than the way women communicate. That just opened up a whole new world for me.

Philip Pape 48:44

That is true, we're simpletons

Cheryl Ilov 48:50

tend to be very direct. And it's really funny because even in my second book, The Ninja book, under acknowledgments, I acknowledge the many magnificent men in my life because I would not be here doing what I do right now. And having, you know, the, the background that I have, without their help, I will admit, some of them were kind of jerks along the way, but that was okay. But most of them were incredible and really helped me get to where I am.

Philip Pape 49:14

You make a good point that men and women can learn a lot just from the other gender, I mean, that right there in life, there's so much you could learn about I mean, for me being married, learning about empathy and listening and so many skills that I you know, identified with myself as being terrible to build so it's true. You know, I'm curious about the martial arts itself though. I do want to ask about that because just I have it on my list because I want to understand how how practical are these martial arts and to real life situations like maybe you get this question all the time, but if you don't, if somebody came up to you on the street threatened, you pulled the gun something like that, like what, what is this mark style effective as a defense mechanism is

Cheryl Ilov 49:57

very much so very effective. I have never had to use it in that type of a real life situation. But I use the skills and the energy every single day. And I think that's one of the reasons why I'm not a target. And even, you know, sensei had told me one time, he says, you know, you develop an aura, you know, like an energy field around you. And people, no, predators are looking for an easy target. And if they see somebody who looks like an empowered person, they're going to move on and go to somebody else. If anybody ever pulled a gun on me, I pray to God, that never happens. I have no idea what I would do. But I do have some confidence that I would pull something out to save myself. You know, and even, you know, we practice break falls, you know, every class, we have a series of falls and rolls and tumbling, which, you know, I didn't realize that when I first signed up, and that was a big shock. Because getting on the floor, something I did not do well, I'm pretty good at it now. And I even had a spectacular fall. That was, when was that it was New Year's Day. And I'd gone to the dojo. And as I was walking out, you know, the sun had there was it had iced over there was black ice, and I didn't know it. So I was carrying a bunch of stuff in my arms. And one minute, I was just stepping, you know, on the cement. And the next minute, I knew I was on the ground. And I actually had flown up in the air. And, you know, when I hit, it was like, Damn, what happened here, and I looked and all my stuff was scattered around me in a circle, my notebook, my water bottle, my keys, my katana pages flew out of my notebook, I hit that hard. And, you know, the men came running out to see if I was okay, because they heard it and saw it. And I just looked at them. The first thing I said was, did you see my break fall? Because it must have been really spectacular. I was not hurt at all. Wow. I mean, you know,

Philip Pape 52:00

instinctually, you know, I

Cheryl Ilov 52:02

think too, I didn't even think about it. I just intuitively did a break fall. And I always wondered, would I be able to pull it out? I don't want to be challenged like that again anytime soon. And you know what I thought even as I was driving home, man, you know, a little bit of a trauma reaction shaking. And I'm like, No, you know, nothing terrible happened. And I thought maybe I should take an Advil or two, just prophylactically and it was like no, see what you felt like in the morning. And I felt fantastic. I felt great.

Philip Pape 52:28

Now you mentioned tumbling is our grappling like, like BJJ or anything like that.

Cheryl Ilov 52:34

We do do some floor work. But our skill set is basically in standing our philosophy is we never want to get we never want to be on the floor. Because there's always going to be somebody who is far more skilled than we are at the grappling the BJJ mixed martial arts, there's a lot of that our goal is to be able to go home. Okay,

Philip Pape 52:54

so how would you how would you compare it to that and maybe like Krav Maga or boxing, right, which are often touted as like, very strong ways to defend yourself to

Cheryl Ilov 53:03

Yeah, crop. That's great. That's a great, yeah, if you really want to kick ass take names, you know, and really do kill stuff. crops. You want to go home with somebody's DNA underneath your fingernails? Or, you know, yeah, I took a craft class one time, it was a woman's group. And I was invited. And I thought I really don't want to do this. You know, to be a team player, I went along with it. And gosh, they're probably 30 Women in class and one of the women said to the instructors, female instructors, what is the difference between this and some other martial arts? And they looked at each other, and one of them said, it's all martial and no art. Got it? And it actually came out of Israel, and they were trained. Or a secret. Yeah, yeah, to be able to fight without weapons and to be able to kill without weapons. I mean, if you really want to get down and dirty and crop is great for that. It didn't appeal to me because maybe with a ballet background, I'm a little bit more, you know, artistic. And one thing I love about our art, it's very sneaky. Okay? It's not. I mean, if you would look at me walking down the street, you wouldn't think Hey, she's really martial artists, you wouldn't think that right? And that's part of the ninja disguise. Okay,

Philip Pape 54:27

I'm gonna have to look I haven't looked researched and I want to look up some videos or maybe if you have something you want to send me of yourself doing that. I would love to see that. What so if you had to women who are listening to want to know how to protect themselves or increase their confidence or all the things that you gain from this, any any strategies for them, you know, besides just doing exactly what you did, but some everyone's going to have a different thing that works for them.

Cheryl Ilov 54:50

Right? Not everybody is going to want to spend 20 years in a smelly Dojo with a bunch of sweating and getting punched and smacked around and I can totally understand that I wasn't so excited about it, myself at first. But if I just want to list a couple of things, because they're really, really important to me, every time I see a woman doing this, it breaks my heart, please put your cell phone down, there is no text, there is no call, there is nothing that is so important that that phone should occupy your attention instead of your surroundings. Pay attention to your surroundings at all times, not to be hyper vigilant, but to be taking notes. You know, like mental notes like that is an interesting looking person. I wonder why they're wearing that, you know, I wonder if this person looks like they're having a really bad day by their posture, pay attention to your environment, and the people around you is a powerful tool for self empowerment. And you can even this is what I love, because you have two little girls, you could actually even play games, turn it into a game at the park, you know, and, and, Hey, what did you notice? And what color was that dog. And if you have to tell somebody you know where you were at and what things look like that you're training them in a way that's playful too. So it's not threatening, not you have to be afraid of everything. But just to be aware, so that awareness is so appointed, important. Put your phone down, start working on your awareness. The other thing of course, this is the awareness to be careful where you park, not to be worried but to pay attention. Always have your eyes up, look people in the eye, even strangers, smile at them, say hello. Because then people know that you're paying attention, people know that you're looking. And that is very empowering. Pay attention to how you walk and how you stand. When you're talking to somebody, let's say you're in a crowded room and networking of event, I talk with my hands a lot just because I always used to. But even now, when you have your hands in front of you been using them as self expression, they can always be used to knock somebody else's hand out of the way. Never stand with your you know, hands crossed, because that's in front of you. That's considered disrespectful. Hands on hip is considered confrontational. Hands behind your back, you might be holding a weapon. So just be careful of your body language and watch somebody else's body language as well.

Philip Pape 57:15

This is great advice. What about in a restaurant? Do you recommend sitting facing the door? Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's what I've always done. Like my family knows. Like, I'm the I'm the guy who has to sit far from the door facing the door that

Cheryl Ilov 57:28

I want to see everything that's going on.

Philip Pape 57:31

Yeah. Yeah. You know, paranoia is not paranoia when it's when it's what's the phrase? Right. It isn't paranoia. Once it isn't paranoia or something? You know, I don't know what

Cheryl Ilov 57:41

the phrase is. But I just think that that a healthy dose of paranoia is is really important to have. Yeah, everywhere. Yeah. Yeah. Being aware. And again, as you're back to the wall, watching. For the audience, pay attention when you walk into a restaurant, a new building someplace you haven't been before. First thing you do look for the exits. Know where the exits

Philip Pape 58:04

are. Yeah. Even if it's even if it's just for safety if there was a fire or something like that. Right, exactly.

Cheryl Ilov 58:10

We're not thinking nothing bad's gonna happen. But if you wanted to make a quick escape, the other thing is, I used to cringe when Sensei would say this, but everything's a weapon. We all walk around with water bottles nowadays. And that's really a good thing to have. So put your phone in your purse, but your water bottle in your hand. I like the ones that have the little hook where you can kind of swing it a little bit. Make sure it's always full.

Philip Pape 58:39

Yeah, my wife tells me about the keys between the fingers, you know?

Cheryl Ilov 58:43

Okay, but he's between the fingers. The problem with that is you have to be really close to the person.

Philip Pape 58:48

Okay, fair enough. distance there. Yeah,

Cheryl Ilov 58:52

I have something called a kubaton. Okay, so you can look it up, you can, I'm sure you can buy one online kubaton. And it's just a little stick with your keys on the end of it, and you hold it, you know, like, like you're holding a pencil or a pen, and you can swing the keys. Imagine what you could do

Philip Pape 59:09

with that. Okay. All right, kind of like, yes, the

Cheryl Ilov 59:13

last bit of advice I want to share with the audience, especially the women out there, do look into taking a self defense class or two. And don't just take one class and think I'm good. Take it a couple of times, take it with a bunch of girlfriends, have an engine night, you know, and practice some of these techniques with each other. Talk about the philosophies, talk about different scenarios of how you could get out of the way how you could protect yourself, you know, the knowledge is power, and the more you know, the safer you're going to

Philip Pape 59:43

be. Love all this advice. And if you get strong in the process, or you know, focus on your health that way and they complement each other don't because a stronger person who also knows how to fight. That's pretty good. Pretty good combination.

Cheryl Ilov 59:56

That's a happy coincidence.

Philip Pape 59:58

Yeah. All right. So I do like to ask this of all guests. So when I respect your time where I know we're wrapping up here, but is there a question you wish I had asked you? And what is your answer?

Cheryl Ilov 1:00:09

Oh, yeah, I thought about that. Um, I don't know, maybe, if you could have asked me. What would you like your legacy to be?

Philip Pape 1:00:24

Okay, what would you like your legacy to be?

Cheryl Ilov 1:00:28

Hmm, that there's a warrior in each and every one of us, and incredible strength and power. And if I could find mine, oh, trust me, you can find yours.

Philip Pape 1:00:42

Love it. Love it, we're gonna leave it, we're gonna leave it that. Share. This has been a pleasure. There's a lot of great strategies here. For people and a lot of insights. We had myself included. I always love podcasts because we learn through our interviews, and therefore I know the listeners learning. So where can listeners learn more about you and your work?

Cheryl Ilov 1:01:03

You can go to my website, it's Cheryl i love.com. Remember, there was no E at the end of I love everybody puts one on there. Even I do it sometimes out of habit. You can find my website I do have if you sign up for my newsletter, you have access to three what I call, you're gonna love this, Phillip, after we talked about meditation, you have access to three audio recordings of I call it meditation through movement. They're actually somatic movement exercises based on Feldenkrais. They're only 20 minutes long. You can download them and unsubscribe, you can find me on Facebook, you can find me on Instagram, find me on LinkedIn, I'm probably more active there than anywhere else. You can also contact me through my website, if you have any questions, especially if you're a woman, and you're thinking about taking some martial arts classes, and you'd like some advice, contact me, I would be happy to guide you through the process. Because if you do want to study martial art, or even just take some self defense classes, you want to be in the right spot. You do not want to be in the wrong school or the wrong dojo, I was fortunate because I got into a school that absolutely loves women. It's a very friendly, user friendly Dojo so I can give you tips on what to look for.

Philip Pape 1:02:15

Perfect. So I will add those links there. The website IG, definitely Cheryl's super responsive. And if you need help with anything we talked about, I always encourage you to reach out to any of our guests but Cheryl, especially for questions, I'm sure she'll help you out. Cheryl, thank you so much for coming on the show sharing your awesome story, amazing things we can all learn from and take action from so appreciate you coming on.

Cheryl Ilov 1:02:36

Oh, thank you so much for having me, Philip. And I do want to say one last thing. Philip is going to be on my podcast next week. So stay tuned and listen to what he has to say. And the name of the podcast, the feminine Joe project. And men are always welcome on the feminine Joe project. And that's one of the things that I make very clear. I love having guys on the show.

Philip Pape 1:02:58

Yes, yes, you do. And so the feminine is a project you can find it I think it's all one word. It is because if you put a space there it may not show up. So all one word, the feminine to project. You're listening to this show now so it's easy to go follow it and subscribe her show. And then you also catch my interview there and all of her other great episodes. So thank you again, Sheriff for coming on.

Cheryl Ilov 1:03:16

Thank you Philip. Have a wonderful day.

Philip Pape 1:03:18

You too. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights. Please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong.

Philip Pape 9/12/23 Philip Pape 9/12/23

Ep 104: Fat Loss vs. Weight Loss

One of these can be downright destructive to your body, leading down a dark path that you’ve probably been down before, many times, that sacrifices your health and physique for the sake of hitting a number. The other drives you to make the changes you need and want to vastly improve your health and physique and do it in a sustainable, life-altering way that aligns with your body.

Today, we get into the very relevant differences between two terms that seem similar on the surface, fat loss and weight loss, but are polar opposites in terms of the behaviors you would take to achieve them.

One of these can be downright destructive to your body, leading down a dark path that you’ve probably been down before, many times, that sacrifices your health and physique for the sake of hitting a number. The other drives you to make the changes you need and want to vastly improve your health and physique and do it in a sustainable, life-altering way that aligns with your body.

We talk about the semantic differences in how we use language in the fitness industry regarding the terms ‘weight loss’ and ‘fat loss.’ We talk about why fat loss is more important than weight loss. We also talk about the dangers of crash dieting and yo-yo dieting, and how they can backfire and make it even harder to get the results you want. Finally, we talk about how to achieve fat loss to get the exact results you want without the negatives of weight loss.

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Click here to apply for coaching!
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[3:43] Weight loss vs. fat loss, definitions, and industry problems
[7:51] Struggling with weight loss before the wedding
[10:52] Unsustainable cycle of crash dieting and weight regain
[12:30] The backlash against weight loss and extreme approaches
[15:27] The debate between restrictive dieting and intuitive eating
[17:23] Using a data-based approach for efficient weight management
[26:32] Losing fat instead of losing weight
[28:13] Combining strength training with proper nutrition for muscle-building
[32:34] Recovery and stress management for a better physique
[37:24] Focus on fat loss
[38:09] Take action now for successful fat loss
[40:23] Outro

Episode resources:

Ep 88: Break the Cycle of Body Fat Overshooting for a Stronger, Leaner, and Healthier Physique - https://www.witsandweights.com/88

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Get notified of new episodes. Use your favorite podcast platform or one of the buttons below. Then hit “Subscribe” or “Follow” and you’re good to go!

Transcript

Philip Pape 00:00

Here's the thing, if you're serious about losing fat and improving your health, improving your body composition, then you're going to focus on fat loss and not weight loss. You're going to train, you're gonna eat protein, you're going to keep that muscle while you lose your body mass. So it's just fat. Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host, Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry. So you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in Wits & Weights community Welcome to another solo episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. I hope you enjoyed our last episode 103 Sweet proteins, food science and the future of sweeteners with Jason Ryder, where we learned about sweet proteins, including the science behind them, their potential health benefits and new nutrition strategy to what foods you might find them in now and in the future. Today for episode 104 fat loss versus weight loss, we will get into the very relevant differences between two terms that seems similar on the surface fat loss and weight loss, but are polar opposites in terms of the behaviors that you would take to achieve them. And what the results actually look like? One of these can be downright destructive to your body leading down a dark path that you've probably didn't bend down before many times as of AI, a path that sacrifices your health and physique for the sake of hitting a number. The other drives you to make the changes you need and want to vastly improve your health and physique. And do it in a sustainable, life altering way that aligns with your body to find out what I mean, let's stick around and get into today's topic. Fat Loss versus weight loss. Here's the thing. What if I told you that the way you've been thinking about weight loss is all wrong? What if what you want is not actually weight loss? Here's the thing. The truth is that weight loss is not the goal for most people, even if it's what you tell yourself, even if it's what the advertisement advertisers tell you, even if it's part of the process itself, right, actually reducing the weight on the scale. What most people really and truly want is fat loss. And they want that for certain reasons that go even deeper than that. But we're going to talk about the semantic differences in how we use language in the fitness industry, when it comes to those two terms, weight loss, and fat loss and stick around. Because I have a lot to say and a lot of opinions. Some might be a little controversial, hopefully not hopefully, there's just reality based on my experience and what I've seen. But when it comes to those two terms, weight loss and fat loss, there are definitely some differences in the industry. We're going to talk about why fat loss is more important, just much more deeply more important than weight loss. And we're going to talk about the dangers of Crash dieting, yo yo dieting, all the I'll say the benefits that you get from potentially losing weight, but also the dangers of a purely weight loss approach, and then how these things backfire and make it even harder in the future to get the results you want. And then finally, we'll talk about how to achieve fat loss, right, because if we're going to put it on this pedestal, I need to justify it for you and talk about how we get there to get the results that you want without the negatives of weight loss. So let's start off with the definitions. And let's talk about the industry and the problems with weight loss because I think these things are very important, these differences and distinctions are important. So in the industry, the terms weight loss and fat loss are often used interchangeably. But there's a subtle or maybe not so subtle, but important difference between the two. Okay, weight loss is simply the loss of any kind of body mass. This is just the weight on the scale, going from one number to a lower number. And this is fat tissue. muscle tissue also includes daily fluctuations like water, but generally we're talking about over time, some sort of permanent loss in tissue as measured by weight on the scale. Now in this episode, I'm not going to get into fluctuations and averaging your weight and all that kind of stuff. We're just going to assume that when somebody says weight loss, they mean true a true drop in body mass over time, whether it's five pounds, 20 pounds, 50 pounds, 200 pounds. Fat Loss on the other hand, respire refers specifically to the loss of body fat, and it may be in the context of a loss of weight. So most people want to get past that initial A new training phase where you might be able to build muscle and lose fat at the same time and not change your number on the scale. Most people when they want to lose a decent amount of extra fat will still also lose weight. But there's a very different process to get there a different result. And the the recurrence of weight regain, and the psychology are vastly different. Okay, this is why I prefer one or the other over the other. By leagues and leagues, when people lose weight quickly, when people lose weight quickly, they're more likely to lose muscle and water but muscle than fat, right. And this is why crash dieting, yo yo dieting, the way that most people diet with restrictive diets, where they really don't have much understanding of how much they're consuming, and what deficit they're in, and how and why the weight is falling off. And so generally, to get the results that you think you want, and get to that number, you go to extremes. And sometimes you push that extreme further and further during a diet, especially as you hit plateaus to make sure that you lose that weight. And this is a very dangerous process. If you want to lose fat and keep it off, it's really about losing weight slowly and gradually, but also preserving muscle and we're going to tie that all together toward the end. But I want you to understand that that's that's the key difference between the two. Now, here's the problem with weight loss. Weight loss is often seen as a numbers game, right? People focus on losing as many pounds as possible, regardless of how they do it by numbers game, you know, I like data, you know, I like numbers. But it's a single number that people focus on, instead of taking multiple data points, multiple qualitative measures of your feedback, multiple aspects of your movement training, nutrition, it's this one number. And for what, what is your real goal here, I want you to just take a step back and ask yourself, why do I want to lose 20 pounds? Right? Or 30 pounds or 50 pounds? And when I do, how am I going to feel when I get there? And is that what I'm after? Meaning? If I lose a 30 pounds, am I going to now feel very confident with myself comfortable in my clothes, I'm going to have the physique I want. I'm not going to have any more insecurities about food, or my training my nutrition, I'm going to be able to maintain my results for the rest of my life. I'm going to be able to keep eating the way I've been eating. If those are all true statements, then, then yeah, maybe you're in a great place. But tell me if that has ever happened to you, when you just lost a bunch of weight. We know it doesn't happen because we know 95% of people regain the weight that they lose, because they're doing it in this way that's focused specifically on that number on weight scale. Wait, let me just tell you a quick story about my my wedding. This was almost 20 years ago. Okay, so I know I'm dating myself. But you guys know I'm in my 40s right I'm the over 40 Crowd says a lot of what I talk about. For my wedding. This was back in the mid 2000s I did some sort of crash diet and on for the life of me no matter how far back I go and emails and everything. I can't figure out what I was doing. It wasn't like a named a big names diet. I did those later paleo zone keto, and so on. I did Atkins earlier than this. But well, all I remember was I had a piece of paper with a list of foods that I could eat. Okay, sound familiar list of foods I can eat. And they were actually very specific foods. It was like, I could eat lunch meat. And I could eat

Philip Pape 08:45

strawberries, you know, and maybe a little bit a few nuts, right? And it was like these very specific prescriptive quantities and types of food. And they were like, I don't know 15 foods total at most, and I can mix and match them. And that's a whole a that's all a it was. It was miserable. And here's the thing, my wonderful wife who loves me and we're getting ready to get married you know, she's just supporting me all the way she was the opposite of a bridesmaid I have to say so good throughout the process had really had fun with it. We had fun planning for our wedding. And deal she never said a word she just supported me you know we were still living separately so I was kind of doing it on my own anyway it's not like she was making my meals for me and come the wedding. I had lost probably 1520 pounds I was you know nice and trim fitting in my suit. But when I look back on pictures of myself back then I said Man, this guy is kind of emaciated is the word I might use like extremely skinny pale, not healthy looking as the word now far be it for me to judge other people like that, you know, at least out loud. We all judge people in our heads I get it. I'm not going to do the on this podcast and say that but I'm talking about myself here so I can do it. that, and this is what I was feeling. But at the time I didn't, I didn't have the same perception. I just knew that I had hit a number on the scale, I was able to fit in my suit. And guess what happened? We go on our honeymoon, we go to Italy, and we go on a cruise. I mean, it was quite the honeymoon, I have to say. And I just was unhinged when it came to food I just picked out I ate everything, all the things. I said, well, the diet did what it was supposed to do. I fit in the suit, and it's over. And now we're married. So there we go, I'm just going to enjoy everything, I'm going to enjoy the unlimited food on the cruise, I'm gonna enjoy gelato is everyday in Italy. And we had a great time in Italy. And I really enjoyed the food. And I don't regret it at all. I don't regret it at all. We had wine, the wine was less expensive than Diet Coke. You know, it's crazy in Italy. So we had we had those prosciutto sandwiches every day, you name it. And I had a great time. But in hindsight, I know that I was completely out of control and had no clue what I was doing. And none of this was sustainable. And the goal of weight loss was fleeting, I hit it, and all of a sudden was over and I gained the weight back. And for years and years went on that same process, right? So just because you hit the number, it doesn't solve all your problems. And that's one of the big problems with weight loss. And then it leads to this unhealthy unsustainable relationship with food with with the dieting process with the what dieting even means, right? We think of dieting as a negative thing of like, Okay, I gotta turn on the switch. And I've got to go, just cut, cut, cut. And I'm going to suffer through this short term period, or maybe long term period, or maybe, maybe years. And I'm gonna get to this number, and then I'm done. And then why, right. So that's if it ended there, that would be bad enough. But we know and you've heard me talk about this on on a previous podcast, this mentality of Crash dieting, and doing it over and over, can make it harder to lose fat in the long run because of what it does to your body, physiologically, and somewhat permanently. Right. And I'm gonna get to that in a second. But besides that, you end up gaining the weight back, you end up having an increased risk of disease, you generally gain more weight than you started with. And this leads to just most people becoming more and more overweight throughout their life. And this is part of why we have just a massive problem with obesity in the Western world. And it's a problem. So I would love to say that the fitness industry understands this perfectly, and has decided to, in principle, do the right thing. But instead of adding nuance, we know that the fitness industry perpetuates misinformation, it perpetuates unhealthy practices, right. And sometimes they are a backlash to weight loss. But instead of solving the problem, they go to another extreme. So I want to touch on a few of these. I know this isn't like the controversy episode. But I think this is so important to the idea of, of weight loss and why I just I almost despise the term I try to never ever use the term, I will use it occasionally. And I very much respect people like for example, Brandon Cruz was on my show twice. And he will use the weight loss quite often. But I know that the way he's using it is really to mean fat loss. And if you listen to what he says that's exactly what he's talking about. So I don't hold it against people who, when it comes to semantics, who use the term and really mean something, that that's cool. Like I really I don't want to get into that. What I think is the nefarious part of all of this is when influencers or people in the fitness industry will say well, weight loss is unhealthy. So we do the opposite of weight loss, whatever that is, right. But let's just focus on how weight loss is portrayed in the industry. First and foremost, it's everywhere, right? It's the very first strategy regardless still the majority strategy online, offline on billboards in ads, we were on the highway, my wife and I were taking a road trip the other day, we were on the highway near the airport, and you have one billboard after another and it's either a lawyer or weight loss add pretty much right? A lawyer or weight loss ad. And I'm like oh, and they always show somebody with a you know, oversized pants, they're stretching them out and look at all this weight they've lost and you can lose, I don't know 10 pounds in your first week or second week at some massive claim always right. And here's the thing, weight is this tiny metric. When it's used out of context, it's just one tiny element of your of your body. Right. And it's virtually meaningless, except for generalizations about obesity and disease risk overall meaning if some, if I told you a person weighed 400 pounds, you wouldn't even have to ask their gender, their height, their age, you automatically know that as far as the human population goes that that is an unhealthy level of weight, most likely now now there actually could be a tiny segment of say, Sumo wrestlers, power lifters athletes who just have so much muscle They're metabolically protected that way. Okay, but come on, we're talking about the 99% of the population that 400 pounds would be excessively overweight. So in terms of generalizations, that kind of makes sense. But in terms of what the day to day person is trying to do to just quote unquote, lose 20 pounds and lose 30 pounds, meaning they really want to be healthier, they want to look better, they want to feel better in their clothes. It, it takes it out of context, from all the other things that matter. Because it's such a powerful marketing tool, I think of weight loss is like restrictive dieting. Right? Restrictive dieting, makes things very simple, because they tell you just eat these foods. That's it? Well, weight loss is very simple, because they say, we're just going to focus on this one number, if we get this number from here to here, you're successful, we're successful, we've taken your money, you're not going to sue us move on. And then next time you regain the weight, just come back to us.

Philip Pape 15:50

And if you send some note of cynicism in my voice, it's legitimate and warranted, in my opinion. Then there's the backlash of the anti diet crowd. So this is what I was talking about before where, where they say, okay, dieting is inherently harmful in all its forms, meaning like being in any calorie deficit, just a bad thing, calories in calories out. All that's just awful. And it can lead to disordered eating and other health problems. And here, you need this holistic approach to health that focuses on listening to your body and eating intuitively and listening to your hunger signals. And we're going to teach you exactly how to do that. And there's a couple problems with this. The first problem is that they're assuming that restrictive dieting, right named diets is the only way to create a calorie deficit and lose body mass or lose weight, or whatever it is. But we know that a flexible approach to dieting can also induce weight loss and fat loss without the problems of disordered eating and weight regain. In fact, it's like this idea of flexible dieting, we know is very much associated with a healthy approach, and a healthy relationship with food. And you can use it to lose some body mass as well, which means we have to add nuance, okay? Intuitive Eating on the other hand, can actually be a problem, because most people are going to have a very hard time learning, intuitive eating without developing the intuition first, and you can only do that through awareness. Now, can you develop awareness via looking at portion sizes, mindful eating, and all of those practices, you can, I will say, however, that if somebody feels that they are an unhealthy level of weight, and is trying to lose some fat, to be healthier, metabolically healthier, it may take a lot longer, it'd be a very frustrating, long drawn out process that requires a lot of discipline and willpower to get those kinds of skills in place. Whereas a simple feedback loop of tracking your macros and calories, and managing a few things like your training, and sleep and stress can be more approachable and measurable, to get you to where you need to be and create that awareness. Once you've got that awareness, you can then do things more intuitively. But I'll tell you what, I talked to people who are experts in physique enhancement, like Dr. Bill Campbell, like Brandon Cruz, and decrees and others. And they will tell you time and again for themselves and all their clients who have a goal. And it doesn't even have to be a super aggressive goal. It's just, they want to get from here to there. And they want to do it efficiently. They don't want to drag it on forever, because dragging things on forever, is unsustainable. They want to get it over quickly. And so using a data based approach with tracking and a science based mindset of you know, we're going to apply all of our tools we have as efficiently as we can to get it done quickly, is what they use. And that involves using a calorie deficit with a known number of calories rather than trying to eat intuitively. Not to say it's not possible. I'm not Pooh poohing intuitive eating. I'm just saying that. It is not the only antidote to weight loss. Okay. Then there's there's the Bazi excuse me, fumbling over my words. Then there's the body positivity movement. Oh, here he goes. Watch out what is Philip gonna say today? So, this is this is this movement that challenges the idea that there is only one ideal body type. Now, right there the premise, I already reject that premise as well. Just like the movement does, I reject the premise that there is only one ideal body type because there isn't. Hey, this is Philip. And I hope you're enjoying this episode of Wits & Weights, I started Wits, & Weights to help people who want to build muscle, lose fat and actually look like they lift. I've noticed that when people improve their strength and physique, they not only look and feel better, they transform other areas of their life, their health, their mental resilience and their confidence in everything they do. And since you're listening to this podcast, I assume you want the same things the same success, whether you recently started lifting, or you've been at this for a while and want to optimize and reach a new level of success. Either way, my one on one coaching focused on engineering your physique and body composition is for you. If you want expert guidance and want to get results faster, easier, and with fewer frustrations along the way to actually look like you lift, go to wits & weights.com and click on coaching, or use the link in my show notes to apply today, I'll ask you a few short questions to decide if we're a good fit. If we are, we'll get you started this week. Now back to the show. Everybody has a different body type first of all, and can nobody can look the same as anyone else. And whatever you are happy with is your ideal body type. And by happy, extrapolate that to whatever it means for you capable, functional, healthy, fit, long life, high quality life. And the again, this is where we talk about extremes, the Buzet body positivity movement encourages people to celebrate their bodies, okay, okay, all good with that, regardless of their size or shape, I'm good with that, too. There's no doubt that they are really focused more on the mental health side of things, which I think is a great mission, because you should definitely love your body, no matter what, no matter what. And that includes giving your body the best shot at a long, high quality life. That is where I have the that's that's my statement, where I think it starts to differ from some in the body positivity movement, that will claim that you can be healthy at any size. And that's really the statement that I have a problem with, because we know physically, physiologically, objectively, medically, that is not true. We just know that we know that above a certain weight, or with a certain lifestyle, or even if you're not above a certain weight, but you have a certain sedentary level of activity, we know that those are associated with higher disease risk, our disease, diabetes, you know, mortality, and so on cancer, whatever. And that's a physical objective thing. I like to think of it as I am positive about my body, I love it so much. And because I love it so much, I'm going to do everything I can to keep it alive and thriving. So get into a healthier weight, ideally, via fat loss. So we're going to talk about and not indiscriminant weight loss is associated with improvements in self esteem, and mood, not to mention the confidence in your body and its capabilities for the rest of your life for the decades to come. So hopefully I gave that the right. That subject the right respect, you know, I'm not the type to go off on things and become the radio jockey kind of guy. I am trying to give it nuanced, but also recognize that there's a ridiculous, if not stupid level of irrationality out there. When it comes to Oh, yeah, you can be 500 pounds and healthy, no, not possible, I'm sorry. But if you're 500 pounds, you can love your body. And you love it so much that you want to do something, and hopefully there are people to help you do that. Right. And that's, that's what we're trying to do in this show is help you do that and do it in the right way. So we know that losing weight in general, can lower the risk of developing chronic diseases like heart disease, diabetes, but only if you can maintain the weight loss. And as we're going to learn in a bit losing fat instead of losing weight is the way of maintaining your newfound health. So let's take this for what it is.

Philip Pape 23:24

There is Vanbrugh. And by the way, if I if I offended anyone I didn't mean to hopefully I didn't. And if I did, please send me a note and let me know that I did. So I can apologize, I don't think I got off track on that. But that some of these subjects are highly sensitive. So you know, and I am a sensitive guy, I think and want to give it the treatment it deserves. So let's take this for what it is, there is value in losing pure body mass from a health perspective. Yet, the only way to do that in a healthy and sustainable way is by prioritizing fat loss instead of weight loss. Therefore, let's take advantage of these benefits of losing weight. And understand that if you only lose weight indiscriminately, and don't lose fat, there are three things that are conspiring against you. Okay, these are physiological things that ultimately also become psychological. And these are the things that make it impossible for 95% of people who lose weight to maintain that weight loss. We are trying to avoid these things. So I want to clarify what those are. All right. So if you say need to lose 30 pounds, and you go and you do a crash diet or you do keto or something you just the weight starts flying off. Okay? There's going to be a few things that happen along the way that are going to backfire because you went so aggressively and you didn't prioritize fat loss. I talked about this on episode 88. It's called break the cycle of body fat overshooting for a stronger leaner and healthier physique, but I'm going to recap them so the first one is body fat overshooting. This is when you lose weight too quickly. The body tries to conserve energy you have metabolic adaptation. But even worse, you start To lose muscle, this leads to an increase in appetite, excuse me, a decrease in your metabolism much more quickly than it would otherwise, which makes it harder and harder to lose the additional pounds that you're going for. And then when you are done, you more easily regain weight for a variety of reasons. Having to do with the hunger, for example, having to do with the fact that you are on a restrictive diet. And now because you've turned off the dieting, switch, everything's back in play, and you're not sure what to eat. So you just eat all the indulgences and all the high sugar, high fat, high carb, whatever things high, everything high calorie, doesn't matter what macro it has probably not a lot of protein, let's be honest. And you regain all the weight and then some and this happens to 95% of people within I think five years. The second phenomenon is called hyperplasia. This is the growth of new fat cells. When you lose weight too quickly, the body might produce new fat cells to replace new ones that had been lost. Now I've seen this been called into question by, you know, reputable evidence out there. So I'm waiting to see more evidence come out, it may not be as big of a deal as we think. But you know why chance and I guess, and if you create new fat cells, you're never going to lose them, you're always gonna have those, it's just more energy storage for future weight regain. And then hyperphagia is the third one. And this is the excessive consumption of food, I believe it's triggered by the metabolic adaptation and the loss of muscle, like we talked about first, and you get these intense hunger pangs deep into the diet. And then that leads to binging, overeating weight regain. Okay, so enough of the doom and gloom, there's a very simple solution, all this to all this, okay? It's not not easy, but simple. We want to lose fat, instead of lose weight. And by losing fat, we're gonna gain all the benefits of losing weight, the health benefits of living at a lighter body mass, but none of the consequences that we just talked about. And so we can get the exact physique we want. And we can know with confidence how to shape our bodies, anytime in the future, do it sustainably feel in control, feel a sense of freedom, it's a great place to be. It's a place that I finally discovered about three years ago, and I've been living in ever since. And it's been so liberating. And then all my clients get to experience this as well. And it's just a joy to see them go through that transformation in such a short time, you know, we're talking three to six months, come out of it with a clarity they've never had before. And it really comes down to body composition. When we talk about our physique. We're talking about looking lean, and strong, and having less fat, which can be dangerous, depending on where it is stored in the body.

Philip Pape 27:51

Being at a healthy level of body fat, and then having carrying a lot of muscle, right. So body composition is what most people are going for. Now you can improve your body composition as a new lifter, without even losing weight on the scale. In fact, you can improve it while gaining weight on the scale. You could of course, build muscle and lose fat while losing weight on the scale. And you could just hold on to muscle and lose fat while losing weight on the scale. So now we start to see, okay, wait on the scale is one metric. But it's not everything is one metric. And we can use that metric. And we can use it for its advantages. But we need to do it in context. And so there really, I'm gonna say four major things that if you can do these, you're gonna have 8590 95% of the progress you want. And the first one is strength training. Absolutely, bar none. We want to build muscle when we are eating. We want to preserve muscle when we're in a deficit, we want to increase our insulin sensitivity, we want to burn more calories at rest. We want to better utilize our food as energy, we want to get stronger, we want to get better bone density, I can go on and on. I've done podcasts in the past all about the benefits of muscle, there are no disadvantages, and there are only upsides to having more muscle. But that is number one. And all the things I talked about before about weight loss and all the programs, all the crazy crash diets, all the billboards I see on the highway. None of them talk about strength training, they are all about just cutting and restricting. And so the people on those programs are going to be in for a rude awakening because when they're not strength training, they're just going to lose a ton of muscle, they're going to get more skinny fat, they're not going to be happy when they hit that magic number. They're going to regain the weight. They're gonna have even higher body fat percentage than before. They're gonna repeat the cycle over and over and over again. Again, body fat overshooting. But strength training is their biggest protector against this. It's your biggest protector against us both in the muscle mass you add, but even in the act of strength training itself and the adaptation and the signal that it sends to your body the day after the week after you know while you sleep. Because once you're in that calorie deficit and you're losing Weight, yes, you're losing weight, you're losing primarily fat tissue. As a representation of most of that weight, the man or woman down the street following the billboard program is losing half of their tissue as muscle, you're losing zero of that tissue as muscle. So while they're losing 10 pounds of muscle and 10 pounds of fat, which is just killing their health, you're losing 20 pounds of fat, period. That's what we want. So strength training is going to be the biggest signal toward that. And then it has to be combined combined with the right energy, the right food for that training. And this is the way I like to approach I'd like to start with strength and start with training. Because once you become an athlete, okay, all my clients are athletes, I'm not saying that they are athletes, and then they become clients. I'm saying they become clients, and then they become athletes. And anyone listening to this show, you can be an athlete, you can be an athlete starting today. Okay, once you're an athlete, and you think that way, and you train like an athlete, an athlete who recovers well, of course, we're not talking about an in season athlete, let's call it an offseason athlete, you're gonna then want to fuel that performance. And we fuel it with the right balance of protein, fats, carbs, which is probably a lot more protein than you're getting now, probably double for what a lot of people are getting, if you haven't ever tracked before, it's probably at least double and probably a lot more carbs than you used to as well. And then you're like, Well, are you telling me to eat more of everything? Yeah, actually, you're probably gonna need more calories overall, to fuel that act of building muscle, you're gonna be able to burn more calories, you're gonna be able to do so with gaining little to no weight, to set yourself, set yourself up for this fat loss phase, where you're training, send your body a signal, that muscle is important. And you're feeding the repair of that muscle with protein and sufficient carbs. Because remember, we've talked about this before, carbs protect protein, so we they kind of complement each other. But when you're in a calorie deficit, you're not gonna be able to have that many carbs. So you try to keep the protein as high as possible. Okay, so we've got training, we've got protein, folks, this is nothing new. You've heard me say this over and over again, these are the, this is the checklist. This is the checklist, okay, but it's good to be reminded of, it's good to remind myself of how important these are. Because as soon as one of these these things drop off, you enter the realm of weight loss instead of fat loss, then we have the appropriate rate of loss that is really important to this, because when we talk about the diets on the Billboard, those are crash diets because they promise fast weight loss and you probably get fast weight loss. And that is a problem because go back to my previous thing about body fat overshooting, hyperphagia, hyperplasia, hunger, you know, unsustainability, on and on and on. We don't want those, we want to go at a reasonable rate, which can still be somewhat aggressive, depending on your starting point, depending on how you feel, depending on how much metabolism adapts, and we're starting from, and depending on your hunger signals, we can vary that between, you know, moderate to pretty aggressive. Depending on where you're starting from, right, some of my more advanced client athletes can go more aggressive because they have a higher metabolism or they're bigger, they burn more calories, or they do a lot more activity and training. Whereas somebody who's been dieting a lot, who has kind of a suppressed metabolism, even once we recover it, it's still not may not be that high in relative terms, or it could be someday. And so you're not gonna be able to go as aggressive on that dieting phase on that fat loss phase, right. So it really depends. But the typical rate of loss is anywhere from a quarter to 1% of your weight per week, we won't get into aggressive fat loss today, because I don't want to mix the signals between that and crash dieting and confuse you here, I will do a future episode, I'm pretty committed to doing a future episode all about aggressive fat loss and how to accomplish that safely. And effectively. And you know, kind of what the limitations are. But today, I'm just keeping it to the standard quarter to 1% of your body weight a week, which for most people is going to be kind of in the middle of that range a half to three quarters of a percent of your body weight per week. So for 200 pound person that's going to be like one on one and a half pounds a week, which is about like a 500 to 750 calorie a day deficit. Okay. And then the last thing is recovery, getting enough sleep reducing your stress. I recently heard something on the revived stronger podcast, Dr. Mike Israel was on there. And he used the phrase, I think I posted a story about it, where he said physique, or he said fatigue kills physique. Fatigue is a killer for the physique. And what he was talking about is when you have too much stress in your life, and the stress could be in the form of too much training too much Exercise and Movement, right? If it's just too much, that creates fatigue that you cannot recover from and it starts to compound on itself. And this creates a load on your body a stress in your body that suppresses your metabolism quite a bit, in addition to the other things that suppress it. So getting enough sleep, reducing your stress are great ways to do that. I'll tell you about my personal journey right now. I'm eight weeks out from left rotator cuff surgery And around the time I record this episode, and I talked to one of my physical therapists about, actually, John Patrizio, he's going to be on the show soon, he's a starting strength guy who's also a physical therapist in my barbell club. And he and I went over some ideas for how I can ramp up my lifting. Now, I can start doing some things like some limited rom bench pressing, I can do safety bar squats, I can do some conventional deadlifting again, so I'm getting into that phase where I can start loading my recovering arm. But instead of doing a four or five day split, like I was used to, he's like, why don't we go to three days do full body. And the reason we're going to do that is because I can't lift that much weight with some of these movements right now. And so it's kind of like I'm a beginner, I'm regressing a little bit to linear progression, like a novice, almost like a novice linear progression, where I'm going to start deadlifting, like 90 505 pounds. Whereas Normally, I'd be up in the mid to upper three hundreds, right. So I'm doing that because I have this bottleneck of my left shoulder, preventing me from lifting as much weight. But now I can do it three times a week instead of once a week. So as an intermediate lifter, I was doing most major movements once a week, because that's the, that's as frequently as I can do them to progress, I might do a second or third day of that movement, at a much lighter weight or a variation of it. But now I could actually deadlift, Monday, Wednesday, Friday, for example, you know, maybe a set of five heavy set of five. And by heavy, I just mean, you know, my top set, what I can handle. So what is my point with all this, I'm actually going to work out one day less a week. And I'm going to increase the frequency. And this is a way to manage fatigue and stress, I'm going to increase the stress that I need to progress my deadlift. But I'm reducing the systemic stress and the frequency stress by going to three days a week and making a full body. These are all important concepts. Now, I don't mean to go off on this long tangent about training in the context of weight loss versus fat loss. But if I was in a fat loss phase now, which I'm not, if I was in a fat loss phase, this would be very important variable in how many calories I can eat. And I like to keep the calories as high as possible during fat loss. So that it's easier, don't you, right, so that's another benefit of keeping your energy coming in as high as possible by keeping the stress down. So those are the big things training, protein, appropriate rate of loss, and in managing sleep stress recovery. Okay, here's the thing, if you are serious about losing fat, and improving your health, improving your body composition, then you're going to focus on fat loss, and not weight loss, you're going to train, you're gonna eat protein, you're going to keep that muscle while you lose your body mass. So it's just fat, while the billboard folks are losing muscle, and worsening their body composition. So it's not easy, but it's doable. And it's totally worth it. And remember, if you haven't done these yet, if you haven't done what we're talking about here yet, if this is all new to you, you know, don't beat yourself up. In fact, congratulate yourself for listening to this content and getting these ideas and learning. And now you have something to run with. And I would absolutely love you to reach out to me if you have any questions if this is confusing in any way, because I know I can cover a lot in one show. But here's the thing, there's no time like right now to get started or to restart this process. There's no time like right now, there really isn't, now is the time. And then once you do once you make that progress, if anyone asks you what you're doing to look so incredible, I want you to share this episode with them and start using the language of fat loss. Instead of weight loss in your conversations. Instead of saying, Yeah, I lost a bunch of weight, talk about how you lost fat and improved muscle composition, or body composition. Or I built some muscle and I lost some of that excess fat in the process, rather than making about weight loss, right? Because at the end of the day, you're gonna probably weigh quite a bit more than you thought you could actually look leaner than you thought you could. And then we can spread the word about the important differences between weight loss and fat loss and why they matter. And if you're tired of not seeing the results you want, I get it. Right I work with people like you every day, we use the same science backed methods I talked about on this podcast who lose fat, no BS, just stuff that works. It worked for me or for my clients. It's not the stuff on the billboards that the show that they're trying to show you in the fitness industry. It's just reasonable, simple, not easy, simple things at work. So if you want to lose fat, not just weight, you want to actually look like you lift. That's what we do. My coaching program, if you're interested is a six month commitment to do just that. It's pretty much the fastest time period you can imagine getting that kind of result because we know how to do this. We take your diet, your training, your lifestyle, we make it all work together. It isn't for everyone. It's just not. It's for people who are serious about making the change we talked about today and who are tired of wasting time. And if that's you, there's a link in my show notes It says apply for coaching, I want you to click it, fill it out, I'll get back to you with a couple of questions. And then we'll see if this is the right fit. If it is, we start immediately, no messing around because I hate wasting time as much as you do. So you don't want to be in the same spot. Six months from now, thinking about weight loss instead of having gone through successful fat loss, I want you to click the link to apply for my one on one coaching program. And let's get to work. All right in our next episode 105 Strength, power and vitality for women at any age with Cheryl I love Cheryl and I will be discussing the art of movement, the challenges faced by women in fitness, and actionable strategies to enhance vitality and build confidence No matter your age, or where you're starting from. The best way to get these new episodes and help others find the show is to click subscribe or follow or whatever it says in your favorite podcast app. And I'm always grateful when you tell others about the show. Because they too can become more informed. They can learn the differences between fat loss and weight loss and they also can have the power to get the outcome they desire. As always, stay strong. And I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits & Weights podcast.

Philip Pape 41:18

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights, please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then stay strong

Philip Pape 9/8/23 Philip Pape 9/8/23

Ep 103: Sweet Proteins, Food Science, and the Future of Sweeteners with Jason Ryder

Have you ever heard of sweet proteins? If not, you’re in for a treat, pun intended, as we dive into this topic with Jason Ryder, CTO and Co-Founder of Oobli, a food technology company building a new category of food and beverages based on naturally sweet proteins. You'll learn about sweet proteins, the science behind them, their health benefits, and where to find them. Jason will discuss sweet proteins' significance in our diet, how they will change the food industry, their health benefits, and how they're made.

You'll learn about sweet proteins, the science behind them, their health benefits, and where to find them. Jason will discuss sweet proteins' significance in our diet, how they will change the food industry, their health benefits, and how they're made.

Jason had senior technological leadership roles at Amyris, Bolt Threads, and Hampton Creek / Eat JUST before Oobli. He received a B.S. and Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the University of Alabama and the University of California at Berkeley, respectively. Jason became Adjunct Professor and Executive Director of the Master of Bioprocess Engineering (MBPE) program in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at UC Berkeley in 2018.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
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[2:19] Interest and motivation in food technology and sweet proteins
[6:16] The science of sweet proteins
[10:24] Role and benefits of sweet proteins
[14:21] Human propensity for sweetness and the added sugar dilemma
[18:40] Health implications of sugar, artificial sweeteners, and sugar alcohols
[20:28] Quantity of sweet proteins in products
[27:41] Production process of sweet proteins
[30:19] Challenges in scaling production and increasing awareness
[33:27] Influence of academic role at UC Berkeley on his work
[35:09] Impact of sweet proteins on the food industry
[39:22] Addressing criticisms and skepticism
[41:07] Excitement and future vision for the field of sweet proteins
[42:10] Potential applications of sweet proteins in other foods and drinks
[49:28] The question Jason wished Philip had asked
[51:51] Where to learn more about Oobli
[53:09] Outro

Episode resources:

Website: Oobli Sweet Teas
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ooblifoods
IG: @ooblisweetproteins

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Get notified of new episodes. Use your favorite podcast platform or one of the buttons below. Then hit “Subscribe” or “Follow” and you’re good to go!

Transcript

Jason Ryder 00:00

sweetness comes in a lot of joyful places. And I think normalizing that that's good by separating it from the negative health effects is really important to us as a human society, because we need to have joy and we also need to have health. And we very much view sweet proteins as one of the key tools and helping us reestablish that connection right. Both joy in and health can live in the same place around Sweden's

Philip Pape 00:27

Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host, Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger, optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry so you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits & Weights community Welcome to another episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. Have you ever heard of sweet proteins? If not, because I haven't, you're in for a treat pun intended. As we dive into this topic with Jason, writer, CTO and co founder of Uber li a food technology company building a new category of food and beverages based on naturally sweet proteins. You'll learn about these sweet proteins from the science behind them to their potential health benefits to what foods you might find them in. Jason will share his insights on the role of sweet proteins in our diet and how they're poised to disrupt the food industry, not to mention the effects on our health and even how they're made. Prior to Uli Jason spent time in senior technical leadership roles at a virus bolt threads and Hampton Creek eat just he earned a BS in chemical engineering from the University of Alabama. So real scientists here on the show, and a PhD in Chemical Engineering from the University of California Berkeley. In 2018, Jason joined the UC Berkeley faculty in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, where he currently serves as adjunct professor and Executive Director of the Master bioprocess engineering program. Jason, welcome to the show. Thanks,

Jason Ryder 02:04

Philip. Great to be here.

Philip Pape 02:05

Man. I'm excited to learn about this because I don't know anything about sweet proteins and I withheld from doing too much research intentionally so that I can learn it from the man himself. I do want to learn a little bit about you and your personal motivations before we jump into the topic. So how did you get interested in food technology for one and sweet protein specifically, and sort of what are your values and personal connection to all of this?

Jason Ryder 02:28

Sure thing. So I'd say you got me right. And the intro, I am a chemical engineer by training. But I'm a sustainable bioprocess engineer by choice. And growing up in Alabama had strong sensibilities about sustainability. Even back in the 80s and 90s. Before you know, the rest of the world really appreciated what our choices as humans were, you know, what, what impacts they were having on on us from a climate, food and health perspective. And so all of my work up to date has been figuring out different ways to harness sustainable technologies like bio processing, to address those problems, including when I was at amorous working on various renewable chemicals and fuels via fermentation technology up through materials that was the bolt threads. And all the way through the last 678 years of my life focused on foods. Sweet proteins was a really interesting one for me, in terms of applying my skill set, which is mostly around fermentation technologies to address that, and it came along in the form of Foodtech, I was working on a different problem making an egg replacement product at each us that just egg product and stumbled across through a biotech incubator, my co founder who was working on sweet proteins, and his interest in sweet proteins was around his grandmother who had cancer, which is horrible, but also the chemotherapy treatments she was getting which are horrible, what they don't tell you is you oftentimes lose your taste. And one of these sweet proteins from the miracle berry it's called miraculous and enables you to regain the tastebuds, which is fantastic. When you're going through chemotherapy and you need nutrition, you'd love to have the taste of food so that you can eat and rebuild health. And so what I did when I joined was to figure out a technology beyond growing these these plants that produce these sweet proteins taking it to fermentation technology, so that you can have a scalable and affordable solution. And that that was again it's sort of hit me right in the sweet spot pun fully intended of the things that I care about. Sustainability, climate, food and health all in one.

Philip Pape 04:50

Okay, so there's a couple of things I wanted to pull the thread on in those what is bioprocess engineering and bio processing in general as a medium of sustained Billy, if you can explain that a little bit, and then I have another quick follow up after that.

Jason Ryder 05:04

Sure. So most of the listeners are familiar with biotechnology. And that's mostly around using living cells to make bio based products on ways that are more sustainable than then then the other ways that humans have produced them a great example are biofuels and bio materials, right? Those that are produced via fermentation. And bio processing is using those living cells essentially building scalable processes around them so that you can make these materials and in our case, foods at a scale that that that is meaningful for the planet and addressing those problems. So things like large scale fermentation, everybody's familiar with brewing beer. In our case, we brew sweet proteins, and that's the bioprocess engineering that we do at Dubli. Okay,

Philip Pape 05:49

and one of those you mentioned was miraculous, which is an amazing name from the miracle berries. And you've regained taste during chemotherapy. So the obvious question you've probably been asked before is what about the COVID, long COVID symptom where people lose taste? Does it help them that

Jason Ryder 06:03

works for those that as well. And again, I think we're all trying to get rid of COVID Right, or trying to stick it, but it is a very useful, sweet protein for those that have been impacted.

Philip Pape 06:16

Okay, so let's step back and talk about sweet proteins in general, let's just define them what they are. Why haven't most people myself included, heard about them and I'll tell you, I know a lot about food and, you know, I look at I think about macros and micros all the time and food selection, I have clients, we're always talking about food, but I've just, it's just a new one to me. Start high level and then feel free to dig into the science like we talked about before we started recording and then how they compare to other sweeteners would be helpful. Sure thing.

Jason Ryder 06:43

So at high level sweet proteins are simply proteins that tastes sweet like sugar. They come mostly from plants and various around the equator. And unlike sugar and alternative sweeteners that most of your listeners are familiar with sweet proteins don't spike your blood sugar, or give you gut microbiome issues that makes them in and of themselves, a revolutionary game changer in the world of healthy sweets, going one level deeper. For for those of your listeners that want to dig into the science, proteins are relatively large biomolecules, right? They're made up of amino acids, often called the building blocks of life, but they comprise some 50% of the dry weight of your cells. Your body has a lot of proteins that are very functional. And based on that sequence of amino acids, they have a three dimensional folded structure that can take on a number of roles in your cells, catalyzing bio reactions. These are called enzymes, and even doing things like your DNA replication. To make more of you you need enzymes, you need protein, right? They're fundamental to life. Now back to sweet proteins. Sweet proteins are a subclass of mostly plant based proteins I mentioned that come from plants, berries and fruits around the equator. And their amino acid sequence and three dimensional structure make them sweet to our tons to our tastebuds what I'll call our T one, r two and two and R three taste receptors. And they're 1000s of times sweeter on a waitwait basis than sugar. Now, why would a plant make such a protein that was sweet to humans and sweeter instead of sugar? Well, plants are really good at making sugars. And they need to make sugars. Well, they make sugars by photosynthesis, right? That's their process. But they would rather turn those sugars into things like cellulose that enable them to grow more plant material for more photosynthesis, right? That's the leaves and the stems and the like. It's metabolically expensive for them to simply store sugar hoping that a human or a higher primate come along and eat them and hopes that they carry their seeds, right. And so we as humans, those mobile species and seed carriers and the early forests evolved in are wired to crave sugar for energy, right, we needed to try and gather. And we gorged on sources like fruits and berries that these plants make. And so they simply made that trade off metabolically to make a small amount of a sweet protein to trick us into eating them, as opposed to all that that sugar. And that was a dirty trick on us several 1000 years ago, when we needed that energy. But nowadays, we've cultivated sugar in a lot of forms, namely sugar cane, corn syrup, sugar beets, it's very cheap. It's recklessly abundant in our food system. And we're paying the price for it in the form of, you know, 40% pre diabetes and the US obesity rates are similar to that heart disease I could go on. It's just not natural. We weren't meant to eat that much sugar. And the cool thing about sweet proteins is they give us a path to have that sweetness, which we deserve as the people fill it but without all of that bad stuff associated with it.

Philip Pape 09:53

Yeah, I agree. The modern food environment has skew things way off from where they were intended to be. And I personally and pretty much everybody listening to this can relate with some level of sweet tooth, right? Whether it's, you know, yeah, we've gone artificial sweeteners or stevia or something like that to continue enjoying sweet things without the deleterious effects of too much sugar, or we've gone just, you know, as much toward Whole Foods as we can, and you kind of lose that sensitivity. But there are a lot of people that are just still stuck in that, you know, cycle of, of eating the sugar. So I think it's fascinating how this was an evolutionary change in these plants to have highly dense form of sugar. So it was a more efficient storage, and it still got the same result of spreading seeds. I mean, that's pretty cool. Is is in terms of like, all the plant matter on the planet, I guess, before agriculture came along with these have comprised a decent amount of plant species, or are they just small corner niches of of the environment?

Jason Ryder 10:51

Yes, so far, we know, there are between 10 or 20 of these species that are commonly known. And they're known because of the cultures that identify them. They're mainly in West Africa and around the equator around the world. And that's because these proteins, they don't have a long shelf life, once you pick the berries or the fruits, you got about three days to eat them before. Different enzymes inside those fruits, break them down. And so they've stayed local, the only one really didn't make it to the US in any form is the miracle berry. And it still has to be grown in the tropical area, mostly Florida and Hawaii. And so the cool thing about fermentation is we can brew these proteins in the same way that you brew beer, and you can brew beer anywhere on the planet. And that's that's game changing technology to go with the game changing proteins as you can make them and make them at a scale that's meaningful. As sugar is literally everywhere, I'd say it's 70 to 80% of the products in your grocery store have sugar in some form or another. And it's confusing for consumers because we call sugar a lot of different things at least 50 By my account, and sweet, sweet proteins give you a great alternative to that. And so that's why we're working on it.

Philip Pape 12:08

Okay, so let's I kind of want to dispel if my audience gets too excited thinking that this is like the new base of a protein powder or something, right, we usually discuss protein in terms of it's important for building importance for building and repairing muscle increasing satiety and our diet, higher thermic effect of feeding all those and we're talking about, you know, fairly high quantities of that macronutrient in our diet. But I suspect the sweet proteins aren't necessarily consumed at that quantity. And so what is, first of all, let's, let's let's discuss whether that's true or not. And then what's the added benefit of the proteins that taste sweet? Is it mainly as a sweetener, that's what I'm getting?

Jason Ryder 12:46

Yeah, so So I'll give you a visual example, since we're recording for, for your audience. And so I'm going to show you a bottle of an orange, fizzy beverage that has around 72 grams of sugar in it, right, which looks roughly like this 18 sugar cubes, which are around four grams each. And so when we sweetened the beverage, like our sweet iced teas, it only takes a few 10s of milligrams of sweet protein, because of the potency of the sweetness, right 1000s of times more potent than sugar. So for

Philip Pape 13:17

the audience, it's a big jar of many, many, many cubes of sugar, versus a tiny vial of a tiny sprinkle of the sweet protein.

Jason Ryder 13:26

Yeah, so a few 10s of milligrams isn't going to get you the protein loading if you're trying to get out and get small. There's lots of other great protein sources for that either animal or plant based depending on your sensibilities. And so what we do is functionally sweetened on that product. And so if you're having a protein shake, for example, we can give you that sweet taste that you're looking for in your chocolate or your strawberry or vanilla. But we can do that with a tiny amount of protein while you're getting the building blocks for all of that muscle from another protein, for example, like whey or pea protein.

Philip Pape 14:00

Love it. And that's actually a great point because, again, most people listening probably have at least one if not two protein shakes a day. And because most people don't like pure unflavored whey protein, they tend to buy the kind of has flavoring which then is associated with usually a form of sweetener, whether it's sucralose or stevia or something else. So we'll get into specific products in a bit. But I do I want to talk a little bit more about this sweetening aspect of it right. We don't add sugar, we will eat fruit and things like that to satisfy your sweet tooth will use these other sweeteners in moderation. If the alternative is significantly more calories, right, because that's what we're trying to do. What's your take on added sugar and our tendency to make things sweet in general, and then artificial sweeteners? You know, because you did allude to insulin spiking. You alluded to gut microbiome and I know some of that science is sketchy and some of it is more solid plus you had the recent who announcement aspartame which is getting a lot of controversy. So what are your thoughts on all of that?

Jason Ryder 14:59

Yeah, So let me describe for your listeners, how sweeteners and in turn sweet proteins work. And so you have a great analytical instrument in your mouth for evaluating the sweetness, right? Because we're, we're hardwired for it, we need sugar for energy, it's the great currency from which we fuel our daily life. And so we have these T one, r two and T winnaar, three tastes receptors on your tastebuds that tell your brain, hey, this is sweet, you should eat more of it. And that never stops, right. But it also we have additional taste receptors in our gut. And they do the same thing. They tell your brain ah, we see sweetness keep eating that but also it alerts your pancreas to make insulin right to ferry that sugar into the bloodstream so that you can use it to fuel your life, and so on sweet proteins work more or less the same way as sugar. And as alternative sweeteners is they bombard your taste receptor to tell you how that sweetness, the difference comes back to the chemistry that I explained before is they're made of amino acids, and they have a folded structure. And so the difference in sweet proteins is once they hit your stomach, which is an acidic environment, or low pH, as scientists tend to think of it, it unfolds and when it unfolds, it loses its activity for tripping, that that taste receptor that's in your gut, those taste receptors that are in your gut, because most of the form of sugar you get are from more complex carbohydrates, where you take those simple sugars and you connect them, you polymerize them, right. And those are, you know, things like complex sugars, multi dextran, I could go on, right. And so you need to be able to tell your body that the sugar is being broken down by enzymes, so you can vary it in your bloodstream. So the sweet proteins don't touch any of those, and so they don't spike your insulin response. That's super important, right? Because even alternative sweeteners can continue to give you that sweetness response in your GI tract continue to bombard insulin production and lead to type two diabetes. And so that's a big difference. Another big difference is your gut microbiome. Um, for those of you that eat protein, or drink lots of protein shakes, or eat high protein products that are sweetened by alternative sweeteners, you call it aspartame, stevia, you know I could go on, you might have tolerability issues, that's a polite way of saying give you gas, you are all walking, talking fermenters, as you have a number of different microbes that are in your tummy that help you break down all of the things that aren't broken down by your normal gi process. And it's a consortium there's lots of different species in there. And when they get out of balance, and they can get out of balance when they're exposed to different different chemicals they're not used to or different food sources that you're not evolved around. And that certainly happens when you have high levels of alternative sweeteners, even stevia and monk fruit. And so the cool thing about sweet proteins is they never get to the gut microbiome, your body has already unfolded them, and is breaking them down into the peptides and amino acids that you normally need to build cells and all that great cellular function I mentioned earlier.

Philip Pape 18:17

Yeah, I think that's pretty cool. I can definitely foresee so many applications for that. Where, you know, protein bars are a big one people talk about, you know, getting bloated and whatnot, because they have the sugar alcohols, there's things like allulose, or there's always some new innovation. And they all seem to have a little bit of a disadvantage in one of those areas, depending on the quantities, you consume them. And so we talked about all right, I think that's amazing. The protein structure fold and how it unfolds when you get to your gut and because the acidic environment and then it doesn't trigger the receptor. This is the science I know we're diving a little deeper, not too deep. It's just Just what I like to hear. What about. So let's talk about the implications of this then, and maybe the food supply, the technology, the psychology of dieting, and all of that some of we alluded to the psychology of dieting. Right? We have an emotional relationship with food. How do you see your work with sweet proteins impacting that? Yeah,

Jason Ryder 19:09

I think we shouldn't hate on ourselves or criminalized sweetness, right? It's a great thing. We associate it with all of the fun things in our lives, like birthdays, for example, birthday cakes. You know, even my kids, they are self self acclaimed. boba tea experts, right? So sweetness comes in a lot of joyful places. And I think normalizing that that's good by separating it from the negative health effects is really important to us as a human society. Because we need to have joy and we also need to have health and we very much view sweet proteins as one of the key tools and helping us reestablish that connection right. Both joy in and health can live in the same place around sweetness.

Philip Pape 19:55

Ya know, couldn't couldn't put it better myself. We talk about sustainability in this program all Time have, you know, no foods are really off limit except maybe trans fats. No foods are off limit to some extent as long as they meet your goals and they serve what you're trying to do. So part of that is our life or lifestyle or social situations. I just today answering the question about carnivore diet and how, you know, when you restrict things too much, then you now all of a sudden you making all these other trade offs and compromises. So if we can use technology to kind of bring that back to a rational space, it's, it's all the better. So as a food technology expert, how do you see this transforming the industry? Because I know you guys I know Googly makes a few products, maybe two or three different products, is this gonna replace traditional sweeteners on a large scale, we'll be able to buy them in, you know, containers and packets in the store, will they be in protein powders and bars and everything at some point?

Jason Ryder 20:48

Yes to that, that is my goal is of course, we're developing a few of our own products to feature our sweet proteins and also establish that relationship of trust with with consumers. I imagine a few of your listeners feel a little jerked around by the stories on, you know, sugar and alternative sweeteners. And even recently, aspartame has been linked to cancer, sucralose, a chlorinated sugar of sorts is linked to genotoxicity. This is scary. And, you know, it's hard to know what to trust. And so we're launching our own products. And we've done our own safety studies, for our consumers to try get curious about sweet proteins drink our sweet iced teas, eat our chocolates, you can go to voobly.com and find all of those, as well as a few stores here in Davis and down in LA. And I think that's a great first step in a series of products that we'd like to launch ourselves through bliss brand, but also partner with others to help rehabilitate products that you know, a lot of your listeners and consumers in general love, but are loaded with sugar. And we know how to formulate and all of those products. And we're working on a platform of these sweet proteins that can get all of them. And so that's really what I'm looking for, throughout the rest of my career with googly is to figure out how to basically go everywhere shutter is,

Philip Pape 22:19

yeah, now that makes sense that I'm looking forward to that, you know, because I put some stevia in my coffee every day because it's, you know, quote, unquote, the making all the trade offs that I can make, it's the best option I feel like I have at the moment. But if I could take a little dropper, dollop of Euro, sweet proteins in there from the miracle barrier, wherever it comes from, that'd be great.

Jason Ryder 22:37

We're working on it, Philip. And so the protein that you'll see and experience through your mouth, and when you buy our sweet iced teas, as well as our chocolates is called the googly fruit, sweet protein that does come from the googly fruit, which is another one of those plant species. And it's berries that grow in West Africa. And it's, it's an amazing, sweet protein gives you a really sugary sucrose taste in your mouth that you crave. And again, it's because that specific plant evolved to trick us into thinking it was sucrose. And so enjoy that. And there's there's several more on the way.

Philip Pape 23:16

That's a good point, right? Because some of these alternative sweeteners even if they're quote unquote unnatural have after after taste or they're bitter. A lot of people don't like stevia, for example, and which is the one in the pink packet that just nobody likes. But I'm curious, so only now I see what are the name of the company comes from the food labeling house? What's that going to look like? I mean, you already know what it looks like because you have to have the FDA labels. What is it expressed as in the food label?

Jason Ryder 23:42

Yeah, we call it ugly fruit sweet protein. As we feel that that's the most direct and honest way to talk about sweet proteins with with consumers in a way that they can grab onto. There are technical names for all of these proteins. I mentioned one, the miracle berry fruit protein is referred to as miraculous. The only fruit sweet protein is also called braising. But but not all of our, our your listeners or even our consumers are protein biochemists and I think recognizing that the proteins are natural they're identical to the ones that come out of plants they just happen to be made via fermentation it's important to know I think we all know in our hearts and heads that natural products are the best ones for us. But you know calling them something a rose by any other name, I think names pretty important. And so for us, we're going to name them by the berries that these natural proteins come from

Philip Pape 24:42

full transparency, what is the what about the macro labeling? Does it is it designed to be shown as a sugar carb or protein? What is it?

Jason Ryder 24:49

It doesn't show up anywhere because it doesn't break the threshold is so small Okay. Routine, right? So we believe me we struggled on that I'm a Scientists and engineer I over communicate by nature, I've probably done a lot of that here. And so we played around with our label a lot to try to figure out how to tell our consumers about our superhero proteins but but also explain why there aren't 10 grams of it, you don't need very much, you just need a couple of 10s of milligrams actually, to get that sweetness.

Philip Pape 25:23

Again, it's kind of like salt. And when they put salt in suddenly it just says salt and there's very little of anything in it. Well, it might show sodium. But what what does so if we if we on your sweet tea, because I actually didn't look at the label yet does it have does it have any other sugars in it? Besides that? It does.

Jason Ryder 25:38

So for example, with our lemon, peach and mango uses sweet teas, we do use fruit to make all of those. And so along with that fruit comes around five grams for our 16 ounce teas. But But again, we don't think that we don't think sugar is a bad thing. But having too much sugar is certainly been a bad thing for us. And so we have the natural fruit that comes along as well as a little bit of agave to round out. And what we're looking for with our sweet proteins is an unrecognizable reduction in sugar that doesn't give you those off. Notice that things like stevia and monk fruit and even aspartame and, and sucralose give you that you can have the sweetness and the form that you expect. And maybe not even though there's sweet proteins in there, we want you to know they're sweet proteins in there for sure. But, you know, your mouth is a very finely tuned instrument around sweetness. And so our sweet proteins along with a little bit of sugar that comes with the fruit is just the right balance for our teas and chocolates. We feel like that hope hope.

Philip Pape 26:50

Okay, yeah, I want to try them. So we'll see I love chocolate. So that you know, it could be dangerous, but that's a that's a good thing. I love chocolate.

26:58

Okay, my name is Lisa. And I'd like to give big shout out to my nutrition coach Philip pape, with his coaching, I have lost 17 pounds, he helped me identify the reason that I wanted to lose weight, and it's very simple longevity. I want to be healthy, active and independent until the day I die. He introduced me to this wonderful Apple macro factor I got that part of my nutrition figured out along with that is the movement part of nutrition, there's a plan to it and really helped me with that. The other thing he helped me with was knowing that I need to get a lot of steps in. So the more steps you have, the higher your expenditure is, and the easier it is to lose weight when it's presented to you like he presents it it makes even more sense. And the other thing that he had was a hunker guide. And that really helped me so thank you below.

Philip Pape 27:42

So you mentioned the sourcing and the types of berries they might come from and where they're located. Let's talk about the fermentation process, because I am curious about that how that comes into this.

Jason Ryder 27:52

Sure thing. So we brew our sweet proteins much the same way you would brew beer, we use a foodsafe yeast just like you would use for brewing beer. And so we does require a little bit of sugar. But again, that sugar is upgraded. And a lot of ways given that the sweet protein is 1000s of times more potent. So it takes a lot less sugar to make or sweet proteins than you would in practice using these products. And so I mentioned on the sustainable bioprocess engineering. So all the steps that follow fermentation are simple, simply some mechanical separation filtration and drying, to make that that sweet protein ingredient that I'm holding up here. And it's great again, if you think about the sustainability aspect of what we're doing. Sugars grown about 65 million acres across the earth 65 million acres that, in many cases used to be arraigned for us, in all cases could be rainforest again, or be growing more nutritional crops, right, most of the sugar grown has to put into drinks and candy bars. And so for us, you know, every six 600 Or every 1% reduction in sugar gives us 650,000 acres back for us to do that. You know replant the rainforests so that the Earth can breathe or grow, you know, better crops to solve the world's sort of food disparities. And so I'm super excited about that. And also the fact that you don't have to ship that sugar in the places where it's grown. Brazil, for example, is a huge exporter of sugar requires a lot of fuel to get it to the ports and a lot of fuel to put it on barges to ship where it needs to go. That's carbon in our air that we don't need. And so the great thing about precision fermentation and in our case, making these sweet proteins as we can make them very close to where you use them and avoid a lot of those costs, not just the agricultural ones, but the shipping costs. Because it's again, you need a A lot less mass for sure. 1000 times less.

Philip Pape 30:03

Yeah, people, people care more and more today as they should about how their products are made and sourced. And if there's a net, if there's a net benefit, where it's not a government, industry, government agency coming in and telling you have to do it, and it's just innovation, I mean, people typically get on board with that. What is the competitive landscape look like? Are there other companies doing the same thing? Is, is the scalability there? Or are there some still challenges in that realm?

Jason Ryder 30:29

Sure thing, yeah, there for sure. A few other companies that are exploring sweet proteins, it's still a relatively new area for folks to commercialize. We commercialize the first one and the first products behind it, we also were the first to publish safety studies around using these as ingredients. But but they're, they're more focused on the way I'd say what differentiates us from some of the other folks that are doing this is we are manufacturing on three different continents now, which is great, building a robust supply chain, so that we can make sure we can get all of our consumers that want it. And we're also focused on natural proteins, those that are there that are present in the plants and nature, there's always an opportunity, when you're you're making proteins to, you know, to make mutant proteins, right? Molecular substitutions that give you a different sweetness profile that can give you a different flavor profile. And I'd say that might be important to consumers in the future. It's I think most folks are focused on on natural products now, and I think that's a good thing. And I'd say, you know, in the future, when that's important, and when the safety of those new proteins has been established, I'd say it's a great time.

Philip Pape 31:48

So speaking of safety of your products, you mentioned safety studies, I'm gonna assume the that your company is funding them, maybe not? How do you ensure the independence of those studies.

Jason Ryder 31:58

So we do all of our safety studies with third parties, okay. And we partner with the FDA, who also has a great interest and at least in the US on on consumer safety. And they're all scientists that review our data packages. And even before that, we have an expert panel of independent scientists that are even independent from the FDA that review our package. And so our first one, the ugly fruit, sweet protein, we've established what is called self grass, are generally recognized as safe for using Doobly fruit sweet protein as an ingredient to sweeten. And that was signed off on by independent scientists in nutrition and toxicology, etc. And it's a similar process at the FDA is you submit the package, you meet with them, I've met with the FDA several times to talk through that. And at the end of the process, after you've established that they progress are generally recognized as safe, the FDA gets a chance to ask questions, and once they're out of questions, they give you a note questions letter. And we have established the safety of the ugly fruit sweet protein, but a lot of the large scale, you know, stores that distribute would like to see that no questions letter to put them on on the big store shelves.

Philip Pape 33:20

Fair enough. Fair enough. Yeah, I mean, I interests are generally aligned with these things. So I just want to ask it to the listener has some more information. Yeah. And then you're at UC Berkeley. So how does your role there contribute overlap to your work with the sweet proteins here.

Jason Ryder 33:35

So I have a great passion for sustainability. And all forms, I tend to refer to my students as mass and energy balances hugging the Earth. My students are by and large, bioprocess engineers trying to learn how to use biotechnology and bio processing to solve problems across climate, food and health. And I hopefully make myself relevant by the work that I do in industry, keeping one foot Iblis and the other foot at UC Berkeley, to for my students, many of them are taking their last steps on their academic path before a long one in an industry where they're going to solve these problems. And so I bring my work into my classroom, not just the work that I'm doing and do bleed, but all of the work I've done beforehand. And I also bring a lot of my colleagues who are working on similar problems into the classroom. And that's a great way to build community Connect community, not just with the older folks like me, that are out doing it at a more advanced stage of life, but also making sure we're growing and developing the young ones who will continue to work on these problems many many decades into the future. So for those my students that are listening to this Go Bears

Philip Pape 34:46

Yeah, no, I think it's great when you're combining industry and and university. A lot of the folks in the fitness and nutrition space that I really admire and follow are the other ones who specifically look for studies that can involve all subjects doing real things that we all want to learn from and do and then kind of bridge the science to say, you know, the bro science is right or it's not. But so extending that to what you do are other studies where you work with, I don't know, nutrition scientists, nutritionists, people that deal with either, you know, weight loss, physique, anything like that in the health and body realm or obesity, you know? Yeah, tell me about that.

Jason Ryder 35:25

We're interested in all of those things. And so I mentioned UC Berkeley, where I also teach but the company who Billy is right next to UC Davis, which has a hospital as well as many of those experts that are working in the field of nutrition, and health. And so we have a number of studies that are ongoing to evaluate the impact, if any, of you know sweet proteins as you replace sugar and alternative sweeteners, so that we can publish that data for all to see, I think that's an important currency for us, as a society to have objective truth and science to make sure that when we are bringing, for example, new ingredients to market, of course, we have a process from which to establish that they're safe. That's the Grasp process I mentioned before. But it's not all encompassing. It doesn't touch on other things, right. That you just mentioned, overall impacts on health, and more importantly, what changes when you replace something like, you know, an alternative sweetener or, or sugar with a sweet protein. So we're interested in all of this.

Philip Pape 36:37

Yeah, I am as well, there's even in the established sweetener and artificial sweetener realm, as we know, being studied for decades, there's still confounding data when you try to interpret what happens, for example, when we talk about diet soda, and obesity, that the idea that you know, replacing sugar beverages with unsweetened actually helps obesity and then others will argue that, well, no, it triggers you know, appetite, and then it goes against it. And then others will say, well, it's people who are trying to lose weight are the ones drinking the more diet soda. So you tend to confound the variables. It'd be interesting at some point to see if these affect things like that, like if you have googly sweetener, and only that kind of sweetener in a in a food, would it then because it doesn't spike insulin? Would it then that have the same effect on your appetite? Right things like that. I don't know if any of those questions sounds like haven't really been answered yet. Because your focus is on safety and going to market? Is that fair to say?

Jason Ryder 37:33

Yeah, I'd say, you know, it's easy to assume that they don't. But I'd say it's really important to validate that it's not true. And what I'd also say if for any of your listeners that, you know, would like to collaborate or partner on this, we think this is important to the whole world. Me and my partner, Ally Wang, are here to bend the Global Health curve on things like diabetes, obesity, heart disease, and we can't do that alone, right, we're certainly going to try with our products, and I mentioned partnering with others. But this is a systems level solution to climate, food and health, we'll need a lot of folks and all of the different, you know, their respective expertise and experience to help us and we're learning all the time. I'm a lifelong learning AI. And I'd really like to learn everything there is to know about these sweet proteins. So if you're out there and would like to collaborate, drop me a line,

Philip Pape 38:32

there we go, there we go. I could probably throw you 10 or 15, names on top, my head two that are just very respectable scientists in different realms of health and nutrition that I'm sure it'd be interested in, this will fill

Jason Ryder 38:43

and we can make this sweet protein, we make a lot of it. And that was important in the early days from which to formulate products and still is, but we now have sufficient quantities to launch products, and also do all of the studies, we're interested to do what I think the only thing I struggle with is his time and bandwidth, right? But I find it, there's anybody out there, I will find the bandwidth and the time.

Philip Pape 39:08

And I'm certainly willing, it is very exciting. I mean, anything new, like this is exciting when especially when it's from a plant, which has just been on the earth for millions of years. And you're like, well, we can do something new with it. Which makes you wonder, always wonder what else is out there? What are the criticisms or skepticisms? Let's just, you know, cover the other side here that you hear about sweet proteins.

Jason Ryder 39:28

Yeah, most people don't know they even exist, and they've never had them. And I think we have a natural fear of the unknown, which, in my experience, education is a great assault for and so a lot of what we're doing in Dubli is getting the good word out about sweet proteins. Hey, if you hadn't had them before, try them. We've had many different events and programs that enable folks to get discounts and in some cases, even free chocolates to try them and we put a lot on our website, we've been participating in a lot of great media forums, like your podcast to get the word out and also published our safety studies so that all can read. So we're going to continue to do that education in all forms, establishing that relationship with trust with with our consumers, as as we all learn more about sweet proteins and all of the great places, and our food and beverage system than it can replace sugar. I think on the opposite side, we know a lot about sugar. The more we learn, the more it validates, you know what, what we know that it's not good for us in excess. And I'd say we're learning a lot more about the alternative sweeteners. None of it is good. And so consumers much like you mentioned with stevia, as they're looking for an alternative. You're making trade offs to do it often on taste, and my joy and making sweet proteins as you don't have to have that trade off. This is revolutionary. It's really a game changer. So I'm excited for you all to try it.

Philip Pape 41:04

Pretty cool. Yeah, me? Yeah, me too, for sure. So you since you are so excited, I could I could sense it. I mean, what, what's your vision for the future here? You know, I mean, you've sort of alluded to it, of the research of getting the product into more hands and more products. Is there anything else we didn't cover that that excites you about the future?

Jason Ryder 41:22

No, I get excited every time I walk into a grocery store, and I look at a product that I hadn't thought about. And there aren't very many left to be honest. But but it gets me excited about the next five or 10 years when we can get products and all of those areas that people love and enjoy sweetness from. And I you know, the way I would like to see that manifest is and true drops and the the growth rate first for obesity, diabetes and heart disease. And then the direct correlation, I would love to be part of the studies that demonstrate it was OOB Lee's suite proteins and the revolution that we created that started the bend on that curve and started bending it in the opposite direction. So that's, that's what I'm excited about in the future.

Philip Pape 42:09

What would you say is one or two of the products that would have massive impact? I can think of one and I think it's diet soda personally, if that's a possibility. And I would love to hear how you would incorporating that, because that's one, one of my vices. And I have no problem saying that because the alternative would be other things and probably have a lot more calories. So yeah, well, what are those products,

Jason Ryder 42:29

for sure. And I think you hit on that one, because 40% of the sugar we consume comes in the form of beverages, many of them are fizzy, like that soda. And so the cool thing, as I mentioned, this bottle of orange soda that I start showed you earlier in the 18 sugar cubes that go in the only function that the sugar cubes do with this bottle of soda is sweeten it. And so that's a great product for us to formulate around regardless of whether or not it's, it's, it's a tea, which is one of the beverages that we're selling now, or a fizzy one, which we plan to sell in the future. And so that gives us coverage of 40. And some would even guess as high as 50% of sugary products and, and they're they're essentially drop in replacements. So that's great when you can make it easy. In other cases, like chocolates, right, that's our other product, it's a little more difficult because sugar makes up by bulk 50% of the chocolate bar. And so when you replace when you remove all that sugar, and replace it with sweet protein, you can give somebody half of the size of the chocolate bar there, that's immediately going to give them a ho hum effect, right and so or you can replace it with something better. And so in our case, we've replaced it with fiber, which is something that's come out of our diet with Ultra processed foods is we just don't eat enough fiber. net net. And so rebuilding products with more healthy ingredients, natural ingredients that people can pronounce the names of without PhDs is also a passion of mine. Again, I appreciate it. I'm you know, I'm doing science at the cutting edge. And I also teach it at UC Berkeley, but I'm still an Alabama kid at heart and trying to solve problems for everybody. Right. And certainly the problems that we're seeing across climate, food and health are touching everybody.

Philip Pape 44:28

Yeah, yeah, I think that no doubt would be a massive impact. I mean, if you go into the grocery store and just go down the aisles, everything is sugar, just everything. I mean, pretty much you can randomly stick your hand out unless it's you know, in the canned goods or something that's gonna have sugar. You mentioned fibers that will kind of fibers added to those.

Jason Ryder 44:45

So we work with a couple of different fibers like Acacia fiber is one of those chicory root fibers is another. There's several What are widely viewed as healthy fibers, plant based fiber As of course, all fibers is plant based, but but can be good for you and help you either as a prebiotic, or just a healthy addition to a product replacing what we're used to what the diet we evolved around and have removed because of, you know, the the advent of ultra processed foods.

Philip Pape 45:20

Yeah, I wanted to ask us some some of the cheaper products, we'll just use the corn fiber. So I was curious about that.

Jason Ryder 45:26

I didn't know, fiber and maltodextrin. In general, we view those as a backdoor to diabetes. And so you do have the enzymes in your GI tract that can break down much of that soluble fiber and corn and make simple sugars, which take you right back to spiking your blood insulin, or your blood sugar level and your insulin and type two diabetes, and so on the types of fiber that we select for, and our products don't have that capability, as we really are working for those folks that want to get their sugar under control, without giving up taste.

Philip Pape 46:05

It's always an interesting topic, right? Because I know you don't listen to the show religiously. But I definitely touch on carbs a lot. And in the beauty of carbs and the benefit of carbs, and you know, everything from whole grains to starches to vegetables and fruits for energy recovery performance. And even for, you know, when you have a healthy lifestyle, and you build insulin sensitivity, it's good to have the carbs. Sometimes you want to spike your insulin when you have to work out, for example, to draw circles on you have muscle mass, but what we're talking about here is the mass of humanity that unfortunately consumes like 50 to 60% processed foods. And if you're not going to necessarily change it at the root. You can like chicory root, just getting change at the root then at least changed the available options in the environment, right, because the Western food environment is a big obesogenic factor that you know, you can you can blame people for their choices. But the it's out there, you know what I mean? It's very hard to get away from it.

Jason Ryder 47:03

Yeah, and I do. I have listened to a couple of your podcasts, particularly the misconceptions on protein, because I'm a huge protein lover. And, and building muscle over 40, I think was was the title of it. And I let your listeners guess which side of the 40 I'm on. But I think it's important and not to demonize carbohydrates. Right, I think what you're telling your listeners is, you're a chemical engineer, right? As you're solving mass and energy balances around people, much like I'm trying to solve them around the planet. And that that, you know, make sure that in minus out, you know, equals accumulation or loss and you want that at steady state, right is how we got ourselves into this situation with diabetes and obesity and heart disease is by eating far too much of one type of carbohydrate, that sugar. And we did it because it's recklessly abundant and cheap. And I'd say it's an opportunity for us to take a step back and look at not just what we're eating, but what other folks are making and selling to us and saying we want something different, right? We don't want to compromise on taste, or health. And we need foods that respect both of those things. And so I think that's largely what you're speaking to is going back to a diet that matches our lifestyle, certain from certainly from how much energy we're consuming, as well as the types of the carbohydrates that we're consuming, that they match our needs of our body that we evolved around. And don't put us in a position where our mass and energy balance gets out of whack.

Philip Pape 48:33

Yeah, for sure. And the choices out there should be as abundant as possible. So that when we make those choices for our lifestyle, we can still be sustainable. We could still have our our social time and still make baked goods and birthday cakes and all of that because again, I you know, I will tell people look if you if doughnuts are non negotiable. Enjoy your doughnut, let's just fit it in. But if you can have a doughnut made with a little bit better ingredients that just nudges us more in that healthier direction,

Jason Ryder 49:00

though, I like the way you think and I like your ideas. I think I just got a new one.

Philip Pape 49:05

Do you want to share it or is this?

Jason Ryder 49:07

You mentioned doughnuts. Doughnuts are also a big thing for where I come from two. So hurry to work on after this podcast.

Philip Pape 49:15

Yeah, I mean, you still have the fried dough part of it. But you know, we can at least get the frosting and

Jason Ryder 49:21

all good things in moderation, right? I can certainly help you with the sugar and the sweetness part of the donut.

Philip Pape 49:27

Sounds good. Okay, so I like to ask this of all guests. And that is what one question Did you wish I had asked and what is your answer?

Jason Ryder 49:36

What one question that I wish you had asked. I think it was more around the sustainability. But But I sort of seated my own answer there as most folks don't connect sweet proteins. With sustainability. It's the problems on health and food are the obvious ones. But But sustainability is not Yes, and I'd love to leave your listeners with some of what I've seen in my life. I spent a lot of time in Brazil earlier in my career, building bioprocess facilities that use that sugar to make bio based products. And there's a lot of sugarcane in Brazil and a lot of the tropical areas of the planet. And it's, it's a terrible crop for us to be growing from an environmental perspective. And so, I'd love for folks to think about sugar reduction, not just in terms of their own bodies and their health, and our food system, but also in terms of our global climate. And, yeah, that's, that's the question you didn't ask, but I think I answered a couple of times anyway.

Philip Pape 50:45

No, I appreciate ya know, for sure I was focused more on the health side, but that is that is going to be valuable because when you hear stories about the rainforests and deforestation things like at the end of the day, it's it's it affects all of us at some level, the wildfires and all that no matter what, what side of politics you are, there's, you know, a very strong, factual part of all this, we need to be aware of

Jason Ryder 51:06

that it's like all things if you don't get a chance to see it on a daily basis, that might be easy for you not to think about it. And so I'm encouraging folks to think about it, as all of your choices have implications. And we as a human society, can make better ones together and solve this whole system of problems we're facing across climate, food and health. I often don't refer to these as challenges or problems to my students, I only use the word opportunity because they're at that early stage in life and they're they're you know, all ready to get out and tackle all of these these opportunities and I say get after it.

Philip Pape 51:43

For sure. I'm gonna call my friend Alan when he says the obstacles the way right there

Jason Ryder 51:47

you go. Alright, so Phillip thank you for that.

Philip Pape 51:53

So where can listeners Jason find out more about you your work Uli any, any discount any study whatever you want to send them, I can throw all those links in the show notes.

Jason Ryder 52:03

Yes, please do visit our website www.weebly.com. That's Iblis spelled o bli. And you can buy our sweet iced teas, both our rather our peach, our lemon and our mango, yuzu, as well as our chocolates, dark chocolates. For now we do have milk chocolates on the way that are dark chocolates or silky cacao. We also have sea salt and raspberry bits. And so try them. And please share your feedback. Feedback is a gift. Certainly the supportive but also corrective. I'd love to hear how you feel about our products and our sweet proteins in general, as we're making them for you. So I'd love to hear from you.

Philip Pape 52:48

Absolutely. So ui.com sweet iced tea, dark chocolate. That's my favorite kind. So I'm going to try those out. Jason is a pleasure to have you on um, you know, I learned a lot I'm sure the listener did. I'm looking forward to more of the sweet proteins in our in our food supply.

Jason Ryder 53:02

Wonderful. Well, I appreciate the time and the ability to go a bit deeper on sweet proteins with your listeners. And I look forward to coming back and telling you more in the future.

Philip Pape 53:13

Sounds good. Jason, thanks so much for coming on. Thanks. So thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights. Please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong.

Philip Pape 9/5/23 Philip Pape 9/5/23

Ep 102: Q&A – Home Workouts, Antioxidant Supplements, Food Logging Hacks, Best Grains for Carbs

Today, we are doing a Q&A to answer questions from the free Wits & Weights Facebook community, emails, and messages from listeners.

We have questions from four listeners about training at home with a video vs. your own program or a template, how supplements impact your immune system based on dosing, some of MacroFactor’s features and how they actually work, and options for grains and cereals as a carb source.

I’m sharing some of my favorite strategies for all of these, and refer to a few past episodes if you want to dive deeper into specific topics.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
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Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:02] How should I program my home workout?
[13:48] Do exogenous antioxidants (supplements like Vitamin C) negatively impact the immune system when consumed in high quantities, and how much is too much (if there is a case of “too much”)?
[21:54] Does MacroFactor allow you to pre-log the day before?
[25:41] Is it only via your body weight that it figures out how to change calories and macros?
[29:57] Can you change the macro amounts? For example, I eat pretty high protein for my weight, as I am a petite female. Or does it do a standard like 1 gram per pound?
[32:09] Aside from oatmeal, are there any other cereals or grains that we can incorporate? Also, do high-protein cereals such as Kashi Go ( which I love with plain Kefir or Greek yogurt) or Magic Spoon offer an acceptable alternative? I guess the main question would be, should we avoid going down the cereal/granola aisle and stick with plain oats?
[41:00] Outro

Episode resources:

Wits & Weights Facebook community
MacroFactor app – use code WITSANDWEIGHTS to extend your free trial to two weeks
Ep 98: Is Your Food Logging App Sabotaging Your Fat Loss and Physique Goals?
Ep 6: Set Your Fitness and Nutrition Habits on Autopilot

Have you followed the podcast?

Get notified of new episodes. Use your favorite podcast platform or one of the buttons below. Then hit “Subscribe” or “Follow” and you’re good to go!

Transcript

Philip Pape 00:00

All the things that your body does to burn calories in a 24 hour period are going to be very complex and almost pretty much they are impossible to measure. But you don't need to measure because guess what? All of that energy that you burn causes your body mass to either go up down or stay the same because your body either stores or uses that energy. Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry. So you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits & Weights community Welcome to another solo episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. I hope you enjoyed our last episode 101 The truth about postpartum recovery and empowering women after childbirth with Peter Lappe about postpartum recovery diastasis recti and the unique challenges women face post pregnancy. Today for episode 102. We are doing another q&a to answer questions from the free Wits & Weights Facebook community and emails and messages from listeners which I always love to get. Whether it's a question whether it's feedback, a comment, maybe something you didn't like, whatever it is, I'm all ears and I'd love to hear from you. We have questions today from for listeners about training at home with a video versus your own programming or template. How supplements impact your immune system based on dosing, some of macro factors features that's the food logger and how they actually work and options for grains and cereals as a carb source. Now definitely listen all the way through because I'm sharing some of my favorite strategies in the answers to each of these questions. And I will refer to a few past episodes as well if you want to dive deeper into specific topics. Let's jump right into question number one. The first question is from tionesta. And she says I was a regular gym goer before COVID. Then I moved to another state and now workout strictly at home. And since I work from home, it's most convenient, I totally get that because I also work out from home. I'm more successful with following along with a video workout versus some programs I own that either have just a PDF with exercises, sets or reps or a five minute video showing the moves. But then you have to pause the video to execute. Is this just a mental block I have to get past I've accumulated a variety of home equipment that makes it convenient to stay home. When you follow a video. It's like having a trainer right there with cues. One of my strength programs as a fillable PDF that gives freedom to choose moves based on methods such as push pull, squat, push, pull, carry, squat, push, hinge, etc. Maybe I just need to take the time to compose the plan and start day one to execute. Okay, there's a lot here, but I'm sure many of you listeners can relate to what Ginetta is asking about this is the classic dilemma between having the structured guidance of let's say a video, a personal trainer or a class, right many of us have come through doing classes, whether it's boot camps, yoga, aerobic classes, strength training classes, CrossFit, et cetera. And it's the difference between that and essentially doing it by yourself to some level by either following an existing program, or designing your own or somewhere in between. And so I want to break down each piece of this because I think they're even though it's kind of one overall question. I think there's different aspects, we want to attack one by one. Because my overall philosophy with anything like this is, what is the true source of the problem? Where's the root cause? And where's the most friction? Because the surface level assumptions may not be the real answer, let's say. So first of all, the fact that you like video workouts, right? This suggests that maybe you're, you're doing a program that is too complicated, meaning the fact that you have to have a video to walk you through all these moves, and then every session is going to be new moves. It reminds me kind of like p90x Beachbody, that kind of thing that I used to do back in the day, that wasn't super effective. But it definitely required you to watch the video because it was always different. Well, when I see something like that, I think it's actually too complicated. And perhaps you're trying to do too much. And what we want to do is simplify our programming and make sure that it meets the basic principles of building strength and muscle. Are you are you performing more or less the same or similar movements from session to session, or every other session, depending on your split, and progressively overloading via the weight on the bar or dumbbells or the rep reps or sets? If instead you're doing something different every single time I mean, maybe coming back to the same move like four weeks later or five weeks later, or almost never, it's not going to be very effective. And it can be very complicated. And you will feel tied to having to do video workouts. So that's the first thing I would ask myself is, is it just am I trying to comp too much stuff because I want it to be, let's say fun. And I'm all for things being fun, but they also have to be effective.

Philip Pape 05:24

Another way to simplify your workout, if you're doing too much as some people are, for example, in addition to the workout, they're doing all sorts of warm ups and mobility exercises, and stretching and cooldown. And you don't need any of that you don't need quote, unquote, mobility, most people, okay, I'm not talking about physical therapy or rehab set sessions, or somebody with an extreme physical limitation that needs to get over that 95% of people just need to warm up with the movements. So if you're going to squat, just warm up with your squat, you don't need to do 20 minutes of quote, unquote, mobility, because mobility will come from working through the full range of motion on those movements. So just warm up with the movements. If you have different full body movements during a workout you want to, and you're going from, say legs to upper body, you definitely want to warm up the upper body as well. But if you're going from a leg movement to another leg movement, you're probably already warmed up. So what I want you to do is check out Episode 15, way back in the archives, it was called maximize your lifting sessions, warm ups, supersets, rest periods, and more about that. But continuing on my question, Shana is what is it that you like about the videos? Because let's focus on the positive as well, not just what you're not doing? Let's focus on what you get out of the videos. Is it the cues, right? They say, Okay, now do this do this, is it the tempo? Is it the immediate visuals you get on the form. And again, I think a simpler set of movements that you can master first, like, for example, most of my newer lifters, or people who start with me, after lifting for maybe three to six months, they're doing something like starting strength, or some other compound lift base program where you might be doing three or four sessions per workout at most. And these would include the big lifts, squat deadlift press, overhead press, and then some maybe rows and or chin ups and pull ups, for example, well, if you only have five movements to work on, it really simplifies the learning process. And the only cues you need are your own personal cues to focus on the things that you're working on in that moment. And this is where the mastery of these lifts is going to come in handy. And you may want to hire a personal trainer for one or two sessions to go over those and get the cues that way. But then once you have them, it's really up to you and your budget and time and all that you should be able to continue mastering those moves for the rest of your life. Now, you could also join a group where you can put form checks up on the group like the Wits & Weights community, we can do that for you as well, you know, totally free, where you film your squat, you upload it, you say what am I doing here, and I and others can let you know what the cues might be. And so that's that that again, comes down to simplifying and making sure you're not trying to do like 50 different movements, a whole bunch of aerobic or muscular endurance type movements, but rather, a few key strength base lifts. And then as you get more advanced, adding in a few accessories that support those lifts. Okay, so you also mentioned a mental block, right? Perhaps just hear me out, perhaps it's not you so much as the programs you've picked, and making it harder, harder on yourself, thus creating what seems like a mental block. For example, you mentioned a fillable. PDF. To me, that sounds like a lot of work that the work has put on you to design your program. That's a big source of friction of resistance. And I would say in my opinion, 95% of people out there or more can just use a good template. I mean, I think you mentioned templates as well. But when I say a good template, I mean one that again, is very effective focused on the lower rep ranges, the big lifts with some accessory movements, done in a way that maximizes rest periods of recovery, and works along with your your goals and your nutrition. So, you know, personal trainers may not like me saying that because their job is to program for you. But I don't think you need someone to program for you 95% of the time. A middle ground would be to be in something like a club like a barbell club. For example. I'm in Andy Baker's barbell club. I have been for probably three years now. He's one of the best programmers on the planet. And he writes a program for each week that everybody can follow. So it's not customed to you, but it changes so you get the variety. It's fun in that way and you get different options to choose from you get a four day split, you get power, or what do you call it? A basic barbell split For three days, and then you get a six day bodybuilding split, you can choose one of those to follow. And something like that is more than adequate for pretty much anyone other than if you're trying to be a competitor or something like that. And you need something very custom. So instead of a fillable, PDF, why don't you get a fixed template that is effective. So some programs that I I recommend for people starting strength, Mike Matthews for women thinner, leaner, stronger, and he has an app called stacked that's free that has the programs in there. So if you'd like using apps, you could just jump right into the app and pick one of those programs. Cody McBroom of tailored coaching method has a brand new app that came out I don't I don't mind plugging that for him no affiliation. And I think that's when you pay for it's like 29 bucks a month. But you also get access to tons of what I know are going to be effective programs for different goals. My good friends Katie and Heather at stronger than your boyfriend have a program called stronger. It's a four day split. It has a nice combination of big lifts and accessories that are kind of unique, some moves that you may not have seen before just to make it fun. But it it goes on a three month cycle like a 12 week cycle where each four week block, lowers in rep range. So you go from sort of a call it I hate to say hypertrophy rep range, but the higher rep ranges of eight to 12 down to like six to eight and then you end up at like one to four something like that. But it gets it kind of eases you into it that way, any of those would be effective. And you could easily learn the most basic movements by watching videos, learn the cues, and then execute them. And hopefully that helps you get over some of these blocks. Now, another block could be that you are not planning ahead. And you kind of alluded to that in one of my very early episodes, episode six. Okay, set your fitness and nutrition habits on autopilot. I do talk about how to pre plan for everything in your week, including your workouts. And I don't know how well that episode has aged but the principles are still the same. And what I like to do personally, and what I recommend to clients is anything you can do ahead of time, well, when you're thinking logically and you feel refreshed and have energy, like on the weekends for many people is going to reduce friction during the week. So simple way to do that is take the template that you're going to use now, let's say it's starting strength, where you know that there's a Monday, Wednesday, Wednesday, Friday workout, and go ahead and pre log, the exercises, the sets, the reps, and the loads that you plan to work to use for your top sets for your working sets. And go ahead and pre load those in your app or your notebook, whatever you use to track so that all you have to do is go into the gym, do it and then check it off. And of course, if you you know, if anything changes as you're working out, you can note it there. Pre prepare your gym clothes, your squat shoes, your belt, your pre workout or protein or creating all that stuff, just prepare all of it ahead of time. So that you get up Monday morning, boom, ready to go. Let's do it. And then that's just one less excuse. So the last thing is I'm a big fan of using resources and communities to figure this stuff out. So whether your medium of choice is a book or videos, but not videos in real time, but more like YouTube videos to learn the form. I like starting strength. I like barbell logic for the big lifts. Hiring a personal trainer for a few sessions, or even using an online community like Wits & Weights to post your lifts. And then of course, if you wanted to work with a coach like me, I'm a nutrition coach, but I do provide

Philip Pape 13:36

form checks. And again, I'm not dragging this directly you should edit but just in general, for folks to know that there are many, many options out there that that are kind of an in between for the answer to your question. Okay, hope that answers your question. I'm gonna go to number two. Now. The second question is from Christina. Do exogenous antioxidants. supplements like vitamin C negatively impact the immune system when consumed in high quantities? And how much is too much if there is such a thing? And yes, there is such a thing as too much. Let's get into some of the details. My general advice for people, my clients and just anybody listening is Be judicious about supplementation and use it for a specific known purpose for you as an individual, including nutrient deficiencies. So this is where you would use a multivitamin. Maybe you take magnesium, maybe you supplement with vitamin D, and the dosing and the need for or depending on your deficiencies for performance. So this is where creatine comes into play. I think everybody should be taking creatine honestly. And probiotics right for digestion and gut health which can be obtained from food but many of us like to supplement with that as well. Now I'm okay dosing with vitamin C, vitamin E, selenium, zinc, copper, whatever you need for deficiencies or immune function in moderate amounts in the amounts that you would normally See on an over the counter product. But an excessive amount of anything is going to be at best useless, meaning you get diminishing returns and at worst, toxic, right? We know that anything in too high of a quantity can be toxic. I mean, it depends on if it's water soluble or fat soluble, things like that, like for example vitamin C, it's hard to overdose on that versus a vitamin D. So you kind of have to understand those nuances. But the key is to keep it in a moderate dosing level per the recommendations. Now, the first source of all nutrients should be what food right period. This is why I prefer a diet of something like 80%, or more whole foods. Notice I said 80%. I didn't say 100%. I didn't say you cut everything out. We we are not about restriction here. This is more that if we are trying to improve our body composition, we're trying to manage our hunger. And we want to manage our health at the same time, we're going to seek out lower calorie density, higher satiety, higher fiber, lots of variety, fruits and vegetables, whole grains, all that a lot of which has been actually conventional wisdom for many years. But because of our modern food environment and the level of processing, it's hard to do that. And the more processed foods you have, the less nutrients you're going to have and the more deficiencies you're going to have. But I also like data, you know that you know that Christina and everyone listening, I love data, I love closing that feedback loop. And here you can track specific nutrients and micronutrients. If your food logging app can do that, and this is where I talk about macro factor all the time, we went into detail about it on episode 98. But it can now do that in great detail. You can track your macro micronutrients, you can set targets, you can automatically set targets based on what the science says. And that will give you a really good idea as well, if something is too much, right. So things that can be at a toxic level of intake, they will often have an upper limit to find not always but but they will in many cases, like for example saturated fat. So like anything, there is a minimum effective dose that you might need to to fill in that gap. And then there's often a toxic dose. And it varies based on the individual, right your age, your dieting, history, medical history, your activity, your diet, of course, one simple reference, if you're looking for numbers, Christina is the recommended dietary allowances the RDA is, and as much as there might be controversy over government sponsored recommendations, it's at least a starting point, right? Because they tend to be on the conservative side anyway. And you can look those up for specific nutrients and see if a particular supplement or antioxidant is way out of bed from those recommendations. As to your specific question about their impact on the immune system. A few things come to mind. First, the the supplements form of anything. So if you get anything in a pill instead of from food, it may not have the same benefits as the things in food, right? Because it's not complemented by the other nutrition and the other the other nutrients and the other compounds in food. So I think I talked about this, what did I talk about this on Oh Is my bonus episode about the carnivore diet recently, where I talked about how real food like fruits, vegetables have other compounds that aren't necessarily tracked. And they may have complimentary effects with these nutrients that you're trying to seek out here. They may not have the same benefits. And they might even act as what's called a pro oxidant which can cause oxidative stress, which is the opposite of what you want. We want antioxidants, not pro toxins. The second thing is that high doses could modulate the immune system in ways that we don't understand. Right meaning you're actually causing an effect on the immune system to compensate in some way. And this is beyond the scope of this podcast and should shouldn't be a concern if you're not taking unreasonably high doses of these antioxidants. So long story short, keep it simple. Don't use supplements as a shortcut. They are absolutely the lowest priority thing. When I work with clients after energy balance, macros, micros, fiber, hydration, even meal timing are all more important than supplements, but supplements can fill in that gap. Okay, so that was the second question. Let's move on to question number three from mn. She says I loved your recent episode 98 about food logging apps and macro factor in particular, great info. And by the way, I've gotten a lot of feedback on that episode. When I created it. I wasn't sure if it would come across as just like a sales pitch for the app. But a lot of people got back to me said You know, I was on the fence. I've been using, say my fitness power or something else for all these years. And it was on the fence because it's a paid app. And I jumped in based on your episode which clearly outlined why these other apps are problematic. And now all of a sudden, like within days or week of using it. I absolutely love what it's helping me discover about myself and helping me reach my goals. So thank you everyone who wrote in about it. Anyway, continue with the question she has no has three questions built into this one question? Does macro factor allow you to pre log the day before? Is it only via your bodyweight that it figures out how to change calories and macros? And can you change the macro amounts? For example, I eat pretty high protein for my weight as I'm a petite female? Or does it do a standard like one gram per pound? Okay, I love these questions because they go to the heart of features that make food logging apps helpful or not the very principles I was talking about in that episode. So I'm going to answer these one by one and then I will repeat and questions as I go along just so everybody can follow what I'm answering. Before I do I get again, I want to remind you to check out Episode 98, which is titled, is your food logging app, sabotaging your fat loss and physique goals? Go check that out. So you have some more context. Hey, this is Philip. And I hope you're enjoying this episode of Wits & Weights, I started Wits & Weights to help people who want to build muscle lose fat and actually look like they lift. I've noticed that when people improve their strength and physique, they not only look and feel better, they transform other areas of their life, their health, their mental resilience and their confidence in everything they do. And since you're listening to this podcast, I assume you want the same things the same success, whether you recently started lifting, or you've been at this for a while and want to optimize and reach a new level of success. Either way, my one on one coaching focused on engineering your physique, and body composition is for you. If you want expert guidance and want to get results faster, easier, and with fewer frustrations along the way to actually look like you lift, go to wits & weights.com, and click on coaching, or use the link in my show notes to apply today. I'll ask you a few short questions to decide if we're a good fit. And if we are, we'll get you started this week. Now back to the show.

Philip Pape 21:54

So NS first question was, does macro factor allow you to pre log the day before? The answer is yes, you can log foods meals or not meals, foods and what they call plates, which is multiple foods and a single time. Because macro factor doesn't use meals because meals is a limiting construct manufacture allows you to log to anytime you want. So if you eat 10 times a day, you can log it that way. Very flexible. So you can pre log or you can log a day, the previous day, you can log future days as far out into the future as you want. Even better as I encourage this practice as a way to meal plan for yourself. And to also solve problems that have been a struggle for you. So let me break those down. The first one, using macro factors a meal planner is is a beautiful thing because you can for example, if you know you're gonna go out on Saturday night, for a big dinner or to a restaurant and you know, it's going to be pretty indulgent, you can pre log that whole day and figure out what it's going to look like you can say, okay, walking back from right to left, I'm going to put in my dinner first. And I'm going to have you know, buttered butter dinner rolls, I'm gonna have that appetizer of fried onion rings, I'm gonna have a Caesar salad, I'm gonna have you know, a steak with butter, and I'm gonna have potatoes or I'm gonna have dessert, whatever, just right, I'm just randomly rattling off things. And you come to find that it's 1800 calories. And it's, you know, blown through your fat budget most likely, and your, your calorie needs or your calorie targets or let's say 2500 calories. So now you know you have 700 calories left for earlier in the day. And you go ahead and you plan out a light protein, veggie based lunch and breakfast. And maybe maybe it's more than 700 calories because you know you don't you know, you don't want to starve yourself, you want to have enough energy, you want enough carbs and protein throughout the day, you want to distribute protein and all that. And you don't want to feel like you have to binge. So you go over by maybe 300 calories. But guess what, that's just 300 calories, you've already figured out what you're going to do, you have a plan 300 calories is a drop in the bucket compared to if you didn't do that. And then you had a big breakfast because it's Saturday and then you know you had a big lunch and then you maybe your normal snack, and all of a sudden you get to dinner you've already eaten, let's say 1500 calories. If you still eat the way you are, you're going to plan to eat now you're going to be 1000 calories over your budget. So it's great as a pre planning meal planning tool. The other way to do this, as I mentioned was if you have trouble hitting a particular macro like protein, that's very common one you have trouble hitting in protein. Actually, a lot of my clients also sometimes have trouble hitting carbs because I'm asking them to eat more carbs than they ever thought they could eat, and still, you know, lose fat, improve their body composition, but it's true. And so, what I what I asked them to do is use macro factor and plan out their next day, let's say a routine day like today's a Wednesday. Tomorrow's a Thursday and I want you to plan out the day as if it is 100% successful right 100% macro and calorie adherence meaning, you know you hit it right, pretty much close to the ground, even though reality is never going to work. count that way, and that's okay. It will immediately tell you based on the food, you start to log, where you're off. I mean, it's pretty simple, you see that you need or you want 150 grams of protein and what you've logged as 100. You know, you're short 50 Now you have to start moving things around. So it's a perfect, logically driven, case, cool headed in the moment, non emotional way to tell your future self, hey, get real, what you're doing isn't quite getting there, we need to make a change. And now I'm pre planning how to make that change. Okay. So the answer is, yes, you can pre log. And then I just went on two big reasons how you why you want to do that, actually. And second question was, Is it only via your bodyweight, that the app figures out how to change calories and macros? So what she's asking because I'm going to reword this, what I get from a lot of people is where do I enter my activity? Like my exercise? Why? Or why don't? Why does it need exercise, right to figure out your expenditure and what the targets need to be? Well, here's the thing, all macro factor needs is two data points, you need your body weight, and it needs your calorie intake. And the beauty of this is that our bodies are a closed system, right. So you have energy coming in, in the form of food, which is measured by calories, you do a bunch of stuff, not just voluntarily, but involuntarily. All the elements of your metabolism, metabolism are happening all the time, every day, right, your organs have to function that uses a ton of calories, your liver, your heart, your lungs, your brain, those are using a ton of calories, your lungs to keep you breathing. All the involuntary movements like flat, you know, blinking your eyes and such. So that's like two thirds of your calories. You move around all day doing stuff, whether you're standing, sitting, walking, cooking, cleaning, all of that you are potentially exercising as well, right? You should be your training, your strength training, you're, you know, biking or walking or doing some sort of cardio, or whatever. And you're eating food as well. And the act of eating food and digesting that food burns calories. So guess what, if, when I hear the question, where do I enter my activity calories? And I know and you didn't ask that explicitly, I'm just extrapolating into what a lot of people think.

Philip Pape 27:16

I should also ask the question, okay, where do I log my digestion calories? Where do I log my, the calories that my organs need to function? Where do I log you get where I'm going, it gets kind of ridiculous. Actually, when I, when I make that hypothetical, that all the things your body does to burn calories in a 24 hour period are going to be very complex, and almost pretty much they are impossible to measure. But you don't need to measure because guess what, all of that energy that you burn causes your body mass to either go up or down or stay the same. Because your body either stores or uses that energy, it stores it in your fat cells, or it releases it from your fat cells, as well as glycogen, right in the form of glucose from carbs, and maybe from protein. If you don't have enough carbs, and your body starts to cannibalize its own protein, it's going to take immediate energy from the food coming in, and then stored energy from your fat cells. And what happens at the end of the day, your weight either goes up or down or stay the same. So macro factor only needs your weight and your calories to know how many calories you're burning, without having to know all the stuff that happens in the middle. Think of a car, think of it as a car. I don't know if this, this analogy will work. But if you wanted to calculate the gas mileage of a car, which is kind of which is kinda like its expenditure, right? Kind of like its metabolism, you're gonna say, how many miles did you drive divided by how much gas did I burn? All you have to know is how many miles you drove and how much gas is left in the gas tank. You don't have to know how much energy is used by all the components of the engine by the tires by all the wasted heat and mechanical energy. No, you have to know all that. Just what goes in? And what goes out simple and precise all in one. So to answer your question, yes, all it needs is weighed in calories. And I encourage you to log those every single day. If you log weight, it needs at least one way in per week. But I strongly encourage you to weigh every day to get better precision. Because if you do it once a week, as I've talked about before, you may be hitting a high point or a low point. And if it goes up or goes down from one point to the next, it may not be an accurate reflection of what's happening in your body. Macro factor will use an average over a three week period regardless, but it's better to have more data points. And then calories. You should be logging your food every day anyway. It's great for awareness and it's great for precision in the data. So it knows okay, I'm eating this many calories my body is doing this, therefore I'm burning this, then you'll know what to do you know, oh, maybe I should walk more and start to push that expenditure up. You don't need to log it in the app, the Apple will realize that you're eating the same amount of food and all of a sudden you're losing weight or you weren't losing weight before Oh, you must be moving more doing something that burns more calories. Alright, and last question related to manual macro factor was Can you change the macro amounts? For example, a pretty high protein for my weight is I'm a petite female, or does it do a standard like one gram per pound. Alright, so in macro factor when you set up a goal, to gain weight, lose weight or maintain, it's going to prompt you to set up your program, your macro program, and there's a few different settings there. And a few settings are universal, I recommend these universal settings, the first one is called coached. So you can either do coached collaborative, or I think it's called manual. And the coach profile is going to set your targets for you, based on your body stats, body composition, and the goal that you set, right based on the rate of gain or the rate of loss. And based on what weight you are right now. So if you want to maintain, it's going to be based on that on not changing at all. So I would use the coached profile for pretty much 99% of people. And then here's the thing, you can change the amount of fats and protein that it uses. So you can set it to low fat or low carb or keto, you can do that it gives you those options. So for somebody who just prefers lower carbs, and wants to give it a shot, do that, again, I usually recommend just the balanced option, which is let the app figure it out for you based on the evidence of a good balanced approach to your macros. And then finally, you can set your protein level you can set it to, you know, low, moderate, high and very high. And I usually recommend high or in some cases very high. And so the high and very high, it's gonna get it close to that one gram per pound. And then the low and the very low will be like around point seven 2.9. But it's all within the range of what the evidence suggests is optimal for results. And by results we mean improving your physique, improving your health, achieving your goals, losing fat building muscle. Cool. So your question was, can you change the macro mounts in that's the way I would do it, I would change if you don't want to do balance your little low fat or low carb or keto and if you don't want to do like very high protein you can go to high or moderate protein. Okay. The last question is from Alan. Cooler weather is coming and many people may turn to cozy oatmeal overnight oats etc for their carb sources making me hungry. I eat oatmeal every morning. Aside from oatmeal, are there any other cereals or grains that we can incorporate? It's a good question, right? Seriously, I love that we're asking explicitly like give me more carbs give me more grains and cereals because I know that those are carbs and they might serve my goals and there's nothing wrong with them whatsoever. Also do high protein cereals such as Kashi Go which I love with plain Kefir or Greek yogurt, or magic spoon offer an acceptable alternative? I guess the main question would be should we avoid going down the cereal and granola aisle and stick with plain oats? I think you know my answer to the question. First of all plain oats are down the cereal granola aisle generally but that's a technicality, semantics. I think when you're talking about grains, most of the options are going to be in the middle aisles of the grocery store, right? Because they're not perishable, like meat, dairy and produce what you would find on the perimeter. So you're going to find them in the middle or maybe you'll find them in the organic or the weak natural section some grocery stores have. But here's the thing. So you kind of know you kind of are leading me with the question, Alan, because you know, I'm all about flexibility and nothing's really off limits like I think you should, every aisle in the grocery store is open to having something that you enjoy that meets your needs period. I absolutely do love oats. I love oats because they're versatile. They taste great. I mean they're, they don't have much of a taste in of themselves. But you know, you can put them with lots of things to add flavor. And they are high in protein. Of course. I personally like old fashioned oats but there's many different cuts to choose from. There's the instant there's the like you said overnight, there's the steel cut, the quick oats, etc, whatever you want. Now, as far as other cereals and grains, I'm going to suggest seven of them. I know it's a big list, but I just want to put it all out there as a nutrition coach. There's a million options, but these are seven good ones. Quinoa. Of course, it's an ancient grain, high in protein, high in fiber. It has that nice nutty taste. Not everybody likes a texture but you can cook it in some broth and it gives it a little bit of a different texture. So you can go from like going from crunchy to soft. So quinoa, of course, Ferro is another ancient grain FA RR O, and it's more it's dense and chewy if you want that. So again, I'm all about mouthfeel I'm kind of a foodie. So if you're into that and cooking and recipes and you want different textures definitely play around with all these grains. And if you're finally back on the carb train after years of being low carb and you're enjoying the beauty of what carbs give you it's it's time to explore and go out go out there and you know pick these up at the grocery store and see which ones you like. So quinoa Farrell, the third one is barley. Barley is good in soups. It's good as a side dish. Yeah, it's in beer too. That's that shouldn't be your main source of it though, Boulder B you LGR is very quick to prepare and that's good in like salads or bowls like when you have those even like the vegetarian bowls, but of course I love adding meat to vegetarian bowls so it kind of defeats the purpose. The next one is rice. I mean rice should be on the list for anybody rice is a mainstay both white and brown rice, all the varieties, all the fragrances Jasmine basmati you know, brown rice is a nice wholegrain alternative if you want more fiber and decrease calorie density, but it is a little bit more. You know, because it's rougher and texture, it's not as smooth mouthfeel and if you're on let's say you're in a building phase Allen, which you are and you want to get a lot of carbs. You know, it actually may be too filling to just eat brown rice and you may want to have white rice I think white rice is is also versatile and delicious. So rice, the sixth one is couscous. Couscous is just made from wheat, it's effectively a form of pasta just in a different shape. That can be a lot of fun. Kids tend to love it as well. And you can, again very versatile. And then millet, it's a small grain right also very versatile cheese in portages, things like that. Now, some of these animals never eat and some of them I eat a lot of like I eat a lot of rice. I eat quinoa, couscous occasionally. The other ones not so much. It's just you know, how much do you want to keep in the pantry? And how much variety Do you want to have at home and try? Okay, so you also asked about high protein cereals. Now here's the thing, I personally have a subscription to magic spoon, I get a few boxes every few months or whatever a very small amount in case I get that cereal craving or you know, I want a cereal fix. I don't get a lot of cravings these days. It's something that you find happens when you go more toward Whole Foods You don't you don't have these massive emotional cravings like you used to which is part of why we do it. Keep in mind though, things like magic spoon, they're still processed foods right in terms of the spectrum but they're not. They're not crazy, like ultra processed side of the spectrum per se. I went back and looked at my box of magic spoon and most ingredients are fine. I mean it has chicory root as like a fibrous filler. That's that's a natural filler. I'm okay with that. It uses alue Lowe's, which is a non nutritive sweetener from fruit, it actually does have a few calories. I think for every 10 calories, you absorb one. So it has some impact on calories. But products like magic spoon, I think were developed for like the the low carb crowd and I kind of wish there were some high carb high protein versions like just kind of normal cereal with good ingredients that add protein. But you're fine with these honestly, because the food science is incredible. It's okay to take advantage of it where it serves you. And when you look at something like magic spoon, it's kind of like a protein bar. You'd have it occasionally don't have it every single day necessarily. Well, I mean, even if you had it once a day, it still probably would fit within your goals. To be honest, I don't want to be that restrictive for anything. But

Philip Pape 37:58

it's it's impressive, right? And they're tasty. They have all these now, they have not what they call natural flavors, which is really not natural per se. I mean you can you can go research what that means. And there were like two other ingredients. Honestly, there weren't too many. I think it's the the primary ingredient is Man, I wish I had it with me, I should look it up. But the primary ingredient is just, I think whey protein isolate, right? It's whey protein, something like that. That's where the protein comes from. That plus the chicory root gives it that, you know, Harvey texture. Okay, so here's the thing, I'm gonna let you in on a secret Alan, and everybody listening, the 1000s of people listening. If cereal is like the most delicious thing to you, it's the thing you just have to have. It's your non negotiables you just love it. And I know people like that with cereal, which by the way you can pour almond milk in and you know you don't have the extra calories from milk if you want to do that. And here's the thing if you have the calories and macros for it in your allocated targets for your flexible diet. All right, a bit of your favorite cereal, even if it's not high protein can absolutely fit in a sustainable diet. Yes, even those, okay, I'm gonna say even high sugar cereals made for kids. gasp There I said it. Right, some cinnamon toast crunch is not going to kill you if it's in your 10 to 20% budget for indulgences. Alright, and when you're eating 4000 calories and building muscles. Sometimes your indulgences come from interesting places. And in granted in a fat loss phase, these are the first things that we tend to limit, right because they don't serve our goals. Something like high sugar cereals just not gonna be very filling. It's processed, yada, yada, it's not going to have much in the way of nutrition although you'd be surprised at how much they fortify these things with after the fact. Anyway, that's what we mean by flexibility and not restricting yourself and so take that fear mongering fitness influencers. Okay, that's it. That's all the questions I have for today's episode. And I think that was enough so please send them in if you want your question answered in an upcoming QA In any episode, the best way to do that is send me a message on IG at Wits & Weights, or Facebook, either directly to my profile. I think my link is in the show notes but better off, go through the free fit a free, the free Wits & Weights Facebook community, those links are in the show notes. So our next episode 103 titled, sweet proteins, food science and the future of sweeteners with Jason Ryder. Wow, I couldn't have planned that any better. To tie off with that last question from Alan. We're going to be diving into the topic of sweet proteins. If you've never heard of these, neither had I before I met Jason. I obviously researched for the episode but even then I wasn't fully understanding exactly what they were until we talked. So check out that episode we're going to explore the science behind sweet proteins, their health benefits in your nutrition strategy, and then what foods you might find them in now and in the future. Maybe a magic spoon who knows? As always stay strong. And I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits & Weights podcast. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights. Please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong

Philip Pape 9/1/23 Philip Pape 9/1/23

Ep 101: The Truth About Post-Partum Recovery and Empowering Women After Childbirth with Peter Lap

In this episode, I talk to UK post-partum recovery expert Peter Lap. Peter will dispel myths and offer post-partum recovery tips, from diastasis recti to women's specific health concerns.

We'll explore the physical, mental, and emotional journey after motherhood, challenging your assumptions and changing your view of women's health and fitness. This episode is also for men since we all want to support the women in our lives.

Peter is an expert in postpartum recovery with 12 years of experience. He has authored hundreds of articles on post-partum recovery, diastasis recti, and back and neck discomfort. He also advocates for more affordable access to women's health professionals.

Peter hosts the Healthy Post Natal Body podcast, which interviews experts and answers listener questions on post-partum topics. He has also appeared on various podcasts, radio shows, and panels.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
__________

[2:02] Becoming a male expert in women’s post-partum recovery
[6:57] Understanding and managing diastasis recti
[14:01] Effects on the core muscles, alignment, and core function
[17:49] Basic exercises for core and glute strength
[23:31] Training protocol for women who trained during pregnancy
[25:36] Post-partum recovery: timelines, misconceptions, strategies
[28:26] Measuring diastasis recti and testing muscle functionality
[31:20] Progression for postpartum recovery
[37:01] The societal pressure to lose baby weight post-partum
[42:03] Addressing and coping with post-partum depression
[50:20] Unethical practices toward post-partum women in the health industry
[55:30] Advocacy for better post-natal health support
[58:39] Key insights from the Healthy Post Natal Body podcast
[1:03:26] The question Peter wished Philip asked him
[1:05:50] Where to learn more about Peter
[1:08:58] Outro

Episode resources:

Peter’s website – free program after you sign up for 90 days, then goes deeper after the 3 months, then ~$10/mo for 5 months - https://www.healthypostnatalbody.com/
The Healthy Post Natal Body podcast
Email: peter@healthypostnatalbody.com

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Get notified of new episodes. Use your favorite podcast platform or one of the buttons below. Then hit “Subscribe” or “Follow” and you’re good to go!

Transcript

Peter Lap 00:00

post partum is not about focusing on burning calories. And we all know as as personal trainers, the best way to actually burn some calories to some muscle gain some muscles and do your strength training and and have your basal metabolic rate go up and you can sit on your bum and burn more calories.

Philip Pape 00:21

Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry so you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits & Weights community Welcome to another episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. In this episode I'm discussing postpartum recovery with Peter lap one of UK is leading authorities in this critical area of women's health from unraveling the complex condition known as diastasis recti. To the unique challenges women face post pregnancy, Peter will address misconceptions and share actionable strategies for postpartum recovery. We'll get into the physical, mental and emotional journey that follows childbirth, uncovering truths that will challenge your assumptions as always, and transform your perspective on women's health and fitness. This episode is for men and women alike because we all want to support the women in our lives. Peter is a post natal expert with over 12 years of helping women recover from pregnancy and giving birth. He has written hundreds of articles on postpartum recovery diastasis, recti, postpartum back and neck pain and advocating for better and more affordable access for women to women, women, to women's health professionals. He's also the host of the healthy postnatal body podcast, where he interviews expert guests and answers, listener emails on anything postpartum related. And as appeared on various podcasts, radio shows, and panels. Peter, thank you so much for coming on the

Peter Lap 01:58

show. Thanks very much for having me, Philip, thanks so much for the very kind introduction.

Philip Pape 02:02

Likewise, yeah, I'm looking forward to get into this. It's not a topic we really just really covered here. And I just want to start with the obvious, right? You're a man working in a field focus on women's health? How did you find your way to becoming an expert in specifically postpartum recovery?

Peter Lap 02:16

Yeah, this is like my, my what went wrong story, so to speak. So I used to have a proper job long, long time ago as a project manager, and then I retrained to become a personal trainer. And as most PTs in the UK, do, you go to personal training school, you take a course or whatever, and then you go work in the standard gym for for a little while until you build up a client base. And I worked for one of them slightly more higher end gyms because they needed people. And I joined. And I found that most of my clientele tended to be women between the ages of 25 and 35. And one of my American friends who was a personal trainer in New York, and have the same clientele same sort of same sort of market. And he said to me, he kept losing clients all the time. Because at that age, now women start families and have kids or they already have one, but then the other second, and if he wasn't postpartum qualified, and 12 years ago, believe it or not, that wasn't a big thing at all, was God and qualifications weren't as popular as they are now. But he said, so he couldn't really he didn't feel comfortable training them anymore, even though he had a whole bunch of clients that wanted to keep training with him. But he was not really comfortable training them. And I just thought, well, that's a silly way, as a business person, that's a silly way to lose clients. All you have to do is take a course and become comfortable with this style. So then I went to have a look at some courses, there were some courses available and take my money, and I took the courses and all that sort of stuff. And before I knew it, I found that within the city where I live, which is Edinburgh up in Scotland, Scotland's capital, and there wasn't anybody else doing, it was nobody else doing postpartum exercise for women at all. And I've always written a lot of articles, that exercise and blog posts and all that sort of stuff. And the more information I kept putting out there, the more Google like, because 10 years ago, hardly anyone was really writing about diastasis, recti, and all that sort of stuff. And I was just contacted more and more, but people were saying I've never heard of it, again, postponed. The postpartum feels wasn't the same as it is now. 10 years ago, women's health wasn't the same as it is now 1010 years ago, and before I knew what it was all I was doing, and so I kind of fell into it for as I kept my clients, which was awesome, right? But then it kind of just became the guy that does postpartum stuff. And the more I don't know whether you experienced this as as as a, you know, white guy, you might be younger than I am. Don't know how old you are, but I'm 48 now, right? So I'm your typical middle aged white guy. And problems tend not to exist until they happen to me It might just be understand. And therefore, and because my wife and I don't have kids, we never went through this process. But the more women I spoke to, the more I found out that women's health, despite recovery for women, just was completely unaddressed by a lot of people. Also, by the health care system in the UK, at least, you know, in other countries, you get quite a bit of help postpartum in the UK, that just isn't a thing. And then I found out in America, it also kind of isn't a thing. And so yeah, before you know it, that's why I found myself. So this is kind of all I do now.

Philip Pape 05:40

That's, that's pretty cool, right? Because I think it bucks the trend of the 99% of the time, when you ask somebody, where did they get to where they are now, it's like, well, I my personal story led me to this exact thing. That's like, of course, you couldn't have necessarily personally experienced it. But like you said, even in your own realm of your wife, or whoever else, you may not have either, but it was because of your clients and the demand and a lack of supply in the market for that. And even just tangential to women's health in general, I can see it through my clients, and through my wife, the huge gap in knowledge research, you go back to, you know, decades ago, and you could see reasons why women weren't even included in sample sizes for research, and we lacked all this information. And yeah, we're two white guys in our 40s. And I'm 42 We're gonna be 43 who are nonetheless we care, we're passionate about helping people who we can help. So I love that. And I think it means nothing's off limits for people if we care about it. And people receiving that kind of care, I think, you know, if they can find somebody who has expertise, almost shouldn't matter who's delivering it as long as it's helpful. So let's let's get into the topic, then. Because there's a lot here, including the pronounciation of diastasis recti, which is there. So let's, let's talk about diastasis recti. Right, the the as I understand it, the separation of the muscles, but it's pretty common, like both during and after pregnancy. So what is it? And what symptoms can it cause?

Peter Lap 07:11

Yeah, sure. That's an excellent question. First of all, the pronounce it, I call the diastasis. Some people call diastasis. This potato for data. It's a dead language.

Philip Pape 07:20

It's Latin. Yeah, exactly. It's not No, I asked my daughter on how it's pronounced cuz she's taking Latin. I'm like, How do you pronounce it?

Peter Lap 07:28

That's probably that's probably the only way to do it. Because that's it. But there is not going to be like an ancient Roman for jumping on the podcast. And

Philip Pape 07:35

you mispronounce this stone tablets. Yeah,

Peter Lap 07:37

it's awkward. So I don't really mind how we pronounce it. Basically, you're right, it is separation of dystonic muscles along that middle line that we all have that runs from the Sturman to the sternum to the pubic bone. So basically, where your belly button is, right, that that's in the center, like the center point of the body, that's kind of where, where the muscles start to move away a little bit. And that is like the center of of it then tends to be so the muscles move, focus, you know, when you're, and I always say that, so director, the cause of it is internal pressure, not necessarily pregnancy, it can be an injury, it can be just a build up. Have you seen a lot of people who have raised too much, I have a lot of valley that, that get it because they lift heavy things. And they're, they're holding their breath as they lift heavy things. And then it becomes a sort of a repetitive strain injury, almost, because that's fundamentally what it is prolonged internal pressure on the core muscles, and a beast that everything just moves up. Now, obviously, during pregnancy, that is because you're growing a human in there. Which is an awesome thing to do so well,

Philip Pape 08:56

before you get there. So I've never heard of this happening to like a man who lifts weights and uses a belt and then literally having the brace but does it how often is it?

Peter Lap 09:07

Not that much. You find it a lot in people with recourse? So

Philip Pape 09:13

if you've built it up over time, maybe Oh, yeah, I

Peter Lap 09:16

mean, if you're an experienced lifter, and all this stuff, because then what you get if you're a serious lifter, and all of a sudden, you have an injury that tends to be a hernia and what we do find with people who are office workers, and people in wheelchairs, believe it or not, people in wheelchairs have this a lot because every time they have to get in and out of the wheelchair, if they push themselves up, and they're bracing that core because you've been sedentary all day, that cord just isn't strong enough to constantly deal with that internal pressure. So yeah, it should have been in Geisinger, and

Philip Pape 09:47

I don't know I'm so curious. I was curious about it. Yeah. But but it does happen in

Peter Lap 09:51

men. So if there are guys listening to this, you know, the big I always said it's you see this a lot in the UK I'm guessing a lot America, as long as alpha guys listening to this, you know how you have some people that look amazing and a T shirt, they look phenomenal. And now you get to the belly and the belly is round. Right? That is internal pressure on the core, fundamentally. And you might find that when you adjust that, actually, there's a bit of separation of the stomach muscles, because the internal pressure is just constantly there. Now what is actually happening is that your muscles are out of position, that's fundamentally what's causing it, like you said, separation. And that's along that linear. So that's that middle line that I spoke about belong the belly button, and all that sort of stuff. Now there's a facial shutdown of a fascia sheet. And that is essentially the bit that is stretching. So that's why men can also get this because you constantly have a, a bloated belly, so to speak, then that fascial sheet stretches and then when you bring it together, all of a sudden, the fascia she just stretched, right. So it's

Philip Pape 10:56

this is not visceral fat from drinking too much alcohol, I'm just gonna, there's different, there's different things,

Peter Lap 11:01

it's a different color. So to understand, because understanding that this is not caused by practices quite, it's quite a big, it's just caused by internal pressure. And that really matters for postpartum recovery. Because 100% of women who are pregnant have diastasis, recti 100%, you physically cannot grow a baby in there and stay completely flat, that is impossible, it is never been done. That doesn't mean it's a problem for everyone. But that's a different beast altogether. Those fighting we find that after six weeks, about 80% of women still have some form of diastasis recti. If you use a narrow definition, I won't go into much detail. But fundamentally for diastasis recti, what matters is the width of the gap, the depth of the gap. And in my humble opinion, muscle functionality is actually dictate whether your core still does what it should be doing. So when we understand is caused by internal pressure, then you can realize and most guys listening to this advice, and most women listening to this who are postpartum at some stage, and doesn't matter whether you're 10 or 20 years postpartum, you'll find that sometimes when we eat food, that bloats our belly as well. But I can't have a dominance without my belly immediately swelling up to the size of a balloon that matters if you're trying to heal diastasis recti. Okay, because it's really difficult to put everything back in its place, if the food you're eating is constantly increasing pressure, do it, I mean, we're trying to flatten the balloon, so to speak, if you're constantly putting air in that balloon, then of course, the balloon is never going to shrink. So understanding that matters, because it means that quite often postpartum, your body responds differently to different types of food, and every woman in the world will understand what I'm talking about that you used to be able to do used to be fine with apples, pre prenatal, and all of a sudden postpartum. You look at an apple and a stamp bloating already. That means that whilst you're trying to do this rehab exercise, which essentially is what postpartum recovery exercises, it's the same as a frozen shoulder and doing shoulder rehab. You just want to lay off the apples a bit as well. Because if they're causing the bloating, then they're not helping you in the moment. Yeah, it doesn't mean you always need to cut out apples. It just means that in the moment for rehab, that's kind of where they need to be. I'm sorry, they felt that way too boring, perfect.

Philip Pape 13:39

But no, I'm fascinated by it. So I always say, Look, we're coming up on 100 episodes, if my audience is bored, and I'm not, then they're not my the ones that do well, listen, so All right, what? Why is it a problem, I guess is another thing I want to understand. I love all the things about preventing the symptoms by paying attention, your food, and then also how it's different for different women. And it's the principle of the separation, not so much that it's caused only by pregnancy, but it's put affects all pregnant women. So

Peter Lap 14:10

why is it a problem? And that is the big question. Because for a lot of women, it used to be an aesthetic problem. They didn't like the way it looked. And that's completely fine. That is a valid reason for addressing something I mean, I go to the gym predominantly to stay healthy, but also to look have reasonable, right? I want to look half human by the time I'm 6070 years old, that's why I got so I always say aesthetics is a completely decent reason to address a problem. The main issue for the SSS Rector is that muscle functionality is quite often impaired when you have diastasis recti. And if your deep core because that's quite often the the one of the problem areas your your transverse abdominus and all that sort of stuff, which is the the middle layer of your three layers of core muscles for anybody listening, right? If that is not working properly, that means sooner or later, other muscles will start to kick in, and work to heart. Right. And in 99, out of 99 out of 100 cases that I come across, that tends to be the back muscles that will start to kick in, especially deep core, back muscles, your QL, and all that sort of stuff. Right. And again, that is just for anybody listening, that is not the superficial muscles that you feel this is your deep core stuff that basically the most important of all the core muscles, these are the ones that protect your spine. And that makes sure you can rotate without any pain and all that sort of stuff, this is not the get a Swedish massage. And then that is a drop down type type stuff that when muscles are out of place, as a physio will tell you, which you kind of tend to have with diastasis recti and a weak core things, your body tends not to be in alignment, your glutes aren't quite firing up properly. And that needs to be addressed because your imbalance is affected. You're, if you're an athlete, your athletic ability is severely impaired, if your body isn't functioning optimally, but just in daily life, if you think about what women have to do women with kids, what they have to do to get from point A to point B car, they have to carry buggies and travel systems and a bag full of stuff. And you can have a toddler that is fighting against you and throwing a little tantrum that is constantly jerking into you, and all that sort of stuff. If you're, if your core isn't doing what they're supposed to be doing, that's when injuries happen is what I always say, it's a life, it's a life thing, much more than just say, other muscles don't work out, we'll deal with it. This is why back pain kind of comes from.

Philip Pape 16:59

Okay, I love that you brought up all that. So for those who listen to this show, not long ago, probably about 10 episodes ago, we talked to Dr. Ryan Peebles about core training and the deep core, and how it propagates into back pain. And it's very nice tie in here to all of that, and I hear what you're saying, because we often hear of injuries, in any context, not even this, just this context of often happening when you you know you're doing something beyond your level of strength or movement capability that you haven't trained for. And so you often hear even somebody who's very strong, they'll go, and they'll reach way over for something to put it on a truck. And that's when they'll their back will have an issue, not the 400 pound deadlift that it's kind of funny. So yeah, glutes not firing, your balance affected, there's a whole propagation of issues. So it's very important. It sounds like to address this earlier than later. So that leads to the question, what kind of training or therapy do you recommend for managing it?

Peter Lap 17:54

Yeah, that's an excellent question. Because it's exactly the issue is exactly what you said it was it is exactly your body is not capable of doing the things you're asking it to do. Right. That's fundamentally how injuries happen. And that means that when you do any sort of rehab training, and like I said, Then it says, back to recovering any sort of postpartum training, in spite of that, you have to go slow. Your muscles aren't doing the things they're supposed to do. So I always say, the first three to four weeks. And this is how long is a piece of string sort of scenario, right? If you were really active during pregnancy, your muscle activation will be better if you were still squatting up until the day before your due date, and all that sort of stuff, your glutes will be much more active than someone who's been sedentary for the entire, entire, like 678 Diamond periods. But I always start with a nice steady, get the body fired up again. So we start we do some glute bridges and all that sort of stuff. And I think top of my head, the first full week home program that I do is like, this is not a sales thing, right? So this is just that I do with all my postpartum clients. We do some heel slides. We do a choreograph. That's the first thing learning how to breathe properly, is essential. With some heels slides that you just lay on the floor, you stretch one leg out, and you bring that back in and see how you respond to that. We do some glute bridges, not even a single leg glute bridges that just a bog standard laying on the floor blueprint is no way to squeeze your bum. We do some squats, we do some reverse lunges. And that's pretty much if basic stuff. And we've tried to do 10 to 15 reps of all this sort of stuff. Not because we're looking for and I'm sure you've discussed high rep ranges and all that sort of stuff a lot on this product, not because we're looking for hypertrophy we're just looking for. Because I get asked this question a lot. Why is it 10 I'm not trying to get a bigger bump. By doing some bodyweight glute bridges. No one's ever built a big bomb in that way. We're just looking to make sure that your glutes are doing the work and not hamstrings. Because how often do we see someone walking into a gym, and then banging out some amazing looking glute bridges with a big barbell, but there's a hamstrings doing all the work? For sure. Right? That is just another way to get injured. So that's where we starting. So it's just building that up. And the more we ask of the body, over a three to four month period, again, how long is a piece of string, some people will be a bit longer, it depends on how your pregnancy went when he had a C section, but it's your second or third child, whether you've been active beforehand, or whether it's six weeks ago, or 20 years ago, right? It's a muscular problem. So it can always be addressed by exercise. That's what I always say, doesn't matter if it's 20 years ago, but your recovery time will increase rather exponentially. If you do, we just ask a bit more of the body every three to four weeks. And the thing is, because it's a rehab thing, we do this every day. Right? That is quite often the key going to the gym once a week for an hour with a personal trainer won't help. Unless you do your home exercises. It's physio stuff, it's I don't know if you've ever had a shoulder injury or anything like that loads of

Philip Pape 21:12

I'm recovering from rotator repair right now, the rotator cuff repair. I haven't started my physical therapy only a month out.

Peter Lap 21:20

The recovery for that will be boring as anything, it's not going to be fun to do big shoulder presses, Military Presses, all that sort of stuff. It's boring, is repetitive. And it's absolutely essential that you do it otherwise you won't heal properly. And it's going to cause you a problem later, you can any sort of we have stuff frozen shoulder over with your tongue, I love to show because everybody has shoulder pain. So I love given that as an example. But all that sort of stuff, we can all rush through it very easily. It is not a problem to rush through shoulder stuff, and then be fine with life and just have a niggling shoulder for the rest of your life. Right, it'll just be that old shoulder injury. Yeah, the problem is, sooner or later, you're gonna have to take a couple of weeks off, because your shoulders flaring up massively after you did some big shoulder presses and all that sort of stuff. And you know, all of a sudden, you can't really train clients anymore, because you can't show them how to do proper shoulder press, because overhand movement is a bit tough, you just end up and therefore it starts impact on the way you live your life. Right, all of a sudden, you have to ask your wife to reach for things off the top shelf, because you know your your stiff shoulder. And, and that's what I always say Wisconsin postpartum recovery as well. But it is dull in the beginning, it's not exciting. In the beginning, you just do 10 minutes every day. But you have to do them every day. Because you have to retrain your body to use the right muscles, again, that they haven't used for three, four or five months at least if you're talking about postpartum recovery. So this is a I

Philip Pape 22:57

love this specificity of your answer, you know, telling us specific movements and rep ranges, that's really good because people get an idea of what you're talking about. And it is a rehab protocol. So you're not, you know, you're not hitting high intensity three days a week, you're hitting, you know, a high high rep range. For, you know, the light resistance, I don't know if it's gonna be bands or by weight every day, which which makes sense. What about what's the difference between women who might have been training beforehand and after should is how valuable is this training protocol versus easing back into whatever they were already doing? And the body just recovering back to normal on its own? You know?

Peter Lap 23:37

Yeah. That's again, that's a great question. Because women who train during their pregnancy are athletes, I've trained one or two tennis players, and all that sort of stuff, and they don't stop training just gets her pregnant, but they're still new competition, they've got money to make, these are not like top 10 level in the world tennis players. I'm not talking to Serena Williams, I'm talking about people who tour and have to tour and make 30 grand a year, whilst working like a beast. They, they find that their postpartum recovery is simply much better, because their muscles still know what to do. Right? That muscle hasn't been inactive for three to four or five months. And therefore, the early stage of postpartum recovery is simply shorter for him. Nothing fancy, I mean, the first four to six weeks of muscle activation, that's usually two to three. And that's fine, and they're completely fine. And then we can start to to place more of the demand on the muscles. So they progressed through the program a bit quicker. And some of them only need a post a recovery program really short because this is all individualized, right? In an ideal world. Personal Training. The important part isn't the training element. It's the personal element of it. In an ideal world, everybody gets their own personal personal program. So for these four Some of these women, I've seen them for like a month, and then they're like, okay, I'm good to go, I can do whatever I wanted, because they know what to do. I'm sure as as a PT, a few myself as some sort of, you know, you have those rotated belts in a restaurant, you just pick your thing. That's why I'm an assembly line, I have a client I six, I moved the map, simply because I think it's rehab stuff, I don't want to I love working with some people for eight 910 years. That that is not my that's not my goal. I want to fix people so I can help the next person. So for some women, that is a month, and then they can go about their merry business for other people. And this is tends to be the case of women who were not active during the pregnancy or haven't never trained all that much on different things. Prenatal. So if you do a lot of cardio during your, during your pregnancy, that is awesome. And that is phenomenal. And it is fantastic. And I'm not knocking it. But it's not going to help your postpartum recovery when it comes to rehab stuff. Because lots of women, lots of women do do this, because they get told to you know, when you've just given birth, the best exercise to do is what they're told is to go walking. Yeah, no, it isn't. Just isn't the best exercise and and postpartum walking is awesome. And you need to leave the house anyway. So I'm not quite sure what that comment is aimed at. There's you should be doing it anyway. Yeah. But but it doesn't help you postpartum recovery from a rehab perspective doesn't get your glutes fired up. Unless you're walking up a hill, or indeed down the hill. Your core activation won't necessarily improve unless you're off balance, or you're asking your core to, to do stuff or just walking does very little for them. So so that is kind of the type of activity you're doing prenatal. And during the practice, it really matters for your postpartum recovery. But predominantly, the program is any sort of rehab program is kind of the same for most variations of diastasis recti have three or four different variations. But the recovery is kind of the same for absolutely every single one of them.

Philip Pape 27:14

Yeah, it sounds just like any time you are going to have a change in your situation, like you said, surgery, I've had two surgeries. And in both cases, I kept lifting right up until the surgery, and then the recovery is really fast. You know, it's the same thing. But I don't know how many I don't know how many I can't speak for women. I don't know how many women who are pregnant or are very aware that this is can be thought of in that way. Right? Like I'm sure it could be I don't remember my wife talking about it. So she may not have experienced it to an extent that it was an issue. But I guess that's where I'm going is how do you know? It's it even needs recovery? I guess you said all women get it, but he didn't get a test. Do you measure something? Is there you know, circumference measurements? Like what do you do to kind of figure it out? Yeah, that that action? Yeah.

Peter Lap 28:00

That's a good question. Yes. For most women, what happens is they get a six weeks postpartum checkup, right? They go, you go to your GP after six weeks. What the GP tends to do, they may look at the baby for 10 minutes, and then it gives you a quick, cursory glance to make sure you're still alive. You're good. Yeah, he's still alive, you get you're not gonna kill yourself, right? That is very, to be very blunt to get asked about postpartum depression. And but that's kind of what it is. Sometimes, you get a good GP and they say, Okay, let's also check your, your core muscles and see how they go. They basically lie on the table, and put a couple of fingers along that linea alba and there's tons of videos on how to measure the assessors RekSai. online on YouTube, it's on my YouTube channel as well. I have a slightly different way of doing it. But predominantly, you lay on your back, Leisha middle fingers, these are finger along that that line that I spoke about, and you just see how wide that gap is, how deep you can put the finger and all that sort of stuff. That doesn't test muscle functionality at all. Right? That is just it with measurements. And as I always tell everybody, that if you're going to measure the assessors, right, and that way, it's completely valid to do it that way. Make sure you get a tape measure. Because I have this big sausage fingers. And if I measure you, you're gonna have to center two fingers separation. And if you measure yourself and you are built, like my wife is, for instance, was much smaller hands than I do. You can fit three fingers in them. And if you take that home, and I tell you, you have two fingers separation, and a week later you measure yourself and you tell yourself I've got three things separation. The first instinct isn't, oh, my fingers must be smaller. The first instinct is oh my god, it has gotten worse. Right? So we need to get a tape measure out to make sure I always get my clients to measure their own. I sit next to them and showed them how to do it and say use your own fingers. Your fingers won't change that much insights and knowledge and even dentists will use the technique. Then what I do is just a basic exercise Can you lift your legs without your stomach? Tommy? Can you do that? With bent knees? Can you do the straight leg some have a leg raise, as most of your listeners will be familiar with the exercise. But there is a leg, which was a tremendous amount of pressure on your core. How many people do we see that their stomach bulges when they do a leg raise, or they start bouncing up and down and they do a leg base because it's predominantly their hip flexors and momentum doing all the work. But want to make sure the right muscles are doing things like I said, with glute bridges. Is it your glutes that are doing the work? Or is it your hamstrings that are doing the work? Those questions those those two things are actually the main ways that I discovered, okay, what's your what's your muscle activation, like the side plank of dips is also a nice way to do it. Because want to know if your obliques are doing their job. And not everybody has equipment in the house to do like woodchopper type exercises, and then off presses and all that sort of stuff. So those three things, right, so you put your fingers in there, you see how wide the gap is, you see how far you can get your finger in there to see how deep the gap is. And then you do some glute bridges, you do some leg raises. And you do a side plank with dips, and they'll tell you but your muscles are working.

Philip Pape 31:12

Very straightforward. very prescriptive. Love it.

Peter Lap 31:14

It's so yeah. But that's

Philip Pape 31:16

why that's the thing, that least sexiest solutions are usually the most effective. So we know how to maybe recognize it, we know why it happens. We know the differences when you are training versus not training and the importance of strength training, not just cardio and walking. And then you mentioned the the recovery period. Besides that form of recovery, you talked about the rehab is there are there any other strategies for recovery, and not eating apples, if that doesn't work for you.

Peter Lap 31:45

The main strategy for recovery is kind of still keep challenging your body as whenever you can. So that's something that we tend to forget quite a lot. As personal trainers in gyms at least, you know, everybody listening to this will probably have signed up to a gym at one stage. And you get your induction with a personal trainer this way, usually you get your first free program from the gym, right? These are exercises you need to do. And they'll say that this is a program and then you do the program for free for five months. Right. And that's usually one session that is not an actual program, they usually give you a session plan exercises new for a month and then say come back to me in a month's time, and I'll sell you a new one. And no one shows up for a second appointment, right, because all of a sudden, it's gonna cost you money, and all this sort of thing. The issue is that if you do the same stuff that you're meant to do for a week, or two weeks, or three weeks or a month, for four or five, six months, you're wasting your time for at least four months of that. Because you're not challenging yourself. And the whole point of this is that any good program has to be progressive. And that includes for postpartum exercise that includes doing the things you want to do. One of the things that I used to forget a lot about is that, you know, I used to be one of those guys that said, hit high intensity interval training. That's the best way to do it. Man. That's amazing. That's the most effective way of training. And I'm kind of completely in a different camp. It's amazing to love hit, you do it every day. That's phenomenal. You do hit once a week or you do Zumba classes seven times a week. Zumba is going to do more for you than the hit classes. Not as a standalone, but as the results you'll get from constantly and consistently doing Exercise and Movement. That's a no brainer. So make sure that if you like kettlebell stuff, there isn't anything scary about a kettlebell swing, if you postpartum if your glutes are working your coursework and go take a kettlebell class, do your thing. Any exercise you have, and this is the biggest takeaway and anyone can get I think from any sort of postpartum thing. Once your muscles are working nicely, you can do whatever you want. And that is essential because it means you can go back to the gym. If you'd like to kettlebell classes, if you'd like to deadlift, I've heard so many stories about people saying I can't hold a plank postpartum because I have diastasis recti. Right, your your your muscles working. Yes, that means the plank will help heal your diastasis recti. strengthening muscles up is an essential part of a rehab program that lifts I had clients that gave birth to twins so that the plan C section and one of my clients was squatting 100 kg, the day before him today. one rep. We didn't go nuts. She just wanted to make sure you know she wants to she wants to go in to the O R. And she was a surgeon herself. She was so she was going to be operated on

Philip Pape 34:42

by her colleagues two plates. That's two plates for people to 25 for America. Yeah,

Peter Lap 34:46

yeah, exactly. So so. So I mean, that is she wants to walk into the hospital and just go come off. So I still squatted 100 kg the day before the day for postpartum. So Over a month that she just back to squatting 40 kg. She couldn't go back to 100 the body wasn't ready for it yet. But if you'd like to squat because what doesn't matter and you slowly but surely and you keep an eye on what you're doing any exercise, absolutely any exercise helps with your postpartum recovery. As long as you don't overdo it.

Philip Pape 35:21

I love it. I love it. I mean, so many things, you said, there's gold, you mentioned progression, we talk about progressive overload all the time. in different contexts. You mentioned, don't be afraid of any particular movement, if you do it right. And it's at the right level of where you're at. I mean, treat treat the pregnancy, like a kind of like an injury or like a disruption or detraining event. And work back into it. You probably like my my former client, she was a tireless hero. She was also on the podcast a couple times. She's powerlifter here in Connecticut, and she was posting video right up into, you know, a week before she was, you know, had a baby of just lifting, lifting everything, you know, lighter weights, because by the time you like you said right before pregnancy, you tend to dial it back a little you don't want to over brace and things. But that's a great message for people because we do use excuses, all of us have whatever it is, and I think lifting weights is never a bad thing. Unless you have an injury that that's preventing it. So good, good message. You know, it's it's awesome. Ya know, we're in agreement, I'd have to kick you off the show.

36:28

All right, this is our and I just want to give a shout out to Philip Pape at Wits & Weights for his nutritional coaching. His coaching is based upon science research, intellect, and wisdom. His coaching is safe, supportive, connecting. And an actually has helped reset my compass in terms of how I direct my health, the action steps I do, and really, really has helped me regain trust and belief in what my body can do and how my body can change.

Philip Pape 37:01

Okay, so another side topic to this is the pressure to lose the baby weight. Because I know we're gonna get into some things. Some of them are controversial topics and maybe Oh, absolutely, yeah, yeah, the pressure to lose baby weight that's very pervasive. Should this be on the list of priorities for women postpartum like wanting to lose weight, and I understand everybody has a vanity, or everybody has different reasons, and vanity can be one and that's fine. But But what are your thoughts on this in general,

Peter Lap 37:29

but generally speaking, and I always tell people this because most women don't notice what happens during your antenatal class is, most women go to an antenatal class and if you're your wife or kids, you got to get it right your dance and be basically just yet exchanged phone number. So you can have coffee mornings with women postpartum because the the messages you pick up in most antenatal classes are nonsense. And they're rather toxic. Okay, because there'll be messages such as breastfeeding will help you lose weight. No, it won't. Breastfeeding has never helped anyone loses weight to lose weight, it will bring some calories. Yeah, we can eat eat to compensate for that. Right. So it is it's breastfeeding is a zero sum game, it genuinely is if you do it, right. The reason I always tell people tell women to not focus on weight loss postpartum is because you still have all those hormones flowing through your body. And breastfeeding is a part of that. Prolactin, for instance, which is the hormone that helps you produce foreign breast milk will make you gain five to 10 pounds. For every woman in the world, that is true. So how are you going to fight that postpartum? How are you going to if you want to lose a baby 510 pounds isn't going anywhere,

Philip Pape 38:48

right? You're gonna starve you're gonna be an energy deficiency to do it. Yeah.

Peter Lap 38:51

And now you have a baby that needs nutrients. And so I once wrote, and I think I copied it somewhere onto my new website as well. I once wrote an article called your baby is a parasite. That got me a lot of angry emails. But there's a lot of truth to it. As my parents, I don't mean anything bad about it. I just been the babies will get nutrients from your body. Right? So if you are under fed and and undernourished, especially undernourished. Where's your kid going to get all this healthy stuff? Right. And this is why I find a lot of the time. You see a lot of women obviously they're they're sleep deprived and all that sort of stuff. They're walking around, not quite looking. They don't have their natural glow anymore, because they've been so focused on losing weight and not not focused on eating right, that they become nutrient deficient. They just are the baby will take a lot of this stuff. And this is not talking about breastfeeding. Breastfeeding is in an ideal world. People can feel breast milk is the better way over formula and all that sort of stuff. If you can help if you can do it. That's an awesome way to do it. but it makes weight loss as a very silly thing to focus on, is what I make, I don't like to be harsh about this sort of stuff because I understand that women have a tremendous amount of pressure put on them to bounce back and all that sort of stuff, you know, in a way that I can never understands, I understand that. But to focus on that is just insane. And the more we move away from the and this is, again, the National Health Service in the UK advice is this on their website is to burn some calories go for a walk. Postpartum is not about focusing on burning calories. And we all know as as personal trainers, the best way to actually burn some calories to some muscle, gain some muscles and do your strength training, and have your basal metabolic rate go up and you can sit on your bum and burn more calories.

Philip Pape 40:53

Yeah, I was gonna go there. I was like this is it's kind of like when we periodized our nutrition and some days like because at least from a man's perspective, you know, I want to put on that power belly as I'm building muscle. And I'm cool with it, because I know it's building muscle. But yeah, both while you're in pregnancy, because again, I've had some clients that while they were pregnant, you know, we're like, we're not losing weight, we have to gain weight. So let's just intentionally make the most of that. And then after you're pregnant during breastfeeding, like you said, treating it as a muscle building phase is a beautiful way to do it. Because now it's serving all your goals, and not going against you in the nutrition and health department. The stuff about you know, breastfeeding, we won't get into all the all of that. Yeah, but what about people who know? And that's fine. Now. I mean, I think everybody knows that today. Right? That's yeah, yeah. And not everybody can do it. And there's reasons you can't do it that are for various reasons, right? And some women aren't able to. So that's fine. You know, my, actually, our first daughter couldn't keep down anything. And so we had to supplement. You know, there's all these different Yeah,

Peter Lap 41:54

exactly. There's completely the January system. I always say that your job is keeping your baby alive in the best way. Yes. Anything after that? I don't care about that.

Philip Pape 42:03

So what about? So now what about if a woman is not breastfeeding? Does that that whole thing go out the window are there so other reasons to not rush into thinking about weight loss?

Peter Lap 42:14

Well, I always think that, you know, when we have to prioritize in life, we have to decide what is important to us. And we do the things we can do, when I don't know about you, but when I work with clients who tend to be sleep deprived, as a lot of new moms are like, who have high stress levels, potentially high anxiety, high anxiety, or high depression levels, or whatever, just elevated levels of anxiety, because all of a sudden, you know, things are things you never used to worry about, such as driving a car through city center are a lot more scary with a new baby in the back of the car. Because all of a sudden is this guy gonna stop he's gonna crash into an executive that was a little bit higher. So you know, the hormonal response. I don't. I will say there's people that are anxious state struggle to lose weight more than people who are relaxed and chilled about this is why I have a ton of clients that they go to Dubai on holiday for a couple of weeks, and they come back later than they were when they were working 8090 hour weeks

Philip Pape 43:22

due to their expenditure just jumps. Yeah,

Peter Lap 43:25

they've been stuffing their face. And then but they've been chilling on the beach, living switches. It's amazing. It's a genuine, it's a genuine thing. I'm not making this up the list. So and then we have to prioritize stuff. I have to prioritize my gym time and my work and my family and all that sort of stuff. So I want to do the thing that is going to get me the most bang for my buck. And that is simply get your rehab training done first. Right, get your strength training done first make sure your body functions well. Because part of raising a new healthy human being is being as pleasant to be around them as possible. And what I find is that when you're comfortable, my confidence is loved by looking at my own family My confidence is low because I'm feeling crap or I'm in pain. Have you heard of the pain cycle? You know, when you're in pain, it gets a bit worse. And you know as a nation, that that type of stuff. You start to take that out on people not deliberately I'm not saying you shouted your wife or your spouse or your kid or your you do silly things, but your mood is not what it should be. So part of raising a healthy human being is having the most caring and nurturing environment and taking care of yourself is a huge part of the on weight loss doesn't really come into them. It is just not part of that discussion for me bots Python. If you if you don't breastfeed or eat Want to express? Can you lose weight? Yes, sure. But should it be your focus? Right? In my opinion? Not Not unless you're preparing for a movie, right? If you're Margot Robbie going to do Barbie, you get 10 or 21st and a million bucks, then it's your job.

Philip Pape 45:12

Yeah, like, like you said, it depends on your goals and whether it's serving you and your life. I do love how you talked about stress, overall life stress, chronic stress as a sort of tax on your body, or some firm term that I sometimes use is like your energy stack, your metabolic stack, it's like you want to build this nice, big robust tower of, of energy production in your body, rather than trying to cut and restrict and lose, because at the end of the day, like you said, you may just naturally, slowly get back to the way you want to be anyway. But you're doing it in a healthy, abundant way, not a restrictive way. But the whole thing about anxiety and depression does lead to the other question I wanted to ask about, which is postpartum depression. Because we know this affects a lot of women. I saw the statistics recently, I want to say it's anywhere from like one and eight to two and eight, something like that. The numbers are huge. Yeah, it's huge. Yeah. And even beyond that, in some smaller level, and I've had many women in my life who experienced various levels of this, some to the point where they couldn't be with the child for a bit, you know, is that serious? And there's a lot of gaslighting. I mean, talking about women's health, and talking about like, just, there's differences between generations I've seen or like how older generations like act like it doesn't exist. And then anyway, how do you help your clients cope with this, because it does come into the equation comes into the stress anxiety. And this

Peter Lap 46:33

is a huge issue. And we because we say things like one and eight and two and eight, and you're right, those are the stats, we forget just how huge that number really is. When we're talking actual numbers, like the small city I live in 600,000 people 600,000 5000 babies are born every year to fortify from the different routes or something like that means out of those 40 545, almost 1000 will suffer from PPD. That's just the 600,000. So city, the numbers are astronomically huge. And the deed like you said, there is a this is real. Well, let me put it this way. One of my clients, you won't mind me mentioning this. She had baby number five, and cover two sets of twins and then then a fifth by a standalone baby, so to speak. And she didn't cope with it particularly well. Her husband referred to it as yes, she has the baby observes. And I'm like, Dude, I want to I want to kill you right now. The baby blues? Are we still using that phrase? It Yeah, more, especially when you're talking about people that suffer from intrusive thoughts, as they call it these days? Not necessarily. I want to harm myself. But you know, we can talk a lot can go wrong. When you're when you're feeling that way. I always say that. And this goes for all my clients. Exercise should never be stressed. If our sessions planned with my clients, and they say, last minute, dude, I want to cancel. I'm not I'm not afraid today. Don't worry about it. I don't have a cancellation policy. Unless you text me say, I cannot be bothered because I got drunk last night. I charged for that session, because that's punishment for you for your sins. There you go. Anything else I don't tend to charge for, because of the clientele that I work with. Right. So a lot of the time when I have one hour session going to help us regularly save lots of time regularly. The women will have just bathe the baby cleaned the baby out for me come to the house to do a lot of my clients have home gyms and all that sort of stuff. I go to their houses. And the baby froze up last minute. And now we have to start the whole process again. So now she's running around like a maniac because Peter is coming in 15 minutes time. Just send me a text, I'll be 15 I'll sit in the car for 15 minutes, do your thing. It's no big deal. Removing stress from anyone who suffers from postpartum depression is just a small thing. But it can really help. I just don't want to be part of the problem. I love that. Yeah.

Philip Pape 49:12

See how you can help or at least not interfere? Because I've seen Yeah, I've seen that too. Like, you know, people who are close to the person was wondering why they're not XYZ wondering why they're not responding to me or letting me visit or this or that. It's like, just back off, you know, like they need a little space. Right?

Peter Lap 49:29

Yeah, just Yeah, exactly. Just just respect that. I don't have the solution for anyone's postpartum depression. Now that you know, that's what doctors are for in psychiatry, cynicism. But I can indeed at least not be part of the problem. So I chill. You want to cancel last minute to get canceled last minutes. I've got paperwork to do it is fine. It's never a big deal. And I made that very clear to my clients. So they they don't need to feel guilty about that. Because like I said, that doesn't necessarily Go for old PT. So if I'm working with if it were to work with a bodybuilder and he cancels last minute, he's just being a jackass.

Philip Pape 50:06

Yeah, or compassion that you need for this group of people. I want to respect your time because I know technology wise we got started late Do you have? Yeah, okay, I'll be good. Good. All right, cool. Just Just a few more. So another, well, maybe not controversial, but I think you've mentioned the health and fitness industry is just like ripping off postpartum women, I want you to want to, to elaborate on that.

Peter Lap 50:31

This is something I've found in that it's really odd when we see especially online, because the online obviously people listen to podcasts and all that sort of stuff. So what I find online is that if I want to do a bodybuilding program, or a get fit, weight loss tech program, I pay 69 bucks, right? It doesn't matter which one you go to, you can go to ATHLEAN X, you can go to anyone just got

Philip Pape 50:56

60 969 4797

Peter Lap 51:00

all over the place. It's always down from 200 bucks to 69.

Philip Pape 51:04

Off promotion, as always, exactly.

Peter Lap 51:08

Look for postpartum stuff and find the one that is below 150 bucks.

Philip Pape 51:12

Okay, okay. 297 497. Yeah,

Peter Lap 51:16

the real value, one of my, one of my colleagues had something online saying my program is worth $2,500. I will sell it to you for 250 bucks, or $500, or whatever was the biggest selling those pricing program in the world. And I won't name it here because I don't want to crap on anyone's great, but the biggest selling point of selling in the world has had 18 price fluctuations that I know of in the past five years, they started off at 100, then they thought that we can get away with charging 200 pounds. So $300 The last one that I called them out on because I sent them an email was 99 pounds. So that's what 120 bucks for a year access. This is a 12 week program. 12 modules they call it now but it's a 12 week program. Or you can pay 30 bucks a month. And I said what about people that don't have 100 bucks in sitting in their account? Write it because all most of these programs do what I do. And they talk about how they like to help women. Yeah, but if you only like to help wealthy women, then how realistically would you really like to do and for an online programs, I'm not talking about again, I'm not talking about face to face PT face to face PT is a different thing. And when you're dealing with travel time and all that sort of stuff. But for online programs, there is no reason why a postpartum rehab program should be more expensive than a weight loss program. It's a bunch of videos. It is not it is not extraordinary.

Philip Pape 52:52

It's the level of the level of desperation is probably a lot higher causing that demand right you will

Peter Lap 52:57

and that's the thing and when you look at most of these things that are sold and this is part of the whole unethical practices for me is that the idea that a lot of these people say well when I was pregnant I had to find all this stuff out for myself and therefore I decided to put together the bla bla bla the program like no you didn't have to find anything else for yourself because

Philip Pape 53:21

I know you're gonna market it Are you kidding me if you want to go down that rabbit hole Peter you could you could tear off

Peter Lap 53:27

you can do because what they're selling is that you can look like me sort of thing quite often but I'll definitely get I completely get it but I can't look like the rock because first of all genetically I'm not the same I don't have access to his level of money. I don't do it there's a full time job and I don't take a GA but I said allegedly Oh they'll drain Johnson sewing news probably good from

Philip Pape 53:53

that for me. we all we all love them we all love them but we know

Peter Lap 53:56

absolutely nothing but we all know he takes off. So and unless you live that life and it's part of the unethical program that practices I think when a 20 year old has never had a kid says you can look like me to a mom was in her 40s Who said faith is just not going to happen.

Philip Pape 54:15

You know my only challenge to that and not not not on the supply demand thing because you can be a cold hard capitalist and say that that's what it is. Is isn't this just isn't as widespread regardless. In other words, I don't necessarily want to give a free pass to any other part of the health and fitness industry. I feel like oh though the Healthy Weight Loss This is not the right find the right angle and niche of like desperation to hold on like we're going to take your pain and we're just going to shove your face in this you know bowl of pain until you realize you have to

Peter Lap 54:49

know Yeah, absolutely right. And you know, I'm okay with almost all of that. Usually in the Alpha fitness industry. The reason I struggle with it is because We're dealing with health issues for a wide group of people, like if like you, if your shoulder, your shoulder, if your shoulder is causing you a tremendous amount of pain, and there's a ton of people selling shoulder rehab programs, but then deliberately overcharging for what I think is a health issue that you can't help, then it becomes slightly different from saying, is just another weight loss program. But I find

Philip Pape 55:25

it's, you know, it's an elective kind of thing. Yeah.

Peter Lap 55:29

And you're completely right in that the problem isn't with the health and fitness industry, the health and fitness industry does what it does. And that's make money from a certain level of desperation. That's why I go to the gym. If I could eat Domino's all day feel great to take a little bit, we want our problems. Yes, I think that for sure. The problem is, with the support not being there when it comes to healthcare systems and insurance providers and all that sort of stuff. But if that was freely available, like I think it should be like I think it would be this as a non problem. Right? You Can I can I have private medical insurance, I have the state one and I've private this off, I can get almost anything I want to be just go to the doctor. And as I've got private insurance, he says what do you want, pick it go but different. If you look at France, and Germany and several other countries, when you're postpartum you get six sessions or eight sessions, depending on where you are with a postpartum health specialist, whether it's dog floor or whether that is something that doesn't I do, okay. That means there's no one in in France selling this stuff is unethical. But the fitness industry has evolved, because it's healthcare. And that's kind of where I struggle with that sort of thing.

Philip Pape 56:46

I understand. Yeah. And there's huge differences between the UK, the US systems as well. And so many health, I think of like just lifting weights, I would love for insurance to cover strength training, but it's too, it's too it's not short sighted enough for them, you know, for them, they have to tie it directly to some like immediate disease. It's like the weight loss drugs that have come out, we'll go in the other ones, you know, now that they know that it reduces the risk of heart disease, because you're helping a bunch of people lose weight, whatever you're feeling on using that versus making lifestyle choices, that's a different thing. So now the insurance companies are forced to look at that as oh, maybe we should cover it, because it's actually going to save us money down the road, when people are not getting heart attacks. And maybe if they can make that connection that but that's the insurance company, man, we're not going to solve that. And

Peter Lap 57:36

that's exactly right. I did an interview with someone a while ago about exactly that. She was asking me what I was going to do more research into this. And so now that the research we have to do is how much money will it save people to give women access to this stuff? Yeah, for free. And that can be an I look at this as a women's equality issue. If you're looking at the gender pay gap and all that it's a part of that is going back to the office, feeling confident within yourself feeling happy within yourself, not being yourself and looking your best feeling your best. So that after a year, you can go back into to your bosses obviously you can have a pay rise now.

Philip Pape 58:12

Is it the same with postpartum depression? In the industry?

Peter Lap 58:15

Yes, they're much. Yeah, very much. Yeah. Yeah.

Philip Pape 58:19

Yeah. All right. Well, some some heavy stuff to think about it. You know, I'm curious for people listening should definitely reach out to both of us about your thoughts on this. Because, you know, we're two guys with two opinions, hopefully, well informed with a lot of information that we objectively, you know, analyze and try to be compassionate about, but everybody has their opinions and our experiences. So, I did want to ask you one more thing, and that's about your podcast, the healthy postnatal body podcast. What are some because your 200 Something episodes now?

Peter Lap 58:49

I just for next week is 226. So this weekend will be to 25

Philip Pape 58:54

Oh, so 225 Two plates. All right. So yeah, so you're getting your past into the string phase? Yeah. What would you say are some of the biggest insights or surprises? I know, it's a big question, because you had a lot of episodes, but is there one thing that sticks out is highly memorable that, you know, changed your perspective or taught you something that you now carry with you, Florida? Yeah,

Peter Lap 59:16

that's a good question. I for a long time, I looked at this as a this whole fun thing. I was I was your typical, I guess difficult PT from the personal changes I see around me. I thought, okay, I do this, why doesn't anybody understand that this is essential, right? The same way lots of PTS look at strength training, and and all that sort of stuff. And the more people I spoke to, whether they were psychologists or parenting experts, or whatever they were, the more it made me realize is that people have so much stuff happening in their life that All I can all I can get, especially postpartum women, there's so much more happening than what I ever thought, it's that that mental load of being a parent is a, you'll notice that the mental load of just being a parent and having to do all the things you already have to do, and then add a whole layer of human beings on to that, and different relationships between spouses and all our citizens how to navigate that new world. I mean, I remember what it was like for when, and I'm not comparing the two, just a little bit. When my wife and I got like a dog for the first time. It changes the thing, also, you're just talking about poop, and walkies, and all that sort of stuff all the time. And I thought that the postpartum recovery bid was significantly more important than it actually turned out to be. And I'm not saying that it isn't important, I just thought it was more important than it tends to be for the people actually go through some recovery. And I think I think this stuff is so it meant that I had to change my approach to postpartum training. And that's why it matters, right? So I used to say to people do two to free sessions, 45 minutes with me a week, and you come to my studio, and other very nice studios, amazing, I was all set up, not realizing that means putting them baby and preparing the journey that's half an hour to get there. Praying, the kid stays for too quiet for 45 minutes and go on back. So I ask these women to give up two to three, two hour slots a week for their postpartum recovery. That is insane. And it's just so unfair when you think about just asking somebody and saying the only way you can do this is if you come to my studio and do it that way. And then so I had to complete the lock change, my approach to exercises stays the same. But I had to use find a different way, you have to be able to do it as part of recovery thing you have to be able to do at home. Because you have to be to be able to do it in a short period of time, because nobody has an hour, three times will be we just don't mean I can barely get myself to the gym three times a week

Philip Pape 1:02:12

for an hour and have a home gym for that reason. Yeah, well, 20 minute

Peter Lap 1:02:15

sessions, I don't want to do an hour three times a week, I want 720 minute sessions, or whatever it is. Out. So I'd be less equipment. And that meant making stuff easier for people because I just had to change my whole approach to this stuff and realizing that if people don't think this is important to them in the moment, it's not important for them, it's fine. If you've got other things to do. That is okay. Don't put it off forever. But just realize that when you have things like this as a director, you can wait a year before you addressed it, it is fine. If you don't do it within the first year postpartum. There's no biggie, we'll fix it. We'll sorted just do the exercises a year later, when you can squeeze it just chill about all because it's

Philip Pape 1:02:58

a priority. Yeah, no stress, no stress, no stress and finding a way to make it easier for the client. Which is funny because I have an online coach. And same thing, like I don't want to make all my clients constantly schedule calls, when it's easier to send them videos or when it's easier to like do it asynchronously, because I'm like, You know what, that's stress. So that's pretty cool. I love that I it's not something I thought you were gonna say that I was gonna be some very specific, you know, technical thing or topic. Awesome. Um, last question I asked this of all guests, Peter. And that is, is there something you wish I had asked you? And what is

Peter Lap 1:03:32

your answer? Well, the thing is, you've covered an absolute ton of stuff. Of all the of all the interviews I've done, you're definitely you know, indigenous and well prepared, and all that sort of stuff. So that's awesome. I think, you know, the, the thing. The, what are other postnatal issues that need an easy solution, back pain, neck pain, and all that sort of stuff. And how are they linked? is good. But again, it's a specific question. Unless you're a physio, you're not going to ask it because, you know, don't know that this. And that's pretty much it. They're not realizing that for anybody listening, back pain, those parts of back pain to start a neck pain, all that stuff, postpartum. stiffness, and other stuff can all be linked back to things like diastasis recti, on a given birth, and a weak pelvic floor and all that sort of stuff and all this stuff. All this stuff. My answer is that is a solution for and it's not complicated. None of this stuff is rocket science. A lot of and that's easy to say because I've been doing this for 10 to 12 years. So I'm very familiar. I can knock you've been the PTE for a while you can take a position plan in five minutes because you have years and years of expertise.

Philip Pape 1:04:54

You like ABC and I had to get you from here to there but

Peter Lap 1:04:57

client says I can't do this today. I want to do Something else awesome. Give me five minutes, we'll be fine. But But let's focus on recovery isn't isn't rocket science. It's not complicated. But we have to address all these issues in one, one little ball. And that that is kind of the thing, we have to do more than just focus on the TVA. And focus on includes if you have to do everything in one go. If that comes anywhere close to what your question actually was that

Philip Pape 1:05:26

there's no wrong answer to that, because you just told me a question you wished I would have. So there you go. All right. Well, you're a cool guy, Peter. And I imagine your clients that love working with you, because just I mean, the energy I get from you, and for those listening and watching hopefully get the same thing as a guy who cares who does have the solutions, even if they aren't rocket science can get you quickly to that and is willing to help and is available to help. So where can listeners learn more about you and your work? And that includes, who around the world can get access to you? Or is it local? Or do it online?

Peter Lap 1:05:59

Yeah, this is this is the big thing for me. So a few years ago, I was indeed just a personal trainer around Edinburgh and I had loads of questions. So I set up a website called Health postnatal body.com, handy title podcast kind of big on that, and it was very much we do assess on the Jordan Defense for Health, postnatal, bodyart, calm and, and and all the other postpartum websites. You know, the 13 week 12 week program I talked about earlier that someone says Pay 99 pound a month or a year, I give it to you for free, it doesn't cost you a penny you sign up, you get three months free trial, right? And beauty so you can cancel on day one, you still get three months free access. Then after the three months, the program goes deeper because it goes into back pain and neck pain and all that sort of stuff. And then I charge $10 A month or eight pounds a month depending on where you are for five months, and that's the total copy of lifetime access. And that includes emailing me Peter and healthy postnatal bodyart comm i get emails every week from people saying, hey, how do I do this exercise completely free is all included. The reason I did that is when you're asking who can access it. Not everybody lives in the UK in the US and has a high level of disposable income. I have a ton of Eastern European members that eight to $10 a month isn't a lot of money for most Americans. It's not a lot of money for most British people. It is a tremendous amount of money for people living in certain parts of Asia and all that sort of stuff. So that I just said this, you pay you pay nothing for three months. Make sure you cancel on day one if you've never gone to pay, don't say that with a state credit card, right? Because you can buy those things out say credit cards and after three months they fail I get charged for that stuff. You sign up on day one to pay dollar whatever cancel on day one you get three months free I still ask the emails I don't care and so healthy postnatal volume comm that's where everybody can get access to the full program. Like I said the program is I think I just added month 12 Or something like that because after four months of progress let's up into what you want to work on. Glutes, core of asanas of legs, shoulders, whatever you want to work on. But you know, sign up for three months and then go away it's also completely fine. And of course alphaplus natively podcast is out there for your listening entertainment every Sunday night at 6pm. UK time so both at 1pm Eastern

Philip Pape 1:08:24

Yeah, that sounds about right yeah so five hours Yeah, perfect. So anybody listening you're on your on your podcast app right now go and follow or subscribe healthy postnatal body podcast right now that's the easiest thing for you to do. And then the next easiest thing to do is if you or someone you love or woman in your life you think needs the help with what Peter offers for postpartum recovery. It sounds like you couldn't get a better bargain then free for 90 days and then it's up to you. I promoted way more expensive things in that for guests and others so go for it jump in there's no risk. Awesome very great conversation Peter so much really good information that I wasn't aware of. It's gonna help me and my clients and other women I know so I'm sure the listeners got a ton from it as well. Thank you for coming on my

Peter Lap 1:09:08

absolute pleasure, man. It's been phenomenal.

Philip Pape 1:09:13

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights. Please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong.

Philip Pape 8/29/23 Philip Pape 8/29/23

Ep 100: Top 5 Lessons from 100 Episodes of the Wits & Weights Podcast

We will uncover 5 of the most important and recurring themes related to evidence-based nutrition, training, and mindset that come up on the show and that listeners are always asking about. I will also mention three episodes related to each lesson, and I’ll give you my current thoughts and strategies on each topic, including the main takeaways you can take action on today.

This is the 100th episode of the Wits & Weights podcast, and it’s going to be epic!

Today, I’ll cover not just one topic but five, taken from lessons I’ve learned since publishing the first episode of Wits & Weights almost two years ago.

We will uncover 5 of the most important and recurring themes related to evidence-based nutrition, training, and mindset that come up on the show and that listeners are always asking about. I will also mention three episodes related to each lesson, and I’ll give you my current thoughts and strategies on each topic, including the main takeaways you can take action on today.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
__________

Today you’ll learn all about:

[3:07] Listener reviews
[7:55] Lesson 1: The importance of energy availability
[12:59] Lesson 2: Evidence doesn't always mean science
[26:34] Lesson 3: There is magic in maintenance
[35:10] Lesson 4: Nothing matters if you can't be consistent.
[45:52] Lesson 5: Your health is the most important investment
[1:00:30] Outro

Episode resources:

COACHING GIVEAWAY! Enter code “EPISODE100” and get an extra month of coaching, a free tub of 1st Phorm protein powder, and a 12-month subscription to MacroFactor when you sign up for our popular 6-month 1:1 coaching program.
Lesson 1: 58, 76, 86
Lesson 2: 80, 84, 92
Lesson 3: 66, 69, 77, 98
Lesson 4: 70, 72, 74
Lesson 5: 32, 51, 95

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Transcript

Philip Pape 00:00

I continue to be inspired and encouraged by the compassion, the curiosity, the positive human energy, by the 1000s that are out there who just want to improve themselves. They just want to improve, so they can show up for their families, for their careers for their friends, for their loved ones, and of course themselves. Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host, Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry. So you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in Wits & Weights community Welcome to a very special solo episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. Why is it so special because this is episode 100. And it's going to be epic. Today you're in for a special treat, because I will be covering not just one topic, but five topics taken from lessons that I've learned since publishing the very first episode of Wits & Weights on November 2 2021, almost two years ago. Before we get into all of that excitement, I have an important announcement. To celebrate 100 episodes of the podcast, I am doing a one on one coaching giveaway for my very popular six month coaching program exclusive to listeners of the podcast. So here's what you get, you get an extra month of coaching. So that's seven months for the price of six, you get a free tub of protein powder of your choice from first form, and a full year subscription to macro factor. To apply just use the link in my show notes to apply for coaching. And enter the code episode 100. All one word, that's episode 100. Everyone who mentions the code is guaranteed to qualify for this promotion. So if you're ready to invest in yourself, and you've just been waiting for the right time, this is as good as it gets. Because I only run promotions maybe twice a year maybe. And I've never given away supplements before. So now is the time to go all in on your health and physique so you can finally look like you lift. Okay, today for episode 100. The top five lessons from 100 episodes of the Wits &. Weights podcast, we're going to uncover five of the most important and recurring themes related to evidence based nutrition training and mindset that come up on the show. And you as the listener are always asking to learn more about I will also mention three episodes related to each lesson. So if you want to check out past episodes from our catalogue of, of 99 before this one, and I'll give you my current thoughts and strategies on each of these topics, with of course some takeaways as always, because it is the big 100 I did want to share before we get into those topics, some recent five star reviews, five star reviews from listeners that listen to the show that follow that reached out that took the time. And he's really stuck out at me because they demonstrate why this show even exists, and why I keep making new episodes for all of the incredible listeners like you who are out there. And the first review is from love before 100 information I didn't know I needed super helpful. Philip is informative and very easy to listen to. As someone working with a trainer and coach. I just do what they tell me but it's nice to understand exactly what and why I'm doing it helps to stay motivated to keep going. Thank you. Well thank you love before 100 Because I do strive to explain why we do certain things and I'm glad that it helped you with your training. The next review is from let's see T JAL Britton just what I needed no nonsense, practical real life advice for anyone who struggles with creating a lifestyle that fosters healthy eating and exercise habits. Phillip is the real deal. Really appreciate that one. Thank you. The next one is from moms overcoming overwhelm, a sustainable approach to fitness and nutrition. Philips passion for his work shines through in every episode, his explanation of periodized your nutrition to focus on your goals, rather than restriction was eye opening for me. He's knowledgeable, personable and wants his community to succeed. I can't wait to learn more from him sincerely, Emily. This really means a lot to me because you pulled out very specific things that I'm trying to get across with periodization and avoiding restriction and how important it is to have our community and so love that you are getting that from the show Emily and the last one is new work are nowhere educational, straightforward eye opening. All right, this one's a long one. But I really it really meant a lot to me because of the detail and thoughtfulness of it. Philip delivers health and wellness material in an organized unintimidating direct approach. His advice is simple to understand, and he has a way of hitting all the points for everyone, both men and women, overweight and athletic, beginner and novice. My biggest takeaways are switching to compound lifting progressive overload, eat more protein than you can imagine and find ways to move 10,000 steps each day, including not under estimating the power of walks. I especially love his solo episodes with basic concepts, because he's a very good teacher and lays it out. Well. I've binged mostly all of his episodes and have such a better outlook on getting in shape, which I thought was hit style boot camps and calorie restricting. Phillip clears up the misconceptions and inspires you to be smarter and happier while trying to be healthier. Side note, a for podcast sound quality, and for getting straight to the point without political current events, fluff in between. Thanks for such a quality podcast. I will just leave that there because I thought that was beautiful. I really am glad that all of the listeners are taking something from the show. It's what podcasting has done for me as a listener, and why I created the show, and why I'm just so grateful to get to this 100th episode, and it's just the first 100 of many, many to come. So without further ado, let's dive into the top five lessons from 100 episodes of the Wits &. Weights, podcast. Here we go. When I started this podcast back in November 2021, I had no idea whatsoever how far I could take it, how it would evolve, or even if anyone would listen to it. And then as the emails and messages started pouring in about how the show would help someone learn about their body, finally improve their health or their physique, or understand why their coach or trainer was telling them to do something, or just having the knowledge, the knowledge, the confidence to optimize their lifting in their nutrition. I continue to be inspired and encouraged by the compassion, the curiosity, the positive human energy, by the 1000s that are out there who just want to improve themselves, they just want to improve. So they can show up for their families, for their careers for their friends for their loved ones, and of course themselves. And it was very difficult to pick five lessons from the first 100 episodes. So I did my best to draw out the big but highly relevant themes that will both motivate you, but also give you a practical place to start learning and growing. Whether you just found the podcast for the first time with this episode, or if you've been a longtime listener. And then for each lesson, I'll share what I've learned that I also use with myself with clients. I'll give you three episodes to check out that touch on different areas of the lesson, and the actionable takeaway. So let's jump into lesson one. First lesson, energy availability is even more important than you think. Alright, so there's a concept called energy flux. energy flux is this state where both your intake and your expenditure are high, both of them are high. And this is beneficial for muscle growth, fat loss, overall metabolic health. And more of my focus on this podcast lately, you've probably noticed, and also with clients is on increasing energy availability and energy flux. Rather than restricting even when we're in a fat loss phase, I want fallows to be as easy as quick as possible as painless as possible. I don't want us to have to take breaks or use refeeds or anything like that. And so keeping your energy high, your metabolic stack your stress load low, keeping that up is a good way to do that. And it becomes even more critical for men and women over 40 Because of hormonal changes, the gradual loss of of muscle and bone density that might have occurred because of your lifestyle over the years, let's be honest, I'm in that camp as well, because I didn't really get lifting until I was almost 40

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The change in your connective tissue, your ability to recover all of those things. So the the lesson is that rather than focus on cutting calories, or what kind of deficit you need to be in, let's focus on increasing energy on having more energy. And for many people, this means living most of the year, not in a deficit. My goal for you and my goal with clients is we're going to get through that fat loss phase pretty quickly and we're going to get you where you need to be leanness wise. And unless you're a competitor and you're trying to be staged, lean, for example, you know, you're gonna get to a point where you've probably never been before you're gonna be happy with your physique or at least much happier than when you started right. And we want to then go back into a well fed a high energy state and live there for six 912 months before we do another cut and get into this cycle where over an entire year you may be in a diet at most for six to eight weeks. That's kind of The goal, right, and there are several episodes that we've done that touch on this topic and I wanted to actually share. Let's say I'm going to, there's three I said I would share three episodes. So the three I'm going to select for you are as follows. Going back to Episode 58 was the first time Brandon Cruz was on the show. So episode 58 is titled, using high energy flux to eat more burn more fat and build more muscle with Brandon to cruise. And that's a good way to jump right to to understand what energy flux is all about. And Brandon is definitely a master of throwing in tons of practical strategies to use there. I learned a lot from that episode, and I'm sure the listeners did as well. The second episode is number 76 Episode 76 diet breaks energy flux, plant based protein and dieting psychology with Eric Trexler. And this we do cover energy flux in there specifically and then some other topics related to dieting and dieting psychology. And then a more recent episode would be episode 86 Energy workout nutrition and performance based strength for women over 40 with Steph Gaudreau. So Steph is well known in the fitness pays for space for focusing on strength and fueling your performance and not restricting. And pretty much all the clients she works with are in that category and not necessarily trying to lose weight. Although one of the pleasant side effects of any increase in your energy availability and your energy flux and perform and improving your strength and performance is that your body just tends to suck up more energy and require more energy. And therefore you need to eat more. And when that happens, you find out that if you want to go into fat loss, it's super easy in relative terms. So those are the three episodes, check out episode 5876 and 86. The big takeaway for this lesson, focus on increasing your expenditure. Don't focus on restricting or cutting, focus on increasing your expenditure through your training, right building muscle training hard training heavy, your movement, keeping your stuff count high, your nutrition, keeping a high protein, well balanced, mostly whole food diet and your lifestyle. Meaning keeping your stress down keeping your sleep high things like that. You want to build muscle to increase your expenditure for the long haul. Because muscle is metabolically active, it's very expensive tissue. You want to have an active lifestyle with lots of steps anywhere from, I'll say eight to 12,000 is a good number to shoot for eat sufficient protein to build and preserve muscle. Eat your carbs, for energy for performance, to spare your muscle tissue for recovery. And because they're delicious, and minimize stressors like poor sleep and too much cardio if you're listening to me too much cardio is a stressor and give your body the chance to build metabolic resilience, which then ultimately allows you to eat more and lose fat more easily. Isn't that what we want? Okay, lesson two. Evidence doesn't always mean science. Evidence doesn't always mean science. One of the valuable lessons I've learned coming from a skeptical perspective, right, that's the premise of the show is skepticism of the fitness industry. And evidence based nutrition, which I am a huge advocate of with my clients is that there is a hierarchy of evidence. And I don't know where I was first exposed to this concept, but I definitely it was reinforced in Alan Aragon's book called flexible dieting it came out I think, just last year might have been two years ago. And we had Alan on the show as well. really generous, super sweet, nice guy. That's, that's why I'd put it just just a really kind soul, who also is very smart and cares, and has a reasonable approach to this whole thing like a reasonable, flexible, sustainable approach. And he talks about the hierarchy of evidence in his book, and the way it goes is that the higher quality information you get, the more you can use it to sort of backup your claims. But at the same time, there are different levels of that hierarchy that all have to be accounted for. So I don't know if I stated that quite clearly enough, but I'm gonna go from the, what we'll call the highest quality kind of scientific information all the way to not what I'll call the lowest quality, but you'll see what I'm getting at. It's sort of the one that everybody dismisses, and yet I think it could have the most powerful effect on the individual. So the highest at the highest level, the hierarchy is systematic reviews, and meta analyses. So this is where they study multiple results for multiple papers, usually all of them having been randomized controlled trials, but potentially other types of studies like observational studies, and they look for the patterns across studies. And it's kind of like weeding out and filtering out and averaging out all the air and all the outliers from all those studies. So if you can find something like that, it tends to be a pretty strong bet. back up for whatever the claim might be. Next down on the list would be randomized controlled trials right? Now, I don't claim to be somebody that's very much into the methodology behind studies, I do have a PhD, I did have to go through the dissertation process and understand a little bit of this, I tend to be the type of person who takes the information does my best to understand it, validates it against good sources, who also make those claims. And also tend to work with my clients and myself to make sure that it works and and give you the prescriptive way to apply it. That's my preference when I do this podcast is, here's how to do something step 123. I may or may not always back it up with the science, right? I sometimes I try to sometimes I don't at the end of the day it is it does come from that place of a genuine attempt to back it up with with what the evidence supports. Okay. So anyways, randomized controlled trials where you have control groups and experimental groups, they are that are random, randomized, and they're controlled. So there you go. Next, we have observational studies, which would be for example, if people had certain lifestyles for 20 years, and then at the end of that 20 years, you know, you haven't been studying them, but you send them a survey and you collect all this information over the last 20 years. And you observe how all the variables interact and try to elucidate cause and effect or at least correlation. Cause cause and effect is very difficult, unless it's longitudinal, right, unless you follow something over time. So that would be the next level. Then we have anecdotes and the media, okay. And this is where we get into the fuzzy gray area gray area of you've got bro science, you've got fitness influencers, you've got folks like me who are just, you know, you you get to a certain level of trust for people because what they say seems to correlate with what you what you've observed works. But in many cases, the hucksters and the charlatans are the loudest voices. And they're also have the biggest conflicts of interest. And so it's kind of trying to tease all of that apart, like I have a conflict of interest in that I am a coach. And so a lot of what I do is to give you as much information to

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improve your health and nutrition as you can, knowing that you may also want to hire me to help you do that. But I feel like that's an aligned conflict of interest, if you will, versus somebody who is being funded by a supplement company to pitch a certain type of training program where there's not really an alignment between them. And then they hide the fact that the supplement program company is funding them, right. Or the whole carnivore diet, fiasco with with what says Paul Saladino and the liver King and all that stuff, right? Where there, there are so many massive conflicts of interest. And there's just falsehoods like, you know, the fact that he didn't use PDS, but he did things like that. So you really have to be careful in this part of the evidence. And then we get to N equals one, what is that, that's you or me, no matter how many things I tell you are backed up by the evidence, no matter how prescriptive I get, if you follow exactly what I'm telling you in a podcast, and it doesn't work for you. Don't immediately blame me, please. It could be that what I'm telling you works for most of the population, and you're an outlier, we are all outliers in certain parts of our lives. And whether it comes to training volume, how many carbs you need, or want, or can tolerate, how you respond to a deficit, your hormones, and I can go on and on. And so N equals one is the idea that there is a sample size of one, that's you, and is sample size. And nobody's going to know you better than you, your body, your biofeedback, how you respond to things, your tolerances, your allergies, whatever. And when you take all the evidence, and you start applying it to your life, and if your feedback tells you, this is not working for you, and you're sure that you've just done everything the way you thought it was supposed to work, then that's telling you something to that's evidence as well. And I don't think you should discount that. I think in fact, that could be the most powerful evidence. And if you're working with a coach, like if you're working with me, you tell me that you will tell me that you'll say, Look, this suggestion you gave me is just not working, what the heck, what do I do? And then I'll say, okay, something is different here, something's going on. Let's, let's go through the checklist. And let's go through the data. And let's most importantly, understand you. And when you do this over time, and you know yourself better than anyone, or again, if you're working with a coach who tends to understand you and your idiosyncrasies, and how you respond. That's where the magic starts to happen, because then you can tweak things that deviate from the quote unquote science, but are actually the best evidence for how it works for you. So maybe a long winded way to say that we should combine science and research with self awareness. And actually, I'm going to attribute some of this to my friend and client Alan Friedman, who was also on the podcast, because he said something to me in a message. Not long ago, he said that, while the podcast is full of structure with science based recommendations and insight, in addition to that, we have layers of intuition. We have self acceptance for what life gives us along the way. In fact, Alan said recently reminded me that the obstacle is the way, right, that obstacles in our way don't aren't always roadblocks, they could be part of the path. And so we accept these things, we acknowledge them. And then we check in with both our physical and mental status as we move forward. And all of these grounds us in the true cornucopia of evidence, if you will. Another piece of this is skepticism. And when I talk about skepticism, it's not just questioning everything that comes at you. It's questioning everything that comes from you. Meaning, we all have long held beliefs, some of which seem to have been backed by science. And they may be incorrect. Maybe maybe the science that they were backed up by 10 years ago, wasn't quite complete, or it was misinterpreted or what have you. And we want to question ourselves and our own beliefs and have that open mind. And it may not be that there's a black and white, this versus that. It could be the nuances. For example, I recently talked to Dr. Bill Campbell on the show. Okay. And that was that was episode 92. One of the episodes I'm gonna mention in a moment anyway. And one of the things he talks about is aggressive fat loss. He's a, he's researching aggressive fat loss in the lab, and seen with real people in a very controlled situation, right, a randomized controlled trial, that you can lose weight at a faster rate than we thought and still preserve muscle mass, but only if the duration is very short on the order of two weeks. So what we're effectively saying is not that you cannot lose weight at a certain rate of loss, and preserve your muscle, we're just saying that there's a corner case, that's the term I use. But basically, there's a a small scenario, a small set of scenarios, bounded by the variable of duration, where we can do this extra special little thing of aggressive fat loss. And so it just adds a little extra nuance to the situation. And that's why we have to avoid making blanket statements like you can never lose fat at more than 1% a week. No, you can, but only if you limit the duration. Okay, so I think you get my point with all of this, I think I'm hammered home, I'm going to share three episodes related to this topic of evidence doesn't always mean science. The first episode is Episode 80, flexible dieting, evidence based nutrition and protein strategies with Alan Aragon. So again, Alan's the man, he knows all about flexible dieting, he practically pioneered it. And he goes into everything in that realm. And I tried to ask him questions in a way that led him to certain answers, and he just wasn't taking the bait. I love it. You know, he's, he really is about flexibility in more ways than one when it comes to our approach to nutrition. So check out episode 80 Episode 92, I kind of have these out of order, I'm sorry, I'm gonna, the next one I'm going to say is episode 84. So 80 is the one with Alan Aragon. 84 was a solo episode I did called why working out less, burns more calories, and boosts your metabolism and fat loss. And the reason I'm throwing this episode in here, why working out last burns more calories boosts your metabolism fat loss, is it's one of those counterintuitive things we have to be open minded about and change our beliefs on so many people come to me saying, I work out six days a week, and I'm not getting results. And it's all set in a way where the working out six days a week is assumed to be a good thing for getting you results, which implies that there is a belief a belief there that may not be correct, or it may need to be, you know, pushed along into a slightly different direction. And so that episode is one where I tried to address one of those and I have many more where I where I do that because it's quite common that influencers or the media whoever spout off quote unquote truths that are the opposite of the truth. And they just just state it as if Oh, this is everybody knows this, right? Like, oh, carbs are bad, right? Of course not. You know, let's not, let's not accept everything. Okay, Episode 92 is the third one and episode 92 is the one with Dr. Bill Campbell. The title is physique enhancement, rapid fat loss plateaus and processed foods. With Bill Campbell. I'm sorry for my long title. Sometimes I really just tried to cram a whole bunch of keywords in there, you know, but episode 92 is really all about five specific topics related to physique enhancement. And I think you're gonna learn something new and Every single one of those, including the one on rapid fat loss, pretty cool stuff. So what's the takeaway here? I want you to take inventory of your personal beliefs, take inventory of those, and what others in the fitness industry are telling you do your own research, or I know that's tough, we don't all have time to go and read papers, follow people who seem to have a reasonable grasp of reality, rather than an ulterior motive, or a conflict of interest or obvious bias. And again, everyone has biases, everyone has an incentive, everyone has some reason that they're doing what they're doing. I started this podcast as a passion project, and it eventually morphed to align with my business. And that's okay, because what I'm sharing on the show is fully aligned with how I help people with the business and I stayed it over and over again and disclose it ad nauseam. So there are there's a difference in that sense. So just be aware of those of who's paying effectively for the information. Experiments on yourself as well. And don't assume that what works for a population will be ideal for you. If something feels like it's restrictive, and not aligned with your lifestyle, or values, except that there are multiple ways to get to the outcome you want. There really are there's not just one way, you're unique, in some ways, and universal like every other human in others. And we have to find that overlap. What's unique for you versus what, what's universal, and make it work. Okay, lesson three, there is magic in maintenance. And thanks again to Alan, because Alan, I think came up with that quote, either he said it or I said it, I honestly didn't even go back to listen, when I researched this episode. And it doesn't matter. It's like it's gone gone down into the mythology of the podcast. But the idea with magic and maintenance is, is a pretty powerful and profound one. And by maintenance, I'm talking about your maintenance, calories, maintenance, calories are those calories at which if you eat them, you will not gain or lose weight. And one misconception with that is that it is a fixed number, and it really isn't. And so by tracking your food, by tracking your weight, using whatever means possible, but of course, I have more efficient means that I've suggested before like macro factor on the last episode, if you can do that, you can become aware of your true expenditure. That is how many calories you burn every day, your true maintenance calories, right, your true metabolism, there's so many different words we use for the same thing. And that awareness unlocks so much opportunity, and so much potential to take control of your health in many different ways. It's kind of like until you do that, you haven't even found the doorway to all the potential paths, you're literally walking around in a void in like a black room with no light, you can't see where you're going. And then all of a sudden, you find this door and you open it and there's light. And that door is an awareness of your expenditure and your maintenance calories. And then you look through the door, all of a sudden, you see all the paths that you can take, right, some may lead back to the place that you had been before, but many of them are going to lead to exactly where you want to go and different ways to get there. That's how important understanding your expenditure is, and all the food lab, but many of the food apps out there, many of the coaching approaches out there, many of the the calculators and the guides and the programs, or even the coaches who say no, you don't need to worry about your calories at all. I feel like they are leaving a big part of of this awareness off the table. And by by taking the time to just do some tracking and collect some data on yourself, you're gonna have this massive awareness that gives you options. And those options will then allow you to shape your body to shape your body composition, to get stronger and build muscle to lose fat to stay exactly where you are for years and years while eating a well fed diet with Yes, plenty of carbs, to go through a recovery diet after a fat loss phase or maybe if you're a competitor after getting stage lean and do it in a way where you don't gain too much fat, but you also don't delay recovery and so on. So there are a lot of reasons that maintenance is so important. And I think Alan said it best when he said that there's magic in it, because it's actually in some ways harder to to maintain your weight than to gain or lose weight because you're effectively trying to get your body not to change too much. And so that's what gives you the skill, the knowledge and the awareness to do all the other things. Hey, this is Philip and I hope you're enjoying this episode of Wits & Weights, I started Wits & Weights to help people who want to build muscle lose fat and actually look like they lift. I've noticed that when people improve their strength and physique, they not only look and feel better, they transform other areas of their life, their health, their mental resilience and their confidence in everything they do. And since you're listening to this podcast, I assume you want the same things the same success, whether you recently started lifting, or you've been at this for a while and want to optimize and reach a new level of success. Either way, my one on one coaching focused on engineering your physique and body composition is for you. If you want expert guidance, and want to get results faster, easier, and with fewer frustrations along the way to actually look like you lift, go to wits & weights.com, and click on coaching, or use the link in my show notes to apply today. I'll ask you a few short questions to decide if we're a good fit. And if we are, we'll get you started this week. Now back to the show.

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All right. So I want to share some episodes with you related to this topic. And then I'll give you my takeaway for this. Episode 66 was with Jeff Hain sustaining fat loss results and maximizing recovery for the long game with Jeff hain. So that was episode 66. And it was pretty cool because we all we talked about was? Well, not all we talked about, it was two topics, right? It was maintenance and recovery. So ignore the recovery Part For today's scope. We talked in the first half of the podcast all about sustaining your fat loss results, but specifically what it means to live at maintenance. What are the challenges of maintenance? How do you stay there? How do you avoid, you know, getting out of it, and so on. So that's episode 66. Episode 69 was a solo episode I did called what to do first, lose fat, build muscle or body re composition. And I think this is an important one because it covered seven scenarios that people are usually in, right, what do you have excessive weight to lose just some weight to lose you're trying to build, you just came out of a fat loss phase and so on. And what to do, and all of it is it hinges on the idea of understanding your expenditure and understanding your maintenance. Right? It's again, it's the pivot, it's the fulcrum, it's the anchor, whatever analogy you want to use this the door, it's a doorway to all of these options. Episode 77 was with my man, Alan. So I, we knew I'd throw this one in there, from emotional eating and bariatric surgery to optimal health balance and mindful living with Alan Freeman. Now that episode covered his whole journey, all sorts of amazing inspiration in there. But it also includes the story about magic in maintenance and how he came out of a fat loss phase. And when he was going to maintenance calories, there was maybe some fear there of weight regain or, you know, what do we do at this point? How do we how do we motivate ourselves and keep moving forward? What does it mean and, and he discovered that there was a lot of beauty and magic to being in maintenance and feeling well fed and recovered, but not being afraid that you're going to all of a sudden gain a bunch of weight, it's a great place to be. And it's a place where a lot of people listening want to be. So that's why I think this is a great lesson. And I'm going to throw in a bonus fourth episode here. Okay, and this is only one episode or two episodes ago. Episode 98 Is your food logging app sabotaging your fat loss and physique goals. And that is a thinly veiled sales pitch for macro factor because it is so far the only tool I've ever found that will help you discover your true maintenance. And then once you discover your true maintenance, the magic starts to happen, as we've just been saying, Alright, so the takeaway, the takeaway for this, take the time to track your food and wait for at least three weeks. So what do you do with macro factor with a spreadsheet with a manual process, it doesn't matter. Do it for three weeks. And then you'll understand how your expenditure changes based on your food intake, your activity, your training, your sleep, your stress. One quick caveat, because I hear this almost every day when I'm on calls with people or we're you know, not with clients because clients I've we've gone through the education of this but people in the group and so on is that the activity on your wearable, the amount of calories burned on your wearable is useless. Do not trust it, do not use it. I mean, I can't be more quick unequivocal about that. It has such a high level of error and inaccuracy. It just doesn't mean anything. It's it's literally just a number that doesn't mean anything. So the only way to tell how many calories you burn every day, outside of a laboratory is the way I'm talking about to track your food, track your weight, see how your weight responds to your food period. That will account for all the things you're doing for all your activity or sleep or training or stress. It doesn't you don't have to measure all that stuff to know how your expenditure is changing. You just have to know how your body mass is changing. Okay. So this is very powerful awareness. This is very powerful feedback that will empower you. That's the goal. We're empowering you This is one of the key tenants of Have

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of motivation is having agency. So now that you can you have it, you can go down many different and flexible paths to your results. All right? Lesson Four, nothing matters. If you can't be consistent. Nothing matters if you can't be consistent consistency, adherence, sustainability, they're all kind of the same idea. The idea that whatever you do in life, I don't care if it's fitness, health, finances, career relationships, your hobbies doesn't matter. You have to do something that you want, or you're going to want to do every day. As my friend, my brother, my fellow podcaster, Carl Berryman, of inspired by impact reminded me in a very touching and compassionate message that he sent me in tribute of reaching 100 episodes. And the consistency required to do that. We all of us, you, me, all the listeners, all of us set an example for others in our life most through our actions. And being consistent with those actions. It's not enough to just do something once it's doing that thing every day, no matter what, and others observing that you're doing that and how important it is for you to get to that goal. Setting that example. It's being that role model. Whether it's listening to this podcast, consistently, engaging with our community consistently to get help going to the gym consistently, or consistently evaluating who you are, and why you're doing this at any given time, so that you are doing the things that serve you serve your goals, and get you the results that you want. So thank you, Carl, for reminding me of, of how just fundamentally critical, I was gonna use the word axiomatic because I'm such a nerd. And then I'm like, how many people I'm gonna lose by saying that, but basically, it is essential, and something you cannot do without to get your goals. Now, how do we do that? That's, that's a question. Okay. It's great. You know, what, Phillip, you're telling me this, and I want to be consistent. But how do I do that. And that leads me to talk about action. Now, again, this is not, this is not a trivial thing. So first of all, action, action leads to results, action leads to results. And by result, I mean, something changes. When you take an action, it's a stimulus response, you take an action, something happens, now may not be the result you want. And so you would take a different action. But once you get that little result you want in the right direction, like when you go to the gym, and you do your heavy squats. And then two days later, you realize you can squat five more pounds. And that's the result you want, because it's getting stronger. This leads to intrinsic motivation. A lot of people think you need the motivation first, but no, you just have to take that action. First, that one little tiny step, get that little win, and allow it to intrinsically motivate you but here's the thing. In reality, many of us we are human, our lives are turbulence, to say the least, you know, in in all different ways. And sometimes we need additional motivation. And we need to reduce friction or reduce resistance. So we need both somebody on the outside to push us in many cases. And then we also need to reduce things that are in our way, in many cases. And again, Alan said the obstacle is the way true. But of course, I'd rather go over a small rock than a giant boulder. I don't know about you. So this is where the idea of self determination theory comes in. So this is all tied in the topic of consistency. Please bear with me. self determination theory from positive psychology is the idea that we have our highest level of motivation when three things are maximized, agency competence, and relatedness, okay, agency is you are making the choice for you. You are empowered, you have freedom, you have flexibility. And this is where the fun comes in. This is where doing things that you like comes in, this is where you do things that you could do every day because it fits your lifestyle, because you can still enjoy going out to eat because you can still eat carbs, because you can still have your indulgences. All of those things are tied into you being empowered to make the choice, not some plan or diet program or book telling you to do it this way in this way only. So agency is important. And if what you're doing right now for your health and fitness feels like it is working against you, and your empowerment and agency could reconsider it reconsider whether there's a different way. So that's agency. The second part is competence. Competence is just knowledge, it's confidence, as well. In other words, if you know something, and you know that some a cause is going to cause an effect. Now you have the confidence next time that when you do this, this is going to happen. When I when I make these choices, I know I'm going to feel good in my workouts. When I make these choices. I know I'm going to lose a pound and a half over each week, right? It can be a very simple thing, or it can be a little more nuanced and complex, right? When I, you know, limit my saturated fats to a third of my overall fat, I know that I have a lower risk of heart disease down the line. I mean, that's a longer term thing. But regardless, having as much knowledge is going to be important. This is where this is where that comments earlier the five star review about how the person's trainer would tell them what to do, but they wouldn't know why. This is where knowledge itself also increases agency. Oh, powerful, right? This is where the more knowledge you have, guess what the more agency you have, because now you have the power of information, like they say Information is power. And now you have the confidence. And now you can take control be like, You know what, I'm in control of my health, I'm going to make the decision. I've done it based on working with others and learning and knowledge, but I don't have to be told what to do. I know what's going to work and I'm gonna make the choice. Alright, the third part of self determination theory is relatedness. And that is having others to, to have a community with to lean on to have in your back, right? Whether it's personal relationships, your significant other, your spouse, your close friends, you know, men and men, women and women, men and women, it doesn't matter all the people you care about in your life, who support you who do not sabotage you. And then more importantly, can you find people who are trying to go after the same goal in a similar way where you can then feed off each other, right? And we call this community and it could come in various ways it could come in the you being a listener of this podcast, right. And it could come in joining our Facebook community, the Wits, &, Weights, community or any other group that has like minded people going after the same goal. relatedness can come from having a coach, absolutely, if I'm your coach, I am totally in your corner. And honestly, that is all I care about. I care about your results, right? Not all I care about, of course, I care about you as a person, what I mean is, whereas others in your life, care about many, many other things and not so much what you're doing in the fitness world. Of that is my priority for you is getting your physical and mental health, you know, leveled up to the best it can be. So agency competence and relatedness. Definitely look at what and how you're doing things. And if those are not satisfied, something might be missing. All right, three episodes related to this episode 74 with my man, Carl carbo Berryman, who I mentioned before Episode 74 He was actually on the show twice and this is the most recent one. It's called bigger gains tracking your food or not. And fitness principles with Carl Berryman. So episode 74 Check that out. We definitely touch on a lot of principles okay principles, which is the which is where it's at. Okay, principles, Episode 70 is the next one episode 70 is tailor your physique for aesthetics, fat loss performance and health with Cody McBroom. Love Cody stuff, he owns a tailored coaching method. Yeah, he's another coach. So of course, he's a competitor like many coaches, but he's huge and established guy and I love to have him on the show. And I learned so much for him. He really helps people cut through a lot of this BS and that's what I find refreshing in that he, he helps you with the knowledge side and the agency side big time. Okay, he's like, look, this, this is how it works. Here's why. All this other stuff is just noise. And it kind of gives you that clarity. So I always appreciate folks like that. So check out episode 70. And then episode 72. With Eric Helms, we talked about self determination theory in that one, but overall, it's just a fantastic conversation, Episode 72, balancing strength, physique, recovery, plus animal versus plant protein with Eric Helms. Again, I know my titles are a little bit long, but we're trying to cover a lot a lot of topics in there. So episode 7470 and 72. Man that was out of order. I should have done 7072 74 But pretty easy to remember. All right, so what's the takeaway from this fourth lesson? The takeaway is to take messy action I love that too. Messy action not perfect action. Not I'm going to do it tomorrow. I'm going to do it next week. Once I have a plan. No, it's right now take action on whatever it is that you know you want to do to move forward. Do not wait. Don't wait. There's something you can do. There's something you can do. Pause the episode right now and schedule with yourself time to do that thing. Seriously. Here's a powerful one. Set up calendar appointments with yourself for the next week to block off your training time. Everybody listening to this episode should already be strength training or about to start strength training pretty much this week. Nothing can limit you can strength training with your bodyweight if you've got nothing else but you can definitely train. So that's what I want you to do that that's your action right now is to pause the episode, and add calendar appointments with yourself. For the next week. Let's see this episode comes out on a Tuesday. So if you're listening to when it comes out, you could set up your training for between Wednesday and Friday of this week. Or if you're listening it to later in the week, set it up for your very first, maybe for the Monday of the next week. But whatever the next training session is, set it up in your calendar, and then resume the episode. Okay. And by the way, reach out to me, send me a DM or send me an email, through the show notes very easy to find million ways to get to me. And tell me that you did that tell me that you heard this and that it inspired you and that you went ahead and you set up an appointment for yourself for your training, or for some other thing if you're already training to make sure you take messy action. All right, Lesson five, okay, Lesson five, your health is the most important thing you'll ever invest in. Health is intangible in many ways, isn't it? It's intangible. It's it's less tangible in many ways than money, and relationships, right with money, we feel it in our pocket, we feel it in our bills, we feel it with our property, right with, with our trips with our cars with all these things. Relationships, we feel it immediately and how people react to us in our interactions with folks, with our wife, with our friends, whatever. Health is a little bit of a long term intangible thing. Now yes, we can experience health physically in how we look. But even that takes a while to shape. And a lot of things related to our health come decades down the road. Now what is health, right, it's literally your body and mind together. And your ability to do things in the world. Your ability to do things in the world now. It's it to me that seems like it enables everything else doesn't it and your physique is is an outward representation of that health, right? But it's also tied to your confidence. Just as human beings, we can't help it. Our physiques, how we look are tied to our confidence period. And, and I speak to those people and I help people who are trying to improve their health and their physique, because I do feel that they all go together. Professional Success, personal relationships, doing the things you love, and doing them for many, many years with the highest quality of life are all built on your physical health. So I do say sometimes that nothing supersedes physical health, not even the person you love the most, because you can't love them and care for them. You can't take care of them without your physical health. Therefore, investing in your health leads to a stronger fitter, longer life full of vitality. But it actually hits you in the pocketbook, doesn't it, not because you have to pay for health but because you have to pay for poor health. Poor health is very costly. long term health care, long term care as you age has been estimated to be something like up to $2,000 a month over the age of 40. When you're in poor health. Now, you may not see that directly as a bill, but it's reflected in your insurance. It's reflected in maybe your life insurance is reflected in trips to the hospital trips to the doctors that just start to add up and then surgeries and procedures and medication, it just adds up. Right So conversely, fewer trips to the hospital, fewer injuries for your illness is going to help you out. And there's even costs that come out of that in terms of your career and your ability to do things that then level up your skills and level up your knowledge and so on. So you can make more money and provide for people and things like that. So your physical health is intrinsically tied to your well being and your everything else. It helps you reduce stress, it helps you reduce anxiety, even symptoms of depression. I know individuals who deal with depression, and health is one of their big go twos, it might even be just going for a walk. And then beyond that, the goals that we talked about on the show achieving strength and dialing in your nutrition, maintain the physique, you want all of these massively boost self confidence, and then that spills over into other areas of your life. Right. So if you tie it all together, it comes down to one big baffling question. And that is why do people rarely invest in their health? You know, we pay 1000s for cars, houses or college degrees. And then we become penny pinchers with our health, you know, not just not just with our money either, but also with our time. And when you think of going to the gym, that's a resource to time resource. And somehow we we make every excuse in the world to not go to the gym. But if you added up all the time outside of work and outside the relationships where you did, probably not such high value activity So let's say like streaming, or just doing leisurely things, it would probably add up to so many hours that you can easily find time to go to the gym. And for many of us, once you are going to the gym and getting results, that becomes a fun distressing experience anyway becomes a form of leisure that you actually do look forward to, which is great, because then it's a twofer, one. Now, as I produced this podcast, meaning as I went through the first 100 episodes of this podcast and started to learn and talk to people in research, I realized how many people are receiving terrible, even dangerous information from the fitness industry, to the point where I had to become a coach, I had to become a nutrition coach, nutrition specifically, because I think that's where the crux of a lot of the misinformation stems. I don't know if I use that phrase properly. But I wanted to help people cut through that nonsense in a very direct, like actionable prescriptive way, like, here's what we can do. Here's why. Here's why all this other information doesn't quite make sense. And mainly, I just wanted people to go through the process that I experienced back in around 2020. When I had been struggling for decades, I had done all the diets, I had done the CrossFit in the boot camps, and the running. And I finally realized that no, you know, I need to get strong, I need to do a little bit less, I need to manage my body and be healthier. I want to eat to fuel my performance. And now I have greater knowledge and control my results. Right, I want to get you the physique results, the health results you want. And I want to do it faster, more easily, and with way fewer mistakes. So this is why I personally hire coaches, for me for my training, for my nutrition for my business, for public speaking for podcasting. I don't always hire coaches for money. Sometimes I have mentors or we mentor each other, or I will swap services with somebody or a former client. Now all of a sudden, we have a relationship as friends and we help each other out. I mean, this is what community relatedness is all about. There's no one right way to do things. But if you're wondering whether I hire coaches, oh, yeah, because I've hired coaches for a single session and gotten more out of it than I could have learned myself in five years. If I did learn that, you know, training form, or how to effectively write emails, I mean, I don't know little things that I could have just wasted time and spun my wheels for months and years. I'm a smart guy. So of course, I have a lot of pride. And it maybe that was a proud statement to say I'm a smart guy. But my point is, I'm an engineer who thinks that I could get the answer to anything, just by looking it up myself. That's my point. Okay, just try to add a little bit of modesty back into the equation here. But because of that, it prevents me from thinking that others can help me more than I can help myself. And I know better by now. Like, that's almost a form of, of wisdom via age. Like it took me decades to figure that out of lots of mistakes. So let me ask you as the listener, before I get too long winded here. Have the strategies you've used before worked? Have you been able to be what we talked about earlier? Consistent? Have you nailed down that exact plan that works for your lifestyle? Based on the evidence that works, right? N equals one, it lets you enjoy all your favorite foods, it lets you still improve your body composition and get to where you want. Are you getting the most out of your training? And do you look like you want? Do you look like you lift? With all that hard work that you're doing? If the answer is yes, then I am thrilled for you. Maybe it's because you're listening to the show or like me, you're just extremely self motivated, you go out you find the information. Maybe you have a community maybe have mentors, and that puts you in the tiny, tiny, tiny percentage of people who have been able to figure it out on their own. And even that it's me, it's not quite on their own right? If the answer is no, ask yourself, why not? What are you going to do differently this time? Given that health is the most important thing you can invest in? That's the whole point of this lesson is that if health is the most important thing of all, and you haven't put every resource into it possible to get what you want for it, why not? This is one of the most important lessons that I've learned through 100 episodes of the podcast that investing in the most important thing to you in the world, your health is absolutely essential, and that you will find a way for something that is that important to you. Okay, so three episodes related to this topic, Episode 51. So going a little bit back in the archives to the halfway point, mental resilience and commitment to training despite adversity, earthquakes with Heather clinger. So Heather is a longtime client of mine, who went through a very challenging situation in Turkey when they had the earthquakes last year and she talked all about it Episode 51. And how committing to her health in multiple ways ended up giving her the massive level of resilience that she never thought she would have during highly stressful time. It's the kind of result we don't put on billboards, we don't put in our marketing, hey, you know, learn to lift weights and you'll be more resilient, like it's doesn't sell to say that. And yet, without it, I think she would have been in a very different place at that time. And so there's meaning, and there's intangible benefits to help all around us. That's kind of the point here. So check out her story in Episode 51.

Philip Pape 55:42

And then the next episode, going a little bit out of order here is farther back in the archives, Episode 30, to fix your nutrition for a healthy, balanced lifestyle with Tyler cero. Now, Tyler was my very first client, the one that inspired me to get into this. And she recorded an episode early on with me, we talked about powerlifting. And such that was before she was a client, but this one came a little bit later. And she talked about her journey since that point. So it gives you a good idea of how, you know, investing in your health can really pay off for what she went through. And then the final episode, I wanted to mention here is 95, how Carol lost 20 pounds and 14% body fat set a lifting PR and gained food freedom in her 40s. And this was very recent, I talked to another client, Carol, who shares her body recomp and fat loss and all the cool things that she learned in terms of her relationship with food, and her lifting love getting a love for strength training, working with barbells. And, of course, being able to now eat a lot more food and not feel like she's restricted in any way and having plenty of energy. So the takeaway for this is that if getting results with your health and physique, are the things that enable you to upgrade every other area of your life, then, Isn't it worth more than anything else you invest in more than your house, your car, the college degree, your career? Definitely more than new clothes or another service, you know, streaming service, even your relationships and mental health are dependent on your physical health. Because without your health, none of these matter. So ask yourself this question, what happens if I don't invest in my health? And am I okay with that? Right? I didn't invest in my health for many years. And if I went back to my, say, 25 year old version and said, ask myself that question and gave him all this context, he would have said, Hmm, I see what you mean, what am I doing not investing in my health? And I didn't until much later but I'm glad I did. So ask yourself, What happens if I don't invest in my health and my okay with that, and then that will give you clarity on how important this is to you. And if you are not, okay, that you are currently not prioritizing invest in your health, you're going to find a way to make it happen. Last thing, if you are interested in one on one coaching with me, because you're ready to invest in your health today, and see, this is the whole conflict of interest I mentioned earlier, I'm a coach, this is what I do, I help people, I'm gonna get you results, we're gonna get them fast, we're gonna get them easily with very few mistakes. And I'm proud to say that, and I know we can do it together. So if you're ready for that, if you want to get results within six months, six months in the scheme of the many, many years, that you may have been spinning your wheels, to get those results that have eluded you. Just click on that, click the link in my show notes and apply. And then here's what I'll do. I'll send you a few questions, literally five, at most, three to five clarifying questions. I'm going to gauge whether we're a good fit. And if you are, we can get started that same day. And here's the thing, if you missed it in my intro, I have a very special very limited promotion. To celebrate 100 episodes of the podcast, I'm doing a giveaway with my coaching. So if you apply, if you apply with the code from this episode, you're also going to get an extra month of coaching. So at seven for the price of six, a free tub of protein powder of your choice from first form, and a full year subscription to macro factor. And by the way, if you have macro factor already, I will credit you a full year regardless. To apply just use the link in my show notes. Enter the code Episode 100, all in Word, Episode 100. Again, anyone who mentions that code is guaranteed to qualify for this promotion. So take advantage of a good deal to finally invest in yourself. Invest in your health and get the results you want right now. All right for episode 101 Peter Lappe is on the show to talk about postpartum recovery from unraveling the complex condition known as diastasis. sis are diastasis recti to the unique challenges women face post pregnancy. Peter will address misconceptions and share actionable strategies for postpartum recovery. Please do me a solid and follow or subscribe to the podcast so you are notified when that episode and many others are published. And again, thank you so much to all of you for sticking with me through to Episode 100 and I am not slowing this train down. We will have many more incredible solo and interview episodes coming up. So keep listening and sharing. letting others know about the show is one of the best ways that we can spread the word. As always, stay strong. And I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits & Weights podcast. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights if you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights, please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong

Philip Pape 8/25/23 Philip Pape 8/25/23

Ep 99: How to Make Fat Loss Feel Easier to Get and Stay Lean with Brandon DaCruz

We're going to talk about how to make fat loss feel easier to get and stay lean. We all know that losing fat can be challenging, so we're going to discuss some strategies and scenarios that can help you overcome the obstacles and make dieting more manageable and sustainable.

Today I have the pleasure of talking to Brandon DaCruz for his second appearance on the show. Brandon is an online nutrition and physique coach, educator, internationally published fitness model, and National Level NPC competitor. He uses an evidence-based approach to help his clients achieve their goals sustainably.

On episode 58, we talked about energy flux and the high energy flux lifestyle, which is a way of eating more, burning more fat, and building more muscle. If you haven't listened to that episode yet, I highly recommend you check it out. It's full of practical strategies to improve your health and body composition.

We're going to talk about how to make fat loss feel easier to get and stay lean. We all know that losing fat can be challenging, so we're going to discuss some strategies and scenarios that can help you overcome the obstacles and make dieting more manageable and sustainable.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
__________

Today you’ll learn all about:

[4:33] Personal struggles with fat loss and fitness modeling
[15:01] The importance of energy balance in fat loss
[20:02] Proactive dieting vs reactive training
[27:20] Energy density and comparing food sources
[31:34] The importance of food choices and satiety
[39:20] Constructing fat loss diets with whole foods first approach
[46:47] The importance of viewing food choices holistically
[52:53] Setting clients up for success in fat loss
[58:10] The importance of tracking in body composition progress, and improving awareness and relationship with food
[1:05:30] Self-monitoring techniques and weight maintenance thresholds
[1:09:35] Energy intake, expenditure, and movement
[1:15:15] What Brandon is up to now and where to learn more
[1:17:10] Outro

Episode resources:

Brandon's podcast: Chasing Clarity: Health and Fitness Podcast
IG - @brandondacruz_
Email - bdacruzfitness@gmail.com
Ep 58: Using High Energy Flux to Eat More, Burn More Fat, and Build More Muscle with Brandon DaCruz

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Transcript

Brandon DaCruz 00:00

Although fat loss sounds simple on paper, which is why many people will just tell you that all you need to do is eat less and exercise more. That's a statement that's truthful, but it isn't helpful for many, which is where I really think that it's, you know, focusing on the nutritional aspect of that loss is pivotal because let's face it, 99% of us do not have the time and energy to create a deficit purely from exercise and to out exercise a poor diet.

Philip Pape 00:23

Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host, Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger, optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition. We'll uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry so you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits & Weights community Welcome to another episode of the Wits & Weights Podcast. Today I have the pleasure of talking to Brandon to Cruz for his second appearance on the show. Brandon is an online nutrition and physique coach, educator, internationally published fitness model and national level NPC competitor, who uses an evidence based approach to help his clients achieve their goals sustainably. Back on episode 58. We talked about energy flux and the high energy flux lifestyle, which is a way of eating more moving more burning more fat building more muscle. If you haven't listened to that, go check it out, Episode 58. It's full of practical strategies to improve your health and body composition. Today we're going to talk about another topic that many people struggle with how to make fat loss feel easier, because we all want to get and stay lean. We all know that losing fat can be challenging, especially if you have a busy or high stress lifestyle. So we're going to discuss some strategies and scenarios that can help you overcome those and make it more manageable sustainable. Brandon, thank you again for joining me on the show. I'm super excited to dive into this topic.

Brandon DaCruz 01:51

Phil, thank you for having back on the show my man. It's an absolute pleasure. You know, I always look forward to speaking with people, but especially like minded individuals like yourself. And it's really cool to connect again, and be returned guests on your show, especially as I know, You've been working hard. Like we've been chatting off scenes, you know, in DMS and emails and things of that sort. I know you've been really working hard to continue to grow the show. And you've had a stack lifts of guests since I've been on last time. So you've had a lot of some of my mutual friends within this industry and people that I really respect mentors like Alan Aragon and Eric Helms and guys like that. So I feel like I'm in good company first and foremost. But it's also nice to see your growth. Because podcasting is something if you look statistically most people don't make it like most podcasters don't make it between a beyond like the three to five episode mark. Because it's such a saturated industry, a lot of times it's hard to gain momentum, both in terms of your own ability to present information, especially when you do it on a one on one format. Also your ability to connect with people get them on to podcasts, just like you know, I'll be completely I'll admit it and be completely transparent that schedule with me, it's really difficult because I have such a busy schedule. And so as a podcaster, and a podcast host yourself, you have to be really flexible, working around people's schedule. So a lot of people behind the scenes like listeners, they don't realize, and I know this now because I was I was talking to you off air about this, but I've done you know, close to 200 podcasts at this point. But at this stage on that episode 70 of the chasing clarity podcasts, which is my own podcast, but you know, the other 130 I've been a guest, so I never had to worry about the back end stuff in terms of setting things up scheduling, editing, everything that goes beyond, you know, behind the scenes, these, this is a lot of work that people put in like yourself, which I respect. And I hope that the audience really appreciates that. Because we go above and beyond what we could be doing other things, but we really try to get back and make an impact on the community as a whole.

Philip Pape 03:32

Yeah, man, it is so true. And you do get better and better at this, the more reps you put in, like anything else, I go back and listen to my first five episodes, and I'm almost like embarrassed, you know, like, I don't want anybody to hear them. But that people will come back and say, you know, really doesn't matter. Because the content, you know, came out what you're saying was genuine and it taught me something that I didn't know before. And really, that's what matters. So that's why we put in the reps. And yeah, you I think you were the first I'll say like big name, person I had on the on the podcast, if you will, but I have no problem reaching out saying yes, or asking you guys, knowing the worst I can get as a no. And the best I can get is to connect with people that I also appreciate and follow. So anybody listening, there's probably a lot of folks listening who are also super busy, they have these kinds of lifestyles, they run their businesses, and they're like, I I can't also, you know, binge a million podcasts and learn everything that that Brandon knows about nutrition and fitness. So they want to hear it straight, right? They just want to hear kind of here's what you do. And so we're gonna get into some of that today, Brandon with the topic. I'd like to make it personal at first though, for you, because I think you can relate a lot to the listener or vice versa and your clients. So what is your personal experience with struggling with fat loss and then maybe even making it more difficult than it needed to be in the past?

Brandon DaCruz 04:47

Man, that is a great topic to start out with because a lot of times people you know if you go to my profile now you will get some of my photos whether it be from photo shoots or from contest preps, a lot of times people will say, Oh, you must have always been lean or it must Easy for you. And when it comes to my personal experience with fat loss, I believe the reason that I've become so interested in this topic of fat loss, and I have made so much content, and so many podcasts and been on so many other individuals podcasts like yourself about this is twofold. And first, it's because it's a goal that I initially struggled with to achieve early on, especially when I first got into fitness modeling, because I started with fitness modeling in college prior to going into actual competitive bodybuilding. And I found myself trying every single popular approach at that time. But due to the limited amount of quality information that was around at that time, what I was doing was definitely suboptimal from all aspects to be honest with you. So we're talking suboptimal from nutrition from training from fat loss and a muscle retention standpoint. And during my first few years of fitness modeling, I literally tried every single popular diet approach, like even fad diets, like things that I'm, I'm honestly, you know, embarrassed to admit to, but I also think that it's good to be aware of our failures, some of the things we've done, the past mistakes we had, and also be transparent about those things so that other people realize, Hey, listen, you know, 15 years ago, I was exactly where you are. So, you know, I did everything. You know, I first started fitness modeling in 2010. So we're talking 13 years ago, and I did every fad diet you could think of we're talking keto we're talking cyclical keto, we're talking intermittent fasting, I did rapid fat loss diets via Lyle McDonald. And at the time, I don't even know if his rapid fat loss book was out. So I think I got it from the boards itself from his his body composition website, I did bro bodybuilding diets were literally all I ate. And this scores me to this date, all I eat for 12 week was tilapia, and broccoli. That's literally the only things I still cannot eat tilapia to this day. And then I also did your If It Fits Your Macros, where I tried to fit in all the fun foods that I loved into my diet, which was literally a disaster. So basically, you name it, I tried to in during those first few years, I noticed that I either struggle to achieve achieve the Lean book that I desired. Due to struggling with an inability to manage my hunger for I had a little bit of the opposite, I was able to get lean, but I quickly regain all the weight that I lost. After as at that time, you know, if I really go back there, and I think about it, we're in such a privileged state. And a lot of people don't realize that if they're just getting to finish, but realize we're in the age of information. So there are so many evidence based outlets for information, whether it be research reviews, or podcasts like we do, where you can get really evidence based and experience backed practices towards fat loss towards muscle gain. There was none of this when I was getting into this. So there was no such thing as a post diet, reverse, or recovery dieting approaches, and there's definitely no such thing as maintenance phase. So I found myself during this time, you know, weight cycling, like a lot of other people who are probably listening to this can relate to so I remember, I worked with a popular bodybuilding coach who was known for turning many guys Pro and for my first contest prep, and this was in 2014. And it was the first time that I had truly gotten shredded. And granted, those were the days where we do like the dirty bulk prior to a prep. So I needed to lose over 50 pounds. So I want people to realize that I've been overweight, I've had insulin resistance, I've had terrible bloodwork, like I've been through the gambit of these things. And now I take a much different approach. But that came through the experiences and failures of my past. And so I remember the day after my show the morning after you know, I'm a young guy, it was my first contest prep, I did really well. And I wanted to know how to improve going forward. So the day after my first show, I emailed my coach, and I asked him how I should approach my nutrition going forward. And he literally told me to go right back to how I was eating prior to the 12 week prep that I did. And he told me that the intention behind that was to take advantage of the quote unquote post show rebound. And the reason I'm doing quote unquote, is because now many of those those fallacies and things that we used to think you know, these myths that we used to be told by coaches and people will distort during that time, I've done many podcasts on about how that's literally the opposite of how our physiology actually responds. Because honestly, if anything, you're primed for an adipose rebound, not a anabolic rebound in terms of muscle gain, you're more primed to regain fat after a fat loss phase than you are to regain lost muscle tissue. Now, mind you, I was dieting on less than half the calories by the end of my prep that I was getting prior to starting the prep. So within the first week, I had gained back around 10 plus pounds. And I continue to gain fat at a rapid rate. And I literally felt like a failure after this first contest prep. I put in all this work to get stage lean. And within a few weeks, I looked like I hadn't prepped at all. And honestly, you know, it's excuse my language, but it was a mindfuck to see at least like it really struggled with my body and with my my desire to go forward my motivation, all these different things. So after that experience, I started diving into why this occurred. I really wanted to know, why did my coach telling you to do this? And why didn't I respond? Because at first I thought there was something wrong with me. Like I followed his instructions to a tee I was very diligent on the planet and exactly the calories and the macros that I had eaten prior to that I didn't understand why was my body now that I had went through a fat loss phase not responding the same way that it did 12 weeks prior when I weighed 50 pounds plus and you know, obviously now we know about metabolic adaptation, and all these other physiological changes that occur during a deficit. However, I didn't do any of that. But, you know, I was lucky in the fact that I was really following evidence based practitioners at the time so I had just recently attended a muscle camp held by Leigh Norton. So I was following all his stuff at the time and keep in mind And there was no, he wasn't doing YouTube and all that kind of stuff. However I went in person, but at that time he actually had, and I'm sure if any OGS our in the audience, you have done this for a long period of time you have a podcast with Sophie Lee, that was called physique science radio. And one of the episodes he had on Eric Trexler. And honestly, at that point, I believe this was so early on, we're talking 2014. So I think Eric Trexler has had been a master student, he wasn't even a PhD. But they were talking about metabolic adaptations that physique athletes go through during a prep. And that's what he, you know, kicked off my interest in metabolism, metabolic adaptation of that most physiology, which obviously, I've continued to dive into this day. So basically, my initial fat loss phases, were disastrous, be frank with you. But by making mistakes and experiencing failure, it made me gain a greater interest in learning not only how to get lean, but how to stay lean and maintain more of the progress I had made. And at that time, you know, going back, you know, close to 10 years ago, I was about 10. I was about one year into coaching. And because I had gotten lean, I had so many people at my gym, and on social media asking me for help with their own fat loss efforts. And I initially was able to get them to achieve their fat loss goals if they could stick to the diet. And the issue here was that we would only do 12 week coaching phases. And it would just be a 12 week package, and then they go on their merry way, we didn't have this continuous dieting program, it was really just like this one off thing. So I was able to get clients lean, and then we'd stop working together. And a few months later, they'd contact me and say that they had regained all the weight that they lost, and they wanted to go back into a diet. So at that point, I realized that there had to be a better way. So since that time of around 2014 to 2015, I've researched, studied and experimented with as many evidence based strategies as I can find, and I've trialed them all myself and collected data. And then if they've proved to be a successful strategy with myself, I would start utilizing them with clients. And I've continued to refine my methods over the past decade, I've been coaching. So I know that last time that we spoke about the high energy flux approach that I take with my clients, but you know, honestly, that actually came way before the term energy flux was even in existence. So I actually started doing that. Because around 2015, I looked at a study in literature from Rosenbaum and Leibel, where they showed that around 85 to 90% of the decreases, we see in total daily energy expenditure during a deficit come from me. So I got a Fitbit. And I started tracking my steps. And then I started having clients do the same. But initially, I didn't start with them, you know, setting a step target, I just had them track it on their own. And I just let it fall where they did naturally. And I noticed that during diets, I'd have clients that were saved between eight to 10,000 steps during a building phase, that we're now taking like four to 5000 steps during a fat loss phase, which would equal you know, a few 100 Calorie decrease in energy expenditure. So that's when I started to set step counts for them on a daily and weekly basis. And I noticed that their fat loss progress was much more consistent and predictable. So over the last 10 years, I've done 15 contest preps, and I've also done over 100, photo shoots, and all of which I've had to get very lean for it, whether it be to contest shape, or at least photo shoot, shoot. So believe me when I tell you, I have done more diets than most people could ever imagine. And through those experiences, as well as through working with, at this point over 1000 individuals, 1000 clients, I've been able to refine my skills, my approaches my strategies towards fat loss, both for myself and then for clients. So that fat loss feels easier, and maintenance is more attainable. And this isn't to say that losing a significant amount of body fat is ever easy. But in comparison to how I used to do things, and how many other clients and certainly other individuals within our space, have approached it in the past, I've found both approaches and principles that I can tailor to an individual to help them get to their goals in a manner that's far more sustainable and effective. And that feels easier, especially in comparison to what they've done previously.

Philip Pape 13:31

Man, this is this is incredible, because I know the average person goes through over 100 diets in their lifetime easily. And like you said earlier in your story, people might mistake you for being this lean, shredded guy your whole life and it comes easy. But because of your physique goals over the years, you've actually probably deliberately tried to do fat loss in quote unquote, the right way. And many, many different times even more, with more iterations in the average person. I would say I think the average person will will try things but you went to that that next extreme yet there's a lot of relatable things there. So just just to list them out again, so people who are listening, you know, the the trauma with your tilapia, like eating the same thing over and over, strikes me as you know, it's in the bucket of is this sustainable, right? Can we just eat a certain diet that you cut, cut foods out, your ability to get lean, but then gain it all back? Again, yo yo dieting, weight cycling, body fat overshooting all of those concepts, the fact that physiology is really really important here that we can't just think in terms of a deficit, we can't just think in terms of right the the calories that were primed to regain fat more quickly, the mental and psychological aspects. And then I like most of all the in there you talked about kind of the hierarchy of evidence, not just the people you follow and the things that you read, but experimenting on yourself, and then even experimenting with your clients, them allowing you to do that and trusting you through that process. So this is a great segue. because when we talk about making fat loss easier, we're not talking about doing it quickly necessarily. We're not talking about making it quote unquote simple in terms of like, just do this. It's more of let's make it easier on ourselves so that we don't have all of these negative consequences, especially the longer the duration, and the more we have to lose. So what does that mean, then? To make it easier? Why is that important? And we can segue into the specifics.

Brandon DaCruz 15:24

Absolutely. So really, when it comes down to making fat loss easier, I really think that this comes down to nailing energy balance, which is the key principle that governs fat loss, meaning we need to look at both sides of the energy balance equation, because a lot of times when we talk about dieting, people only talk about calories, they only talk about the food, but they're not talking about both aspects. And really, we will focus on calories and food because that's going to be the main intention. But I do suggest and encourage those out there to listen back to our high energy flux podcast, because that's going to focus more on the calorie expenditure side of things. So when it comes to losing fat, effectively, we basically have two main levers that we can pull, we can increase our calorie expenditure, or the amount of calories that we burn per day, which is best done through increasing physical activity and meat as we've covered in the previous podcast. And we can also decrease your calorie intake, and you hit the nail on the head, Phil, where you said that this isn't simple. So the thing is that, although fat loss sounds simple on paper, which is why many people will just tell you that all you need to do is eat less and exercise more. That's a statement that's truthful, but it isn't helpful for many, which is where I really think that it's, you know, focusing on the nutritional aspect of that loss is pivotal, because let's face it, 99% of us do not have the time and energy to create a deficit purely from exercise and to out exercise a poor diet. And even if we did, doing so wouldn't help nearly as much with hunger and appetite management as focusing on our diet, which is the main issue as to why people struggle with losing fat and keeping it off especially so one of the biggest struggles most of us have encountered or will encounter and experience during a fat loss phase is dealing with increased hunger and issues with appetite and satiety management. And hunger is one of the most common feelings dieters experienced during a fat loss phase, this hunger is a natural response to an energy deficit. So this is an inherent part of that loss process. But how we approach our diet and the hunger management strategies and tools that we do or don't use can make or break our ability to successfully get lean and stay lean. So the issue with hunger is it generally builds and increases the longer you diet and the leaner we get. As you you know, as you move more and more body fat, the more of an increase in hunger, you'll notice that the more of an increase in appetite you will experience, which can threaten your ability to stick to the diet and adhere to the calorie deficit needed to continue losing body fat, which will continue to go down. So we have to make sure that we're thinking about the long game. It's not just about what you can do, you know, in terms of the calorie deficit, you can induce in a day or week, we have to think, what is the trajectory? What is the long term, let's let's back cast, essentially, if your goal is to lose 20 pounds, let's look at this as if we're doing you know, 1% of, you know, point five to 1% of weight loss per week, and that comes out to one pound for you. We need 16 to 20 weeks. And this is you know, we look at hunger, we look at appetite. This is a completely natural and evolutionary response to being in a deficit. And it's a sign that you know, when you're you know, a lot of people get scared when they're hungry. But honestly, feeling hunger is a sign that you're losing body fat and depleting some of your body's energy source. So experiencing hunger isn't a bad thing. But it is something that we need to focus on managing. And this is why I've spent so much time and energy focusing on learning how to manage hunger and mitigate its effects. Because this is something that I've personally struggled with, and I know that many others have as well. So by implementing a different nutritional approach to fat loss diets and adding in certain hunger management strategies within my clients plans, I've been able to enhance my clients adherence to the diet and ability and improve their ability to get lean and stay lean. So really, when it comes down to making fat loss easier or feel easier, at least, I'm focusing on different aspects of the diet, such as the calorie density and food volume, I'm looking at taking a protein centric approach, I'm ensuring sufficient fiber intake, and I'm modifying the tolerability and processing level the diet by doing what I call simple foods swaps. So really, what that means is we're using a whole food first approach, which are all individual topics we can dive into as you know, I know that part of this podcast, you really want to look into the importance of like things like food selection, food quality and satiety during a fat loss phase. And these are all aspects to diet that I focus on when constructing a fat loss diet. That's both of high quality and provides a ton of satiety per calorie, which is what is going to help make that loss easier because the number one detriment to fat loss it you're the one number one bottleneck or anchor that stands in people's way or presents a challenge or even holds people back from getting as lean as they want is dealing with issues with hunger, and thus, the downstream effect that hunger and appetite has on their ability to adhere to the diet.

Philip Pape 19:39

Yeah, so I'm really curious then about behind the scenes, right if if a client was working with you, and let's say they have the basics down, you've got them primed for the fat loss phase already. They're training they're moving, they're tracking in some way tracking calories, check tracking macros. We don't have to get into too much detail about the fact that that's going to be it necessary to an extent how do we develop an awareness of the hunger? And what to do about it? And do we get ahead of it? As we get into the fat loss phase? Do you have a plan for those substitutions? Do we have a plan for If This Then That, our tracking, biofeedback, all those things, because what approach is, start to diet, get some results, get some wins, and then deal with hunger as it comes up for that person, because some people have more hunger than others. And another is let's just get way ahead of it start substituting right from day one. What do you think about that?

Brandon DaCruz 20:32

Yes, so I'm really something that in terms of dieting, I'm proactive, and when it comes to training, I'm reactive. So what I mean by that, let me extrapolate out on that is that when it comes to dieting, I know that there are an inherent physiological implications and ramifications that all people experience, we see that when we lose body fat, we see a decrease in leptin, we see an increase in ghrelin. So essentially, what that means is we see a decrease in satiety and an increase in hunger. And that is a natural and inherent part of fat loss dieting, and I'll tell you, Phillip dieted hundreds of individuals, I've never had someone that has told me when they're losing a sufficient and a significant amount of body fat that they had an experience hunger, so I like to get ahead of that. And really, how I do that is I look at several dietary factors that I focus on to increase satiety and manage hunger for clients who are in fat loss phases. So generally, the first thing I'm looking to do in terms of food selection for fat loss, dieting, is looking at the calorie density of the foods we choose during a diet, because really, what I want to do is I want to create the most satiating plan for them to be able to manage hunger throughout the entirety of the phase and I have a thematic approach to this. So you'll see as I go more into like the methods that I use, that it is a periodized approach. So yes, there are different tools and different strategies that I use throughout the fat loss diet that become, you know, they garner more benefit as we get leaner and leaner. But there's things from the start that we can educate clients on. And we could focus on from the from the bat. And so these are things that I'm utilizing. So for instance, calorie density and food volume are strategies and areas of a diet that I'm utilizing to set a client up for success, because here's the thing, you know, we could forecast that this diet is going to take 12 to 16 weeks. But if a person isn't able to get past the first three or four weeks due to lack of adherence and dealing with hunger, and the big thing that I find that's an issue is that a lot of people only focus on the calories and macro aspect of dieting. So what do they do? They take their existing diet, they know they have to create a 500 calorie deficit and all they do is portion control, meaning that they use the same hyper palatable energy dense foods that they have, and just eat less of them. So say that they eat, you know, higher fat, you know, meat sources, they have, you know, a ribeye every single night. You know, they went from a seven ounce ribeye to a five ounce ribeye, well, all we're seeing is yes, you're you're decreasing the calories, but you're also decreasing food volume. So a lot of times when people think eat less, and exercise more, they think you have to eat less food, which really, I'm going to go through this, but a lot of my philosophy is I want them to eat more food weight and food volume, but less calories. So really, the first thing that I look to do is calorie density. So within calorie density this is also referred to as energy density. But this is the amount of calories contained in a given weight of food. So essentially, it breaks down to how many calories are contained in one gram of a food source. And I like to leverage the calorie density of the food that I use in a fat loss phase. So as we get deeper and deeper into a diet and experience more hunger and a heightened level of appetite, we're consuming more low energy density, high volume foods that provide a ton of satiety per calorie and are more filling and help to manage hunger better so that we can get as much fullness per calorie within the treats of our current target calorie budget. And the best way that I found to do this, when going from say a building or maintenance phase to a fat loss phase is to transition from high calorie density food sources to lower calorie density food sources. So this could look like going from fattier cuts of meat and poultry and dairy to lower calorie leaner sources of protein and, and to include more low calorie density items like fiber containing vegetables, fruits and whole grains that provide a ton of fullness, yet less calories than their higher energy density counterparts. So by making this switch, we're able to get more bang for our buck in terms of the amount of fullness and satiety of experience from the amount of calories we need to eat to continue losing body fat. And it's really important to be able to distinguish between low energy density and high energy density foods, not only for constructing your regular baseline diet that you're going to use, you know, Monday through Sunday dirt, you know, when you're locking your fellow skis, but also we have to think about this, that I now you know, I've previously worked with a lot of professional athletes, a lot of competitors. But at this point in my career, I've worked with a lot of lifestyle clients, a lot of business owners, people that are busy, and that have other priorities other than fitness. So I'm always trying to make fitness a part of their life, not their entire life. And that includes the nutritional aspect of fitness. So if someone wants to lose that, we need to be able to navigate and also look ahead and see what are going to be certain bottlenecks or certain anchors in their way or are certain obstacles essentially. So one huge obstacle is eating out. And so within that, if you're able to know and you have awareness around the energy density of different food sources, you know when you might not be able to always weigh and measure out every portion size of foods that you're able to eat, whether it be you're at a restaurant where you're eating At a family member's house and you're not able to prepare and wear your foods. However, you can use the calorie density of different food sources to make food choices that are more in line with your goals and help you more easily maintain a deficit. So for instance, I'll give you an example. When I go out to eat, the first thing that I look at on the menu is the protein options. And I know that lean sources of protein such as grilled chicken, turkey, burgers, and tuna are going to have a lower energy density than things like fried chicken, your bacon cheeseburgers or ribeye, so I'll go with a leaner protein source. I've already saved hundreds of calories there. Then onto Corp. I'm gonna look at you know, when it comes to different port sources, I'm looking at lower energy density cartridges that are more satiating. So I'm looking at something like a baked potato or veggies instead of your fries, your potato skins, your pasta with cream sauce, like things that are going to have, you know, 1000s of

Philip Pape 25:44

extra calories on the appetizer menu. Absolutely. So as you know,

Brandon DaCruz 25:47

I knew in my mind that a baked potato and veggies both have a lower energy density, but for the same amount of food we as those other options, but also from a satiety index perspective, they're much better at increasing fullness. And I also like educating clients and making them aware of high calorie density items that can we can reduce from the diet, especially when going out to eat that will help them to spontaneously or easily reduce the amount of calories that we eat in a meal so often advise them to revolve things like your dressings, your cream sauces, your oils and your butters and high calorie condiments and spreads like say barbecue sauces, or mayo, as all of these are very high in calorie density however, so so they pack a ton of calories to a meal, but they provide little to no satiety benefit. So you're getting all these calories, but you're getting no fullness from this. So this is just I don't want to say wasted calories, but think about it in the constraints of a budget. It's almost like if you had a financial budget, and you knew that, you know you had certain expenses, you have bills to pay, you're gonna prioritize that. But you wouldn't like frivolously spend on things that are just a waste of investment that provide no return on investment provide you no satisfaction, no fulfillment, no enjoyment, you will make smarter investments, the same thing can be said with our food choices. So we can even switch from using like high calorie condiments like Korean based sauces and condiments to lower calorie condiments like yellow mustard or hot sauce and save hundreds of calories in the process. And these are really simple simple swaps and having the knowledge of the calorie density of different foods from having spent time tracking can really help you make better food choices during a diet in terms of getting more bang for your buck in terms of food volume and satiety for your calorie budget. Now, next, the next strategy that I like to use, and I can do this from the start.

Philip Pape 27:21

Yeah, but before we get there, just just so some more practical strategies for folks. If someone is completely uncertain as to calorie density, what's what's an easy way to do it? Is it is it a calorie per gram type of deal where you just kind of compare it that way. Is it a satiety index? Is it a guide, where you just have here all the cuts of meat from highest to lowest protein density? You know, what do you think? Yeah, so

Brandon DaCruz 27:44

honestly, the best method that I found is I always tell clients, because technically, if you look in the literature, energy density is defined as calories per gram, one gram, but no one eats one gram of food. So that's unrealistic. So this is how I like to look at it. I like clients to think about a 100 gram serving, because 100 grams of a vegetable or fruit or even, you know, 100 grams of a protein source is a sufficient amount. So I like them to compare the calorie density of different food sources within the same bracket. So for instance, if we look at something like, I know this because I often had this conversation with clients, but additives to protein shakes. So a lot of times I have clients that want to utilize like, they want to do a protein smoothie, or right now Creek ninja cream is really popular. So everyone's doing those ice cream concoctions with like whey isolate, and they want to add things in. So they're always asking me about sides. So I know this off the top of my head, because I've went through this, like so many times with people and I always try to compare different energy densities of food. And here's the thing, just because the food is healthy does not mean that it's it fits your diet or that it has a low amount of calories. So for instance, the best example I can give you with this is in terms of what to add to protein shakes, or even to Greek yogurt, and things like that, or to your oats and things, you know, things like that. And so the two most common things were additives or signs are going to be your fruit or it's going to be a nut butter. And so the greatest example I can give you with this as 100 calories of strawberries, or 100 grams of strawberries is 36 calories. Now for that same 100 grams of peanut butter, which keep in mind, it's the same amount of food week, you're getting the same thing. But if you were to measure 100 grams on a food scale of peanut butter, it's going to be far less than food volume, far less fiber, it's going to have less micronutrients, less poly phenols less of all these beneficial antioxidants and you're gonna get less fullness because 100 grams of strawberries is a nice cup of strawberries. So keep that in mind. However 100 grams of strawberries is 36 calories. 100 grams of peanut butter is around 632 calories. So that's a massive discrepancy about 20 times difference between the two however, you added the same thing into your shake. So really, when we look at energy density, I like going by 100 grams. So you can do that in terms of protein comparisons. So you can do 100 grams of grilled chicken skinless chicken breast versus chicken thighs, where you can do even more drastic, you know, manipulations for comparisons and just really feel and just look at it. And I always like looking at things like a budget because I tend to work with a lot of First typing individuals and then very business oriented clients. So I have a lot of other coaches that I coach, a lot of other fitness professionals, gym owners, you know, you name it that I work with, especially from a fitness professionals perspective. But these are business owners, these are busy people. And they're also those that are invested not only into their fitness, but into business. So when I always when I, when I go back to these financial budget analogies, it always makes sense for them. So I'm always trying to go back to the fact that would you make if you had a certain monetary budget in each month, and you needed 50% of your, you know, if we're going to do financial investments, you would spend on your the things that you needed necessities, and you would always prioritize those? Well, that should be your nutrient dense whole food sources, that should be your low energy dense food sources that are going to give you a ton of satiety per calorie. And then if you had like this other little discretionary income, so say the 10 or 20%, then it could go towards higher energy density, tastier foods, but you shouldn't make that the predominance of your diet. And that's really looking at the energy density of foods, and really doing a comparative analysis because we can look at 100 grams of fruit compared to 100 grams of chocolate, the chocolate might, maybe more, you know, preferential towards an individual. So a lot of my women, they love chocolate, a lot of my female clients, but I always tell them, Listen, we shouldn't be making the decisions, which are going to leave you feeling hungrier and less able to stick to the diet because you're you're, you're prioritizing those options over the things that could really provide you with the best bang for your buck in terms of fullness per calorie satiety per calorie, your micronutrients or fiber intake and all these other important and building blocks. These are the big rocks of your fat loss phase first and foremost.

Philip Pape 31:34

So here's an interesting thing. Speaking of a budget, we all have our calorie budget, do you set try to compare that to grams budget for those calories, like x calories per gram total for the day? Do you ever do it in that way? Like so if your budget as 1800 calories? You're gonna say, however many grams, well, would that be like one and a half would be extremely high? Extremely low density? And then more than that, you get what I'm saying? No. So I just think they're too complicated. So

Brandon DaCruz 32:01

no, no, I've never I do know those statistics off the top my head. So for instance, we look at things like carrot we look at Strawberry, we were looking at point six calories per gram, or under in terms of energy density. When we actually look into the literature on energy density, I never get into these nuances unless it's like a fitness professional. But we see that we don't have an ability to moderate our intake physiologically. So naturally from a hunger and appetite and satiety perspective, over 1.5 grams, or 1.5 calories per gram in terms of our actual response to energy density of foods. So we see that all of the hyperplane edible foods are at a way higher spectrum of those. So if you look at like condensed fats versus one gram of a fat source is going to be nine calories per gram. So really, even if we do a calorie comparison between like a whole food, carbohydrate and a fat source, that's why we see a huge discrepancy in terms of energy density between these items. So for instance, 100 grams of butter is going to be far more calorically dense than 100 grams of sweet potato. And so I never do those, because I know that they gets really into minutiae with clientele, I don't give them like, I don't want a black and white perspective, I really want them to think of things as what is more conducive for my goals, like what foods choices are going to suit my goals best, and what are more conducive foods and less conducive foods. So if we're looking at really low energy density, food source, your vegetables, your fruits, your whole grains, your main protein sources, these are going to provide a ton of satiety and very low calories for the amount or a very low amount of calories for the amount of grams and the food weight that they provide us with. And then if we have extra in our budget, just like we would have with a discretionary income, then we can allocate towards some teacher foods. But you'll see as people get leaner into the diet, I'm gonna start prioritizing different things, because that's where really, I guess my expertise comes in both from, you know, working with so many people being through, you know, getting so you know, lean so many times myself that that's where you really have to get very specific with food choice, palatability, and different aspects of that. But even before that, I get into different nutritional and nutrient aspects. So from here, generally, what I do is, I first focus on energy density, and then I'm giving them certain targets to hit but it's not just from a macronutrient perspective, because like you mentioned, they already have the basics nailed. They had their calorie intake They've tracked, they have their protein, carbs and fats, and that's what everyone in this industry talks about. And those are important, don't get me wrong. So the one thing I do want to hit on that the rest of the industry does is protein intake, because the next strategy that I use to increase satiety and manage hunger during a diet is to utilize a high protein diet as protein is the most satiating macronutrient, so it helps us feel fuller and manage hunger better. And there's this theory called the protein leverage hypothesis, which describes why protein is so important for satiety his research on the protein leverage theory has found that we eat until we get enough protein and we will not stop until we hit that point. And so we need to reach this this threshold essentially, when we're eating aluminum to reach our natural level of fullness. And there's also research that has found that increasing the protein intake of a diet from 15% of calories to 30% of calories led to a spontaneous reduction of over 440 calories per day throughout a 12 week period. However, the best thing about this Study is this was an ad libitum diet, or this was an ad libitum study, he was not a dieting study. So these individuals created close to a 500 calorie deficit just due to feeling fuller from eating a high protein diet, which is why privatizing protein is a major key when dieting for fat loss. Now we know that in terms of that is something that we should all be doing. However, beyond that, then I'm looking at different nutrient values of things. So yes, I'm telling individuals, here's your, your calorie budget, here's your protein target or your protein range. Those two things are what most of the industry do. The next thing I focus on, instead of going to carbs or fats, that's not really what I'm focusing on, what I'm focusing on, is fiber intake. So what I want to make sure is to ensure a sufficient vibrancy. And besides protein, the other main nutrient or the other food component that I focus on, that's been shown to be highly filling, you know, aspect of the diet is fiber. So this is another aspect of the diet that I look to leverage. So hyper fiber foods can increase fullness and reduce hunger, as high fiber foods generally provide a ton of food volume. So we're getting back to that energy density aspect with the food volume for a low amount of calories and the allow us to feel fuller during the meal, but also after, and the delay or gastric emptying rate so that we feel fuller for longer periods of time, and we don't feel, you know, the worst thing in a diet is where you've had a really tasty meal. And it's been incredible, it tastes great. However, you're just as hungry after that meal as you were when you started. That's not the intention of food, especially when dieting a lot of people eat and make these macro creations. And they do this macro Tetris and stuff, where the food tastes great in the moment, but it drives them to want to eat more. The intention of eating fruit, especially during diet is to manage your hunger well enough that you're actually full after a meal. And you can go a few hours and not be completely food focused. But when we actually look at research on fiber, there's research that has found that for every 14 grams of fiber consumed, it decreases someone's ad libitum calorie intake by 10%. So this is significant. And usually the more fiber that you have in your diet, the fuller that you will feel. And it's also a good sign that your diet is nutrient dense as most of our dietary fiber should be coming from food sources, whole food sources, essentially, like your fruits, your vegetables, and whole grains, which are also packed with micronutrients, including vitamins, minerals, and cofactors. So this is where we get into the food quality aspects like we can't neglect that a lot of times when we only think about macros and isolation, we think about your protein, your carbs and your fats. We don't eat macros in isolation, we eat food. So we really got to focus on other nutritional aspects look, let's look at the fiber. Let's look at the micronutrients. Let's look at the vitamins the poly phenols the the minerals that are contained in these foods, which is really why you want to be getting your fiber from whole food sources rather than from protein bars or fiber supplements or these, you know high carb you know high fiber tortilla, you know, things that a lot of people use. So one thing that I specifically like to include in my diet is one big salad in all my fat loss diets for salad packs a ton of satiety per calorie. So with every bite of a salad, you feel fuller, despite taking in such a low amount of calories. And a salad helps to slow down your eating rate, which is another thing of literature that we actually see that slower eating rates actually induce greater feelings of satiety. But when you eat processed foods, if you look at like Kevin Hall's research, you see that higher ed rates are with processed foods are associated with a much higher calorie intake. And so we want to not only eat things that are going to make us feel full, but are also going to help us slow down and practice some mindful eating techniques. Because a lot of reasons why people have issues beyond just the fat loss phase itself, but in just general life and they over consume calories is because they eat mindlessly, they're distracted. They're not in the moment, they're not focusing. And they also consume foods that allow them and exacerbate that effect. So if you have fast food, yes, it's fast, because the delivery to you is fast, but also because you can eat too much tonic calories before you ever get through satiety signals from your stomach to your brain that you're actually satiated.

38:36

My name is Tony I'm a strength flipped or my 40s Thank you to Phil in his Wits & Weights community for helping me learn more about nutrition and how to implement better ideas into my strength training. Phil has a very, very good understanding of macros and chemical compounds and hormones and all that and he's continuously learning. That's what I like about Phil, he's got a great sense of humor. He's very relaxed, very easy to talk to. One of the greatest things about Phil, in my view is that he practices what he preaches. He also works out with barbells, he trains heavy, not as heavy as me, but he trains heavy. So if you talk with him about getting in better shape, eating better, he's probably going to give you some good advice. And I would strongly recommend you talk with him. And we'll help you out. Thanks.

Brandon DaCruz 39:20

So another thing that's great about high fiber foods, they generally tend to be lower energy fancy food sources that contain a great micronutrient profile. So they have, you know, they're low energy fancy, but they have a rich nutrient density and provide a ton of volume and are highly satiating as a result. And then I think this is the last aspect that we can get into that you may be most interested in because this is where we really get nuanced with things and where there are very specific nutrient manipulations. So this was when something gets really lean. So at the beginning of a diet, I almost do like this hedonic, you know, descent down a staircase, and really what that means is we're going from more palatable foods to less palatable foods throughout the course of a dieting phase because as you get leaner, it's going to be harder and harder to stick to a deficit. So really when it comes down to it, another aspect of constructing fat loss diets that I found a massive benefit from, which not only increases satiety, but makes dieting for fat loss, far easier is modifying the palatability and the processing level of the diet by making simple food swaps and utilizing a Whole Foods first approach. So as we get deeper and deeper into a diet, and we get leaner, a few things happen that magnify our hunger levels, and increase our likelihood of veering off the diet and not being able to hit our calorie macro targets if we don't manage them properly. And that's the fundamental thing, we could talk about all these nuanced aspects of nutrition and training and movement and all these other things. If you can't adhere to the plan that you're on, you're never going to be successful. So that is what we have to ensure. And that's why I like to get ahead of them with the other three strategies that I employed and that I discussed. However, when things get harder, I always have levers, I always have tools in the toolbox to be able to integrate into the diet to make things easier for my clients at that time. And so when we get deeper into a diet, we get leaner, we see certain things happen. So we see leptin levels decrease source or satiety levels decrease, or ghrelin levels increase, which increases our drive to eat. And then we also see that our food focus increases, all of which make energy dense hyperplane. Well, delicious foods more appealing. But it also makes it more difficult for us to moderate our calorie intake from these items. And this is because the more palatable or more tasty essentially, a food is, the more this food triggers the reward center in the brain, which increases our likelihood to, you know, over eat that food. And this is where being too flexible with food choice can be a slippery slope, because a lot of times when you're including these tasty foods, as you get deeper and deeper into that, when you get leaner and leaner and your calorie budget becomes more and more constrained, these things become more and more tempting. And so if you're playing macro Tetris, and you're fitting super tasty, hyper playable processed foods into your diet, you're going to be more likely to slow down or stall your fat loss progress due to you know, lacking adherence, but also over consuming calories, even if you don't need to. And this is what's referred into literature as passive overconsumption meaning this wasn't done purposely, this is just a drive to eat. And sometimes you don't even realize because like I said, a lot of people eat mindlessly, or they eat distracted, or they're busy. So they don't even realize that he took down, you know, 800 calories in a meal instead of 400 calories. So really, when it comes down to it, I often have these conversations with clients, especially when they're getting leaner and really have to get down to the brass tacks. And we say that although you can eat whatever you want, so I'm not trying to put like this pink elephant in the room, or this dichotomous relationship with food. I'm always like, listen, although you can eat whatever you want, and lose fat isn't realistic once you get leaner. So just because a food fits your macro targets, doesn't mean that you should try fitting it in, especially on a daily basis. Because if you constantly include and expose yourself to higher plateau, playability foods, you're going to need to use more willpower, you're going to need to use more discipline and a lot of more mental currency to try to not over consume them. So you're in this constant battle with yourself, you're really hungry. And now you're putting yourself in a situation. It's almost like, you know, negative exposure therapy, essentially, where you're kind of just torturing yourself. It's almost like if you had a temptation food that you always need to binge on, like utilizing that in a diet. It just makes no sense to me. And this is why I find that a great way to mitigate the situation is you simple satiating and less palatable food services, which include more whole and unprocessed foods to be really beneficial during a diet as they provide more fullness per calorie, yet less calories per serving. And they also don't inherently drive up our appetite so that we want to eat more of them, like hyperplasia and processed foods do so to manage hunger throughout the course of a diet. I'll often lower the palatability of the foods I'm eating as hyper palatable. Ultra processed foods are less satiating per calorie first and foremost. And they also have been shown to drive up this passive overconsumption, which is why we're more likely to overeat on them. And this is where I've really found sticking with minimally processed Whole Foods to be highly beneficial for both myself and clients, especially as we get leaner. Because these are going to provide us with more satiety per calorie, they're going to help us feel fuller for longer, while eating less calories and being in a deficit and they also help me managing our calorie budget more effectively as they're easier to moderate or consumptions of. So generally, the advice that I give to clients and I would even give to anyone that asked me for this type of advice is if your goal is to lose a significant amount of body fat aim for especially as you get leaner, eat for satiating, yet, you know, simple yet satiating foods, that suit your goals can fit their calorie budget, to help manage that budget like you would your bank account. So I'll tell you how I go about this, because I do do these financial analogies a lot. And it's something that I realized that it often speaks to people and it kind of sticks with them when I look at it like this. So this is personally how I go through my own fat loss phase. So we discussed some of my fat loss failures, but then also my successes. This is the mindset that I've utilized towards that loss that has made me successful up into this point. And so how I personally look at this one I'm constructing my own fat loss diet is my total daily energy expenditure determines and dictates my calorie budget. So how much I'm moving and how much my basal metabolic rate and all these other components of my total daily energy expenditure, that is what dictates how many calories I can eat, and still afford to lose weight. And I need to manage my calorie intake like I do my financial budget. And to do so I weigh the calorie costs of each food choice in terms of the satiety provides and the calories it contains, and then make choices that most closely aligned with my goals and my budget, because in order to improve your body composition, you need to make sure the food you choose fit your budget as your choices can either make or break the bank. And we also want to look at like the difference between hyper palatable foods and food processing and all these different levels of things. We have great data that shows the vastly different effects that the two have. So we have, you know, metabolic Ward research from Dr. Kevin Hall that specifically looks at the different effects of diets containing either mentally process Whole Foods versus a diet of ultra processed foods on body composition. And this study found that when they provided participants with meals that were matched for calories, and they match all the macros, so we're talking protein, fiber, carbs, and fat. And then they allowed clients eat to fullness, these individuals ate an average of 500 calories more per day when their meals were comprised and made up of processed foods as compared to when their meals were simple and made up of whole foods. So when they were on the ultra processed IBS, they naturally over consumed calories and green fat. Whereas when they were on the minimally processed whole foods diet, eat 500 calories less per day and lost body fat without even purposely trying to do so. And what's really interesting about this study is that they looked at the satiety levels, and they asked, you know, individuals to subjectively and objectively measured these different levels of appetite and satiety. And they found that they had the same level of, you know, satiety and fullness, however, it took 500 more calories per day, to reach that same amount of fullness with the processed diet, as it did the whole foods diet, which shows how less satiating these ultra processed foods are, as you know, compared to Whole Foods, and why we're more likely. And so, you know, it happens so common that we overeat them. So, you know, one cookie turns into a dozen, you know, all these things, it's like a downstream spiral. So it's important to be more intentional. And also, when you approach that last item to be really informed, but also intentional about the food choices and the selections you make.

Philip Pape 46:47

We can we can take that entire clip brand. And that will literally give you everything you need to know about why you're making these choices during fat loss. And you don't want to mention that it's, quote unquote, healthier, good, bad, you know, all the traditional tropes of these things that, you know, make people think that they have to make a moral choice rather than something that's in line with their physiology. I mean, I took so many notes, and I've heard all these in bits and pieces before but the way you put it together, how Whole Foods versus processed foods stack, the benefits stack on top of them on top of each other time. And again, when you talk about the fact that we get fuller, right, and we will eat to our natural fullness, the how fiber helps with this as well. The, you know, you said having the salad every day again, that salad I was also thinking about fruit when he talked about cravings and you know, fruits this off limit thing for some people, it's kind of insane, you know, in the fitness industry, but I'll tell you what I want to fat loss phase, man, give me the sweet cherries, give me the bananas give me the blueberries. And it's like almost like eating, you know, highly palatable food that's actually not. So

Brandon DaCruz 47:49

I really actually want to hit on that because a lot of times when I do discuss this with clients, or I've done presentations on palatability and modulating and modifying the palatability of food sources, sometimes people are like, Man, why would I want to switch from like all these tasty foods to plain foods. And here's the thing, we have to view things, we have to stop viewing things. dichotomously foods are not good and bad, tasty and disgusting, you know, gray and bland. Like we have to stop looking at it like that. First of all, we're blessed to be able to pursue a goal like that well. So this is a choice that you made, no one has forced you pressured you nothing. This is an active choice that you've made to better your body composition, better your physique, better your metabolic health, there's so many downstream benefits of fat loss sighting that go from the physiology to also the psychology. So a better, you know, body image, a better confidence level, you know, feeling better about yourself, just feeling better in your clothes, how you feel around your family, really impacting people around you, whether it be your children or your spouse, whatever it may be, there's so many positive benefits. And if you weren't in the privileged position where you could pay and hire a coach to help you get to your goal, you are one of the very fortunate individuals out there. So I always want to make this apparent. I always tell clients about this, especially when I have someone that has had a really tumultuous relationship with dieting in the past, they've been through chronic dieting cycles, where they feel like a failure, and they feel like they're just going to compete. Continue to repeat their mistakes in the past, I always tell them listen, this is a fresh start. Just like for instance, if you were to slip off your diet, you're always just and I want people to really understand this and I'll say it twice if I need to. You're always one meal away from being back on track, you are always one meal away from being back on track. If you slip up, don't just say f it. Just like if you had a flat tire in your car, you wouldn't slash all other three tires. Because of that incidence, you would you know, hopefully what you would do is call someone or you'd replace that tire and you keep it moving. And so really when it comes down to it, we shouldn't look at these things through this dichotomous relationship. You know, this rigid restraint mindset where we look at things as black and white good or bad on diet off diet. We should look at these things as shades of gray This is a spectrum so what I talked about with palatability meaning you went from a building phase where you were hypo or hyper caloric you were eating in a surplus you have more than enough energy availability, good sufficient amount of calories and probably by the end of it, you're at your highest body fat point first and foremost, you're also your leptin is high your ghrelin is really low. You probably have no appetite like your it's almost like a tree For to get these nails down. And we've all been there that have really pushed ourselves for muscle growth, where we've really had to push calories for a prolonged period of time, then you go into a dieting phase. And as we get leaner and leaner and our calories go down, we just make better food choices. We make simple food swaps, we switch to more, you know, whole foods that are going to micronutrient dense, because remember, when you're in a calorie deficit, you're more susceptible to micronutrient deficiencies, because by proxy, if you went from eating 2500 calories, and now you have the 2000, we're now you know, you're three months into a diet and you're at 17 or 1800 calories, you have lost a considerable amount of your calorie budget and also your micronutrient budget. So let's make every single calorie count. And really, when I say that, I mean that from a satiety perspective, a fullness perspective and enjoyment perspective, you know, making this from an adherence perspective, but also from a micronutrient density perspective is really, I do a lot of expensive blood work with clientele. And I have a lot of people come to me that I can't even express how many times I have, especially females come to me, that has many nutrient deficiencies, I do a full analysis on micronutrient profiles when someone comes to me and does a consultation and decides that they want to onboard with coaching with me, and I'll tell you, I've been a coach for 10 years. And I will say that maybe one out of 100 clients that new clients that comes to me, in the course of the year does not have inherent micronutrient deficiencies from a lack of food quality from a lack of supplementation from you know, lifestyle, especially if you're a chronic Dieter, but this is especially susceptible when you are in a fabulous space. And here's the thing. For instance, if you had your a deficiency of three cofactors, let's look at selenium, iodine, and zinc, those were all down regulate thyroid production. But if we look into literature on those with full thyroid hormone, it can decrease your basal metabolic rate, which accounts for 50 to 60% of the calories you expend per day, a low thyroid level. So clinical hypothyroidism can decrease your BMR in the literature by up to 25%. That does not mean that every single person that's hypothyroid sees a 25% decrease in their total daily energy expenditure. But you have up to that. So let's look at it from this component. If BMR makes up 60% of your total daily energy expenditure, and now you have a 25% decrease, that means your total daily energy expenditure is decreased by 15%, because of multiple inherent problems, and one of the many reasons that I see that people come up on lab work as being hypothyroid is because of nutrient deficiencies, high stress and chronic dieting. So these are things we have to work on. On the back end, we have to be very intentional, you know, this industry, it's really interesting. This industry has gotten so into macros and calories that we've neglected everything else. And really, if you're a nutrition coach, or you're a nutrition professional, we need to speak about nutrition because people don't eat macros. They don't calories, the food. And so we need to talk about food quality, food choice, food selection, really educate people. And that's where I really tried to take this modifying palatability approach because I want to leverage these different tools to be able to set people up for success. And here's the thing, the reason I do it almost in like a descending curve is the leaner, you get the hungry, get the leaner you get, the more your appetite goes up, when you get them, the longer you've been on a diet. So the more diet fatigue you have, the more mental currency has been drained, more willpower that you're lacking. So we need to employ different strategies towards the tail end of the diets a ensure that when you're at your hungriest, we're utilizing strategies that are going to ensure that you're as full as possible. Now hunger is an inherent part of dieting, so I'm never going to tell someone, you're never gonna experience hunger because honestly, if you're in an energy deficit, and you're liberating, and oxidizing body fat, that's, that's just par for the course, we're all gonna experience hunger, but it's about making these, this approach as minimal as possible. And when is that most essential, it's not only during the beginning, it's also towards the end, where you're at your highest susceptibility to just veering off the rails and falling off. And that's why a lot of people, they start that while sights, but they never actually get to their goal. So we see that in the literature, that seven out of eight individuals that go on a diet will lose weight, that doesn't mean they hit their weight loss goal, but they will lose a significant amount of body weight. So around 86% of individuals that go on a diet will lose weight. Now here's the thing, when we look at the diet recidivism rates, we see that within three years of having died, most people 95% 90 to 95% of people will have regained all that weight they lost. For more we see, you know in terms of or more, we look at 33 to 66%. However, let's look at the dieting rates per year. So if you actually look at the dieting rates per year, in westernized countries, industrialized countries like US, UK, Canada, we see that between 42 to 63% of the population reports going on a diet every single year. These are the same individuals going on a diet every single year to lose weight. And why is it so on is happening so constantly and so repetitively because a lot of people Yes, they'll lose a couple pounds, but then they regain it, they go through these the cyclical fashion, they never get to their goal. So really what I'm trying to do is utilize methods, I'm doing educate clients, I'm utilizing things that are going to help them in that moment and through that phase, so that they can get to their goal and we could utilize that 12 to 16 weeks phase to get them to their fat loss goal, get them lean and then focus our other time on recovering from the diet, maintaining living to learn it maintenance and then focusing on building muscle and going into a state of abundance in terms of energy availability, focusing on fueling our training and getting out of this mindset. They always have to be in a energy deficit you always have to be in fat loss it because so many people look at fat loss as like this permanent state this permanent phase. That's all they do because they never get to the goal. So really what I tried to do is set my clients For Success, which is why I never put a client right into a fat loss phase, we always go through a primer phase verse, you know, I believe the healthy bodies responsibility. And that's the way the method that I used to get there. So I set them up for success at the start, then we go on to say their, their goal is fat loss. And we've done our lab work, we've seen all their physiological markers or psychological markers, they're in a great place, we've eaten sufficient calories for an extended period of time, they've been out of a deficit for a prolonged period of time, we've reversed any negative metabolic and hormonal adaptations, as you may have seen from previous sites before coming to me, then we go into a deficit we're trying to get in and we're trying to get out, that doesn't mean Rapid Fat Loss, what that means is effective fat loss, meaning 1216 20 weeks, whatever your goal necessitates. Let's get in. And then let's get out. And let's focus on recovery, getting back to maintenance, reversing these metabolic adaptations, and then going into a state where we're focusing on performance, and fueling your training performance, which is really going to drive your body composition progress moving forward, so that the next time you do die, see that's a year down the road, or 1618 months down the road, you're going to be a better version of yourself, because the next time you get leaner, you're going to be more muscular, you're gonna have much better habits, you're gonna have been out of a state of being in a deficit. And in the state of both physical and mental restriction, we're now you're looking forward to it. Because I'll tell you, there's been so many times that a female has come to me and has done diet after diet after diet, and to get them into a state, a mindset of abundance. So we're doing the high energy flex model, they're moving more, they're eating more, they're getting used to the fact that they can maintain their body weight on much higher calories, you know, then we go into a fat loss phase, we get them lean, but then we focus the next year on building muscle. And the next time that they go to the diet, they fear they face for less challenges, because they haven't been in this restricted state all year. So it's not like they're feeling like they're the first week of the diet, they're already like in hell, or they're in Purgatory, because they've spent so much time in a state of being in a surplus. And so it's almost like something that they're encouraged to do as well as they're, they're really excited to get into a deficit, because you're like, listen, you've been pounding food down my throat, this whole phase, I really want to get into a state where like, I'm, you know, I'm not feeling full all the time, I just kind of want to feel light on my feet and like, then you're looking forward to these things. And that's really where I'm taking a phased approach and utilizing nutritional periodization, going from one phase to another, making sure each phase is as effective as possible. And the same thing applies. So the palatability of foods, I'm lowering them throughout the course of that last night, however, then when we get out of there, and we get into a state of abundance, and I've gotten you back to maintenance calories, and we've reversed a lot of the metabolic adaptations, we can start increasing availability. And so it's never a permanent thing. This is a transient state, just like metabolic adaptation, a lot of people look at this as metabolic damage, which has been disproven 10 out of 10 times in the literature. However, these things that you face the situations, you go through the fact that you have to, you know, sustain an energy deficit, that's a temporary state, and no, we should, it should be a temporary state to get your goal. And then we focus on maintaining that by utilizing more sustainable habits going forward.

Philip Pape 57:41

And your energy is so passionate about this brand. And I couldn't agree more with everything. But what I really love about this is, even when you talk about being in that energy deficit, even when you talk about food choices, it's really keeping you in the highest energy state you can be getting through the diet with without having to constantly interrupt it, maybe take breaks, refeeds, whatever, potentially, and getting it over with and I agree, like if you can build for most of the year and get support, you're taking these mini cuts, and it's hardly a blip in your life, that that's where people want to be regarding the palatability and all that. I think you talked about body composition and the overpass of overconsumption. I think recently, you also talked about how thermic effect of feeding could be higher. And you just mentioned how nutrient deficiency could cause a reduction in expenditure. So these are all really good things for people to think about how just the food choices could make it easier to diet. Besides the hunger and the satiety, which is awesome. I want to respect your time. I know we're bottom of the hour, we probably have to wrap up Do you have a few minutes, let's you know

Brandon DaCruz 58:45

what let's do the principles to track I know that that will probably tie us up in a really good situation.

Philip Pape 58:49

Let's finish principles of tracking. Let's do it. Alright.

Brandon DaCruz 58:53

So I'm a big believer that what isn't measured and tracked isn't managed as well and manipulated to truly yield optimal body composition progress, especially when we're in a fat loss phase where it's really challenging to induce and maintain an energy deficit when we aren't tracking. So a few principal areas that I like to have clients track are their food intake, your body weight, your step count, other sleep and our stress levels. So we really have to realize and I often say this to clients, because I have a lot of people come to me and they've never tracked in their lives. And I know that they're a little bit I guess averse to it or you know, it's really an introduction, I always try to meet people where they're at, but I always remind them listen, whether we count calories or not, they always count. So regardless, if you count your calories, they still count. But if you've never tracked your calories, you're gonna have very limited awareness around the calorie density like we just discussed previously how important that is, you know that very little awareness around the calorie density of foods, which can lead you to making food choices that don't align with your calorie budget and your goals. Which is why the most effective way for most individuals to improve their body composition is by real body composition by losing fat gaining muscle or recapping this attractor dietary intake. So that's the first fundamental component that if I'm gonna have someone track, the first thing we're looking at is food intake, because that's really where I find a lot of bottlenecks in the system. You know, someone might have some issues with training, but it's not like it only is inherently coming down to the fact that they don't log your lifts like yes, logging your and tracking your lifts can really go a long way. But often what I noticed is, I have a lot of individuals that are advanced trainees that are intermediate or to death, they've been training a long period of time. So they track their lives, and they have all these spreadsheets, but they've never tracked your calories and macros. And so that's really where I try to introduce them to this, especially when it comes to a fat loss phase. And really, when it comes to tracking, you know, we want to know what's in the food you're eating from a macro and calorie perspective so that you can account for it, and to see if your dietary approach is getting you closer or further away from your physical. Also, another reason why we should track is because intuitively, our brain doesn't know how many calories we've eaten a meal. And this is because satiety is delayed sensation. And it takes different nutrients, different amounts of time to digest and send satiety signals to the brain to tell us to terminate a meal. And really when it comes down to it or stomach since food weight and food volume, not calories. So if you don't make a meal, say you know high energy dense meals, so say we do like something like a sandwich, we do a peanut butter and jelly. So we have bread, we have peanut butter, and we have jelly, it's going to take much more calories from a PB and J to get hold them from a whole food meal that consists of something like chicken breasts and sweet potato. And this is because our stomach or you know, our stomachs have gastric stretch receptors that sends pressure when we eat. And when these receptors sense a lot of food volume and stretch, they send a signal to our brain that we've eaten enough and are full. And the great thing is there's a lot of low energy density foods that provide a ton of food volume for a low amount of calories, which allows us to get a lot of satiety per calorie or fullness per calorie. And these include these food sources include things like your vegetables and your fruits, especially those with a high water content like your salads. And even like we were talking about BERRIES BERRIES are perfect strawberries a great option for high no low energy density, high volume foods. So if you include more of these low energy density food items into your diet, you'll naturally eat less calories than if you eat highly processed energy dense food items that can override our hunger and satiety signals. Just like we saw on the Kevin Hall study when they eat processed foods, it just overrode their natural ad libitum eating habits where they eat 500 calories per day more per day. And so when it comes to tracking food intake, there are a lot of you know, a ton of benefits, spending at least a significant amount of time learning how to track can provide us with such as the fact that tracking improves our awareness around what you're eating and your habits and behaviors around food. This is really important from like on mindfulness perspective, because a lot of people they have like these mindless habits where they have, you know, tastes, looks, the bites looks and tastes and little things that they don't even realize unless they're tracking things. And that's where they really say, oh, Brandon, you know, I didn't even realize how many times I just took a scoop of peanut butter or Aida a handful nuts or I took a snack in the kitchen or I eat my kids chicken nuggets like the rest that were on the plate. So you know, it teaches us about the calories the macros and micros different foods provide, it also allows us to discover what foods are higher or lower in calories and what macros they provide. And it helps us determine what foods are more or less conducive for your current goals, which is extremely helpful when trying to lose or maintain weight. And another aspect of tracking that a lot of people don't hit on a lot of times, you know, there's this dichotomous relationship with tracking where a lot of people within like the intuitive eating space essentially are adverse people that are non dieting, you know, he's moving and stuff someone's gonna say, you know, tracking or dieting, it causes disordered eating. First of all, we don't see that in literature, if you do not have a predisposition or an existing eating disorder, we do not see tracking, increasing your likelihood of experiencing that. And there's clinical trials and, and very rigorous data that has looked at that if you are someone that is dealing and currently has a clinically diagnosed eating disorder, then tracking could exacerbate that. Those are two different things. When we're talking about clinical pathologies and normal physiology, they're two separate entities and we really have to be able to differentiate and not pull data from one and then try to apply it to another. And this is something I'm really big on. You know, oftentimes I speak about research, but if I'm talking about a female specific topic, I'm only looking at research that was done on females, I'm not taking it from male data and a pie into a female because they have a different physiology. So we really have to be intentional with the information that we provide. But we have to realize that often, you know, I actually find people develop a better relationship with food, when they're able to track and become aware of what's in their food. And this is the reason why I felt the thing is a lot of people had only what they've heard from pop culture from the media, they look at foods as black and white. These are good foods and bad foods, they know nothing about nutrition, but they they know about these demonized seed oils, or they know about you know, you know, artificial sweeteners or sugar or, or fruit like you said, like fructose of the devil, and they feel that they cannot eat these food sources. And they, you know, essentially exclude those from their diets. And they have these really, you know, highly, you know, for instance, we'll have people that come to me all the time, they've never tried a macro or calorie in their life, but they're, you know, they're gluten free or dairy free or free. They're sugar free, every free that you could think of, but they haven't been able to attain their goals and they're living a extremely restricted lifestyle and have a poor relationship with food. They have a very limited food list that they can work off when I get them to track and I show them what's in food, the benefits of different food sources, and it's not that you have to eat everything you have to Know that you can eat pretty much anything unless it's the only thing. I don't demonize any food on this earth, except for trans fats, because there's enough clinical data that shows cardiovascular disease risk, just from a 3% intake of stock, you know, trans fat. So

Philip Pape 1:05:12

that's the only thing that will be nice. But besides that, it's all par for the sport and for the most part anyway, exactly. And

Brandon DaCruz 1:05:17

so when it comes down to tracking, that's one thing that I really like having people do. And then from there, you know, other than having them track their diet, I liked doing scale, we and I know that's another controversial topic. But there's a very specific reason that you're not

Philip Pape 1:05:27

on here, right and not on here, your listeners are all on board.

Brandon DaCruz 1:05:31

Perfect. So you know, you know, this is something that I have most clients track and take multiple times per week, and even up to daily, as this is a great tool for a determine a client's energy down status. So whether they're in deficit, threat maintenance, or they're under surplus, and it's a great awareness tool over habits and behaviors around nutrition activity levels, which can help us determine if we're moving closer or further away from our face specific goals that we're working towards. And self monitoring techniques, like frequent weights have been shown in the vast majority of literature to lead to better weight loss outcomes, as well as greater success with weight loss maintenance. So it's a habit that increases that awareness. If you see your your weight ticking up and trajectory going up, it's something that can easily help you reel back in your habits are making certain adjustments to realize, hey, maybe I'm over consuming things, or maybe I've been a little bit too loose with my diet, let me clean things up. So I can get back to a weight stable or weight maintenance threshold, you know, what's comfortable for me, where I feel good, I'm healthy, and it's within my goals, you know, subset, essentially, then another

Philip Pape 1:06:28

frequent word is important that you said, it's not just random every once every few weeks or something.

Brandon DaCruz 1:06:33

No, it's actually the meta analysis that we have on this, we have several of them wing has an incredible meta analysis on this, this is she's looking at daily weighing, or at least multiple times a week. And here's the thing. So when you actually look at successful habits, weight loss dieters, we have, you know, information from the National Weight Control Registry that shows us we have wing is one of the researchers that has done an immense amount about successful weight loss, and then weight loss maintenance. She's also the person that came to the industry with diet breaks. So she was the first person to ever, you know, introduce diet breaks to the industry in 2003, with her wing and Jeffrey steady. So just a little, you know, food for thought or just like a little A fun fact about wing, but she's done incredible research. And what she has shown is there's this discrepancy, or there's relationship between vein frequency and weight loss outcomes and weight loss maintenance success. So what the she her research has shown the meta analysis she's done, and the systematic reviews on the literature has found is that when people go during a fat loss diet, and they weigh in more frequently, they're more successful with their weight loss. When they maintain those habits, they're more successful with weight loss maintenance. However, when someone decreases their frequency of self monitoring habits, like self weight, like food tracking, physical activity levels, so at that point in the literature, they weren't really utilizing step count, but it was like minutes per week, when they decrease any of those three aspects of self monitoring techniques or tools, they see a regression, meaning that they're regaining more weight than those who have maintained and sustained the habits that got them there. So really what it comes down to and weight loss maintenance, a lot of people know, they see that the statistics of weight regain are so high, but it's really about maintaining a lot of the habits, and making them and putting them as a component of your new lifestyle. So it's not that you stay in an energy deficit, we increase your food intake. Absolutely right. Outside of the deficit, we're done with the fat loss phase, let's get right back to maintenance. However, let's maintain a lot of the positive habits that lead you to success. So that's things like monitoring your food intake, weighing your foods, tracking your food intake, doing nutritional habits, even if it's stuff like listen, you're not going to track every single meal, let's make sure we get an adequate amount of protein with every single meal, let's make sure that we have a sufficient amount of fiber per day. So when we really look at it, statistically, Americans reading between 11 to 18 grams of fiber per day, if we actually looked at nutritional overseeing bodies, the recommend 30 to 35 grams per day. So really, we're getting 1/3 to one half the amount of fiber we ship per day. So vast majority of individuals are clinically they're essentially deficient or insufficient in fiber intake. And actually, fiber is one of the four nutrients of concern that the US has put out in governing bodies and guidelines that this is something we have to pay attention to. So these are just little simple things, making sure that you hit a vegetable and fruit minimum per day. All these little habits are things that we can track, even just habits and this is something that sometimes I have clients that are super busy, or they're not a data type of individual and I have a lot of work with a lot of professionals. A lot of business professionals love it guys, things like that. They love the data tracking, but then I have your busy household mother that doesn't like that. So I had to do it have a checklist, where it's protein intake per day reading three to four servings of a sufficient bolus of protein, we're making sure to get either a fruit or vegetable with each and every single meal. We're eating mostly Whole Foods, we're going on post mill walks, you know, we're we're taking you know, a certain minimum amount of supplements like vitamin D things that they're deficient. And so these are we can really scale up the amount of things we track but it doesn't have to be like all or nothing. It doesn't have to be like I track things or I don't track anything at all. It can be expectrum Essentially, this the shades of grey. Another component that I'm going to track and this is because I am such an advocate of the high energy flux lifestyle is I track you especially with clients whose goal is to lose body fat I'm going to track you know their daily step count as a proxy for me and their overall off his activity levels. And this is because being a deficit causes an unintentional and subconscious reduction in our NEET levels. And this is a natural part of the processes. It's one of the many defense systems and mechanisms that our body has in place to reduce our energy expenditure exactly during a deficit, it's trying to conserve energy. So it's going to do that in any single way. However, the the insidious thing about me is that this reduction happens subconsciously. So often, you won't even notice that you're burning less calories per day throughout the process of dieting. So reductions in meat are generally proportional to the amount of energy deficit you put yourself in. So the larger the calorie deficit you create in your diet, the less you'll move as a result of putting less energy in the system. So we have to realize that energy intake and energy expenditure are intrinsically tied. So as energy intake goes down. So it is your energy expenditure. So we have to offset that in some type of capacity. And so there are a couple of ways to combat this. First, I want people to track so through aware of they're aware and conscious of their daily activity levels. But also I like to intentionally increase movement activity, seeing as the amount of subconscious movement you're doing sucks, you're fidgeting, you're standing, you're walking, you're blinking is going to be reduced. So let's offset that by making sure that you're moving around a sufficient amount. And then the last kind of component that I track with all clients is there sleep and stress levels, both through objective and subjective ways based on the client that I'm working with. So sometimes I'll have been tracking reporting their sleep quality and sleep quality, as measured through a device like aura, which gives us more objective readings. But then sometimes I have someone that doesn't do well with data tracking. So we always have to, you know, fit the methods. So I had many checking sheets that it's really going towards, you know, it's not a one size fits all, not everyone's getting the same check in form. For me, it's really based on the individual themselves. So sometimes I have an individual they don't do well, without a tracking. There's actually something in the clinical research or literature called ortho Samia, which is where people actually inhibit their sleep quality because they're so worried about getting insufficiency. So it's, it's almost like orthorexia, or any of these these issues, anything with ortho in front of it, is they're becoming obsessive about the quality. So it actually inhibits these things. So tracking that with an individual like that, that's really worried about sleep quality would actually be a negative, it would do the opposite. So in that case, I'll simply have them report on a scale from one to 10, how well they believe they've been sleeping, and how they feel in terms of energy levels, and how rest and refresh they feel when waking up. And it also really believed that we can't separate our psychology from our physiology. So I tend to ask a lot of lifestyle questions from clients. And I try to build a very like open and honest line of communication between the two of us, I really think that coaching is a relationship. This is a friendship that we've we've garnered together that we've built up and it's really something that I like to get this open line of communication around, especially around their stress levels, as oftentimes just looking at some objective markers, like their calorie intake, or their skill weight, or their training performance doesn't show us the full picture of what's really going on. So I really feel that one of my main roles as a coach is to be a detective, and to dig in deeper to peel back the layers of the onion, to find out some of the bottlenecks and some of the anchors in a client's life that go far beyond just what they're doing in the gym or in the kitchen, that could be potentially causing a slowing in the rate of fat loss progress, or a plateau and fat loss. So if I didn't have these conversations, maybe I would always think And dude, I've been doing this 10 years, I definitely don't have this, this, this mindset at this point. But often, if we only looked at the spreadsheets, if I only looked at scale weight, or calorie intake, and things like their pictures and just objective markers, if I only looked at the data, as it was without really considering the individual client that I was working with, maybe I would think, Alright, they sold this week, it could be metabolic adaptation, it could be a lack of adherence, let's just slash the calories even more, let's bring down the macros like, you know, make these adjustments. It's just this, this excellent knows of calories and macros and you know, training sets and reps. Instead, I really need to dig in deeper to the person that they're dealing with stress issues, if we're seeing stress and you support, you know, cortisol return card, cortisol induced water retention, if I'm seeing that they have really hectic life, so maybe it's time that maybe physiologically they've only been dieting for three or four weeks, they don't need a diet break. But psychologically, they do need it. So we have to consider both sides of the equation and really realize we're working with humans. This isn't just data analysis. This isn't just data collection, and just spitting things out like an algorithm, which is why I really think that things like aI coaching and chat GBT and all these different things, they're going to be revolutionary for a lot of industries. But really, when it comes down to coaching, this goes for like quality coaching goes far beyond the X's and O's of just nutrition in terms of calories and macros. And in terms of training with sets and reps, this is about digging deeper getting to know someone really customizing your approach to that individual that you're working with. And really being a guide in your life and looking not only to help them make physique transformations, but lifestyle transformation. And that's something that no AI device, no app, no chat GPT is ever going to replace us for.

Philip Pape 1:14:31

That is so true. And it's like you could have an entire huge Encyclopedia of all of this data that you just talked about. We can have the exact answers for every possible scenario and no matter what you do, the human body and the psyche are so complex, and knowing that person and having that relationship with them in the compassion and understanding and listening, active listening, so important to say, You know what, over this, this other thing has been happening in your life. It's not reflected in the numbers, but it's causing something downstream. And I get what it is. So let's understand it together. Man, this is so awesome because you just peel back every layer and people listening just have a ton to go with. So I'm gonna probably be touching on multiple, multiple of these concepts in the future. Brandon, I always learned something talking to you. Is there any last thing you want to say? Or if not, you just let listeners know what you're up to now and where they can find you.

Brandon DaCruz 1:15:20

Absolutely my man. As always, I first and foremost want to say that I'm very appreciative to be on your show, I always appreciate the invite to share information, and really provide a positive impact on this industry. When I got into this when I started in the actual fitness industry 14 years ago, and I remember where it was at. And always my intention with everything that I've done, since the beginning of my career, I've always lead with integrity lead with a real drive and purpose and passion. But also my intention within everything that I do is that I'm going to leave this industry better than I found it. And when I find individuals like yourself, that that seem like motivation and drive and passion, I really only respect and I know that recently I had reached out to you and just commended you on that. You're doing an incredible job with the podcasts, you're building things, you're really putting out great information. I respect that first and foremost. And also, I kind of mentioned to you off air, that we're one of the good guys in the industry, we're one of the few and this industry is getting saturated, but unfortunately, it's not saturated with great individuals. So if we're able to just align with ourselves in terms of a group where we're able to share evidence based information, but also experience anecdote like real, like client led coaching, and what we've learned in the trenches, it's going to help this industry as a whole. So I have an immense amount of respect for you for your show. And I'm appreciated beyond here. For anyone out in the audience. If you guys liked this podcast or you're interested in any other further information, please be sure to check out my own podcast which is the chasing clarity health and fitness podcast available on Spotify, iTunes, or even YouTube. Then also find me on Instagram I post daily content literally I'm someone I'm Mister consistency, so I would not miss an educational post one day since 2017. So you will find you know, an immense amount of posts and always like things like this will be on there. I'm constantly sharing podcasts that I'm on, you know, whether it be a guest or even things that I do on my own. And so that is going to be on Instagram at Brandon Cruz underscore and if anyone has any inquiries, questions or any you know things that they want to follow up with, feel free to reach out to me on my private email, which is betta Kristin is@gmail.com

Philip Pape 1:17:10

And your and your podcast Jason clarity for anybody listening, definitely follow it and listen all the way through because there's gonna be something you learn every time every time so definitely check it out. Put the idea put the email in there. I really appreciate the words about me that you just said Brandon that that means a lot. I appreciate it and look up to you and all the guys in the industry like that. I agree. We all want to line good guys unite and women and help each other out. So thank you so much for being on the show. It's a pleasure.

Brandon DaCruz 1:17:37

Absolutely, man. We'll be happy to be back whenever you want to happen. Absolutely.

Philip Pape 1:17:41

Thank you. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights. Please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong.

Philip Pape 8/22/23 Philip Pape 8/22/23

Ep 98: Is Your Food Logging App Sabotaging Your Fat Loss and Physique Goals?

I'll discuss the importance of food logging, what the science says, and why most food logging apps fail, not just in features and usability but also because they are not based on body composition science, don't adjust to you and your goals, and encourage an all-or-nothing approach that leads to failure every time you use them.

Today, we are going to explore the value of using a food logging app as a tool to serve you in reaching your health and physique goals, and how many people hate the idea of food tracking because most apps completely fail in this mission.

I'll discuss the importance of food logging, what the science says, and why most food logging apps fail, not just in features and usability but also because they are not based on body composition science, don't adjust to you and your goals, and encourage an all-or-nothing approach that leads to failure every time you use them.

I'll then talk about MacroFactor, the food-logging app that changed my life and helped me transform faster and more successfully than I imagined possible. I think MacroFactor is the only app that fills the gaps in other apps because it was built from a different perspective by nutrition and physique scientists.

I've used it since it launched, all my clients use it, and in full disclosure, I'm an affiliate because I recommend it to everyone who wants to attain their goals quickly and easily. To find out why it's a cut above the rest, make sure to listen to the whole episode.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
__________

Today you’ll learn all about:

[3:32] Why you should track your food intake
[7:09] The areas where tracking apps fall short
[13:50] How MacroFactor changed my life
[23:38] Easy food logging with MacroFactor
[26:30] The app is fast and requires fewer taps to use
[29:10] True weight trend with the weight trend algorithm
[31:37] Metabolism tracking with the expenditure algorithm
[36:33] Dynamic adjustments based on your data
[38:06] Full macronutrient tracking, including targets
[39:37] How MacroFactor creates a positive feedback loop
[41:13] Other features worth mentioning
[43:30] Why a nutrition coach would recommend MacroFactor
[47:36] Outro

Episode resources:

MacroFactor app – use code WITSANDWEIGHTS to extend your free trial
Ep 78: Stress-Free Macro Tracking, Nerding Out on Metabolism, and Fitness Science with Greg Nuckols
Ep 95: How Carol Lost 20 Pounds and 14% Body Fat, Set a Lifting PR, and Gained Food Freedom in Her 40s

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https://witsandweights.com/free-call

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Transcript

Philip Pape 00:00

It's the psychology of dieting, and how these apps do everything in their power to make you feel terrible. When you don't hit a goal. Tell me tell me I'm wrong. Tell me this isn't your experience. Because if you've ever had an app that doesn't do that, it's it's doing something right. Even if you're a calorie over on some of these apps, you'll get a warning or notification, a red indicator, you'll get something that says it's bad. And so this, there's this moral choice, it's good or bad. And then you end up feeling guilt, or you end up feeling like you failed, and then you start lying to yourself in line in the app.

Philip Pape 00:36

Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host, Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry, so you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits & Weights community Welcome to another solo episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. I hope you enjoyed our last episode 97 where I talked with di Manuel about the importance of fun in fitness, challenging yourself to reach new heights in your life, how to recognize self sabotage and challenge your past beliefs and how to find your optimal in your fitness journey and in life. Today for episode 98 Is your food blogging app sabotaging your fat loss and physique goals, we are going to explore the value of using a food logging app as a tool as a tool to serve you in reaching your health and physique goals. And how many people hate the idea of food tracking because most apps completely fail in this mission. I'll go over the importance of food logging in general, what the science says and where the vast majority of food logging apps fall short, not just with their features, and usability. I know it's fun to talk about that stuff. But more importantly, because they're not based on body composition, science, they don't adjust to you, they don't adjust your goals. And worst of all, they feed into an all or nothing approach that leads to failure every time you use them. Then I'll talk about a food logging app called macro factor that completely changed my life, and allowed me to go through a personal transformation more quickly and successfully than I thought possible. In my opinion, macro factor is the only app on the market that I've ever found, that addresses the gaping holes with other apps, and was designed from a completely different perspective by people who understand nutrition and physique science. So I've been a user since it launched, all my clients use it. And in full disclosure, and I'm proud to say this, I'm also an affiliate, because I endorse it wholeheartedly for anyone who wants to reach their goals with as little fuss or wasted time as possible. I'll explain exactly why it's a completely different experience in the episode. So make sure to listen all the way through to get those details. If you're impatient to try it out right now if I'm already kind of selling it up for you, and you want to see what it's all about. Pause right now before we get into the details of the episode, so you can download the app look for macro factor. And then if you want to support me in the show, use my code Wits & Weights to get an extra week on your free trial. Just search for macro factor in your app store, or click the link in my show notes and then use affiliate code Wits & Weights when you sign up for the free trial. Okay, let's jump into today's topic is your food logging app, sabotaging your fat loss and physique goals. I want to start with why we track at all and the importance of tracking now I didn't look up the episode number before but I did do an episode A while back, called why you should track your food, something like that. So you can find it. But I go over that in great detail I wanted to cover on the major points here. So the first point is that the evidence is clear that those who track their food intake are more likely to achieve and maintain their goals. Usually these are in the context of weight loss because that is where most people struggle, you know that I like to use the term fat loss because we don't just lose weight, we also train to hold on to muscle and thus improve our body composition and our physique. But nonetheless, part of the equation is losing body mass losing weight. And there are definitely some myths and misconceptions that tracking is can cause some sort of disordered behavior. And that is absolutely not true in people who have a history of disordered behavior. It could, it could play into that but not because of the tracking itself. It's more because of the person's individual history. Actually, tracking shows quite the opposite because when you log your food, you immediately increase your awareness and mindfulness about your consumption. It starts to unlock the logical side of your brain and connect it to what you're eating, as opposed to the emotional side of the brain, always making decisions for you. Now, just because you have that awareness, it doesn't necessarily follow that you're just going to, quote unquote, clean up your whole diet and be perfect. But it does mean that you know how the feedback, the feedback loop works, you know that what you put into your mouth, causes this change in my body and this change in my weight, it causes me to feel this way. And now I have the data. And what it then does is actually cause you to change your behavior. It gives you a sense of accountability to your dietary choices. And it starts to create this virtuous cycle of improving how you eat and how you look at food, your food quality, whether you're hitting your macros that you want, like your protein, and so on. And the challenge really then comes down to how do you do all those things. And the smart person listening to this podcast, which is you is going to know that that takes education time skill information to get there, but at least you have the data from which to make those decisions, very important. And then what is what does it do? Well, consistent food logging, then correlates with more significant weight loss and better maintenance of your goals. And so I am a huge advocate of tracking your food, if the goal is to go after a specific result. And you've struggled in the past, because whatever you were doing in the past is obviously not working. Even if you want to be an intuitive eater, okay, and intuitive eater, you can't develop that to intuition without the awareness. So that is the importance of tracking. All right. I don't want to spend too much time on that because I want to talk about why most apps on the market fall short, and I'm happy to name names. There are apps like My Fitness Pal, lose it chronometer, what else we have carbon, there's probably a few others that are pretty commonly used. And they all have different features. Some have features that others don't and do things in different ways. But there are some general things that if you just lay them out on a table, almost every single one of these apps shares one of these downfalls, I'll say the they fall short in one of these areas. The first is that they are just tedious. And we can't discount the value of when you use a tool, you want it to be so easy, you don't have to think about it. And it's fast and easy. Right? You will don't want food tracking to be a hassle. Because anything that's a hassle creates friction creates resistance. And this is a general principle I like to apply to everything, everything. If you're having trouble being consistent with your workouts, where is the resistance, where is the friction, because to say that I just need to be more disciplined or more willpower or have more willpower is not going to cut it. The most driven high performing people in the world might still have trouble in areas where there's just too much friction. So if your food logging app just feels like it's a hassle or crashes, or it takes multiple tabs every time to do a simple thing. That's gonna be a problem. If it's hard to find your foods, if it's hard to find the brand, that's gonna be a problem. Because every time you hit that wall, you're like, Ah, now I got to spend, you know, five minutes figuring out what to do. Or I have to go Google, you know, instructions for how to do this. Okay, so that's the first one. The second one related to that is the speed. So even if you can do things, I find that apps are just not optimally designed to load as quickly or their interfaces are clunky, you have to tap too many times. And that's tied to number one, the tediousness. But the speed is also important because even when you figure out how to do something, every time you do it, if it takes, you know, five seconds, instead of one second, or four taps instead of one tap, that's going to be frustrating. The third thing that these apps fall short, and this is probably one of the biggest is the lack of dynamic response. They do not adjust to you to your body, to your lifestyle or changes in your lifestyle. They don't adjust to your health goals, they don't adjust to your conditions, whether you're lifting, doing cardio have a certain amount of body fat, you want you like to eat low fat, high fat, low carb, high carb, high protein, and on and on. What do you want to cycle your carbs, and then they don't adjust to what has happened in the past. So if you if you take one of the more standard apps on the market, they will calculate some goals for you based on an estimate. But then they leave it there. And you are now hitting this estimate week after week after week. And there's no change. They don't adjust to it. Now some of the apps may adjust. But none of them quite do it in the way that that the app I'm going to talk about today does it I mean, not even close. And that is actually the deal breaker for me. Because if I have to tell the app, what to tell me. It's the app is not really doing its job is it's just a data repository. It's just a place to store stuff, right? That's not helpful. Most of the apps lack any sense of dynamic response. The kind of related to this is a lot of them have one size fits all recommendations. And so for example, they use ratios of macronutrients, I don't use ratios. If you've ever heard me talk about how to calculate your macros, we always start with protein. And the protein is based on how many grams per pound of body weight you want to hit, then we calculate fat and fat is more or less based on preferences. And then the rest is carbs. Those aren't ratios because guess what happens when you go in a fat loss phase, and your calories are much lower, your protein is going to be about the same or higher in absolute terms, and therefore it's much higher in percentage terms. And so percentages just are meaningless, right? When you think of something like I don't know, the Zone diet or, or 3040 40 type ratios. It doesn't account for your individual needs and your goals and where you are in the process. The last thing now I said, I said dynamic response was probably one of the most important, this one that I'm going to tell you now could be the most important, and it has nothing to do with the recommendations with the targets with the food. It's the psychology of dieting, and how these apps do everything in their power to make you feel terrible. When you don't hit a goal. Tell me tell me I'm wrong. Tell me this isn't your experience. Because if you've ever had an app that doesn't do that, it's it's doing something right. shaming tactics, right, many of the apps use warning messages for even the tiniest deviation. I talked to Greg knuckles about this when he was on my podcast. He is he's behind macro factor, how even if you're a calorie over on some of these apps, you'll get a warning or notification, a red indicator, you'll get something that says it's bad. And so this, there's this moral choice, it's good or bad. And then you end up feeling guilt, or you end up feeling like you failed, and then you start lying to yourself in line in the app. I've done it in the past, when I used to use food logging apps, before I discovered macro factor, I would just flat out lied say, Well, if I put in that extra meal, I'm gonna be over my number. And then it's just going to make me feel bad. And why would I do that? Let me just keep keep keep it off of there. Right? It also seems to bias toward weight loss, and doesn't really think about what if you're building muscle, you actually want to be a little bit over your calories because you're trying to push you're in a surplus, you're trying to push the weight? And so does it distinguish between those. So all of this stuff, these rigid standards, and not accounting for real life, and the fact that you're gonna go to a party, you're going to eat out some days you want more than others. And you're going to choose to do that if things are done in a healthy way, in a positive psychological way, you're going to choose to do those things you're going to plan for them. And the app you want to use has to account for that. And if it doesn't, it's not a good app for you. Right? It's just misaligned with what you're trying to do. So to me, those are the big sort of principles of design of these food logging apps as a tool, and why so many people fail with them, right? Why they are sabotaging your goals why we feel like food tracking overall is somehow not the way to go. And I see macro tracking and food tracking lumped in with diets. And it's quite the opposite. If you look at the science on rigid versus flexible dieting, flexible dieting, where you have macro and calorie targets that you get to choose your food is associated with a positive experience with weight management and long term results management with a healthy relationship with food. But it's these tools that sort of make it a poor experience. So that's why I wanted to create this episode, not just to be a show for macro factors. Even if I am at an event, I'm proud of it. And if you don't like it, hey, you don't have to listen to the episode, right? But here's, here's the story. Okay, so now let me get into the next part. And I'm gonna talk about this app. Okay, to me macro factor is it's not even in the same category as the other apps. And I don't mean that in a salesy way, I mean that in an actual objective way, and that the way it works, for it was built from the ground up. From a different perspective. I think all the I think all the other apps come from the same place, have a place to store your information, and then we're going to ding you when you miss your numbers. And that's what it is. And I feel like manufacturer has a different perspective. But let me tell you my personal experience, okay. For years for years, for four decades of my life, and so primarily from, I'll say, my 20s and 30s, from college on, I was always trying to lose weight, and I would be successful multiple times along the way, and then gain it back. And this is a very common story that I hear from all my clients of trying specific diets or approaches or the latest and greatest thing and a book that that was, you know, something different like intermittent fasting, the lean gains protocol, right, or even die It's that sound cutting edge like carnivore keto, all of these words. They're so extreme that that's the attractiveness of them, if that makes sense, right? Like, oh, wow, I'm just gonna eat pretty much meat. That's amazing. And it can get me my goals awesome, I can live that way. And then three months in, you're like, oh my god, I have to have another, you know, steak or whatever. And I can't have any of these other wonderful foods that I would I would normally enjoy carbs, fats, fruits, and so on. So I went through that experience as early as my 20s, doing SlimFast and Atkins to later on doing paleo and keto, and just random low carb diets and some weird things along the way. I did fasted training, I did lean gains with EAS, B BCAAs. I did all of it. And then in a few times during that period, I did try tracking and I tried it with, I think it was called my macros plus, at one point, I know I did chronometer, because when I tried it years later, I had an account that was like 10 years old, that hadn't been used. And I definitely tried My Fitness Pal, and probably a few others along the way, like lose it. And some weird, you know, it was always a free app, too. I was like, I'm not paying for this, right? You know, this is, it's not that important to pay for. So I wouldn't pay for it. And you get what you pay for generally. But what would happen is I would find that they were slow, clunky, hard to use, frustrating a chore. And they weren't really giving me anything back for the effort I was putting in meaning I would go weeks at a time and it would have this number in there. And I basically had to tell him to tell me how much to eat. And what was that doing for me nothing. Because the numbers I was given it. I didn't really understand nutrition science, I didn't understand the right targets. I was going by some defaults that it was suggesting, pretty much worthless. And so I would give up every time, I would just give up, I'd start lying to the app, I'd start skipping days and meals. And then we'll give up. And one day I was going for a walk while listening to stronger by Science Podcast. And again, I've had both Eric Trexler and Greg knuckles on the show. And I know Eric Trexler has since moved on from the podcast. And now it's Greg and Lindsey, his wife doing the show, which is awesome, super long. But if you want the deep dive into a topic, that's where you're going to get it. And so this was back when Eric and Greg are hosting it, I was going for a walk. I always listen to podcasts when I walk, you know, habit stacking. And they talked about their upcoming app. And I think they were in beta at the time. And I wish I had jumped in during beta but it doesn't matter. I wasn't giving it a second thought I was like, well, that's interesting, what are they talking about. And the more they mentioned it, because they weren't really selling it, they were just mentioning occasionally, as far as the background work happening. And the science and algorithms behind it. The more they mentioned, the warm I was like is this this is like a food blogger, right? That sounds pretty cool. And so I one day one came out, I downloaded it did the free trial. And of course, the rest is history. Because I've since been a user, this was in 2021, I think came out. So two years now. And I have to say, of all the things I pay for my life, it has to be the best bargain I've ever paid for because of how it has changed my life and my trajectory for the rest of my life. And what I mean by that is I started using it. And like with what many people discover, all my clients tend to discover this not all of them do not tend to they all do is that you immediately realize something is different. And that's something are some of the details I'm going to get into in a moment here that allow you to get the feedback you need to know to make that connection between the food logged and what's happening with your body. And that is where the lightbulb moment occurs. Because now you can adjust each week to continue making progress toward your goals. And if you're not making progress, you'll know it but you won't be shamed for it, you'll simply have the data that says okay, I know I made choices. This is what happened. And it actually encourages you to to log everything. Because if you don't log it, you don't get all that helpful data. And in fact, it could give you the wrong information if you don't have all the data, right garbage in, garbage out. And it's a beautiful kind of experience that closes the loop like the other apps don't. And so what happened? Well, we're talking late 2021, I had been strength training pretty effectively. For a while, I've been gaining a lot of weight by just eating whatever drinking a lot of milk, I knew I was gaining weight probably too quickly. But I didn't know any better at the time. And I was gaining muscle, which was a lot of fun. I could see the muscle, I can feel it. I can see it in my shirt. But I was also gaining a lot of extra fat faster than I could have if I knew better. And so manufacture comes along just in time for me to get to the point where I had gone from say, one 160 pounds to 195 pretty big jump over a fairly short period much faster than you should. And I started using the app and logging my food and I realized wow, this thing is easy. It's fast. It's I can find the information. I can enter a barcode and it's right there. I can copy and paste. And then by the way, look at these other features. And on Monday when I check in. It tells me my new calories amount macros, I've never had anything that can do this so seamlessly. And now I know what to eat this week. And then the next week in the next week, and before long, I had a goal to lose something like 25 pounds of fat. And in Latin, let's say six, whatever it was 16 weeks, I don't remember the duration. But it was within the evidence within the range of evidence of rate of loss that you want to go after, which the app knows, because it's based on all these scientific principles. And it will recommend it to you. And really, it'll warn you when you actually try to go outside that suggesting that, hey, you might lose muscle if you go too aggressively. And so based on that, I ended up losing all the fat I wanted to lose over the time, I wanted to lose it super effectively. Now, of course, I had to log my food, right. And I had to actually stick to those principles. But it significantly improved my chances of doing that. Okay. So as I was doing this, I was posting my results on Facebook, on Reddit all over the place, and it caught the eye of and I may have even mentioned it on my podcast, which at the time was just getting started. And the owner of manufacturer, Greg knuckles reached out to me by email, which is just really cool. And he said, Hey, we are inviting some people who are really passionate about the app or big users who have a following who are doing some sort of practice related to to this, we're offering you to be an affiliate. And you know, here's how we make it work. And I'm like, yeah, why not? Like, why wouldn't I try to make a little income from this? Because I use it, because I tell everybody about it already. And interestingly, months later, when I started my nutrition, coaching journey, and helping people, and I experimented with the app with them, and they were just floored at how effective it was for getting their goals. One of the doubts in my mind was, well, I'm a nutrition coach, is this kind of taking away from my job, right? Is this doing what I'm supposed to do? And I realized, you know what, any good tool that makes your job easier, you want to go all in and use it. And if I can help my clients accelerate the results that much more, because one, normally tedious, annoying thing is now off the table. That only increases adherence that increases commitment that increases accountability. And that gets you results faster, and frees us up to work on other things. Okay, so that's my personal story, why I became an affiliate, it's still it's still something I use, I still log every day. The only time I haven't logged in the app is two vacations that I took, right two week long vacations, I just didn't log, no big deal.

22:30

Before my coaching session with Philip, I was really struggling with staying consistent with my nutrition, Phillip really showed me the importance of being consistent day to day, he also helped me see that it's not a bad thing to take a rest day, he really helps me get in that more positive headspace of a rest day being something really good for me. I've been doing this for a month now. And I'm finally starting to see some progress and my numbers. And I'm really excited about that. And I just appreciate so much the help that Phillip has given me, he's always willing to answer questions to offer resources that are totally free, and very, very helpful. So I just want to say how much I appreciate that. Thanks, Phil.

Philip Pape 23:15

So we're going to talk about the features of the app. Right? But this is not going to be a what do you call it? This is not going to be a kind of a YouTube video comparing, you know, multiple apps, this is just what are the big things that stick out? And what makes it different. So that you understand what you're getting into and are fully informed in the context of the evidence, which is, I think, where the beauty lies. All right, so the first thing that I want to talk about is just the food logging experience. And there's a few things you really want to know, because I've seen some Miss Information or misunderstandings, right? People will say, Well, my fitness pal seems to have a lot more food. Yes, true. Why? Because my fitness pal allows anybody and everybody to just randomly enter whatever they want. And so you have tons of duplicates that have wrong information, you have tons of of entries that just have wrong information, right? Nothing's verified, macro factors database is verified. And that's a huge difference. Right? Some apps may also use verify databases, but not some of the big ones. And it gets the information from two sources. First are vetted databases. And the second is human verified entries. So there are some user entered entries, but they go to a human to be verified first, you know, like a nutritionist before they go in the database. So they're all verified. And I honestly I've been using it two years, and everything I enter seems to be right. Like it passes the sniff test, with very, very, very few exceptions. I mean, very, extremely rare exceptions in my opinion. It also has a barcode scanner like most of them, and and it's all it's all part of the normal, very inexpensive subscription price. Not like some of the other apps that charge extra for that. And they've been expanding the database over time. So if you live in you Europe, for example, they added the European products a while back, they've been adding other countries. But for the most part, if you're in the US, it's fine. Like, you'll find everything in there. With the exception of like, really, you know, really small boutique companies that may or may not make a lot of product. The the other other features that has some of these are typical of other apps, some are not, it allows for custom foods and recipes. And you can share those recipes. So you can share it as like a little export file, and then it ends up being a link, and somebody else can click the link and it'll import it into manufacturers. That's pretty cool. It has a timeline style food log. So instead of meals, which I know some people are used to meals and snacks, it's simply logged by time, which is actually more flexible, because then you know, you might snack eight times during the day at all random times, it's not going to force you into specific meals. It's a little bit different getting used to but it's really cool. Once you do, it has a smart history, right. So when you enter new, when you go to log a food, it's going to show your recent foods and it's it uses AI to show to determine what to show based on things like the time of day, or even what you start to type. It has a lot of copy paste features. So you can copy an entire time or a food or an entire day to another time or that day or the same time that day or two right now. I mean, there's so many options. Once you figure it out, you realize it's like boop, boop, boop. If you eat pretty routinely, it's going to take you seconds, mere seconds to log your food. The next thing is it's really really fast. Okay, now this I just I'm so frustrated with slow technology or buggy technology. And I'm sure you are as well. It's like, why can't you guys get this right? You focus on all these other features, but you can't get just make it fast. And in some cases, I imagined the developers have painted themselves into a hole by how they buy the architecture of the app. And I don't want to get into software here because that was my background. But it's probably what it comes down to, it's probably too hard for them to make it fast at this point unless they redesigned from the ground up. But macro factor from the beginning, they thought about how many taps it would take how much friction you can reduce from every single workflow from every single thing that you're trying to do. So not just a single action, but like, what are the typical things that someone does, right? When I go to have breakfast, I know I have to look up a food app to find it, I have to change the grams or the serving. And I have to log it to a certain time. Well, they made it where every single one of those is either down to one tap or zero taps in some cases, if it's like defaulted to the best option. And then the last thing is really cool. It's called a I describe. And what it allows you to do is either type or use your text to speech, what you're eating for your meal in like a big blob of a list or text, and it will separate it all out into the various foods and amounts and log it for you. You know, and like anything else they add, it's not perfect, and it probably get better. But you could say, you know, I'm having a salad with Romaine with cheddar cheese with croutons and this and that and the other, and then it'll try to separate all the foods and log them for you. Okay, so those are, that's the food database. stuff up, maybe it's slightly on the boring side of things. But I wanted you to know that it's in and of itself, it's superior to other apps, which I think is important, because the other apps, that's pretty much all they do. So they've already licked that part of it. Now I'm gonna go to the part that I love. Okay, the advanced algorithms and the dynamic adjustments. Okay. So again, I am a walking sales pitch for this app, because it's like, how do I put it, it's like if you went back to the Stone Age, and you had to gather a bunch of wood, and everybody bartered wood, and you all of a sudden came across a solar powered chainsaw. And you would be 50 times more efficient than the next person, you would want to use that chainsaw. Like you wouldn't even think about anything else that That, to me is how separated this app is, at least at the moment, hopefully, like anything else with competition. They'll encourage other makers to try to catch up. But it's going to be tough. So the advance algorithm, I'm going to try to simplify this, there's two pieces to this. There's the weight trend, and there's the expenditure. The weight trend algorithm, I'll say is, quote unquote, simple because we know exactly what the math is behind it. The weight trend algorithm, the way it works is when you log your weight, and you're and you're supposed to log your weight at least once a week in the app. As I've always said, I recommend logging every single day. Because when you log every single day, it no longer becomes an emotional thing. It's just another data point. You get used to all the big fluctuations day to day, you realize that no, you're not gaining a bunch of fat overnight, just because your weight went up two pounds, definitely not possible. It's because of other things like water and inflammation, sodium and carbs and so on. And so when you weigh every day, it makes it a more left brain logical type of thing. Macro factor will give you the best Precision, the more you enter weight. So I also recommend doing it every day in the app. And what it does is it takes a 20 day, exponential moving average. Alright, so just in technical terms, that's what it is. And what it amounts to is, instead of it looking like up, down, up, down, up down, like your weight normally looks, it smoothes it out and shows you the true pressure or trend of your weight over time over over a roughly three week period. And it gives more weight pun intended to the more recent data points, which makes sense, right? Because you're not really the person you were three weeks ago anymore. But the change since then does tell us what's been happening to your body. So that's the weight trend algorithm. And when I work with my clients, every week, we do our check ins, I will focus on the trend, and I don't really pay too much attention to the scale. Now. No matter what guaranteed, clients will mention their scale weight, it never goes away, like Oh, my skin weight dropped two pounds. But then you say, my skin weight went up two pounds. And in both cases, my responses generally like, okay, yeah, we see that. And we see that that doesn't really reflect what's going on with your body. Because the trendweight has still been going in a single direction this whole time, right? Just because you had this big pop or this big drop, doesn't mean that that is your true change in fat mass, right. So the weight trend is really important in the app, because it's right on the dashboard. And every day, if you're wondering how much you quote unquote, way, rather than going by the scale weight, you can go by the trendway. And it smoothes it out over time. And it makes it a less stressful experience. So that's the weight trend, which you could do in a spreadsheet without the app. Yeah, but it's just a lot of work, then we get to the expenditure algorithm. Okay, so this is the beauty of the app. This is the beauty from the from the data side. Macro factor continuously updates your energy expenditure, which is your metabolism, how many calories you burn every day, based on two things, the food that you're logging, and the trend in your weight, how your weight is changing over time. So if your weight trend is even over time, if you're not gaining or losing weight, and your weekly average calorie intake was 2000, then it's gonna say your expenditures 2000. But then the next week you're expending, you might have logged 3000 calories every day. Yeah, this is totally hypothetical. Let's say you just ate a ton more the next week. And all of a sudden, your weight trend still stays the same. Well, what does that mean? Well, the app is going to say, Hmm, you actually ate a lot more food, but your weight didn't go up, therefore, you must be burning more calories. So we're showing a higher expenditure for you. This, this can happen in real life all the time. So for me, I recently had surgery on my left rotator cuff, and my expenditure in the weeks that followed, shot up like a rocket. And it did that because of the healing process. Most likely, also, I was getting more sleep, and that could have helped, but most likely from the healing process. And if I wasn't tracking with macro factor, I would have started to lose a lot of weight, because I'm burning more calories, but I wouldn't have known I would have eaten the same amount and I would have lost weight. And so macro factor helped me keep eating enough and actually increase what I ate over the last few weeks to maintain my weight and keep the energy coming in. So I can heal the best heal, I can recover as fast as possible, because that's the phase I'm in right now. And that's my goal. And so you can imagine all different scenarios where your expenditure changes quite rapidly, your lifting habits, change your walking, amount of walking changes, and so on. And unless you know how many calories you're burning, you don't know how much you should eat. And we're gonna get to that part. But my point is the expenditure algorithm algorithm and macro factor is probably the most science backed, unique feature that it has. Because it says here is how your weight trend has been changing. Here's what you're eating, based on your body composition, based on your lifestyle and preferences based on your macros. All these things go in as variables to the algorithm, we know how many calories you're burning. Now I get this question a lot, I get the question. Well, I don't see a way to connect my Fitbit or Apple or Apple Watch to macro factor to get the calories burned from exercise or to add my exercise? And the answer is because it doesn't need it. Two things. First of all, the calories burned number on your wearable is useless. The error rate is so high as demonstrated by the evidence that you cannot trust it at all. It's based purely on a calculation on an estimate. For an average, it may have nothing to do with your actual expenditure. Don't use it and therefore macro factor doesn't use it, nor does it need it. Because all it needs to know is here's what you've been eating. Here's how your weight has changed. Therefore we know how many calories you're burning. For all the complexity of the human body when it comes to what causes us to burn calories and it's way more than exercise right exercise is like 5% It's way more than that. You don't have to know you just need to know the in and out. I ate this much food. My body changed by this much weight, boom and it gets more complicated under the hood, but that's that's the general idea. Okay, so the expenditure algorithm is huge, because on any given day, I can tell you how many calories I'm burning. I have graphs over the last two years that show when I go into a cutting phase to lose weight. And this is seen with all my clients, you'll see it gradually go down, down, down, down with metabolic adaptation as your body mass decreases, and all the other things, you know, your activity level goes down, and so on. Conversely, when you're building phase will see it go up, up, up. And that's, this explains why some people think they're hard gainers, they have to keep eating more and more just to stay on top of that curve to actually gain the muscle and gain the weight. And also, it helps you remain it's so when you come out of a fat loss phase. One of the most challenging things for people is how do I sustain this, and you could listen to Carol's story on episode 95. And she talks about that, I think Alan Friedman also talked about a while back, what they find is even maintenance can be a little tricky, because your metabolism is starting to recover. So it's actually going to go up up up, but it may not go up like I think he may stall, it may go down a little may go up a little. And it'll help you each week, adjust your calories to stay at maintenance. And if that surprises you if the idea that when you're at maintenance you, you don't necessarily eat the same week to week. That's why you need the app. That's why you need to track your food versus your weight, because then you'll actually see what happens with your body. And you might find that, for example, Hey, I'm gonna start walking more, I'm gonna start walking an extra 4000 steps a day. And you'll see your expenditure go up maybe a couple 100 calories now you can eat more food without gaining weight. Isn't that where we want to be? So that's the expenditure algorithm. And then that leads to what Well, that leads to the gold in the app, which is the dynamic adjustments. This is where a lot of nutrition coaches are really just macro coaches that they calculate this stuff for you, you can calculate this stuff in a spreadsheet yourself, you can Google TDE or metabolism and calculate it. But guess what that number is a fixed number in time for statistics, that may have nothing to do with you macro factors taking your actual expenditure. And it says okay, this week, because you're recovering from surgery and your expenditure went up 200 calories. On Monday, when you check in with the app, you're going to eat 200 more calories a day just to maintain your weight. And as a result, your protein goes up maybe a little bit, and then fats a little and carbs come up quite a bit. And here's our new targets for the week. This is the feedback loop I was talking about it adjust the recommendations based on your logged intake and your weight trend change. And you can make this a tiny bit easier. For example, if you have a smart scale, I use a Bluetooth smart scale where I just get on the scale open the app, it beams the number to my app, my app goes Apple Health, Apple Health connected the macro factor. And boom, the weight is in there every day with and all I have to do is step on the scale. I don't have to do anything else. Right. So you can make make things easier. But anyway, the gold in the app is that it adjust your weekly macro targets based on your expenditure. This is huge. Okay, so enough about that. I think you get the idea. A few other things that I wanted to mention. First of all, is the macronutrients. Recently they came out with a huge update, literally just within the last few weeks with full macronutrient tracking. So in the past people said, well, macro factors not as good as say chronometer, because chronometer lets you have targets for your nutrients. And that was like the only distinguishing factor. Well, now macro factor does that. And I think it does a better than everything else. Because like, all the other features of macro factor, it takes the evidence, and it takes your personal data, and it combines the two to give you nutrient targets, for example, it will tell you, here's your iron target, if you're a male of this age, or if you're a female to say so for example, a female

Philip Pape 38:44

who's 30 years old is going to need probably more than double the iron that a male needs or postmenopausal female. And it knows that based on the evidence, all that stuff's programmed in, it knows you your gender, your height, all these things. And it says here's your target. Now, you can obviously change the targets as well. But it will automatically give you targets for everything for selenium, magnesium, calcium, saturated fat fiber, on and on and on. Even the sub elements are the amino acids under protein. So it's all the macros and micros, the vitamins, the minerals, even choline, everything's in there. And you can decide which ones you want to show on your homepage or pin them or whatever. You can decide which ones are really important. But at any given time, you can look at all of them for a given food or for your entire day. So it's awesome. So they just added that in case you're wondering and that's important to you. I use that with my clients if we're tracking saturated fat for example, or fiber and it's really helpful. Okay, the next thing is before earlier I talked about the psychology of dieting Okay, and I haven't even touched on that yet with macro factor. Why does macro factor not to shame you and not make you feel bad about yourself like the other apps? It's because it doesn't use any notifications, warnings colors, labels, judgment It doesn't consider anything good or bad, it simply shows you the data. So just to put it break it down really simply, if you are in a fat loss phase, and your target is 2000 calories a day, and you eat 2100 calories, it is simply going to show that data, it's not going to say that it's red, or you're over or anything like that. Now there is a little display on the food log at the top, where if you swipe, it can show you how much you are over under your target. And I like using that I like to see a negative number, when I'm in fat loss. Or if it's positive, that means I'm over. But it literally is just the number. Again, it doesn't tell you that that's good or bad. And you can hide that you could actually hide that in the settings. And you could just swipe and not look at it. It even gives you the option to not show alcohol, for example, if that's a concern for you. So it encourages consistency. Because the more data you put in, the more accurate you are, the better data you get to make those decisions. And then that creates a feedback positive feedback loop so you don't feel ashamed about your choices. And that's what we want that that's what leads to long term success. Okay, so it is amazing for that. And then, and by the way, I think Greg Knuckles, and I dived into that whole thing about psychology as well and the episode that he was on, if you want to check that out. Some other features it has just before we wrap up it, they recently added a couple other features before and after photos and body metrics. So again, this is something that users asked for. And by the way, they have a roadmap where they prioritize all the features based on what's most in demand. So if people really want something, they're going to add it, right, they're gonna have a desktop version, they're gonna have a coaching version, at some point, they're gonna have all sorts of things that people are looking for, before and after photos, so you can track your visual progress, body metrics, I've been using this myself every week, on Sunday morning, one of the things on my reminder list is do my circumference measurements. So I do my neck, my chest, my waist, my thighs, and my biceps, put them in there. And then over time, I can see progress toward my body composition, you can track your period. So for the women, this gives you kind of a holistic view of your health because you can track your period relative to your expenditure. And so if you're, if you have the type of body that's over responsive to your period, between the follicular and luteal phases, this can give you some insight into Hey, the here's how many calories actually burned more or less based on my period, if everything else is sort of consistent, and then you can export your data as well. So I'm sure a lot of the apps let you do that. But it's nice because it pretty much includes everything in one spreadsheet. Okay, now that you know I love this app so much, because I want tools that serve me, I don't want them to work against me, I don't like wasting time, I'm lazy. Let's just put it that way. I'm lazy, I want the best tool for the job. And so of course, I encourage you to try it out. Just to recap, macro factor uses dynamic adjustments based on your body, and lifestyle. It is built around the psychology of dieting and the scientific evidence of nutrition. So it makes it this fun, positive experience. And it is so easy to use from a usability perspective that you're gonna forget that you're really tracking food, I mean, it's gonna take longer to measure your food on a food scale than to log it. In some cases, use my link in the show notes, or search for macro factor in your app store. And then, if you want to support me, and support the show, enter affiliate code Wits & Weights when you sign up for the free trial, and you'll get an extra week to try it out. Last thing, I touched on this a little bit, but I want to mention it again. You might be wondering why a nutrition coach is telling you to use an app that calculates your expenditure for you gives you weekly calorie and macro adjustments and hold you accountable. Isn't that what a nutrition coach is for? And I love, love, love this question because it allows me to separate what I do from the 1000s of macro coaches out there. In my opinion, the job of a good coach is to help you get results as quickly and efficiently as possible. While and this is the important part while also learning the skills and behaviors to be successful. For the rest of your life. I want you to fire me when you're done and say I don't need you anymore. Thank you. I'm good. That's what I want. For example, okay, there, here are all the things that that don't have anything to do with macro tracking that you still will learn working with a coach, being consistent with your meals, logging, hitting your targets, balancing your food quality, your timing for your workouts, on your goals, supplementation, learning how to use a food scale, estimating food at restaurants, learning how to meal plan for your week for things like holidays, for travel, adjusting your training for fat loss or building muscle, managing hunger, managing emotional eating, managing stress, managing sleep, the list goes on and on and on. And the average time that I work with a client is six to 12 months, which isn't that long in the scheme of your life, but it's long enough to teach you everything you need to know because that's what I'm all about as education knowledge teacher, I want you to know. In fact, I tried through these podcasts and so Michael intent to get as much transparency information out there. So if you pieced it all together and did it yourself, you would be successful, right? But a lot of people need the extra guidance, right? And you're trying to get the results that you've been struggling to get with all the other programs and diets they've tried in the past, I've been there. And you want a sustainable approach, like if that's what you're going for something that fits you your preferences, your lifestyle, your body, so you're not dependent on anyone but yourself, to maintain your results forever. That's where coaching can help. So tracking your food is like 5% or less of the process, right, and it becomes almost like zero, once you get used to it, it's just a thing you do. It's a habit. And it doesn't actually matter that much after a while because what matters more is everything else. And I'm happy to let a piece of software do that part of it, so that you and I can focus on the deeper, meaningful changes to make better decisions for success. So a coach offers professional guidance support an objective set of eyes along the way. And I mentioned that my clients use macro factor from the first day in fact, from day negative four, because I asked them to start logging their food before we actually get on boarded. So we have some data to start from right away and hit the ground running. And they all love it. They all love it. What they love more, though, is how they don't have to stress about what to do, how to do it, how to deal with the roadblocks along the way. They can just take action. And then they have a coach by their side. They know what to eat, they know how to train, they know how it all works and why it works. So that they won't lose muscle or they won't gain the weight back. And at the end of our time together. They often decide I don't want to even track anymore, but then they have the confidence to reach their goals anyway. So if you're interested in my one on one coaching, which is perfect for individuals who are driven, focused, understand the value of strength training, and what those results that have been eluding them, click the link in my show notes to apply. I'll send you some questions and make sure it's a good fit. And if it is, we'll get started right away. Again, click my link in the show notes to apply for coaching. Don't wait if there's no time like the present, I'd like to say for episode 99 Brandon Cruz is back to talk about how to make fat loss feel easier to get get and stay lean. We all know that losing fat can be challenging, especially if you have a busy lifestyle, a lot of stress or a history of yo yo dieting. So we're going to discuss some strategies and scenarios that can help you overcome these obstacles and make it more manageable and sustainable. Go ahead and follow or subscribe to the podcast do it right now. So you get notified when that episode is out. That's all for today. As always, stay strong. And I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits & Weights podcast. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights. Please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong

Philip Pape 8/18/23 Philip Pape 8/18/23

Ep 97: The Fun Side of Fitness and Finding Your “Optimal” with Dai Manuel

Today is all about FUN, a FUN-ctionally fit life with my guest Dai Manuel. You’ll learn how to balance personal and professional roles while prioritizing fitness. We’ll explore the concept of what “optimal” means in fitness and life, the role of ‘fun’ in fitness, and practical strategies for finding balance while living a fit life.

Known for his award-winning digital thought leadership and best-selling publications, he’s an extraordinary blend of business acumen and contagious enthusiasm. Dai’s journey as co-founder, COO, and CMO of an eight-figure retail company and a sought-after lifestyle mentor and executive performance coach is impressive and inspiring.

Navigating the balance beam of life’s responsibilities while keeping health and happiness at the forefront, Dai knows the struggle of the juggle. His philosophy is based on the 5 F’s: fitness, family, faith, and finances, all wrapped under the roof of fun, and built on a foundation of health.

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Click here to apply for coaching!
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Today you’ll learn all about:

[3:17] Meaning of fitness and fun in a FUN-ctionally fit life context
[7:43] Instant gratification fun vs. true meaningful fun
[10:10] Role of ‘fun’ in difficult but effective fitness activities
[15:36] Coping with constraints in achieving personal goals
[17:59] Definition of “optimal” in life and fitness
[25:31] Personal optimization considering individual circumstances and trade-offs
[28:32] Max thanks Philip for helping him prioritize his health and dropping 45 Lbs
[31:04] Having a big enough "why"
[35:15] Handling uncertainty and variability in personal optimization strategies
[43:13] Gravitating toward something that makes you nervous
[48:08] Giving people power and agency to go after a goal
[52:01] Role of data and feedback in the optimization process
[54:39] One question Dai wished Philip had asked
[57:21] Where to learn more about Dai and his work
[58:45] Outro

Episode resources:

Instagram: @daimanuel
Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/daimanuel/
Dai Manuel’s Whole Life Fitness Manifesto: 30 Minutes a Day for a Healthier Body, Mind and Spirit - https://amzn.to/3O4La9D

FREE 30-minute results breakthrough session with Philip ⬇️

https://witsandweights.com/free-call

Learn about 1-on-1 coaching ⬇️
https://witsandweights.com/coaching

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Transcript

Dai Manuel 00:00

I understand what Optimal means for me, I understand what my expectations are of me and I also know why I'm doing it. And I think that is the clarity piece that people require to really fully answer the question that you've asked depends on what aspect of the our lives or life that we're looking to optimize, you know, because I always

Dai Manuel 00:21

recognize that there's probably areas that need more attention than others. And yet, we all like to do things that we do really well.

Philip Pape 00:31

Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host, Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger, optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry, so you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits & Weights community Welcome to another episode of the Wits. & Weights podcast today is all about fun, a functionally fit life that is with my guest diet man. Well, you'll learn how to balance personal and professional roles while prioritizing fitness. We'll explore the concept of what Optimal means and fitness in life, the role of fun in fitness and practical strategies to find balance while living a fit life. In the world of business and lifestyle coaching there are people who talk about living a balanced life and then there are those who embody it meet demand Well, a man on an incredible mission to positively impact 1 million role models around the globe. As a super dad who leads by example, partner who keeps the flame alive by dating his wife of 21 years, and a high octane life enthusiast die showcases what it truly means to live a functionally Fit Life. Nova is award winning digital thought leadership and best selling publications. He's an extraordinary blend of business acumen and contagious enthusiasm some of that I've already gotten to meet before the recording here. days journey as a co founder CEO and CMO of an eight figure retail company as well as a sought after lifestyle mentor and executive performance coach is not only impressive, but also inspiring. Navigating the balance beam of life's responsibilities while keeping health and happiness at the forefront. dinos the struggle of the juggler is philosophy is based on five F's, fitness, family, faith, finances, all wrapped under the roof of fun built on a foundation of health that is a dynamic speaker, author and thought leader who's here to inspire you to take action and become the best version of yourself die. Thanks for bringing your energy to the show.

Dai Manuel 02:35

Thanks, Phillip. That's, oh, man, I'm stoked to be here. I really am honored for the opportunity to have this conversation with you today. So I know we've had lots of back and forth and lots opportunity to creep each other on social. And, dude, I totally love everything that you stand for. But also the fact that we're both, you know, we've got word fathers of daughters, man, and you got to band together my man band together,

Philip Pape 02:59

ya know, for sure. I mean, we both we both are at different stages of our lives, we can relate so much. And I'm sure the listener can as well. This is a fitness related podcast, as we talked about, and your foundation of or your philosophy or approach is based on a foundation of health and what you call functionally fit life. So I am about bringing the energy enthusiasm. So what does fitness and fun mean to you in this context?

Dai Manuel 03:24

Yeah, I guess. I mean, let's be to be fair here. You know, there's a lot of will say misinformation and redirects, especially when you start going down the path of trying to define for oneself? What does health mean to me, right, or what is being optimal? mean to me, and there's lots of different directions, we can go and we can objectify those answers, we can also objectify them. And it's usually best to have a bit of a blend, but it's the personal experience aspects, you know, that really solidifies everything or takes it from knowledge to wisdom, right? It's that application of the knowledge to create a certain result. And I'll be fair, for those that probably don't know my story, but I wasn't someone that naturally came to fitness. They came to it little bit later in life, you know, I'm gonna say later in life, like in my teenage years, I discovered fitness at 15. But prior to that I had, gosh, I was in a massive state of unhealthy you know, I was morbidly obese. And, along with that, a lot of other, you know, stigmas, especially on the mental health challenges and the bullying and, you know, I was just, it was tough place, you know, a tough place like anyone that's struggling with chronic health conditions, especially if it's more lifestyle orientated, you know, you can't help but look in the mirror all the time and be like, Ah, is that me? And and, you know, and that was an everyday occurrence and at 15 You know, looking in the mirror one day I was just like, I don't like who I'm looking at, you know, and I don't want to be like this anymore because the fear of stuff A stain that way, was not as great, or it was actually greater than the fear of changing. Yeah, and that's when most people are really ready to make a change. And, and so I started that, you know, it took me five years to get to that stage when it took me about, or just shy of two years to take off the weight and to develop a new lifestyle. And that really set me forward in this trajectory of wanting to help others with health and well being changes, you know, and taking control of their situation to maximize and optimize, really the life that they want, you know, and more or less get out of their own way, right and let things happen. And so, over those years, you know, now almost 30 years working in this space, I've heard it all. And I've done a lot of things. And so this philosophy has emerged, you know, the Whole Life Fitness manifesto was the book I published, almost eight years ago now. But it's really just a lot of very common sense type things. But as we all know, with common sense, it's not so common. And, and, but fun. You know, if you're not able to smile every day, there's room for improvement, you know, and I find that no matter what challenge I encounter, that inner confidence, I gained through the fitness aspect, you know, this ability to do hard things, to challenging things, and know that I have the resilience to not only bring me through it, but also to pick myself up when I fall because I do fall. And I follow a lot, you know, figuratively and legitimately. And so that fun and fitness aspect are so critical in that foundation of health, because when that's the foundation, solid, family relationships are better. My working relationships are better. You know, I show up more present not only for those in my life, but also for myself. And so that's sort of what emerged in the five s is really just alliteration to give people sort of some simpler and easier to follow context, when they start to use those filters to apply to their own life. Yeah, and there's,

Philip Pape 07:02

there's so much there to unpack. But I do want to dive in more on the, on the fun piece of it, right, because a few things come to mind, right is you've mentioned doing hard things. And I know from personal experience, even just doing heavy squats, it's it's a simple mechanical thing that you're doing with your body. But it's also a form of meditation and growth that like very few things in life that you're able to control and change your body with. And that then causes you to be confident with other things. And I just spoke to my client, Carol, who by the way, is going to be on probably the episode before this one when it comes out. And she talked about how she used to be very, she wouldn't speak her mind. And now that she lives, she speaks her mind. And so, yeah, I love that. So when we talk about fun, how can we separate the idea of instant gratification fun, from true, deep, meaningful fun?

Dai Manuel 07:57

Well, yeah, that's a great question. And and it's, I wish I had a very straightforward answer. And I think as simple as I can answer this is, you know, fun, and fulfillment, I think, coming hand in hand, you know, and I think all of us are sort of on a path to want to optimize our level of fulfillment, joy and happiness in our lives, right. And we can't help it. But when we're having fun, you know, adrenaline's going, we've got some other neurotransmitters that are firing in our brains, you know, giving us that dopamine, that serotonin, and that lightening of our mood, but also gives us that little bit of an edge to maybe push ourselves to do things that otherwise we would deem we're not capable. And I find that if you can keep it fun, keep it real, and just trust that things are going to be okay. Because it usually is that, that good things happen, you know, that's where it really change, not only takes hold, but we gain that, that ability to see ourselves as the change makers for our lives. And, and, and I'll be fair in the statement, because, you know, there's been periods in my life where I felt more like a victim of change, you know, and it's a tough place to be, it's really hard to find motivation, and to not continuously procrastinate or find other excuses to not do the things that we know, if we just did the more consistently, we feel better, you know, and, and, but it's a tough place to be, you know, and so that's a long winded answer to a very simple question.

Philip Pape 09:29

No, but it's, I think it's required to really think about and step back because some of the things resonate very much with me as a person who will be accused of will be accused of making light of things or being too positive about things. For example, I had rotator cuff surgery a month ago, and I've seen about it and everybody's like, man, it's really positive and then we'll have people that say, you know, I, I had a similar situation. I have to have more surgeries. I'm not looking forward to it. And I noticed there's just a different And in mindset of how people approach things, in terms of like positive psychology, and we want to be sure not to have what the term I've heard is toxic positivity, right, just like thinking that it's positive fun. So the idea of of the neurotransmitters and pushing us to do things we're not capable of, it sounds like what you're talking about, again, is, has to do with purpose, right? It has to do with growth, personal growth, purpose moving forward. And what what do you say to somebody who wants to take a journey of growth, let's say it's physical health, and they just don't like what it's going to take. So they know that that, that they need to do something in a training room, something nutrition room, and you give them 10 options. And for whatever reason, it's just because of their life experiences. I don't want to do that. I don't like to do whatever. How do you do you try to make that fun somehow? Or do you have something that gets the flywheel momentum going, that then makes it fun, because of the results?

Dai Manuel 11:02

That's awesome. I love that. I love how you frame that Phillip and and because these are conversations that you and I both have very regularly with our clients, you know, and just probably our conversations on social media, because people know that we do suffer from a chronic ailment called PMA. And for people that don't know that it's positive mental attitude. And it's chronic. And yeah, my wife and I are, we're guilty, we're sick of it. We're sick of with PMA. And so I can appreciate that sometimes people will just say clam up, you know, if they get around people with that kind of outgoing energy. And, you know, I am sort of more introverted in certain ways, but I'm also extroverted in certain ways. And, and I think everyone has that ability. And here's the interesting thing is to answer your question, you know, when we think about change, all of us at whatever stage we are in life have experienced a tremendous amount of change. You know, like to get to wherever we are, we've gone through lots of changes, and it's, it's a given, it's a truth, you know, Buddha like 2600 years ago, he's like, hey, you know what, this whole universe of ours is completely impermanent, constant state of change energies, exchanging from one thing to the other, and, you know, law of entropy science caught up, you know, about 100 years ago and said, well, Buddha was right, you know, everything, just a bunch of space, and everything's changing. And, and yet, I think a lot of us feel like Indiana Jones and Raiders of the Lost Ark, you know, there's a big boulder barreling down up behind us. And it's a great metaphor for change, you know, and we feel like we're just trying to escape it. And what I like to do is invite people to share with me, tell me their stories of where they've experienced changes, that created a positive result, even though the experience of the actual change might have been negative. And because we've all had that, you mean, change isn't necessarily easy. Otherwise, we'd all sign up and say, Hey, can you give me some more change, please, you know, like, people aren't really lining up for it. Right? And especially when it comes to health changes, because yeah, are they hard? Yeah. Are you having to rewire the brain to now create a new habit to override an old habit. And if that old habit was a 10 year habit, it's not going to just go away in one or two workout, or one or two salads, you know, like, it takes a commitment and consistent effort and a frequency. That is enough that it offsets the negative, you know, and, but it takes commitment. And so I find when people share a story, I'm like, Man, you can handle change, you've done it before. Why is this health change so challenging? You know, and often, you've probably heard about 1,000,001 excuses. And I always say excuses, because they really are, you know, for the most part, and when your fears in the same excuse more than once, it's a habit. And so it's just a matter of having a good conversation to help people see that they are capable. And I find once they have that belief, and that inner confidence that at least is enough to get the momentum starting or create enough for nursing for that first step, that first squat that first squat off the couch. Right before you take your first step on this new journey. And, and that, yeah, and I mean, what are your thoughts on that? Like, I'm sure you've had so many different conversations on this. Yeah, I love how

Philip Pape 14:25

you put when you mentioned a frequency, that's enough to offset the negative. What came to mind to me was the idea of attacking resistance of now we have two sides of the scale here. One is our actions. And you can call that willpower or discipline or taking that first step. And on the other side are all the things whether they are excuses or just real things that are very hard for people to overcome. What can you do to reduce that side of the ledger, right, that's actually easier potentially then taking that action, and then taking the action becomes even easier now. Now some of that also might be extremely look like coaches, and your spouse or people who support you where they're just pushing you to do it. And that's your that's what you need. And then you are taking the action. You're like, I don't like this the next day, I don't like this. And then the third day, well, look what happened this week, I'm feeling great. And like you said, the result produces the motivation from there. They're Correct. That is my, that is my thought die. But I do like a spectrum of people, because there are people who are very just inherently, you know, yours, they're yours. And it's okay, it's okay. They just need a different type of communication style and maybe love from people.

Dai Manuel 15:37

Well, I was gonna say, Philip, like, even just listening to your podcast, I think this is a wonderful example of a positive input. You know, it's like, what do we feed our minds with every day? Right? Like, because there were our brains are sponges, you know, it has the ability to pick up and learn new things, to adapt to evolve to, to be resilient, you know, and allow us to, to grow into whatever vision we have for ourselves. But, you know, we have to challenge the inputs, if the outputs are not the results that we want in life. And, you know, so that means the, like, Jim Rohn, used to say, what are the net, some of the five closest relationships that we have are the people that we tend to hang out with the most. And I think there's a lot of truth in that, you know, there's power in association. And so if you're hanging out with a bunch of people that are also yours. I mean, you don't know any other way. You know, like, it's just that's normal to your world. It's just Yeah, it's exactly right. It's your world perspective. And, you know, and I've been down that path, I've had many points in my life where my perspective, was not serving me, but I wasn't really aware of it. And nor was I willing to open my eyes to it, you know, until Usually, you have one of those, Oh, heck moments, you know, where it's like, wow, there's a big change that's looking like that boulder that's coming down my path. And if I don't make a change, right, now, it is going to squish me. And there's going to be drastic shifts in my life that are going to happen as a result. Do I want that? No. Why don't I want that? Well, here's why. And then getting back to that, why, again, that purpose that meaning, which, you know, as Nietzsche said, you know, like, it's like, with a strong enough why we can endure anyhow. And I think there's valid, you know, if you have a big enough purpose, it doesn't matter, the challenges that come it will help you through it. I agree. I agree.

Philip Pape 17:26

And having and once you have that purpose, it sounds like another area that people struggle, and you alluded to this was the the input output system, right? You mentioned inputs and outputs. And that speaks my engineering mind is that we can either have an open system or closed system, and if you don't close it with feedback on the output to the input, then you just aren't aware, you're just not aware of all those models are helpful for people to understand of why we do things, why we track something or you know, collect, or listen to a podcast and so on. So that leads me just quite naturally, not intentionally, but quite naturally talk of optimization. And what is optimal mean, right, like, in the context of physical mental health. To me, when I hear the word optimal, I at least have been conditioned on the word optimal from all the podcasts and things in the world. It's, it's as close to perfection as you can get. Right? That's the, but then the other side is, you're never going to be perfect. So what's best for you? And is that optimal? So what does it mean to you? What is it for me to do?

Dai Manuel 18:35

Well, so here's something that I had to learn, and I kind of learned it the hard way, because I think I was resistant to it initially, especially as I was aging, you know, enter into my 30s, mid 30s, especially, you know, I was still able to train at high intensities, like very, very high intensity really challenged myself and, and yet, my body was changing. You know, it was there were certain shifts, like things that we do in my 20s, where if I tweaked something, the next day, I'm, well I can go lift again, or I can go train again, like I just would sort of work through it. And it felt like my body was more resilient, or just had this better recovery ability. And, and, you know, it may have been true, it may not have been, you know, it could have been just my 20s and my my stubbornness to just push through it. But then as I got into my 30s, and as my kids were getting older, I realized that I had to sort of shift things because my life was shifting. And so I had to challenge sort of my belief systems around what is optimal, especially when it comes to health and fitness. Because it's such a big part of my life, just like yourself, like it's been an integral foundational piece for me. It's really what got me started on this trajectory that had been on you know, since I was 15. And I don't discount that, you know, it's important to me and yes, I have to keep honoring that piece. in me that knows that if I maintain certain levels of fitness, my health resiliency, my ability to manage stress, my autonomic nervous system, you know, it's in a much better place. And in my mid 30s, in the years, there was a sort of that critical moment where I really had to own this. And it was forced upon full disclosure forced upon me, you know, I did a Tough Mudder it was the first time they came to Canada, they did it up at Whistler BC. I went out for it, we had a number of friends that came and did it with us, it was amazing. I love those kinds of obstacle course races, like I really enjoy it, like Spartan, Tough Mudder. Like, I just, I love them, I love them. And I don't do it to race it, I do it to complete it, just to say I did, and I can and I will do it again, you know, and, and after that first Tough Mudder experience. And full disclosure, I'm not a runner. Okay, I'm not a distance runner, I'm a straight sprinter. I do not do long distances, because I do have a lot of muscle mass, and I just I don't really enjoy running long distances. I'm preaching to the choir here. But but my thighs got chafed. And a little bit of a rash. After all that, you know, it's like just about, it's about a half marathon distance. And I'm not conditioned for that. So I got this little bit of scrape within the next 24 hours, this this infection to cool, and my body was systemically shutting down. And we rushed me to the ER, they took a quick blood test. My neutrophils flatlines. And neutrophils is what neutralizes viral infections and bacteria. And they were like, like what's going on here, they thought maybe I had a form of leukemia that I was undiagnosed. And so there was a lot of fear setting in at this point, right. And I ended up being hospitalized for 10 days, you know, and they had me on this like massive antibiotic drip, and they're pumping me full of Neupogen, which is a common biological drug that they use to treat people that are finding various forms of cancer because it bolsters your immune system and gets your bone marrow over producing neutrophils and other important pieces for our ability to recover and defend ourselves. And anyways, my immune system crashed, and three bone marrow biopsies later and a series of other tests, we are able to determine that I have an autoimmune condition that I've probably had all my life up to that point, but I've never really been challenged to that extent. And so all of a sudden, I became hyper aware that wow, certain ways that I eat certain ways that I manage stress, certain ways that I train, you know, especially if it creates huge inflammatory responses that can be really challenging on my immune system. So all of a sudden, you're I'm in my mid 30s. And I've done things a certain way for so long. And I was like, you know, what, I'm gonna have to adapt, I need to change, I need to adapt, I'm gonna train because I've got this underlying chronic health condition, that's not going to go away. But yet, I do not want to compromise my quality of life, I still want to be able to do all the things that I want to do, I want to experience all the things I want to experience I want to I want to live life, you know, to its fullest, no matter my age, and it's not an excuse. It's an input. No, it was and but it was challenging, because I had to discover new ways of doing things new, especially around training. And nutrition. Nutrition was the the biggest one actually, and but after I enjoyed that, and work through it, you know, it took a couple years to really develop a new lifestyle from that. It unlocked something in me, you know, and as I pivoted into my 40s, and now I don't, I'm just looking down the barrel of the gun at 47. I'm actually the fittest and healthiest than I've ever been in my life. And it didn't happen by accident. But that critical moment at 35 shifted my trajectory entirely. And I had to learn a new way of doing things, but man, it helped. And so my idea of being optimal now is really, it's all about longevity and vitality, being able to be the best version of myself and be present for myself and my own life. And to live a life where I can say yes to the challenges that presented to me, you know, and I had a client of mine, he wanted this year, we always like to send a big physical goal, you know, because there's also a huge mental piece to those big physical goals. And we decided to do the West Coast Trail, you know, he was going to do it. And it's an 80k hike and off grade out in the bush in the western coastline of Vancouver Island and very rugged hike. And I was like, You know what I'll do it with and if I didn't have that belief in myself, and that confidence in my health, my ability to to just navigate that. I wouldn't have said yes. And I would have missed out on one of the greatest things that I've ever experienced in my life, you know, so that anyways, big, big, long winded story that sort of tried to give you some context there around what Optimal means to me

Philip Pape 24:46

a lot and context is everything. Because that that that that leads to some follow ups that I wasn't planning on asking in a sense when it comes to anyone determining their optimal because you mentioned health, longevity, vitality, you know, and these are great words, but we want to, we want to define things. And we also want to talk about what's relevant to different people, because here's where I'm going different people of different ages, different phases of their life, like you said, in your 20s, very different from your 30s. And then when you discover your autoimmune condition, and many of us as we get older, have injuries, and you know, stress is higher, and there's lots of changes. So where you're starting on where you want to go, and the balance, there are trade offs. So where I'm going is there are trade offs to everything. So for example, if someone is, is just getting started with their lifting, and said, Well, I want to live a long life, do they? Do they compromise some aspects that you care for, for longevity, because they really want to focus on getting super strong, and eating more food, which they wouldn't do forever? Because it could impact on longevity, you get what I'm saying? I do all the all the health goals, we have performance, physique, longevity, they sometimes conflict. And so what are your thoughts on that?

Dai Manuel 26:02

That's a great point. Wonderful point, actually, Phillip, and I appreciate you giving me that sort of clarity around that question. You know, and I guess I just to play with the example that you shared with someone had this goal to be super strong, right. And it made me put on quite a bit of muscle mass in conjunction with that. So obviously, their calorie intake is gonna go up. But also their volume, you know, the training volume will probably go up as well, especially when it comes to loading time and attention, all that other good stuff, but my biggest question is going to be why? Why What? What is it about that goal that's really pulling me right now? You know, and it is a goal should be pulling, not just pushing, right? You're pushing yourself to go for the goal. But that goal? Is it like a magnet pulling you towards it? And why? What is the outcome? Like? What does it look like when you're there? Can you define what there is? Yeah, because I think it's important for them to understand what is that motivation, both intrinsically and extrinsically? That's helping them channel this energy and commitment, because you're right, everything comes with a cost, you know, I'm gonna say yes to this, there's gonna be inevitably things we have to say no to, you know, it's like, oh, I wanted to drink my first Ironman, I'm like, Well, you want to do that and get super strong. You know, what, that may not work very well for you, you know, it's gonna be you're gonna be really eaten a lot. And you're gonna be training all the time. And then yet, you're running a successful business, you know, you put in 56 hours a week plus your family time, like, when you're gonna make it all happen, right? Like, let's get real, that struggle with a juggle is legit. And, and so that's just one example. I think it has to be more context through conversation and clarity through through dialogue, you know, and, but I know for myself, when I have those inner conversations, it's always nice to talk to somebody externally, you know, whether it's a coach, a mentor, an accountability partner, I mean, whatever that is, it's nice to say, have a sounding board to sort of speak through the ideas and the things that we want to accomplish or do and yes, and recognize, it might just be a season of that. You know, and that season could you know, I'm not saying it's like three months, like a quarter in a year like it maybe it's a couple of years that will be your commitment. And I'm like I look at professional bodybuilders I mean, they have an offseason guys and so it's recognizing this and that the seasonality of it all as well.

28:33

That's a Philippe an awfully for a long time and know how passionate he is about healthy eating, and body strength. And that's why choosing to be my coach. I was no stranger to a dieting and body training. But I've always struggled to do it sustainably really helped me prioritize my goals with evidence based recommendations, or not over stressing my body and not feeling like I'm starving. In six months, I lost 45 pounds without drastically changing the foods I enjoy. But now I have a more balanced diet. I weight train consistently. But most importantly, I do it sustainably if I scientifically sound healthy diet and a Langstrom body is what you're looking for. Really paid Easter guy.

Dai Manuel 29:18

I competed for the first time again in the CrossFit open this year. But I taken a hiatus for about six, seven years. I had a couple of hernias, and he talked about injuries, a shoulder injury, I could list off all the injuries I've had right and and so I just wanted to take a break from the competition side of things. So I could just get back to a place of just feeling great waking up in the morning not feeling any aches and pains and but it took a lot of time for me to really focus on mobility, flexibility, as well as conditioning with bodyweight exercises, calisthenics. And so I took a break from lifting for a while, you know, and my body thrived. And it was awesome. And, and then I started to introduce weights again, but I'm not gonna go for one rep max is I think going for three rep max is that real often, you know, unless it's a testing cycle and the beginning or the end of like a cycle of training. And that works for me. You know, it works for me. And because I understand what often means for me, I understand what my expectations are of me. And I also know why I'm doing it. And I think that is the clarity piece that people require to really fully answer the question that you've asked, you know, yeah,

Philip Pape 30:26

yeah. And I want to I want to come to the why I have a question related to that. But first, the the concept of mixing things up and all these things you've tried and experimented, that strikes me as a very valuable thing to do, as well as sometimes you don't know. Why not? Not that you don't know, the deep why behind your overall activities in your life, but sometimes you don't know whether or why to do something specifically, right. Like, like you said, the CrossFit Games, somebody might be interested in that. And when you ask them why, just because because I want to, there may not be a deep way to that one, in my opinion, I think because because of personal experience, even though there's a bigger why to their life. So Right? In trying to figure out your why I'm assuming there's no wrong answer, right? Everybody's wise or why, right? How does how does someone do that? When they when they just want to try something for the first time, let's say they want to get shredded, you know, like, like they, they've gone around, they built all this muscle. They're like, You know what, but those bodybuilders do I know, it's crazy. Everybody said they're miserable at the end of the cut. I don't care. I really want to see if I can do it. Is that a good enough? Why? You know what I mean? So what are your thoughts on that?

Dai Manuel 31:30

I think that's it, I think it's absolutely correct to say is a is it a big enough? Why for them it is, you know, just to prove to them, because it does require like to get to that level of leanness is a commitment. And it is not easy at all, you know, I, for a longest time of my past company, one of our key guys, you know, was professional, natural bodybuilder, you know. And so during the season, though, especially when he was cutting for competition, I was miserable. Really walking around on eggshells, and he had his watch and his phone, he had all these redundancies set, walked around with this massive cooler, and it'd be like, I'm not gonna go talk to that customer now, because my watch went off a minute ago, and I gotta eat right now, you know, and there was like, just the level of rigidity. And non negotiables. It was, was immense. And, but for him, it was the mental challenge of it all, you know, like mentally sound like I have never met somebody so committed to to an end result. And it's also why he's been extremely successful. You know, in every competition he's placed in the top, you know, and it's phenomenal. But it came with a lot of, I'm gonna say the word sacrifice, for sure. You know? And so, the why, and I think this is kind of the interesting thing, you know, we think about, like, what's the meaning of life? While it's like, well, what's the meaning of life to you? And whatever answer that person gives, great, that's true to them. There's no right or wrong. It's that's their perspective, you define the meaning, you know, in life. And I think the same can apply with the why. And if it's just to prove that, hey, I can do something really hard, just to say I, I've done it, and I've done things like that, too. And I did stand up comedy as an example, like, I needed a challenge. And it was something that intimidated the heck out of me. And I was like, gosh, getting up on stage for five minutes and trying to make people laugh. Well, that sounds really freaking hard. That scares the poop out of me, you know? And I was like, You know what, though? I want to do it just to say I could I did it. And you know, and then after I did it, I was like, Man, can I do it again, I repeated it. I did it a second time, you know, and now I've had a break for a number of months, but it was just, it was nice, you know, to do something that I was so intimidated by. And to come out on the other side after it all happened and realize, you know, what, it wasn't as bad as I envisioned it was gonna be. Yeah, and, and so that's, you know, again, some stories to sort of get some context here. But that's some of my beliefs around.

Philip Pape 34:03

Yeah, but that's another very powerful thought that doing something intimidating. You said, quote, doing something intimidating was nice. And there's a lot of in that, Steven, because I can think of any time I've done something scary. Like for me in Toastmasters, doing speech contests was scary. They're still scary and still do them. And I've actually blinked out on stage and I still do them. Because I know there's some growth that comes from that regardless, and things are easy, you just don't get that growth from right there. You know, they're easy. There's, it's kind of like in positive psychology, there's a model of oh, what is it here? It's flow, you know, the flow model getting into flow, where the optimal state of flow is the right balance between skill and challenge. So if your challenges and is too high, you're just gonna have anxiety because there's no way you could possibly deal with it right now. But if the challenge is just past your skills, It's getting in that state of like deep, undistracted flow toward that. Anyway, I'm also getting off on tangents I know,

Dai Manuel 35:07

it's I think it's all relevant to the conversation we're having. I love it. I absolutely love it Filipino, I love the way your mind works as well. So, continue, continue.

Philip Pape 35:16

So if somebody, somebody says, here's how I want to do this, you've had those conversations, they challenge themselves, maybe have good people in their life to challenge them. Yeah. And then they want to take the steps forward, we know that on day two, your plan goes out the window like this. And so, you know, at least the way I put with my clients is like we don't, we're never almost never going to be on the path, but we're going to be somewhere near it. And we'll end up in the destination. Right? Right. And so you've got to have the if then kind of choices and, and contingencies along the way. So given that there's uncertainty, that there's change, that there's complexity, how do you adapt your strategies to quote unquote, optimize? So you keep, keep going forward? Yeah,

Dai Manuel 35:59

I guess it depends on what aspect of of the our lives or life that we're looking to optimize, you know, because I always recognize that there's probably areas that need more attention than others. Yet, we all like to do things that we do really well on, you know, and so it's also finding sort of that, that ability to shift between those two areas and recognize that now, there's gonna be some of these things, I'm gonna have to develop new skills. You know, it's things I haven't done before, I've never done very well, well, it's gonna need some extra time and attention, maybe some extra resources, maybe I need to hire a coach or someone to support me through that. You know, like, I do workshops frequently. I recently did with my younger daughter, you know, we went and did a gymnastics workshop that focus predominantly on rings and handstands. And why because I'm a big dude, man, I'm too tan, you know, like six wine. And there's nothing light about me and trying to do gymnastics, especially in rings. This top, you know, really tough, it's hard on my body. And but I also know, it's like, I don't, I believe I have the strength. But I know, I don't have the technique and the skill. So you know, we did a six hour workshop, and it helped by the end of it, you know, I was doing muscle ups. And it was awesome. I was like, wow, you know, like, and and so that confidence and that confirmation that I can do something that I believed I couldn't do before. That was the piece that really solidified Why are committed to doing it, because I love having those little self discovery moments. Where it's like, holy smokes, I did it. Wow. Wow. Like I always laugh about Nike just do it. What a great slogan. It's awesome. But you know, what's better than that? I just did it. You know, like, That is freaking amazing. Because it's the completion or the result of the action that we committed to doing especially when a lot of times there's huge uncertainty, we don't know the future thing, or what will happen when we try that thing. You know, and so it's self trust, I believe that we did, we sort of foster in ourselves as we just navigate these paths, as you mentioned, and but also remember, and sometimes you gotta go bushwhacking. There might not be a path there for you to follow. So it's okay. It's okay. You know, you're capable, you're in what's the worst case scenario? You know, I always Tim Ferriss, that TED talk. He did not. I mean, I don't know how long ago, maybe 1516 years ago, but you know, he talks about fear setting exercises, you know, this idea of just asking yourself, you know, what's the worst thing that could happen if I go and try to do this thing? You know, he's taking that sort of stoic philosophy, and he's applying it to that, you know, and just saying, like, what is the worst case scenarios? Yeah. Because when you start to look at it, you can actually logical take over, because a lot of it's fear based, right? And then all of a sudden, when you let logic sort of look at, it's like, Does that really happen? I mean, I guess it could, could aliens come down? And you know, like, yeah, man, it could happen. But well, now I'm gonna be able to do Spartan that day. That is true. And so but I found that exercise really, really powerful for myself, because it helped me eliminate a lot of these fears that I knew were there. But it couldn't necessarily articulate or reason through. And sometimes you just got to go through that process, you know?

Philip Pape 39:13

Yeah. Now the exercise specifically, you're talking about, I was just asking, what's the worst that can happen? Is that what you're saying? Yeah. No, I love that. Because even if so, I had mentioned before flow and challenge and everything, but even if something does seem insurmountable, why not try it anyway, potentially, and at least push yourself toward that, you know, thing. You mentioned that new challenging things require extra resources that stuck with me too, because it brought up two things. One is the idea of balance of you can't be doing challenging things all day necessarily, because you get burned out. I can tell you I can go all day and when my brain is starting to feel tired before my body feels tired. I know I've just been doing too many just on things and I have to go and sit or go for a walk to talk to my Why for play video game? I don't care what it is something that requires no brain power whatsoever. Yes. That and then also, the fact that when you have a new, very challenging thing, especially when it's brand new like, it can be, like you said, lifting the bar for the first time, or whatever for me when it was 12 years ago, joining Toastmasters for the first time, and I had never done this before, of taking the time and decide what do you need in your life to support that, like, don't just walk around, you know, hoping that it'll work in the same way all of your high strength existing skills work, but rather, do I need a group to join? Do I need to read a book? Do I need to join a course I get a coach, just take time to think about it in my daily schedule and so on. I'm not really asking a question here other than trying to connect with everything you said, because I think it's great.

Dai Manuel 40:50

I agree. I agree. You know, Toastmasters for me, it opened up a whole new path in my life. Yeah, because I was intimidated by public speaking. You know, like that, that idea of speaking in front of a group, especially large groups of peers, or people, even people in my own industry, even though people that I believe I'm part of the same tribe like that intimidated the heck out of me, like, very, very much fearful of it, you know, and definitely, Toastmasters was that thing that allowed me to channel through it. And I'll do I still get nervous as all heck yeah, I do you my hand sweats my heart rate race. Yeah, it all does. But I can channel that that sort of anxiety or anxiousness into something that can make an impact. And that was why I wanted to do it, because I believed I was being called to do something more. And I think we all are on that path. You know, we all have that Inkling. And so it's pulling us to do something greater than we thought we were capable of doing. Because we do have that potential. That it's just unfortunate. And a lot of times it goes unrealized, you know, and all it took was a mentor to tell me like when I asked him, I said, Listen, that you were amazing at this, like, What's one thing I could do to just be a little bit like you. He's like, I'll give you one word, Toastmasters. That was a Friday conversation. I went home and I Googled on the Toastmasters website, I found my nearest club location I showed up at the Monday morning. And it was called Early Edition Toastmasters because they meet at 630 Monday mornings. And it became a part of my every day for the next four and a half years and then eventually moved on because we moved and relocated. So I found a new club, but it's always been a part of my life, you know, and it's helped so much, so much. I think it's

Philip Pape 42:23

an amazing organization. And it's I've talked about on the show multiple times, and I've met guests who I had no idea and after afterward, they're like, Hey, have you heard of Toastmasters? I'm like, yeah, absolutely. I everybody I tell everybody about, at least for me two things that will improve your confidence dramatically is lift weights, heavy weights and join Toastmasters. Like both others, right?

Dai Manuel 42:42

Yeah, but you're right, though.

Philip Pape 42:45

Yeah. Yeah, I agree what you meant. So you mentioned also the nervousness. And somebody somebody mentioned recently, she was starting a, she just started a podcast. So I love talking to people. So I'm coming up on episode 100. And I feel like I just started and I'm still have a lot to grow. But then I realized people just getting started, you know, have a lot of anxiety about the technical side, and speaking of people, and so on, and I said, you know, that just means you care. And it's something you should be doing, like everything that makes me nervous in my life, I continue to gravitate toward because I think there's value there. What do you what do you think? Oh,

Dai Manuel 43:20

I agree. 100%? It's my just, you know, sort of looking at that, as opposed to my own life. And you're absolutely correct. You know, and was it hard to make the commitment to even push myself to try those things? Yeah. Yes, I just trying one thing, but showing up the second time and a third time, you don't do sort of long winded circle here. You know, to get back to your questions like day two, the plan goes out the window was just that, but you showed up for day two, you know, you showed up for it, you did it day one. And then like I I still coach CrossFit, you know, I'm the film guy at the gym, like so just if the other coaches are sick, and they need someone to cover I'll go in, and I'll cover because I love the community element. I love coaching and helping people. And so I like to be part of that community and support it that way. And I always say to people, like, you know, especially when you get these new people here, I'm like, Yeah, sure they show up for that first session, right. And they might have done a Foundation's, and then they show up to class for the first time. Or maybe they just came from, you know, a regular sort of a Globo gym, you know, where they've had more of a traditional sort of history of training. Now they've been introduced to CrossFit for their time, which is very different than than what I was accustomed to prior to joining toes, sorry, CrossFit trying first time, but those people that show up for the second time, I'm like, good on you. You know, good on you. And I think it's phenomenal. And I'd like to remind people because I often will have these conversations with women and we talked about lifting weights and getting stronger and the confidence is for them. And so many women I've met and said I'd love to just be able to do a pull up. I love you know, the pole my dead weight on a bar to get like, you know what, that's a great goal to work towards. And you know, it will start with you know, maybe some ring ropes you know, maybe we'll get some some led to teaching rose will use a band on the bar will start to condition your body to be able to handle that. And here's the cool thing. I know you can do it, and you're gonna get there, and the day that you get that first pull up. That's 100% improvement. How often do you get to say I have 100%? Improvement? Like that's perfection right? Now after that it's diminishing returns. But yeah, regardless, to go from zero to one is always the most rewarding part of the process. You know, always and, and the confidence and belief that comes from that achievement is remarkable. And so I always encourage people this, yeah, you're gonna get started. And you're going to hit that first milestone, and realize it's the first of many, but that first one is so critical, because it will set the tone, as well as the path for you to follow after, you know, and so it's just maintaining your self commitment to that first milestone.

Philip Pape 45:56

Well, and I'm making a connection between that, that that first of something, and kind of the dopamine hit you get and like you talked about fun, that is a version of fun, and it's knowing that it's hard. Embrace that, right? Because knowing that it's hard means when you do it, it's gonna be fun. And we kind of connected it all back. I was thinking just this week. So I started lifting again last week with Max three limbs as the shoulder I'm not allowed. But I try to one arm deadlift, not a one legged deadlift one arm. And I was like, this is pretty cool. But I was all wobbly and weird. And you know, stabilization wasn't there. Because it's like, like, you're a newbie again. And it was all wonky and out of balance, but I did it. And then this today, I did it again. And like it was super solid and felt light. And it always reminds me how quickly, you know, you make progress. Like you said, eventually it's diminishing returns, but that initial burst, and that adaptation you get from it applies to anything, not not just physical. Don't you agree? That's right, everything. Yeah, absolutely.

Dai Manuel 46:56

I've really, you know, it's, it's awesome. But it's the, like, why I keep and why I've been coaching and mentoring people for almost 30 years now. Is I love being able see I told you. So I saw that potential in you. I teased it out a little bit. And you did it. And now you know you did it. And you did that you did that? I didn't do you did that, you know, and that is that fulfillment piece that I get? I just absolutely love that moment where they're like, Yeah, you did tell me and I did do it. And it's like, just seeing that in their eyes is like, oh, man, it's awesome.

Philip Pape 47:30

It's awesome. I agree. And I think it comes from maybe our confidence as well be knowing that it's going to work for them. So then that the counter to that just to be on the little slightly negative side here is true, people have self doubt, because they've tried many things to get that outcome. And we know and health fitness, this is all the time because I hear like, I hear people say I've, I'm in my 40s or 50s. Now the weights not coming off or whatever is not happening. And what I used to do doesn't work anymore. Or, you know, I run a lot and I work out seven days a week, why isn't it working? You know, I've been cutting calories for three years, why isn't working right? And be a little facetious. But how does someone get that confidence back without being manipulated or thinking that they're gonna meet up with another huckster or charlatan? Because there's so much out there? Yeah. How do we? How do we give people their own power and agency to recognize that and find that person?

Dai Manuel 48:26

I think the agency word is great, because that's really what it boils down to. Right. And but trying to think of an example, I guess, if you think about health, because, you know, this is talking about health, it's talking about fitness, you know, it's it's helping them achieve that first, when I find people with that sort of negative mindset, or that that maybe that disbelief that they can do it, because they've had so many previous experiences that has been able to prove this new bias that they have for themselves, right? Like it says, it is bias. It's like I have this underlying bias that I don't believe I can do it. And I'm like, Well, do you I understand what these biases do. You know, it's like little programs that run in the background, and you're gonna do whatever you can, especially your subconscious to prove that that's a correct belief. And so that idea of self sabotage is very, very real, man, I know how many times I've done it, okay. I don't think anybody is immune to it. But recognizing when it's happening is a skill that can be developed. You know, that self talk can be developed, it can be nurtured. And I think that's a good place to always begin, you know, it's that awareness piece, that mindfulness piece of oneself and some of those past beliefs being challenged. And I find the simplest way to do that is helping them achieve a win very early on very early on, you know, something that does give that little dopamine hit, right, but also it's like, whoa, okay, I didn't believe I could lose this. This extra five pounds. And yet, I just did You know, and I'm like, Well, you didn't lose it, you released it. It's gone, man. It's never coming back, you know? Right, right. And they're like, oh, yeah, you're right, you're right. But But this belief, this belief is now being redefined. And it didn't take a massive shift and for 180 change in direction to make that happen. And also, it started with that smallest of wins. And I find that if you have that, and you have it early enough on, it's going to be the unwinding of a lot of those belief systems that might have been ruling your life up to that moment. And the, here's the crazy thing, is those belief systems, they're connected to all areas of our lives, all areas and impacts every, you know, every person, it's not just a fitness thing, it's not just a nutrition thing, you know, it's not just a men's health, it's everything. You know, and, and if you believe that it's an isolated thing, that doesn't affect other areas. I'm just gonna say, Iran, Iran, and if you look at the web of your life, you'll see that everything's interconnected. And so the way it there's that, quote, I forget who said it, but you know, the way you do anything, is the way you do everything. It's true. You know, it's true, like, you'll see that, that that belief system repeat itself in other ways. And so it's, it's important to learn a new way of doing things, you know,

Philip Pape 51:18

that, yeah, what you just said, reminds me of the broaden and build theory, from psychology, I think it's Barbara Watson, that last name, I should know this, broaden and build the idea that your personal resources spiral upward. Once you get these wins, or once you start to change your belief, like you said, on one thing, it just makes the others it unlocks the rest and it spirals. Opposite of a downward spiral. Right? Very good. And that's true. So the other thing that came to mind there die is like when we say I can't, if we can just use our logical brain and really dissect are we talking about a physical limitation in the law of physics, right? Like the law of the universe, like I can't fly. Okay. Logically, that's true. But 99.9% of the time, the I can't is more of a self limiting belief, like you said, not. And so just assume that you can, and see what that does for you. I don't know that's, that's my thought on it. Like,

Dai Manuel 52:14

yeah, I agree. And I'll challenge me when I hear that I'm like, No, I'd rather you just choose not to, you know, like, I want you to to be fully aware that you're choosing not to do this, it's not a matter of you're limited that you don't have the ability to do it, you're choosing not to do it. You're choosing not to prioritize yourself, you know, that's like, that's okay. But it's not, listen, you are talented, you are capable, you have been gifted this life, to accomplish cool stuff. And he keeps saying you can't do it, it's not a matter of can't, it's just that you're choosing not to own it. And if you own it, I'm okay with that. And you should be okay with it, too. You know, and stop complaining about it. Stop talking about it. Just own that that's your decision, you're not gonna do it. Like I had to get to that place of surfing. As an example. You know, we were living in Bali for two and a half years before the pandemic. And I was like, everybody serves here, man, it looks cool. I want to try it out a bunch of lessons can try in it and try it. And then I got to a place I was like, you know, I'm doing this because it looks cool. I'm not actually doing because I enjoy it. Because I don't enjoy it. Keep getting pummeled. I'm a sinker, I'm not a swimmer. Okay. And I was just like, No, I'm just I choose not to do surfing. I choose not to surf. I'm okay with that. But I had to get to that place to own it, you know, because I found myself saying I can't surf. I found myself saying that I hate it. My wife is like, she's really funny. But she's like, No, that's a four letter C word we never say in our house, you know, and

Philip Pape 53:43

like you choose not to serve, right? Yeah.

Dai Manuel 53:46

So I gotta get to a place to say I choose uncertified I'm, I'm okay with that. And I own it. And I've got no problem with that. I don't think about like, oh, man, I failed or I didn't like I got up this is just, I just choose i There's other things I'd rather do. You know? Yeah. And so, yeah, you're right, the way we talk to ourselves, the way we speak is so critical. And that's also something really valuable we went through Toastmasters right so that practice and feedback it's amazing to see some of the defaults that we have when it comes to communicating not only with ourselves, but especially with others

Philip Pape 54:16

agree and that feedback just gives you more knowledge of who you are and what you can do and you know the counter to the surfing example because that that reminds me of something that you you maybe could have gotten good at but you just chose not to do because he didn't enjoy it. The opposite would be you might be good at things and not enjoy them as well. Right? And it's okay just choose not to do them and Okay, so I want to respect your time. We only have a few minutes. I did want to ask one I could talk to you for hours. I this has been awesome. I

Dai Manuel 54:45

love the jam, jam and I love this man. It's been great conversation that

Philip Pape 54:49

but I do ask this of everyone on the show. So I don't know if you heard one of my shows toward the end and that is what one question Did you wish I had asked and what is your answer?

Dai Manuel 55:00

Well, you know, I heard this question and I've been thinking about it. And you know,

Dai Manuel 55:10

for me, it's rather cliche to be honest with you, you know, it's like, if given the opportunity to do anything different, would I choose to do it differently? Yeah. And I think about some of those really hard moments in my life. You know, really hard moments, like when I struggle with alcohol and narcotics, you know, is a great period of my life, there was really dark and you know, it's easy. There's a part of me that's like, I wish that never happened. Because there was there was a lot of shame and guilt wrapped up in that, in Ireland, a lot of a lot of self ridicule. And it's hard place to come from, especially when you're trying to make changes in Ireland because you feel like yeah, this Balanchine that's just dragging behind. Yeah, and, but it's those amazing struggles in my life. And I couldn't say amazing. Now, we're going through it, I wouldn't say it was amazing. But in reflecting, and after introspecting, and looking at where my life went, as a result of me saying, You know what, I'm worth the change. And I'm choosing my life over this thing that was consuming my life. I would do it all same. I would, you know, even knowing that that was the path I was on. And that was common, and I was gonna have to go through it again, I would do it. Because my life right now is a result of that moment in time that I had to go through that struggle. And that's something that I always think about, you know, like, and if I could redo things when I redo it, and because it's amazing how the mind works. Plus, I love sci fi, you know, you can sell my common butterfly. Yeah, just alternate realities.

Philip Pape 56:44

Yeah,

Dai Manuel 56:46

totally like the metaverse. Right. And and so I

Philip Pape 56:49

love you know how that story goes, though. The alternate reality, it's always worse. Correct?

Dai Manuel 56:55

Yeah. Well, that's what they tend to keep hammering that home. Right. And if it would seem that new Flash movie, they really hammered home in that quite well. But it wasn't a great movie. But anyways, I digress. But yeah, that would be the question. That would be the question.

Philip Pape 57:09

No, I love it. I thought initially, you were saying that my question was cliche. And I was like, where did you go with this? By No? Second? Yeah. Cool. Cool. All right. So last question, of course, is where do you want folks to learn more about you and your work? Hi. Well, thank you,

Dai Manuel 57:27

Philip, again, for today's conversation. And thank you for creating a space to capture these conversations. And now, all of us get to be flies on the wall and learn all these new perspectives. But also, it's hearing that one little nugget that shifts everything, right, it's just a min. And so thank you for putting so much value at all of us. And, you know, for me, I'm very active on Instagram, LinkedIn, I'm fairly active on Facebook, but I would say Instagram and LinkedIn, you know, easiest places to find me if you can spell my name right? You'll find me because I'm like, the only you know and dies a Walsh name for David dai men, well is Portuguese. And man, you El. I know people are like, whoa, that's weird. And I'm like, Yeah, it's weird. But I'm Canadian. Don't worry about it. Okay, so I'm just to blend and yeah, reach out Connect. I love having conversations. You know, I love hearing what people are proud of accomplishing, you know, what are they working towards? I just, I slept during story. So please, share, share, share, share.

Philip Pape 58:29

There it is. And thank you for filling this space. I mean, you talked about the space but thank you for filling it with so much energy today. To Burstein it was wonderful. I will I will throw the links in there for your IG your LinkedIn and also your book The Whole Life Fitness manifesto. I can see that thank you. People find out and that's it. Thank you again for coming on the show was a blast.

Dai Manuel 58:49

Philip, thank you. I honestly really honored and finally I'm in the process of prepping to get my own podcast. I can't wait to get you on so I can grill Yeah.

Philip Pape 59:00

I would love it. I love James. Good. Good.

Dai Manuel 59:02

Yeah, it's on. Take it easy.

Philip Pape 59:04

Philip Pape 8/15/23 Philip Pape 8/15/23

Ep 96: Why Reverse Dieting Doesn't Work Like You Think (and What to Do Instead)

I will discuss why reverse dieting does not work as advertised, the misconceptions behind it, and an alternative to reverse dieting that is more adaptive, less stressful, and allows your metabolism to recover more quickly from a fat loss phase, as well as scenarios where some of the approaches from reverse dieting might still be helpful, but for entirely different reasons.

Today’s episode is about reverse dieting. This popular but controversial concept claims to boost metabolism, prevent weight regain, and make future weight loss easier by gradually increasing calorie intake after a period of calorie restriction.

I will discuss why reverse dieting does not work as advertised, the misconceptions behind it, and an alternative to reverse dieting that is more adaptive, less stressful, and allows your metabolism to recover more quickly from a fat loss phase, as well as scenarios where some of the approaches from reverse dieting might still be helpful, but for entirely different reasons.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
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Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:05] What is reverse dieting, and how it actually works
[4:52] Does reverse dieting really "fix" your metabolism?
[6:46] Does it boost your metabolism?
[8:26] Does it prevent weight regain?
[10:32] The four illusions that make it seem like reverse dieting is effective
[15:52] Stephanie shares her experience with her one-on-one nutrition coaching with Philip
[16:37] What is a recovery diet, and why it is better
[20:04] What is dynamic maintenance
[22:05] Psychological and physiological benefits of recovery dieting
[23:27] What to expect when you come out of a fat loss phase, and some scenarios
[27:17] Recommended tool to track your progress
[31:33] Outro

Episode resources:

MacroFactor app – use code WITSANDWEIGHTS to extend your free trial
Eric Trexler's article – Reverse Dieting: Hype Versus Evidence

FREE 30-minute results breakthrough session with Philip ⬇️

https://witsandweights.com/free-call

Learn about 1-on-1 coaching ⬇️
https://witsandweights.com/coaching

Ask Philip anything ⬇️

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Transcript

Philip Pape 00:00

Reverse dieting is a slow torturous approach to coming out of a diet and recovery. Dieting straight to maintenance is simple. It's stress free, helps you recover faster, it gets you focusing on your new maintenance phase or building phase, rather than continuing to feel the effects of dieting longer than you have to. Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry. So you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in Wits & Weights

Philip Pape 00:45

community Welcome to another solo episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. I hope you enjoyed our last episode 95 Where I interviewed my client Carol, who transformed her body composition and her mindset discovered a new love for strength training, losing 14% body fat and finding a deep seated confidence in herself and her abilities. Today for episode 96 Why reverse dieting doesn't work like you think. And what to do instead is about reverse dieting, which is a popular but controversial concept that claims to boost your metabolism, prevent weight regain, and make future weight loss easier. By gradually increasing calorie intake after a period of calorie restriction. Shocker, it actually does not do any of these things. And I will discuss why reverse dieting doesn't work as advertised the misconceptions behind it. And an alternative to reverse dieting that I use and my clients use, it's actually pretty simple. And it is more adaptive, it's less stressful, and it allows your metabolism to recover more quickly from a fat loss phase. But I will touch on a scenario where some of the approaches from reverse dieting might still be helpful, but for completely different reasons. So let's jump into today's topic, why reverse dieting doesn't work like you think and what to do instead. Alright, let's define reverse dieting. This is a very popular post diet strategy, it's been around now for probably 10 years or so maybe a little bit longer. It involves gradually increasing your calories over several weeks or even months to prevent weight regain or weight gain as you return to your calorie level. So imagine that you're on a in a fat loss phase, you're in a diet, you're in a deficit, maybe it's eight weeks long, 12 weeks, 16. Maybe longer than that maybe you're a competitor, whatever, and you want to come out of the diet. So reverse dieting says oh, here's what you need to do. Whatever you were just eating, increase it by 100 calories next week, and then do it again and again and again until your body recovers. And that way, you're not going to gain a bunch of fat right back. Right. That's the premise. And there's other claims that are made as well associated with the we're going to go into in a second. Here's the thing, there is no scientific evidence that reverse dieting is effective in increasing metabolism or preventing weight regain. And full disclosure, I spoke to Eric Trexler. On the subject. I read his article, the one about the hype versus evidence posted on the macro factor app. I and my clients and everyone I talked to that I recommend using food logging, use macro factor. And he has a financial stake in macro factor. And he addresses this in the article as well. But also, in from practical purposes, the science is clear. And the alternative that we use instead makes a lot of sense. And I use it all the time because I just find that it is super sustainable. And everyone who uses it loves it, you'll understand why and it works. It works more effectively than anything else. So the last thing about the whole Eric Trexler thing is that he effectively coined the term originally, so he kind of had an interest in seeing it be a real thing that was validated. And when it wasn't, you know, he threw up his hands and said, Hey, that's what the evidence is showing us. And that really comes down to the premise of our podcast here, which is skepticism. And I recently posted online, the idea that skepticism goes both ways that we have to not only question what everyone else is saying, we have to question our own beliefs. And that is something I will continue to do. And if whatever I talk about today, some day turns out to have a superior alternative. I will definitely you know switch to that if that's what the science shows works. But right now there's there's pretty clear, anecdotal, research based and coaching and experience based evidence that what I'm about to talk about is is kind of the way to go. And that's why I wanted to make a whole episode about it. So let's start with the claims about reverse dieting. And there, they're probably more than these, but I'm going to talk about the three big ones that come up all the time. The first one is this idea that it quote unquote, fixes your metabolism. And nothing can damage your metabolism, and therefore nothing can fix it. And what I mean by that is, when you are in a deficit, your body will adapt, your metabolism will adapt, we call this metabolic adaptation. And this is a natural response to weight loss, it occurs for several reasons. One reason is you're just losing body mass. But probably the bigger reason is the your hormones respond to the fact that you are in a deficient energy state, you don't have enough energy coming in. And so you just don't have enough resources to support every metabolic process in your body, and your body starts to triage, it starts to prioritize, and it will down regulate certain things up really up regulate others to get you back to that homeostasis. And that is why you get hungry. That is why you feel more stressed, there are many symptoms, most of which we would call negative that happen, as measured by our biofeedback during fat loss. But none of this is permanent. That's the beautiful thing about it is it's not damage, therefore it can't be fixed. And when you are ready to come out of the fat loss phase, and yes, you're hungry, and yes, you have more stress. And yes, you have more sleep and all these symptoms, and maybe hormonal dysregulation going on reverse dieting, is actually just going to slow the process of you coming out of that. And that's one reason, the claim just doesn't make any sense. Okay, your metabolism is going to recover regardless. And reverse dieting is going to make it take longer. And you're like, well, well, how do we do it faster? Well, I'll tell you that in a bit, that'll be the second part of the podcast today. The second claim is that it boosts your metabolism. So the first claim was that it helps it recover or fixes it or something like that, this claim is that it boosts it in a way that is beyond what you would get just by jumping up to your maintenance calories, or, you know, even in a if you wanted to take a break, let's say a diet break, and then you wanted to go back no fat loss phase. I've heard this many times and it's completely false. So if you're listening to this, and you believe this and you've heard it, or another coach is telling you this as a way to sell you into their program, please don't buy what they're selling. And that is, hey, if you take a break from your diet, and you do this reverse diet, it's going to increase your metabolism. So when you go back on the diet, you're eating more food to to lose the same amount of weight, nope, Bs, I'm calling BS on that, that does not happen. When you go back into your deficit, you adapt right back to where you were, the break a diet break, and I cover this in other episodes, a diet break is psychologically beneficial. And that's it, it is not physiologically beneficial, other than the things you take advantage of while you're in that break, like being able to push your lifts a little bit, or get more sleep or something like that, that then helps you recover. But it's not because of the extra calories in and of themselves. So that's one and reverse dieting may also give you this kind of false sense of security, when you think that that it's actually increasing your metabolism. And so then it causes you to over eat maybe or to binge eat once the phase is over. There's all sorts of side effects that we're not considering here that we should. So that's the second claim. The third claim is that it prevents weight regain. Okay, and this is the claim that, hey, once you're at the end of this diet, if you jump your calories too quickly, you're just going to gain a bunch of fat. This is not supported by the scientific research, which shows that the rate of calorie increase does not affect fat regain, or body composition after weight loss. Very important understand. So if you increase a signal, even if you increased way beyond your maintenance, and you jumped way into a building phase, you're still not going to gain any more fat than you would if you did it slowly over time and eventually got to that surplus. And in the process, you're prolonging the effects of the diet, you're prolonging the effects of the calorie deficit. And this actually is a negative for your body composition because it can increase the risk of muscle loss and hormonal disturbance, right? Because you're still your body still thinks it's in a deficit. This is actually in my opinion, the biggest problem with using this approach is that all the things people claim it's doing it's almost doing the opposite. You know, in a way it's not it's not damaging your metabolism. It's not artificially reducing your tablet. What I mean though is that it keeps you in a state that prevents you from full recovery for longer than you need to and what we are we trying to do when we come out of a diet we're trying to recover back to homeostasis homeostasis so we can get all the energy back we can get our hunger back down, we can get more sleep, reduce our stress, so we can go to the next phase. The next phase And our nutritional plan in our goals, whatever it is. Okay, so those are the big claims. Now in the article I referenced earlier, which is called reverse dieting hype versus evidence, and I am gonna link it in the show notes I have to give full credit to, you know, Eric Trexler. And everyone who's been behind all of this, he suggests for illusions, illusions, he calls them that make it seem that reverse dieting is working, or that it's superior to alternatives. And so I wanted to address these guys who think they're another lens to another perspective and think about this from the first illusion. Okay, so therefore, again, the first one is that the improved consistency from reversed from reverse dieting. Okay, meaning you're, you're only coming up a few 100 calories. And it's this very kind of rigid plan, stepladder approach, that the consistency from that can be mistaken for success, right. And I think this comes down to the fear people have, if they don't reverse die, the fear that they have, they jump up right away, then all of a sudden, it's going to throw everything off, they're going to gain a bunch of weight, and then it's going to cause them to want to go back in the diet or something like that. There's a lot of different reasons. But that's that's one illusion from reverse dieting that makes it seem more effective. Perhaps another illusion is that maintenance calories are, are this fixed number, right? When in fact, they are a range, right. So your maintenance calories have a lot of tolerance like we have, we have this ability for our body to maintain weight within a decent range of calories. But it's pretty fascinating too. Because if, if you've been in maintenance for a while, and it's pretty steady, and then you want to start building muscle, or going on a fat loss phase, you might find that if you just take a small, tiny nudge in that direction, your body doesn't really respond like it might actually take a lot. Now, eventually it will probably respond. But the good news about that is that when you get back to maintenance, the fear about all of a sudden gaining a bunch of weight is not really something to worry about because your body is very tolerant of those changes in calories. So when we get back to maintenance,

Philip Pape 12:14

we consider that somewhere around plus or minus three pounds, which is quite a bit for some people depends on what weight you are. And this leads to a misunderstanding of what we mean when we say reverse dieting. It's not like we're trying to find the magic number, right? We're not trying to find a magic number. I think some people have a fear on these first I'm like, I'm gonna eat my way up, and I might carefully tiptoe up there, and eventually I'm gonna find that magic number, but it's not fixed, it changes every day. Illusion number three, that the immediate calorie intake, versus the delayed weight gain from reverse dieting. makes it feel like you're going to gain a bunch of weight, right? Or it makes you feel like you're actually maybe in a surplus. Like there's this idea, there's this fear behind coming out of maintenance that my to maintain my weight, I need to eat not much more than me now. But I need to eat something higher than I am now, as opposed to a much higher than I am now. And there's a weird psychological and I see this all the time with clients where their maintenance calories might be 2300. And they've been eating in a 500 calorie deficit at 1800. And their diets over I'm like, Okay, well, let's go right back to 2300. And it's like, Well, wait, aren't I gonna gain? Like, that's 500 more calories a day? Aren't I gonna gain a pound a week with no, no, because you're actually losing a pound a week. So now you go from negative one to zero, right. And I know it sounds like simple math, but there is a pig psychological aspect to that of like, Oh, I'm going to gain a bunch of weight. So people don't want to all of a sudden eat a ton more food the next day thinking I'm going to gain a bunch of weight. Okay. And then the fourth illusion is not understanding cause and effect when it comes to weight changes. And I think this really comes down to when you come out of a diet, your body is going to start recovering. And the faster you can get back to maintenance is going to recover even faster. And as it recovers faster, that means your expenditure is going to go up and you're actually going to able to eat be able to eat more and more while still maintaining your weight. And again, this this kind of ties into the last one where people think of that big jump in calories and the associated with a big jump in weight. But when you're tracking when you're aware and when you know your expenditure. That's the beauty in this process is that now you are in full control to know what's going to happen. So we're going to talk about what that all means. If you want to know more about these illusions because I didn't really get into all the nuances. I don't want to take away from the original article. Eric goes into all of that. Check it out. Again, the link will be in the show notes. Here's the thing. Reverse dieting is not all it's cracked up to be. It's not even close and in fact it's worse I'm not, I don't like to use it at all with anybody and I would never recommend it. It doesn't repair boost your metabolism, it doesn't reduce fat gain. And it can prolong your deficit, it keeps you in metabolic adaptation. And it risks further muscle loss and hormonal dysregulation. And a lot of people might be listening to this, maybe coaches, maybe people have been preaching or talking about reverse dieting for a long time. They're like, No, no, this actually works. And I will admit, under a controlled situation where you, you do know your expenditure, but you're just taking longer to get there. And then eventually you get there. And there's some psychological reasons for doing that, which I'm actually going to touch on toward the end here. I think there's a place for that kind of approach, but not for the reasons that people claim, we do it not to fix your metabolism not to boost it not to prevent weight regain No, no, those are not valid claims.

15:52

That most value that I got from this was the fact that I had someone that I could talk to about anything, and that there was going to be no judgment, it was just Well, here are your goals, here's the best way that you're going to achieve it. And then let's work together to help you feel inspired and motivated to do that. And a lot of people out there trying to be coaches, and not all of them have done the work and also just be a genuine person that is positive and coming from the heart in terms of wanting to help. And Phillip really embodied all of those qualities, I would recommend him to just about anyone that's looking to achieve goals in that realm of their nutrition and building new habits.

Philip Pape 16:38

So what do you do instead? Alright, it's actually pretty simple. And I've mentioned it a few times already. Some people call this a recovery diet, instead of a reverse diet, whatever you want to call it. Or if you don't want to give it a name, that's fine. The idea is that when you're done with your diet, just increase your calories straight to your current maintenance calories. The key word there is current, okay, and the quandary here is that you have to know that number, unless you're properly tracking your expenditure. And what I mean by that is not a wearable device, or you know, the machines that you use, or what your phone says that you're burning every day, all those are up to 80% inaccurate, you cannot use those for expenditure. Instead, you have to be using either a spreadsheet or an app like macro factor. Based on two data points, you're changing weight over time, and you're changing or not, you're changing your calorie intake over time. Otherwise, it is a guessing game. And it is very reactionary. And that's probably why people use reverse dieting, because they really don't know their true expenditure right now. And so this is why I've always talked about the why it's essential to track scale weight and food intake during a fat loss phase. And by scale it I mean every day, so that you can get a moving average over time. And by food intake, I mean, you know your calories and macros every day. That way, you can easily come out of the fat loss phase when you're done. And then if you don't want to track at that point, great, but you'll at least have a starting point for your maintenance. So for example, with my clients, we track a 20 day moving average of weight, and we track weekly averages of calories. Okay, so now we have our scale weight and food loves to give us that information. And then we can make weekly adjustments. And as you're going through your fat loss phase, guess what's probably happening, those weekly adjustments are probably going down. Now there's a lot of fluctuation throughout the phase, depending on your movement, depending on your lifting on your recovery, if you're healing from an injury, and so on. And again, this is why we want to track this because it does fluctuate doesn't just go down. But but generally on average that kind of like the stock market up, down, up, down, up, down, but it goes in one direction over time, in this case down. On the very last week of your fat loss phase, we know your expenditure is this number. So let's say you started your deficit and you were burning 2800 calories a day. And now after 12 weeks, you lost a bunch of body weight, you've experienced metabolic adaptation. And now you're burning 2300 calories. Right? So you started at 2800. And now you're at 2300. Well guess what? That is your current expenditure. And we can recover to that immediately the next day after your fat loss phase is over. So if you're, you know, Sunday, you hit your goal and you're like, Okay, I'm done. I'm happy. I feel great. You know, I have the physique I want. I'm good to go back to maintenance and look with excitement toward whatever the next phase is. Okay. So what you can do is on Monday, set your new targets at 2800. Or no, I'm sorry, 2300 2300, because that's what you're burning right now. Now, people who use reverse dieting might not know that number. And they knew that they used to burn 2800 calories. They know that they're eating less, but they're not quite sure because it's not they're not eating and maintenance, right. They're doing it in a deficit. So they're not quite sure if they're exactly in a certain deficit. Whereas if you know your expenditure, you know that deficit is and you know that you won to close that deficit back to zero, and eat at those calories. Now, macro factor, which is the app I use, they call this dynamic maintenance, which is just a fancy term for your current and maintenance on on a given day, as opposed to an estimate a calculator a guess what a lot of people use. If you know this number, you can increase your calorie target to match. And then what I usually recommend is aiming for just a little bit above that number, when you start to eat, just to make sure that your body fully recovers as quickly as possible. And you're still going to maintain your current weight. I mean, this is a no fuss strategy, this is boom, come right back to maintenance, overshoot it just a tiny bit to make sure kind of to be safe. And why I do that is because as soon as you start eating more food, guess what your body's gonna say, Oh, thank you so much. I was dieting phase was getting a little long in the tooth. And now you're feeding me you've got you know, I've I've had protein, that's great. You've never really, you've never really deemed me on protein, which is great. But now you're giving me all you know, some extra fat and a lot more carbs, right? Mostly carbs. And, and now I can start you know, reducing your hunger and I could increase, I can reduce your stress, and regulate your thyroid and all these other things better than I could before. And all of a sudden, your body starts to become even less efficient, which is what we want, and it starts to burn more calories. And you actually then need to eat more to stay at maintenance and not continue to be in a diet. That's the crazy thing. If you were reverse dieting, you would be in a deficit for a long time. And even as you started to get closer and closer to that maintenance level, once you started to get to a true maintenance where your body started to recover, you're actually going to have to keep going up and up anyway. So let's not prolong the process. Let's go right away. And we're going to eliminate, we're going to eliminate this ironically, much more rigid, stressful need to track small jumps over many weeks in an unhelpful guessing game that drags out that recovery. We also know that this approach, the approach of recovery, dieting, of jumping right to your current maintenance is psychologically beneficial. Because you not only get to eat to the level, your body truly needs, what we were just talking about what it needs to kind of release itself right release itself from that stress now to get back to homeostasis and full function, but the resulting physiological response, like the weight gain and the energy and so on, it enforces that sustainable positive relationship with food. It's actually opposite of what we might think, right? People are worried that if I jump up, all of a sudden I'm gonna gain a bunch of weight, and that's going to cause some sort of disordered eating. And we actually find the opposite. And that's because your biofeedback quickly improves your hunger improves your energy, your recovery, your sleep. And here's the thing, even if you are afraid of a bunch of weight regain, because you jumped so many calories and I I see it all the time, I have clients who were getting to the end of the fat loss phase, they're super excited. But they're also a little bit trepidatious. About the maintenance, because it's like, oh, no, am I gonna get a bunch of weight? Am I gonna just start eating a bunch of junk food that I used to love my guests are binging and so on. And of course, we find that none of that is really caused for for concern, because we've put in place really long term practices during the fat loss phase. So it actually just becomes a less stressful, easier version of that when you get back to maintenance. But a couple things I wanted to mention, okay. First, you will regain some water weight from the increase in carbs and gut content. And this would happen regardless of your approach, it's just going to happen quickly, instead of overtime. This is not fat regain. It is not it's simply fluid. Secondly, if you slightly overshoot on the weight, which I really don't see that happening, in fact, what often happens is what I said before the body recovers really quickly, it becomes inefficient with its calories, it starts to burn more calories right away. And you actually sometimes have a little dip, I actually sometimes see a dip where you got to backtrack. And like what happened here, I thought I was at maintenance, I'm actually losing more weight, or I've had clients who are like trying to get that last pound and I say you know what, let's just stop. Let's just stop stressing the body and not worry about it. Let's bring up come up to maintenance. And guess what the next week, everybody dips down to that last pound because you've now given it that relief. Very interesting how the body works for sure. And we can always play those little games. But if you slightly overshoot and actually see an increase on the scale, like by an extra couple pounds or even three pounds, it's okay, it's only going to benefit you to have that extra energy. And because we're tracking the expenditure, you can then just adjust calories and the subsequent weeks to nudge it down just to nudge it down a bit. I said earlier in the show that plus or minus three pounds is a good range for maintenance. So if you've gone up like two pounds since the end of your fat loss phase, you're really still at maintenance. And again most of that is fluid so no big deal. Really no big deal. because you just went through that successful fat loss phase, guess what you could always get where you need to go. So there is one small caveat. And that is something Carol talked about in the last episode. And this is that if your fat loss phase was fairly aggressive, so this is this is you in a very large calorie deficit, and it could be six 800 1000 calorie deficit, which is very common for me and guys, and men and women who are more advanced trainees who have higher metabolisms. You go as aggressive as you're able to with without losing muscle, because you can because you have higher calories to work with, and you want to get the diet over with quickly, right. So if you're, if you're in that situation, you may not be able to jump up that amount of calories in one day, right go from, say, 2000 to 3000 calories. In fact, I know when I've come out of fat loss phases, and sometimes I go straight into a bulk now of jumping like 1200 1500 calories, I usually don't do it in one day that that is kind of insane for a lot of people. And so you can just take a few days and get there. And it's okay. But that's not really reverse dieting. Reverse dieting is over weeks and months. And it's like you're limiting yourself, it's kind of like a diver who is making stops along the way, you know, to avoid getting the bends. Right, it's like you're making these artificial stops along the way to avoid whatever to avoid, you know, weight regain, or whatever people are scared about, that we already talked about. But if you just simply can't eat a ton more food on the next day, that's fine, there's no need to force yourself. This is a logistical and a psychological short term reason to stretch things out a bit, and a far cry from a reverse diet with the smaller jumps over several weeks. Okay, so to recap, reverse dieting is a slow torturous approach to coming out of a diet and recovery. Dieting straight to maintenance is simple, it's stress free, helps you recover faster, it gets you focusing on your new maintenance phase or building phase, rather than continuing to feel the effects of dieting longer than you have to. So let's be smart about this. I am all about efficiency, right? Not wasting time I talked about all the time, like if you want to work with me, we are not going to waste time with silly games like reversed, I am not going to do it. One final reminder that again, the tool that I 100% percent recommend a user myself, all my clients use to figure out your dynamic, dynamic maintenance. To make precise adjustments to avoid reverse dieting altogether. It's called macro factor. In my opinion, it blows away all the other apps, I am an affiliate, I always say this with pride because I was asked to be an affiliate because I have been a user since day one. And I talk about it all the time, you know, for free, because I love it. And I think it's effective, and it helps people. So use the link in my show notes and use the code Wits & Weights, and you'll get an extra week on the free trial to try it out. If you don't like it fine. But I've actually never heard someone that doesn't like it, who started to use it. So that's pretty cool. I will be diving into food logging and macro factor in particular in an upcoming episode, because they just added complete nutrient targets and tracking. And I want to talk more about how to get the most out of the app. So if you use the app, there are a lot of cool little features and tricks and shortcuts. And then now they have the nutrient tracking, which allows you to track to a specific target, and then see how every food contributes to that, which is incredible. And then you can look at graphs over time and all this fun stuff. For all of us that love the data. But it even it even identifies your targets for you by default. Like you can just say, hey, use the default targets and it'll say okay, you know, you're you're a 42 year old male, this height, this weight, whatever. This is your fiber target. This is your Selenium target. This is your saturated fat limit and so on. Pretty cool. By the way, by the way, this approach all of this we're talking about here of using science backed strategies like dynamic maintenance, like recovery, dieting, that actually work. That is exactly what I use with my one on one clients, where I help them achieve the physical results they desire. It's physical results, but I'll tell you, it leads to so much more than that. So if you want to look more to find muscular leaner, lose two to four inches in the waist, lose three to 5%, body fat, whatever your goals are, along with the confidence, the mental resilience, just like Carol talked about last week, to know how to continue building your body and fueling your performance. This isn't about restriction. This isn't about dieting, this is about being the best. You can be strong, capable, healthy, and you want to have sustainable, long term results long after you ever work with a coach. That's what it's all about. So this is a six month program, where we combine evidence based nutrition, like recovery, dieting, along with your training and lifestyle so you don't have to waste time you don't have to waste time getting the physique you want. It's perfect for people with demanding lifestyles, and I can empathize with those Folks who lift but they want to shed some body fat or break through a plateau. If you're interested, just click the link in my show notes to apply for coaching. And I'll respond back with some questions to make sure it's a good fit. And if it is, we'll get started right away. We don't waste time people I'm in, I'm as impatient as they come. I don't like spinning my wheels. So if that's you, and you don't want to be in the same place, you are now six months from now or a year or five years from now. Click the link in my show notes to apply. Okay, our next episode 97 is an interview with dai Manuel, where we talk about the importance of fun in fitness, challenging yourself to reach new heights in your life, how to recognize self sabotage, and challenge your past beliefs and how to find your optimal in your fitness journey in life. And ladies and gentlemen, I already recorded this just this week, and it was incredible. It's a an amazing episode. It's one of those where you're not sure how it's gonna go because it's not like a very specific technical nutrition topic. But wow, there are there's one insight after another I was taking notes Fast and Furious and you definitely want to tune in so make sure to follow or subscribe to the podcast so you don't miss that episode. And that will help others find the show. So I really appreciate it. Don't just download and forget about it. If you like this show, definitely follow or subscribe. I also appreciate reviews and I absolutely love the most of all emails and messages on social from all of you about anything you took away from the podcast or how I can improve it. As always, stay strong. And I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits & Weights podcast.

Philip Pape 31:41

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights if you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up there Wits & Weights, please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then stay strong

Philip Pape 8/11/23 Philip Pape 8/11/23

Ep 95: How Carol Lost 20 Pounds and 14% Body Fat, Set a Lifting PR, and Gained Food Freedom in Her 40s

Today, I’m excited to share a motivating chat with Carol, my client. She’s a teacher, a mom of two wonderful kids, and a happy wife for 26 years. When she’s not in the classroom, Carol might be walking on the local greenway, hiking, reading, cooking, baking, or practicing yoga. But what impresses me most is her passion for strength training, which shows her commitment and perseverance.

Carol achieved amazing results in four months. She dropped 23 pounds of fat and gained 3 pounds of muscle, lowering her body fat from 30% to 16%. Carol learned to eat well, manage her macros, and overcome unhealthy habits. She also reached impressive strength goals, like bench pressing a personal best, doing 10 pull-ups in a row, and finding new confidence in herself and her skills.

Her journey isn’t just about personal wins, though, it’s about the positive influence she’s become on her children, the mental resilience she’s developed, and her relentless pursuit of goals she once thought were unattainable. Carol’s story is a beautiful example of the physically AND mentally transformative power of strength training and fueling your performance.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
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Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:55] Carol's fitness journey
[6:44] Introduction to strength training
[8:21] Discovery of Wits & Weights
[11:29] Setting personal goals
[13:29] Nutrition and health strategies
[21:51] Navigating the fat loss phase
[28:32] Celebrating body recomposition success
[33:31] Transitioning to the maintenance phase
[40:01] Mindset changes and personal growth
[42:58] Importance of community
[46:05] Managing stress through fitness
[48:27] Advice for fitness beginners
[51:01] Importance of strength training and online coaching
[54:32] Surprising outcomes from your fitness journey
[56:36] The question Carol wished Philip had asked
[59:51] Where listeners can learn more about you and your work
[1:00:33] Outro

Episode resources:

Wits & Weights Facebook community - say hi to Carol
MacroFactor – use code WITSANDWEIGHTS to extend the free trial
STRONGER training program – use code WITSANDWEIGHTS for $5 off

FREE 30-minute results breakthrough session with Philip ⬇️

https://witsandweights.com/free-call

Learn about 1-on-1 coaching ⬇️
https://witsandweights.com/coaching

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Transcript

Carol 00:00

lifting heavy and just like being able to lift heavy things and get strong just really changed my mindset to you know, I can do this like this. I'm not going to limit myself anymore I think. I think as women a lot of times we like put self limitations on ourselves and it's mind blowing because if you'd have told me like that I would be eating this many calories a day and not gaining weight. I'd be like, kidding, like, you know, significant weight. You're choking. That's not possible and it's just crazy to actually be living it out like

Philip Pape 00:35

Carol 02:28

Wow, thank you so much. I'm I'm really thrilled to be here. That was like the most glowing introduction ever. Thanks.

Philip Pape 02:36

Absolutely. I mean, it is just the truth. And I know sometimes it's hard to hear our own like story told back to us and are harder or helpful or whatever. But it's really nice to talk to you in this context, because we're usually on a coaching call, right? And now we get to really explore all the wonderful things that we've been through together and your journey. So let's talk about how you got to this moment. Tell us what your health and fitness journey look like before the recent transformation. And then and then leading to the moment that you realize that you wanted to step it up and do something different?

Carol 03:09

Sure, absolutely. Um, so I guess I've been on this whole health and fitness journey for about 10 years, maybe it really first started after my husband and I moved with our two children to a new city. And at that time, my son was in school and my daughter started preschool and I knew that I wanted to do something more active than what I'd been doing. And I have a little bit more free time on my hands. I was a stay at home mom. So I started running, I just started running and I loved it. I really enjoyed it. It was a great outlet. And I'd never done that before. And so I made some pretty, you know, fast gains and just really loved it. I started doing five K's and that sort of thing and really got into it. My husband likes to run to you so it'd be fun to run with him. And then eventually, I just started doing some strength training at home on my own with dumbbells. I don't know if you've heard of Kathy Smith. I'm gonna date myself here, but I had a couple of Kathy's and have a video. And I would do those like, you know, I'd alternate upper body, lower body, I just do my home after I go for my job. And then eventually there was a crossfit box that opened up about 15 minutes from our house and I'm gonna do that. So I got into CrossFit. It was really fun. I loved it. It was I think what I loved most about it was the community aspect. Because I was really seeking that and it was just fun. It was great and you have accountability and you have support and you can like compete with each other but it's all in good fun. So that was great. I loved it. However, I guess after about three months or so, I injured one of my legs and my right leg and I think it was because of it deadlifts not certain but I was essentially sent for an MRI, nothing major was found it was just I was diagnosed with like, anterior tibial tendinitis, or you know, it was kind of like this weird vague diagnosis. However, I didn't have to wear a boot for like, I don't know, maybe a month, I don't really, really remember. And that was during the summer. So that was pretty, not fun. You know, my kids go to school, and I'm stuck in this boot. And after that, I just kind of thought, you know, maybe CrossFit isn't really for me. And so then like, I shifted more towards running again, once my leg healed, and oh, fast forward a few years,

Philip Pape 05:44

just to stop you there. Right? So this is a very valuable tool. I'm sure a lot of people get into these various things and myself to CrossFit, you injured the leg prop, maybe from something you did in CrossFit. And that that was the sole reason you stopped doing? It wasn't anything else, right? You liked the community and all that but thought this is maybe too dangerous, or maybe not the mode of of exercise I want to attempt?

Carol 06:05

Absolutely. That's so true. Like, I loved everything else about it. But then I was like, oh, gosh, I got injured, and I was like, out of commission for a long time. It's awful. Yeah. Yeah. So um, I, like I said, I kind of I kept on running a lot. And then eventually, I just sort of did all running altogether, I was still doing some dumbbells at home. But then eventually, I just kind of stopped doing that I, I returned to a full time job teaching. And I just didn't really have a lot of time. So like, all I could do was go for my run in the morning. That was really all the time I had. And so finally, I guess this was maybe like, a couple of years ago, I was seeing a doctor at the time for just some health problems. And he, you know, he was like, I really think you're taxing your adrenals too much, you need to give the brain a break. And I'm like, I don't I don't want to do that. But I did. And so it was at that time that I really started doing the weights and I stopped running, I decided I would just walk instead of run. And then I started doing a lot more weight training on my own in the time that I would have spent running. So I didn't go on my own. For about a year and a half, maybe ish. Just doing the YouTube videos, I had a couple of channels. Carolyn Gervin was one and I would just, you know, use the dumbbells. And that was pretty much it. I do like maybe 3045 minutes a day. And so then, I guess, more recently was when we about a year, any last fall, I should say last fall, I was when I really got interested in doing it more like just just with dumbbells. And it was probably really in December that I decided I was just gonna go for it. Because we have all the equipment at our house, my husband, like totally decked out our garage, and it's a home gym basically. Fabulous. It's so great. And I'm, I feel so lucky to have that don't have to go anywhere. It's just, you know, right there. So, um, I feel like it was maybe in December or January that I heard you on a podcast interview with Karen Martell. I had started working with Karen to address some health problems I was having. And she interviewed you. And it was like, the best interview and I knew, I've got to start lifting heavy. And you like you knew everything, you had all the right answers. And I was like, I've got start doing this. And so I basically just kind of started out there with the barbell training going up from the dumbbells, and I've been just doing that ever since

Philip Pape 09:01

love, I love it. So that whole story is, is not so uncommon. I mean, except the part about, you know, finding me and saying that was the perfect interview. So I appreciate I'll just let that let that image sit there. But um, you mentioned the hormones, right? You mentioned the adrenals, for example. And I think a lot of people do find it surprising. When, like, if somebody asks me, What do I do, I've got all this stress and like you're doing too much, and maybe you should lift heavy No. And and the confusion is often there. How does how does lifting heavy weights, you know, help with your, your stress and adrenals. And we find that the recovery, right? The recovery versus the stress that you're placing on your body, it just shifts in a completely different direction. And it sounds like you've started to discover that and then you you did the dumbbells and then you started to get into barbells. Now, what was it and I'm not stroking my ego here, but what was it that you heard on that interview? You that you're like, I have to do this.

Carol 10:03

Um, well. So I've been doing the dumbbells on my own for so long, and I just felt like I wasn't progressing. And I mean, there's only so much you can do with dumbbells. And so I think it was really that and I just, I felt like I had maxed out on that. And also, I was getting a little burnout on it. How's my skin kind of boring? You know, I'd like to try something new. And back in the day when I did CrossFit. I loved it, you know? And I just, yeah, so it just sort of reignited the fire in me to get back into it.

Philip Pape 10:34

Yeah, so that's great. So it's a plateau, which I think is important for listeners, because that's one of the biggest problems people have is plateaus in their training, their nutrition, their physique, and it and like you said, it could come from doing the same thing over and over again, in something not changing enough to change you. And there's something has to give, right? And you recognize that it was the load on the bar. And some some people tiptoe around this. But like, if you ask me, what is the quote unquote, best way to lift I'm probably going to say barbell training. And then you can say, Well, what about dumbbells? What about bands? What about bodyweight? I'm gonna say yes, yes, yes, those are effective for a while, for a while, because as you get strong, it's just a function of going against gravity. And like you said, the dumbbells get kind of burned out, because, you know, you have the same movements over and over again. And you're not going to be lifting 150 pound dumbbells? Probably, before you probably instead, switch to barbell. So you know, what, one of the things you did you hit a PR on your bench, right? While we work together, you're really excited about that. And I just want you to talk about that excitement as in the context of this so that people understand how fun barbell training can actually be?

Carol 11:42

Sure, sure, absolutely. Well, usually, when I'm doing my strength training, it's, it's in the morning by myself in our gym, or home gym. And I don't ever have anyone spotting me, I get up really early, because I have to leave the house really early to get to work. And so we were on vacation, and there was a local gym that I'd looked into. And so we decided to just pay the one week fee and join it, and my husband and I, and then sometimes my son, we would all go together. And so since he was there to spot me, you know, technically it was supposed to be a D load week, like I told myself, I was gonna do a D load. You know, he's here to spot me, so I'm just gonna go for it. So um, yeah, no, it was really fun, who was just great. Not only the I got a PR, but also just having the encouragement of him. And then some other folks around there, you know, that we're watching and stuff. And so yeah, it's just nice to achieve a goal that you have in your head and be like, Oh, I really can do that. You know? Yeah. So that's been really fun. I did since then I've done I did a one rep max on my body weight for the bench press, which was pretty cool.

Philip Pape 12:55

That is amazing. As a big milestone. Yeah. It's just just so fun. You know? Yeah. So you got into strength training, this was late last year, correct. Leading into the beginning of the year, or not got into straight barbell training,

Carol 13:09

barbell training was really probably more like January. Because in the fall, I was still doing the dumbbells and I was so heavy, I was having all these health problems, and I gained some weight. And so then in January, I was like, you know, I'm gonna do this barbell for me, you know? Yeah.

Philip Pape 13:26

So then you got into that. And let's, let's also turn into the nutrition side, because that's a lot of where we worked on together. How did you I know, you found about out about me through the podcast, but the coaching practice and Wits & Weights in the community, you know, how did you find out about all that? And what resonated with you and your goals?

Carol 13:45

Yeah, sure. Well, after I heard your interview with Karen, um, I, of course, subscribe to your podcast immediately. And I started like listening to every single one I could. And so start

Philip Pape 13:56

from episode one. Did you do that?

Carol 14:01

I don't think I listened to Episode One. But, I mean, there's so educational and so informative, and you cover all the basics, and it makes it very, like just anyone can do this, you know, like, anyone could do this. And so that was really, I guess, where I got started. Just listening to your podcast. And then I guess I reached out to you. Because like, I mean, one thing that really impressed me about you was just your genuine desire to help other people. I mean, like, You're the real deal, you know, like there's no gimmicks, none of that. And I knew that I could do like a one on one call with you, just as like a basic introduction kind of thing and not not have to pay for it. And I thought, This is amazing. So that was when I reached out to you and we did the one on one and then I feel like you really gave me some great guidance like first steps things to do to get me on the path to where I needed to be

Philip Pape 15:01

And what were those things that were like? What were you remember? What were the things that you really wanted? When I'll say, Well, we started working together because eventually became a client. But even in that initial call, which as you said, it's not the way I do them, it's not like discovery calls, sales calls, because I can't stand those tactics. And I don't like the like, let me get you to call on that. I'm gonna tell you, I don't even mention that in my coaching unless you ask, but it's really like, how do we get you from A to B? Because for me, that's what frustrated me for years and years and years, is just knowing exactly how to do it. And that how to do it is often not what we think there's so many beliefs that we have to shift from what we thought to what they really are, what were the things you really wanted and your big goals at the time?

Carol 15:42

Yeah, so I'm just real quick to say something you helped me learn to shift was my attitude towards training, like I was like, all in, but like too much all in like, I was way overtraining, like I was, I was hardcore five days a week like, and sometimes Saturday, and Sunday, just never allowed my body a chance to rest and recover. So like, You really helped me make that change for sure. That it's okay to take a rest day and to recover. And that's part of the process. So that was awesome. And then the other shift was with nutrition, because like, any other time that I had, like, tried to lose weight, I would just restrict, restrict restrict a lot like restrict, you know, every day, like Monday through Friday, and not eat enough. And then on the weekend, I'd be starving. And so then I just like eat all the things, which just, you know, I was just like totally backpedaling, any progress that I've made, and it was totally not sustainable, not sustainable at all. So you helped me really see a sustainable way to pursue nutrition in a way that allowed me to reach my goals. And so like, my, my primary goal was really just to lose weight. Because I just wasn't comfortable with my body weight, I didn't feel good and healthy. During the fall, I'd had some health problems, and I hadn't been able to work out at all for like, maybe a couple months. I don't know. So that was my biggest goal. But also I just, I just wanted to get back to where I felt strong and fit and healthy. You know? So

Philip Pape 17:19

yeah, so much there. So the first thing you mentioned was that less is more, and I can't tell you how many I would say the vast majority of the conversations I have with people is do less just just do less, and you get the kind of the look really right. Or, or the concern that isn't my metabolism gonna go down if I do less, right. And I think I even did a recent episode, because I get that question so often, and it was about how working out less can increase your metabolism. So I'm glad you took that message and found that, hey, I could have more time in my life, more time to myself and still make progress.

Carol 17:58

Right, right. Yeah. You first told me to do just like Monday, Wednesday, Friday, like the compound movements Monday, Wednesday, Friday, I was like, that's just three days a week. That's insane. I couldn't like it was so hard to make myself do that. To only do three days a week, but But it definitely was what I needed.

Philip Pape 18:15

It is and it's it's counterintuitive to me to this day to Carol, it really is. And there are some strength training programs that are like just do, you know, heavy singles or triples twice a week? And do one movement? You know, yeah. And you still make progress. And it's crazy to think that some of these things work. But your your growth in your strength in your muscle is really an adaptation, right? It happens as you sleep, it happens as you recover. So if you reframe and say what my lifting session is giving me the most maximum stimulus possible, as short time as possible, so that I can let that recovery process work. If I'm working out seven days a week, and if I'm running every day, I'm just constantly interrupting that process and never letting myself

Carol 18:59

that's what I've been doing, which was just ridiculous.

Philip Pape 19:01

Yeah. Yeah. And then the nutrition, the weekend binge is also very common. And I say common Carol, right? Because I want that, that you've got a lot of listeners who I know are going to learn from this conversation, just like you said, the podcast likes to cover the basics and teach you things that anybody can do. Carol did this. anybody listening can do this. And the things she's going through the things that a lot of people go through the weekend binges where people say I don't understand why I'm gaining weight or not losing weight. I'm really good Monday through Friday. And you don't realize how much you deviate on the weekends. Right? Whether it's was it I don't know if it was alcohol or just mindless snacking or just going out like what was it for you?

Carol 19:42

It was pretty much it was there was some mindless snacking for sure. But also like just some emotional eating tied to like daily stressors, you know, like just the buildup of stress and things like that. This is like self sabotage, you know,

Philip Pape 19:56

so yes, yeah, yes, but somebody said recently on a show on another The Park as I was listening to that, you know, emotional eating is a learned behavior to learn behavior. And it sounds like you were able to either unlearn it or learn something to replace it. So I don't know if that's a simple thing that occurred for you if it happened over time, but what do you think was the catalyst for that?

Carol 20:16

Well, I think just the process of really dialed into my nutrition with you, and especially once I started using macro factor, and eating enough calories on a daily basis, and like not feeling restricted, and not feeling the need, or like the ones to overeat on the weekends, because it was all good, you know. So that really, just that process really taught me a lot about emotional eating and the triggers for it, and you know, what's the cause of it? And this is why it's because you're ever restricting. So yeah, perfect.

Philip Pape 20:53

Yeah. So you became aware of what you were doing? And that awareness itself sounded like it already unlocked the vast majority of that, that journey, right, because so many who would just don't know what's happening. And now that you know, and now that you're tracking, and this is important, because people think tracking is obsessive or causes disorders, what all that is, is bunk, right? We know from the evidence, and from experience that unless you have a prior disorder, tracking only helps like tracking your budget, right, like tracking your schedule for your meetings, and tracking everything else makes you aware and gives you control. And then the other thing you mentioned, was eating more. And that's the other thing that's counterintuitive for people is, so many people are not eating enough. And if you eat enough and let your body you know, relax and destress and not restrict now all of these other issues go away. Right? Absolutely, yeah. Yeah. And I'm just, I've just paraphrase everything you just said it wasn't a question, but it's good to re emphasize how important all of these are. Okay, so I think about a four month period, you've gone through mostly a fat loss phase during that time. And just so the listener understands, like Carol is lifting, you know, she's lifting properly with progressive overload. She's, you know, pretty self discipline that, in my opinion, like, there's different levels of discipline people have just naturally, and not that discipline, and willpower necessarily have to be high for this to work. That's where accountability comes in. But she's been able to take the things we talked about, like the sleep and the stress and all that and go and execute to that. But, and that allowed her to start a fat loss phase fairly quickly. It wasn't so and I say that because not everybody's ready. Not everybody's ready for fat loss on day one, right. And some people call it a cut, whatever you want to call it. So share the experience of navigating fat loss, right, the challenges and roadblocks because it's not easy. Let's be honest, it's not even fun. Always. Let's be honest. It's it's a it's an extreme in a way. It's a it's a deviation from the norm that we want to live every day. But you have to go through that process occasionally. So how was that for you?

Carol 22:59

Well, I mean, you're right, it's not easy. But also, it wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it was gonna be, I have to say, like, macro factor was the best because it just does everything for you. You just punch in the numbers, and it tells you what to do. And it's fabulous. So I just like I followed that to a tee. I'm really detail oriented. So I love tracking and like keeping up with everything, you know, I just I love that. So I basically I just did what microfactory told me to, and every week, it would cut my calories by a little bit more. But it wasn't by these huge amounts every week, you know, it was just like maybe 100 calories, some weeks, it was only 50 calories. And so gradually, I would just I would make the changes, I would sub in something for something else that you know, had less calories. And as I went along, and I learned a lot about which foods make me feel the best. With the least amount of calories. So that was pretty cool. Um, and I was like, I guess maybe I think it was week 14 of the fat loss phase, I think I was down to 1400 calories. And I didn't I never even had to go below that. Like I didn't have to I thought it was gonna go down to 1200 or something. A number to me, that sounded really unmanageable, but it was pretty, and I

Philip Pape 24:14

and you're fairly petite, let's just say I mean, we don't have to share all the details unless you want but you're fat. We just want people to understand you're fairly petite. So 1400 calories is is not bad, really deep into a fat loss phase.

Carol 24:25

Right, right. Yeah. I'm like five, three.

Philip Pape 24:29

Exactly. It's important to know that right? Yeah. So

Carol 24:31

like that was not that at all. And the other thing that I really, so I've always been someone who likes to eat mindfully because I have a history of some digestive illness. And so I really usually always try to eat mindfully when I eat for that reason, but this really like, dialed that in big time because like if you eat slower, then you're gonna get fuller, you know, and like it really taught me the importance of just like eating slow Totally, and it really helps you like savor every bite and really appreciate what you're eating. Because you know, that's all you're getting. So, so Yeah, honestly, I was really surprised at how once all the pieces came together, like working with you and using macro factor. And of course, the barbell training once all the pieces came together, I was really surprised that like how effortless it seemed, I mean, I really I, I really did not anticipate losing the weight that quickly. And that was pretty cool.

Philip Pape 25:30

Love it. Yeah. And I saw that progress. We can we can put it into numbers in a second. But you were surprised at how effortless it seemed? And just is there is there one thing that sticks out of out of all that that was the most important. So I know it's a lot of things. And sometimes people feel overwhelmed, like, oh, I have to track and I have to train I have to this and this and that. And ultimately you want to incorporate all those practices. But is there one or two things that were the most important out of those?

Carol 25:58

Um, so yeah, like, for sure tracking, but also just having the mindset that I was in this to be successful, like I like, in the past, anytime I'd ever tried like to lose weight on my own, I would always just, I never would succeed, like after a little while, you know, I just, I've never had any success. And I'd give up and just give up. And so this time, there was just this mindset change that was like, I am going to do this, I can do this. And I will do it. So I think that was really important to just keep in my head. And also, I mean, it's when, when you can see the progress, like, since I was lifting heavy, and you can see the progress from week to week, it's motivation to keep going.

Philip Pape 26:46

So many good things. Okay. All right. So the first thing is the mindset to be successful, but not doing it on your own. I think that's important, because I don't know about you I have I have all sorts of coaches, mentors, teachers in my life, whether I pay them or not, they're all over and I seek them out. Because the fastest way that humans usually grow is getting feedback, as you go through a process to see what your mistakes are and how you can improve. And so you knew, if we got on a call and like things, were just all out of whack? I'd let you know. And we would dial on it. Right? Yeah. And oftentimes, when that happens, especially for a client like you, again, who hasn't natural self discipline is you'll just then go ahead and make it happen so that you don't get called out to your coach. So there's all different styles, some people, it's more reactionary, right, they kind of, you know, make certain choices, and then have to get schooled a little bit, you know, in the coaching call, which is all good. Or you tend to have that in your brain like, Okay, now I'm gonna be talking to my coach, so I better get it all in gear. But then by doing that, you got results, and those results motivated you. Yeah, that's the awesome part of this, because that means we don't have to be working together for 10 years, you know, you're gonna be able to go on your own. And, and do it because you know, that the results are gonna happen, like you have certainty that a lot of people lack. So. So awesome. Yeah,

Carol 28:07

absolutely. And like, like any doubts that I ever had about that, like, I would just reach out to you, and you just reassure me and you tell me what to do. And I would do it. And it was just, it just worked like magic.

Philip Pape 28:19

Yeah, like magic. Love it. Yeah, no, it is like magic, I feel the same. Even Even when I go through the process myself and make choices. I'm like, wow, that actually works. It's biology. So it put it to put it in numbers for folks, I alluded to this in the intro, you lost 20 pounds from 140 to 120. Okay, so there's a way we're gonna just put it out there, including a massive 14% loss in body fat. And so I want the listener understand incredible numbers here. Because when we talk about gaining, maintaining and losing, generally people who have some training under their belt, they might be able to redo some MRI composition, at maintenance. Generally, they it's very hard to gain extra muscle in a in a diet, right, in a fat loss phase. I think I think this is my theory is that because you just started really pushing the weights properly, in January. And then shortly after, when your fat loss phase, you were still in that newbie gains phase? Sure, from a stimulus perspective, and then you were in a fat loss phase. So you, if we take your percentages, and we do the math, you lost 23 pounds of that 20 in fat, meaning you gain three pounds of muscle, because like it would be negative otherwise, right? Pretty cool. It's cool, right? So so just again, for the listeners, she lost 20 pounds on the scale, she actually gained three pounds of muscle and lost 23 pounds of fat so you got leaner upon leaner. Doing that that is pretty cool. It's like the Holy Grail of body composition. Right? And, and now of course Carol is going to potentially go into a building phase and might gain a tiny bit of fat in the process at some point. If she builds and then as she cut Once again, you know, she might not be able to necessarily gain this gain muscle, but she's already gained all this muscle to keep in the future. Hey, this is Philip. And I hope you're enjoying this episode of Wits & Weights. If you're looking to connect with like minded listeners on their health and fitness journeys, come join our free Facebook community. It's a supportive space where you can share your experiences, ask questions, and access free guides and weekly trainings. Just search for Wits & Weights on Facebook, or find the link in the show notes. Now back to the show. So did you get stronger while losing that fat? Like? It sounds like you gain mass. But did you also gain strong get stronger?

Carol 30:36

I did get stronger? Yes, I am. Yeah, I track all my weights and everything and how much I'm lifting. And I always do progressive overload. And yeah, like I could, I could still lift heavier, almost every week with my, with my lifts. So that was pretty cool. And you

Philip Pape 30:53

know what that tells me that tells me that besides your individual advantages you may have genetically, it tells me that you had enough recovery, that you were getting good sleep that you were probably also moving enough to keep your energy flux high so that you keep the calories high and thus the calories could fuel what felt to your body like less of a diet. Right? Absolutely. I think people need to understand that because more and more I want to talk about that these days is is the idea that even though you're dieting, what's important on the diet is the deficit. But you don't want to you don't have to be in that deficit at a ridiculously low number of calories. Right? You could be on it at a higher number if you do these other things and sleeps a big one. Like I think you were pretty good with sleep, right? Yes, sleep is huge. Yeah. It's big, because I've seen people literally jump by 200 calories on their expenditure when they start getting more sleep. Yeah, you know. And so now if you're on that's 1200 versus 1400 calories.

Carol 31:50

Right, exactly. Yeah. And I think the other thing that made a difference for me was just my daily walks like I walk every single day after school, I stopped by the Greenway, and I walk for like anywhere from 45 minutes to maybe an hour if I have time. And I think that really helped me as well.

Philip Pape 32:06

We were averaging 10 12,000 or even a little more. I'm

Carol 32:10

probably about 12,000 Some days, maybe 15. You know, but um, yeah, I mean, walking is so underrated. It's like the best therapy. It's great. It is

Philip Pape 32:21

you're right. It has so many benefits besides just the expenditure. Yeah, you can listen to podcasts, you can think, what do you like to do when you walk?

Carol 32:29

Well, I of course, I love listening to podcasts, for sure. But I also really just love finding clarity in my walk. Like if I'm if there's something you have kind of like struggling with emotionally, you're trying to figure out that just being in nature really helps bring clarity, and it also just is such a great de stressor, it helps me feel so much better.

Philip Pape 32:51

That is good. You're speaking to me, Carol. You know what I do? Sometimes I will start off listening to a podcast. And then my brain starts to get distracted with some other thought that's been niggling there and just waiting, right? And I'm like, okay, stop the podcast and start to explore this. And I will literally talk out loud. Personally, as I do this, I will talk out loud in the middle of note, you know, nobody can hear me to kind of process through the thoughts. And you're right. It's kind of your own therapy. Great, great. Yeah, you can't do as well, I don't want to claim you can't do that while running. You probably you can to an extent. But there is that extra distraction of like focusing on the running to, you know, Sure, absolutely. All right, so then we transitioned to the maintenance phase, right, using a recovery diet, which just to clarify for folks is, is when you come back up to your current maintenance. And you can do it right away, or you can take a few days, but it's the it's not reverse dieting, which is kind of the older idea of like, slowly coming up over like weeks and not ever quite getting into your maintenance. So and you mentioned you we use macro factor, which lets you know what your expenditure is. So when you started your diet, it might have been x and now it's x minus whatever. That's your current maintenance. It brings its own challenges going to maintenance, doesn't it? Right? Physiological, physiological. So how did you manage it? Like how did you deal with that? How did you sustain your success coming out of the diet, so that you didn't just like binge and go back to your old ways, you know, and then so that the listener understands how to manage that transition.

Carol 34:23

All right, sure. Well, something just like struck a chord in me I was just like, I've worked too hard to get this far. I'm so invested in it. Like I'm not going to go and just blow everything up after I've worked so hard. And also have to say this is something that I didn't expect, like when I when I went into maintenance from the fat loss phase, I was just gradually increasing my calories because it was like a huge jump for me to go from like 1400 I don't know was it 2200 I think it was such a huge job. I could not physically eat that much food I got so also fast, I guess, because maybe my stomach shrunk. I don't really know. But it just was not possible for me to eat that much food. So like, I would get so uncomfortably full and I just felt awful. And then I'd have a stomach ache. And I'd be like, okay, not do that again. So I would kind of slow with pumping up my calories. But again, I am, I think it was also it's like, wow, I get to eat more of this, and I get to eat more fat. And this is so exciting and so great. Like, who gets to do this? And I just really, like I said, I just didn't want to blow the progress I made. And honestly, I knew that if I over ate, I would feel awful physically. And I just did not. I didn't want that. So

Philip Pape 35:42

yeah, yeah, so the part about upping your calories was for the the psychological and the biofeedback aspects, which are exactly the reasons we would do it that way, right, as we talked about on our call. And, but but just just so people know, like reverse dieting normally is intended to avoid over gaining weight, right. And in your case, we're simply avoiding you feeling terrible. By jumping into it, which is the right way, the right reason to come up not instantly by like you said it was something like 800 calories, because you were in a fairly aggressive deficit, it was the appropriate deficit for you, but it was fairly aggressive. And then the second part you mentioned was this idea of now all of a sudden, it just seems like a buffet of calories available to you, even though this is what's required to maintain your weight. And actually, it's probably gonna go up from there. As you recover. I mean, what, what were you? Were you thinking that you would like, not be able to eat enough at some point?

Carol 36:44

I honestly was, there were some days like, I'd be like, I'd be looking at microfactory being like, how your calories do I need to get to this? And my husband's like, what are you doing? And I'm like, I'm trying to eat more, but I just don't. But also, I do want to say, there is this piece of it as but you know, especially with women on the scale, like, I will readily admit, I had this little, you know, fear of like seeing the scale weight go up. And I did not want to see that. You know, it's like, I don't want to see it go up. And so I think also there was just this like, mental piece mental roadblock to get over and be like, it's okay, if it gives up. It's really,

Philip Pape 37:24

yeah, yeah. Because we did talk about and that's being aware, right, and being understanding of what's going on with the body, right? Because when we look at, if you gain two pounds overnight, I say this all the time, like, it doesn't mean you gain two pounds of fat because you would have had or eat by 7000 calories. Well, you're not even eating to your maintenance yet. So logically, and I know the logical brain motional brain, they fight a lot. Logically, that's not possible. So what's left, while we know it's left fluid, glycogen, the carbs the food in your gut, the food, you know, being digested, maybe inflammation, because you're training harder. And that's not even to count, you know, your cycle if you're a woman and other things. Right. So we talked about that. And if you're listening, and you're coming out of a diet, and you go back to maintenance, and you're doing it the right way, you're probably going to gain what, two to four pounds, most people maybe guys a little bit more than that. Is that about what you saw? Yeah, you

Carol 38:23

know, it's really funny. Um, I actually like, sometimes my weight would shoot up by a couple pounds. But then the next day, it dropped a couple pounds. Like in fact, that just happened recently, like my weight shot up by two pounds. It was after I had horrible insomnia, and I was stressing about going back. And then the next day, it was back down to pounds. So I'm I'm really like, I guess overall, maybe I maybe I've gained a pound. I don't know.

Philip Pape 38:48

Yeah, exactly. And and, uh, your, uh, your weight that actually does make sense, right, like being 120 a pound. Whereas like, a 200 pound guy, it might be two or three. Yeah, and the point is, it's like it's insignificant, and it also has nothing to do with fat. It's just you regaining the fluid. And now you're sitting there, you're just sitting there with all this food. And that's your new maintenance. And that's the beautiful thing, because you have muscle mass that's giving you this muscle mass and movement. Yeah, attributing to that.

Carol 39:15

Exactly. And it's mind blowing, because if you'd have told me like that I would be eating this many calories a day and not gaining weight. I'd be like, kidding. Like, you know, significant weight. You're choking. That's not possible. And it's just crazy to actually be living it out. Like,

Philip Pape 39:30

yes, pretty well. We see it all the time. And everyone's different, you know, again, everyone responds at different levels. And everyone has a different, you know, like, Carol is doing everything right, I would say, you know, for the most part, like doing all the things, quote unquote, optimally as best you can. And some people will struggle with some more of these things, but always know that it's in your power, like the choice is there that you have these toggles and that you can make the change. So important message I mean, super inspiring. Have you mentioned also that strength training has influenced your mindset and increase your confidence? Like I want to touch on the mental resilience part? Because I think that's really important. And I think you said, quote, gain a mental edge with the hard things in life. Can you elaborate on that?

Carol 40:15

Yes, that is so true. So it just, it has definitely brought me a lot more confidence. I've, I've never really had a ton of confidence in myself, and, and just my profession, I think, has made some of those things a little more challenging for me. Um, and so lifting heavy and just like being able to lift heavy things and get strong, just really changed my mindset to you know, I can do this like this, I'm not going to limit myself anymore, I think. I think as women, a lot of times, we like put self limitations on ourselves. Like, we impose these limitations that we cannot do XYZ. Why, like, just because we've never done it, you know, that doesn't make any sense. You can do anything you set your mind to. So I think the fact that I could, like, you know, say, for example, hit a PR on my benchpress was like, Oh my gosh, I can do this. I can do anything like I am capable. I'm strong, not just physically, but mentally and emotionally. And I can do it.

Philip Pape 41:26

Yeah, I mean, you'd never hit, you never pushed anything like that, above you in your life. Right. And now you did. So you did something to make that change. Yeah. I want to sit with that a bit. Because it's, you know, it's a, it's a cliche, right to say like, well, you can do anything you put your mind to, I'm not building what you said, what I'm saying, you know, people use that as a cliche, right. But there's something about when you're effectively by yourself, this is a solo activity. If you think about even though we're in a community, and you have coaches, at the end of the day, when you press that bar, it's you and your muscle fibers in your mind. Right, right. And you're like, Well, this is this is pushing stuff around, and I can change my body by pushing stuff around. Right? And how does that how does that translate to other things? Like, is there something else you mentioned the confidence at work and others, there's something else you noticed you changing how you approach it?

Carol 42:23

I think like sharing my opinion, and speaking my mind about things in the past, I'd always be a little hesitant. I'm so I'm a peacemaker, and I really avoid conflict, you know, just by nature. And so inserting my opinion, there could be conflict. You know what I do with that, but so I was always I was always so hesitant to do that. But now, I'm like, Yeah, I'm gonna say what's on my mind.

Philip Pape 42:50

Love it. Yeah. Love it just just from that, you know, that's awesome. That's great. Okay, so I was, I don't know, I don't know why I have this question in my notes here. But one of the three pillars of self determination theory, which we talked about with Eric helms a while back. The others are autonomy and competence, but one of them is relatedness, which is being part of a community. Okay. Now, I know I wanted to talk about this. How has been part of a community since we just talked about how lifting is a solo activity, but at the same time, everything you're doing isn't part of a community? How has that influenced your journey? And how could listeners find their community?

Carol 43:28

Sure, absolutely. Well, being part of the Wits, & Weights community has been like, it's been so supportive. It's really helped me grow like with like minded individuals, and feel like I have something in common. There's accountability, like when you did that shape up for spring challenge, it was so much fun. I loved that. And so it just gives you the impetus to keep going, when you're maybe not really feeling motivated. And I think I mean, there's so many groups out there, and I, I just, you know, on social media, whatever, on Facebook, there are so many groups out there that are just waiting for you to join, and they're there to help you. And so I say, just reach out, especially the Wits &, Weights, community, it's great. It's great. And also, like, you've learned so much from other individuals in the group, it's fine. I mean, you know, Alan, for example, who's in our community, he has taught me so much about mindfulness. And I love that especially as an educator, and so it's just you never know what you're going to end up getting from the group.

Philip Pape 44:39

Yeah, that's a good that's a great point. Just the idea that there's fresh perspectives, knowledge, and there's some characters you know, there's some fun people, some jokesters they're serious folks. We've got some people that are like really serious lifters and, you know, they'll, they'll kind of like the positive but the tumors away It'll let you know what you're doing wrong, which is fine, because we're all there. And it's kind of a safe space to help each other, or. Yeah. I'm glad you mentioned that. Yeah,

Carol 45:09

yeah. And something else. That's really cool. It's like, you know, form checks. Like, if I wanted to video myself and post it, I know that everybody would give me advice about my form on a lift. And then of course, like, you know, the the once weekly things, or maybe I don't know if it's once a week, but you always do a live recording weekly. And it's always on a topic that's pretty helpful, you know, like nutrition or fitness or

Philip Pape 45:31

my for sure. Oh, yeah, we're to continue with this infomercial here, because I don't want to over promote the stuff. But what Carol is talking about is, you could ask a question, and I'll answer it live on Friday. And we're talking about not just a generic question that I would answer on the podcast. But actually, your situation, like if Carol came in and say, this is these are my lifts, these are my macros this is this this, and I'm struggling with this, what should I do? And I'll give you a specific answer. So definitely, I don't know how many groups do stuff like that, but we are there to help. Okay, so what about, you mentioned stress a little bit before and chronic stress? And how this process helps with that? How did that work?

Carol 46:15

Well, it was a great avenue for some stress relief, you know, like just pushing around a bunch of heavy weight. It's really great. I mean, there is like, it's very different from like, running, but there is an adrenaline rush to it. You know, like, it just feels great. And so when I work out stress that way, as opposed to like ruminating on something or worrying about it, or, you know, it just, it solves a lot of problems for me.

Philip Pape 46:45

Nice, nice. So just the act alone of the lifting. distresses you cool. It does,

Carol 46:50

yes. Yeah. Yeah. It takes your mind off whatever you've been stressing about, you know, because you're focused on your lift.

Philip Pape 46:58

Yeah. Would you say? How does it compare to like a high rep, more endurance style lifting session? Because both I think both release endorphins, right, but running and endurance, we'll release more of those in a moment, but they also kind of wipe you out. How do they compare? Just so people kind of get the differences? Um,

Carol 47:17

how do they compare? I think, honestly, I think with lifting heavy, it's for me, like I feel more accomplished, might, after a run, I'd be like, Oh, that was a great run, you know, it was a great run. But after lifting heavy, it's like, that felt amazing. Like, it's just, I don't know, for me, it's just a different level of accomplishment.

Philip Pape 47:37

I'm with you. I'm with you. When you said that you struck deep in the heart of me, because you're right. Like, it's not a lot of reps. It's not a lot of volume. You take all this all these rest periods. If anything, sometimes when you get started, you feel like you're not doing much. But but then when you do that one lift that's heavier than you did last time. You do it successfully, like, whoa, like, I just lifted more than ever lifted my life. I mean, you do it again. And again. And again, you're like, This is something right? Versus just okay, I ran again, for half an hour, maybe I ran a little faster, right. Anyway, I could get a little cynical about this stuff sometimes. And I think there is there is a mechanism of chronic stress reduction just from lifting anyway, but from the muscle mat, like you mentioned, the adrenals and the hormones, there's all of that wonderful stuff. So I'm sure there's that. Right. What would you say to all the women over 40 Or anyone of any age, but you know, we're sometimes focused on that demographic, who are wondering how to get started and get the results that you got or the results that they're looking for?

Carol 48:39

Sure, absolutely. First of all, keep it simple. You taught you that. Keep it simple. Do what you can with what you have. So like if you don't have access to a gym, or barbells, for example, start with dumbbells. That's great. It's a great first step. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that. Just start with something. You can even do your own bodyweight until you have dumbbells, for example, start doing something to get you on the path to success and it can little things you know, they add up over time. Like don't overdo it. Don't you know, Don't set yourself up for failure. Take rest days recover. Make sure that you know the importance of that and yeah, just start small go after it and you can do it.

Philip Pape 49:26

Love it. Do something Keep It Simple exam.

Carol 49:29

Also, I just want to say I know for me like it was kind of hard to figure out the structure to my fitness routine. Like I I'm a planner, I plan my training sessions out every single week, every Sunday afternoon I plan out what I'm doing for the week and initially when I got started with you I wasn't really sure like which program to do, what should I do and so you gave me some great options. And thinner leaner stronger is really awesome. And also right now I'm currently doing the program stone stronger that was put out by Katie and Heather off of stronger than your boyfriend? Yeah. And that one's great, too. And I mean, like, they're all good. And there's so many good ones out there. So find a program that you like and stick with it.

Philip Pape 50:10

Absolutely. And there's different ones for different people, even though I talked about a few that I think are highly effective, because for me, look, I'm lazy, like in the sense that I don't want to waste time, I want to get the results as fast as I can, you know, without burnout without all the other things. And so that's what I will recommend. But like you said, start with what you have. So I will definitely get people that say, but I just absolutely can't get access to a barbell no matter what, no gyms have it, I can't get it, I can't fit it in my house, this and that. It's okay. It's okay. Don't stress, like there'll be something. And I guarantee that once you get started with something that is way more effective than what you're doing now, even if it is not optimal. The results, like you mentioned before, are going to inspire you to get creative and figure out how to keep going. Right, right. So what about on the coaching side, so this is where again, I not everyone can afford a coach, of course, and there are a lot of people who are self starters and who are very self motivated, and they can read a book, and they can go and just do everything perfectly and have great discipline and willpower. The other 95% of people. Like you said, Maybe I've tried many things over the years, I'm in this camp as well tried many things over the years. And it wasn't till I started getting help from somebody that I started to make more progress. So if someone's on the fence about, about strength training in general, but hopefully we they're convinced of the value of that listening to the show, but on working with an online coach, for example, what's your advice for that person? Who's, you know, wondering about that?

Carol 51:45

Sure, yes, I would say just do it just like take the plunge and do it because I wish I had done it a long time ago, it would have saved me, you know, just some struggles that I had with previous attempts. Just do it because like for me, I have a tendency to overanalyze things. And if I'm out here floating on my own little island, I'll overthink everything to death. And then like spinning my wheels and not getting anywhere. But with you, I could just shoot your message, you know, and he would respond right away. And then I knew exactly what to do. So just do it. And you won't regret it.

Philip Pape 52:19

And it took you four months to get amazing results. Right? Yeah, I think of that in the scheme of your life, right years and decades of your life. And so anyone listening who's like, once you make the decision to do that, to accelerate the process, working with a coach or getting help, or whatever it is, whether it's in a group program, an individual coach, you know, something that your insurance pays for, I don't care. You know, think the results are going to come pretty quickly in relative terms.

Carol 52:49

Right? Yeah. It's an investment worth taking.

Philip Pape 52:53

Yeah. Because if I if I asked you who's listening six months ago, where did you say you'd be today? You probably said the same answer. You say today, not you, Carol, because you've gotten your results, right. But if someone if I say word, you know, what do you want to be in six months? Ask Did you ask yourself that question six months ago, and get the same answer in six months before they get the same, in which case, there's maybe time for a change. That's the way I look at my eight years spent in CrossFit not doing anything, that's what I like. Alright, so and then as far as working with a coach, how does someone make the most of that process so that they know that hey, from day one, they're actually getting what they need out of it?

Carol 53:35

I just to make the most out of it. Just you know, don't hesitate to reach out to your coach anytime, anytime, with anything. I mean, that I mean, coaches, especially you, you know, there's just a wealth of information. So it's like, take advantage of that, you know,

Philip Pape 53:50

yeah, I agree. I mean, I have clients who all they use me for is like an encyclopedia. And guess what, that that works for them because they couldn't have found that they couldn't have Googled or chat GBT that information and got exactly what they needed, you know, seconds. And I think that's important because I use all those tools as well. But I know that if I'm struggling as a business owner or as a, as a husband, or whatever, and I just need an answer. For me, that's gonna work. It's great to have a friend as a coach a community, even if it's, again, even if it's a free community, it doesn't have to be a coach, right? It could be in a community. Go ask, you know, Joe or Susan, right, like the question and they'll get an answer. Yeah, yeah. Surgery. So what has been the most surprising result of this entire process?

Carol 54:36

Um, the most surprising result? Um, well, you know, it was really surprising that everything happened so quickly. Like that definitely surprised me just with the weight, the fat loss. But I think just how stronger I've become and how I'm be able to lift heavy and that's that's really been surprising because ever since that first injury back with CrossFit, I just over and over and told myself, I can't lift heavy, I can't lift heavy, I can't lift heavy because XYZ happened, you know, and I mean, my legs still flares up every now and then but, but I had to jump that hurdle and just say I can do this. And so but I think that really has been the most surprising that yeah, I can I do, and I did it. And it's great.

Philip Pape 55:30

And how, what do you want to be doing when you're, say 90, in terms of strength? See now that now that you've transformed your identity in a way, think about it, like to the day you die? What do you want to be doing that? For, you know, that demonstrates your strength?

Carol 55:49

Yeah, well, I mean, I love to be lifting, I've never really lifting at 90 really love to be doing that just being active, you know, just staying active.

Philip Pape 56:01

That the wonderful thing is that you can, that's the thing that's out of this whole process, you can be that person and buck, the trend, Buck, the trend of the again, 90 95% of people we see walking around as they get old and frail illness sets in and disease and everything else. So in the short term, you've gotten the physique you wanted, but you've also gotten strength and health in the long term altogether, which is wonderful. Definitely. I'm inspired by you. So I know I am talking a lot not asking as many questions, Carol, but it's just wonderful to see this.

Carol 56:33

Thank you.

Philip Pape 56:34

So, you know, a question I'm going to ask next. It's the penultimate question of the interview. Okay, what question Did you wish I had asked, and what is your answer?

Carol 56:43

All right. So I've thought long and hard about this one. And like, one of the questions I get a lot from people, when I tell them about my routine, is how do you get up so early. And I do get up, I get up at 4am. Because I have to leave my house at 645 to get to work. And so I make my strength training a priority in my day. So I get up really early. But also, one thing that has made a difference for me is I read a book called the Miracle Morning by how Elrod you've probably heard of it. He's got a fabulous podcast. If you if you're not familiar with who he is, you should check him out. Because he has a really inspirational story. He was in a car accident, nearly died, was in a coma for like six days and made this transformational comeback. So he wrote The Miracle Morning, and he's got this acronym. I think it's savers. And it's like, so each morning, the goal is you set yourself up for success. By doing each of these little things as part of your daily routine. The S stands for silence. And so this is like meditation, that A is affirmations. So every day I write down a daily affirmation, you know, like I will, or I can or just something that is affirming, for me. The V is visualization. This is where you like, visualize yourself going throughout your day successfully. This is great when you're lifting heavy to visualize doing that. Yeah, the E is for exercise. Yeah, the E is for exercise. And of course, I do that in the morning. And then the R is for read. So he's a big, you know, like self help read a book about something you know, to help yourself grow. And then the S stands for scribe, which means right, so then write in a journal. So I read that book a couple of years ago, and it really just changed my whole morning routine. And also something else he points out is like, the night before, tell yourself that you're going to wake up ready for the day, like make that mindset change the night before. And like, even if you know that you're not going to be getting much sleep because you go into bed late, you know, tell yourself you're going to wake up and be ready. So it's really cool to like, be successful with all those things before you even leave the house. And it just sets up your day much differently than it otherwise would, at least for me. And so that would be my answer. If people ask me how I get up at 4am

Philip Pape 59:08

Ya know, love it, there's definitely there's like morning lifters and afternoon lifters, you know, and I read that book years ago too, and we all take something different from it, but you're you're right that like starting your day off on a good solid footing. Thinking Ahead, planning ahead sounds like you get your day ready ahead of time. And you're in control, right? You're just like in control of your outcome. And that's what this is all about. So definitely to all the 40 M lifters out there you know, take care of advice and still try to get to sleep you know at a decent time the day before because it will catch up to you.

Carol 59:41

Yeah go to bed at like eight so there's that yeah,

Philip Pape 59:45

I don't know if how lifts heavy weights so we got to get them you know, training but all the other stuff. So okay, where do you want listeners to learn about you and reach out to you?

Carol 59:54

Sure. Well, I am in the Wits & Weights community so folks are able to read reach out to me through there and I'll be happy to help you respond to any questions just support you. cheer you on in your journey.

Philip Pape 1:00:08

Yeah, so I'll include the link to that and then so folks can join and find Carol and if you can't find or just post or reach out to me and say where's Carol you know, so we can reach out to Purdue should be pretty obvious. Carol, this is fun. The time just flew by. I love everything about your story. It's just teaches us how resilient our our minds are and our spirits and how we can change at any age, no matter who we are, no matter where we're studying, no matter what we've done in the past. And just thank you so much for sharing your experience.

Carol 1:00:39

Oh, thank you. This was so much fun. It was an honor to be on your show.

Philip Pape 1:00:44

So much fun. Thanks, Carol.

Carol 1:00:45

Thank you.

Philip Pape 1:00:48

Philip Pape 8/8/23 Philip Pape 8/8/23

Ep 94: Mike Matthews on Energy Balance, Training Volume, and Priorities for Novice and Intermediate Lifters

In today’s episode, I have the utmost pleasure of talking to the one and only Mike Matthews, a legend in the fitness industry, a bestselling author, and a successful entrepreneur who has helped countless people transform their bodies and health with his no-nonsense, science-based advice. You’ll learn about his fitness philosophy and advice on topics from training for older lifters to nutrition and hormonal health, cardio, and more.

Mike is the founder and CEO of Legion, a coaching and supplement company, with the highest ethical standards. He is the author of several influential books, including Bigger Leaner Stronger, Thinner Leaner Stronger, and Muscle for Life.

Mike’s Muscle for Life Podcast, with 25M+ downloads, features health, fitness, and lifestyle tips from experts and celebrities. Mike has been training for 20 years and is passionate about helping people achieve their fitness goals.

I discovered Mike in 2020 through his book and podcast. Through him, I learned the science of fitness with online calculators, articles, and guest appearances, so I’m grateful to have the chance to sit down with Mike and have this conversation.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
__________

Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:30] Mike's evolution as an authority in fitness
[10:08] On getting started with training and diet
[16:07] Factors and expectations in achieving optimal fitness
[20:33] Maintaining a calorie surplus for building muscle and strength
[25:59] Energy availability, RED-S, hormone, and recovery
[35:22] Training volume and progressive overload for optimal muscle and strength gains
[40:42] Lifting program and equipment to start with and how to progress
[44:24] Sleep's role in muscle and strength gain
[48:56] Limiting the time spent on cardio for strength and recovery
[58:03] On pursuing his passion for fitness and writing
[1:06:36] Where to learn more about Mike
[1:09:32] Outro

Episode resources:

Mike’s website: www.legionathletics.com
Mike on X: @muscleforlife and IG: @muscleforlife
The Know Your Bill of Rights Book

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https://witsandweights.com/free-call

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Transcript

Mike Matthews 00:00

by normal, reasonable human standards, you absolutely can. You can be big. You can be lean if we if we define lean as athletic, you can look athletic, you can have a lot more muscle than the average person and be a lot stronger than the average person.

Philip Pape 00:16

Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry, so you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits & Weights community Welcome to another episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. In today's episode, I have the utmost pleasure of talking to the one and only Mike Matthews, a legend in the fitness industry, a best selling author and a successful entrepreneur who has helped countless people transform their bodies and health. With his no nonsense science based advice. You'll learn about his fitness philosophy, his advice on topics from training for older lifters to nutrition and Hormonal Health, maybe cardio and some other topics we might get even get into podcasting, writing and his never ending journey for wisdom. Mike is the founder and CEO of Legion, a coaching and supplement company that also has very high ethical standards. He's of course the author of several wildly popular and influential books including bigger, leaner, stronger, thinner, leaner, stronger, and muscle for life, all of which I've either read followed or recommended to family, friends and clients. Mike also hosts the muscle for life podcast, one of my favorites in my feed, so make sure to subscribe if you don't already now has more than 25 million downloads, where he chats with experts and celebrities on all things health, fitness and lifestyle. Mike has been training for two decades has a passion for sharing his wisdom and experience with anyone who wants to achieve their fitness goals. I personally first learned about Mike back in 2020 when I first read bigger, leaner, stronger in my personal quest to learn everything I could about evidence based fitness, his podcast, online calculators, articles, and appearances on other shows were essential resources during my first successful transformation. So I'm grateful to have the chance to sit down with Mike and have this conversation. Mike, it is truly an honor to welcome you to the show.

Mike Matthews 02:18

That's quite an intro. Hopefully I can live up to the accolades.

Philip Pape 02:23

No doubt you will no doubt you will. And I kind of want to appear behind the curtain of who you are. Because you've got the eyes and ears of probably millions of people at this point, you know, as a successful fitness author, Coach business owner, did you always envision that you were going to help and influence so many people? And how is that awareness of that impact and mission evolved as you've personally grown?

Mike Matthews 02:46

So no, is the answer to the first question. This started for me. About 1011 years ago now, when I wrote and published the first edition have gone through several editions now bigger, leaner, stronger. And that was a nights and weekends thing. It actually was more driven by my interest in Amazon's KDP self publishing platform, than it was in becoming a fitness kind of niche micro celebrity as I joke with. That's, that's that's my, my assessment of myself. Yeah, I'm a niche micro celebrity at most, but no, so that when I when I wrote that book, it was the result of my own personal transformation. And then working with other people and seeing things that many people in the evidence based fitness community would just take for granted like energy balance, and macronutrient balance and progressive overload and some of the other basic principles of proper training. But as anybody who already knows those things knows and has experienced firsthand. They're transformative when you experience them for the first time when you when you first understand, for example, you've been trying to lose those 10 or 15 pounds for however long now and you've tried every diet and you go down, you go up, you go down, you go up, and you just can't quite get there and stay there. And then you learn about energy balance. You learn about macronutrients, you learn a bit about food quality and food choices and you put those things together into a simple meal plan. And you're skeptical you're like there's no way it can be this simple. I get to eat all these foods that I like I just have to watch my portions basically. And if I just do this consistently, I'll get shredded No way. And then you do it and you get shredded and you're like wow, okay, I guess I'll never have to worry about my weight ever again. And you can have a similar epiphany in your training as well. When I mean I remember again, this is this is these are the types of things that led to bigger leaner, stronger going from two hours in the gym five or six days per week. bodybuilder type workouts so a lot of reps a lot of different exercises a lot of maybe like fancy training techniques. And I did gain muscle and strength of course, but to go from set to do that for six or seven years and be completely stuck to then doing workouts that that were 45 to 60 minutes long, probably more than cut my my volume in half. And doing a lot fewer exercises and working more on making progress on those exercises rather than just a bunch of exercise variety. Again, I was skeptical that that is going to work better. I remember doing some of these 45 minute workouts and feeling almost like guilty like I'm leaving the gym now 45 minutes, I was just, I was just getting warmed up previously. And and though then to see it firsthand over the course of the next few years. To gain quite a bit of muscle, I would say to go from probably in my first seven years of weightlifting I'd gained, let's call it 25 pounds or so. Um, so I looked like I worked out but seven years for 25 pounds of muscle. That's not very good if we're just judging that objectively. So, and then over the course of the next several years gained probably another 20 Let's say over the next three to five years, I'd have to go back and look at my old logs. No, exactly. But that gives you an idea. And, and so that was kind of my own personal transformation. And then again, I was working with friends and family and almost being just like, I mean, it wasn't charging them money, but I was training people who wanted to come they would they saw what happened with me. And I would tell them, Well, why don't you come train with me for a month or two, I'll show you what I'm doing. teach you a bit about diet. And you can take it and do what you want with it basically. And then seeing repeatable results that led to bigger, leaner, stronger, publish that. And when I published that book in, I think it was 2012 January 2012. I, I felt there was like a 5050 chance that either sold zero copies, or not zero copies. That's it. That was my only expectation initially. Because because it was kind of a side hustle as the kids like to say. And I was experimenting, I had had done some other short book projects, I was experimenting with Amazon's Kindle platform. And it just occurred to me that that's something that it could be a good experiment. And it could help a lot of people and meet a real need. And so that's why I wrote it initially. And it was very much kind of a minimum viable product. In the beginning, I think it was 30 to 50,000 words. And I did try to make sure that there's enough meat there to satisfy the promise that I was making in the marketing. But I knew that it was a minimum viable product that if it did, well, I could refine it, I could make it better. But I didn't want to put an inordinate amount of time and effort into something to have it sell zero copies. And so by the end of the first year, it was selling probably a few 1000 copies a month, it was doing quite well. And I also launched it 99 cents to was just as an ebook. And like, I wasn't trying to make money with it. I was just curious if anybody would care. I put an email address right in the first edition saying, Hey, if you have any questions, any suggestions, you can reach out to me. So it starts to sell. And by the end of the year, again, it's selling 1000s of copies per month. And at that point I already was putting together what would later become the second edition as people were emailing me asking good questions. It's good point didn't think of that or, you know, that question tells me that I didn't explain this correctly. And, and so that probably at that at the end of that first year is when I saw that there was really an opportunity to pursue fitness education seriously, and maybe be able to make a living with that.

Philip Pape 09:16

Yeah, and that story is so relatable like what, what I've what I've seen from your content is how you took a lot it sounds like you took a lot of trial and error. And maybe the evidence based space wasn't what it is today. Plus there wasn't as it was not right. And even today, I would say there are very few voices who put it out. So clearly, at least in my opinion, guys like Andy Morgan and a few others that I follow. They're just very to the point very prescriptive, which I prefer and I know a lot of people do, let's get through the fluff. Let's just talk about what works. But the idea of like, you know, I did all the diets, people do all the diets and then they think macro tracking is just another diet but really it's a completely different philosophy and principle. The you know, I did CrossFit for eight years and then finally started lifting heavy like you said while the, if you're lazy, that's the way to go. Right? It's an efficient way to get results. So, yeah, and I know you sold like 20 copies of your book in your first month you talked about before. So it obviously quickly quickly took off. What are your words for folks who, who haven't quite started there, and I've got beginners who lift and I've advanced folks lifted this podcast, listen to podcasts, and maybe they're afraid to take action. Maybe they have just had so much misinformation. And I know you're a man of action. You're all about like determination and going out there and persevering. What are your words of wisdom for those folks right now? For the first part for people who are who are on the fence, people who aren't sure where to start? Where to start?

Mike Matthews 10:39

Well, the good news is, you can start probably, I think the best advice is start with something. Take the tiny habit approach to use a BJ Fogg concept he has a he has a book tiny habits, where you're starting with something that is very low friction, that that the idea of doing it doesn't feel like much of an ask, it doesn't feel like a burden. So for some people, for example, if someone's brand new to all this, they're very overweight, they would like to get into great shape, but they know it's a process. And currently, they're doing nothing that might be start with going for a walk every day. 30 minutes, go outside if you can get some sun, and do that every day. And when you're doing that consistently. If we want to add a little bit more to that, then can we go out and walk faster now? Can you kind of like speed walk now for 30 minutes? Okay, great. Now let's switch to dark. Let's switch over to the diet. So let's say this person is drinking a lot of soda drink several cans or more of soda per day. Can we cut back on that? Can we replace that sugar sweetened soda with diet soda, for example. Now if we want to say what would be the absolute best for health, maybe it would be no soda whatsoever. The research on artificial sweeteners and particularly how they can affect the microbiome is is an emerging field. It does appear though, to affect different people differently, it appears to clearly have negative effects in some people, and seems to be more neutral in other people. And scientists aren't quite sure yet why that is. There are probably genetic underpinnings that at some point in the future, we might be able to even do a test that will allow us to understand better what foods and chemicals are going to aggravate our microbiome and not but for now. I would say the best option is probably to stay away from artificial sweeteners. Generally, that doesn't mean to not have a soda here and there and not chew some gum here and there. But not to have five sodas per day or something like that, or worse in sports nutrition not to have like 10 servings of sucralose per day between protein powders and pre workout and post workout so forth. So with diet, can we start there? Can we can we cut down on the on the caloric beverages? Okay, can we increase protein a little bit? Can we just maybe add a serving of protein to the to the current meal plan? Once that's ingrained? Can we add a serving of vegetables? Can we maybe remove a serving of starchy carbs that just aren't necessary. And so by going, if I were to flip back to the exercise, we have our walks in every day, maybe we even want to turn it into a rock where we we now take a backpack and we put some heavy books or if you want to be fancy, you can get a rocking backpack with some metal plates. I have one ironically, and you walk around you add, I have mine. And that walk now is a bit more cardiovascularly demanding. And if the next thing I would say is can we start strength training, can we start just one workout a week, we do one full body strength turning training workout per week 45 to 60 minutes, if somebody is brand new to this, they can just do it at home with their body weight, maybe some bands if they want to pick up some bands, like in my book muscle for life, I have beginner programs for men and women that don't require you to go to the gym. You can you can do it all at home with your body and with dance. And so by approaching this incrementally what can occur is over the course of a year or so, this person has changed, made major changes to their lifestyle and to their health and their body composition. But it never felt that difficult because they approached it one small step at a time rather than trying to change everything wholesale, which is what many people try to do. And that does work for some people that might be a personality thing or or other circumstances that in their life that just make it easier for them to make huge changes to go from nothing to getting in the gym five days a week, and to go from your standard American diet to a very nutritious quote unquote, healthy diet and so forth. But many people, maybe just as many people who try that will not succeed with that approach. So, and that there's a spectrum there. And so many people find also naturally where they are on that spectrum, and how much change they can make, without having the wheels fall off.

Philip Pape 15:33

That's a good point. I mean, there's a there's definitely a spectrum. And some of us who've been through all of the change, like we have, over the years, have to put ourselves in the shoes of someone who hasn't taken that first step. And you mentioned different conditions, like potentially working with a coach, you can accelerate that process, or other, or if you're in a community, right, everybody's kind of pushing you. People get so concerned about optimal all the time I hear it all the time, how do I optimize this? And that? And then And then the question is, Okay, have you taken the first step? Right? Do you have the baseline? Do you have the foundation, whether it's protein strength, training, whatever? How would you rank the relative importance for someone who's gone past the initial stages, maybe they're a beginner lifter, and now they are trying to work toward quote, unquote, optimal? You've got your training, you've got protein intake, your energy balance, sleep, right, your sub count? How would you rank the relative importance? Or it's just are they all important? And you need to pick what works for you that you need to take next? Yeah, I mean, you could take

Mike Matthews 16:29

that kind of pillars, you could use the pillars analogy and saying that you need each of those things to keep the structure up. But I think we probably could rank these things. So this would be for somebody who's newbie gains are exhausted, right? Yes. So they're through their first year, maybe even through their second year, and now they've they've stagnated or they just don't want to stagnate, they've seen progress slow down markedly. And and people should know, that's normal. Your average guy, for example, if he's doing the most important things, mostly right, most of the time, he should be able to gain anywhere from probably 15 to maybe 2025 pounds of muscle in his first year of training for women, you could cut that in half fat loss could be could be much more but but for muscle building, that's that's usually how it works out. And in the second year, you can cut that in half, you can cut the male and the female female numbers in half. So that year to a good year to for a man is probably about 10 pounds of muscle gained a good year to for women, five, maybe eight pounds of muscle gained. And every subsequent year, those numbers have again and again and again. And that sounds almost too neat to be real. Like it sounds too mathematical and algorithmic. But there's there's a good amount of research now that shows that that is reliably true for a number of reasons. And so expectations are important. I would say we'll we'll get into ranking as are things but but it's very important to have the right expectations and to understand what isn't isn't possible, at least without PDS. If you want to stay natural, which I would, I would suggest. And and the reason I say that is, especially with social media, and I've heard from these people over the years, who now are intermediate or even advanced weight lifters who have actually done quite well, but they actually don't even realize it because they are not doing well compared to what they see on social media. The type of physiques they see on social media, the amount of you'll see people who, who have the trifecta of big, lean and strong write really big, really lean really strong

Philip Pape 18:43

uncannily cells doesn't,

Mike Matthews 18:45

that that requires drugs. If you're if you are natural, you get to pick like you get to be big and strong. Yes, you can. You can get big and strong naturally, but you're not going to be very lean. Or you can just be lean, and I guess you could say you can look big, even though your muscles have shrunk in size, but there's a visual illusion because now you're lean, you look small in clothes enclosed when you take your clothes off and you're shredded and you look actually pretty big. But but you can't have the trifecta. You can't be big, lean and strong by social media standards national I would say by normal reasonable human standards. You absolutely can you can be big, you can be lean if we if we define lean as athletic, you can look athletic, you can have a lot more muscle than the average person and be a lot stronger than the average person so

Philip Pape 19:44

I'll tell you this my when I look at my IG feed and look at everybody on the beach, they don't exactly look the same. Do they? Correct

Mike Matthews 19:50

Yeah, even the fittest the fittest guy at the beach, even though he would get zero likes zero likes on his right and And so So anyway, so expectations are important and understanding what is and isn't possible and what should and should not be happening depending on where you're at in your journey. Now, we let's talk about, which are the most important factors. And let's also, let's put it in the context of you are, you just were kind of a newbie and you went through that phase, and you did most of the things right and you gained a lot of strength, you gained a lot of muscle, you had a lot of fun with it. And things have slowed down now. So some of the more common mistakes, I'm just going to start with calories, paying attention to calories, I'm going to put that at the top because what I've seen is a lot of intermediate and advanced weight lifters don't understand how important it is to consistently maintain a calorie surplus to keep gaining appreciable amounts of muscle and strength. What came so easily previously does not any more in that for your first year or even two years, I mean, your first year, you probably don't really even have to, especially if you're just starting out with a normal physique, you don't have to pay that much attention to your calories, you don't even have to make sure you're in a caloric surplus because your body is going to be so responsive to the training. If you do. If you're if your training is relatively well designed, and you you are relatively consistent with it, you're going to do very well unless you just dramatically under eat and dramatically under eat protein. But so long as you're eating something around your maintenance calories, whether you know it or not, so long as you're eating something around, call it 0.8 grams of protein to one gram of protein per pound of body weight per day. Or if you're overweight, we could we could reframe that to one gram per centimeter of height per day. So long as you're kind of around there, you are going to do well. Now though, you're an intermediate or an or an advanced weightlifter, probably this is more of an issue with intermediates because you don't make it to the advanced phase without learning this. Now, now there is a there is a big big difference in your performance in the gym and your results between around maintenance calories, sometimes you're a little bit over sometimes you're a little bit under. Also, if if you are trying to stay lean, that means that you are going to be at least in a small calorie surplus more are sorry, deficit more than you're going to be in a surplus because that's really what it requires to stay lean. Like if you're doing and you just want to keep your abs, you have to err on the side of under eating more than overeating or you lose your apps, right. And, and so just that point alone can be enough to cause you to stagnate to hit a plateau. So you can be following a well designed training program. And you actually no matter what changes you make in the gym, no matter how much volume tried to add, no matter how you try to periodized your training, no matter how you try to play with rep ranges, etc, etc. If you're not consistently eating enough food, your progress can stall. And that's the rule. There are exceptions, there are people again, who are so genetically gifted for just building muscle and getting strong, that they can get a lot further than the average person without paying attention to calories. But for most people, that becomes a very important point. So I would start there and I can continue if you want

Philip Pape 23:38

to. It's good. I'm letting you talk. And to add to that, right. Even if you're not a hard gainer, I've seen it time and again, no matter who you are, if you're trying to be in that surplus, your your expenditure metabolomes just going to start to run out only say start to run away. But I've seen appreciable jumps in your metabolism metabolism over say a six month period of anywhere from four to six or 800 calories where you really have to stay on top of that are also Yeah, maintenance. Yep. Right. That's what you see as well. Oh, yeah.

Mike Matthews 24:04

I mean, you know, you're doing it right. When after the first month or two, certainly, three, you just feel like you're forced feeding yourself. And you're never hungry, and you're just sick of eating, and seatbelts are uncomfortable. And you're just you just you just now like, hoping that you can just slashed your calories in half. That's what you would like to do.

Philip Pape 24:36

Yeah, and even when you get back to maintenance and you're not at those extremes we all eat the grass is always greener, we're always imagining Hmm, now I think I really want to be dieting now. And now I want to be in a surplus again, it's always a next phase. All right, so another topic because now we're talking about intermediate lifters but also I want to touch on older lifters and my older I mean,

Mike Matthews 24:54

let me go over before we move on, let me just let me just quickly give people just if they're wondering What are the other kind of most important things? You had mentioned? A couple? I think I think it was a good question. So, so calories understanding the importance of calorie surplus, experiencing it firsthand. Again, when when I've heard it from particularly a lot of women over the years, when they lean bulk for the first time, they are amazed at how good it feels, particularly in the gym, to have those extra calories, it's very anabolic, like you're gonna have your best workouts as a natural weightlifter. When you're in a slight calorie surplus. And you've been doing that consistently for a few weeks, your sleep is probably going to improve, and you're just going to have a lot of energy, those workouts that you were doing, certainly in a deficit, even at maintenance, the workouts that were difficult can feel downright easy when you're when you're in a calorie surplus. And,

Philip Pape 25:50

and it's true, especially since much of that comes from carbs, which also are generally underfed.

Mike Matthews 25:55

Yep, it's even it's even there's there's the carbs, there's that aspect, but then there's just the energy availability, just having the extra energy makes a big difference, the body generally runs better, everything runs better, especially non essential processes run better, because if energy is is not as available, then the body has to play kind of triage in terms of where is it going to allot energy and which physiological processes is it going to run at full capacity in which ones are not going to run at full capacity. And unfortunately, the processes related to hypertrophy are not very high on the list of where the energy is going to go, before we get to muscle building. And so just that, that, that fact that that's one of the reasons why it's generally recommended for athletes to be athletic in terms of a physique, but not try to get in stay too lean. It does happen naturally, with certain athletes that burns. So many, like cyclists burn so many calories, it's impossible for them, especially in hard training periods, to not lose weight, and they want to stay light also for their sport. But in sport in many other sports, it's not recommended to try to get and stay too lean, because that requires not just a calorie deficit, but then staying there requires a lower caloric intake just generally than if they were 10 pounds heavier. They could eat. There's research on this, particularly as it relates to lean mass. And so if I remember correctly, if you're an athlete, ideally, you're probably you probably be in the range of 40 to 45 calories per kilogram of lean mass per day, I believe is the evidence based recommendation. And if you are, let's say mid to high 30s, that's probably okay, you probably would, would notice an improvement in your performance and your energy if you were to be a bit higher. But when you get to low 30s, High 20s, that is going to significantly impair performance. And so you have to do that sometimes, like if you're cutting or if you have an athlete who has to make weight or something, then they are going to have to restrict their calories. But generally speaking, when they want to perform and they want to be able to perform. They want to be closer to 40 to 45 calories per kilogram of lean mass per day. Yeah, so

Philip Pape 28:35

so it's just an ask us that's like 20 That's it. Okay. 18 calories per pound of lean mass. Got it? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Let's hit on that a little bit, because there's a couple of top cut topics related to energy availability, because I know reds comes to mind for me for you know, relative energy efficiency, but also, because we deal with a lot of older lifters, hormones and recovery. I've seen them significantly improved just from the extra energy, what do we what do we know about that for, especially for women, whether it's DHEA testosterone for men and women, and then recovery, you know, we often talk about the physical and biomechanical aspects of recovery, but I think energy does have a big part to play.

Mike Matthews 29:11

Absolutely. I mean, that's, that's, that's those those things are part of the equation right? Reds, where women will lose their periods because again, that's, that's where the body's in triage mode and it's not getting enough energy, and it's making sure that its vital processes are are continuing but then non vital processes are not getting the energy required to function properly and menstruation is one of those. And and if if an athlete develops reds then there are a number of other symptoms, you know, exhaustion, excessive soreness, the long term drops in performance and so forth. And it takes a lot to get there. You're not going to see that in an everyday gym goer, but you can see that in probably competitive athletes as opposed to maybe a weekend warrior, but somebody, somebody who's training every day, 567 days a week, and if he has games on top of that, and so forth, like somebody who's really, that's, that's mostly what they're doing is playing their sport. And so recovery with with energy availability, I mean, there are a number of different physiological processes that contribute to recovery, that, again, are are non vital. And so if energy is if it's not available enough, it's not that those processes are not going to occur, they are going to occur, but they're not going to occur. To the extent there's a quantitative and a qualitative aspect here, they're not going to occur to the extent that they would, if calories were higher if energy were more available. And so again, if anybody listening wants to experience it, just if you haven't linval, to do it, workout, assuming assuming you're in a, let's say, healthy body fat range, you have a healthy body composition, now, work out what would be approximately 10% more calories than you burn on average, and start eating that amount every day. And you'll you'll see firsthand within it probably take one to two weeks or so until you really start to notice it. But then you will really notice that you're going to feel more recovered, you'll probably you'll notice is less muscle soreness, you'll probably notice fewer aches and pains in your joints, you're going to notice better sleep, you're going to notice high higher energy levels, you're going to notice better moods, and those are all symptoms of recovering well. And you probably also will find that you can recover your performance faster. So if you train one muscle group fairly intensely, whereas previously, maybe it took you three, four or five days, to be able to repeat that performance, you might now be consistently seeing that recovery in two or three days, for example, or three or four days. And it's never five days anymore, which is also a reliable indicator of recovery in the context of strength training, in particular, less muscle soreness, more performance, if you if you did, you know, five sets five with whatever, and you came back three or four days later, and you're a little bit sore, but you did five sets of five with the same weight, or maybe with a little bit more weight, you were recovered. So again, it's it's it's an often overlooked thing, because it's so simple, it's just calories.

Philip Pape 32:44

It is and I think a lot of people are afraid of just gaining a bunch of weight. And sure because because you know the surplus you're in and you're tracking it that right there gives you that feedback of of where your intake is. And because your metabolism is so recovered and you have so much energy you do start to find that it actually gets harder to even eat what you need. And it's kind of a nice place to be right you're you're barely gaining, but you don't feel deprived.

Mike Matthews 33:08

Again, I haven't I haven't been booked in some time, at least not like, purposely, for you. I haven't done like a six month lean bulking a long time. But after three or four months, it was I would say it was just as difficult in a different way. But just as difficult as cutting, you know, for three or four months and hunger is higher. workouts are worse, and cravings are present and so forth. So that's after a few months of cutting, that's just usually how it is after a few months of lean bulking though against that point of having no desire to eat whatsoever. And I can liken it too. I remember a time many years ago when I had a flu, and I was pretty sick for I don't know two weeks or something. And for that first week, I had no appetite whatsoever, I just had to force myself to eat some protein at least to try to like mitigate muscle loss. And so that's kind of how it felt at least for me after three or four months of lean bulking. I was not enjoying any food, anything period like even the stuff I really liked pasta for example. So that was like my second dinner that I had to eat but even that I was just forcing myself to eat. I couldn't find anything that I actually liked to eat anymore. So

34:31

yeah. Hi, my name is Lisa and I'd like to Big shout out to my nutrition coach Philip Pape with his coaching I have lost 17 pounds he helped me identify the reason that I wanted to lose weight and it's very simple longevity. I want to be healthy, active and independent until the day I die. He introduced me to this wonderful at home macro factor I got that part of my nutrition figured out along with that is the movement part of nutrition. There's a plan to it and really helped me with that. The other thing he helped me with was knowing that Need to get a lot of steps in. So the more steps you have, the higher your expenditure is, and the easier it is to lose weight, when it's presented to you like he presents it, it makes even more sense. And the other thing that he had was a hunker guide. And that really helped me. So thank you below.

Philip Pape 35:16

Continuing down the hierarchy than what we talked about energy, so

Mike Matthews 35:19

the next to the next, so we've taken care of calories, I would say that the next thing that an intermediate weightlifter needs to look at is is their volume. In particular, now we can define volume in different ways. But let's let's use the definition of hard sets per major muscle group, we can look at it per week. And a hard set is a set taken close to muscular failure. And so not a warm up set, not a submaximal set where you do six reps with a weight that you could have done 10 reps with or 12 reps with now, these are six reps, and maybe you could have done seven or eight, you don't have to go up to failure. But you're pushing close. Those are hard sets. And the mistake that I see many beginner now intermediate weightlifters make is. So let's say they're doing about 10 Hard sets per major muscle group per week. And that works well. For most people for the first year, let's say anywhere between eight and 12, maybe even into the second year, if they're a high responder, there's a point though, where that amount of volume is not going to produce any more progress to speak of, and what I see many newly intermediate weight lifters or even long term intermediate weight lifters and they've just been spinning their wheels, what I see them do is they think that their programming needs to get more sophisticated. So now they need to be working in different rep ranges, that's the key actually. So they need to be doing sets of two's and sets of sixes and sets of 10s. Or they need to make some major changes to their exercises and start doing more exotic movements, or they need to start doing drop sets, or super sets, or giant sets or negatives or, or, or, and, and some of those things can produce results to a point. But it's, it's it's not going to consistently move the needle, they might be able to do some of that. And for certain reasons, they might be able to gain a bit more muscle and strength, but it's not going to be very efficient. So again, after let's say a year, of doing all that kind of stuff, if they've been consistent, they probably will have gained some muscle in that year. But whereas they maybe could have gained 567 pounds. Like that's what they could have gained if they would have known what to do. Instead, they gained too. And and so the the number one change that intermediate weight lifters have to make is just more volume, they have to just work harder, and I get why many people don't automatically go to that because that is the worst.

Philip Pape 38:05

It requires effort.

Mike Matthews 38:07

Yeah, that's, that's just bad news, really, unless you just love being in the gym. That's not what people want to hear. Right. So the bottom line, though, is, if 10 to 12 Hard sets per major muscle group per week, if that is going to work well for let's say up to two years. In most people, I think that's fair. Those people, if they want to keep progressing at the rate that they can be progressing at at least let's say most of most of what they can be gaining, it probably needs to go up to upwards of 15 parts sets per major muscle group per week. Now, a 10 per week may be able to go to 1213 and see consistent progress for another year. So if they're at 12 already, and they're kind of stuck, they might be they might have to go to 15. And then and then eventually, for advanced weight lifters, if they're staying natural, and they're trying to gain every ounce of muscle and strength genetically available to them, they probably are going to have to go as high as 20 Hard sets per week, maybe not for all major muscle groups, but for certain major muscle groups that are a bit more stubborn than others. So we all have high and low responding muscle groups, in our in our high responding muscle groups, maybe we never really need to go beyond 1314 15 Hard sets per week, so long as we have our programming set up correctly. And we have a good progression model built in and we can achieve progressive overload consistently blah, blah, blah. And that might get us to where we want to be with that muscle group. But then there will be muscle groups inevitably, that need more than that, that need 1518 20 Hard sets per week consistently to get bigger and stronger. And so that would be number two. Again thinking with the context because I've had many of these conversations with people over the years. And so I'm just thinking with what intermediate strength trainees often overlook?

Philip Pape 40:07

Yeah, no. And I'm glad you focus on volume instead of specific movements or specific types of programming, it really is highly variable depending on the volume. But yep, you mentioned, the amount of weight you gain or muscle you gain in that first year, it could be a lot smaller than you want. And it could happen by accident, right? I mean, there's so many programs, quote, unquote, work for a newbie, but aren't optimal. And then if you kind of get programmed to the idea that this mode of, of training works, now you try to step up the volume using that same training, that's gonna be less effective. Just taking a step back if we go from, because you mentioned muscle for life and bands. But then we also talked about, we haven't talked about the primary forms of lifting with barbells. Mainly, is there an intermediate, beginner range there with, for example, dumbbells that is effective for someone to start with, because I get this, especially from a lot of women, or a lot of people who don't have access to the barbells. Sometimes it's an excuse, but oftentimes, it's a real thing. Is there a trans transition type of programming they could use there?

Mike Matthews 41:09

Absolutely. That actually is the intermediate program in my book muscle for life, which is written specifically for people 40 Plus, who are who are new to all of this. But you you progress from bodyweight, and bands, to dumbbells. And if if you have access to it a trap bar for deadlifting, which is a great hip and back friendly alternative to the traditional deadlift, not that the traditional deadlift is detrimental to your hips and your back. But it's more stressful on your hips and back. And so I like to see particularly if people are a little bit older, and they're new to this, I like to see them with a trap bar first, and establish a good movement pattern, build some strength there before they progress to a barbell. And so as far as even, let's say, a home gym setup, well, if you have, you can even go with modular dumbbells, especially if you get a set that goes up to 80 or 85 pounds. And if you're a woman, you might not even need that, you might just set up to 5055 pounds. And if you want to add a trap bar, which you can get for probably anywhere from 150 to $300, you have everything you need to get well into your intermediate phase. And, you know, for many people actually, if you look at it just in terms of their goals, if you have somebody whose goal is just to get into really good shape, again, by objective standards, not the deranged Instagram standards, and stay that way. They don't need anything more than that, actually, if they just have the know how. And they have a good dumbbell setup, and they have a trap bar, maybe a pull up bar, maybe a dip bar, a couple other things that you can just have at home, that is enough to go from completely out of shape, into great shape. Strong, and you can stay like that for the rest of your life. Now, if you want to see how muscular and how strong you can get given your genetics, then yeah, we're gonna want to add a bit more equipment. For most people, it's easier to just go to a gym, even the space required not that you need a ton of space to have a home gym, a well equipped a well equipped home gym, but you need a bit of space, you need a bit of money. So you're gonna need to do that adding a barbell, you're gonna probably have to expand on your dumbbells. And there are a few machines that are worth considering, like a cable setup and a few other things that you can get at any decent gym, of course.

Philip Pape 43:52

Cool. So we talked energy, we talked volume, what's next movement?

Mike Matthews 43:55

Sleep? Um, so let's see. Movement, I would say no, that's probably I mean, it's good for health. And that's good for not sitting around too much. And it's good for getting outside. But if we're talking to just body comp and performance, you could just have an upright bike like this and just drone away for 30 minutes. But I do is I do it four days a week. And I guess you could call that movement. But if we're talking about continuing to improve strength and continuing to gain muscle, I would say sleep has probably I didn't just say there. It's a common issue with a lot of people, I guess these days with young, younger people and older people, and it certainly will get in the way particularly if you're not 25 anymore. If you're not just physiologically invincible, like we were at 25 then the penalties of not sleeping enough are much larger. And there are things going on that we don't see that are particularly related to muscle protein synthesis or the creation of new muscle protein. So when we don't sleep enough muscle protein synthesis levels in our body are generally lower. And that, of course, is bad that that's going to detract from muscle hypertrophy from from growing muscle. If we can't gain muscle, we are not going to be able to gain strength. After your first year or two, when you've gained a fair amount of muscle, you've gained a fair amount of strength, the most reliable way to get stronger is simply to gain muscle, there's really not much else you can do anymore, you're not going to improve the neurological function of your muscles and your nervous system better, you're not going to get appreciably better at the exercises, you're probably pretty good at them. Now, if you're going to get stronger, you have to gain muscle that has to be the focus. And so regularly, it's not just getting enough sleep, it's it's also the quality of the sleep. And also it's not just getting in bed and getting out of bed at certain times, you know, you'll ask some people, so how much do you sleep and they call Yes, seven or eight hours. And what you learn is, well, they're getting in bed, and they get out of bed after seven or eight hours, but the actual sleep is no more than six. Because when they get in bed, they're on their phone for a bit watching TV, or watching TV or or they just have trouble falling asleep. And then maybe they're waking up anywhere from one to three times in the middle of night. And either they have to pee or maybe they just wake up and they can fall back asleep. But but those wakings add up to another 30 minutes, let's say of sleep last. And so I probably would be remissed to to put sleep lower on the list. And we could reorder these things depending on who we are talking to and what we're going for. But I think it's appropriate to say with intermediate weightlifters, paying attention first and foremost to the calories, then to work out volume, then sleep probably is would be the third thing. And for for people who are skeptical if you're currently if you honestly assess your sleep, and it is, let's say more like six or seven hours of actual sleep, and maybe it's broken up, if you were to increase that by an hour or two consistently, it would have a similar I mean, everything in your life has just gotten better actually. And but but if we if we if we if we just stick with the gym, it's going to have a similar effect to going from a calorie deficit to a calorie surplus, your performance goes way up. Your your not only is your performance go up, but your perception of effort goes down too. So now you are lifting more weight, you are maybe even doing a bit more volume in your workouts now because you have the energy. But it it feels easier than your workouts did previously on less sleep. And so sleep is it's annoying because it I wish we just didn't have to sleep. I would do unconscionable things if I didn't have to sleep anymore.

Philip Pape 48:28

The Productivity be through the roof. Yeah, it's I think it's good for people to understand I understand that. Because I will hear stories about people plateauing. And they're like, I'm doing everything right, I'm training got my protein. Yeah, and I only get six hours of sleep well, there's a root cause often. And I know from personal experience, like,

Mike Matthews 48:47

let's just, let's, let's just fix that. Let's just stop talking about all the other things. And let's just start there.

Philip Pape 48:53

That becomes your number one. But real quick about cardio because you talk about it all the time. And I actually like your rule of thumb of limiting your kind of medium and intense cardio to half the time you lift. Did that come from some evidence at some point? Is it just a really good rule of thumb? Where does that come from?

Mike Matthews 49:11

Yeah, yeah, I would say I mean, I that's based on my understanding of the evidence a the research is particularly on what's called the interference effect. Because cardiovascular training produces a certain type of ad, a type of adaptation in the body strength training produces a very different adaptation in the body, and they are fundamentally at odds. And so that's why many people have traditionally said that cardio is going to kill your gains. You can't do cardio if you're trying to gain muscle. That's not true. That's that's just an exaggeration. But what is true is at a physiological level, they are at odds that's true. Now, fortunately, unless you're doing way too much cardio, cardio is not going to get in the way of gaining muscle and gaining strength and in some ways that actually can any Hansard, for example, one thing that you'll notice, if you currently do no cardio, and you start doing cardio and you build up your cardiovascular endurance, one thing that you're going to notice, if you pay attention is you're going to recover faster in between your sets in the gym. And if you're like me, I watched my little my little stopwatch on my phone. And so I'm resting three, three and a half minutes in between sets of bigger harder exercises, squats, deadlifts, overhead press, bench press, probably not not necessary. And on everything else, it's more like two, two and a half minutes. And I'm, I feel recovered in those time periods. But if I think back to I've been doing cardio consistently, for some time I cardio is not outstanding, I wouldn't consider myself an endurance athlete, but I do enough to have better than average cardio. But I think back in the past, though, when I wasn't doing cardio consistently, those time periods, which are evidence based rest periods, and I would say generally are good, just one size fits all recommendations. If I think back, my heart rate was a bit higher previously, I'd be I'd be resting for two, two and a half, maybe three minutes. Okay, I feel fine, I'm ready to do the next set. However, my heart rate is a bit more elevated, I'm breathing a bit heavier, and and now, my heart rate is lower. So my body cardiovascularly is recovering faster in between sets. And that can improve performance. In the in the same two to three, three and a half minutes, my body is recovering faster because of the cardio. And then and then there are a few other physiological mechanisms in play whereby improving cardio and doing cardio consistently can actually enhance muscle growth or some stuff related to blood flow. And so minimally, it's not going to hurt it. However, again, it can hurt it, if you just do too much cardio and buy too much. It really depends on the person. But I'd say probably anything over especially running research shows that running in particular is detrimental because of the impact and the amount of wear and tear it puts on your body. It's just running as it is much more difficult to recover from than, than a bike or than a rower, or than swimming or an elliptical if you get rid of that impact. And if you want to make it even harder, like high intensity sprinting is the highest is the hardest to recover from, right. But if you are running probably anything more than five hours per week, unless you are very conditioned, and you've been doing it for so long, that's nothing but the that's probably where you're starting to enter the realm of interference where there actually will be some amount of interference with your strength training, not only the the performance, like if you're running quite a bit, especially if you're doing 10 plus hours per week, no question, if you're doing 10 plus hours of running per week, it's going to be interfering with your strength training with your bill, your ability to gain muscle gain strength, you're going to notice in your performance, because you're you're just going to feel a bit beat up, probably always. But then But then the results are going to be impaired as well, you're going to gain less muscle from that training, because of the cardio, you're going to gain less strength because of the cardio. And and so then to take a very kind of safe, conservative position. That's why I took it back to Okay, let's let's limit our cardio to half of the amount of time that we're spending training our muscles. And that way, there's just no way that we're going to run into any issues with the with the interference effect. And if we wanted to stretch that, I would say we could stretch it to probably about the amount of time that you're training, that you're doing strength training. Unless you're doing let's say just one hour of strength training per week, but then I would I would recommend saving one hour of strength training, we're doing five hours of cardio per week. There could be reasons to do that. Maybe you just really enjoy it, that'd be a good reason. But if you're open to it, I would I would ask if we could do three hours of strength training and maybe two hours of cardio per week. So we have some some flexibility. And but I think that's just a good recommendation that allows people to get in enough cardio to benefit from it materially, so you're going to if you're just doing one to two hours of useless just moderate intensity kind of zone to cardio per week. That is great for improving your cardiovascular health, improving your overall health, your sense of well being. It's great for things related to longevity. So like, you know, I joke like, you lift weights to make your life better you do cardio to Make Your Life Longer. But there's, there's, there's truth, there's truth in that. And, and it's it's something that is approachable for many people. So they're in the gym, probably many people listening least many people who are in my orbit, they're lifting weights maybe three to five hours per week. And if they're being asked to figure out maybe adding one to two hours of cardio per week, and so those can be anywhere from 20 to 30 minute workouts that you do, and what type of cardio doesn't really matter, it can be things like I've mentioned, or it could just be playing sports, or you'd like to play pickleball cool, do that whatever, right? It's just, it should be something a bit more challenging than just walking, walking is great. But there there are significant benefits to also doing zone two, right. So like zone, zone one where we're walking is fine. But it's not very challenging, therefore, the adaptations are limited. Whereas when you increase that difficulty, you're now going to get bigger benefits from it. And finally, I would say if somebody does want to add some high intensity stuff, because they like it, or because it's relevant to like, if they really are trying to improve their, their cardiovascular endurance, then it does make sense to do some high intensity work as well. If we are also doing strength training, and our priority is to progress in our strength training, if everything else is kind of secondary to that, I would say, probably a good idea to limit your high intensity work to no more than an hour per week, because high intensity work is great for improving your endurance. And it can be great for burning a lot of calories in a shorter period of time. But it's also harder to recover from.

Philip Pape 56:59

Thanks, all great advice, because there's always confusion about that. And it's really about the dose, what your goal is, whether you're trying to improve your work capacity, and whether you enjoy it, and it's great. I want to respect your time. I know I you know, in my over ambition, I probably have 15 Other questions, I'd love to ask you that philosophy and others.

Mike Matthews 57:17

Practice I haven't been a guest on someone's podcast, and in months, well,

Philip Pape 57:22

you know, mine's gonna keep going on and on. So if you ever want to come back for part two, we can. But I do want to ask you a question. I ask all guests. And that is, is there anything you wish I had asked you? And what is your answer? And I know we kept it kind of to a constrained topic here. But yeah, would you answer that? Yeah.

Mike Matthews 57:40

It's funny, we only we only really touched on a couple of things. Maybe maybe, instead of that, you have one more question that you want to ask?

Philip Pape 57:52

Yeah, I mean, you're a very hungry guy, like I could tell you're always out for, you know, growing, improving and building your business. And people people respect and are drawn to that. So I mean, what else do you want to accomplish before you die?

Mike Matthews 58:06

That's interesting question. So so it kind of comes back actually, to what I said, originally, which was that my plan initially was to write this book, and put it out there and see how it does. And if it if it does, well follow it up with some more books. But originally, my plan was to, to write in different genres and write about things that are interesting to me. So I've done some of that I've written a book on the bill of rights that actually has has sold quite well under a pen name, just because it would be very random to publish that under my name. And then people are like, wait a minute, bigger, leaner, stronger, and the Know Your Bill of Rights book, is this a joke? And so from a marketing perspective, it makes more sense to keep all the fitness stuff under my name like, sir, you know, I'm the fitness guy. And then I, I didn't put much thought into the pen name is just to name two names in my family. Two people's names I picked Sean and Patrick. So Sean, Patrick, and, and and so I've written I've written books and a couple other genres as well. That was my original interest was writing. That's why I got into this. And I almost didn't pursue all of the fitness stuff because I didn't want to. I wasn't thrilled at the idea of becoming a niche fitness micro celebrity as I joke, right. I just I wasn't that that wasn't very appealing to me. And Part Part of that's just my personality. I'm not very concerned about getting approval from other people and getting admiration from people and prestige and status. I'm human. So those things have some appeal, and they always will, but they're not major factors in my Decision Making particularly important decisions, like what am I going to do with my life. And so, originally, I wanted to keep writing, I wanted to write fiction as well, I was very interested in that. And I wanted to use what I was learning about books and selling books to have a digital publishing company, publish my own stuff, publish other people's stuff. And then the fitness stuff started to do so well, that I decided to just go all in on that and pursue that opportunity, despite a part of me not wanting to, and I figured, okay, if I can stick to what I like about it, like if I can stick to writing, and researching, producing content, and doing it maybe also my way, so to speak, like if I go all the way back before the book, so I had my little personal transformation. I was, I was pretty lean, it was probably seven or 8%, body fat, had a good amount of muscle look pretty good. Working out with a with a friend. And he was joking with me. He was like, Mike, why don't you just take your shirt off on YouTube? And just like, sell shit, why don't you just start doing that. And that would have been back in 2012. Now everyone's doing that there weren't actually that many people on YouTube at that time, at least, that I can remember who were in good shape and and who also could maybe explain things and be educational. But that didn't appeal to me. I just didn't want to do that. But what did appeal to me was writing a book, which objectively, is not a great business decision going on YouTube would have been a smarter business decision. If we're talking about probabilities of turning into something that could mean something. But I decided to do what was more interesting to me, which was write a book, which turned out they did far better than I ever thought, good decision. Yeah, yeah. But but but you know, ironically, though, yes, you could say that. However, I think that you have to you have to judge decisions based on the information that you had at the time. It's wrong, I think, to look at it now with hindsight, and say, Oh, well, yeah. You know, I made a great decision there. Because even though there was a 1% chance that it would work out, it did. So

Philip Pape 1:02:22

that was the value was, yeah, no, that actually

Mike Matthews 1:02:25

was not great. However, however, I would say it was a good decision, in my case, because I wasn't thinking my goal was not to become a fitness celebrity, that was not my goal, to try to make as much money as I can as quickly as I can. That was not my goal. My goal was to do work that I was going to enjoy and do something that interested me that also could benefit other people. That was writing a book. So that's why I did it. And, and so now, fast forward 1011 years, and I've written a number of books and sold a lot of books and, and Legion has has come a long way and done far better than, than I anticipated in the beginning as well. And I'm still though interested in there's my, my interest in, in writing, that's still the work that I enjoy the most. And so, I actually I'm interested in seeing how I can make time to pursue some of these original interests, like writing fiction, for example. And in some of these other writing projects that I I just tabled, because I decided I was going to focus all of my energy, and all of my time on the fitness stuff. But I was going to come back to some of these other things in the future. So now I'm at that point where I want to come back to some of these other things without taking away from the fitness work.

Philip Pape 1:03:59

Yeah. And I get that in some of your other work. Like, I don't know, the the Little Black Book of workout motivation, you know, it's almost not a fitness book. Right. It's more about philosophy. Yeah, exactly. Because I don't have it. Yeah. And so I was able

Mike Matthews 1:04:11

to like scratch my own itch, but it's related to fitness. It's not totally random.

Philip Pape 1:04:18

But that is a good message about I mean, people say tritely, you know, follow your passion. But I mean, the intangible long term potential growth of an idea because you pick something you enjoyed that allowed you to adhere to it really is consistent with the fitness message of doing things you enjoy and and everything else we talked about. So I wouldn't discount that. I think if you saw an alternate history where he didn't do that, who knows if it wouldn't have been as successful.

Mike Matthews 1:04:43

The ironic alternate history would be the one where I let's say pursued fiction, right? So I've sold about 2 million 2 million fitness books maybe a little bit more something around that right. And and that's a lot of books have objectively but but it's there. There aren't many people in fitness who have sold that many books. Now, if you zoom out, and you look at, let's say, just general health, and diet, now there are many, many books, especially if you look over the decades that have sold millions of copies. And maybe not many self published, I've published one book traditionally muscle for life, the rest have been self published. And so that's kind of an interesting angle, maybe a bit unique. However, the majority the vast majority of money of, of economic activity with books is fiction. Just go look at right now go look at the top 100 books on Amazon, and probably at least 80 If not 90 of them, maybe even 95 are going to be fiction books. And so the ironic kind of alternate history of you the one where I wrote fiction, instead, and that achieved the same magnitude of success in fiction, which would be probably, literally 10 times the books sold like so, you know, sell 20 million 30 million books, fiction, and the majority of them being self published, where you're earning three to $5 per book, that would have been the ironic twist.

Philip Pape 1:06:22

I will say, I don't know how many people you would have impacted in terms of true like impact on their life and transformation. But that is one they were happy that you did. And I thank you for personally, I know many others do. So to wrap it up, where can listeners learn more about you. Um,

Mike Matthews 1:06:39

I guess Legion athletics.com has kind of that's that's the my online home, so to speak. So I'm still active on the blog, there have shit we have 1000s of articles. Now I have a couple of other people now who write with me as well under their names. And, and then I have my my podcast muscle for life, which is also there. And if people want to check out my books, they're in the store there. But they're also on Amazon anywhere online where you buy books, and I'm not very active on social media, because I just don't care to put the time into it. But I do exist. At most of Life Fitness on Instagram at most Flyff on Twitter, I'm actually more active on Twitter than, than Instagram or anything else. Because I like to use Twitter to test ideas to test even phrasings ways of expressing things. I actually have like a whole system I've put together that tracks engagement and so forth, that helps inform my fitness writing. So so I can because as a content creator, something I've always hated, is you put a bunch of time into a piece of content, you think it's great. And it's just just fizzles. It's just annoying. It's annoying. So So I'm thinking about Alright, how can I have that happen less often? And this is this is really just a marketing question. And and testing is, is a it's just a fundamental tool in marketing. And so I like to use Twitter, Twitter to tasks x. That's right now that's when it's is it going to move to x.com? Is that the Excel? Yeah. Interesting. So he's just deleting Twitter, a part of a part of me loves that actually, just because because of what Twitter was before. It's just going to die a complete death at which which I like actually. Anyway, so x x is is great is great for that. And that'd be a whole nother discussion, but I'm more active on Twitter at muscle for life than anywhere else.

Philip Pape 1:08:50

Alright, cool. So I'll definitely put all that stuff in the show notes. I can put your nom de plume Sean Patrick in there as well if you want.

Mike Matthews 1:08:58

Actually, I have have a second edition of that book coming. So my work on it is done. I have somebody working with me helping just gather up some footnotes and things and it's not a top priority for us but there's a fair chance that it'll be out later this year. The a new second edition that I think is a pretty significant improvement over the first even though the first I'd say is pretty good. I mean it's it's sold maybe 100,000 copies and gotten a lot of reviews and stuff so

Philip Pape 1:09:31

check it out. I've I've two girls that are very much into history. So check it out. Alright man, thank you so much for for doing this. You know you're incredible guy, ethical person, which I've always appreciated that and I think you're doing amazing things. So thanks for coming on the show.

Mike Matthews 1:09:46

Thank you. I appreciate that.

Philip Pape 1:09:49

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights, please Take a moment to share this episode with them and make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode until then stay strong

Philip Pape 8/4/23 Philip Pape 8/4/23

Ep 93: Ditch Alcohol for a Physically and Mentally Healthier Life with Karolina Rzadkowolska

Today, we're talking about living an alcohol-free life with Karolina Rzadkowolska, an alcohol-free empowerment expert. We are unpacking the realities and myths around alcohol consumption, its impact on our physical and mental health, and whether it is actually serving you.

You will learn about effective strategies to change drinking habits, cope with social situations, and relieve stress without alcohol. Karolina will help us explore the concept of aligning our lifestyle choices with our personal goals and how giving up alcohol can lead to greater self-discovery and purpose.

Karolina helps intuitive women ditch alcohol and discover their greater purpose. She’s worked with thousands of clients through her programs to transform drinking habits and unlock health, happiness, and potential. She is the bestselling author of the book, Euphoric: Ditch Alcohol and Gain a Happier, More Confident You and her work has been featured in the Huffington Post, The Sunday Post, Popsugar, Real Simple, Elite Daily, and multiple TV shows.

Karolina’s passionate about helping you discover what really makes you happy outside of a beverage and design a life you love.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
__________

Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:29] Karolina's journey to an alcohol-free, 'euphoric' life
[9:17] What opened up for Karolina when she became alcohol-free
[14:07] Debunking alcohol health myths and discussing its actual effects
[21:05] Misconceptions about alcohol as a stress reliever; alternative stress relief methods
[27:56] Allan is grateful to Philip for his refreshing approach to nutrition coaching and how it has impacted his fitness
[28:43] Tools and strategies for changing drinking habits
[31:07] Effects of alcohol on fitness goals, hormones, metabolism, gut health
[37:12] Aligning lifestyle choices with personal goals
[45:57] Managing social situations when not drinking
[48:44] Communicating decisions about alcohol to friends, family, or colleagues
[51:58] One question Karolina wished Philip had asked
[52:27] Where listeners can learn more about Karolina and her work
[53:09] Outro

Episode resources:

Karolina's website: www.euphoricaf.com
Her book: Euphoric

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https://witsandweights.com/free-call

Learn about 1-on-1 coaching ⬇️
https://witsandweights.com/coaching

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Transcript

Karolina Rzadkowolska 00:00

Is this serving me in my life anymore? You know, maybe it did have a place and a time in my life and college or in my 20s or 30s. But is this really helping me today become the version of myself that I want to become? And there's no better way to discover that than just by experimenting with a break yourself.

Philip Pape 00:18

Karolina Rzadkowolska 02:03

Thank you for the warm welcome. I'm so excited to be here.

Philip Pape 02:07

Yeah, me as well. We were talking before we recorded that this is a kind of a unique topic for me and my audience. Because the only time we usually talk about alcohol is in the context of how many calories they have or like, make sure you track and watch what you drink and maybe alternatives and substitutions. Although we do talk about the mind altering effects that then can lead to other certain decision making. You know, I want to talk about your personal background in this because you wrote that you used to think of alcohol as a ticket to having fun feeling glamorous and a treat I deserved after a long hard day, which I think many people can relate to that statement. So what was the turning point for you when you realize alcohol is not serving you anymore?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 02:48

Absolutely. And I love to talk to health conscious people because it's oftentimes that one incongruency right, we can do everything healthy and an alcohol just gets this pass. And I you know, found myself there and to my mid 30s I had partied very hard when I was in college. So that's kind of where I picked it up. Right I picked up drinking as a habit. But you know does almost doesn't matter what you do or where you are every adult at some point, for the most part picks up drinking into their habits, whether it's at work or through college or high school or whatnot. Anyway, I was so overpowering, then over drinking then. But as I grew up, I got more into health and mindfulness. And so drinking became something I compartmentalize. So I would do all the healthy things all week I would you know, drink my green juices go to yoga classes eat adjustables try to read at night. But alcohol still played a very heavy role every weekend where basically I thought I was unwinding. I thought I was letting off some steam hanging out with friends socializing. Yeah, every single Monday morning, I woke up feeling like a shell of myself. I felt like I made progress during my healthy week and then took five steps backward every single weekend. I felt lower mentally, emotionally, I felt like this depression, I felt not very motivated to go after my goals. And I just thought that I had to get stricter and stricter with how much I was drinking. So I was on this constant quest to drink less. And I had a lot of lot of rules around that. And this cycle repeats itself for over seven to eight years of just living in this like constant I want to drink less. I want to be healthier, and yet somehow this thing keeps happening to me every weekend. I was tired of it. Honestly, my drinking wasn't what you would call traditionally problematic with a rock bottom story. I literally was drinking lessons I was in college, but it was still because I was so aligned with a healthy lifestyle. And as I got older one or two drinks would literally give me a hangover or a headache that next day it's like it didn't even matter how little I drank. I still felt worse for where the next day. And I think that's something that we don't often admit to ourselves like nobody actually wakes up the next day after drinking feeling like a million dollars. Right like alcohol has certain biological and toxic properties that our body has to detox and absorb and process through And it changes how we feel the next day. And I wasn't like I was feeling that, but I just didn't think any other people were I thought I was just someone who just couldn't figure out this alcohol thing in my life. And finally, I heard of dry January. And to me that was like this release and this permission that I finally gave myself to explore what a break from alcohol could do. Because this whole drinking less wasn't working, it was still giving me so much strain and stress, so much mental gymnastics, you know, like, what's the rule today? You know, how am I going to let myself down when I actually do break it nine times out of 10. But dry January was like this, okay, I can actually just get some space away from alcohol. And I never thought I could do that before. Because it always seemed like there was the social pressure to drink, you know? And it's like, well, what are you going to say to people, if you're not going to drink, you know, don't interact, admit that I have a problem, but start going to these meetings. And so I kept, like, putting it off putting it off thinking I wasn't allowed to really do it until I heard of dry January. And that was like the first time I could publicly just be like, Hey, I'm doing this and taking a break from alcohol. And it allowed me to fall in love with a completely new lifestyle. You know, every single morning, I woke up with so much more energy, so much deeper sleep, I mean, asleep got so much better was incredible. I also started waking up feeling so much more proud of myself so much more self love, where the decisions I made the day before were setting me up to succeed the next day. And not like I was five steps behind, right, I was waking up on the right side of the bed, instead of the wrong side of the bed, I started to cultivate new discoveries into what made me happy. And I noticed that my mood was actually really elevating just naturally, I was enjoying hiking more and just being with family and friends, like my mood was going up. And February comes along. And I don't yet believe that I'm allowed to remain a person who doesn't drink like I've just like, well, socially, people are going to expect it. So I drink a few times in February. And the contrast is so big, you know, wandering for drinks completely ruins my sleep. But what I really noticed is how much it ruins my mood. I literally have a drink or two. And then an hour later, my get frustrated, cranky, I'm picking fights with my husband. And that was like the wake up call I really needed because to me, I thought I was drinking to have fun. I thought I was drinking for the pleasurable quality, I thought I was doing it to elevate my mood. And when I saw so starkly that it was literally ruining my mood. And I was so much happier in January without it. That's when my mindset really shifted. So I committed to another break at that point, which actually turned into five plus years later that I'm here at today that I remain a non drinker. And everything in my life has snowballed and changed so much not only did my physical health change my emotional health, my spiritual health, but I also recognize why I was really drinking like the existential reason, I couldn't wait for the weekend, every week, my job couldn't go fast enough in order to get off and I couldn't wait to finally unwind with some alcohol. And I didn't realize how unfulfilled I was with my work week. And so instead of putting up with that, and using alcohol to numb that I literally changed everything, I decided to launch a business and to leave my day job and to do what I'm so passionate about. So I feel fulfillment every single day. And so instead of that immediate gratification, I was going for at the end of a workday or the end of the Friday or whatever I now feel that like long term fulfillment on a daily basis, which is what I'm so passionate about sharing people.

Philip Pape 08:20

I mean, you you've sold me just with your story. That's such, and you've answered all my questions already. But no, not really. I love so many of the parallels here. There's definitely parallels with other things that are people find triggering to them, whether it's food or something else that that kind of is tied into something else that we're covering up. And you mentioned, you didn't have to go through this rock bottom to get there unnecessarily. But I like that you did the experiment with the dry January that gave you the contrast. Because what sticks out to me is the the need for community here oftentimes, right, the relatedness to other people that there's such peer pressure, if you want to call it with with alcohol, whereas other things like foods, I don't know candy, for example, if you want to stop eating, can you know he's gonna get on you for that, right? But it's like, Oh, you don't drink? Why not? Right? Like, I bet you get that question a lot. So some things you said about compartmentalizing it. And I don't know if you use the word but I'm using the word rationalizing, right we do that lying to ourselves. Let's admit that. The interesting thing is, I know what you're saying as far as the symptoms, and I think everyone has different versions of those, right? Like, I know that if I had surgery recently, I couldn't drink for like two weeks. I occasion we'll have one drink a week, but just even not having had it at all. You could see the differences. Even though I'm dealing with all this other stuff. You could just sense this greater sense of clarity and other symptoms that mysteriously go away. Okay, so I want to focus on the positive first and then get into some of the other things you mentioned. Because by removing something that that's fine, you've now added in opportunities to your life, right? What opened up for you now that you became alcohol free?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 09:54

Yeah, so sure, great question. Um, you know, I was So living in such a place of mediocrity before, and all of that was just fine. Like, I was living a just fine life. I had my job. I had my marriage. I had my, you know, vacations twice, once a year for two weeks, right? And I really didn't believe that I was allowed to paint outside of those lines. And I think going alcohol free was like, first it was just the little things like, Okay, I'm not drinking this Friday. So what do I do on a Friday night, you know, like, I literally drink every weekend for a decade, like, you know, that was my source of fun. And so I had to kind of rediscover what pleasure and fun looked like in my life. So I started exploring new activities, I started going out and doing things I wouldn't normally do. I did paddleboard yoga, I went to writers workshops, I went to Zumba classes, just totally getting outside of my comfort zone. And I think that really brought me in touch with all the mental time and energy you also released from not drinking alcohol started really getting me in touch with my deeper creativity, my deeper intuition and my deeper passions. And when I really got so strongly motivated to recognize how incredibly life changing was to change my relationship with alcohol, I knew I wanted to share it with other people. And the past, though alcohol and just my past, limiting beliefs would have told me you're not an entrepreneur, you can never write a book. In fact, I had tried to write a book for over a decade, I used to write a lot when I was a kid and adolescent, I would write little poems, short stories, journal a lot. And as soon as I start drinking in college, my writing just completely dries up. But the desire to write doesn't go away. So I keep having these new year's resolutions every year. This is the year I'm going to write a book, right? I've always wanted to be an author. And I would write maybe the first week of January, and then it was completely like strapped to the side. And I never worked on it. Alcohol didn't give me the creativity or the discipline. In order to do that, it was so much easier to open a bottle of wine than write the next great American novel, right. And so I continued to choose what was easy and my comfort zone over and over and over instead of pushing myself. So just allowing myself to push myself outside of my comfort zone, find these new senses of creativity and passion, but also kind of change some of these limiting stories because I never thought I would be happy without alcohol. I kept telling myself a story. That's not like I needed it, like I was dependent on it in some kind of addictive or biochemical way. But that like I just it, it brings pleasure to my life. It's fun, I'm never gonna have fun without it. And that limiting story made me feel so stuck. And so I never thought I would be so happy without alcohol. But I was. And so I was like, Well wait a minute, maybe some of those other stories. I'm telling myself like, I couldn't be an entrepreneur or I couldn't quit my job, or I couldn't write a book or also be yes. So started expanding my sense of possibility so much. And I just got such a fire of confidence. Courage, like we just talked about, everyone really assumes you're going to drink and most people do drink. And so when you go alcohol free, you build your courage muscle like no other just the simple fact of saying no, thank you, or explaining it to people or whatever, like you're the odd one out in that moment. And that courage muscle that you're building, to align your life, to your values to what works for your well being and not just doing what you know, other people are doing to try to fit in or to please anyone else. It builds so much strength and courage within yourself. And so I think it's like this confluence of gifts that you get when you go alcohol free. Not only do you get that clarity, do you get that time and energy back, I got that confidence, that courage that also rediscovery of what my real passions were, instead of just outsourcing fun to a beverage. And I just got so excited to say like, why couldn't I go after my dream life. And my story is not an anomaly. Most of the clients I work with, and a lot of women I've heard from who've just read my book and stuff, they ditch alcohol, and it's like that fire within them is completely ignited to go after their deeper passions. I know people who've written books themselves, launch, businesses started nonprofits move somewhere beautiful, because they've always wanted to live there. It's just an incredible way of activating that deeper desire within what we want. Instead of settling for the status quo that we have.

Philip Pape 13:59

I love the vision and the dream you paint, which is where I wanted to go first because then we kind of reverse engineer back to it. And I'm gonna ask a little bit about science along the way, if it's something you want to get into, but you talked about the courage, muscle, unlocking the fire, having time, energy, clarity, all of these things, which is amazing. And I wonder if some people are listening thinking, Hmm, is that the thing that is that what at least one of the things in my life besides others, they may be aware of? That if I just stopped as an experiment to see what would happen, would all of a sudden unlock? Why do you think that is? So that's the big question is, I guess, physiologically or otherwise, because you said you weren't really addicted or it wasn't a dependence. Is that true? Really, or maybe you were a little bit?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 14:40

I will definitely argue for emotional dependence. And I will say that most people in my study also have that same emotional dependence. Right. And I think most of us are kind of brainwashed into having an alcohol regularly in our lives, you know, and usually it's a lot more than just the one drink a week like it is for you. Right? It's like a few drinks on Friday, Saturday, Sunday time. thing. So that emotional like I outsource so much alcohol, I also grew up really shy and I'm introverted. So to me alcohol was the secret to confidence and being able to socialize with people. So there's a lot of things I outsource to alcohol that emotional way. And that's what I love doing with my clients is that a lot of times it isn't this deep, like I'm talking addiction as in like, if you remove alcohol, the person is gonna get sick, right? You're gonna need to go to the hospital. What it's emotional, though, it's all these just mindset associations we've formed over time. And all of those can be broken. All of those can be reframed and rewired into something different. And when someone finally feels for example, competent on their own to socialize, and they don't need a drink, what a powerhouse they've just unlocked. You know what I mean? But going back to your question about the science, why do I think this is so one really big reason is literally what alcohol does to our neuro chemistry. And I didn't know any of this when I was drinking. So it's just was a huge mind, you know, mind blown kind of moment when I started learning more about it, but I could, once I knew about it, see it when I like reflected back on drinking. So first of all, Alcohol is a depressant, it will slow down our central nervous system, and really kind of slow down ourselves and our processing and stuff. And some people obviously enjoy that kind of numbing effect that happens when alcohol is in the way. But what happens that I didn't know is that our body is a miracle, right? We have these counteractive systems in our body. And so when this depressant is introduced, the body actually knows to release stimulants in response to it. And so the body releases cortisol, adrenaline and dine orphan dine orphan, something that is basically the opposite of endorphins, it makes us feel very low and depressed. In response to alcohol. Most of the time this is released about or maybe like, you'll feel it once the alcohol effect wears off. So it just depends on how much you drink. If you drink just one drink, you'll probably feel it like an hour later. If you drink all night, though, you might feel it in the morning, right? If you wake up at 4am. Like with a jolt, like how many people have had that kind of wake up call after drinking. It's literally like cortisol has just been totally released in your brain in your body. You might feel it the next day by just having anxiety or just being overly worried and just feeling just kind of behind on things as well. And these what's really interesting about these stress hormones is that while alcohol, the actual, you know, toxin of ethanol can be processed in our body quite fast or not quite fast, but depends on how old you are. Within a you know, a day or two new stress hormones can actually live in our body a lot longer. So when I was drinking every weekend, but like not drinking during the week, I actually was never experiencing my true mental state, I was always at the effect of those stress hormones like circulating my body for longer. So we have the heightened stress hormones when we're drinking but then also what alcohol does is lower a lot of our happiness neurotransmitters. So our GABA, serotonin and dopamine go down. In fact, because alcohol does this high spike of dopamine in the brain, our brain is like this is a natural, right. So over time, it actually actually retracts the receptors that catch dopamine. So people who drink regularly have lower levels of dopamine, serotonin and GABA in their brains. Again, this is just all the time, not just the second after drinking or anything like that. So you have the heightened stress hormones, the lowered happiness neurotransmitters. And to me what that looked like in my life was just apathy. Like on a general day of the week, I just felt apathetic, pretty bored, a little stress, like that was just my feeling right. And then on a Friday, I could get excited to have a drink to have that one little spike of dopamine I was so looking forward to when I ditched alcohol and allowed my neuro chemistry to rebalance, I noticed the stress hormones start to go down, those neurotransmitters start to go up and the littlest things start to make me feel so much more joy and happiness. They even have a word for it called the pink cloud. Now that intense search and the intensity of that might wane a little as you get used to it. But like the feelings I have just wellbeing and joy are so much heightened as a non drinker than as a drinker. So I think that's a huge component to it. When we look at the science, there's a lot more obviously, we know good sleep I know for anyone interested in health is so important. Just one glass of wine has been proven to reduce our REM sleep cycles from around the five to six tonight, we could get down to just one or two. I didn't know that either. Right. So here I am. I'm a pretty big sleep fanatic. I was always making sure to clock in those eight hours. I was getting the eight hours but my sleep was so fragmented, so poor the quality that it didn't understand how why I was so exhausted why I was always feeling so lethargic and stuff. And there's all these things that happen on a biological level. Like we could probably write a whole book just about that on alcohol of what it's doing. You know, it's it's a toxin, your body has to work overtime to process it's also slowing down your metabolism at that same time because it has to process alcohol first. So all the things we ate that day aren't getting processed because we have to probably can't store alcohol on the body like that. So there's so much going on, I think on a biological neurochemical level, even molecularly they've tied anxiety to an alcohol in our cells molecularly and it's so Interesting that we're learning more and more about this. And so it just starts to, you know, really get the questioning not to say that everyone's got to quit drinking, and it's this horrible thing. But it kind of allows us to have permission to not have to have the rock bottom or severe, severe problem to just be like, wait a minute, is this serving me and my life anymore? You know, maybe it did have a place and a time in my life and college or in my 20s or 30s. But is this really helping me today become the version of myself that I want to become? And there's no better way to discover that than just by experimenting with a break yourself?

Philip Pape 20:32

So much in there. That was just that was a way more comprehensive answer than I expected. And I love that because I immediately slipped my mind merely started going to the spiraling right everything we do spirals into other things in our life, both positively and negatively. And for those listening who care about body composition, health, emotional health, mental health, everything, just imagine, think of what Karolina talked about when you're messing with your, you know, cortisol, your adrenaline, when these hormonal effects lasts for days beyond the drinking, I mean, think about that, right? Most things are short term days beyond the drinking, it is true that alcohol gets processed first. So now you're blunting the benefits you're getting from all your protein that you're trying to consume for your you know, diet, and then the apathy and the poor sleep and we know that poor sleep causes a slower metabolism and causes greater hunger and that also leads to ill health effects. So at the end of the day, my question for for people listening, and this is for you, as well you get this a lot. Karolina is why what rationalizations remain? And how do we attack those because I hear a couple right? One is that there are so called benefits of alcohol, whether it's the resveratrol and red wine, you know, antioxidants, all this and I used to believe those as well. I used to have my red wine every day with dinner, and I was never a big drinker, like you would still, frequency wise it was enough. And now I understand that there are really no upsides at all. According to the evidence, there's really no upside to alcohol. And so that's one rationalization the other is stress relief, right? Like, I've had clients who were trying to eliminate calories or trying to clean things up. And it's like, well, I have to have the alcohol will really do you is it a non negotiable for and then they get rid of it? And all of a sudden, oh, my goodness, everything else got easier? I wonder why. So talk about all of those remaining rationalizations and how we can dispel those, and then we can move to like, Alright, what do we do now?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 22:18

Yeah, and there's that social element too, right? So there's that belief that we have to be drinkers. So you know, with the with the first one, the health benefits, you know, honestly, we were kind of duped. And it has a really similar history to like what happened with cigarettes. In the last like five to seven to even 10 years or so there's just been so many conclusive studies that show there is no health effect of alcohol, and any previous health effects that were tied were done by flawed studies. And so once you kind of weed those out and clean up that data, there's just there is only life loss, only degenerative diseases, only more risk for cancer and cardiovascular, you'd have to drink drink, I think 18 bottles of wine to get any of that reservatrol antioxidant effects that you want, right? And they actually can pinpoint it, there was a doctor back in 1991, who was the first person to say that alcohol is good for your heart. And that is literally you could look and go back and see that in 80s. More Americans drink soda with dinner than wine, which obviously soda isn't the best either. But you know, it's just so interesting to see, compared to this huge consumption level, that's changed in the last 30 years, because alcohol essentially became a health beverage, right. And so I think that is really, really just a good, not just a wake up call, but like, we can drink, we can have alcohol, you can have all the things in your life that might not be so good for you. But we need to know we need to be a form what that's doing to us. And so I think, to call alcohol health beverage for so long, and to say so many benefits, and this and this and this, that was wrong. And thank God, now we're getting the new information. And then people can choose what they want to from that, for example, Canada just lowered its drinking limits to literally zero or if you want to, you know, have a little risk, it's two drinks a week. I mean, think how different that is from you know, what we were saying seven or even 14 drinks a week, like that is a lot of alcohol in the system, especially for a woman Anything over that seven drinks is actually considered heavy, risky drinking. So obviously, we have those studies and that you know that that's a that's a learning curve, because for so long, we've been taught that it is good for us or so. So there's a lot of you can research, you know, for women, especially the breast cancer risk goes up by 15% by just drinking two drinks a week. And you know, for me that two drinks a week would have been nothing, right. So it's like, what's the point? And then you mentioned obviously, distressed response. So this is obviously a big one, you know, it actually becomes a habit where our brain literally gets the cue of, Okay, it's time to drink. And we understand that there's going to be this reward of that stress release, and you know, becomes a ritual in our lives. I actually think the ritual is beautiful in the sense that we work all day we're so productive. We're always on we're taking care of all the things we have so many responsibilities, and you get home and you pour a glass and you finally allow it all to melt away. And just to relax, I think that is actually beautiful. It's just the ethanol in that drink isn't really relaxing you like you think they once did that study. So we talked about the cortisol earlier, but they once did this study, where they put brain notes on people who just left work. And so everyone's a little stressed out, they're able to see their brainwaves. It's all a little wonky. And they go to a bar restaurant, and everybody orders a drink. And all of a sudden the brainwaves relax, they're nice and smooth. And the kicker here is, is that nobody actually received and drink the

Philip Pape 25:30

drug, they just ordered it got it. Right.

Karolina Rzadkowolska 25:33

Like, we can see the power of habit and the power of ritual on our brain to anticipate that relaxation. And honestly, one of the easiest ways to make a switch in order to still have the ritual without the negative side effects is mocktails, and alcohol free beverages. There's so many on the market these days, there's ones made, especially for people who are health conscious or athletic, like athletic brewing, for example, that literally have the same taste and or quality of an adult beverage, but don't have any of the ethanol or negative side effects. And I have to say that like most people find that that placebo effect like that works like a charm. And it also really helps in the social occasions, because you know, we do have this huge ritual around drinking, we come together at birthday parties at weddings at funerals, I mean, literally any Wednesday of the week, for game night, whatever it is, alcohol is going to be around. And it's like, you know, you mentioned earlier with someone care if you stop eating candy, you know, hopefully not. But for some reason, we're so fixated about what's in our cup, you know, and I think that like we can kind of start tearing that pressure down. And by having a more inclusive society where alcohol free drinks are to be more normalized. Okay, you have the beer in your cup, I have the alcohol free beer, who cares, right? We're all socializing. We're all bonding. And so I think that's also a really beautiful way not only to get that stress relief, there's so many other ways, obviously, you know, we can incorporate some more you in yoga, or some breath work or meditation, or my favorite is just taking a walk at sunset, because it doesn't matter what problems I have in my life. Like that all seems super petty when I'm watching the beautiful, like grandeur of the universe explode in front of me during a sunset. So there's obviously a lot of other structural release techniques. But we have to be willing to experiment, you know, we have to be willing to ask ourselves, What if alcohol actually isn't the best way to decompress my body? Because it's not doing that on a biological level whatsoever? What if I try these other things while I take a break and kind of learn and go from there, and then that social element to you know, I think we just the more people who are starting to not stand up and say alcohol is bad, but just to encourage a world where not everybody has to drink at every occasion where it's perfectly okay to choose the alcohol free option. We're starting to change that expectation too. And you know, it starts one person at a time it starts with a ripple effect. You know, like I had a friend group that would totally question why someone wasn't drinking a few years ago, no one would do that my friend group now everyone's kind of aware enough to say everyone can choose their own way.

27:57

Hi, this is Al and I just want to give a shout out to Philip Pape Wits & Weights for his nutritional coaching. His coaching is based upon science research, intellect and wisdom. His coaching is safe, supportive, connecting and it actually has helped reset my compass in terms of how I direct my health, the action steps I do and really really has helped me regain trust and belief in what my body can do and how my body can change.

Philip Pape 28:31

I tell you after this interview I am definitely going to be talking more about this on this platform and others because I do think it's really important as a health issue as well as a social issue and I know what you're talking about with rituals when I'm when I'm in a fat loss phase I cut out alcohol together anyway just because I don't want the wasted calories so to speak. And I will actually have a diet Root Beer sometimes in the evening as like my go to because it has that flavor and yeah it's soda but it's not it's fine because it's not alcohol and I get that it basically replaces it without any harm my wife's not much of a drinker so it's I kind of don't have that pressure when I when we go to like family dinners or whatnot. But I found that Guinness alcohol free Guinness is delicious right and like it used to be the old duels as the only option so we because what came to mind earlier for at least a lot of men and maybe I'm stereotyping is like the craft beer industry and the the distilleries and all that have become really sophisticated and cool now right you see it in the marketing it's a big piece of of the modern man he did all that kind of idea. So even for men and women mocktails and new drinks are a great option. What are what are your favorites for those like what is their present a particular recommendations you have when people do that when they go out to just a random restaurant with friends?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 29:44

Yeah, so someone's health conscious. You know, almost all of the alcohol free beers are like once you remove alcohol, this calorie counts go down so low they even have like 10 Calorie IPAs and zero calorie alcohol free beers as well. So it's just incredible. But for the beers like you know, I thought like growing is a great one groovy in Denver is a great one. What is it called BrewDog is a good one as well. And it's just really exciting. I think what happens is that there's so much in the space, like every month, a new drink company comes out. So to me, I used to I lived in San Diego for a long time, I was so wrapped up in that craft beer culture and the wine culture as well. And to me, like part of the fun is the discovery, the experimentation exploring different options. And I think there's more happening in the alcohol free space than in the alcohol space. So if like, you'd like to try new drinks and see what's new on the market and stuff, you're gonna have a lot of fun, and you're not going to run out of drinks to try in this new arena. Wild as I think is also really great. That is an alcohol free wine that doesn't add back sugar or any juice. So it's also super low calorie, and it's not overly sweet, which I love as well. So that's a really great option.

Philip Pape 30:49

If you said, Well, I know what you like that one.

Karolina Rzadkowolska 30:55

We also have, you know, just new drinks that aren't trying to be you know, an alcohol free substitute. But like these nootropics or adaptogen drinks, like you Forex for example. And I also say to like just go to your health food store, like there's literally hundreds and 1000s of drinks on the market that aren't, you know, that have some kind of more health quality that aren't alcohol. And that ritual really takes care of that like that.

Philip Pape 31:18

So you mentioned nootropics. So you mean there's like ashwagandha drinks you can buy and things like that? Oh, yeah, I'm not even aware of that. I shouldn't be as a nutrition person. But I just, it's just been kind of a, I think this is probably true for a lot of people correct me if I'm wrong, it's almost like a non existent space in your brain because you drink like you're not looking for the alcohol free stuff. So you don't realize this whole world out there. But I imagine it does take a lot of innovation to come up with something that's tolerable and tasty. At least that's the assumption right? In that space. Yeah, I

Karolina Rzadkowolska 31:47

mean, there's a lot of innovation happening. And a lot of like the beer they say is almost like on par to par, the wine industry is still working on, like really making it better. But it's really exciting to see everything that's coming out in the last few years or so and exploding. And I think really changing the younger generations perceptions as for alcohol as well, which is pretty amazing.

Philip Pape 32:07

Now, do you get we touched a little bit on the health effects? Do you get into some of the more details behind alcohol and its effect on fitness outcomes at all, like fat loss, muscle gain, athletic performance and things like that?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 32:19

Yeah, absolutely. So first of all, like I, I will just tell you my personal story, I was a ballerina growing up. So I always had a smaller frame and was athletic or so. And then I went to college, and I can I started you know, drinking a lot and eating things like pizza rolls. And I was wondering, by the time I was 21, why I like literally inflated, like, lots of lots of pounds. And so ever since that, that age 22 Or so I literally was on this quest to lose weight. And so literally the whole decade of my 20s I was spending, I would try all the diets, I would try cutting this out doing that, you know, and nothing really seemed to budge, or at least it was a lot of hard work if it did even a little. And so then I ditch alcohol and immediately lose like a few handfuls of pounds just effortlessly. I'm like what, like I was trying so hard to happen here. And that's what really caused me to look into it. So there's a lot of factors, obviously, we understand the calories, everyone understands that you're, you're drinking the calories. And I got that too. But here's some of those secret things that I didn't know about. So first of all, alcohol increases our appetite actually signals to the brain to numb that signal that tells us we're full. So you know when you're having a few drinks and you're munching on some pretzels are you craving that fast food, you know, it actually signals that you're to the brain you're not full keep eating and also increases your hunger levels because it depletes our nutrients. So I don't know about you, but I don't eat kale for the taste for me. It's because I'm trying to absorb those healthy nutrients. And alcohol actually blocks our absorption of almost every vitamin and most minerals too, meaning they're just getting flushed out of our body and not absorbed. That also makes us hungrier, right. So it does, its blocking that we just touched upon it earlier. But because our body can't store alcohol, it means it's one of the first macronutrients that has to be processed. So because your body's focused on processing alcohol, the fat, the protein, the carbs, they're getting saved for later, which could be in a muffin top right. And that's because it was like that, like typical habit. You know, this is what I was adding to my week of trying to be healthy. But this like Boulder, I was literally pushing up hill every week what was happening. Alcohol also really affects our aerobic fitness. So it increases our heart rate but without any related physical exertion. So it actually makes the heart have to work harder to pump the oxygen through the blood and increases heart rate blood pressure and the inflammation I believe does increase cholesterol, because when you remove alcohol studies have proven that cholesterol does go down. Mine went down by 50 points. So aerobic fitness

Philip Pape 34:47

was just a short the heart rate. Those are longer term. It's kind of a cumulative thing or will you see an immediate impact like the next day?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 34:56

You will definitely if you have like an aura ring or some kind of other tracker you'll definitely See your heart rate up immediately. And obviously to in the long term as well, it's just like it habitually raises in stuff. And so the aerobic fitness goes down, you're not able to do your best, you know, PRs or runs because your heart literally isn't as efficient into pumping that blood and having that lower resting heart rate. And then it also decreases our testosterone and increases our estrogen. So for any kind of muscle building, or muscle protein synthesis, it's depleting that testosterone that we need to gain that muscle. So those are just some of the things that I was like, Whoa, I had no idea all that was happening. No wonder it was an uphill battle to try to get fit when I was still drinking. And you know, the thing is, is like, we can just ask ourselves, you know, for someone who has more than one than they have two, or three or four, are they really that motivated to do all their health and fitness goals the next day, and if they are, are they almost doing it out of a punishment and a very negative energy, right, because I remember going to that hot yoga class to thinking I needed to sweat out those toxins and having just the worst headache and pain because I put myself through that. So it's just amazing to see both intuitively but also the science underneath it. Like it's so much easier to live a healthy lifestyle when alcohol is not in the picture. And I think just waking up every day in a better mood from both the neurochemical level, the sleep, being fantastic, all those things, it just sets us up to also then do the habits and the practices and the routines that instill a healthier lifestyle.

Philip Pape 36:23

I agree. And it's not like you need alcohol, see, I mean, you need food, you need food. And so it limits not limits you but you know, you have to choose from within that choice set. It's funny, MIT talk about how it makes you feel the morning, because if I drink during the week, and and by the way, I'm probably going to start just drinking less, if at all, based on talking to you. So this is fantastic. If I drink during the week, it's the day before my recovery day, right? So it doesn't interfere with my lifting. And I'll even advise clients to have to drink like to time it in that way. Which which logically means I know there's a negative effect. And we all know there's negative effects, you know, just intuitively, but it's it's great to hear it viscerally explain like that, that it affects appetite, hunger management, deplete your nutrients, you know, and then raises all these blood markers, because that is counterintuitive to what we're trying to do here. So, okay, then we talked about stress we talked about, you know why it's not truly a stress management tool. How about when you work with clients, when we work with primarily women right to change their relationship with alcohol helped them understand why it does or doesn't, why it doesn't serve their goals? What does that process look like?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 37:29

Absolutely. So, you know, first having that awareness that like that, that possibility, yeah. And I think that that's where I was living for a long time was that possibility that life would be better without alcohol, but like this, how do I ever make that a reality like everyone drinks, it's just part of the social fabric and all those kinds of things. So just imagining I mean, I remember imagining what it would be like to be a Buddhist monk. Why? Because like, this Buddhist monk wasn't drinking, he was spending time and contemplation and meditation, like he was just living these healthy rituals every day. And I fantasized about that because it was so far removed from my like, social life or just a normal Western social life. Because I didn't think I could live this healthy lifestyle and, you know, really have boundaries around drinking, unless I was like, you know, living this kind of fantasy. So if anyone ever yearns for that kind of healthier lifestyle, that's already kind of a clue that, you know, maybe that alcohol is playing into those negative side effects and just, you know, lowering your mood, and so forth. And the thing is, is that we have to recognize if you look at it from a really objective level, like imagine I'm an alien, I just come to this planet, I'm learning about our practices. I noticed that, okay, these teenagers, they're maybe 1718 21, whatever they're getting, like this rite of passage around alcohol, right? Like, they, these adolescents, they don't drink. But then as these teenagers come in, they drink and alcohol is positioned as this tool to be cooler and more rebellious and independent act like an adult. And then it's ingrained into the social fabric, every single event for the rest of their lives. Like what a sneaky marketing ploy on the alcohol industry. It's like this rite of passage, we get into it, and we have the habit for the rest of our lives. And so it's just kind of like, so fascinating to question that to question what is the role of the alcohol industry? What is the role, like, Who benefits when all these people on this planet are drinking? And what beliefs have I come to have in my life, whether I got them from my own experiences, whether I got them from TV, I mean, you can put on any TV show marketing to teenagers and they'll be so much alcohol and that show, whether I saw it on Sex in the City or in James Bond movies, what like the least have I absorbed the alcohol either gives me benefits, pleasure or comfort, or gives me some kind of status to right because there's that rule, I'm the fine wine connoisseur, I know my varietals, right, that's status. We're looking for an alcohol that has nothing to do with alcohol itself. So we get these beliefs that really we formed over time about what alcohol does for us and the positive and how I work with women is to help them change those beliefs. help them actually mine them and debunk them and discover that alcohol is not serving any of those things that you think it's doing. And let's find your own power to feel the feelings you want to feel. I always say it's not the drink someone wants, it's the feeling they believe a drink will give them. So how can we achieve that feeling without the drink and give the power back to the person. So for example, I mean, just make it super clear, because I know this is a little nebulous. i At first started drinking, because I thought it made me more confident, super introverted and shy, I was growing up, and then I start drinking alcohol and oh my god, it's this magical elixir. Now I'm an extrovert. Now I'm the life of the party. Now I can make friends so easily. And so in my mind, slowly, maybe not consciously, but subconsciously, I attained this belief that alcohol makes me more confident. And I believe that so strongly, like I don't like going to an event and without a drink, you know, I look for the first drink I can get, I continue to reinforce it that I need alcohol to be confident. The thing is, is that it's not making me more confident over time. It's actually deteriorating my confidence. So first of all, there's actually times I've embarrassed myself on alcohol, right. And there's just the little things like having wine stains on your teeth, or seeing something a little out of character are just waking up a shame the next day of drinking a little too much than you want it to. But there's also this other subconscious phenomenon of every single time I reach for a drink when I'm socializing. To be more confident. I'm telling my subconscious, Karolina, you're not interesting. Nobody wants to talk to you, I have nothing good to say, but here, have this drink, and you'll be so much better. And just telling myself that I'm not worthy as myself as I am. And so by the time I'm 31, I'm reevaluating the relationship I have with alcohol, my confidence is so low alcohol never was raising it over time, right? It was this little bandaid that just really didn't work. And I have to really kind of nixed this belief that alcohol makes me more confident it actually makes me insecure. It's lowered my self esteem over time, it's maybe not be able to trust myself completely. And so yes, do I have to work on confidence is this a new skill that I have to build in my alcohol free lifestyle? Sure, because I never practiced it before. A lot of people who drink regularly, literally haven't practiced socializing without alcohol, ever, unless it's like at work or something, you know, because it's just so instilled into us. So I learned to practice it, I learned to put myself out there, I gained the competence first to just get comfortable in my skin. And recognize I don't need a drink to be confident, that's something I can build within myself. So now, instead of telling my subconscious, I need something outside of me, in order to feel confident, I have now built that within myself and feel so much more strong and self love. Because of that. I've nixed that belief out of my subconscious. And now I believe something completely different. Alcohol was making me insecure, it's only myself that will make me feel more confident. Now we probably have like 20 to 30, big beliefs like that in our subconscious around alcohol. So each one of them needs that kind of a process to change the mindset. But here's what's brilliant about it is that once you completely change those beliefs and that mindset, the desire goes away. Because if you subconsciously don't believe there's any benefit, or comfort or pleasure, or whatever you were attaching to alcohol in the positive, this of the desire goes away. I mean, I used to smoke cigarettes in college, as a lot of people do. You couldn't pay me today smoke a cigarette, like That's gross, right. And that's almost a kind of feeling we can get to with alcohol. If we do this mindset process of it's not something you can't have or aren't allowed to have. It's something you don't want.

Philip Pape 43:28

Yeah, there's a lot there to that there's a lot of reframing going on, which I love. And one of the parent maybe a parallel to that is how, when someone starts to change up the way the for their goals, let's say it's more protein, and you know more vegetables, because they need the fiber and so on, they're not cutting things out. They're just adding things in, you know, to the positive. And all of a sudden, they realize their body feels great. And they realize it was because you know, once they start reintroducing these things that they've cut out inadvertently, that it starts to make them feel this way again, and they don't need them anymore. When he talks about the 20 big ideas or 20, big social constructs. Where does that come from? First of all, is this. Is this just your own list you've developed over time? Or is it based on some research or evidence? And then I'm assuming not everybody has issues with every all 20? Or do they? You know, is it usually a few that you want to prioritize or target?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 44:18

Absolutely super unique to people. And these are just like the most common ones I've heard. I've heard time and time and time and time again. So number one is like alcohol relaxes me, right? And not only do we because we think it happens through our personal experience, but we have advertisements and all this stuff telling us to pour a glass after you know worker so you know and then there's so many other ones like normal adults must drink or I would be a problem. If I didn't drink like I would be labeled with a problem. All the way to alcohol makes vacations more fun or alcohol makes Friday nights more exciting. You know, there's just so many different ones, but they're oftentimes related to how alcohol either brings us down in the sense of like decompression relaxation. Alcohol brings us up, it excites me, it makes things more fun, nice something to look forward to, or something to do with the social element, which either could be, you know, everyone else is doing it, or it makes me more confident or eases my social nerves or something like that. So there's, there's lots of different variety of them. But usually those are the three kind of schools of where they come from, you know, in some beliefs also come like really deeply, deeply negative beliefs we have about ourselves as well. And we're using alcohol to numb those and not have to work through and process them. But in that moment, we also do think that alcohol helps us solve our pain. So even that is another belief. Alcohol helps me solve pain, right? So a lot of these things can be super subconscious, we wouldn't actually verbally say a lot of these things. So I just like to ask people, why do you like to drink? And from there, we can oftentimes kind of distill out what those beliefs are.

Philip Pape 45:51

Yeah, so and then as far as the social situations, you talked about alternatives, but what what's the general advice for people listening, who just maybe tonight they're thinking of going out? And drinking is going to be there? Like, what what? What are the steps that they should go through mentally, potentially, to start changing their behavior in the way that would serve them better? Yeah,

Karolina Rzadkowolska 46:10

absolutely. So anyone who's already embarking on a healthy lifestyle, like you're choosing to do things differently than maybe the general populace, because you value your health so much. And I'm guessing it makes you feel very proud, I'm guessing you're proud of your workouts, you're proud of your eating habits, you're proud of the steps you're taking to live your life aligned with your health. And if we can see not drinking in the same light, that it's not something that we're doing that makes us the odd one out or the weirdo, we're actually the one who is aligning their life to their health and values. There's a study that came out that showed that over 52% of Americans actually wished that they drank less or not at all. And so we all have that desire or not, at least a lot of us do. And yet it's not getting acted upon. So when you go out and are the only one not drinking with your friends, or family or whoever, you have to know that secretly, at least half of the people there wish that they were doing what you were doing, you know, it's kind of like imagine if you were to go out with a friend and they ordered a fast food meal and you got the healthy salad. The person who got the fast food meal is a little like, oh, I probably should have done that, you know, I'm a little jealous or a little, you know, whatever about them. So like, you can actually go from being what's called the odd one out into the leader, you know, into the role model into the Inspire. And there's so many incredible role models out there who don't drink that you would never even question about him. For example, Tony Robbins doesn't drink. No one's gonna go around to Tony Robbins asking him why he's not drinking, or come on. Just join us, buddy. Like he would laugh that off so fast. And you can find examples of that of just these movers and shakers and people who really align their life, not only to their values, but also to their goals and dreams, where it's just like, why would we? Why is there room or time for alcohol, it makes absolutely no sense. And then you can use that same pride that you use to achieve your other goals or you know, healthy living standards. And kind of you don't have to proclaim it like a preacher with a pulpit or something. But you just kind of live with that energy. So instead of being kind of embarrassed or intimidated by this idea that you're not drinking out with public, you're like wearing it with pride, you know, and that curiosity. And you never know that ripple effect you could create in your social circles, because trust me, you're not the only one questioning it.

Philip Pape 48:22

You speak so much to me, and probably a lot of the listeners I love I love the idea of pride and excitement and owning it out there. Because the courage to be an outlier. It's something that concept we talk about a lot to the point where you realize that being an outlier in society, in almost anything probably means you're doing something right. Because that way, and that secretly, many people want to be in the same shoes. So we talk about support systems for health, right when people try to sabotage your goals, and oftentimes it's out of insecurity because they really want to be like you Why aren't you staying with the tribe staying with the crowd? So when when when it does come time to do this? What about the closest people to you, right, your friends, family, who are still drinking? And you just you have to have some conversation potentially? Or is it more of a matter of like you said, walking around with chest high pride, just making the decision, and not really having to explain yourself so much as just saying, like, here's the choice I'm making. What are your thoughts around the verbal verbalizing that

Karolina Rzadkowolska 49:19

well, obviously it depends on what you know, unique personal relationship you have with each person, but something so easy to say is I'm taking a break and I feel amazing. Who's gonna argue with that? Oh, here have a drink and start feeling shitty again. Great. It's like we don't have to make it this huge permanent thing at first and because we didn't we mean we might not know where it's gonna go. Right. You know, it's kind of hard to determine. You know, sometimes it's scary to say something more like Final like, Oh, I'm not drinking anymore. I quit because you don't know where it's going to turn out either. So explaining that you're taking a break and you're feeling amazing or you're taking a break to improve your health. I mean, those are all the truth and all very inspiring. And it can can also come have like, you know, take the pressure off other people, as you're getting into it, though, you know, like, I lead with the benefits. So for example, my closest relationship was with my husband. And we definitely shared drinking together, it was kind of our pastime, it was date night, it was what we did on the weekends, you know, and so to just one day be like, I'm never drinking again, would have probably been a little like, okay, so instead, obviously, I took a break, and I started sharing breadcrumbs with them, I was like, you know, what, oh, my gosh, I slept so well, without drinking the night before. Or oh, my God, I'm feeling so much happier. Or, like, I feel so much more motivated to go hiking with you. And maybe even showing him more love and more quality time. So that when it came down to like, whether or not I was gonna go back to alcohol, purity, totally got it. You know, he already saw how much better this was for me, and how much positive you know, examples I was sharing with him about how much better I feel. And ultimately, he wanted me to be happy, right. And in those places, where the person maybe is, like you said, a little bit more insecure, or just not reacting as positively. You know, first of all, we hold that mirror up to the other person. So it might be that there are a little insecure about their own drinking habits. But it also could be deeper, it could be like they might be they're scared that they're going to lose you, especially if that was such a like time, like a past time together. And for that, especially for like romantic relationships, I think it's really important to still devote the quality time and the bonding together, just find new ways of doing it. So for example, instead of date night at the brewery, my husband and I signed up for a half marathon and did Friday night runs together, like what a cool way to bond and elevate our relationship to the next level and it didn't like tear us apart are so much closer.

Philip Pape 51:39

So great. So great. I love it. And honestly, your advice can apply to anything that you are, you know, making a choice to improve your health with I imagine, you know, I'm I'm in strength training, and I feel amazing, you know, I'm taking a break, and I feel amazing. So I love that. And then alternative activities and alternative drinks and all these things are definitely the way to go. So to respect your time is there. I do like to ask this of all guests, is there any question you wish I'd asked? And what is your answer?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 52:05

Oh, sure. Well, if this was a lot for anyone and you want to like kind of process it and you know, mull it over and get some really good guidance, do check out my book euphoric, a euphoric ditch alcohol, again, a happier, more confident you because basically, almost everything we talked about is in that book, and you'll get a lot of tips and guidance and a weekly plan to even follow to take a break from alcohol. So just be sure to check that

Philip Pape 52:27

out. Check the book out, and I was gonna my final question is gonna be where can listeners learn more about you? Do you want them to go to the book or somewhere else?

Karolina Rzadkowolska 52:34

Yeah, so you can go to euphoric af.com. And that's my main website. We have our programs, we run group programs, we also have retreats around the world, which is really fun. And I also certify new alcohol free women who are passionate about sharing this with other people and helping other people change their lives. So if anyone's looking for a career change, or just something to motivate them to help other people too, that's an incredible option. And then you can find my book at you know, euphoric and Amazon or euphoric book.com And then I'm also pretty active on Instagram. So if you want to shoot me a question or you know, share anything with me, please feel free to and that you've worked on it. Yes.

Philip Pape 53:09

And great content on there for those watching or listening. Definitely put those links in the show notes and check them out. This was really enlightening super vibe I love when I have guests on where I personally learned a lot because I know the listeners gonna learn a lot and take action from this and improve their lives for the better. So Karolina, thank you so much for coming on the show.

Karolina Rzadkowolska 53:26

Thank you. It's such a pleasure.

Philip Pape 53:30

Philip Pape 8/1/23 Philip Pape 8/1/23

Ep 92: Physique Enhancement, Rapid Fat Loss, Plateaus, and Processed Foods with Bill Campbell, PhD

Today we are speaking with Dr. Bill Campbell, whose work I've followed for a few years, including his monthly research review Body by Science. We are tackling five very important topics related to improving your body composition to get the physique you want, including how consuming highly processed foods impacts your goals, the effectiveness of a rapid fat loss phase, why weight plateaus occur, and how to break them, physique-training vs. nutrition, and the use of diet breaks and refeeds to optimize your physique.

Bill Campbell is a Professor and Director of the Performance & Physique Enhancement Laboratory at the University of South Florida. He publishes a monthly research review (Body by Science) that summarizes the latest and best research focusing on fat loss and building muscle.

Bill has published over 200 papers, 3 textbooks, and 20 book chapters related to physique enhancement, and his articles have been cited over 7,000 times.

He also is the co-creator (with Dr. Layne Norton) of the "Physique Coaching Academy" - the most comprehensive and evidence-based course and mentorship program helping weight loss and physique coaches across the world.

__________

Click here to apply for coaching!
__________

Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:03] Bill's background in the field
[5:15] Balancing research and practice
[9:22] Highly processed foods and their impact on physique goals
[14:20] Eating whole foods and controlling for calories
[19:31] Rapid/aggressive fat loss
[24:46] What induces hyperphagia
[27:19] Aggressive dieting and muscle mass
[36:30] Use of diet breaks and refeeds
[43:58] Weight loss plateaus
[51:44] Training vs. nutrition for body composition goals
[53:22] The question Bill wanted Philip to ask him
[54:37] Where to learn more about Bill and his work
[56:21] Outro

Episode resources:

Bill’s Instagram: @billcampbellphd
His website: billcampbellphd.com

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https://witsandweights.com/free-call

Learn about 1-on-1 coaching ⬇️
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Transcript

Bill Campbell PhD 00:00

Two things that help protect muscle mass or a higher protein diet and resistance exercise. So if you're dieting, do those two things try to eat higher protein. And what that meant might mean different things for different people. The second thing is yet resistance train.

Philip Pape 00:15

Bill Campbell PhD 01:54

Yeah, thank you. That's quite an introduction.

Philip Pape 01:58

Well deserved. Yeah. And you know, what's interesting about you and your work is that, you know, you've dedicated your career to enhancing how we understand physique enhancement, which is a more niche area of you know, we talk about body composition, training, health fitness. Why is that specifically important to you, including the work you do at USF and what continues to motivate you to push those boundaries?

Bill Campbell PhD 02:21

Yeah, so when I use the word physique enhancement, that kind of implies a person that wants to take their physique to kind of a, an advanced, some might say, elite level. So knowing that I make no apologies, with the fact that I'm on the vanity side of our profession. So as an exercise scientist, I serve people that aren't necessarily doing their exercise and nutrition for health reasons. But for vanity reasons. And again, I don't make apologies to that, because nobody does this. And there are a lot of harms, health harms that can be done. So one of the things that my research does is we we emphasize how to help people optimize their physiques within a maintainable lifestyle. And that part of that statement that precludes some unhealthy practices that people have done in the past that fortunately we're getting away from my research does serve bodybuilders. In fact, bodybuilders are who I study, they're the experts of fat loss, I just dialed back what they do a notch or two to to broadcast to what people like myself, so I don't have a plan to step on stage. But I'd like to look like I could step on stage in the next few weeks or few months. And then also this, obviously, I do a lot of reading of the obese research as well, because there's a lot a lot to glean from that area. And my career actually started off studying people with obesity. And then over the last 510 years, I've gravitated towards this, the more people who are in shape, who are exercising, what do they want to do to go to the next level in a way that they can maintain? So that's what I do. That's what I'm motivated to do. And essentially, I would say, I designed research studies with my team that benefit me and my wife, like, what are do we want to improve our physiques? How do we want to improve our our function? You know, and do this where we can go out for ice cream with our kids and make sure that's part of the plan. So it's kind of a selfish endeavor. And when I look at it like that as well,

Philip Pape 04:34

I love it and you had me an ice cream man, because that's one of my most enjoyable vices, but you're in South Florida, and I told you I grew up in South Florida. So you know, it's just the thing you have. I think that's a really important distinction you made there with or not distinction, but you talked about folk focus on the entity and focus on looks, but making it maintainable. And a lot of people shy away from talking about that or kind of dance around it in terms of Talking about why it's so something so great for your health. You know, we've been talking about body composition and strength training, and emphasize a lot of these other things. And at the end of the day, everybody wants to look better as well. It's a it's probably a natural human thing built into our, our DNA. And like you said, you need to understand how to do that in a healthy way. So how do we balance those things? And specifically, how do we take all the information? So you do research? But man, you can you can find 1000s of articles online about one of these topics. And most people don't go past the abstract, let's be honest. How do you take that and actually apply to practice and walk the line between the two before we get into the topics?

Bill Campbell PhD 05:41

Yeah, and one thing that I also say is my research is focused on your physique. But there's a lot of health snuck in the back door, you can sign metaphor, right? Yeah, yeah, if you lose excess body fat, by default, you're healthier. If you're engaging in exercise, any exercise, if you're walking an extra 2000 steps per day, there are clear metabolic improvements in your health, that would that will be realized. Now again, my guess my marketing curtain is, hey, do this to build bigger muscles do this to lose more body fat. But behind all of that, I just choose not to not not to come at it from a health perspective, but it's there. And the older I get, the more I appreciate. That's true of anybody, the older you get, the more you start to move your interest from physique to health. Again, not that people ignore physique, but there is a greater appreciation of health the older you get. I don't think that answered your question. In terms of well,

Philip Pape 06:45

it was actually but I liked that, let's let's take that tangent just as a bit of pull the thread because I also work with a lot of older folks. And so older, meaning over 40, I'm over 40. And they're usually people who lift who liked to lift, but they're like, I gotta shed a little bit of extra body fat. Now, you know, it's just it's come time. And by the way, I'm doing it because I want to be healthy. And I'm worried about my blushing. But let's be honest, I also want to look at, there's always both, like I'd never seen just because just because we get older, and like you said you focus more on health than you did when you were young, when you might not have even cared a lick about it, because you got all these years ahead of you. Right, but you never lose that idea of hey, I still want to look great and feel great, because I'm a human. So

Bill Campbell PhD 07:21

yeah, and one thought that popped in when you said working with somebody that's older 40s or older, and we just insulted every 40s cluding me it's now I kind of lost my my train of thought. But even if you are you maintaining your body fat in your 40s, mid 40s. And on, you're actually winning, because the normal progression is you gain body fat in your mid 40s more in your 50s more in your 60s. So that's something that a lot of people don't appreciate, if you working just to maintain, puts you ahead if you want to lose, and this is maybe something I don't know what your history history has been with body composition, but you have to work quite a bit harder in your 40s than you did in your 20s to get the same body composition outcome. And a lot of our younger professionals have no clue they they they and again, that's not a those are who I teach, those are my students that they just haven't lived long enough. So

Philip Pape 08:32

it's easy for them, quote unquote, in relative terms, right? Yeah,

Bill Campbell PhD 08:36

absolutely. Yes, it is. Again, not in Yes, relative terms that thinks the key statement there. But it is an appreciation and then again, you factor in and do our view your clients have children. What's their work demands? I just I remember when I was younger, my career my days my life revolved around my training. Well, that that gets harder to do. Life start

Philip Pape 08:57

locations. Yeah. Yeah, it's true. Yeah, are you get injures injuries, or in my case, I had rotator cuff surgery about two weeks ago. So now I'm like, I can't lift it. I'm going to next week via the three arm the three limbs, man and try to get back into it. You know, but you're right. So why don't we Why don't we dive into some of the specific topics that I mentioned before then that cover this both from a nutrition and training perspective. And the first one is about highly processed foods. I mean, it's kind of out of the blue, but it is an important topic because a lot of people struggle with controlling their intake of highly palatable foods, whether it's fast food, junk, food, snacks, sweets, whatever you want to call them, even the ice cream we talked about before. That's my vulnerability. And one of the impacts of our food environment. It's just that people over consuming this stuff naturally, right? I mean, the studies show that people will over consume highly palatable foods, all things equal, when they're not tracking when they're not intending to do you know stay in a particular trajectory. So what are all the various ways of consuming these foods impact our physique goals energy Balanced me one of them, but I'm sure there are others.

Bill Campbell PhD 10:02

Yes, I start with research, that's epidemiological in nature, which reports consistently, the greater amount of highly Ultra processed foods you eat, the higher your BMI, Stated differently. The more processed foods you eat, the more body fat you have. So there's our base. And then we can kind of look at different research about mechanisms as to why so one thing I think you've kind of mentioned it, but if you're not active, if you're not on top of your caloric intake, those foods, and I think the best way to mention this is they're engineered to over consume. And it's, it's, it makes sense from a business standpoint, and my, I have a degree in marketing, I actually like marketing, I like reading about marketing. And that's my pleasure reading. So I appreciate the marketing side of things. And just even with just highly processed foods, it's just it's so nice. It's, it's, they're engineered that we're going to keep eating them because it does not it has very little effect on appetite. And just the time savings, like it's so easy to open up a package of something and consume it than it is to grill a chicken breast or to cook your rice or whatever you know, your own food prep is. So it's it's a very hard battle for a lot of people and a hard battle for myself at times, to not default to easier, more processed food choices. Let me just transition that to the base statement of the more you eat, the higher your BMI. There's been one study that was done, which didn't discuss or investigating mechanism. In fact, this is the only study that's ever actually shown that eating a highly processed food diet will increase body weight and body fat. And what they did was they had subjects for two weeks eat and only Ultra processed food diet. And then for another two weeks, the same subjects ate a non processed food diet. So they had them live in a in a research unit for 28 days, it might have been 30 days, under two different conditions. And essentially what happened was when they eat the ultra processed food, and by the way, the subjects were blinded to the study, like they didn't know why they were doing this, they didn't know that their food was prepared for them. So they didn't know it was a weight gain weight loss study. And the subjects while they were on the ultra food processed diet, they ate an additional about 500 calories per day leading to about a two pound weight gain over the two week period. And they actually had a little bit of weight loss when they were on the the non processed food diet. And the really intriguing thing was which at first, when I read it, it puzzled me. There were no differences in their subjective feelings of hunger in either of these two week stuck to week phases. And I'm like, but I thought that ultra processed foods made us more hungry. Like they don't say she ate you as much. And then the more I thought about it was obvious. They they were just as hungry. Or they were they got the same feelings of hunger. But they had to eat 500 more

Philip Pape 13:26

to consume or Yeah, to get it. Yeah, perfect. So it took me a few

Bill Campbell PhD 13:30

minutes. They're like, Oh, make sense. And one other thing. And this is a whole other conversation, the subjects over ate on carbs and fat. So most of the excess calories were from the carbs and the snacks, essentially. And that goes into another topic called protein leverage theory. So if you follow my work or some of my research, we do, we've published some studies about the importance of having like a higher protein diet, enhance your physique, and just to prevent excess weight gain.

Philip Pape 14:02

Yeah, and as I was mentioning, before, we recorded this that the episode coming out right before this that already came out as people are listening to this was all about protein. And I referenced some of the study you talked about, where women had just a slight increase in protein, and there was a massive difference in body fat reduction, and so on. So I think that's important. What about what about if you control for calories? So the calories are the same between two groups? What other effects would we see? For example, the thermic effect of feeding I understand is higher with whole foods. What would you know, would your expenditure change just all things equal? Or any other variables change because you're eating whole foods versus processed foods?

Bill Campbell PhD 14:41

Yeah, so I'm aware of one study where that's been shown. So you have 1000 calories of a of a whole food meal and you have 1000 calories of a ultra processed meal. You're you're going to expend more calories with the whole the non processed meal. Now that's probably I wouldn't call While a trivial because you do that meal after meal day after day that will likely have an effect over time. But there's yet not only do you not only when you eat a highly processed food diet, not only are you going to be hungrier, but your body actually less burns fewer calories to digest, absorb, transport and process those foods. So you're kind of losing on both ends of the spectrum, they're entered the energy in you're likely to consume more, and your energy expended or your energy out. Yeah, so we That's it again, there's there's, there's nothing that the science is not favorable to anything about highly Ultra processed foods if you're trying to optimize your physique or trying to manage weight gain. Now, that being said, again, my core tenant is optimize your physique within a maintainable lifestyle. Or at least for me, and how I'm raising my children, our lives aren't maintaining our lifestyle is eating ice cream sometimes. Yes. Now some people that they would say, That's horrible. How do you do that? My, my children have soda sometimes. So and I'm very sensitive daughter, so I'm very hypersensitive to eating disorders or disordered eating. So we don't really talk about you know, hey, we just know if you're gonna have a snack, you'll get a bowl. And when you finish the bowl, you're done. You got that enjoyment. So there's that aspect as well. Yes, the research isn't favorable. But if I know the research, and I'm gonna have chocolate chip cookies sometime in the next week,

Philip Pape 16:43

likewise, I'm totally with you there. And again, it's it's it's a matter of quantity. It's like, all the recent studies and observations about aspartame, you know, like make sure to have less than 15 cans of soda every single day. So you avoid the you know, deleterious effects of, of aspirin anyway. So that's what I was going to ask. And you basically answered that is like, how do we is there a place for those in our diet? And the answer is yes, if you want it to be maintainable, at least if you enjoy those foods, obviously, if you just enjoy eating 100% Whole Foods, go for it. What about when the foods are associated with emotional triggers? Binge eating things like that? Right? specific trigger foods? Do you get into those discussions in terms of helping people or clients with improving the relationship with food in that context?

Bill Campbell PhD 17:25

Yeah, so that's, um, outside of my research expertise, when, when it comes to that, like eating behaviors, behavioral psychology, I will just say practically, a lot of coaches that are in my network, they have kind of a base recommendation, which is the 8020 rule. So try to have 80% of your food choices be from Whole Foods, and 20% being the foods that might be a little bit more hyper palatable. Now, we also need to suggest here and again, I'm not talking about health, but there are also this eating a highly processed food diet, yes, it causes more hunger, yes, it causes less energy output. There are metabolic metabolic consequence, metabolic health consequences as well. So more insulin production, probably a greater risk for type two diabetes. So I'm not focused on the those those health effects of this. But that's a consideration as well, usually nutrient deficient. But again, I tend to focus on just the adipose tissue side of this, which that's that's a very health centric focus for just on eliminating or reducing excess adiposity in somebody.

Philip Pape 18:44

Yeah, speaking of nutrients and food science, you mentioned how fascinating it is with the marketing and the science. And I agree, do you remember that show? The guy from Mark summers, I think it was from Nickelodeon. Back in the day, he had this show about how factories make food, and you can find them watching. Like, like, like Twinkies or something. It's, it's incredible, right? Like the robotics behind it and how they engineer the ingredients come together. But then when you learn what those ingredients are you like, okay, now I understand. It's, you know, everything's ground down to a fine powder and then smashed together and there's like, no nutrition in it. But it tastes good. You know, for a lot of people. So yeah.

Bill Campbell PhD 19:22

I haven't seen that. But that I liked that kind of stuff.

Philip Pape 19:24

Oh, what was it? Was it called unsnap? On out an unwrapped, unwrapped is what it was, it was back in the 90s. I don't know. So okay, so then the next topic is I want to talk about aggressive fat loss. And so when we talk about whole unprocessed foods for hunger, we talked about controlling calories. One of the scenarios of course, with improving your body composition is fat loss and managing the symptoms that come along with that like hunger. So I couldn't imagine eating an all Twinkie diet during an aggressive phase. There are different reasons people want to lose fat, quote, unquote, quickly and we can define what quickly means right? We're not talking crash diets. Whether it's an event like a wedding, a vacation, maybe a physique competition, or guys like myself or lifters who I work with who just want to get in and out, you know, they're already in a somewhat lean range, but they just need to kind of cut that excess fat in 810 12 weeks and minimize muscle loss. Right? So how can how can Rapid Fat Loss be done effectively?

Bill Campbell PhD 20:24

It needs to be done. The research that I'm reading, in fact, we were about to submit my labs research on a rapid fat loss study. So the answer is based on my interpretation of the research in my own labs findings, it needs to be very short. So if you want to be aggressive, or if you're even going to take an extreme approach to fat loss, get in get out. If you want to protect lean mass, you want to protect your metabolism, the harm is greater. Apparently, the harm is greater in Lean people embracing crash dieting, quick, aggressive, rapid fat loss strategies that go on and on and on their does. Some of the most recent research that I've read was on individuals with obesity doesn't seem to be as detrimental to be very aggressive. And again, the caveat is in both situations, it needs to be short, when I say I'll define it 14 days or less of being in a very severe caloric deficit. And let's define that as approximately 40% or more of a caloric deficit. As soon as you start going longer than that, then I don't I don't, I my interpretation of the broad research, which there's not a lot of studies, you're there's only so much, there's only so much muscle that you're able to maintain in a short period of time. So as these aggressive diets gets extended, lean mass is lost. Metabolic Rate is suppressed. And then the big catch here is this this post diet phase or post diet observation called fat overshoot, where if you've taken an extreme approach to dieting for an extended period of time, your your hunger levels, it's a it's a term that describes it is called hyperphagia, which is basically an uncontrollable desire to eat. So it's binge eating when the diet is over. There's been the hypothesis that this feeling of hyperphagia uncontrollable desire to eat after your diet ended will persist until you have been able to gain back the lean tissue that you lost during your extreme diet. So one thing my lab is focused on is, let's design diets that protect muscle mass from the first day of dieting, so that we never get into this. So there's that there's that sustainable part of this. So protecting muscle mass needs to be a priority when in a fat loss diet. And that's true, whether it's a slow and methodical six month process, or a 10 day extreme diet process, what are the things we can do to protect muscle mass and prevent this post diet rebound, fat overshoot, and a feeling of just uncontrollable hunger?

Philip Pape 23:28

Okay, I want to break down at least two or three of those concepts, Bill. So the first one, you talked about the aggressiveness. In terms of the deficit, you said 40% or more just to do some quick math, let's say a male who burns 3000 calories a day, that would be a 1200 calorie deficit, which is around two and a half pounds a week. So assuming that person's say 180 to 200 pounds, that is more than the 1%. You often hear in the normal range of fat loss rate you hear quarter to 1% of your body weight per week is always the number thrown around. And this sounds like it's more like maybe 1.2 Or maybe 1.5%. Is that about right in terms of percentages?

Bill Campbell PhD 24:06

Yeah, that seems about Yeah, that seems about right. And again, I'd like to base it a little bit more on just the caloric deficit. Okay, around 40%. Yes, if that's going to be extended, I would anticipate losses of lean mass significant reductions in metabolic rate, which again, do not serve us well for long term sources.

Philip Pape 24:30

Okay, but if somebody wanted to lop off 10 pounds in two weeks, in their 200 pounds, and that seems feasible. That's interesting, right? Because I was just I just want to put boundaries on this because I've never gone there with anybody. I don't work with that kind of client. But I could definitely see that being a tool hyperphagia is that induced by the muscle loss itself and some sort of hormonal signals as a result of it or is it the fat loss and the shrinkage of your fat cells sending some signal causing that hunger? Do you know the mechanism there.

Bill Campbell PhD 25:01

Know, what you're asking is debated. So historically, it's been what they would call the lipo static theory, which was your fat, you're losing body fat, and that causes this hormonal environment. So loss of leptin increasing gralen. That's what causes this. And then we had a protein stat theory, which was popularized by a researcher called du loup. And he presented data from the Minnesota starvation trial, some very compelling data. Other research in in Army Cadets that were losing massive amounts of body weight and five week periods of time, with extended extreme caloric deficits, that research seems to point to it's not the fat loss, because the subjects that experience fat overshoot, whether they're gaining significantly more body fat than what they had before they started the diet. This, these, this hyperphagia was still occurring, even after they had gained all of their body fat back from the dieting, and it persisted until they gained back their lean tissue. So that's that's the again, I don't think I don't, this is not settled yet. But I look at the available evidence and think there's more. It sides more with the muscle. Yes. And then if you're going to ask, well, what's the mechanism with muscle and hunger? I don't have an i don't i don't know if anybody does, there might be people that have that have been investigating that. But it does seem like muscle is a little bit more important for keeping hunger under control post diet, compared to fat loss.

Philip Pape 26:46

Yeah, and even if we don't understand the mechanism, people listening, it's just I just want to hammer home the point always of how important it is to keep your lean mass, however you need to do it. Hey, this is Philip. And I hope you're enjoying this episode of Wits & Weights. If you're finding value in the content and want to stay up to date with all our latest episodes, be sure to hit the Follow button on your favorite podcast platform. By following you'll get notified whenever a new episode comes out. And you won't miss out on knowledge and strategies to level up your health and fitness. All right, let's get back to the episode. And so going back to the aggressive dieting, if someone just wanted to do what we might call a mini cut, I don't know what you would call this 14 Day highly aggressive diet. There's a term but somebody wanted to say do it over a four to eight week period just a little more typical. What do we need to do to maintain muscle mass? Is it more than 1%? Or again, you go by a calorie deficit?

Bill Campbell PhD 27:40

Well, in general, it's very simple. Two things that help protect muscle mass or a higher protein diet and resistance exercise. So if you're dieting, do those two things, try to eat higher protein. And what that meant might mean different things for different people. The second thing is yet resistance train. And then the other consideration, yes is what is the what's the caloric deficit? How much can we? How aggressive can we be, and I'll just share what we found in our study. So we had resistance trained males and females on a 37.5%, on average, 37 and a half percent caloric deficit for 14 days. Our initial analysis of our data was they lost a third of their body weight from from lean body mass, which is more than what you would ever want. But then we did what all researchers should be doing with these types of studies, we accounted for the losses of body water. So they lost considerable amounts of body water in this short period of time. And when you factor that in, they pretty much maintained all of their what I call dry, fat free mass or dry lean tissue. And that was that was also supported by their resting metabolic rate, there was a drop in the first two weeks, but that came back quickly in the following two weeks. So my art studies data is what I used to be if you listen to anything I would have said three years ago, it was avoid Rapid Fat Loss approaches all the time. There's no nuance and now my own data has made me revisit this. Find some other studies that also reported in this area and I was like, okay, there is more nuance to this. And my Newt, my nuance that my data and some other studies that I've read is You we can be aggressive. If it's a short term, aggressive approach. And some of my latest reading, just in the last two weeks, is in people with obesity. It may even be a wise decision to be aggressive initially. So that there is a a again, that this is where I'm not a behavioral psychologist, but there's this feeling of success and tangible results immediately. Whereas always going slow all the time. You don't get that So yes, I'm, if you haven't noticed, I'm literally in the midst of my diet, transition of my own thinking. And I'll have it resolved in another month or two, I just happen to eat some more studies so I can feel good.

Philip Pape 30:14

So me me answer when you have everybody will find. That's funny because yeah, I mean, I could see where all of these could apply somebody who's who's obese, I guess they're the one thing that comes to mind is if their expenditures kind of low, right? Somebody who's been sedentary has been training and don't know how much muscle mass and for whatever reason, lower expenditure, it could be, it could be very tough even on a short term, because now the calories are just ridiculously low, to where you might have to make some more extreme trade offs that are not sustainable. But again, it comes back to your premise, it needs to be somewhat maintainable in the long term. What about so if you're, if you're trying to lose like 20, or 30 pounds, but don't want it to take that long? How aggressive Can you go over two weeks, because you said minimum 40%. He said that's around the number.

Bill Campbell PhD 30:58

That's what we let's just say approximately, just to make it easy, that's what we investigated. And what we found was lean tissue was pretty much maintained with that aggression. In two weeks. Now, we also have to appreciate our subjects, we're doing the same volume of resistance training, so they didn't change their training at all. And they were getting a gram per pound, or 2.2 grams per kilogram of body weight of protein. That's a lot of protein. And, especially if you're a small person, it just happened to be a lot of our smaller females, that's almost all of their calories from protein, if they're going to get a gram per pound. And we had to work with them on that. It was not again, somebody like me, I had a lot more, a lot more wiggle room with my calories. Somebody like my wife, and it wasn't like 80% of our calories were coming from protein. But what we learned is a at least in that one study, that's what it took to maintain this dry fat free mass.

Philip Pape 32:08

Very interesting. Yeah, I hadn't looked at it in too much. And I'm glad I asked about it, I want to hear more when it comes out. Because I could, you know, I almost envision a scale or a table that that has guidelines, where based on the aggressiveness and how much you want to lose, like, here's where you could target because if you wait for some people that have more weight to lose, you're not going to want to go, you know, 80% deficit for two weeks. So of course, you're gonna have to stretch it out. But how, how long do you stretch it out? Versus how high do you go, you know, without losing the muscle mass?

Bill Campbell PhD 32:37

Yeah. And that's where that's the question, what if we had gone three weeks, so my, my guess is, if you start to go longer than two weeks, you start to lose the ability to maintain your your lean tissue. Now, let's say you do lose some lean tissue over a month, it's not gone forever, you're gonna get it back, it might take a week, it might take a month, six weeks. So it's not like you've damaged yourself for life, because you've lost some lean tissue. But at the same time, that's also the time that you were dieting plus the time after that it took to get it back. That might be two, three months of you not building any new lean tissue. So there is that consideration. And I just want to just throw out this idea of something that I that I'm again, as I'm literally, you're watching My life flashed before my eyes. And as I'm changing, I think I'm changing my mind on this. There's a reason why being very aggressive for a short period of time makes sense to me. And I'll start with asking the question, When are people most motivated to diet when they start or after they've been dieting for right at the beginning. So to me, it makes sense to leverage their motivation, and their, their ability early on, to beat hunger. Now, I always say, hunger always wins, you can beat hunger for breakfast you can be you can beat hunger for dinner, you can be under for a week, hunger will win. But can we design an aggressive approach where you have enough willpower to lose this excess body fat for the first week or two? And then you come out of it? And I'll give one other thought to this that just excites me. Let's say you put somebody on a moderate caloric deficit. So you tell me what would be a percentage decrease in calories that you would define as moderate

Philip Pape 34:34

half a percent of your body weight? So I don't do that. I don't think in terms of

Bill Campbell PhD 34:39

Well, let's let's let's use that. So they're going to lose half of percent of their body weight per week.

Philip Pape 34:45

So a pound a week for 200 pound person that's 500 calorie deficit a day. Yeah.

Bill Campbell PhD 34:52

Yeah, I'm gonna go back to the, to the caloric deficit because I think it tells us it gives a better analogy. So let's just say it took some About a 25% caloric deficit to get to this half a percent of body weight per week, which I think that's probably actually pretty close. So you start somebody on that. And they're like, Okay, well, now I'm dieting, I'm a little bit more irritable, and reducing, and I can't eat all these foods and I'm hungrier. Alright. That's that that would be a typical response. But what if you started somebody at the initial part, and you cut their calories by 40% for the first week? And now you put them in week two, you put them at 25%. Guess what their mindset is?

Philip Pape 35:35

Yeah. Let's think of the same thing, then a scaled version of this start aggressive and scale. Yeah. It's almost like you've gone up to maintenance with a refeed or something here. Yes,

Bill Campbell PhD 35:43

it's a completely different paradigm. You're like, I get all this extra food, but not really, you still, you're still bad. Now again, this is where I know there's awesome psychology behind this. I'm not a psychologist. I don't know what it is. But my logical brain says, this makes sense. And I am going to be meeting with my research team today. And we're going to be talking about future studies. And maybe we maybe this is something we look into over the next year or two.

Philip Pape 36:12

Yeah, I like that idea. And I've seen a few people do that. And I did it myself took two cuts ago, where I did it very aggressive at first and then scaled back intentionally planned it that way. And for me, it was knowing that my metabolic adaptation would be kicking in. Yeah, and I just wanted to get get as much gain loss at the beginning as I could, that this really good, really good stuff, though. So I'm going to actually switch some topics around and bring the refeed topic up to next because I think it's a natural next step of when we talk refeeds and diet breaks. You know, dieting for a long time can be psychologically taxing, just like we talked about. So if you do have that extra weight, you know, 3040 50, or even more pounds to lose, you know, they're not going to do that in two weeks. You could take this scaled approach, that's one option we talked about. But where do diet breaks and refeeds fit in? And when would you choose to use them? Because that's always the question of like, do I take a two week? Do I take a weekend refeed every week, because that's when it's aligned with my lifestyle? Do I take a longer diet break to kind of let things recover for a while psychologically and physically? Talk about that?

Bill Campbell PhD 37:16

Yeah, so I'll talk about my opinions. And then if we want to get into the research that I base my opinions on, we can. So let's all start with, I think both, again, starting where our conversation started optimizing your physique within a maintainable lifestyle. So two things. One, we know that people eat more food on the weekends, that there's research demonstrating that. So why not design a diet that fits that lifestyle that fits that data, so allow yourself to have more food on the weekends, where you're still losing body fat, and what that looks like is your diet a little harder Monday through Friday, so that you can then go back to maintenance on the weekends. And that fits your normal, what research says is a normal eating pattern. Now let's extend that diet breaks are typically defined as in weeks, like one week, two weeks or more refeeds are typically one day or two days, in this maintainable lifestyle paradigm that I am an advocate of, you have refeeds on the weekends, and you take diet breaks, when you're on vacation, when there's periods of your life or you're just you have diet fatigue, you take a week or two off, and you you're not in a perpetual caloric deficit. So I'm, I'm of the opinion, you incorporate both now let's let's I always love to take a devil's advocate approach the the counter to that is well, now you've just extended the torture of dieting, and your it's going to take you longer, but my counter to that is but this is a your lifestyle, like you're fitting this in, I don't want you to have to grind out four months of dieting for you to get to this low level of body fat. And now what chances are, you're gonna, you're gonna increase it anyway. Let's just make this a part of your lifestyle. And again, there's still discipline involved when you do a refeed it's back to maintenance calories. So you still have to have a regulatory or a governor on not overeating, and the wire breaks the the you're going back to. So there's still a level of control. But I think both and let me say this, the research overwhelmingly suggest that they're better than the answer's no, they're never worse than they other than if you're going to say it takes more time. But we do have data two studies, one from my lab and one from an Australian lab. Both studies in resistance training people reported significant improvements in desire to eat, let's just call it hunger. And my study was disinhibition which is the propensity to overeat when stressed or around hyper palatable foods to do different studies, both coming to the same conclusion that if you do if you implement diet breaks, you're less hungry. And if you're less hungry if these studies were elongated out to six months, 12 months, two years, again, hunger always wins. Anything you can do to help hunger likely gives you longer term success. So is doing a diet break then is does it give you some hack that's metabolic and metabolic advantage? No research. But it does in resistance training active fit people, it does seem to lower hunger levels? And do

Philip Pape 40:37

we know is that? Is that physiological hunger? or physical or psychological or a little both? Or doesn't matter?

Bill Campbell PhD 40:44

I don't I don't know. I will say that our data was based on a psychological questionnaire, which is called the eating inventory. It's like a 51. Question. And then the, the other group was, I think, just basic Likert scales, like How hungry are you? It was a desire to eat. And something else, but both studies can do the same thing. But yes, I'm, I know that data was was was collected, you know, a psychological later, how do you feel? But yeah, I don't have an answer as to anything past that.

Philip Pape 41:20

Yeah, no. And it's important that people listening understand this is it's primarily a lifestyle and psychology thing, even though hunger comes into it. And that does does affect your behavior. Physically, in terms of your food choices, for example, the only caveats I've ever seen is people who are very kind of self disciplined already and prefer a routine and kind of shifting things around tends to throw them off. Or people who are maybe very sensitive to over eating naturally. And like you said, it actually reduces it. But perhaps if you have this, like looking forward to the weekend mentality, for a small percentage of people, it may not be optimal. But I think for the most people, this is a great strategy. So yeah, good point.

Bill Campbell PhD 42:02

Maybe for a fitness professional working with a client, they can't turn it on and off. So they they go on a diet break or refeed on Saturday, and Sunday. And Monday and Tuesday. Turn it off, then obviously we know that that's not a good strategy for that client. Now, I will say that argument is not supported by the scientific research you won't find there has there is not a study published. And again, there's not been many studies on this topic. But there is no studies published that would suggest that people have that there's any issue with people being able to follow the diet, regular diet, repeating and having relapse problems, but what you just said, it's intuitive, and it's logical that some people will struggle with that. And then we know, don't do this, it's, it's you're doing more harm than good. And that's just being a good coach and being aware of your clients struggles.

Philip Pape 42:59

Yeah. And he talked about shifting the calories. That's the other thing I want to clarify for folks, at least the way I understand it with refeeds, you could either take a net slowdown approach to retie refeed, meaning you're going to have your normal deficit during the week and then up to maintenance. But now you've slowed your progress down or you're going to eat like you said diet harder during the week. Do we both do both of those kinds? refeeds, I guess or if one is just a slower rate of loss, I guess than the other. Right?

Bill Campbell PhD 43:26

You're saying is what? Like a diet, right? That's more than seven day like seven days?

Philip Pape 43:30

No, no, what I'm saying is, let's say you decide to have a certain deficit. And then as you're doing that deficit, you say on weekends, I'm gonna go up to maintenance, but you don't actually reduce Monday through Friday. It's just going to slow down your written costs, you know?

Bill Campbell PhD 43:43

Yeah. Well, I would say at that point, you're not dieting. Right. You're there the entire time. And then that I mean, or we could call it a diet break. And some of us are

Philip Pape 43:52

you still in a slight deficit? Because you have five versus the seven days? It depends on how much of a deficit you're in. But yeah. Okay, so now, the next thing is plateaus. And these are also quite common for folks when they start dieting. So maybe they go aggressively or not. And all of a sudden the deficit that they're in no longer works. We know, there's a lot of reasons for plateaus, right? And I'm a firm believer in tracking as much as you can. Some people don't, you know, like to track a ton of data. What's really going on with a weight loss plateau with most people from what you've seen, right? Is it the metabolic adaptation? Is it you know, body composition, because a lot of folks are new to lifting and they're getting into this? You know, what is it? Well,

Bill Campbell PhD 44:35

yeah, that's let's start there. So if you're somebody who is lifting weights, or even just aerobic ly active when you're dieting and you're taking creatine monohydrate, which you should be everybody should be taking that fit. That's, that's active should be taking creatine. You're doing everything you can to prevent the scale from moving and so appreciate that you're not going to see somebody like I'll just use my mom as an example, who doesn't when she goes on a diet, she doesn't know exercise where she's going to have more visual success of the scale moving because she's not maintaining muscle mass. She's not eating higher protein, which helps protect muscle mass, she's not taking creatine, which helps preserve muscle mass. So there's one consideration, let's give ourselves a little, a little grace, if we're doing everything we can to maintain muscle mass, which works against the scale for moving. The other the the real question you asked is, well, what's the cause of it, and it's, it's one of two things, it's either metabolic adaptation, so your body is failing to respond to the caloric deficit that it wants to did. So your body has adapted to what you were doing such that it, what you were doing is no longer having the same impact. And then the other side of this is a lack of adherence to what you used to be doing. So there's, there's really, I can pull research studies to support either the the latest one that I read was a mathematical modeling study. This was in one of my recent issues of body by science. These were researchers use mathematical modeling from real human subjects study. So they wasn't made up datas, they use the data that existed to model what the cause of a weight loss plateau is. So it's important to note that they predicted weight loss plateaus due to metabolic adaptation to occur at about two years. So if you diet for two years, your body will adapt to the point where it will stop losing body weight. But what we see in almost every single research study that's a year or longer is we see weight loss plateaus at about six months. They said they asked the question why their mathematical modeling suggested that it was not due to their metabolic, the subjects metabolic adaptation, or their metabolic rate slowing down, it was because they stopped following the diet, they were not adhering to the diet anymore. So I take both sides of the data. And I tried to come up with a system that helps coaches who work with weight loss clients. And the way that I present this to to coaches is this if your client is struggling, or is is having a self proclaimed weight loss plateau, I don't think we're doing our job if we take them at their word and just assume that they're following the plan. So I think we first have to say, are you really doing what you say you're doing? Is everything being tracked? Are you? Are you exercising more than what you're telling me or less than what you're telling me? So let's not have blind trust in our client about what they say they're doing? And they're our go? And let's say we've done those checks, and they are well, then the other explanation is, yes, there is some metabolic adaptation which is occurring. Which one is it? I mean, it depends on the client. But I think, historically, we've all been quick to say metabolic adaptation. And in fact, it that might not be the case. And clearly here, another consideration is what's the level of your client? Are they pretty elite, they have a high exercisers, well, then I'm going to save that they're probably more on the metabolic adaptation part. If you're working with a new client for a couple of months, who's new to fitness, and they're saying I can't lose weight anymore? Then I'm gonna, I'm gonna probably say maybe this is an adherence issue. And then finally, I'm going to say this, because this, everybody needs to hear this. If you're if you're defining a let me, let me phrase like this, you as a coach, need to define what a weight loss plateau is, with your client the day or the week that you start working with them. You do not want to

Philip Pape 49:02

be reactive, you help prepare them for it. Yes, it will happen, for sure.

Bill Campbell PhD 49:07

And when it does happen, how are we going to define it? Is it because you weighed less you weighed more today than you did yesterday, because some people won't use one day's weigh in. So again, you define what that is, I would, here's what I would say, which everybody is going to just forget it. One month, four weeks of dieting in a row, whether your body weight has not changed. That's what I would say. Now again, it's easy. I'm a researcher, and I don't have to put food on the table working with clients who are angry at me and my program. So it's easy for me to say a month. But still, I know, I was literally looking at some data in our lab in the last two days now. Weight loss isn't linear. People you think you're in a weight loss plateau, but if you just stayed with the same plan, a couple more days or another week or two under two weeks, you'll notice Whoa, I just lost weight in pounds. And I changed nothing. It's true. Yeah, it's true. Right? That's that goes against it goes against.

Philip Pape 50:10

I hear you I with my clients, we use like a three, three week moving average for that reason. And I'm like, don't don't look at the scale, I want you to gather the data points don't pay attention to the skin, let's look at the average. And there's one slight nuance I actually came to my mind when you mentioned not adhering to the diet for new folks at tracking, and that is they just may not be tracking accurately and being aware of it. So for example, the estimate food that they eat out, that's really hard, right? So they may be under estimating the calories, even though they're logging it, and therefore it looks like they're eating less than they are. That's the little nuance corner case.

Bill Campbell PhD 50:47

That's a great point. And let me just give you huge kudos if you have your clients agreeing to a three week rolling average, that's good, like you're earned, you've somehow you've communicated or have a relationship with your clients that is earned because that's, I know, that's I can't get my, my wife to.

Philip Pape 51:06

It's hard. But you have to have the data right next to the scaly data as it rolls on. You're like, look how the numbers are different. You know what I mean? Yeah, this one smooth, and this one goes up and down a lot. So we're gonna go with the smooth one, you know, but still, yeah,

Bill Campbell PhD 51:17

you're anybody can say look at the data, but not not everybody will, will want to do it. So anyway, I applaud you. That's awesome. Yeah,

Philip Pape 51:25

yeah. So we got it. Hey, man, I haven't learned this stuff for myself too, as I went along and figured out what works. All right. So I know, we only have a few minutes left, just a couple questions. The last topic was going to be on train versus nutrition. You know, the adage, abs are made in the kitchen, there's always a debate of is one more important than the other? You've already talked about the importance of protein and strength training and nutrition. So I think I know the answer. But what's the optimal balance between training and nutrition? If there is one?

Bill Campbell PhD 51:58

If well, I'll just go with the first thought that came into my head, if you're trying to change the shape of your body, then training is going to change your body. If you're trying to lose the most weight in the shortest amount of time, then diet will be your your best approach, which, obviously, I'm in this niche where we try to do both, we've tried to get fat down to lower than average levels, and we try to maximize muscle mass as close to our genetic potential as possible. So that's a very fun niche to be in. So yeah, I think it really depends on and there's also an argument here to be, you know, to have phases. So define your phase, if you want to lose fat, embrace that. We can lose a little bit of length, we don't want to, but we're going to be okay with losing some length issue, if that's our goal. And if you're in I want to build muscle, well, then don't sabotage that by dieting. Every you know, every other week, when you're when you say your goal is to build lean tissue. So there's a, I always say define your goal and then pursue that goal and don't sabotage it with with Nuance from from the other side.

Philip Pape 53:07

Yeah, there you go. There you go. It's also the reason I know I personally prefer the term fat loss to weight loss to make that distinction. The what what do you mean? Oh, let's let's break down the difference. You've got to hold on your tissue to lose the fat or else you're gonna lose both. Yeah, yeah. All right. So this is I like to ask this question of all guests below. And that is one question. Did you wish I had asked and what is your answer?

Bill Campbell PhD 53:30

Cool. All right. Give me a minute.

Bill Campbell PhD 53:36

Oh, I got it. What are you currently working on in your lab? So what we're currently working on and I have to give credit to my research coordinator, Corey Lafond THON, he's coordinating this entire study for us. We're comparing what's better for fat loss resistance training, or aerobic exercise or cardio. And we're doing that by we're compiling every study we can in the English language that meets our criteria that had an aerobic group within one study, and in the same study of resistance training group and then a concurrent group. So we're only looking at the studies that we're designed to best answer that question. So hopefully, by next year, we're going to have an answer if you're trying to lose body fat, is it better to do cardio only or resistance training only Of course, we know what happens if you combine them you get the best fat loss outcomes. So that's

Philip Pape 54:29

all right. Looking forward to that and I'll keep now keep subscribing the body by science encourage anyone listening to do the same if you want to learn same kind of insights. Where can listeners learn more about you go

Bill Campbell PhD 54:39

to places. My Instagram is Bill Campbell PhD. And thank you for being a subscriber to body by science. It is my I just I love it. This month's issues about the semaglutide the anti obesity drug it's a it's an really good primer and some thing that I haven't mentioned yet, but I'm going to be going live with all of my subscribers to talk about the threats to fitness professionals who work with weight loss clients. And we're also going to talk about opportunities that this drug can give us in this space. So, not mentioned that anywhere yet. But I plan to go live, probably three times to make sure that I can try to capture all of my subscribers that want to want to attend that. So I'm going to give a little bit of a lecture on that. And again, the real meat of that will be let's, let's not be fearful of this and be powerless. Let's use this to help us serve more people make more money as fitness professionals and I'm very, I'm very excited about that. And I have not done that before with my subscribers.

Philip Pape 55:50

Okay, so your IG and body by science? Oh,

Bill Campbell PhD 55:53

yeah. Instagram, Bill Campbell, PhD, and then my website, if you want to get body by science, it's Bill Campbell phd.com. And I'll just say you won't regret it. It is. I bring in experts, people like you to apply the research in their own coaching client relationships. So I review the study's. I have experts come in and say here's how I would apply this. And then again, I'm going to add on the some live sessions as well.

Philip Pape 56:20

Yeah, that's my favorite part of it actually, is after you wrap up the article, you have a couple of experts that provide their insights based on practice. So really good stuff bill. Great talking with you. It was it was a true joy. I'll put all the links in the show notes so listeners can find you and thanks again for coming on.

Bill Campbell PhD 56:36

Yeah, thank you for having me.

Philip Pape 56:40

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up there Wits & Weights, please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong.

Philip Pape 7/28/23 Philip Pape 7/28/23

Ep 91: Protein Misconceptions and Strategies for Fat Loss, Muscle Growth, and Optimal Health

Today for episode 91, titled “Protein Misconceptions and Strategies for Fat Loss, Muscle Growth, and Optimal Health,” we are discussing the wide-ranging benefits of protein, its pivotal role in enhancing satiety, preserving lean mass, boosting metabolism, supporting muscle recovery, and improving body composition, especially as you age. We’ll uncover surprising facts about protein about the ‘Anabolic Window,’ its role in sleep-induced muscle growth, how much protein you can actually use, and how protein needs change with age.

My goal is to share the latest evidence-based information about protein and dispel some of the misconceptions hanging around for a while so you have more clarity regarding this essential macronutrient.

I’ll leave you with specific strategies to meet your protein needs, optimal protein distribution throughout the day, the use of supplements, and how to apply these strategies for a flexible approach during any fat loss or muscle-building phase.
__________
Book a FREE 30-minute call with Philip here.
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Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:13] The effects of a slight increase in protein on body composition
[5:33] Wide-ranging benefits of protein
[10:21] The anabolic window
[12:03] Consuming protein before bed for sleep-induced muscle growth
[13:20] How much protein you can actually use
[16:35] Tony shares what he likes about Philip and the Wits & Weights community
[17:20] Food quality and satiety
[19:05] Strategies to meet your protein needs
[23:03] Optimal protein distribution throughout the day
[24:48] Protein sources and the use of supplements
[26:30] Fad diets that suggest very high or low protein
[28:15] Flexible approach during any fat loss or muscle-building phase
[32:51] Outro

Episode resources:

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Transcript

Philip Pape 00:00

We become less efficient at absorbing and using protein, right what's called muscle protein synthesis. The effectiveness of it declines with age. And so you actually need more protein with age, not less. So, the older you get, the more protein you need, the more protein you should have. Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host, Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry, so you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits & Weights community Welcome to another solo episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. I hope you enjoyed our last episode number 90, which was a q&a where I answered 11 questions related to calorie tracking daily weigh ins, building muscle over 40 and EA supplementation among many other nutrition related topics. Today for Episode 91, titled protein misconceptions and strategies for fat loss, muscle growth and optimal health. We are discussing the wide ranging benefits of protein. Its pivotal role in enhancing satiety, preserving lean mass, boosting metabolism, supporting muscle recovery and improving body composition. Especially as you age, we'll uncover surprising facts about the so called anabolic window. Proteins role in sleep induced muscle growth, pre bed protein, how much protein you can actually use, and how protein needs change with age. My goal in this episode is to share the latest evidence based information we have about protein, and dispel some of the misconceptions that have been hanging around for a while so you have more clarity when it comes to this essential macronutrient. I'll then wrap up with specific strategies to meet your protein needs, optimal protein distribution throughout the day, the use of supplements and how to apply these strategies for a flexible approach during any fat loss or muscle building phase. Let's get into today's topic. First, I want to start off by highlighting two recent studies. And I looked at these in the Dr. Bill Campbell's research review. And by the way, he is going to be on our next episode, so make sure to follow and check that out. One of the studies is from 2021, ones from 2022. And they highlight how powerful just a slight increase in protein can be for body composition. Independent of calories of training of any other factor means really somewhat surprising when you look at the results. The first study, the more recent one from 2022 is called effects of whey protein or its hydrolysate supplements, combined with an energy restricted diet on weight loss and older women. So what they wanted to do is evaluate the effects of whey protein or other way supplements combined with a diet in these older women who have who are overweight or add an obese weight. And it was a randomized controlled trial with three groups, the control group was on an energy restricted diet. And then the other two groups had two types of protein, the whey protein, 20 grams of whey protein, or 20 grams of whey protein hydrolysate for eight weeks. And the results were that both of the supplemented groups with the extra 20 grams of protein had higher reductions in body weight, BMI and body fat, then the control group, which is crazy, because they actually had slightly more calories to think about it because all the change was adding 20 grams of protein. And then the the whey protein hydrolysate group had a slightly larger increase in lean body mass, and a few other factors, I think resting energy expenditure and some metabolism factors. So the conclusion here is that whey protein or similar combined with a calorie deficit, a diet can benefit anybody in this in this case, it was older women, but really anybody during weight loss. And so it's very powerful because these women were not training, they didn't change anything else, and they actually lost more body fat, even with slightly more calories. Crazy. Okay. Now Similar results were previously found in a study from 2021. And the title of that study is the effect of 12 weeks of you energetic high protein diet in regulating appetite and body composition of women with normal weight obesity. And in this case, the is was also a randomized control trial. This had two groups, a high protein diet where 30% of calories came from protein, and a control diet was half of that 15% of calories from protein for 12 weeks, and both provided the same amount of energy that participants normally ate The results were that the high protein diet led to greater reductions in body fat percentage fat mass and visceral fat than the control diet. It also not surprisingly, increased satiety, reduced hunger, and the desire to eat compared with the crowd control diet. So the conclusion there is a high protein diet is effective for improving body composition again, and appetite regulation. Even in women with normal weight, obesity is the term they use. So what I want to do is jump into talking about all the other benefits of protein just too, this is going to be kind of an epic episode that covers everything protein related. So the first benefit is something we just mentioned. And that is related to satiety. And I'm starting off with this one, because I think we focus a lot on muscle mass, but it's very important understand that protein helps you feel full, which can then reduce your caloric intake and support your fat loss or weight loss efforts. Even if you're not tracking just having more protein, as we just discovered with those two studies. Part of that is because protein takes longer to digest as a higher thermic effect of feeding than carbohydrates or fat. And that just helps you feel fuller for longer, especially if you're getting it from Whole Foods, slower digesting foods, and so on. So that's one important benefit. The next and better benefit is that it preserves lean mass, we know that Protein is essential for muscle recovery, or muscle growth, but it also preserves lean mass during calorie restriction, which then what does that do? Well, it promotes greater loss of fat. This is so so important. In my recent episode about body fat overshooting, I talked about this, that when you are not strength training, and you don't have enough protein, you're going to lose some muscle in the process. But we've actually seen that even if you're not training, having a lot of protein is going to blend that effect as well. So that's how important it is, your body's going to break down muscle tissue for energy if you don't consume enough protein period, independent of strength training. And then of course, training is another variable. Another benefit of protein is that it could actually slightly increase your energy expenditure, your metabolic rate allow you to burn a few more calories. And that's because of the higher thermic effect of feeding. Now, maybe this has been overblown, a little bit, it's not a huge amount. But if you look at the numbers, protein has a thermic effect of around 20 to 30%. In carbs and fat, it's around five to 15%. So in relative terms, it makes a difference. And also the more whole foods you eat versus processed foods, you're going to have a higher thermic effect. That's another really cool side effect of eating whole foods beyond the natural fact that you're getting, you know, higher satiety and fiber and nutrients and all those other things. All right, the next big one, which we all know and love is muscle recovery and growth. And I say recovery first, because it's important to know that we build our muscles while we're sleeping, right? We build them between workout sessions when we are recovering. And so after those, those training bouts, where your muscles have broken down, you need that protein to help repair them and rebuild them, and then make them stronger and larger, all part of the beautiful process of getting big and strong. Another benefit of protein is it, it can help in reducing abdominal fat I, I alluded to the fact that that second study or the older study showed a reduction in visceral fat, we you see this in all sorts of habits, like when you get more sleep, we noticed that fat tends not to accumulate as much around the abdomen where it's more dangerous that visceral fat. And evidence shows that high protein diets also may assist in reducing abdominal fat doesn't mean it's going to necessarily reduce fat by more than than other diets, although I think it actually does as well. But it also reduces where you store the fat in terms of your, you know, around the organs. And that kind of fat is linked to an increased risk of heart disease, stroke type two diabetes, all sorts of things.

Philip Pape 09:06

Protein is extremely important for physical performance and blunting the effect of age related muscle loss as we get older. So in addition to preserving lean master in a caloric deficit, it's also simply critical as we get older, we become less efficient at absorbing and using protein, right, what's called muscle protein synthesis, the effectiveness of it declines with age and so you actually need more protein with age, not less. So the older you get, the more protein you need, the more protein you should have. And then, of course strength. I mean, we talked about coupling protein with resistance training, the you know, repairing rebuilding of those muscles. I think I'm being redundant. So maybe because I just love that aspect of protein so much. So those are the benefits of protein. Now I want to talk about a few other things about protein that may or may not be surprising to you. So there's not going to be anything shocking here. Other than the fact that if you've accepted certain elements of bro science all these years and by the way, some bro science is spot on. And they knew things way before we did and we before the Science showed it, I'm referring to the bro science, it just continues to hold its grasp to this day and it's just not true. So the first one is the anabolic window. I think I talked about this with Alan Aragon when he was on the show, and I've talked about it with a few others. The anabolic window is the period of time after a workout when your body is most receptive to muscle growth. And it was once thought that you had to consume protein immediately after workout right or else you just lose that opportunity. Recent research shows that as long as you get protein throughout the day, actually, as long as you get enough protein for the day, the timing may not even be that critical. Just because of how long this window really is. I generally say you know, to play it safe, consume your proteins around workout, consume your protein around workouts, right, I like to say two hours before two hours after. But it's as long as you get your total protein for the day, generally, you're fine no matter what. And don't worry about the next time someone talks about the anabolic window. The other misconceive Another misconception is protein before bed. So yes, consuming protein before you go to sleep will stimulate muscle protein synthesis during sleep. But it's no more than any other time of the day. So just because you spread out your protein in one happens to be before this long stretch of sleep slash fasting. It isn't any more effective than having done that earlier in the day. Right. So the counter to that is if eating late causes you to have trouble sleeping or have trouble with digestion, or it just doesn't make sense for your calorie distribution or your lifestyle. You don't force it right. On the other hand, reserving some calories for a late night snack before bed. But early enough before bed, where it doesn't bother your sleep can be a great strategy, especially during fat loss to make sure you have room for some an extra extra burst of protein, right at the end of the day an extra like 20 grams that you might need. And also to take away some of the hunger you might be feeling. But But that has nothing to do with protein synthesis. So just wanted to mention that if you want to eat before bed, casein is always thrown out as a good option because it digests slower, but it really doesn't matter, you're going to stimulate protein synthesis regardless. Okay, the next thing is the idea that your body can only, quote unquote, absorb or use so much protein in a single meal. Now, it is true that if you try to eat a lot of protein at once, you're not going to get the maximum muscle protein synthesis synthesis spread throughout the day, just because you don't have enough moments at which you are consuming that protein. And that's more important than the amount at that one time. But the most important thing at all is total grams of protein for the day. And so whether you have a lot of protein at once or not, the excess protein is still going to be used for other bodily functions, it's still energy, it doesn't disappear. You don't pee it out, right? It supports your immune function hormones, but it repairs other tissues. So you've got to do what works for you. Now, if you're trying to consume 200 grams of protein, you probably don't want to have it all in one meal because men that that that would be tough on your stomach, I think for most people, and almost be hard to, like fit the food down. So there's logistical elements to this that we all have to consider. And don't worry, however, if you can only have two or three meals and you have to just eat more protein that that day in those meals, it's okay if you have 70 grams, 80 grams, but we do have a sweet spot of around 2530 35 grams of protein per meal snack. So if you're trying to quote unquote, optimize, definitely try to do that. Okay, so now protein quality, right? Not all proteins contain all nine essential amino acids in significant amounts of essential amino acids are the ones that the body can't produce, right, and you have to obtain food from food. animal proteins typically have all the essential amino acids, all nine. Many plant proteins are incomplete. But if you're eating a variety of plants, mixing and matching, and of course if you aren't omnivore anyway, you're fine. If you're vegan or vegetarian, your options are more limited, you have to get slightly more creative. But just be aware of protein quality. We don't want to be slamming protein shakes or protein bars all the time. It's not just about the amino acids, it's also about the amounts of those, the digestion, the availability, the the other elements of the nutrition and what we eat, things like that. Okay, I already mentioned before that the protein needs of older adults increases due to decreased protein efficiency and the increased risk of muscle loss, you just become less efficient. So we do have to consume more as we get older. And I wanted to just reiterate that in case people thought it was somehow the opposite that Oh, older people don't need as much protein. No, you need more. The other another myth related to one thing that I just mentioned earlier was the excess protein. You know, how does excess protein get used? Well, like any excess, like any excess energy, it's going to get converted into glucose or fat, which gets stored in the body. But it comes down to energy balance, it really does, it comes down to energy balance. So if you want to have 250 grams of protein, but have fewer fats, and carbs, and the calories are the same. From a weight perspective and the fat loss perspective, it's going to be similar. Now, if you if your protein plummets down to like 30, or 40, or 50 grams of protein, that's where we get into the territory, where you actually start to significantly lose the benefits of protein. And then it really isn't just about energy balance. It is but it isn't meaning having protein that is too low is going to lead to your a different difference in how your body uses and stores that energy such that you may be hungrier right. And you may actually your body mass changes in accordance with calories, but the composition of your body mass will be worse off meaning your body will sacrifice more muscle. And that is not a good that is not what we want, even though the weight on the scale is going to be the same. We don't want that.

16:35

My name is Tony Romo strength lifter in my 40s Thank you to Phil in his Wits, & Weights community for helping me learn more about nutrition and how to implement better ideas into my strength training. Phil has a very, very good understanding of macros, and chemical compounds and hormones and all that and he's continuously learning. That's what I like about Phil, he's got a great sense of humor. He's very relaxed, very easy to talk to. One of the greatest things about Phil, in my view is that he practices what he preaches. He also works out with barbells, he trains heavy, you noticed that he has made but he trains heavy. So if you talk with him about getting in better shape, eating better, he's probably going to give you some good advice. And I would strongly recommend you talk with him. And he'll help you out. Thanks.

Philip Pape 17:20

Let's see, we talked about the thermic effect of feeding. So I don't want to reiterate that. We also talked about satiety. And I think this is really important that not only satiety but also food quality. So when you're in fat loss, your protein should be pretty high relative to your overall calories, much more than when you're gaining. And this is a good thing because it leads to you selecting foods that are generally whole food sources. Because where do we get protein from primarily meat, seafood, eggs, dairy, and plant sources, they're very few processed foods that have a decent amount of protein. If you need a lot of protein. There's some write obviously, whey protein and supplements. I don't quite count those as processed because they're very limited. Limited processing and filtering from a whole food source. But you know, that's arguable. But just consider that. From a from a weight management perspective, even if you're not tracking protein can be very important. And then the last thing is, protein is is really amazing in terms of its impact on your overall health. Right besides muscle. It repairs other tissues, as we said before, but it also helps to create enzymes helps transport nutrients, right helps in the production of hormones, neurotransmitters, other important substances, so it's very important for oral health. Okay, so I kind of covered the bases, I think with protein benefits and some of the surprising things about protein. What do you do with this information? What do you do with this information? All right, so I'm going to try to just summarize the main points one by one to hit the basics, but also to optimize. So first, let's just talk about total protein needs. And I know I've talked about this in a lot of other shows, maybe you're new to the show, maybe you just want a refresher. So this episode is meant to be all inclusive. You want to determine your protein needs based on primarily your target body weight, but it's also based on your activity, your goals, things like that, we are going to assume you want to improve your body composition, which means you are strength training, and you either are trying to gain muscle or lose fat. So I'm gonna give you a nice wide range here of 0.7 to 1.2 grams of protein per pound of target bodyweight sets a very large range. I would say one is a good rule of thumb, one gram per pound, and that could apply both to gaining and losing phases. Generally you need even more protein while you're losing, which is interesting, because it's harder to get more protein while you're while you're losing or cutting, you know, while you're cutting weight. But it helps us to tidy as I mentioned before, and it also helps with muscle maintenance. So if you can get that up in that one 1.1 1.2 range, while you're cutting, I would strongly encourage it, if you're, if you're living on very tight calories, like down in the, you know, 1615 1200 calorie range, you're gonna have to give up some of that protein just to get enough fat and carbs. Right, we understand that. So when I say target bodyweight, I mean, where are you trying to get to, so your ideal body weight, so to speak. So if you're 250, you're trying to get to 200 200 your target, if you're 150, and you're trying to gain to 181 80 is your target. So that kind of scales it toward the direction you want to go. Now, if you're significantly overweight, if you're up in the 300 range or higher, I would, I would, again, use your target bodyweight, even if it's significantly away from your current weight. So like if you weighed 350. And you ultimately, you know, maybe a year and a half, two years from now, I want to be down at 200. Go with the 200 for the protein, it looks so keep you in the ballpark. So that's total protein. And that is honestly the most important thing. And if you stop right there, and just work to get to that by tracking your food, and starting to make adjustments just on your own, literally just playing with it and having fun and figuring out how to do this. And you get there. That is like 90% of the game. But then your question is, well, how do I do all that? Because that's where I struggle. I just asked this question recently in our Facebook group, you know, or I think it was on my personal feed. Like what, what's the biggest struggle with protein and most people said, it's like, getting the right sources of protein and consuming enough. So they know they need to consume enough but getting the sources is hard. So let's talk about that. We definitely want to consume efficient sources. So these will be quote unquote, high quality protein sources, usually ones that provide all all nine essential amino acids, right? That would be animal based foods like meat, poultry, fish, eggs, dairy, but also plant based foods when they're mixed. No, when they're combined together. Everything from soy, yes, I'm gonna throw it out there soy, believe it or not quinoa, buckwheat, hemp seeds, all the grains that are in there that are high in protein, legumes. And then of course, you can combine these to get the essential amino acids. If you are an omnivore just include a lot of these things on a regular basis. And you're good. All right. You can get creative, right, you can add beans or lentils, to soups to stews, you can add tofu or tempeh as a meat substitute in a stir fry, if you don't eat meat, all these little things, you can get creative. Okay. So that's that's the second thing is, you know what sources of food and it's basically anything that's high quality, because what you don't want to be doing is eating a bunch of peanut butter to get your protein, because that's mostly fat, right. And I'm actually going to cover a list of foods in a moment here. So stay tuned for that. The next thing is we want to start optimizing to the next level, it's distributing your protein evenly throughout the day. Okay, now, again, if you just strive to get total protein, and you're not there yet, focus on that and forget the rest, do your best and forget the rest, okay, and then work on the distribution of protein. So what we want to do there is distributed evenly throughout the day. And the idea here is to optimize muscle protein synthesis, present muscle prevent muscle breakdown, they go hand in hand, try to aim for at least 20 grams of protein per meal or snack with a minimum of three meals or snacks per day. For most people, this is going to look like four or five, or one or two of those snacks are going to be purely protein or a protein shake. So we're talking, you know, hard boiled eggs could work, but they have some fat, Greek yogurt and cottage cheese are two of my favorites. Nuts and seeds could work. But again, they have fat, jerky, you know, anything that has whey protein, or anything, it has a lot of protein in it, even protein bars occasionally, if you have to rely on those, okay, I'm not I'm not hard and fast on this. You can adjust your protein based on your training schedule, so that on your training days you consume the protein before and after your workout rather than or more of it before and after your workout rather than necessarily, quote unquote, evenly throughout the day. So your meal plan would look like you know a bunch of protein before and after. And that might be up to half your protein for the day. And then two or three more meals or snacks with protein. And if you have enough protein at like four of your meals and you have a fifth meal, well that fifth meal made doesn't have to have protein, right? You could add it could be a carb based meal or whatever, as long as you're trying to stick within your calories. Okay, so then when we talk about this, most people say well, I can't get all that protein from whole food sources. Now I would say that's, that's a that's a subjective thing, of course, but it's hard for a lot of people. Definitely hard for a lot of people, partly because of actually feeling too full from all the protein. And partly from the logistics of just having to make all this meat or dairy or whatever. Or maybe you just get tired of eating the same thing. So yes, it is okay to supplement your diet with whey protein. If you have trouble meeting your needs and weight, I would just go with way, just the purest way you can find, you can get pure whey protein or you can get them flavored from a company like first form, use a link in my show notes. They're super high quality, minimally processed. There's other companies like optimal nutrition, whatever works for you and that you're comfortable with, go for whey. Casein Protein could work as well just digest lower egg, protein, beef, protein. And then if you're vegan, there's like the vegan powder from first form is based on pea and rice, you can get various blends of vegan protein powders. The reason we all like whey is it is a fast digesting protein, it can increase your blood amino acid levels very quickly to stimulate muscle protein synthesis. And it has all the amino acids in a very pure, efficient way for the calories you consume. So I like I personally often have whey protein before and after my workout, in addition to my whole foods, just because I need like 180 to 200 grams of protein. So that gets me started for the day. But you can also add protein powder to your smoothies to your yogurt to your oatmeal, all sorts of creative recipes out there to add protein power powder to your diet. The next thing is I want you to avoid falling for any fad diets that suggest a very high or very low protein intake, and eliminates other important sources of nutrition. It just just just as a blanket rule of thumb is don't have don't follow a diet that has rules that cut stuff out. Okay? Even if you know protein, you want your protein to be high. Don't just seek out a high protein quote unquote diet that then starts to cut other things out. We want a flexible approach. We want to enjoy a variety of foods, we don't want to have strict rules and restrictions. There are so many protein sources available. You may not be aware of a lot of them. So this is your moment right now listening to his podcasts and take that action, like just go to Google or ask ask me ask somebody on a forum online. Like, you know, I like this. I

Philip Pape 27:18

don't like this, you know, I'm looking for quick, quick to go snack. But what would you recommend and you'll get so many responses. And don't feel like you have to consume specific things like if you don't eat meat or you don't eat eggs, or seafood or dairy. But I would encourage you to try if you've if you're just picky, and you didn't like them before, I would encourage you to try I would encourage you to change the way you prepare them to try them raw vs cooked to try different versions of things. Like when I hear people say I don't like fish. I'm like, well, which fish because Mahi Mahi, salmon, tuna and cod all tastes completely different. You know, Mahi Ma he tastes almost like chicken. Right? Tuna is well Tuna has its own unique tastes right? The white fish are pretty bland and kind of fishy. Salmon is a lot of people like salmon. It's got that because it's fattier. Right. So anyway, I'm going on and on about foods. But I think they're important because this is where a lot of people get stuck. Now when you're when you're in fat loss, you have to make some trade offs because of the limited calories. So this is where to get your protein you want to keep it as lean as possible for the protein sources themselves. Right. So you want to look for sources that are low primarily in fat, that's usually where the extra calories come from, such that the percentage calories from protein are as high as possible. So an example would be having top sirloin instead of ribeye or having 93% ground beef instead of 80% ground beef or having a white fish instead of salmon or having low or nonfat Greek yogurt or cottage cheese instead of the full fat variety. Having skim milk mozzarella instead of cheddar cheese, I can go on and on but you get the you get the idea. Now there are there are foods that are kind of in the middle that are really good nutritionally, and they also meet other needs that you have for your macros like your carbs. So for example, certain grains like quinoa, brown rice, or legumes like black beans are a decent amount of protein but they also have carbs and some have a little fat too. But you may need the carbs so you kind of have to balance it out. Whereas the you know, chicken breast of core chicken and turkey breasts fat free yogurt, shrimp, egg whites, whey protein are gonna be almost almost all protein. And on the other hand, I mentioned peanut butter, but really like when I ask somebody if you protein they say I like cheese I'm like cheese I don't even count as a protein. It's a fat with a little bit of protein. Same thing for like whole milk and full fat cottage cheese. They taste great but you are going to pay for the calories in terms of fat some avocado, almonds kind of fall in that category as well, like, you want to be sparing with those when you're in fat loss, but they're delicious and nice sources of fat. But they're not protein sources. Even bread, like whole wheat bread, if you are having a sandwich and you just want to have bread, and you're good with the carbs, as part of your macros, it has decent amount of protein, right? But it's not just a protein source. So those are kind of some examples. Some people ask me about like chickpeas and a mommy. I mean, any of those things from plants are generally in the middle, they have some protein, but they also come with some carbs. So you kind of have to get educated in that in that realm. Okay, I think I think that covers it. I think that's everything I wanted to cover about protein today. I thought it might take a whole hour, but I think it's less than that. So it's a lot of information. But I hope it helps you get closer to your goals and dialing in your nutrition, because protein is probably the most important to figure out in this whole the Tetris with the macros. And honestly, that's why I created this podcast so you can get that information so you can upgrade your education, and your ability to take that action right now with this information. Now, if you still have questions about how to apply any of these protein strategies to your individual situation, I would love to get to know you better, I would love to understand what drives you to improve your health to get stronger to improve your physique. And the best way to do that is getting on the phone with me, I have a link in my show notes to my calendar so you can schedule a free results breakthrough session with me. Now you should be able to find a few slots open over the next week or so. So reserve a spot as soon as you can. And we can hop on a zoom call, ask the questions about what's holding you back right now. Whether it's the education, motivation, something else, and I will give you a clear strategy on how to get from here to where you want to go. Again, just click the link in my show notes for the free call. I'll help you figure out how to dial in your protein if that's the challenge, or anything else to get results faster and easier if you've been spinning your wheels. Okay, our next episode 92 is an interview with Dr. Bill Campbell who I mentioned earlier from his research review. And we are going to be covering five very important topics related to improving your body composition to get the physique you want, including how consuming highly processed foods impacts your goals. Can a rapid fat loss phase be effective, so aggressive fat loss, why weight plateaus occur and how to break them, which is more important for your physique training or nutrition and the use of diet breaks and refeeds to optimize your physique. So go ahead and follow or subscribe to the podcast so you don't miss that episode. Subscribing also helps others find the show. As always, stay strong. And I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits & Weights podcast. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights, please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong

Philip Pape 7/25/23 Philip Pape 7/25/23

Ep 90: Q&A - Calorie Tracking, Protein Shakes, Weigh-Ins, Muscle Over 40, EAAs, and More

Today, for episode 90, we are doing a Q&A to answer 11 questions on everything from calorie tracking to how often you should weigh yourself to building muscle over 40 and lots more nutrition-related questions.

We hope you’ll find this episode informative and helpful. Remember that there’s no such thing as a silly question, so don’t be afraid to ask!

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Book a FREE 30-minute call with Philip here.
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Today you’ll learn all about:

[1:15] Do you need to track if you're working out and eating healthy regularly and your only goal is to be healthy and lean?
[7:04] How many protein shakes do you recommend a day if you aren’t that big of a meat eater?
[10:13] How often should you weigh yourself?
[12:20] Is there a specific time to weigh yourself?
[12:54] Do certain foods affect hormones?
[19:34] Should people be concerned about sodium intake when dieting?
[21:32] Carol is grateful to Philip for helping her be consistent with nutrition and understand the importance of taking rest days
[22:19] Do thyroids play a part in these types of processes?
[27:16] Thoughts on building muscle over 40?
[32:53] What’s your opinion on EAA
[34:50] What’s a good resting heart rate?
[37:14] What’s the best way to add electrolytes to your water if you don’t like flavored water?
[40:16] Outro

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Transcript

Philip Pape 00:00

I would say if you're a beginner, you can train three days a week, full body, go all out and see how you feel. And you should be able to recover just fine. Even if you're 40 or 50, or 60. Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host, Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger, optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition. We'll uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry. So you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits & Weights community Welcome to another solo episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. I hope you enjoyed our last episode 89 with Dr. Ryan Peebles where we talked about lower back pain, how to reverse it through movement, and how to recover from low back pain injuries, prevent them and improve your back health. Today for episode 90 We are doing a q&a, we're going to answer 11 questions on everything from calorie tracking to how often should you weigh yourself to building muscle over 40. And lots more nutrition related questions. So let's just get into that first question. I work out six days a week and eat healthy. But I've never tracked my calories or even know how much I weigh. Should I keep track of this if my goal is just to be healthy overall and be lean. So this is an interesting question. Because it's not just about health, it's also being lean. Now this person is working out six days a week. I don't know if that's too much too little. You know, oftentimes, I see people overdoing it with their workouts. And we oftentimes dial it back. Especially if you're a newer or intermediate lifter, we're looking at three or four days a week of lifting. And then the other day is for recovery, or some light work and definitely lots of walking. And this person is wondering if they should track to be healthy and lean. Now, although caloric balance and weight are components of health, they're not the only ones, right? We have all the other aspects of what we're trying to do here, including what you eat, to manage things like hunger and whatnot, your training routine, you know, are you lifting heavy, and what your ultimate goal is, right. But if you want to optimize your body composition, I think it's going to be important to track and weigh yourself regularly. And the reason is, they are objective measures, they are data points that will give you more information more quickly, to assess your progress to adjust your intake and optimize your results. Think of it as a simple feedback loop. If you don't have the data coming in, in terms of the feedback, you have no idea what to change going forward. Now, if you're not tracking calories, you still have some data coming in. But if you're not tracking your weight, that data is basically how you look in the mirror how you feel, and things like that. And that may be enough for you. But if you want to get lean, and you want to do it effectively and quickly. And what I always like to tell people is when you get lean, we're talking about a fat loss phase. These are no fun. They're not a walk in the park. And I'd rather you get them done as quickly and effectively as possible. Not a crash diet, but efficiently within the range that allows you to support and preserve your lean muscle. But as quickly as you can. If you track if you're not tracking your calories, you don't know how much energy you're consuming. You just don't you also don't know how much you're expending. Because you need to know how much you're eating plus how much your weight is changing over time to know how much you're expending. And this changes every day. And so how do you keep track of how much you need to eat to eat more or less next Monday, what about the following week more or less? Again, if you're just kind of going by the seat of your pants, and how you look, it's gonna take a long time to get that right. So you might under eat one week, you might overeat one week, all of these things do affect your health, they affect your performance, and they affect your body composition. It just think about performance. If you one week are under eating and you don't realize it, you may all of a sudden not be able to lift as much in the gym, that's going to affect your ability to build muscle or preserve muscle, right? So they're all intertwine, you may not get enough nutrients to sort your recovery, your hormones or immune system, it is could lead to fatigue to injury to illness, muscle loss, even some metabolic adaptation when you didn't mean to. If you're over eating, you may gain unwanted body fat, which is just going to slow down you're getting lean obviously. And of course, just gaining extra fat that you don't want is not great for things like chronic disease and inflammation and insulin resistance and all those which then makes it harder for you to achieve a lean physique. So by tracking your calories, you know that you're eating enough to fuel your performance and support your health. And you're not eating too much that you gain excess fat and then you can tweak you can adjust your calories. Okay, I need to I need to be in a certain deficit to lose fat or I need to be a certain surplus to gain muscle. Also, and here's I think the most important thing, tracking your calories especially if you've never done it will teach you so much About your eating habits, the caloric content of your food, the macro breakdown nutrients, right, the macronutrient breakdown, or the micronutrient breakdown, which all helps you feed back to make better food choices and improve your nutrition quality. That's the irony of this whole thing is, so many diets are about eating this not that are clean foods versus these foods, whole foods versus processed foods. But as soon as you start tracking, and you see what you eat, you start making those adjustments pretty quickly to serve your goals. And that actually leads to a sustainable approach to higher food quality. The other thing is weighing yourself if you don't weigh yourself regularly, you have no idea how your weight is changing over time, okay. And this also makes it difficult to evaluate progress and see if you're moving toward your goal. Pretty obvious, if you're trying to lose fat and you don't weigh yourself, you may not know that you're gaining weight, or that you're hitting a plateau. And by the time you do, you've wasted several weeks, if not months of time. And then you don't make the changes that you need to to your your diet, your training, and so on to break through the plateau. And then the opposite case for trying to gain muscle. So if you weigh yourself regularly, you can monitor the trend over time, okay, and I like to use macro factor as a food logging app and also as a weight logging app. And by taking both the food and the weight, you know how your body you know how much you're expending every day, you only calories you're burning every day, and then you know exactly what you need to eat. Okay, you can also correlate this with other things, photos, measurements, right? How you feel how you look, your biofeedback, and all of these give you the big picture. So I would weigh and track your calories, or I would track your calories and weigh yourself regularly. If you're trying to be lean and healthy. They give you valuable feedback. And they keep you accountable and motivated because they show you the results of your hard work, right? They're in cold, hard numbers. And again, they're not the only factors, right, you have stress, you have your hydration, you have things like your digestion, lifestyle, sleep, and so on. So that's my somewhat long answer that first question. Okay, get into the second question. How many protein shakes do you recommend a day, if you aren't that big of a meat eater, I have to supplement constantly. So this person isn't saying that they are vegan or vegetarian. But that would be kind of the extreme of this question. They're just saying they don't eat that much meat. So if we think about how much protein we need, the recommendation is generally, if you want to optimize, if you're worried about body composition, and building muscle is point eight to 1.2 grams per pound. So if you're 180 pounds, you need somewhere around 140 to 180, or more grams of protein. So even if we're on the lower of that around 140. And you have, let's say, three meals and one or two snacks, each of those meals is going to be around 40 grams of protein and the snacks are each going to be around 20 or 30. So I would say it's almost inevitable that at least one of those snacks needs to be a protein shake. So it's not only you're asking me, how many do you recommend a day, at least one if not two, it's perfectly fine. I mean, whey protein, pea and rice protein, they're just minimally processed derivatives of food. That's the argument I like to make in terms of supporting them, because I'd rather you have them rather than not get enough protein. And you can get very high quality ingredients that are minimally processed with very few additives. From good companies, for example, first form, which you can use the link in my show notes for first form, they have a vegan shake, it's I think it's called Vegan. It's pea and rice blend. And then of course, they have a bunch of whey shakes that are perfectly fine. They have a faster and slower digesting shakes.

Philip Pape 08:40

We always want to balance this with real food. So if you're not a big meat eater, first, I would say what kind of meat do you eat? And can you just scale that up and eat more of it or varieties of that and cook it in different ways? Second thing? Are you not a big meat eater, because you're kind of picky or out of habit? Like would you be willing to eat other forms of meat just to try them out, or mix them in with the meat that you like, or mix them into a chili or a casserole or something like that? If you're looking for the biggest bang for your buck, it's going to be seafood. So we have things like shrimp and white fish, which are basically pure protein. So maybe you don't need a lot of beef. But would you would you eat like shrimp cocktail, right? Just frozen shrimp, thaw them out, eat them as a snack, ton of protein, right? There's also dairy is a huge source of protein, cottage cheese, Greek yogurt, legumes, and then all the plant based sources of protein. So there's really you could get all your protein from food, but the less of the denser proteins you eat, and the more proteins you eat that have other things like carbs, which is the case of plant foods, the harder it's going to be to balance the calories and the protein and then you often need to supplement it with something like a whey whey casein or pea rice Blend If you're avoiding if you're like vegan and avoiding all animal products, so that'd be my recommendation. If you're going to have one or two shakes, you know, go All out and get all the grams of protein you need based on the math. So if you're shooting for 30, or 40 grams in a meal or snack, go ahead and have one and a half, two scoops of protein don't just have one scoop, go ahead and just scale it up to what you need. Okay, next question. How often should you weigh yourself? So earlier, I talked about how important it is to weigh yourself from a data gathering standpoint. Believe it or not, the evidence suggests that regular self weighing helps with weight maintenance and weight loss, and is not associated at all with any sort of disorders unless you had a propensity for that to begin with. And then it gets into that thorny territory that I'm not going to go down right now. But I will say all my clients weigh every day, I weigh every day, and plenty of other people do without any issues. And I think I've said this before, but when you weigh yourself every day, it becomes a fairly meaningless, tiny individual data point. And you start to learn that your body fluctuates significantly day to day, and that those fluctuations have nothing to do with fat, fat gain or fat loss. I was just checking in a client today. And he gained two pounds on the scale overnight. And we know that he had pasta late at night and some a lot of sodium in a sauce. And so that extra salt and those extra carbs definitely gained cause fluid retention overnight. And I said, Look, if you gained to gain two pounds of fat, you would have to consume an extra 7000 calories. Not going to happen, right. And in his case, he tracks his food and he pretty much his lock on the yo Rocksteady day to day anyway. So we know that didn't happen. So the day to day weigh ins allow you to see those fluctuations get comfortable with them, and start to be like yeah, I'm confident that that has nothing to do with my, my lean tissue, my body fat. So I'm going to click Keep collecting those. And then over a two to three week period, you start to see how that pattern shifts in one direction or another. And that's telling you how your body mass is actually changing. And again, we use macro factor because it has a trend wait based on those daily points. You don't have to weigh every day, you can do it every few days or a couple or once or twice a week. But the more the better and the more precise, which means faster adjustments, which means you get to your goal more quickly with less frustration along the way. Okay. At the end of the day, this is about consistency, and focusing on the trend. So related to this as another question, is there a specific time to weigh yourself? Very simply, yes, the most consistent way is in the morning. Preferably, if you can do it, okay for most people, at the same time each day, preferably in the morning, after you use the bathroom before you eat or drink. And just wear the same thing every day. Usually for men, it might be boxers, for women, it's whatever your undergarments, just the same thing every day. This also goes for body measurements. By the way, if you're gonna measure your waist, circumference and chest and hips and all those things, do them also around the same time you would weigh yourself. Okay, next question, do certain foods affect hormones? So I was thinking about how to answer this question. Because on one hand, I

Philip Pape 13:04

don't like to use these questions as an excuse to try to explain away why you're not gaining, gaining or losing weight while you're hitting a plateau. And you're and try to hack every little detail of your food and sort of get obsessive very much like a diet would be where you're like, well, these are good hormone foods. And these are bad hormone foods, right? We don't want to get it to that level. Because at the end of the day, the overall dietary pattern that serves your goals, high enough protein, sufficient fats and carbs for energy and recovery, the right amount of energy balance and calories for whether you need to gain or lose weight, and then a good blend of micronutrients for your health. It's really all you need. And the hormones should kind of work themselves out, so to speak. Having said that, I wanted to bring up a few specific foods that have been shown to be helpful for your hormones. And I'm doing this because I know these foods are the kinds of things people just should be eating more of. And you guessed it, for the most part, we are talking about vegetables, lean meats, and high fiber carbs. So cruciferous vegetables, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, brussel sprouts, evidence shows that they help your liver metabolize estrogen and balance your hormones. Now, these claims I'm making are associated with specific studies. I'm not going to link them all in the notes but I do have them in my in my personal notes. And again, I don't want you to kind of overweight these relationships say well, okay, you know, I, my doctor said I need to, you know, I have a problem in balancing my estrogen so I'm gonna eat more broccoli, and that's going to solve it. I'm not trying to make these types of connections. At the end of the day, my my message here is that eating mostly Whole Foods at 90% Whole Foods and a variety of them. And if you're picky trying to be adventurous and incorporate more foods is probably going to be our best bet overall for meeting new goals and helping you with things like your your fat, fat loss, your body composition, your health. So cruciferous vegetables, salmon and albacore tuna, we're talking high omega three fatty acids. We know omega three fatty acids are a good thing to have. It's why some people recommend supplementing with fish oil. Not all some of the jury's still out on this today. But we know that there's some linkage with reduced inflammation and improved insulin sensitivity from having these extra omega three fatty acids. Again, some of the research is overblown. The ratio of omega three to six researchers has maybe been overblown as well. But salmon and tuna are very high in protein is protein too, so you might as well enjoy them. Keep in mind salmon is a fattier fish. Tuna is a little bit leaner and other white fish are leaner as well. So depends on what you're trying to consume here. Avocados, wonderful fat, they also have fiber, they also have magnesium, and potassium. All of these things are great for your hormones, enjoy avocados, fruits and vegetables, you can't really have enough of them. We're talking antioxidants, vitamins, minerals, fiber, all of these things are, are just well known to be good for your blood sugar, your insulin, your hormones, like cortisol and other hormones. And then anything with fibers is going to be helpful. When you talk about carbohydrates, oats, quinoa, beans, lentils, right they slow down absorption a bit, which somebody will argue then when you have them as part of your meals overall, you lower the what am I trying to say the the index, the glycemic index, or at least you can help regulate blood sugar a little bit better. Again, I would say just if you're active, if your strength training and you're eating unhealthy dietary pattern, it's going to kind of work itself out. But these are little extra things to be aware of. Now, as far as foods that disrupt your hormonal balance, oh man, you can find probably one influence or per food out there. To bring this up, I'm just going to mention three things, soy pesticides and alcohol, that's I don't want to go down any other rabbit holes. Soy is a is a dietary source of phyto estrogens, which is a plant compound that can mimic estrogen in your body. And I used to think that they were just totally off limits because of a man and I don't want to all of a sudden start producing a whole bunch of estrogen. But it really does come down to dosage like many things, overdoing it on the dose dosing can lead to toxic levels of anything, right, anything. And so I think generally the evidence is that a moderate consumption of soy is perfectly fine. We see it from population studies, observational studies, cultures that consume a lot of soy, you know, some of the where you might want to watch out as the soy, soybean oil just because there's so much of it and everything. But even that we talked about seed oils and whatnot, again, may not be terrible. And if the if it's a source of replacing saturated fats with poly or unsaturated fats that could be beneficial, really depends on you and individual factors. So I just wanted to throw that out there almost to say that, like, don't freak out about soy. But you may have heard it as a potential hormone disruptor. So look into the research and make your own decision on that. Pesticides, we know that those have been an issue worldwide for many decades, and there have been all sorts of regulations such as Roundup, when it comes to oats. My family, for example, buys organic oats because there was a study that that analyzed many, many oat brands and found that the vast majority of them had rather high levels of Roundup, just visibly upper, you know, observable right there on the oat and I'm like, Hey, I don't want to take a chance, I'm just gonna buy the organic. But again, you have to make your choices on these individual things and how much of them you eat. When it talks organic versus not, you have your budget to consider you have you know, the food environment, how much of the stuff you're eating and how you're preparing it. The other thing is alcohol there there is research that certain amount of alcohol can affect your hormones, the production of metabolism, the signaling of your hormones, we know that there's nothing net positive about alcohol, from a nutritional standpoint. So so the less is generally better. But we also know it's part of life, and we enjoy it. It's part of social gatherings. I drink alcohol a few times a week, generally, I enjoy it. And there you go. That's life. So these are general guidelines. Everyone reacts differently to different foods, your hormones are influenced by so many other things, stress, sleep, exercise, genetics, whatever. And, you know, I would recommend go get tested if that's what you need. Talk to your medical professional. If you have special circumstances. This is not medical advice. And I hope that answers your question. Okay, the next question. Should people be concerned about sodium intake when dieting? So if you go back, I don't have the episode number with me but I interviewed. I interviewed Dustin Lambert. He's another coach. Great guy, and he's in our group as well. And we talked about this a little bit and he surprised me a bit because, you know, his philosophy is that there's been a counter back Last against the sodium, the high sodium crowd, meaning the recommendations generally is to keep sodium less than a certain amount per day. And I think it's 2300 milligrams per the general guidelines, because it's associated with high blood pressure in people who are sensitive to sodium especially. And there was this backlash like, Well, no, that's just because you know, people will have poor diets and processed foods, they get way too much sodium. But if you're on keto, or low carb or whole food diet, you don't get enough sodium. So you need to start assaulting everything. And his argument was, well, that we're pushing too far the other direction that you can still over consume sodium. And so I would agree that there is there has to be a balance. And at the end of the day, I would suggest tracking your sodium using your food logging app, seeing what the consumption level is, compare it to the recommendations, if it's significantly more, okay, then I still wouldn't say you're necessarily over salting. But think about your how you're eating, and whether there's something that contributes a lot to that. Sodium, that could be a simple change, and also cross reference against your blood pressure, if that's what you're doing it for. Like if your blood pressure is perfectly fine. And you've been consuming, I don't know, 4000 milligrams of salt a day for years and years and years. Is there an issue? I don't know if we're talking other things besides blood pressure, maybe. But from a blood pressure perspective, maybe you're just not as sensitive to sodium. So sodium is an essential mineral, it is a great, you know, electrolyte to prevent dehydration, but most people get enough sodium. And the question is, are you getting too much? Do the things that I suggested track it, compare it cross reference against your blood pressure.

21:34

Before my coaching session with Philip, I was really struggling with staying consistent with my nutrition, Phillip really showed me the importance of being consistent day to day, he also helped me see that it's not a bad thing to take a rest day, he really helps me get in that more positive headspace Have a rest day being something really good for me. I've been doing this for a month now. And I'm finally starting to see some progress and my numbers. And I'm really excited about that. And I just appreciate so much the help that Philip has given me. He's always willing to answer questions to offer resources that are totally free and very, very helpful. So I just want to say how much I appreciate that. Thanks, Phillip.

Philip Pape 22:19

Question, do thyroids play a part in these types of processes? And by these types? I think the person asking the question is talking about metabolic processes metabolism, especially body weight, body mass, which most people are concerned about. And of course, thyroid disorders can interfere with weight management because it is so crucial to your metabolism. And I don't want to get too much into the disorder side of things I want to talk about just the general generally what I see with most people talk let's think about what the hormone does. Its I like to call it the metabolism hormone or not just me Others call it that it's you know, how you consume your how you take the food that you consume, and transform it into energy. The thyroid hormones affect how your cells use energy, how your body burns fat, how it regulates blood sugar, how you maintain your body temperature, many, many functions, okay, all these hormones are pretty complex. And before we even get into today, pay play a part in metabolism, everything else, just metabolic adaptation. When you are dieting, when you're in a deficit, and you don't have enough calories coming in for your hormones, in general, every all of these hormones are affected in some way. And so yes, it's going to affect your metabolism down, you know, negatively in a downward direction for everybody, no matter whether you have a disorder or not. Okay, and there's not much you can do about it other than eat more food again. And the only way you can eat more food is either reduce your deficit or move a little bit more right have a higher energy flux walk more, not necessarily lots of cardio, right? high intensity cardio, but just walking more, and then that usually raises your expenditure. So you can eat more, and then that helps a little bit with the metabolic adaptation. So, what is what is the thyroid hormone come from? It comes from your thyroid gland, which is the front of your neck produces thyroxin T four and try, try idle, idle firing, I think is how you say T three, T four is mostly inactive. T three is the active form that affects your metabolism. And your your thyroid gland converts T four into T three with the help of an enzyme called D, D IODE. And A's. So here's So again, I'm not a doctor, folks, I'm not a hormone specialist, per se, I have studied these quite a bit and help clients with when they have sort of what appears to be hormone dysregulation. In some cases it actually is an end up being on replacement therapy, because I do deal with primarily clients who are I'll say in their mid 30s all the way up to their 60s and a lot of female clients as well. And you do see this through Peri menopause and post menopause. So I'm not saying you don't need supplementation that's between you and your medical professional. But the anyway, so that's that's why I know a little bit about these things. There's this sort of feedback loop system involving your hypothalamus in your brain, your pituitary gland, and multiple other hormones. So there's this cascade all of these hormones interact with each other in different ways. Now, the hypothalamus is the brain part of your brain that controls things like thyroid releasing hormone, it stimulates your pituitary gland to produce thyroid stimulating hormone, TSH, and then that is where we get the T four and T three, and on and on. Okay, so sometimes the thyroid gland can produce too much or too little. And these cause problems as well. So we talked about hyperthyroidism, when there's too much thyroid hormone, and then that speeds up your metabolism and causes like causes causes weight loss causes anxiety, tremors, palpitations and other things. Then there's hypothyroidism when your plant produces too little. And that's what a lot of people are concerned about, because it slows down your metabolism can cause weight gain, fatigue, depression, and so on. And I've definitely seen this happen where a client will just have these almost inexplicable weight loss plateaus no matter how much of a deficit we take them into, because that deficit is further exacerbating this hypothyroidism, which further slows down the metabolism. It's like you can't keep up with it. And then when they start taking some T three, synthetic T three or whatever it all of a sudden goes away. Again, you have to talk with your medical professional about this situation applies to you. I'm just explaining how important thyroid is to your metabolism. Beyond those, there are definitely other things like nodules and cancer and other things I'm not going to get into. So if you suspect you have a problem, consult with a doctor. But at the end of the day, if you don't have the basics down, like proper nutrition, strength training, let me tell you, strength training, if you're not training, and you start lifting, you might be surprised what an amazing effect this has on all of your hormones to the point where a lot of these will express themselves as hype, both thyroidism or actually just related to fueling yourself for nutrition and working on your fitness and body composition. Okay. All right, next one. These are a lot of questions. In this episode, I realize thoughts on building muscle over 40. Okay, I could do an entire episode multiple episodes about this. It comes up all the time people say well, I'm over 40. What do I do? In my opinion, building muscle over 40 is not much different from building muscle at any other age. Now I am 42. And I started properly lifting when I was almost 40. So it's not like I've been lifting since I was 20. And just saying yeah, everybody gets the same. What's the same of the principles? Progressive overload, right? Adequate volume for you, because everybody has very different volume response, men, women, different age, different size, very different. The intensity and frequency, the need for recovery, proper nutrition, and of course, individualization. So those are the principles. And if I have a 45 year old versus a 25 year old, the same principles apply. But because they are principles, the actual prescription changes for you. So the main differences I see are that older lifters have reduced recovery capacity, it's just a fact. It's just the fact it's just harder to recover. An increased injury risk, right? Hormonal changes that come with the older age, especially in women, it's, you know, exacerbated for women, slower muscle growth, or muscle protein synthesis as we get older. And keep in mind, some of this has to do with the fact that we've lost muscle mass through age, especially if we've not been training, right. So it's kind of like a multivariable situation here. So what are some of the modifications for people over 41 modification is you may have to have a slightly lower frequency for certain muscle groups or certain movements. You may, right, you may not. In fact, I've been in a situation where if I increase the frequency but have shorter sessions, I'm actually able to recover better, and get more stimulus that way. So you never know, this is where I'm saying like, just because you're over 40 doesn't mean it's the end of the game. And if anything, it's never too late to start. If you're 65 and you haven't started training, it's not too late to start. If you're at it's not too late to start, it's only going to be beneficial for you. Another modification would be volume, right? And by volume, I mean sets per week. So trying to play with the number of sets, right? If four sets is just hammering you into the ground, but three sets allows you to recover sleep feel great the next workout, then that might be your sweet spot. Okay, you just don't want to over train and get over fatigued. But don't use that as an excuse not to train hard enough. I would say if you're a beginner, you can train three days a week, full body go all out and see how you feel and you should be able to recover just fine, even if you're 40 or 50 or 60

Philip Pape 30:01

The other thing is, you know, at that at this age, life tends to get in the way, so not in the way. But I mean, you have this ideal plan to like live four days a week, and you're gonna go nonstop, you're gonna build X amount of pounds of muscle or nine months, well, what's gonna happen, you might get injured, you know, you might have family things that come up stuff at work, you know, death in the family, you might have to go on a trip, business trip, you might have your vacations, on and on and on. So many things get in the way. And these are essentially forced D loads to the point where you may not even need to ever plan in a D load, you just make them line up with these parts of your life. So acknowledging that and coming up with and following a program that gives you that flexibility is a good approach, because then you won't feel frustrated that you all of a sudden took a bunch of steps back, right? Yeah, it took a week off. Okay, now get back on and continue. Similar to this is using programming that allows for autoregulation. Now this is a more advanced concept that I really wouldn't worry about until you get about six to nine months in, meaning your first six to nine months, I would focus on just increasing the weight on your bar, your dumbbells or whatever, just getting stronger, and using the same sets and reps and just getting stronger. But then as you get more advanced, you get a feel for what pushing hard is and you can use rep based programming, or maximum based or percentage based programming, where what you squatted last, you know, two weeks ago, it may be a different maximum this week, but still feel just as hard. And it allows for you to kind of undulate with your personal recovery ability and your volume. The other thing is, you know, we talk about warmup, and mobility and stuff like that, I don't think you need anything fancy. But just make sure that if it's cold, you'd take a few minutes to warm up, put some basic movement, maybe on a bike, right? And that you're always focused on your technique. Anybody at any age can get injured, and anybody at any age should be focused on their technique anyway. But just because of you haven't been training and you're older, your your connective tissue is less flexible or less limber than when you were younger, you may have gone through injuries, you may have had surgeries, and so on. I'm just trying to stress that it's perhaps even that much more important that you really dial in your form and technique as you go along. And one of the best ways to do this is to get a qualified coach. Or the second best is to be part of a group where you can do things like form checks on your form, rather than just doing it in a vacuum and assuming you're doing it right. Okay. And then the last thing, of course, always is going to be proper nutrition, proper hydration and electrolytes, sleep and stress management to support your muscle growth and your recovery. So building muscle over 40 is 100% possible, just follow the basic principles of training and nutrition and make adjustments based on your individual needs. All right, I have a few more questions here. The next one is what is your opinion on EA supplementation? So what is EA EA stands for essential amino acids. And these are the critical amino acids for muscle protein synthesis. And I would say that you can get enough of these from a well balanced healthy dietary pattern. Even though you do if you're training, you need a lot of protein. Okay. You do not I do not recommend EAA supplementation for most people, I think they're unnecessary. I think they're overpriced. I think you can get all the essential amino acids you need from eating protein. And even like whey and, and vegan protein supplementation, where you get not just the yeas, but the rest of the protein, amino acids, and everything that comes along with it, that you know the calories that are in protein. So, EA supplements they're marketed as superior to whole protein sources because they claim to have faster absorption rates and higher bioavailability. But I would say most of those are based on flawed studies that compare them to low quality protein sources or unrealistic doses of EAs as well as they'll take participants who have extremely low protein consumption to begin with and give me a raise and say, Oh look, there's a benefit, but there would have been as much or more benefit if they had just consumed whole protein. So maybe they're useful for people who have trouble eating enough protein from food like vegans and vegetarians, but even for them I'd recommend like a pea rice protein blend I talked about before. Simple Rules, right point eight to 1.2 grams of protein per pound of body weight per day, spread across three to five meals from high quality sources like meat, eggs, dairy, fish, whey, or plant sources. Stick stick to the simple stuff. I wouldn't waste my money on EAA supplements. I don't take them myself. I used to and I don't anymore. Next question. What's a good resting heart rate? Okay, so wearable devices are pretty good at calculating your resting heart rate. So what I recommend doing is tracking that number over time and seeing what happens under two different scenarios. So let me ask you to let me ask you a question answer your question. First. The normal resting heart rate for adults is between 60 and 160, and 100 beats per minute. And the lower end of that spectrum is more common for people with better cardiovascular fitness. And athletes might have an even lower one than that. So I'll give you an example I was I just had rotator cuff surgery, my resting heart rate while sitting there waiting for the surgery was 4546 beats per minute. And they said, Oh, are you an athlete? I said, Well, I really thank you very much for that. And I always I always love when people say that, because I never used to consider myself an athlete, I used to be overweight, my resting heart rate used to be closer to the mid 60s. And it wasn't until after my after I started lifting. And then walking a lot that I saw my resting heart rate come way down. It wasn't from cardio, it wasn't from running, it wasn't any of that. It was simply from getting to a reasonable weight, you know, body mass, for moving and training. And that's it. So anyway, so what I recommend doing is tracking your number because it's really about the relative change. And the first scenario I would do is track it before and after a significant change in weight, like a fat loss phase, or muscle building phase, wherever you are now, just whatever the opposite of that is, and see how it changes. I personally have found something like a five to 10 Beat per minute change, which goes down when I lose weight and goes up when I gain weight down when I lose weight, or when I gain weight, very clear correlation. The second thing you can try is before and after you change your training or your movement. So if you right now, you're pretty sedentary and you're gonna start strength training, or let's say you train but you only get like three or 4000 steps a day, and you're gonna go up to like eight or 10,000 subsidy. That's also great before and after, to compare. And just make sure you note when you're doing these things and compare them your resting heart rate, and you should definitely see an improvement. So a good resting heart rate is going to be around 60 or potentially lower. But again, it's relative to you, your history, all these other factors. And if you can improve it, that's that's the best. Okay, and then there's one more question. One final question is what's the best way to add electrolytes to your water if you don't like flavored water. electrolytes, of course allow us to absorb our water and stay hydrated. And there's multiple ways to do this. The one I always recommend it's super easy as adding a pinch of, of sea salt or Himalayan salt to your water, salt, of course it does contain sodium, and then add lemon juice to that because Lemon. Lemon juice contains citric acid which helps enhance the absorption of electrolytes and also has vitamin C, which can't go wrong with so salt lemon juice. Another way to do it is to just buy off the shelf liquid electrolyte supplements, right? elements or Dr. Berg's I think it's called I mean, there's a whole bunch just looking at ingredients that contain usually multiple electrolytes, sodium, potassium, magnesium chloride, the oftentimes don't have sugar calories, some have artificial sweeteners. So it's really up to you what you want there. And you can, you know, pop those in your water after a workout, for example. And then one other thing that I haven't tried myself that adding some coconut water or watermelon juice as well, because those are natural sources of electrolyte and they would add some nice flavor to your, to your water, as well. Okay, so that was a lot of questions. I you know, it's like 11 questions for today. Speaking of questions, I wanted to mention something that we just started recently in the Wits & Weights Facebook community, which by the way, is totally free to join. We have something called Ask Philip, where you can post a specific question about your health and fitness journey. And I'll answer it live on Fridays with the video replay immediately available in the group. So I want to be clear, this is more than just a general q&a, like today's episode, the Ask Phillip thread gives you the chance to get very specific about your goals and where you're stuck. Right? Like, hey, you know, here, here

Philip Pape 39:08

are my macros. Here's how I train. Here's how many steps I get blah, blah, blah, and I'm stuck at a weight plateau weight loss plateau. What do I do? Or I've never tracked before, I'm not sure if it's right for me. Here's my scenario here. Here's my goal, what do I do? Right? And then I will give you a very specific answer to help you move forward based on your situation. So if you're not already in our free Facebook community, click the link in my show notes or search for Wits & Weights on Facebook. Again, just click the link in my show notes to join our free community. All right, on our next episode 91. I will be reviewing the latest research around protein intake and body composition. And I'm going to break down exactly what matters why it matters. The simple steps you can take to ensure you're getting enough protein both for the minimum effective dose but also to opt Amazing results, including some surprising findings from the research. So make sure to follow or subscribe to the podcast Wits & Weights in your podcast app right now go ahead click the subscribe click the Follow so you get notified of every new episode. And as always, stay strong. And I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits. & Weights podcast. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights. Please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong

Philip Pape 7/21/23 Philip Pape 7/21/23

Ep 89: Reverse Lower Back Pain and Herniated Discs Using Natural Movement with Dr. Ryan Peebles

Joining me on the show is Dr. Ryan Peebles, a Doctor of Physical Therapy, to talk about a topic that many people have experience with, myself included, and that is lower back pain. You'll learn about the "deep core" and why it's the key to reversing back pain.

We will discuss how age, lifestyle, stress, and heavy lifting impact our lower backs. We will also discuss the pros and cons of chiropractic adjustments, physical therapy, and MRIs.

Dr. Ryan committed his life to uncovering the root causes of chronic back problems and learning how to reverse them. Now, he helps thousands of back pain sufferers get back to doing what they love without pain each year. He created a unique movement retraining program called Core Balance Training, which successfully reverses back pain.

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Book a FREE 30-minute call with Philip here.
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Today you’ll learn all about:

[1:58] Personal experience with back pain and its effect on identity
[4:18] Understanding the "deep core" and its relation to back pain
[6:33] Best practices for recovery from lower back injuries
[8:25] Preventing lower back injuries: the role of strength, activities, posture
[11:07] Impacts of a sedentary lifestyle on back health and mitigation strategies
[14:01] Age and its correlation to lower back pain
[21:45] The effects of modern society's activities on back health
[22:56] What Ryan did after his accident
[25:58] Impact of heavy lifting exercises like back squats and deadlifts on back health
[28:26] Stephanie shares her experience with her one-on-one nutrition coaching with Philip
[29:42] The role of stress and mental health in back pain
[34:39] Pros and cons of chiropractic adjustments for back pain
[38:13] Effectiveness of physical therapy or massage therapy in treating lower back pain
[43:07] When to consider getting an MRI for back pain
[47:57] Possibility of healing herniated or bulging discs without surgery
[49:39] Overview of Core Balance Training and its unique approach to back pain
[51:23] The effect of Core Balance training on pain in other areas
[53:12] Learn more about Ryan and CBT
[54:13] Outro

Episode resources:

Dr. Ryan's website: www.corebalancetraining.com
Youtube: @CoreBalance

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https://witsandweights.com/free-call

Learn about 1-on-1 coaching ⬇️
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Transcript

Dr. Ryan Peebles 00:00

For most people with chronic back pain, and we deal with people that have been having back pain for 30, even 40 years, you can actually get back to an active lifestyle without setting yourself into, you know, an episode or a flare up of

Philip Pape 00:17

Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry. So you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits & Weights community Welcome to another episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. Joining me on the show is Dr. Ryan Peebles, a doctor of physical therapy to talk about a topic that so many people have experience with myself included, and that is lower back pain. You'll learn about the deep core and why it's the key to reversing back pain. We'll get into practical strategies on how to recover from lower back injuries, prevent them from happening and improve our back health. I'm going to ask Dr. Ryan about how things like age, lifestyle stress, maybe even footwear and heavy lifting impact our lower backs. We'll get into the pros and cons of chiropractic adjustments, physical therapy and MRIs. I'm personally interested in that one, and we'll learn about his core balance training to reverse back pain. When chronic back problems threatened to take his passion of surfing away from him forever. Ryan committed his life to uncovering its root causes and learning how to reverse them. Now Dr. Ryan helps 1000s of back pain sufferers each year get back to doing what they love. Without pain. He created a unique movement retraining program called core balance training that is highly successful at reversing back pain through increased core connection. Ryan, welcome to the show. Hello, Phillip.

Dr. Ryan Peebles 01:55

Thanks for having me. I'm happy to be here. Awesome.

Philip Pape 01:58

So I want to start off with the whole surfer thing. Because you are a passionate surfer. Not something I'm too familiar with. I grew up in, in South Florida. We had beaches, you couldn't really surf there and I never picked it up. But you're a surfer You almost lost your ability to surf because of your back pain. So tell us about that. And how did that affect your identity?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 02:17

Right? Yeah, so I started surfing when I was super young, my dad threw me under the water. And it was definitely part of my identity. And it's kind of an extreme sport on the spine because of the pop ups. So if you're not familiar with surfing, you know, when you go to pop up off a surfboard, you're kind of doing a cobra, you know, the yoga position of a Cobra for a moment, but it's also kind of abrupt. It's kind of forceful. And so the repetitive nature of that backward bending Can I mean, a lot of surfers struggle with lower back pain. Because of that, you have tight hip flexors, which I'm sure you and your audience are aware of it flexors and stuff, right. So that's going to make it a lot worse. And that was the case for me. And so I started getting lower back pain at a really young age. And worse, you know, it was probably about 610 when it started and got worse over the next eight years, to the point where Yeah, I had to take about two years away or at this at that point, I felt like I was done surfing. But it was a period of about two years, where I couldn't serve until I learned some things about my body and got it back into balance.

Philip Pape 03:28

Cool. Yeah, I, I've heard a lot of people go through experiences like that some people really never figure it out, never seem to figure out how to recover. I've talked about my story here where I actually did end up having surgery, it was a micro diskectomy for for severely herniated disc, whether I had to or not, I'll be curious to see if that's a question I can answer from today. But for me, it was like getting back to lifting, right. So people like to do what they do they have passions, and we don't want to give these things up because of something that's potentially fixable. So I do want to talk about the mechanics of this. And some specific questions I have. One starts with just this idea of the deep core that he talked about, that it's the root cause. And, you know, my idea of the core is, you know, the trunk and all the muscles and the system that supports that. And I think of that in terms of like isometrics and stabilization, at least when I do lifting. But can you explain what you mean by the deep core and why it's important?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 04:21

Yeah, definitely. So I wouldn't say the deep core is the root cause I think it's the solution, actually. So, you know, I can get real deep into the cause, but we'll kind of skip to the fun part and talk about how the deep core can be the solution. It is the it's the muscles that you can't see from the outside. It's composed of the muscles underneath the six pack abs, and they tend to wrap around the torso, you know, the flank area around the sides and it's shaped like a corset. And as the Test designed to support the lower back the lumbar spine. And that's the area of our body. You know, if you look at a skeleton, where there's the least bony support, and you can see behind me scaly back there, for those watching, the ribcage provides tons of support for the thoracic spine, and then you have the pelvis down below. And that's inherently very stable, but there's a gap between the pelvis and the ribs, where it's really just the spine. And so we rely heavily on this corset like muscle group, which I call the deep core. But you know, it's composed of several different muscles. And it doesn't really, you don't really need to know the names, because we don't single out any one of them as the Savior, it's not the transverse abdominus, that's going to heal your back. They're all designed to work together. And so that's what the program that I teach is about is about reconnecting with that muscle group and learning how to use it in your everyday life.

Philip Pape 06:01

I like that you said they have to work together like a system. Again, just making an analogy to lifting weights, you know, people love to talk about muscle groups and individual muscles and individual, you know, isolation movements, when in reality, if you don't have that overall movement pattern down first, and then overall strength with it think muscles work together, it's gonna be hard to go beyond that, or you might be at risk for injury. So it's funny, you said, I was gonna ask you the name of the muscles a little bit, because I'm so interested in like, Oh, what do you call it? It's okay. So, um, a lot of people. And I know, we want to focus on the positive, but we have to start with like, the fact that a lot of people suffer from lower back injuries, things like herniated discs. So just top level, before we get to all the details, what is what's the best way to recover from them and avoid chronic pain?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 06:49

Yeah, so there, there's a large percentage of lower back injuries that will end up becoming chronic pain and, and there's another percentage of people who will recover and they can move on with their lives. But it's that large percentage that I deal with, it's specifically chronic back pain that we're focused on. And I guess, you know, the best way to avoid it, if I was going to break it down into like, I don't know, it's just like, in a nutshell, it would be listening to your body. And there's so much more that goes into that. But our body is constantly communicating to us the things that it doesn't like through pain, but also the things that it wants more of through good feelings. And so it works both ways. And if if you just do more of what feels good, when what's working for your body and do less of what's hurting, like sitting, for example, is probably a pretty safe way to not fall into that chronic category. But yeah, I don't think that there's really something I could just say, like, Oh, you got a herniated disc? How do you how do you not let it become chronic? Without talking about the core? Okay. It's such a major part. You know, I think even Logically, if people just think about it, like, there's something to do with the core that that is going to be necessary to recover from that. And so that's where all arrows point to for me.

Philip Pape 08:20

Okay, let's follow the arrows because you mentioned something like sitting right, where I think a lot of people will say that, well, I understand that I've got things that I do all day, because I'm working behind a desk and work from home and I sit, and maybe while I'm sitting it's not, maybe it's not painful, but then there's some pain when I get up or you know, like I'm stiff and all these things. How do you listen to your body? Because like some people I think don't have that signal anymore, right? So how do you relearn to do that properly? Yeah,

Dr. Ryan Peebles 08:49

I talk a lot about this actually on my podcast as well. So listening to your body is actually more than just feeling pain, or feeling good feelings. You can get into that what you actually what you spoke about, where sometimes you have to reflect back because the body often has delayed signals. And so for example, a lot of people will hurt themselves, stretching or doing any yoga class, but they're not they don't feel like they're hurting themselves in the moment. But then maybe later that night, or even the next day, they're their back is tweaked, and like they just feel off. I think that's a really common experience. And it's not because of what you're doing in that moment. It's because of what you did a few hours ago or even a day or even two days ago. So there's always this ongoing this this like moving period of time where the things that you've done recently affect you now and it does require reflecting back. Another thing you mentioned is like, well, you know, we got to sit a lot for work and I do think sitting is kind of like the enemy. But it's also to stop sitting is not realistic. And it's also not the solution to back pain. Because if if it was that simple, I think that everybody would have a standing desk and a lot less people would have back pain is

Philip Pape 10:16

are you sitting right now? Are you sitting right? I

Dr. Ryan Peebles 10:18

am sitting right now. So, you know, it's gonna be just like a lot of things in life, it's a fine balance. And we have to sit just because of the society that we're in. And so that might require us to do a little more cross training, like focused on things that open up the body, because sitting is a very closed position. It's right. It's like the fetal position. And so walking would be a good example of something that kind of is a healthy search synergistic movement that opens the body. So to do that, in between in a little breaks from sitting, to go walking, but again, I don't really think for somebody that's already in a state of chronic back pain that that alone is going to be the solution is just one step in the right direction.

Philip Pape 11:07

Okay, so what are the other steps? Right? Because you talked about the core, do you want to get into that?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 11:11

Yeah, so a little background on the cause, because I think you do have to understand the cause, to be able to, you know, understand the solution. So that was my belief. And you can, you know, do your own research. And, you know, you don't just trust me right off the bat, but take what you believe my belief that the cause of the vast majority of chronic lower back pain conditions comes down to muscle imbalances. And so that's just a word or a phrase for when the muscles in your body are the tension and the tone. And those muscles are not the way that they really should be. So the hip flexors might be a little bit too tight. And another muscle group like the abdominals might be a little bit lengthened, and maybe possibly underactive, and the things that you do. And this pattern, there's a predictable pattern and muscle imbalances. You know, the upper traps get tight, the glutes tend to get a little amnesia, we sit on them all day. That's not surprising, right? So this pattern of muscles that are too tight, and other muscles that are too weak, lead to postural imbalances. And if you zoom in really far in the body, if you look at the joints, they just tend to be a little less congruent than they would be if the muscles that are attached to them, those tension guy wires essentially, were more imbalanced with each other. So you can think about a tent, if you if you had a tent that was held up by guy wires, and you pulled some of them too tight and the others do loosened, the tent would be a little wonky, right. So that's a similar thing that happens to our body, that affects the joints, they're not as congruent. So there's more friction in the joints. Or when there's more friction on something like a disc, your L, five s, one disc, it's going to wear down a little quicker. And so that could end up being a bulging disc, or a herniated disc or degenerative disc disease. The the final event that happens is like the diagnosis. But if you just go upstream a little bit, all of these different results can you can kind of find a pattern that they're all coming from this monster of muscle imbalances that we are dealing with. And this is again, specific to chronic back pain. So yes, you can hurt your back in a car accident. But if you hurt your back, picking up a toilet paper roll, it's most likely not the toilet paper roll that hurt your back, it's most likely that was just to use upon the straw that broke the camel's back. And you've been this has been building up for a long time in these muscular imbalances that I'm talking about.

Philip Pape 14:01

What about the classic situation where and this is what I went through where I had like when I was 30 just a pop, right? And I was like warming up on squats had to hop really painful went away after a day or two years later, came back. And then it got worse and worse till it was like I had a numb leg like sciatica basically, where I can barely walk or stand. And you know, had the MRI and the whole thing. And I had had herniated discs before and it was now completely like squirted out, you know, so to speak. But I didn't have pain between that entire year just the disease acute episodes, is that that's not chronic pain, or can that still kind of be chronic pain? And I just got lucky and didn't feel it because it wasn't impinging the nerve or is this completely different situation?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 14:47

Yeah, that's a really good question. I wouldn't say what you experienced is actually a lot more common than the back problem from a car accident, or from picking up a toilet paper roll. Although both of those things happen. A lot, the most common one is something in between those two. And so I would consider just the fact that you were warming up that it wasn't like a one rep max, that it was, there was probably something building up to that. Right, right. And then you went a couple years without symptoms. And that is maybe it's not maybe not typical, but it's not uncommon. And part of that could be just because there are no nerves, no pain, nerves, no nociceptors, inside a desk. So the pain receptors are actually on the surface of the disc, and other anatomy other tissues of the body. So it may just be that the way that your disc ruptured, was not triggering the pain signals until it progressed to the point where it reached that again, two years later, I felt it again.

Philip Pape 15:58

And then when people tell me about their herniated discs, I hear all different, again, a spectrum of things where it seems that with age, there's definitely some correlation, right? Just natural. I'll call it natural degeneration. But you can challenge that if that's not really true, because there are a lot of correlations we make with age that are not because of age or because of other things that happen to happen over time. Because you're getting older, for example, loss of muscle mass, you know, we we talk about our slow metabolisms, it's not because we're old, it's because we've lost muscle as we age. The I've definitely heard the statements like everybody over 30 hat will show something on an MRI. And, you know, almost everything can be healed and doesn't require surgery. And I want to get into all those statements. Because whether true or not, I want to hear your perspective, specifically a herniated disc, but then other things that are very common degenerative issues that cause chronic pain, what what's your take on all that?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 16:55

Yeah, so definitely, there is an element of aging. And so with aging, there's going to be natural degeneration, osteoarthritis, stuff like that is going to it's definitely going to occur and all of us, and so you can get to, into the research and find that there's something like, you know, over 50% of people, I actually have it, I'm going to pull it up. While I'm talking here, I have a lot of interesting percentages that would make people feel better about themselves, okay, because if you're, you know, 35 years old, and you have a bulging disc, and you may feel like you're, you know, kind of your spines a little compromised, and then you find out that 60% of people your age, have that same thing. And those 60% of people have no symptoms at all, that there's a very poor correlation between these MRI findings and the pain. So I find it one of the most interesting parts of research, so I just pulled it up right now. So disc degenerate, what's what's your age range? What decade are you in?

Philip Pape 18:02

I'm 42. Exactly. Okay, so

Dr. Ryan Peebles 18:04

in your 40s. So, in your 40s 68% of people with no back pain at all will have degenerative disc disease 68% disc bulge 50% of people in the 40s. And this is 40. So it might be closer to 40. And then, let's see herniated disc 1/3 of people, one out of every three people walking around with no back pain at all have a herniated disc. So it's extremely common in their ages as you go up in age. Like I can see in the 80s here. 96% of people in their 80s have degenerative disc disease. It's not really a disease. It's just aging. But the problem occurs when it's kind of like premature aging when these problems start happening too early in life, and different parts of the body break down faster than they should like for me, I was 16 years old. I got my X ray. And the chiropractor who took the X ray told me that my my discs looked like they were 40 years old. So like definitely I felt broken. I felt like something was wrong with me and and so that kind of degeneration happened early for me. And there is a reason beyond age. That's related to that. You know, my personal story. I had something to do with surfing but it also had to do with the fact that I started lifting weights, heavy weights, bodybuilding style lifting when I was 13 years old, and I created these muscle imbalances in my body that I've now discovered a really common across the population. It's the same pattern of imbalances that bring you into the fetal position is the same pattern that people are voluntarily going and when they're sitting. So these types of activities, and it's not just sitting, it could be something like stress, when we get stressed out, we hold tension in our bodies, right? Well, the tissues that hold tension, the best are the muscles, they're the most dynamic tissue in our body. And so they can they that's how they say this, the only language they speak is tension. So they, they increase tension, they decrease tension. And when we're tense in our mind, we hold that in our muscles, and there are specific muscles that hold it more than others. Like the upper traps, you know, those neck muscles that everybody can feel gets tight. On the hip flexors are another one. And all of these muscles are the pattern that they that that they that relates all of them is that they all contribute to bringing bringing the body towards the protective position, which is the fetal position, which is sitting, which is how it all relates to this. And so I know I kind of went off on a tangent there, but it's good. Yeah, that's how you can, your body can age prematurely. And if you look at an old person, they are curling back down right into the fetal position, which is what we started life in, we open up and the goal is really just to stay open for as long as possible.

Philip Pape 21:26

Stay open for as long as possible. So if we were going to take your 16 year old version of you who had been lifting weights, and then had the surfing the the surfing conditions, you know, the Cobra moves the pop ups, right? That and and we also think about humans before modern civilization, for example. What's the difference? Like is, is most of this issue of being too closed in, like you said, sitting a function of modern life? Or is there would this have happened naturally, if humans lived to they were 50 6070? Way back when?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 21:59

I definitely think it's related to a modern society. I think back in the day, people moved a lot more. And, you know, there was a point in history when the chair had not been invented yet. And so it's really interesting to think that that, that something that we do, probably more than anything else is, is actually not part of our history. Right. So you know, there's, there's a whole lot of people out there that believe, you know, the healthiest thing that we can do is try to mimic what our ancestors did. And, and I think that I'm probably fall into that category. And there was probably a lot less back pain, a lot less postural, a lot less text, neck, back back then. If you've heard of Yeah. So yeah, definitely related.

Philip Pape 22:53

No, I can I can feel that. So then what are you doing? What did you start doing? After you had that accident? Or that diagnosis of yours, that you also do for other people? Now that helps us get into that better movement pattern?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 23:10

Yeah, so the first thing I started doing was searching everywhere. For a solution, you know, I went to every possible type of health care provider, every doctor, I went to countless physical therapists, for a 10 year period. I mean, I tried everything under the sun that I could think of and find. And the turning point happened when I decided that I could, I had to just stop searching outside of me, and I had to just take responsibility, I realized I wasn't going to find the person that was going to heal me. It was me, that was the only person that could heal me. And so that was my major turning point. And I, you know, for me, it was okay, I'm gonna commit my life to the body. And I'm going to start, I'm going to enter a profession that's dedicated to healing the back. And so that was physical therapy for me. But, you know, going through physical therapy school, I was, I wouldn't say it was the thing that taught me my solution. What we do in core balanced training is we actually model core connection, core development after how an infant and a baby develops their corn. Because if you you know, if you look at a four year old child, they have developed perfect posture and movement without any developmental abnormalities before your child has perfect posture and movement. And nobody ever told them how to do that, right. They don't know what a muscle is or how to contract it or what their names are. They just naturally did it. And that was through their interaction with really as an infant and a baby with the floor and gravity and thereby and their intention was that they just wanted to get up and be like everyone else. And they were pushing away from the floor. And, and when you're, when you're an infant, your arms and legs are pretty much have no strength, all your strength is in your core. And so they push away from the floor with different parts of their core. And so we've named these areas of the body, we call them support points. And we model after that, we just simply get down on the floor. And when we develop, we reconnect to our core through pushing away from it. And then it's a three month program. So it's, you know, it's a lot more involved in that. But ultimately, what we do is we get familiar with that core connection, and then we apply it to all the functional movements of our daily life, which if for you, if it's, you know, lifting weights, it would, it would integrate that core connection and do a deadlift and do a squat. And

Philip Pape 25:58

how does that work?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 26:00

Yeah, so the core connection is simply just learning a way to engage your core, you know, everybody says, you know, engage your core or use your core or whatever. But how do you do that? Nobody for a long time, nobody ever taught me how to do that, like, what was the right way to do it? Like, they teach in Pilates? Or like abdominal hollowing? Or you bring a belly button to your spine? Is that the right way? Or is it bracing where you're like, you know, kind of bearing down? What is the right way to do that? And, and also, like, how intense do I want to walk around all day, like with a 90% contraction, so that the art of it is really learning how to do it naturally, like in a way that's functional, that you can actually do movements, like something a 10% intensity activity, like gardening, or doing the dishes or something, and have just a subtle level engagement is really not something you can teach in words. And that's why I mentioned earlier, like, a child doesn't really know, if you said contract to your muscle, they wouldn't really know. So he learned through the feeling. And that's why it's it's kind of hard to talk about, it's even hard to, it's hard for me to talk about. And I've been doing this for six years. Now. The learning happens through experience and through feeling so you'd have to get down on the floor. And I'd have to say, Okay, push away from from your back support zone, and feel what happens in your core muscles when you do that. Okay? Now do that for a few days in a row and get really familiar with it. And then we're going to get up off the floor, and we're going to pretend you're doing the same thing. So pretend the floor is there, you're going to push away from that support zone, but the floor is not really there. But the same core engagement will happen without the floor. And then we're going to do that with a deadlift. So that's kind of how it works in the program that that would be that would that process would happen over the first like month, essentially, it's a long term, it's a slow solution.

Philip Pape 28:15

Ya know, like many things, like many things, I mean, we talk about changing our bodies, even with nutrition, whatever else, you know, it takes time you got to learn, you got to put in habits, you have to practice getting feedback, and so on.

28:26

The most value that I got from this was the fact that I had someone that I could talk to about anything, and that there was going to be no judgement, it was just Well, here are your goals, here's the best way that you're going to achieve it. And then let's work together to help you feel inspired and motivated to do that. And a lot of people out there trying to be coaches, and not all of them have done the work and also just be a genuine person that is positive and coming from the heart in terms of wanting to help and Philip really embody all of those qualities, I would recommend him to just about anyone that's looking to achieve goals in that realm of their nutrition and building new habits.

Philip Pape 29:11

You have you have videos all right, you have a YouTube channel. Yeah.

Dr. Ryan Peebles 29:15

So I mean, we have a YouTube channel, which is where I kind of just educate on any number of topics with the actual program is kind of like an online course. Videos. It's five minute videos and one lesson per day for there's there's 12 weeks worth of modules.

Philip Pape 29:36

Okay, yeah, so we'll we'll definitely put that in the show notes. I want to ask a few more questions about some of the causes too, because you mentioned stress. And I remember when I was going through my back issues, somebody recommended a book to me by someone who had his his whole philosophy was about the mental side of you might even know who it is I came

Dr. Ryan Peebles 29:56

to John Sarno healing

Philip Pape 30:00

Gonna go? I don't know what your thoughts are on him or on that on that I didn't pursue it too far because it didn't seem necessarily applicable to me. But anyway, go for it.

Dr. Ryan Peebles 30:09

Yeah, so that is one of the books on the recommended reading list for all students in the program. I've got probably like four books on this list. And so that's one of them is a pretty big deal. So Dr. John Sarno teaches that all chronic back pain is actually mental. And that it's a he calls it TMS. And so he named it and, and so it really relates the mind and body. Now, do I agree with him? Not completely, I think there's a major physical aspect to back pain, but it's very eye opening for people to even just be introduced that idea of the mountains, you know, the mind body connection could actually be that strong that stress in your mind could cause back pain. And I think there's definitely truth to that. I just don't stand in the extreme side of the court that I say all back pain is from that. I often say that 90% of the solution to back pain is mental. And that's because, yeah, we're doing physical things. But so much of what we're doing is requires focus. And I think a lot of great athletes and trainers would say the same thing about their sport or their activity. I know, that's probably, but I just watched the documentary on Arnold Schwarzenegger. And he was talking about that his bodybuilding was actually mental. And the body, you change the shape of your body with your mind. But yeah, there's lifting weights involved. But there's just such a huge component of the mind in doing that.

Philip Pape 32:03

I agree 100%, I wanted to bring this up. Because when, when I, when I read that book, my wife and I then looked up the documentary he had made, which is hard to find, because it's not like you could just stream it, you know. And they were just case after case after case of person who people who they were in such pain, you know, they were on the ground and their legs up most of the day, that kind of thing. And they dealt with it mentally. But definitely, again, when I think of lifting weights, for example, I've definitely come around to the idea that the physical, the physical is just the tail end of like the chain of effects, right? You've got to have the mental, whether it's resilience, or focus or mindfulness while you're doing it. And I could see how all of that is tied together and people listening, just be open minded about all of this, because what you're saying makes a lot of sense. And if you haven't found a solution, then you know, there's something else that's got to kind of work for you. It's not like it's hopeless.

Dr. Ryan Peebles 32:59

Yeah, definitely. I mean, I have I read John Cernos book when I was struggling when I didn't have a solution. And it was a, it was a turning point for me just, you know, it was such a massive eye opener, that I have it on my reading list, right for all of my students. But did it heal my back pain? No, it's just something it's another step. Just like what we were talking about with sitting or you know, cross training to reduce the effects of sitting, it's, it's not going to heal you completely, especially if you have a long history of chronic back conditions. But it is a big step in the right direction. And if you and if you do enough of those steps, with different elements, you can definitely no matter what's going on, you can definitely improve your life to the point where tomorrow is better than today. And you can for most people with chronic back pain, and we deal with people that have been having back pain for 30, even 40 years, you can actually get back to an active lifestyle without setting yourself into you know, an episode or a flare up of pain is just improving that relationship with your body. And it's it's a journey that doesn't end you keep going you keep learning every day

Philip Pape 34:23

really for people to hear you can you can improve every day and part of it is opening your mind to improving your mind and thinking positively and taking that action and all that like you said not one thing is going to solve everything necessarily but they all come together and maybe spiral on each other. I wanted to ask about so getting into solutions people think about one of those is chiropractic. Okay, I've never been to a chiropractor, I've thought about it but tell me your thoughts on about totally open minded are they worth it? Do they provide relief to they make a difference? Doesn't matter based on the chiropractor, you know?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 34:56

Well, I'm gonna start off by saying that people think I hit cut I practice and I don't, I've had a, I've had a, you know, one of my greatest mentors was a chiropractor. So I, it's all up to the individual. And like in any profession, there are good ones, and there are bad ones. And so if you're gonna go to chiropractic, my best recommendation is to do your research, you know, look at the reviews on the person, hopefully go to someone with like, from a good referral, because the problem with chiropractic is, they, it's possible that, you know, if, if you get a bad one, like I did, when I was probably around 22 years old, they can hurt you, you know, it can hurt your body, if if they do something that's too extreme. And typically, if you have a herniated disc, the underlying nature of that kind of condition is instability. The tissues that connect the vertebrae are compromised. And when they're compromised, that means they're not, they're not holding it together as well as they would, right. So that's it's not as stable as it would as it would be if the tissues were fully intact. And so typically, you just, you don't want to manipulate, you don't want to thrust an injured tissue like that. And the good chiropractors know that they won't do that. And they use different kinds of techniques, and they adjust other areas of the body. But when I was 22 years old, a chiropractor gave me a strong thrust into my injured vertebrae. And it's, you know, that that sent me spiral spiraling for years, actually, I really, it really messed me up. And so that's why I had a really bad experience with a chiropractor in my life. And that's true story. And, and I always tell people, you know, do your research, but they are, there are good ones out there. And there, they are able to help you get, you know, be like, maybe be a catalyst for getting, you know, improving your body. But again, as I said, in the very beginning of the show, there, the solution is not outside of you. It is not somebody else, it only can be you. And it only can be you improving the way that you use and operate this body that you live inside. And that's, that's my strong belief, there is no other solution to back pain, even if you get surgery, you still have to do the work to improve the way that you use your body.

Philip Pape 37:37

And that's empowering too, right? Because it means we have control over it. Your example of the cat, the chiropractor as a catalyst made me think of like, for example, these new GLP one agonists for for people to lose weight, right? It's like a catalyst, maybe if you've you know, struggled, struggled, struggled, but then you got to do the work. Right? I just spoke to a person who on my podcast came out say he had bariatric surgery years ago. And he's like, it's tough. If you're going to do that, you got to go through the work. So I like that it really comes down to you your choices in your control, but you have to know what to do, which is guy like you here telling us some some of that, what we can try. So what about two other areas would be massage therapy and physical therapy. So obviously, your physical therapist will in there, but massage therapy, what do you think about that?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 38:21

I think everybody should get massages, because, you know, it improves blood flow to the muscles and makes you feel good. If you can afford it. You know, it's it's a fantastic thing. Some massage therapists can get a little aggressive. And if you have an injury, it would be very wise of you to let them know before getting a massage can attest to that. Yeah. So I mean, I got one, I think it was two days ago. And it was actually pretty aggressive. And I even told him, I was like, I have a history of back problems. It's all good. Now I just want to let you know. And he was doing some like thrusts on my on my spine. I was, you know, in the middle of the massage, I'm like, It's okay, I don't need that. So just to set some boundaries around your body, don't stay quiet. If they're messing with one of your injuries and it hurts. Speak up there. They don't know. They can't feel you know what you feel. But other than that, I think massage is a fantastic thing for you know, all the reasons even if it's just because it feels good. that's healthy for your mind. Which is healthy for your body. So yeah. Is it the solution to bachlin? Probably not. That's the theme of your battle. Yes. Yeah. So So physical therapy. So I'm a physical therapist, right. So naturally, I would have a bias towards my profession. And I will be the first to say that it's actually not that effective for chronic lower back pain. I did ongoing physical therapy for about 10 years when I had my problem, and I got better each time, you know, I would go for, you know, 12 to 16 visits and then get discharged and then start the cycle again. And each time, I would probably get a little bit better. And then as soon as I stopped, the problem would return. And so I think there's a gap with physical therapy, where the exercises and the hands on treatment become the solution. And I don't think that's enough. Because when you get off that treatment table, and you leave the clinic, with those other 23 hours of your day, if you're just living them the same way that you did before. And I mean, I mean, literally like walking around in your body, bending over doing the things in the same way, then that's so much more significant than 30 minutes or an hour on a treatment table. And so I think that the gap with physical therapy is that there's not enough emphasis on integrating the way that they teach you to use your body into activities of daily living of the tasks that you do the mundane things that you do to get through your day, every day. And that's where I think that you can have a long term solution, and not be dependent on exercises, as the things that will keep you out of pain.

Philip Pape 41:25

I've never heard it put that way. And that was really clear the idea that 23 hours of our day, when we're not in physical therapy, we're basically reversing or worse, what happened in physical therapy, and then that's only for 12 sessions, right, or 16 sessions and the rest is gone. So I've never heard it put that way. But I know personal experience physical therapy, I was always thinking, I was always feeling like it wasn't enough where there wasn't much going on, you know. And then even when I did the exercises, you're right. It's just like these discrete, you know, moments, rather than, Hey, there's this overall movement pattern you need to work on, like you said, the moving like an infant and dealing with your back that

Dr. Ryan Peebles 42:02

way. Yeah. Well, moving, developing, like an infant understood under, you know, but yeah, I really, I really don't like the whole three sets of 10 thing. And it's so common physical therapy, but I will also say the same thing. It's the there's, there's good ones, and there's not so good ones. And the best physical therapists are doing what I'm talking about. They're doing movement patterns, they're doing movement retraining, and they're telling you the things that will last beyond walking out of the clinic door.

Philip Pape 42:40

Yeah, I like how you're speaking movement patterns, because, again, just tying it to lifting because that's, that's what I know. Yeah. When I, when I did CrossFit, and all sorts of other things for years that were fun, you know, they were athletic, but they didn't, they didn't make me a lot stronger help with my muscle mass. And then I learned about movement based strength training, right, which a lot of the compound lifts kind of fall in that category where we start thinking systematically. So I like where you're going with that. That you mentioned MRIs before? And I don't know, we didn't really get into it. The level I wanted to, but how effective are they should people get them? Are they misleading? What are your thoughts.

Dr. Ryan Peebles 43:17

So I think they're necessary because they, they need to be able to rule out something like a cyst or a tumor or stuff that we can't see that could be going on, on the inside. And so they're important. However, I think that the way that we use them is not the most beneficial for most, the vast majority of back pain patients. Because what happens when you have back pain, you get an MRI, you find out you've got, you know, a degenerative disc, or a bulging disc or a herniated disc, like in your case, oftentimes, we get the report, or we talk to the doctor, and then we feel a little broken. And that is not good for the mind. Because when we feel broken, it actually changes the way that we move is there's a name for it. It's called fear avoidance behavior. And so we we a lot of people can develop a parent movements where they're, they would they'll bend over to pick something up in a different way that's more kind of protective are trying not to hurt themselves. And then we'll also avoid activities we'll avoid, you know, when maybe we won't go play that pickup game of basketball. And so that is in as a single event. It's not that big of a deal, but it accumulates and it spirals into, okay, now I'm not going to do that activity anymore either, because my back's not feeling very good. And then you know, you don't use it, you lose it. Your body adapts to this less active lifestyle. And we continue to go in the downward spiral of back pain. So I do think MRIs are important. But I think it's important to educate people like what we were talking about earlier about how common the conditions are, and how they're very poorly correlated with pain. Because remember, those percentages I was giving you earlier, were all for people that have no symptoms, no back pain. And so there's a poor correlation. And sometimes there's people with severe back pain that have none of those conditions. There's the MRI is unremarkable. But they have severe back pain that is that exists, and it's not uncommon. So to educate people, if you're going to give them the report, and then also, I think there is something to be said about maybe just not actually giving people the report, if there's no red flag, if there's no reason to believe that there might be a cancer in there or something and say, you know, your your spine is relatively normal. And we recommend you, you know, being a little more active and getting some maybe getting some physical therapy to treat the pain that you're feeling that there's nothing really about this MRI that makes you broken or different than the rest of society, sure. And then have the effect on people of feeling broken, and then acting different and behave and moving their body as a broken body, they can feel that confidence, which really, I mean, I've made an entire YouTube stream about this, it really improves the health of the way that you move when you move confidently versus in fear.

Philip Pape 46:45

All in the mind. And really, a lot of it is in the mind. It's funny, because again, like just my own personal experience with the surgeon I had the first time I had an MRI that showed, you know, showed a herniated disc. And he said, You know what, this is fine. Like, it's fine. 10 years later, as I had really bad pain symptoms, he said, Well, now it looks like you probably need some intervention, which again, for my unique case, may have been the case, before the 60 something percent of people in their 40s, who have some degeneration without pain, then you have people with pain without degeneration in their MRI, logically, then there's an overlap of people who have pain and have something in their mind MRI, but that may not be causing the pain. Right? It's

Dr. Ryan Peebles 47:27

more of a correlation. And it's not causation. Because again, there are so many outliers. And I think that the way that you had that experience with your doctor was respectable, and I'm sure that there's a lot of radiologists and doctors out there doing it that way. And I'm I hope that it's that's a trend, because it's not the way that I experienced healthcare when I was when I was going through my problems.

Philip Pape 47:57

So consult how many people who have a herniated or bulging disc? Can healing without surgery? Like, is there a number in your mind that is it? You know, 95% of people? Is it half? Is it everyone? Like what are your thoughts on that?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 48:10

Definitely, I don't know. But if I had to guess I would say probably north of 80%. And maybe we'll just go with the 8020 rule, because it's so prevalent. Yeah. And I think that the even with people that get surgery, you know, there's so many people that actually get a second 1/3 One. And I mean, I know multiple people that have had six microdiscectomy days. And it's because you know the surgery isn't doesn't heal the disk, either. It's just removing a, you know, a torn piece of the disk that might be pushing on a nerve in most cases. So. So regardless of the surgery or not, I think the solution has to happen. And the only time I would recommend getting surgery is if the pain is so bad that it impedes the ability of you to do that the actual solution, you know, the core connection, if you can't get down on the floor and do it because the pain is so bad that that's when I would get surgery, and then also if there's motor nerves involved, so if you're experiencing paralysis in your foot or ankle or your hip, that would be definitely a case for getting the getting the part of that nerve that's compressed, just to remove that whatever compressing that nerve.

Philip Pape 49:39

And then as far as the healing goes, is the the movement pattern training that you do the primary part of this or is there an extra element of strength training or something else on top of it?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 49:52

We don't use weights. So the program is heavily focused on just the Developing the core connection. And then we apply it to functional movements. So we once in those first four weeks, our people feel confident with the core connection that we teach. We start to apply it to standing and hip hinging and deadlifts, and squats. And then we get into these other functional movements that train, hip rotation, and thoracic spine mobility. But the way that we leave people off in the program is we kind of usher them into applying this into the things that they love to do. Because really, that's the motivation for a lot of people is like, I can't do this anymore. For me, it was surfing. And that was my motivation to get my body healthy is so that I could surf again. So to apply it to what you love to do, whether that be weightlifting, or running, or yoga, we actually, you know, I'm a big believer in yoga. So I, I kind of end the program, say like, this is how you would apply all this stuff to a yoga move. But yeah, I will say that I think yoga is the best for healthy people, people who have their bodies in balance. And if your body is really out of balance, you can definitely hurt your back, trying to do a yoga move that your body's not ready for. So

Philip Pape 51:19

yeah, sounds like just about any movement can can be until you train it. So what about last thing is what about other pain in other areas? Since you deal with a low back? If you have shoulder issues or hip issues? Does this tend to resolve some of those? Or is that kind of outside your scope. And there's other approaches for those? Yeah, so

Dr. Ryan Peebles 51:36

the focus of the program has definitely lower back pain. But what we've found over the years is that definitely we have the side effect of people telling us that their knees are getting better and their hips are getting better and their neck feels better. And it's not surprising, because we're addressing the body as a whole. And we're improving the posture of the whole body. And those muscle imbalances, that same pattern. It's a predictable pattern of muscle imbalances. And I often refer to it as the monster is underlying a lot of neck pain conditions to you know, like patellar tracking disorders where the patella is actually just in the groove a little laterally, and it's causing a lot of friction. Well guess what's pulling it laterally? A tight muscle on the outside of your leg. And so that's a muscle imbalance just zoomed in to the knee and so that it's that same pattern of multiple monitors that were just generally improving. And yeah, it does tend to make people feel better and other areas that they didn't really expect.

Philip Pape 52:38

Another another good reason we call it the core right? core of everything. All right. So I there's a hard stop in about five minutes here. So I want to ask you the question I ask all guests, and that is, is there any question you wish I had past you? And what is your answer?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 52:53

Oh, man, that actually puts me on the spot because nothing that nothing's coming to me right now. No, I can't really think you covered a lot. And I thought you had some really good questions. So I don't got anything for you there.

Philip Pape 53:12

That works. That works. All right, man. So where can people learn about your program and your work?

Dr. Ryan Peebles 53:18

So you can go to court balance training.com, you can go to YouTube and just search for balanced training. We're all the same names on Instagram, Facebook, whatever. But I think the best resource that I can recommend anybody is the master class, I just took all the most kind of valuable information that I could and I tried to pack it into the smallest video possible. So it's 15 minutes. That explains explains with illustrations. What I was talking about, you know, the underlying muscle imbalances that often lead to chronic lower back pain, and then the solution that that I believe, is the best way to long term address this muscle imbalance and get get back to doing an active lifestyle.

Philip Pape 54:13

Awesome. I will add all those in the show notes. And your approach is refreshing and makes a lot of sense to me. Always looking for solutions to this because it is so prevalent, and I really appreciate you coming on the show, man.

Dr. Ryan Peebles 54:24

Yeah. Thanks for having me. Philip really appreciated. And I look forward to checking out more episodes of your podcast.

Philip Pape 54:31

Yeah, man. Check it out. All right. Thanks for coming on.

Dr. Ryan Peebles 54:33

All right, you're welcome.

Philip Pape 54:37

Philip Pape 7/18/23 Philip Pape 7/18/23

Ep 88: Break the Cycle of Body Fat Overshooting for a Stronger, Leaner, and Healthier Physique

Today we are diving into body fat overshooting, which is potentially the most important phenomenon to understand when it comes to body composition in the context of manipulating your nutrition. If you’ve tried many diets over the years with little success, feel like your metabolism is slowing down, or struggle to maintain your weight for the long term, this episode is for you. We'll go over the role of hormones, appetite, and muscle, why 95% of people regain weight, and how to be in the 5% who are successful so you can have not only a leaner physique but a long-term, sustainable approach to maintaining your hard-won results.

Today, for episode 88, titled “Break the Cycle of Body Fat Overshooting for a Stronger, Leaner, and Healthier Physique,” we are diving into body fat overshooting, which is potentially the most important phenomenon to understand when it comes to body composition in the context of manipulating your nutrition. If you’ve tried many diets over the years with little success, feel like your metabolism is slowing down, or struggle to maintain your weight for the long term, this episode is for you.

We'll go over the role of hormones, appetite, and muscle, why 95% of people regain weight, and how to be in the 5% who are successful so you can have not only a leaner physique but a long-term, sustainable approach to maintaining your hard-won results.

Now let’s dive into today’s topic: body fat overshooting.

__________
Book a FREE 30-minute call with Philip here.
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Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:05] The significance of body fat overshooting
[6:04] What is body fat overshooting
[7:40] What is hyperphagia
[8:36] What is fat cell hyperplasia
[10:20] Why strength training is essential to successful weight loss
[13:59] The value of strength training during weight gain
[14:34] Max thanks Philip for helping him prioritize his health and dropping 45 Lbs
[15:38] Protein intake and its significance for weight loss
[19:42] Sustainable approach to weight loss or diet based on your lifestyle
[26:51] Outro

Episode resources:

MacroFactor food logging app (or download from your app store and use code WITSANDWEIGHTS to extend free trial)

FREE 30-minute results breakthrough session with Philip ⬇️

https://witsandweights.com/free-call

Learn about 1-on-1 coaching ⬇️
https://witsandweights.com/coaching

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Transcript

Philip Pape 00:00

During weight loss, if you are not strength training, you are going to lose muscle period and it could be very high it could be as high as half half of the tissue you lose could be muscle, I want to iterate this fat. Very clearly if you lose 20 pounds 10 of those could be muscle. Then when you gain 20 pounds back, almost 20 of them are fat. Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry so you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in Wits & Weights community Welcome to another solo episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. I hope you enjoyed our last episode 87 with Ashton love Eric, where we talked about the power of leaning into the future, embracing your future self and becoming an alpha in order to win in fitness and in life. Today for episode 88 titled break the cycle of body fat overshooting for a stronger, leaner and healthier physique. We are diving into the topic of body fat overshooting, which is potentially the most important phenomenon to understand when it comes to how your body changes during fat loss to body composition in the context of manipulating your nutrition. If you've tried lots of diets over the years are a yo yo diets with little success, or you feel like your metabolism is slowing down. Or you've struggled to maintain your weight for the long term. This episode is for you. We'll go over the role of hormones appetite and muscle, why 95% of people regain the weight and then some and how to be in the 5% who are successful. So you can have not only that leaner physique, but also a long term sustainable approach to maintaining your hard won results. Now let's dive into the topic today, which is body fat overshooting? And I want to start by talking about its relevance, like why do we care about this? What is it? I think this topic has significant implications for weight management, for body composition and for health. And these are all tied together. And I think a lot of people don't understand how this works or that it even happens. Okay? It's it touches everyone who embarks on a weight loss journey, fat loss, body comp, whatever. And so it's crucial if you're, you know, care about your investment, your fitness and your health. Talking about weight management, right? It is not uncommon for people who lose weight, especially when they do it through yo yo diets or crash diets or some sort of drastic restriction, cutting whatever to regain it back. And often more than that, and we're talking about staggering numbers, 95% of people gain it back within five years period. This is just shown time and again. And the compounding factor here is that most of this weight gain is predominantly fat, more fat than you lost when you lost the weight because what you're losing when you lose weight is not just fat, but also muscle unless you do the things we talk about later on in this episode, but we need to understand why this happens. Okay. So this creates a cyclical pattern of weight loss and regain that we often talk we often call yo yo dieting, but it's not just that you're going down and up in weight, you are losing muscle on the way down, and then you're gaining fat on the way up. And so your body composition is getting worse and worse, you're you're getting effectively fatter over time, even if the weight on the scale didn't change. And that is not good for your health. So if we understand this, we can optimize our body composition. Because when we lose weight, we want most of that to come from fat rather than muscle. And then the opposite. When we regain weight, we want that most of that to come in form of muscle with just a little bit of fat along for the ride. And so we can strategize our diet and training in favor of muscle maintenance and muscle growth. And that is the crux of everything we talked about. This is why I care so much about strength training and adding that muscle building stimulus because it affects everything. When we talk about nutrition, we can't talk about it in a vacuum, we can't talk about it without the the muscle building to go along with it. And that's what we'll we're going to talk about. metabolic health also is impacted. When you gain back your loss weight primarily as fat. We're talking about reduced insulin sensitivity, increased blood pressure, negative blood lipid profiles. This is important, folks, because what this means is you don't just have to become very overweight, to have these problems occur. And if you've noticed with age that some of your blood markers have declined and you haven't really gained much on the scale. This could be why because of the additional body fat that you're carrying relative to muscle. The other thing is we talk about sustainability all the time sustainable health practices in nutrition, the strategies that are required to properly counteract body fat overshooting, which is a gradual, sustainable approach to fat loss and healthy lifestyle changes, we'll say, will mitigate that, but also give you the habits and routines you need. For any fitness goals you have going forward related to body composition. This is why I keep saying this is maybe the most important thing to understand. And then everything you do with your nutrition and your training are going to affect this. So this is really about empowering you to make the choices. And that allow you to control this machine that is our body, our biological machine, being able to turn the dials to crank it up and to control how we how we look and feel. Okay, so this goes beyond aesthetics. This goes beyond health, it also affects our I mean, goes beyond weight, I should say it also affects your health. And so I don't think it affects everyone. All right. So that's why we care. As far as what it is, okay, let's, let's go a little bit of deep dive into this today. The concept is if you lose a significant amount of weight, and then you go back to your pre dieting habits, which guess what everybody does, like 95% of people do that, you're likely to regain more than you initially lost. And one of the critical factors here is your body's what we call homeostatic mechanism, this is what tries to get you back to its setpoint. And everybody has these these kind of ranges of set points. When you go on a keto diet and you cut a bunch of carbs, you lose a bunch of weight. Yeah, I lost 40 pounds in like two months, all of a sudden, then what happens? Are you able to eat that way for the rest of your life? Chances are very, very likely almost certainly not. You go back to what you read him before, but then you end up gaining weight faster and just mostly fat. Okay. The second thing is adaptive thermogenesis, right metabolic adaptation. As you lose weight, your metabolism goes down. It's conserving energy. It's regulating hormones. We know about this, we talked about this a lot. But the problem is when you're not closely tracking this, and you're not quite aware that this is happening, which people who are crash dieting are usually not tracking their calories and aware of what their expenditure is usually, when you don't know that guess what, when you go back to when the diet is, quote, unquote, over, you're like, Okay, now I'm just gonna sustain my weight. Well, your metabolism has declined, and you don't realize that and so you're actually on a lower amount of energy intake than you were before. And then you might start overeating, not realizing that that's happening. Another interesting thing is called hyperphagia hy perp H AGI is a Greek spelling hyperphagia. So when you have a prolonged period of caloric restriction, there is I believe hyperphagia is tied to the muscle loss that occurs during that diet when you're not strength training. And it creates a very ravenous sensation of hunger, much more than you would have just from metabolic adaptation. And then, and this is kind of your body saying, like, Hey, I am like breaking down all sorts of tissue here, you've got me deprived of energy for a long time, I just need to get whatever I can get my hands on salt, sugar, fat, doesn't matter. Give it to me. And this results in overeating and weight gain contributing to the overshooting you know, you just crave. And you binge and you go back to it, and you're just, you know, or software you started.

Philip Pape 08:37

Another thing, it's a very similar word, but it's different. It's called hyperplasia, and this is related to your fat cells. And this is not something we want to have happen. If you go through an extreme weight loss phase right beyond the limits crash dieting, what have you, you can stimulate the production of brand new fat cells, that's fat cell hyperplasia. Normally, when you gain weight, you you fill up your fat cells, when you lose weight, they shrink. But if you lose too quickly, your body says, oh, no, we don't have enough energy storage, devices, units, whatever. And it increases your out of out of sight tissue, okay? Which will never go away. And I'm not saying this to scare you, but it just, it will never go away. So you're going to have a slightly harder time in the future. Maintaining weight loss, not saying it's not going to happen, because many people have gone through this and have been perfectly successful at the other side. Hormones, right? We know that the metabolic adaptation also affects the or dieting and being in a deficit affects your hormones that regulate Well, everything but especially your appetite and your fat storage. So leptin, ghrelin, insulin, cortisol right? Leptin goes down, because the fat cells are saying that we're shrinking we don't have as much energy so please, you need to eat tells your brain you need to eat so your hunger goes up and not also potentially leads to overeating. Ghrelin, which is the hunger hormone also goes up. All important things to understand. So we have a common theme here, and it has to do with you've, you've done something in an extreme, and now your body wants to fight back, and you're kind of going to pay for it. If you you know, continue down that road. During weight loss, if you are not strength training, you are going to lose muscle period, and it could be very high, it could be as high as half, half of the tissue you lose could be muscle, I want to iterate this fact, very clearly, if you lose 20 pounds, 10 of those could be muscle, then when you gain the 20 pounds back, almost 20 of them are fat, what have you just done, you've worsened your body fat percentage, and that muscle never comes back, unless you do start strength training to build the muscle back, which is a lot harder than then then manipulating fat, okay. So then when you gain the weight, you gain fat, when you lose, you lose muscle over and over again. And this shifts your body composition in the negative direction. Okay. According to a literature review by men at all, in 2007, the majority, the vast majority of people regain their weight within five years of their initial loss. And that's a statistic I was mentioned before, I think it's around 95%, whatever it is, it's extremely high. So that leads us to what do we do about it, and it really comes down to it comes down to several things. But the two most important are going to be strength, train, strength training, and protein intake, it really does come down to those two, those comprise 90% of it. You know, the other habits, we're going to talk about support your health, they support your ability to do these things. They support adherence. But strength training and protein are the two most important so why strength training, it provides a muscle building stimulus. You're a human being walking on this earth. This is what I the way I like to look at it, I'm walking around here, I am recording this right before I go in for surgery. And I know how important strength training is. And one of the reasons I wanted to record this episode is because I have, I'm not going to be able to give myself that stimulus for the next few weeks while I'm recovering. Although I'm going to try to find creative ways to do it regardless around the you know, outside of the affected shoulder, which is where I'm having the surgery, see if I can work out other muscles on my body. But I'm not going to have that I'm really going to miss that because I know how valued is as a human being to be strong and capable, to be able to move things around and be able to help people to get off your seat, to be active to play with your kids to do all the things that we want to do all the way into old age, you know, to the day we die, we want to be strong. And we also know that strength and muscle are associated with countless health effects, you know positive correlations with health. Muscle is medicine. It's a sink for glucose, it burns more calories on and on and on. But for the purposes of body fat overshooting, why do we care about strength training, it's simply because as you are losing weight, sending a signal to your body that muscles important means your body is going to shuttled resources like protein toward rebuilding that lean tissue. Instead of instead of allowing it to atrophy. It's kind of the way I like to put it. So a sedentary person who is not strength training, they go on a diet, they have fewer calories coming in, well, your body has a few different options, it can say, Well, I'm gonna go ahead and rebuild your muscle tissue. But now I'm lacking calories for all these other things like my hormones, no, it's not going to do that. It's gonna say you're not using that muscle and that's very metabolically expensive, we're gonna let that atrophy and that's fewer calories now that we have to use from the food coming in for that the rest can then go for toward the you know, hormones and other metabolic processes. That's awful. That's awful. That means you're just like wasting away your muscles every time you lose weight when you're not strength training. So the remedy to that is to strength train, to minimize metabolic slowdown, and all the other benefits that come with that, okay, and then when you gain weight, of course, you want to be strength training as well because now you're gonna gain a significant portion of that as muscle. So you're doing exactly the opposite of body fat overshooting. And that is the whole point. The whole point is that you want to lift heavy weights, progressive overload, heavier and heavier over time. So your body continues to adapt and wants to hold on to that very expensive muscle tissue. And then you become a fat burning calorie inefficient machine which is exactly what we want.

14:34

That's a Philippe an awfully for a long time and know how passionate he is about healthy eating and body strength. And that's why I'm choosing to be my coach. I was no stranger to a dieting and body training. But I've always struggled to do it sustainably really helped me prioritize my goals with evidence based recommendations on not over stressing my body and not feeling like I'm starving. In six months I lost 40 Five pounds without drastically changing the foods I enjoy. Now I have a more balanced diet, I weight train consistently. And most importantly, I do it sustainably if a scientifically sound, healthy diet and a Langstrom body is what you're looking for. Philip Pape is your guy

Philip Pape 15:19

if you can't train, so this is my example where I'm going to have surgery rehab, I would still want to walk a lot, keep my energy flux high, keep my protein high, you know, eat at maintenance, and then do as many other forms of activities, I'm reasonably able to, to tell my muscles that they're important and that I love them. Okay, so the other thing is protein intake should be obvious. If you follow my stuff at all. Or if you care about strength training, that protein kind of goes along for the ride. But guess what, even if you're not strength training, even if you're sedentary, and I don't encourage anybody to be sedentary, but still, having high, much higher protein is going to be more beneficial than not, it's still going to preserve lean mass, during weight loss, it's still going to help you even maybe build a tiny bit of muscle during weight gain, even if you're sedentary, but we don't want to be sedentary, we want to be strength training, we combine that with a sufficient intake of protein, anywhere from point, you know, point eight to 1.2 grams per pound, right? More is better during fat loss. But it's also harder because you only have so many calories to work with. So I'm okay with being flexible, right, that's the whole point here is being flexible within that range. And by doing that, when you lose that 20 pounds, something like you know, 1819 of it will probably be muscle fat for for at least a newer lifter. And oddly, not oddly, but interestingly, if you're brand new to lifting, you can have some of that body recomp we talk about, even potentially, while you're losing weight, not much, but you might, the point is you're not going to lose a bunch of muscle. And that's what we're trying to avoid. When you recover your weight when you're coming back out of a diet or when you're gaining weight intentionally. Or even when you're at maintenance, you want to be lifting as well, of course, because that's going to help you build muscle and reduce fat accumulation. All right, there are plenty of diet, there are plenty of studies out there, that show that a high protein diet has is really supportive of weight management and body composition for a number of reasons. The big reasons we like to talk about are number one, it's helps with fullness more than the other macros. Number two, I like to talk about protein in the context of the grocery store, when you go shop for food. And I if I tell you, you need a lot of protein, go shop for your groceries for meal prep, you're going to have to stick to the outside of the grocery store. For the most part, we're talking animals and plant sources, you know, meats, dairy, eggs, grains, beans, all those things, because it's very hard to find a lot of protein in processed foods. I mean, yeah, you could eat protein bars all day, nobody's going to do that. And so a high protein diet tends to crowd out less probably overly processed foods, which is nice. It's a nice side effect. And then what's the other thing, it also has a slightly higher thermic effect of feeding. So it costs a little more to digest than the others. It's a minor effect, but it's nice to know. Okay, so how do you get enough protein that's a whole topic in and of itself. But it really comes down to meal planning, right meal timing, so having enough meals to get enough protein, something like four or five for most people, and then planning ahead. And the way I like to do that is whatever food logging app you're using, in my case, it's macro factor. I will have my clients look to previous successful day and a previous maybe not as successful day and diagnose them and say, Okay, on a successful day, here's how I got my protein, right, I made sure to have it every time or I made sure to have protein for breakfast, which on the less successful day, maybe I skipped it. On the less successful day I only ate three times instead of four or five, right? Little little things like that. And if you haven't had a success with it yet, then plan ahead for the next day and pretend that it's the quote unquote perfect day. And what would that look like? Right? And then the to go along with this you have to have a good understanding of all the different foods that are high in protein. And beyond the obvious of the meats, eggs, dairy, it's okay, when we take dairy. What are the options for dairy? Well, if you had something like cottage cheese, you could have full fat cottage cheese, we could also have 2% cottage cheese and when you look at the macros they they're different ratios. So that's just my practical tips on on protein intake. Um, so when we put all this together, we also have to consider the fact that when people want to go on a diet when they want to lose fat, lose weight go into deficit, we have to have a sustainable approach here. Okay. And it starts with understanding the evidence supported range of rate or loss and I just Want to remind everyone of that? Okay, when you crashed, I did that one time on on the carnivore diet and lost 40 pounds in two months. That's not necessarily good thing. For several reasons, one, it probably led to some level of body fat overshooting because it was too fast for you just lost some muscle and then you gain some fat. And number two, it's not sustainable. Like those are the big reasons. So the evidence says that if you want to lose fat and minimize muscle loss, during fat loss, you want to lose between a quarter to 1% of your body weight per week. So 1% of your body weight because weight is the max, okay, unless other than corner cases, like athletes who are very lean, or people who are doing mini cuts or into bodybuilding, things like that, that is the max you want to go. So if you weighed 200 pounds, no more than two pounds a week, if you go more than that you're going to risk losing muscle. Similarly, when you gain weight, you want to go between, say, point one and a quarter percent a week, or you risk gaining more fat. Now that is a little bit less of a problem. Because if assuming you're doing this, for the purposes of building muscle and your strength training, if you want to push it a little harder at the risk of getting more fat, because you might be a high responder to muscle, you know, that's your choice to make knowing that you'll just have a little extra fat to lose in the in the fat loss phase later on. But when you're doing all the things, that's okay, you know, you're in control of that, and you can do that. So, you know, it really depends on individual preferences and what you're going for. So being within the evidence supported range is going to avoid this problem. Having a high protein of you know, point A to 1.2 grams per pound. Now this number may sound different than another range, I've used often, which is point seven to 1.7 to one is like the the range most people want to be within most of the time, the point eight to 1.2 is more what I recommend, and 1.2 is more when you're losing fat, if you really want to hold on to that muscle, that's going to be hard for people that don't have a lot of calories to work with. So around one or even as low as point eight is fine. Okay, then heavy lifting heavy lifting three to five days a week period, we got to lift heavy with progressive overload. You know, barbells are your friend in this in this regard. But if you haven't gotten up to barbells, yet, you don't have them what have you, and you're working your way there. You know, dumbbells and machines and even bands and bodyweight could work a lot of variety. But eventually you got to work your way up to a much heavier loads, which generally requires barbells cardio, okay, I didn't address it yet. But we want to use cardio. Strategically, cardio is great for heart health, and a little bit of extra calorie burn. But it shouldn't be the main way that you lose fat. That's what strength training is for and manipulating your diet, cardio should be used very strategically in a very limited way for its intended purpose. And that isn't to lose fat, but that is for heart health, for overall athleticism, if you will, and also for a little bit of extra expenditure, if you need it. Okay, tracking and measuring as much as you can, will be helpful here.

Philip Pape 23:09

So not just your scale weight, but also your body circumference measurements, your strength, right, because if you're losing fat, we want to make sure we're not losing our gains in the gym. Too too quickly, at least sometimes you'll plateau or you'll regress a little bit just inevitably. But we don't want it to drop off too much. So we want to track and measure what as much as we're able to, to be able to adjust. Be creative, right? have backup plans ready to go things like refeeds and diet breaks, right? You don't have to do everything 100% All the way exactly day to day like you originally planned the plan can change but have a plan for how your plan changes is my point always have that backup plan ready to go. Don't artificially restrict by now you should know this that like when we talk about flexible dieting, we are not talking about good and bad foods, clean, dirty foods. We're not talking about cutting out carbs. We're not about any of that. Okay, we are talking about taking a choice based additive nutritional approach, where you add in the things you need to serve your goals while still enjoying your lifestyle. Okay, and that's why we use flexible dieting and track things like calories and macros because those are nice targets we can aim for, but still choose the foods we want to choose including the indulgences that we occasionally enjoy. Last thing, reach out for help. This could be someone close to you that you live with family or friend who's supportive. It could be a community like our Facebook group, please check that out because we have a lot of great folks who are constantly chiming in with really helpful advice for people who have questions. I do a weekly live where I asked your answer your specific questions. We do trainings all the time that are free it's totally free Wits & Weights Facebook group, you can go in and definitely you know level up your progress that way or get a coach definitely something I do I help people all the time, get through this process very effectively, very efficiently very easily, with as few mistakes as possible. Because I've been there done that, and I can help you along the way. All of those are great ideas. To recap, body fat, overshooting is important to understand potentially the most important thing to understand because of its impact on your body composition and your health. Without a muscle building signal or sufficient protein, you will lose muscle during weight loss, and you will gain mostly fat during weight gain. We want to do the opposite by lifting, eating your protein, losing and gaining at an appropriate rate and doing all of this in a sustainable way based on your preferences and lifestyle. And if you need help developing a more personalized strategy, based on what we talked about today, you know how to reach me, click the link in my show notes. For a free results breakthrough session. This is a free 30 minute call with me, where we map out exactly how to get where you want to go with all the steps to get there. I don't hide any information from you. I'm all about education. And I don't do any selling on this call. So click the link in my show notes. Let's figure this out together. Look for the results breakthrough session the free call next week for episode 89. It's an interview with Ryan Peebles where we talk about lower back pain, how to reverse it through movement, how to recover from lower back pain injuries, prevent them and improve your back health. Whatever app that you are using right now to listen to this podcast. Please pause and make sure to follow or subscribe to Wits & Weights, this would be doing me a huge favor, you will first of all by subscribing you're not going to miss future episodes they'll download automatically, and it actually helps us in the rankings. Okay, reviews are great. I love reviews. But following and subscribing actually helps us in the rankings so people can more easily find the show. Alright, I hope you enjoyed learning about body fat overshooting today. And as always, stay strong. And I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits & Weights podcast. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits & Weights. If you found value in today's episode, and know someone else who's looking to level up their Wits & Weights, please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the Follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong

Philip Pape 7/14/23 Philip Pape 7/14/23

Ep 87: How to Achieve Anything in Fitness and Life by Leaning Into the Future with Ashton Levarek

Today we're diving into the power of leaning into the future, embracing your future self, and becoming an alpha in order to win in life with my guest, Ashton Levarek.

Ashton will reveal the importance of reframing our memories and interpretations, using positive visualization, and how to measure progress toward becoming our ideal selves. We’ll also explore the concept of being an alpha and its impact on our lives.

Ashton is a retired Air Force Special Warfare Pararescue Jumper with over 14 combat deployments and has a bachelor’s degree in Sports, Health, and Science. He is a managing partner for Valkere Investment Group and has over $90 million in real estate under management. He also hosts The Art of Winning Podcast.

Ashton is passionate about living his best life and helping others do the same, and providing a financial platform that allows people the freedom to pursue their true passions and full potential.
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Book a FREE 30-minute call with Philip here.
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Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:31] Ashton's past experiences and how they shaped his approach to winning in life
[6:40] The problem of living in the past and how it can hold us back from making progress
[10:25] The value of our past experiences and how they can help us improve and grow
[14:20] Measuring and tracking progress towards becoming our future self and adjusting strategies as needed
[18:55] High performers who identify with their future selves and constantly strive for personal growth
[26:56] Lisa credits Philip's coaching for her 17-lb weight loss and gives him a grateful shout-out
[27:40] Reframing interpretations of memories and their significance to our present selves
[31:20] Principles for sustainable and long-lasting personal growth
[32:40] Developing mental resilience when faced with failures
[35:01] Utilizing visualization techniques to counteract negative thoughts and envision a better reality
[42:10] Approaches to talking to and engaging with our future selves
[47:17] Identifying and addressing the gaps between our present and future selves
[52:55] Being an alpha and its importance in living a fulfilling life
[55:05] What question did Ashton wish Philip asked
[56:51] Where can we learn more about Ashton
[57:28] Outro

Episode resources:

Ashton's website: www.valkeregroup.com

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Learn about 1-on-1 coaching ⬇️
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Transcript

Ashton Levarek 00:00

So that's what I'm saying. So if you can be conscious about what you're priming your mind with, and this just goes back to what do you want, I want to be happy. I want to be wealthy. I want to feel good. I want to have love, you're gonna find that you're gonna find that in the people. You're gonna walk through a crowd of negative people and only find the good one happy person.

Philip Pape 00:17

Ashton Levarek 02:07

Thank you so much. That was awesome intro. I appreciate it.

Philip Pape 02:11

Well deserved, man. Yeah, we want to set you up for the audience. They know who you are. And kind of digging into that a little bit. Combat in the Air Force, entrepreneurship, podcasting, you've definitely had your share of high pressure, maybe high stress situations. And ironically, we're gonna get into how our past potentially holds us back. But how has your past your experience in the military and beyond shaped your approach to winning in life?

Ashton Levarek 02:37

Yeah, um, you know, I've always been that kind of that guy that wanted to be challenged. I always look for the challenge. I was the first guy that anytime we were snowboarding, I was the first guy to jump anytime, you know, off the cliff or whatever, we're when we're swimming, same thing. Like, I was always, I don't I'm not sure why that happened. Maybe it was because I had, I was the firstborn. And I'm very competitive. And I always trying to get back in the spotlight. That's what child psychology tells you, right?

Philip Pape 03:08

Never know why we do these things. It wasn't jumping out of parachutes. And I was the firstborn. So who knows?

Ashton Levarek 03:13

Yeah, I don't know. I mean, that's what I've heard. But anyway, that's, that's kind of how it started. And I was just never into school. When I was in school, and it was kind of like a, you know, what's the next adventure because I know, I'm not gonna go to college. This is not, it's just not working. I barely, it wasn't that I was bad at school wasn't that I was not smart. It was just, I was not motivated to go continue classes. And I wanted to be challenged. And so going in the Air Force, the military. It kind of just seemed natural for me, right. And so that's how I went into that. And then, you know, you kind of get into you build up that momentum in your life, right. And I think that's important too. Because there's that saying, you know, be careful where you're headed, you're likely to end up where you're going. And if you see, you know, these these things come up over and over and you don't like it, man, that's your sign. And you change your mind, change your body, change your lifestyle, whatever to get what you want out of life. And I actually really enjoyed where I was going. And so it made sense to me. I just kept pushing on and you know, I don't know if you want, like, I'm not trying to get metaphysical but things happened. And it just kept leading me on this bigger and bigger adventure, both into business as well as in the military.

Philip Pape 04:29

So yeah, man, we can nerd out on metaphysics on philosophy, whatever you want here. I love it all. And I always tell people I self select my audience, they don't like it. They tune out if they do they keep following so I mean, you said something interesting there that Be careful where you're headed, right? You might not like when you're going and oh, man, there's a lot there. Right because it also implies that there's a lot of people probably just sitting on their ass complacent with life. And they if they really just took a moment to think about it, they would know where this is going or maybe not go going anywhere, let's be honest. Yeah. And what would you say to that person or our what kind of exercise to kind of, you know, give you that spark so that you can make that change?

Ashton Levarek 05:11

I heard a quote once and I think it's great. I'm gonna butcher it, but it's like, if nothing could go wrong. What would you like your life to be? You know, where would you like to end up? There's another one I heard Joe Rogan. This one's even even better, I think is if your life was a movie, and you were the main character in that movie, you were the hero of that movie. What would your hero do? Right, go do that. Right. And I tell people all the time, when we have these conversations, I'm just like, check us on here.

Philip Pape 05:41

You go for it. I'll check them explicit box. I'll go.

Ashton Levarek 05:45

I like, here's and I like to cuss because I think it adds drama to it. Like, what the fuck do you want out of life? Like, what do you really want? Right? As Jordan Peterson says, like, this life is gonna kill you. One way or another? It's gonna get you. So what are you waiting for? Go after it. You know? For sure.

Philip Pape 06:02

Yeah, yeah, we were we were talking about my friend Carl. offline. And he's he he also says something similar that you know what you're not doing? Like, what is it? You're not doing that? You know, you need to do? It's kind of related to that. Yeah. So okay, so we had this conversation by email about, and also you covered it in the podcast episode that came out the day we're recording this. So this is May 12. So folks, check out Ashton's podcast and go look at that episode, how living in the past can hold us back, right? How can hold us back from making progress in life, that we often say our current cells are the culmination of our experiences. But here's, here's what you said in the email to me, quote, these experiences that we rely on to tell us who we are. And what we are capable, capable of only exists as memories in our mind, we can see that our present selves is limited by our interpretation of our memories of the past. If we got amnesia today and could not remember our past, would we no longer be scared of spiders apprehensive when it comes to making huge financial decisions, joining the gym, etc. So let's dig into that a bit. Why is this a problem? Like why why don't we want that context of the past? Or is it really just the asymmetrical part of living in the past? The negatives of the past?

Ashton Levarek 07:14

Yeah, I think it is your interpretation, right? Because the past and the future, both just exist in your mind, I don't care where you are in your life. But for some reason, we give a lot more weight to what happened to us in the past than we do to what could happen in the future. Right. And we make decisions off that, oh, I can never do that. I can never do that. I'm not like that guy. Well, you could be like that, right? You could, I could never make that much money, I could never lose that much weight, I can never, you know, get that job. Like we have the subconscious. It's the script. For our mind, it's the script for our life even. And we don't even know it. Because we, for some reason, we slip out of we talk to ourselves, in our mind, but we don't even consciously we're not even conscious of that at times, and it becomes so repetitive. That you just take it as a fact. But as wise people have often said like a belief is just a thought you keep thinking and you can change beliefs, these can be changed. And so what I'm kind of what I was alluding to, in that that email when when I was discussing that, and then of course on the podcast, who is just like, Well, for one, why do we wait, you know, give so much weight to what happened in the past, when there's so much more potential in the future, you may not be able to change the past, but you can change your interpretation. So they say there's two types of mindsets, right? There's a growth mindset and a fixed mindset. A growth mindset says I can learn from this. The fixed mindset says this is that's all it'll ever be. You can you see those people? They tell you their story over and over? Oh, yeah, it was terrible. I lost all my money. And that's why I would never do that. Like I'm in real estate invest in real estate. So I hear that all the time. Like, oh, yeah, 2008 was terrible. I would never buy real estate. Like, you know, how many millionaires were created in 2008? Because they bought when everybody else was selling. So like, it's how you interpret the information. But the easiest way to get past that is to look into the future. What do you want the future to hold? And give more weight to that? Obviously, you can, if you really wanted to go to you know, like, this is how psychologists work, right? You go to a psychologist and they analyze your past all everything that's happened, you can help you reinterpret it. You can do that yourself too. But you could also just look into the future. What do I want out of life? And if others have done it, why can't I?

Philip Pape 09:38

Yeah, and it seems that that looking into that. So if you are kind of stuck in that pattern, that mental pattern of the past, we know that some changing how you think can be can be a step, a larger step for someone than it could be for others potentially, from what they've gone through and taking a step into the future and building that momentum then could lead to your reentry. reputation of the past. I mean, do you agree with that statement? Cuz I that's what I'm thinking. When I think for example, a skill like public speaking that I would have labeled myself in the past as an introvert, like that is the memory of what I was back then. Right? Yeah. And I it, it didn't matter because it was holding me back. But then when I said, Okay, I need to get those skills, I need to join Toastmasters, I need to put myself out there with all the things that I'm afraid of, and do them. In hindsight, I realized that I needed that, you know, understanding of who I was to push me into action to the future. So I don't know where I'm going with this from a question to ask because we said we'd get metaphysical but like, where are we on all that continuum? And maybe practically, somebody listening? Who's mired in those thoughts? What's one thing they can do right now to move that needle forward?

Ashton Levarek 10:45

Oh, yeah, no, I love that. Okay. So here's, here's something that I love this, I wish I had a whiteboard or something, but it's like you have where you are right now you have your potential for people that are watching us, it looks like a box. So you have what you think you are what you think you can do, that's one corner. And then according to what you think you can do, where you are in life, all that what you deserve, even like, because a lot of times that is part of that we don't think we are capable of or deserve that job. So we don't go after it or that person or whatever, right? Anyway, so you're in that corner, and then you take action, which leads you to the opposite corner, right? And that in that corner, you take action. And then you get the feedback. So if you drop down, you can look at a circle or a box, I like a box, because the every corner is a point, you come down to the bottom corner, it's like you take action, you learn from that action. And as you learn, you change your potential and it just keeps going around, right you change the idea of what you're capable of. You take action with that, you learn from that you adjust what you think your potential you're capable of, and it just keeps going around and around. And so where I'm going with that is when people let's say you live this life where you're actually I don't even know I don't want to, like, maybe you're in this, you're in a box right now. And you feel like there's nowhere else to go. Right? One of the coolest methods I've found is physical. Because if you take action, it changes your paradigm, right? Go to the gym, lift a couple of ways. Go for a run like these things, getting the body moving in doing something you've never done before, right? Or something harder than you've ever done before. Or more challenging in some way or another. It could be mentally it could be physically it could be emotionally, like all of a sudden you're changing your paradigm, which is that top corner we started in, that's your paradigm, right? That's your, your framework for which you approach life. And when you change that, your potential changes and you're able to take more action learn from that actually keeps going and going. I'll tell you a quick story. This was really interesting to me, my mom, a very strong lady entrepreneur, you know, when she was a flight attendant started her own business very strong. My dad and her split and she took it really hard. And something happened where she's like, Screw it, I'm just gonna go to Tahiti, her my my little brother, they went to Tahiti. And next thing you know, she's that was the first step. And then she's got her scuba diver license. Now she's diving with sharks. Now she's living this, this, I don't know, Eat, Pray, Love kind of lifestyle. We're traveling and doing these amazing things that not that her marriage was holding her back from any of that. But it shifted her mindset, like, Divorce isn't a terrible thing. And now she's living this free, amazing life where she's doing a lot of this stuff, but it was a paradigm shift of what she's capable of, you know, and, and a lot of that had to do with it. She had to take that physical step first, obviously, which opened up that door to so much more and learning and growing as a person, right.

Philip Pape 13:48

Yeah, I mean that this is ostensibly a health and fitness podcast, I liked that you went there, right? Because I just interviewed someone who talked about upward spiraling and how the science is showing us the physiological link between taking some physical action, usually about 20 minutes a day of like, medium intensity movement of some kind, in affecting your neurotransmitters, right and your nervous system. And actually then spiralling other things, improving your mood, improving energy. So like, just to link it to science a little bit. There's, there's a reality to this, but the way you framed it. So here's the way I always I always thought of it as a feedback loop. Where you get the feedback, you improve, and you keep you go to the next step. But you just amplify that with the idea that the person you are and your potential and your paradigm shifts, it gets bigger moves. And that actually makes it easier to move forward to the next thing. And when you look in the mirror like wow, I've come a long way since I started. That's awesome, man. I mean, just taking that radical action or not even radical action, a simple action that's different to get you out. Yeah.

Ashton Levarek 14:49

Yeah. And I don't even know the first step that led my mom to think I should go to ged either could have been something even small. It's just going for a hike or something. I don't know. But you know what I think is yeah, what I think is interesting though, if you look at children, children are are some of the best. You know, they give us some of the best lessons if you really watch. They don't have any apprehensions. They just see other people around them doing it, right. Because in their first few years of life, it's just grown up. And they're like these guys are walking. Which imagine the paradigm shift. Yeah, that's like a thing hanging out with birds and be like, Man, they're flying. And I should do that. Yeah. And they, the kids do that, right? Like, they're hanging out with these adults. And it's just like, oh, wow, he's standing on his two feet. And I'm going to do that and they crawl around. And then eventually, they're walking. And but as we get older, we get this baggage like, oh, yeah, in high school, I wasn't good at the mile run. So I can't go run and you know, like, Don't and dumb stuff. And we hold on to it for some reason. And that, that becomes our framework for life as we move forward. So,

Philip Pape 15:55

yeah, and then that that action, you know, the phrase messy action we sometimes talk about, I think even on today's show, you mentioned the difference between being impulsive and irresponsible, like with some big financial decision, where you just take some random risk without understanding the The facts are the consequences, and actually just moving forward and not holding yourself back. So I think that's the side we're living on here, where I see this all the time. Ashran, where you take action in one area, that's easy, and you don't think much about it. But because you did that it opens up some door to take an action somewhere else and somewhere else or somewhere else. So just doing more things, and being more involved, not to the point where you're stressed out, but you know, being out there and doing stuff. Like that's the way I look at it. It's a spiral.

Ashton Levarek 16:40

Yeah, I think it's a, you know, if you can adopt that mindset that there is no such thing as failure, there's only lessons, then it becomes even easier to shift paradigm mean faster. Yeah, there's a really cool study with entrepreneurs. And I got really into this because I'm, you know, I'm in the entrepreneur space, I'm in business. But it was like 90% of all first year entrepreneurs will fail or will fail in the first year. Right. And of those, a huge majority will not try again, they'll not start another business, which is sad, but of the ones that do. It was like 90 something percent are wildly successful.

Philip Pape 17:18

Because they learned from that first experience. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. In that.

Ashton Levarek 17:22

So So then it begs the question, right? And I love this one. How many failures? Are you away from massive success from your first million from your first 10 million? You know, how many failures? Are you away from that ideal lifestyle, that body that that relationship that? Whatever you're seeking, whatever you think you want in life? Like how many failures? Are you away from it? It could be one, it could be two could be 10.

Philip Pape 17:47

But it's just the Thomas Edison thinking. Yeah, right.

Ashton Levarek 17:51

What you I bet if you even if you knew it was 100, you might be pretty excited to get your first failure. He's like, I'm on my way.

Philip Pape 17:57

Yeah, you're on your way. It's a step on the way. Yeah. Yeah, I had someone on my show recently, Adrian Moreno talking about when he was trying to learn to sell and making sales calls and had like, 27 nose in a row. And 2728 was a yes. And he's like, if I had, if I just given up at 25 or 23, or whatever, you know, you wouldn't have seen that. I mean, it's a great message to just keep going and put in the reps. Also, while learning from that, right? Yeah, just doing the same thing over and over. If you don't learn it is a failure. Yeah, I mean, podcasts, things like that, right? You can you can relate to this, where you hear the data on podcasters, just to get in the top 10% You just have to keep going pretty much like, it doesn't even have to be a good podcast, just keep making it and you're gonna be the top 10% That's how many people give up. And then you know, the next 5% It's like, you know, you sit, sit around with more listeners, and then you start to the Challenge gets higher and higher, but your paradigm has shifted where like, Okay, I got this now I'm gonna go to the next level. Yeah. Okay, so you mentioned you also mentioned Arnold Schwarzenegger in your email, which I always love referencing him just cool guy. His autobiography is great, all his movies, he's still making them. And Earth Heroes is a fun guy. And one of my favorite quotes of his is, for me, life has continuously been hungry. The meaning of life is not simply to exist to survive, but to move ahead to go up to achieve to conquer. Right, and I guess that's aligned with the idea of identifying with your future self. You were talking about how high performers and successful individuals cultivate that mindset. Do you have examples that you'd like to share about that stories of, of high performers?

Ashton Levarek 19:38

Yeah, so you know, being in I'll tell you right now being in special operations, you get to work with a lot of cool people. We're talking people that are super motivated, super capable. But they also bring in a lot of different trainers and athletic performer you know, athletes and stuff to get their experience and help the it's become your essentially we used to joke Talk about it. We're we're professional athletes and special operations. It's just a little bit different. We're going overseas instead. Because you do you get a lot of that training, the psychological, the mental. And of course, the physical nowadays, he didn't used to be like that. But it is now and it's pretty cool. But, you know, we had some Olympic psychologists like Pete guys, that coach Olympians, and one of the things they were huge on was visualizations, which I thought was really interesting. And so they would have us do visualization reps. So for example, when we go to the range, you're you're training for every contingency when you're at the range shooting, right? So shooting with by yourself shooting with your team, maybe you have a malfunction, you pull your pistol, all that stuff. So you'd have guys do that. And then they would have us visualize it, some guys visualize it, and some guys just do it and you know, the speed at which you learn and adapt and, and become that person you're trying to become that very fast, very smooth. shooter was almost the same with the visualization and the the people that physically trained to write,

Philip Pape 21:13

Oh, okay. Okay. You're saying without having actually physically trained it, you've now gotten yourself to that level.

Ashton Levarek 21:19

And so that's what you're doing. You're projecting yourself into the future. You're, you're, you're visualizing what it would look like if you did it perfectly. Right. And, and they even man, I love Arnold Schwarzenegger, because he talks about this. The funny thing is, he used to think he used to imagine his muscles growing. Right? Which,

Philip Pape 21:38

from a pretty young age to which Yeah,

Ashton Levarek 21:41

and it's interesting, because you're starting to see the science back this up, right? Yeah, they did a study, it was like, they did just hand strength. They did. And I can't, I wish I could quote the guys, but they did hand strength. It was like just finger strength. So they had these, like, half the group, your finger exercise, and the other half just visualize doing finger exercises. And it was almost exactly the same in finger strength growth.

Philip Pape 22:06

That's insane, man. Yeah, that is insane.

Ashton Levarek 22:07

It is insane. Because, like how,

Philip Pape 22:10

how many? How often can I go to the gym and lift weights in my brain, you know?

Ashton Levarek 22:14

Well, so I don't know if you've listened to or have ever heard of Joe Dispenza. But I'm a huge fan of his stuff. He talks a lot about this stuff. how the body responds to thinking it's response to words, there's lots, there's some amazing studies that back this up. spontaneous remission, people are getting healed without, you know, when they should be dying. And then other people other things like the study where they took the water and they wrote bad words on it, and then good words on different water and like what the molecular structure looked like when they did that, like, word carries vibration, vibration, is what you are made up of every electron, a neutron proton in your body is a vibrating molecule, right? It's a vibrating energy. And sound and thought are energy. And so what when you think in a certain way, when you talk in a certain way, you are arranging your vibration in some some way, shape or form, right. And I think the more emotion that he says, the more that motion is with that, and goes with those words that goes with those thoughts, the faster the manifestation in the body. And so whether it's sickness, or happiness, or healing, or growth, or whatever that may be, right. So, I mean, the there, you want to talk metaphysical, like quantum physics is finding that our physical world responds to thought. I mean, that's as simple as it can get. And you are a lot more powerful than you think you are.

Philip Pape 23:47

Yeah, I'm open minded to this stuff, in the sense that I'm very rational and scientific about things. But I also understand there, maybe 95% of phenomena in existence, we don't understand and can't explain yet. And one day, in my mind, rational mind, we wouldn't be able to explain it. That's kind of the way I think of it, as opposed to just an unexplainable thing. If you think about lifting strength training, we know a lot. We know a lot about the body and its adaptation to stress on it, right. But we still don't quite know how, like, we really don't know, we, we can say this happens. And this happens. And this happens, right? Yeah. But, but we can't, you know, if we knew exactly how it worked, we would know to tell everybody exactly to do this. And we don't we just know, everybody's tried these things. This subset of those things has worked. So do those things. And there's some variants. And when you're talking about thought, I'm like, okay, when you when you adapt, and you get bigger muscles, for example, it's happening during your sleep, it's happening after the fact with your body responding to who knows, you know, chemicals, neural signals, muscle fibers, everything been activated, because you put the load on your back, but then that's happening independent of that. So like if you could think or do something to instigate all those things now There might be 50 things going on that I don't know of a mental exercise anybody's found yet that could like make you jacked without lifting weights. Yeah, but maybe one day. So that's Joe Dispenza. Is he? Is that that like the resource for practically learning how to try some of these things?

Ashton Levarek 25:17

Yes, some really amazing videos. He's got some really good books, the first book that comes to mind is you are the placebo. Okay. And he just talks about, a lot of that is about the placebo effect and how, I mean, I was a medic in the military and placebos work 60 to 80% of the time, which is as much if not more than most drugs, which is insane, right. And as you were talking, I just remembered another study. This one was cool, just correlating to health, nutrition. They gave I was like 100 participants, 50 of them got. Everybody got the same milkshake, but they didn't know that they told 50 of them that this was a very nutritious milkshake. And they were over there on the one side, and they told the other 50 that it was, you know, just an ice cream milkshake? Right?

Philip Pape 26:01

What they call it a slurry, don't they?

Ashton Levarek 26:04

Yeah. But the point is like, yeah, their bloods blood sugar spiked, and the people that thought it was just as a slurry or an ice cream sundae or whatever. Right? Whereas the other ones, they didn't have as much a dramatic effect. What's that about? You know?

Philip Pape 26:20

Yeah, you're right. Is that Is that the one where they tested like caught pre workout or into workout carbs? Or it's probably similar to that.

Ashton Levarek 26:26

Similar man. Definitely sounds similar. This one I heard. The one I understood was it was a shake, but

Philip Pape 26:30

okay. Yeah, no, there's a lot of weird. You're right. Placebo Effect. Of course, that's what a lot of what we're talking about is called and I'm going off on like, this complex way to describe it. But no, you're right. There's like studies where just tasting a sugar or a car. But even if you don't ingest any of it causes the effects of, you know, increased glycogen usage when your expression when you're lifting, whatever. So good stuff, man.

26:56

Hi, my name is Lisa. And I'd like to give big shout out to my nutrition coach development with his coaching, I have lost 17 pounds, he helped me identify the reason that I wanted to lose weight, and it's very simple longevity. I want to be healthy, active and independent. Until the day I die. He introduced me to this wonderful Apple macro factor, I got that part of my nutrition figured out along with that is the movement part of nutrition, there's a plan to it, and really helped me with that. The other thing he helped me with was knowing that I need to get a lot of steps in. So the more steps you have, the higher your expenditure is, and the easier it is to lose weight when it's presented to you like he presents it, it makes even more sense. And the other thing that he had was a hunker guide. And that really helped me so thank you below.

Philip Pape 27:40

What are we going next on this? So I was thinking about the how we interpret memories, because that's one thing you mentioned. And then we give them that significance with our present self. And he talked about reframing. So how do we reframe them?

Ashton Levarek 27:54

How do we reframe our memories? Yeah, yeah. Well, I think I think it's important to well, you have to be clear about what you want, right? What do you want out of life? You want to be happier? Do you want more money? Do you want a healthier body? I would also, and I said it, I gave it away. But the first thing, if you if you were to whittle down everything you want out of life, and why you want it, you will find like 99% of the time you want that thing because you think it's going to make you happier. Right? So can we focus on that first, right? And then the journey just becomes a fucking joy? Excuse my language, but it becomes a joy. Like, it's the whole process, right? So if you're looking at your memories, oh, my dad beat me. Alright. I'm gonna, I'll tell you like, that's a real thing. For me. That was something I grew up with. But I look at that now. And I'm like, Man, when I went to boot camp, I was, they were yelling in my face, it did nothing to me, because of how my father was so disciplinary. And I was it had no effect on me. So for me, that's a positive thing, right? Because I choose to interpret as a positive thing. Because I choose That's happiness, right? You want to be happy? So if you believe let's be let's have fun here for a second. If you believe Einstein said, you have to ask yourself, do you think the universe is friendly? Or it's unfriendly? Right? And that's really what it is. Right? Does the universe want the best for you? And I would argue it does. Because you let's say you get a cut in your arm. It heals on its own. Yeah, you know, science is going to explain all this. And I get that and I get how it works. What it does heal it on its own. But when you are depressed, and there's high stress, it doesn't it's slower, right? You get sick faster, like so. It does start in the mind. It starts with how you interpret the scenario, right? And it's and so whatever happened in the past, how you interpret that's going to affect everything, obviously, but also how you how you are presently how you choose to interpret that past can change. Because, again, the past only exists in your head. And so I think it's very important to get clear about what you want, I want to be happy, I want to be healthy, I want to be a monster in the gym, I want to be a fucking millionaire, like, these are the things I want, you know. And so as you lean into that what you want, the universe will provide the answers. universe God, Spirit source, whatever you want to call it, I don't care. Because we can talk about like the I love this topic to the reticulating activating system in the brain, you know, essentially, whatever you're looking for, whatever, whatever you're looking for in life, your eyes will find and your ears will hear, you know, you'll be in a crowd. And if you're focused on making more money, you will find you will hear somebody talking about making money and you'll automatically gravitate to them. Or if you're someone who's very depressed, and in, you know, wherever you are, you're going to find something to be depressed about. So it really comes with that intention. What do I want out of life? Right? Do I want it to be easy to I want it to be hard to like, do I want to be challenged? Do I want to have fun? Do I want this to be fun? Because once you do that you will find the path? You know, I looked for challenges in my life when I was young, and I went down that road, you know, like you, you will run into it.

Philip Pape 31:24

Yeah. And do you? Do you find that? When you do that enough? You start to not really ever interpret things negative not not ever enough. Nothing's never but it elevates your whole persona just in exists, you know, on this plane of existence, period, because now you're just always, because you've reinforced the fact that when you look for things, you find them, you're gonna be always looking for those positive things. Things will happen to you. But still, yeah,

Ashton Levarek 31:52

yeah. And I think when you listen to some of these, when I started focused on making money, like when I started, I started focusing on that I joined a couple these masterminds, which I forgot to mention, like, that's another way to shift your paradigm. You want to be something else go be around people that are doing Oh, yeah. You know? Yeah, yes, you won't be the smallest fish in the pond, and you will learn very fast, that'll shift you. You're like, man, these guys are buying islands, like some of these guys, like they're trying to buy and sell islands. And I'm like, that's insane. I'm coming from a blue collar background military, you know, but like, it shifts your paradigm of what's possible. I didn't know you could finance an island. You know what I mean? So, so like that. It's a paradigm shift, right? But I'm kind of getting off track. Shoot, where was I going with that?

Philip Pape 32:41

No, it's all good. We can we can play with that. Because the other thing that comes to mind there is how do you know? How do you know what what the right thing to chase is? When you're in that mindset? So somebody listening is like, Alright, I'm gonna take control of my health. You know, I've got to be there for my kids. For my family. I want to live long life, blah, blah, blah. And it could be the deepest purpose ever. And they've been fed so much misinformation for years and haven't you know, like, if they just went out and took action, they'd stumble into another program that's not gonna stumble with another huckster. You know what I mean? So where are you? How do you deal with that?

Ashton Levarek 33:16

Yeah, that's, that is a good question. And you know, what I think it is, you know, it goes back to that. I will find what I'm seeking, you may run into a wall a couple of times, but you're gonna find it, you know, when you listen to like, these highly successful people, like, let's say Oprah, or Walt Disney, or Steve Jobs, or Henry Ford, or like they did, they ran into door into wall after wall after wall. But they were so intense, so focused on where they wanted to go what they wanted to do, that it worked out, right. Yeah. Like, Oprah Winfrey was like, fired. They said she could never be on TV. Look at her now, you know, like, but she needed to be fired to learn to become Oprah Winfrey, she is today, right?

Philip Pape 34:00

Yeah, yeah. No, that no, you're hitting it on the head. Because when I think of clients who, you know, I work, mostly people who are over 30. So they've had a lot of women who've died many times they've done many things. And I'm really thrilled when they find me, because I know I'm going to help them and do it the right way. And they don't quite know that yet. Right. This is just another attempt. Like you said, it's another attempt along the way of your counter failures, hoping that this won't be the failure. But because you've done it so many times you have all this experience and education of what didn't work in the past, which goes back to like the past is important from that perspective, but it's framing. So yeah, that's a great point that and here's the other thing from personal experience when I finally figured stuff out back in around 2020. Like for my health journey, it was because I had time during the pandemic to pour everything into learning and joining groups and listening to podcasts and reading and it was because of the just sheer exposure that I finally could find things that made sense. And that's again, reps and quantity just getting out there and doing it. Do you agree or what do you think about that? Yeah,

Ashton Levarek 35:03

no, I absolutely agree. And you know, what I think is interesting, the more you think, and it's kind of go back goes back to Einstein's theory or question he asked about the universe. It also goes back to Nikola Tesla, he says the same thing. You know, if you think the universe is friendly, then you must have faith in it being friendly, right? And you will find what, and when you have that faith, it's all of a sudden, it's like, okay, well, I'm here for a reason. Like, I brought myself here, but that it because I wanted something. And this is part of my journey. And it's almost like, when you go to sleep, when you have a meal, you don't go, oh, man, I hope I digest this food. You know, most of us don't, right? Like you just trust in your body, which is a really cool thing. It's really cool. We trust that our heart is going to be that our lungs are going to absorb oxygen, that we're going to metabolize the nutrients, right. There's this trust. But imagine, I mean, if the placebo effect is as as powerful as you think, what if all of a sudden you started to distrust your body? You know, like, I don't know what would happen. I don't know what would happen. But I think when you start to trust the process of your life, and I'm not saying you need to believe in God, I'm not saying I'm saying you're actually more powerful than you think I'm just That's all I'm saying. When you believe in it, I think it unfolds the way you ask, right? But a lot of us, we get in this weird hamster wheel where we like, yeah, I want to end up over there. But I don't know how it's gonna happen. And because you don't know how it's gonna happen, you don't believe in it. So it happens a lot slower and stuff. Yeah. Right. And that's even proof to you. That it's not working. But I think it does. We do. And it's the same. You go to the gym, right? You have faith, like, okay, these guys said, If I do you know, this much cardio, this was weightlifting, if I eat this way, if I get this much sleep, they trust you because you're an authority, and that that's where their trust come from, for sometimes it has to start there. But imagine like, if you were a kid, if you just had faith? Well, they're all doing it. I can do it.

Philip Pape 37:06

And then yeah, yeah. And what I want to separate for people in what you just said is, like the gym example. There are people who they go and they there's, there's two sides of this, they they take a philosophy or program or idea, they go apply it, but then they're not consistent than they don't get results and in blame, whatever it was, even if it might have worked, then there's people who take something that's not effective, apply it consistently, and it doesn't work. And I think there's where a lot of the value is, right? Because they, they put in the reps, they took the steps, and then it didn't work. So now you've got that feedback. Okay, cross that off the list and move to the next thing. Whereas the people over here, you can't suss out, which were the problem is, I mean, you can once you realize they're not being consistent. Yeah, you know, I mean, again, we're getting philosophical, because I'm thinking of all these things, as well as your your thought about trusting in the world. And, like you, I'm very rational, but I have seen it time and again, where just believe that that people are good by nature, right? Because I think 99.9% People are good by nature. That's what I've seen. And I and I know social media can like really sour that perception of humanity. But then you got to you got to hang out in the right places, you know, you have to stay away from things. I mean, it's your choice, you can stay away from where the poison people are, and focus elsewhere. You know, like, my Facebook community is like that. I don't moderate it. I don't, you know, I just trust that everybody's gonna be good. And if you had a bad apple, it comes up fine. But yeah, it's very positive man, skits stuff,

Ashton Levarek 38:38

you know, what I think is cool, too. I've considered this couple times. So if everything is okay, well, I'm not gonna go that way just yet. But social media, the algorithms that they designed social media with, or how they use them, or whatever, are exactly the way your brain works. Like you, when you see something terrible, you tend to notice more terrible things. Right? Whatever you're conscious of, you tend to see more of right. So if you shift what you're conscious of, if you make it like if you feel I'm depressed, I'm down. I don't feel like going to the gym. This is a you know, fitness podcast. So I don't feel like going to the gym. And all you do is sit around the house, you will not feel like but if you were to, I don't know, get on social media and look at all these amazing people having these amazing physiques doing these amazing things with their body. All of a sudden, you're there's it's going to shift things for you, right? And you're going to feel that that's a feeling like oh, yeah, I could do that. I should do that. And I'll tell you right now, I've been working out my whole life. I've been in sports my whole life. And I'll still like sometimes I'll put on I like CrossFit because I think they're amazing athletes, and I'll just watch like a competition. Like, I'm going to the gym. I gotta get

Philip Pape 39:54

psyched up, right? Yeah, it's strong, man. You're like, Man, I'm a weekend

Ashton Levarek 39:59

out there. Yeah, it's, yeah, it's absolutely it works. And I mean, I think that it goes holds true for anything if you're trying to build a business, but whatever. But you can use that reticulating activating system in your mind, you have to be conscious, you have to constantly, this is what I'm looking for. And let me just explain. So the reticular activating system is just you conscious, you can consciously comprehend, I think it was like, I can't remember exactly was like 100 images per second, right? pixels per second, or something like that is what they figured out. But your subconscious processes processes over 1000. And they found if you prime your mind, your or 100,000, if you prime your mind, it will pick out the things you are primed to pick out. So when they did these tests with these people, they said, okay, they had all these images showing up on a screen, and they asked them which ones the people remembered, right? And they would prime them with stuff like, Okay, before, just when they went in this is I have a feeling this is how a lot of magicians do stuff, too. But honestly, how they read your mind. Yeah, so they they prime the people with like, talking about, I don't know, doctors, nurses, hospitals, stuff like that. And then in the 100,000 images that they watch, there's a few of those. And that's the only thing that people remember. Okay. And so, so that's what I'm saying. So if you can be conscious about what you're priming your mind with, and this just goes back to what do you want, I want to be happy, I want to be wealthy, I want to feel good. I want to have love, you're going to find that. You're going to find that and the people, you're going to walk through a crowd of negative people and only find a good one happy person. That's amazing.

Philip Pape 41:35

It is yeah, it is amazing. And it gets you hyper focus, I think, yeah, right. Like you get, I think of the things that I'm really passionate about now that I may not have been in the past. And it sucks, like just kept thinking about them going after learning, learning, learning, to the point where you just, it's just your brain is like carrying you that direction. Yeah, you know, and I see it with clients, too, who have struggled their whole life. And all of a sudden, they start lifting weights and getting PRs, PRs, PRs, and they're just like, I need to learn about form, I need to learn about movement and learn about programming this and that, and it's just like cycles on itself. So

Ashton Levarek 42:05

it's a positive reinforcement loop, but it goes the other way, too. So you do have to be intentional. Yeah.

Philip Pape 42:11

So then what about you, Ashton? How do you personally do this? And how do you talk to your future self? Like, because that's one concept we talked about is like reaching out to your future self talking to him getting getting yourself to go forward? I mean, do you invite him on an imaginary podcast episode, you know, with yourself?

Ashton Levarek 42:30

I mean, that is one way. Yes. I mean, you could think of it like that. That's not recorded. I actually, I mean, I do record my the ones where I do solo is me, a lot of them. It's right before that I'm journaling or free, free thinking. But, so I got this a long time ago, and I can't remember where I got it. And then somebody put this into a book and the book is called the morning. Miracle Morning, all about your morning routine. How something right? How Elrod Oh, there you go. And so it's really an intentional way of building a habit to prime your mind to prime your body, your mind all that stuff, right. And there's, it's he calls them he uses an acronym is called savers. And I was actually doing this long before, not all of them, but a lot of them before he made the book. And I find it very effective. So it's, the first one is silence, Affirmations, Visualization, exercise, reading and scribing. So savers, sav e Rs. And essentially, what you're doing is you're you're priming your mind. So the first one is silence, you want to silence It's the first thing you're doing. When you get up in the morning, when you go to the bathroom, take a leak, drink some water, I like to drink some water because I know I get dehydrated overnight. And I sit in silence and I want to silence my mind because I know my mind. Like in Zen, they call it your monkey mind. It'll just run off with thoughts. And then and then there's nothing intentional. You're you're reacting and you're not. You're reactive to everything in your life instead of proactive and I want to be proactive. I'm trying to create a lifestyle. I'm trying to create a life A Journey. I'm trying to create that. And so I don't want my monkey mind to control my, my, the beginning of my day because that's that's, that's your primer, you know? So do silence and then the affirmation is when you after you come out of silence the affirmations is what you're talking about the podcast so you have a conversation with yourself and we don't know we're a lot of times we're not conscious that we're doing this throughout the day. But we're always having a conversation I'm hungry I'm full. I don't like this I do like that that tree looks amazing. You're thinking these things in our in your brain, right? But the affirmations piece is a huge thing. It just goes back to telling yourself having a conversation with of yourself with yourself. What you want your day to be like what you want your life to be like what do I want? Who am I? Right? Because a lot of what you do in life boils down to who you think you are and so if you want to change who you are you think you are. You can tell yourself these things. Man I'm getting you don't have to lie don't lie to yourself either because Right. Don't know when you're lying. You're like, I'm Mr. Olympia. Like, everybody's gonna You're no, you know you're not. But you can say things like, I'm on my way. I'm on my way. And it feels good to be making changes in my life. And I'm getting better at this every day. Right? Those, and that feels really good. And then the visualization, I like the visualization, one, because, yeah, you bring the actual, you bring it. And you can do vision boards. I think vision boards are really good. I think in my journal, I have the first two pages are like, my ideal house where I love surfing like all these different meals and things that represent things to me. And so when I flip on my journal, which is one of them scribing like writing, and I'm a very big fan of writing, because you get your thoughts out on paper, and now you can analyze your thoughts and put in organize them. And I'll tell you, one of my biggest problems early on was I didn't organize my thoughts. So a lot of times talking in public was very unnerving, because I would say, just come out.

Philip Pape 45:56

But anyway, thanks. Yeah. But then

Ashton Levarek 45:59

also, like, you can read inspiring stuff like these, you're priming your day. And that's the whole point, right? You're priming yourself. For what to pick up on what to focus on throughout the day, what you want to feel what you want to do have be whatever. And so yeah, I think sabers is a great way to start. You don't have to do all of them. Pick a couple that work for you. I know there's a huge craze for like cold therapy. And you know, which, again, what works for you works for you use that. And I some of these things have a lot of science backing them up.

Philip Pape 46:28

But no, no, that's true. Yeah, yeah. Do it works for you. I agree. Because yeah, people will hear this and say, All right, I'm going to do all those things starting tomorrow. And by the way, you mentioned something about cold ones, I'm gonna do that too. You know, and it's like, even with the gym, or fitness or whatever you want, there's difference in optimal and just workable, just get it done. Like if you're not doing anything right now that that's going to be 80% of the way toward where you want to be just doing something. Yeah, but these are all great. And you can pick and choose actually read that book years ago, and remember getting up at 4am to do stuff. I don't do anymore, because I know the value of sleep, and I have to kind of work it out. But it's good stuff. So if you're listening to this, check out Miracle Morning and silence Affirmations, Visualization, exercise, reading and scribing. Do some of them, do all of them, whatever works for you. All right. So I know you've accomplished a lot in life. But I sent your hunger I sent your hunger to achieve more, you know, you talked about your vision board, you want to spiral that out to I'm sure your family, your tribe, I know you've talked about the tribe, right? Customers and so on with everything you do. So what is for you the biggest gap right now between your present and future self? And what are you doing about it?

Ashton Levarek 47:39

I don't think I'll ever close that gap. So, but that's my inspiration, right? Maybe someday I'll meet that guy when I die. Which you know, and I hope I do. And that guy's like, Hey, man, good job. You did it. Yeah, I would. I would hate to get to the end and be like it and he's just like, what happened? So now I, um, how do I close that gap? I think I think that guy will always be out there developing. It's kind of like that. It's kind of like that. You want to be I want to be my biggest hero. Right. I think it's good to idolize other people. Sure. I get it. You know, but for me, it's always been about what is my potential? And I think that's there's a quote that I absolutely love by Nelson Mandela. I'm big quote, guy. I read a lot. But Nelson Mandela said, all shoot, I'm gonna butcher it. Yeah, it's basically there's no, there's no joy to be found in living a life less than the one you're capable of. Right? Yeah, yeah. It's something of that nature. But that's what it is. It's like, you have this potential. And it's kind of like that feedback loop. You You do, right. We have this potential. But we think it's limited until we take action until we learn from that and then reframes and just keeps going like that. But if you're not doing that you're not growing. Right. And one of the things I think is interesting is, you know, people talk about it like Tony Robbins, he's big motivational speaker and coach, and he says, if you're not growing, you're dying. I think he's right. You know, think about it. You look or listen to Viktor Frankl if you ever read his book on Man's Search for Meaning, when people had no longer had purpose, they died very quickly. He lived and he was in the concentration camps, obviously. So it's very accelerated. But the reason he he would give or the reason he found that people actually lived through those is because they had a purpose on the other end. So you know, I'm going to see my wife, I'm going to have another life I'm it's going to be over but when people give up on their purpose, they die very quickly. Now, that's the extreme opposite, but what I'm saying is, you know, you're alive you feel the most alive when you are growing when you're being challenged when there's slight risks, not terrible. risk. But when there's risk when there's, you know, you remember when you went to vote you the first time you saw your high school crush, and maybe they looked at you and you're about to say something like, there was that? That's

Philip Pape 50:14

your life. Exactly.

Ashton Levarek 50:15

But it's also what in my mind, is you're expanding your potential, right? And that's you growing. And that's, and that's what happens. Every time you take action, you get that feedback, you change your frame, like you're growing. And I think we have an and we you kind of put this in the intro. And I know we're getting late on time, but so I kind of like throw this in there in the last minute here. I think it's every person's duty to explore their potential. The problem I see though, is most people I mean, I can't remember the statistic is like, over 60% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. Which means if you were to look at like Maslow's hierarchy of needs, over 60% of Americans are living in the bottom half there, they're fending for their family, they're trying to feed them, clothe them, and put a roof over their head. And that's it. And so they never get to explore their physical and maybe even their mental potential. Now, I'm not saying money is the answer, but it sure does help. Right? And so that's what that's what I think about sometimes like how do you what prevents humans from reaching their potential and exploring their potential like writing that best seller song, writing that book that changes millions of lives running for governor so you can change your econ your your social economy or your your government? Right? Like, those things are what move the needle in the advancement of humans. And so I think it's very important that people explore their potential. Making money is one of the keys to that. But

Philip Pape 51:52

I agree. Well, it's funny that you bring up money because I know that your industry and I used to be a big iron Rand fan. Not not I like her books, but I'm not gonna say I follow her philosophy, like, idealistic. Well, in I think it's her big her big Opus, right, Atlas Shrugged. The character, what's his name? DiFrancesco are the guy he makes us Who is it, he makes a whole speech about money, just Google it look up the money speech on random money speech from a look it up. And the whole thing is about money being in exchange for value, and we give it so much. We give it so much human pneus that it doesn't deserve because it's just an exchange for value. In our, in our society. We use it for that. So I'm totally on board. Of course, being an entrepreneur and everything else trying to take care of my family, I get that. So you're coming from the place of let's help more people also get that and be able to exchange more of their own value to then elevate their lives and those of others. Yeah, that's, that's the way I interpret it. So you got an ally there in that regard? Okay. All right. So, I mean, I guess, well, I was going to talk about being an alpha and all that, I think you kind of covered that a little bit. Unless there's a specific, you know, aspect to that you wanted to add?

Ashton Levarek 53:06

Um, yeah, for me, I think that's what it is, you know, as, as the leader of your family, even as a young man or young woman growing up, like, an alpha is somebody that is protecting and helping other people's grow l helping other people grow. And it's only because they're exploring their full potential. And you see this, like, we see this in the animal kingdom, like the alphas make sure that the pack is being led, being fed being cared for, right. And that's what you're doing when you become a leader in your society. When, if you're just a father, a mother, that's the alpha, right? It's gotten a bad rap over the years. Because we say alpha males are toxic, and this and that, whatever. But that's not what I'm talking about. I'm just talking about being a natural leader and, and ensuring the growth of humanity. I mean, imagine, look at let's take Elon Musk for, for example. Right? I would say that he's an alpha, he's not complete alpha because of certain things. But the way he's moving the needle in the advancement of technology in, in the world. I think it's in a good, it's good, we're moving in that direction. Whether you think it's good or bad, it doesn't matter. Like it's people are going to learn from it, and it's gonna get better and better. And, yeah, and that's what it is. And, and that's how humanity progresses. That's how, you know, that's how so many kids can eat in America now, because we've learned how to produce food and energy and, you know, becoming an alpha should be everybody's goal, in my opinion.

Philip Pape 54:32

I agree, man, I agree. And again, going back to just tying in what I'm familiar with, with my clients, a lot of times the goal is to they want to provide more for their family and they want to set a good example for their family and they feel themselves down with their health. And as you see that shift, you see it go out to their family, and you see all these winds that have nothing to do with them anymore. And it's like, my daughter saw me lifting now she's lifting with me and my son is now like, picking protein like when we go to the grocery store like little thing But it's going to have an impact on their tribe on their family. So yeah, that definition of alpha makes complete sense to me. All right, man. So you've got the art of winning podcast. Oh, there's one last question I like to ask guests. And that is, what one question Did you wish I had asked? And what is your answer?

Ashton Levarek 55:18

Dane, that is a good. We talked about so much stuff. What is the one question I wish you asked. I don't know. How maybe how can someone reach their full potential? And I think, yeah, I think the answer to that it's going to be, keep moving forward. It's going to be clarity and focus. And, you know, I'm not a big Oprah fan. Honestly, the second time I talked about what she said. She said something and I, it's absolutely true. It's like most people don't get what they want out of life, because they don't explore what they want out of life. Right. And there are certain things that are inherent in you in your life, whatever, that drive you in a certain direction. And you have, if you don't explore that, like, if you say, I want to become a pilot, but you never pursue that. You're you're leaving so much on the table. That was part of your potential, you know?

Philip Pape 56:16

Yeah. Yeah. Don't just think about it exploring.

Ashton Levarek 56:20

Yeah. Are we going to do it? Are we going to be about it? Are we just going to talk about it, you know, like, we're here. We're in a physical realm. Let's take it and make

Philip Pape 56:27

it. Find somebody but get a book. Go, go go to get some training, talk to people who know about this stuff. listen to a podcast, anything. People listening right now there's, there's easy things you can do to move that needle forward. So

Ashton Levarek 56:38

yeah, taking action can be very small, but it gets bigger and bigger, because all of a sudden, yeah, that is because your

Philip Pape 56:44

paradigm shifts, your potential gets bigger. There you go. All right, man. This is awesome. So where can listeners find out more about you and your work?

Ashton Levarek 56:51

So yeah, I have the the art of winning podcast. And we have guests on and I also do solo episodes talking about a lot of this stuff, as well as entrepreneurship. But it's focused on health, wealth and happiness. But we also have our website, and it's more for real estate investing, but it's called a Valkyrie investment group. And that's www.vl KER ie group.com Valkyrie group.com.

Philip Pape 57:17

All right, you got it, the art of winning podcast, definitely follow it. If you're listening right now. It's super easy to do that. Just go on your app, look it up, click follow, and check it out. And then the website I'll put in the show notes, man, Ashton has a lot of fun, really cool topics that we dove deep into and I enjoyed it. So thanks for coming on.

Ashton Levarek 57:32

I appreciate you for having me. Thank you so much.

Philip Pape 57:37

Philip Pape 7/11/23 Philip Pape 7/11/23

Ep 86: Energy, Workout Nutrition, and Performance-Based Strength for Women Over 40 with Steph Gaudreau

Today I have the pleasure of speaking with Steph Gaudreau, sports nutritionist and lifting coach. Steph Gaudreau will teach you about lifting, performance, and nutrition for athletic women over 40. She will talk about low energy availability, workout nutrition, carbs, and protein, and why you need to be strength training. She will also address gym intimidation and the unique challenges for women over 40.

Today I have the pleasure of speaking with Steph Gaudreau, sports nutritionist and lifting coach. I learned about Steph through her podcast, Fuel Your Strength, and was immediately drawn in by her practical science-backed advice for women over 40 who want to step into their strength and her philosophy that “lifting weights is a catalyst for a more expansive life.”

In today's episode, Steph Gaudreau will teach you about lifting, performance, and nutrition for athletic women over 40. She will talk about low energy availability, workout nutrition, carbs, and protein, and why you need to be strength training. She will also address gym intimidation and the unique challenges for women over 40.

Steph Gaudreau is a Certified Sports Nutritionist and USA Weightlifting Sports Performance coach. She helps athletic women over 40 fuel themselves better, get stronger, and perform better in the gym. Her best-selling book, The Core 4, shares her Core 4 pillars of health which are detailed in the book. She also has a podcast called Fuel Your Strength which started in 2015 and has over 4 million downloads.
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Book a FREE 30-minute call with Philip here.
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Today you’ll learn all about:

[2:22] Step's wakeup call 11 years ago
[10:34] Low energy availability - explanation, signs, symptoms, and importance
[13:55] Defining an athlete, specifically women over 40
[20:36] Importance of protein - distribution, quality, and timing
[26:20] Unique challenges for athletes over 40
[28:21] Client mindset and weight loss
[31:04] Benefits of strength training for women over 40
[34:43] Personal experiences with setbacks, injuries, or plateaus
[39:15] Dietary restrictions for conditions like Hashimoto’s
[43:38] Menstrual cycle and menopause considerations for fueling and training
[44:59] Workout nutrition - big picture and specific recommendations
[48:59] Overcoming intimidation towards lifting weights and gym culture
[56:56] Basic strength training programs and principles
[59:30] Personal hobbies outside fitness
[1:00:50] The question Steph wished Philip asked
[1:04:37] Where to find Steph
[1:05:13] Outro

Episode resources:

Steph's Podcast: Fuel Your Strength
Instagram: steph_gaudreau

FREE 30-minute results breakthrough session with Philip ⬇️

https://witsandweights.com/free-call

Learn about 1-on-1 coaching ⬇️
https://witsandweights.com/coaching

Ask Philip anything ⬇️

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Transcript

Steph Gaudreau 00:00

We have to stop thinking that we're like, too fragile to do this. In fact, doing these sorts of things in a sensible way. With a with a good plan, and paying attention to our bodies and giving enough recovery and the nutrition to support it is how we become more resilient.

Philip Pape 00:20

Steph Gaudreau 02:06

Thanks so much for having me. I appreciate it.

Philip Pape 02:10

So one story that you shared on I think it's maybe on your Instagram profiles that 11 years ago, a nutritionist said that you had quote surprisingly low food intake considering your volume and performance level. You said you're struggling with mood swings, soreness, nagging injuries, and that that was a catalyst for learning what was going on with your body, and then eventually helping and educating other athletic women. So tell us more about that wake up call. And then what it led to?

Steph Gaudreau 02:39

Oh my gosh, okay, I'll try to keep it sustained. Because I know we have a lot of content to get through. But I've been an athlete my whole life, participating in everything from childhood team sports, all the way up through competing at CrossFit regionals, triathlons, all sorts of stuff. So I've been in it and done a lot of things. And really, no one ever sat me down and said, You need to make sure you're eating enough. And this is how you do it. And by the way, these are also the outcomes that can happen if you if you don't properly fuel yourself. It's not just your performance may suffer. And of course, as a performance minded person, that mattered a lot to me. So I had just come off of a very long period of time, about eight years of racing bikes, I finished off at the sort of like endurance distance level was racing, 12 hour solo races, 24 hour races on teams, like putting in so much work on the bike, transitioned over to also doing extra triathlons, and then kind of burns out from that and didn't realize at the time, you know, looking back, hindsight is always 2020. You think, Wow, a lot of that probably had to do with just being so under fueled to really promote that burnout. And I transitioned over into lifting weights, which I'm super glad that, you know, looking back that that thing happened to me that I burned out and I was like, I need to really get serious about just not basing like all of my self worth on how small I can be. And a lot of the things that I was doing that encouraged that and found lifting and got really into lifting and really into CrossFit, which was great. But again, I still didn't have the knowledge of this is how we need to fuel for this kind of training this, you know, this is like a heavily glycolytic endeavor, or you're doing a lot of heavy lifting like this is how you would approach fueling in that way. My performance was really tapering off. I was starting to deal with a lot of injury. And I eventually said, you know, does anybody here like work with a nutrition person? And at the time I was teaching high school so I wasn't even in this career yet. And I connected with a sports nutritionist and I did a week worth of food logs, sent it into him and basically got that reply back like cool. Wow, okay. You're yours. significantly under eating for the kind of training that you're doing. And that was really, I don't know, if it was like, I think in the back of my mind, I knew something was going on. But again, I didn't know these principles at the time. And it was, it was hard, like, I got a list of things I should improve. And I always tell people, like, I probably wasn't the most compliant client at the time, because I found some of the things were really challenging to be in terms of like, the fears that I had, or, you know, not really knowing how to approach it. So that was a huge turning point for me, and went on a few months later. So that was kind of the end of 2012 went on, in 2013, in May to compete on a team across at regionals. And I will tell you, I was like a different athlete at that time. Like it was an amazing weekend, I felt like I performed probably in the top three performances, like in terms of athleticism, and sport, if my whole life, it was just I really turned it around and making sure that I was eating enough was a huge part of that. So it might sound really obvious to a lot of people like, Hey, you just got to eat enough. But at the time, I mean, it was it something that was really going through the forefront of my mind. So

Philip Pape 06:16

yeah, that's such a great story. There's a lot of things I want to pick out of that. But even just the principle, like I'm a big fan of principles, and just the the, the idea of it as fuel or helping out with health and these other outcomes, and eating enough, like you said, it's simple. Honestly, a lot of people just start there, and they don't need to worry about timing, and, you know, supplementation, let alone everything else. So you said originally, you were told, or you found out that it doesn't just affect performance, but other health outcomes. So what do you mean by that?

Steph Gaudreau 06:46

Yeah, for sure. So I think you know, growing up, I was in high school in the 90s. People want to figure out how old I am. I'm 44. And, you know, I had heard about things like, for example, female athlete triad. That was a thing that came out, it was first came out the literature in 1992. So, you know, kind of figured figured out the math there. Like it's something I had thought about, I had heard about, but I thought to myself, well, I don't have an eating disorder. I don't think I have osteoporosis. And I haven't lost my period. Well, I actually don't know, because I'm on birth control. So at that time, right, it was hard to say like, did I actually have what I have had a natural cycle, if I was not on oral contraceptives. So but in my again, in my mind, I was like, well, these are the three things that can happen to you, if you don't eat enough, and I don't think I'm displaying any of these, so I should be fine. So that's not the full story, right. And we know now that instead of just female athlete triad, right, that under fueling can affect athletes and athletic individuals, you don't have to be an elite athlete, you could be recreationally, training, you know, training for fun, just for your own improvement and enjoyment. But the underfilling affects all people, regardless of sexual, like, you know, assigned at birth, you know, male, female, etc. And can affect all these different levels of athletic individuals. So instead of just the female athlete triad, the symptoms of low energy availability, and sort of the outcomes of low energy availability were expanded into something called Red s. So relative energy deficiency in sport, the IOC came up with kind of their first statement on this in 2014. And then it was updated in 2018. And now more people are becoming aware that it's not just performance aspects that are going to take a hit, if you're in this chronic low energy availability state, and you don't also, by the way, have to be a woman for this to affect you. So we see, you know, things happening in all athletes. So it's not just for our performance. So we might have issues with our immune health issues with our digestive health issues with our psychological health, it's really across the board that we may start to see symptoms in what's going on as a result of under fueling, so low energy availability being the driver. And that doesn't always mean that you're, you know, intentionally under eating either, right, you could just have picked up a little bit more training, maybe you're training for something new, and you don't realize how much more energy you're expending. So you may not be purposefully, purposefully under eating. But of course, you may see that there are outcomes because you don't have enough fuel coming in. Once you've accounted for your activity level, which is what low energy availability really is to maintain the optimal health of these other systems. Right. So reproductive system, bone health, right are some of the common ones that we we might know about, but this is really can be a system wide, or across organ systems. Outcomes that people are dealing with in may not even know that it's down to. Yeah, they'll the lack of energy intake.

Philip Pape 09:55

Yeah. And that's huge because it often we often try to overcomplicate things when it comes to our health that we need to addressed these 10 or 15 issues and, and you told us a story about both the mental side of this, like when you're talking about being focused on being small, right, or how small you can be and transitioning away from that, transitioning from high endurance sports to more strength focused, even though they were highly glycolytic. Right? requiring lots of energy, you know, for people who aren't familiar with the term, right, glycogen and so on. And then men and women both face this now, do you find that it's, it's women predominantly that have this issue, and in particular, because so you've got people who are overweight, right, or think are overweight, or whatever term you want to use, that may have been gaining weight slowly over time. And then we have people that are maybe under fed, and then we have people who are sedentary versus active in both those states. So where are we? Where do we break it up? And categorize those different things in terms of the low energy available that you talked about?

Steph Gaudreau 10:52

Well, we really have to look at our activity level, as is kind of driving, you know, part of what's going on here. So we have our basal metabolic rate, right, which is the amount of energy that we're going through if we were completely bedridden, or lying down all day long. And this is such a simple concept yet very misunderstood, right? In that our bodies are requiring energy to run all of our background processes. Even if we're doing nothing, a lot of times we associate, oh, I, you know, I went and exercise. So people will say things like, Oh, I went and exercise. So like I quote unquote, earned like this tree or this desert, right? We have a lot of transactional relationships with like, exercise, therefore, I can eat more, or I'm like burning off that cheesecake. I mean, if, if we had $1, for every time, we've heard those sorts of things, but we need energy, even if we're purely at rest. So we have our basal metabolic rate, then we have things like our non exercise activities, so you know, fidgety, I'm moving around here moving my hands, you know, lifting up a fork, I mean, getting dressed like putzing, around your house, all those things not exercise activity, we have our purposeful exercise or purposeful activity, right? So we're engaging in an actual structured exercise. And then we have our thermic effect of food, which is the small, relatively small amount that we're using energy to actually digest and assembly the food that we're eating. So when we look at those things, like what can we shift the most? So we're talking about the difference between somebody say, sedentary versus somebody highly active, there's, there's could be a few things going on here. You know, the bigger our body is, the more energy we are using. So that's something to consider. But when we're looking at what do we have a lot of direct control over? It is sometimes those non exercise activity. moments, I guess we'll say, so like, how kind of active are we overall? And then are we engaging in exercise? And like, what is the intensity and duration of that? So we still have a, we have a baseline energy need, and then we're going to be layering more on top of that, based on those other factors. And I think that that's something where people can sometimes get a little bit stuck in the weeds of like, Am I doing more moderate exercise Am I getting used to, you know, just a little bit exercise, you know, versus somebody who's has a highly physically active job is on their feet, you know, maybe their labor, a labor of some kinds, like, they're gonna be going through a lot of energy. So it's not always just in the the exercise portion that we need to look. But I think that that can give folks a pretty decent starting point to start kind of estimating where they're at. And then knowing of course, if we're going to be doing something like strength training and trying to build up our muscle mass like, that means that you know, we're taking that longer view, but we are potentially adding more metabolically active tissue like that will raise some of these energy consumption. Buckets, if you will. And we can actually use that to our advantage.

Philip Pape 13:48

Yeah, I sometimes talk about it as like increasing the size of the pie, right? When you build that muscle mass. Let's, you mentioned the word athlete a few times. So I definitely want to be on part of this whole thing. Right? Yeah, you know, you're, you're you're a sports nutritionist, you're lifting coach, you have a background in biology, background physiology. And you apply all these principles to athletic women over 40. So now, how do you define athlete in that context? Why why women over 40 as well, I want to understand both aspects of that for you.

Steph Gaudreau 14:16

Yeah, for sure. So I think, first and foremost, when it comes to the word or the concept of an athlete, there's a lot of gatekeeping around this term, frankly, and I've seen some hot takes on the end on Instagram or the internet about like, Oh, you're not an athlete, unless you've ever competed in at least something in your life, or, Oh, you're not an athlete, unless you're at this level of competency, or, you know, like, let's say you you compete on a national team or an international team. I mean, there's just so much

Philip Pape 14:47

people want to label everybody there's just so much so much debate.

Steph Gaudreau 14:51

And to me, someone who's an athlete is somebody who's engaging in like intentional exercise and you you may have a goal in mind like You're, you're showing up with purpose in what you do. Period. Right. So that's, that encompasses a lot of people. The problem with that is that that identity, for a lot of people is something that they've taken off the table as an option. Maybe when they were in high school, they had to do the I don't know, we had to run what the mile Presidential Fitness Test all that stuff. And maybe you were like, I sucked at this, I sucked at running, I hated it. And maybe you had a coach that really was like, You're not good enough to be on this team. You're not athletic, I got cut from freshman basketball. So you're totally got it. No, it gets cut from freshman basketball, by the way.

Philip Pape 15:39

So I couldn't do a pull up when I was at age, and it was embarrassing, you know,

Steph Gaudreau 15:44

to climb a rope in gym class and you failed, or like whatever that happens to be. A lot of people have taken that off the table, or we look up to elite athletes as setting the standard and saying, Do you swim like Michael Phelps? Probably not. So you're not an athlete, right? Or do you get paid to work out? Yeah. Are you professional? You know, have you ever been to the Olympics? Probably not. So you're not an athlete. So we have that, that sense of, I'm not an athlete. But that can affect that identity, or that rejection of that identity, that piece of your identity or working to become or not become a person who is athletic, really changes the habits that you engage in? Or how you see the importance of things like making sure we're eating enough. And, you know, like you said earlier, is everybody working out or training to the extent that they need to really worry as much about things like nutrient timing, or supplementation, I mean, it's going to vary. But at the end of the day, for somebody who is working to become a more athletic person, or a more fit person, they might do things like understand that they need to prioritize their recovery a little bit differently, or like sleep is going to be more important. Or making sure that they're not skipping a bunch of meals every day. And these, this is where the rubber meets the road for most people that I work with most of the women that I work with, right? They're trying to figure out, Okay, once I have that knowledge, and I lean into that identity, how am I actually going to do that? Like, what are the systems, the structures, the environments, the social support that I need, in order to make these things happen?

Philip Pape 17:23

So good showing up with purpose in what you do, right? It's kind of like the difference between training and exercise and weight, lifting? Oh,

Steph Gaudreau 17:31

absolutely. Yeah. And so why women over 40 It's hard to define exactly when perimenopause begins, because it's different for every person, right? It could be your late 30s, you start noticing changes, it could be your late 40s. Right, we have this like window of time, for the most part unless it's an early, early onset, which is a different kind of condition to deal with. But looking at that, just that transition that we're going through, right, going through a physiological transition from pre menopause into post menopause. And also, the reason I say over 40, is, there's just a lot of challenges that happen in this phase of life, like, midlife is no joke, right? So you might have mounting pressures at work, you might have shifting family dynamics, maybe you have kids, and your kids are getting older, and they're like leaving the nest, so to say, maybe there's like not leaving the nest, and you have to deal with that. I don't know, you know, relationship challenges, those sorts of things. And then, of course, the biological challenges that are going to come with that, and how it affects how people see themselves as well. So there's, you know, a lot of continued body image challenges that women are dealing with understanding how our training potentially needs to change. So we're looking at how do we, you know, not necessarily make drastic changes, but how are we going to understand why we're shifting in the way that we are, and even things as simple as giving yourself more flexibility. Whereas before, when you were younger, you might have just been able to really power through no matter what. Right, or really just burn the candle at both ends, and not pay as much attention to some of the other stuff like soft tissue recovery and some of the other things that we know we need. And then also, of course, looking at the muscle and bone elements as well. But you know, things are shifting and changing. And are we going to continue to just harken back to what we always did, because it's familiar, which by the way, change is scary. And doing new things is scary. So we need support. But you know, are we going to just keep going back to what we did, because it's the familiar or we're going to evolve our training as we go and yes, the million dollar question.

Philip Pape 19:47

Yeah. And it can be a very exciting new phase of your life. It really can. I mean, I'm 42 So we're similar age range, and I didn't personally focus on my health as much as I could have should have whatever until I was almost 40 When you know the rubber hits the road, you're getting to this, this current turning point in your life and like all the decisions of your youth are finally catching up like they really are you made those decisions at a time when they didn't really affect you. Yeah, now they're kind of accumulating. And but you have some something that you can do about it, which is the empowering messages I think you have. And when you add, like women over 40, into the mix, where there's other things that from because of biological reasons, and otherwise, from hormones that make it that can make it confusing and complicated, but you try to cut through that and, and help them move forward. So it's super inspiring. Let's talk about what do we want to talk about next, let's talk about we talked about fueling your training. But and the importance of just basic energy needs. But now let's go to the next level of importance beyond that, whether it's macronutrients, timing, carbs, protein, all that fun stuff. For those listening, if you don't really listen to stuff, podcasts, like you break these things down in detail each episode, like very clearly, so it's like masterclass, and all this stuff, try. So just just for the different modes of training, what are the basics, basic recommendations here?

Steph Gaudreau 21:03

Yeah. So I mean, I think if we're thinking about being over 40, in general, the first thing that we need to think about is our protein intake across the board. I mean, whether you're, yeah, there's some variance like, are you heavily into like, endurance words, ultra endurance sports, like how you slice and dice sort of your protein versus carbohydrate, and fat is going to vary a little bit. But what we know for the most part from the research is like, if we're looking at aging, and we're looking at things like basic protein needs, we're going to need more protein as we age, not less, which surprises a lot of people because they're like, You know what, like, I maybe I'm not as active or I'm not lifting as, quote unquote, as heavy. But we, especially if we're going through the perimenopause, into menopause transition, we're starting to see kind of a shift in the balance of unless we're doing something about it right of more muscle parts, protein breakdown, versus muscle protein synthesis, the loss of estrogen, and its effects on, you know, muscle satellite cells and kind of getting nerdy about that science. And now,

Philip Pape 22:06

let's get let's get one extra nerdiness on that. Because I always wonder about this. I know that muscle protein synthesis slows with age. I know and women, I believe that that accelerates also with the age. Is it? Is it solely a function of the things you just mentioned? Or is it also because you have not been building that muscle mass? Yeah. And then that correlates with age,

Steph Gaudreau 22:28

I think we're seeing, you know, a push to include that in the conversation like, is it is are we? Are we slowly seeing like aging, and that loss of muscle mass, and then potentially, like clinical levels of sarcopenia? Which is muscle loss, like is that solely due to inactivity? And like lack of lifting and so on and so forth? Or is that just natural aging? And so on and so forth? And I think the answer, if I had to make a guess, is probably it's a little bit of both. And so of course, if we stay strength training, for example, through our 40s 50s 60s, like, can we maintain a portion of what we've built? Right? Can we build more tissue? Yes, like, does it mean we're going to experience no loss of, for example, muscle tissue or bone? It seems to be as far as I'm aware that we're still going to have some loss, right, as far as what the research is saying. So it's probably a little bit of both. And I think this is the thing that makes it exciting, slash hopeful for people is like, there are things we can do. And I think that that's, I will keep coming back to that. Because if we feel like it's hopeless, like that's where we get a little bit into those mindsets of like, what's the point? Why bother? And then we know that we can positively affect that. So yes, like having adequate protein intake to help drive muscle protein synthesis. And in combination with resistance training, we see so many studies where they're looking at the things like sort of the effect of whether it's creatine supplementation on bone, and I was just talking to Dr. Darren Kando. About this, they did this big study in Canada on this and they looked at creatine supplementation, along with resistance training. So if we know if we have that mechanical tension, from resistance training, we have that microscopic damage to our muscle tissue that then causes growth and repair. We have an adequate protein intake, to support that, that we're going to see a better outcome. So you know, women in general, you know, I think, again, what it comes down to for people is like not in the knowledge of like, oh, I need more protein, but then what does that actually look like? And how do I do that? In all of the habits that I have, but yeah, looking to have that adequate protein intake. And you know, just like ballpark here, we're kind of looking at 1.6 to 2.2 grams per kg body weight range. There's lots of ways that you're you're going to like customize If this were you so but but that's more than even kind of what the going level for sedentary individuals is these days, which is more like that 1.2 Maybe a little bit higher. So, yeah, we need more protein for sure. And then looking at carbohydrate intake, just based on again, like what what is our training look like? What is our activity look like? Are we endurance athletes that we're, you know, training for a marathon or something of that nature, where we're doing a lot more just, we have a lot more energy expenditure and output? Are we doing a lot of glycolytic? Training? You know, if I'm, for example, somebody who's mainly lifting weights and walking, does my carbohydrate level need to be at the level of somebody training for an Ironman? No, unlikely, right. So understanding how we have our total energy needs, and then how we divvy that up, protein is kind of stay, it's like the middle of that seesaw, like kind of staying consistent? Because we have that absolute need for protein, and then how do we, like raise the carbohydrate need, and then sort of, like, balance it out with our fat intake, so that we're, we're in that, you know, I so caloric range? We're trying to build a little bit, we're maybe a little bit over, but we're making sure that like, those pieces come together?

Philip Pape 26:20

Yeah, quick follow up on the protein versus carbs for endurance athletes, I don't know how many of those types of athletes you work with, versus just the run of the mill Gen pop, who lifts and walks into some cardio? Is is the concern more toward, like lead up to an event and then the event itself? Or is there a continual period during the training that you kind of have to sacrifice a bit of that protein to get the carbs in,

Steph Gaudreau 26:42

um, I tend to not work with people who are really in that very long Ataris slash ultra endurance crowd, I am working more, with more people now, though, who are understanding the importance of just cardiovascular training and like, you're doing more of that cardiovascular training, Is it always like an intense level? No. But again, it's like, you may have to shift again, looking at the, our sort of like total energy need, and then how we partition that out. So there are some people who are doing ultra endurance type pursuits, and they end up shaving a little bit off of their protein need just to account for the extra carbohydrate need. But I think we're coming to understand that like, we need to kind of keep that as as high as possible, without sacrificing you know, any, any muscle mass in the process, or as little sacrificing as little muscle mass in the process. And that is definitely something that I experienced when I was doing all my endurance training. And again, I was doing kind of like ultra, ultra, but like longer endurance events, I was just like, could not hang on to muscle mass muscle was just like sliding off my body at a certain point, because I just was not keeping up with my overall calorie needs. And my protein I like I had have no idea if I had to, like even think about how much protein I was eating, but it wasn't very much.

Philip Pape 28:04

So priorities. You have priorities, you know, for that, for that mode of training. Yeah, yeah.

Steph Gaudreau 28:08

So sometimes they'll will, they'll scoot it down, they'll scoot protein down a little bit to account for like the the higher calorie allotment that needs to go to carbohydrate.

Philip Pape 28:18

Okay, what now? Do you work primarily? So let's say a client comes in who has kind of a, I guess, traditional narrative of like, feel the need to lose some weight? Are you working primarily in the kind of body recomp and lifting and muscle building side of the phases? Or do you also dip into fat loss regularly with your clients?

Steph Gaudreau 28:40

I am pretty much solely focused on how do we help get you stronger and put some muscle on your body? Yeah. There are a lot of clients, or a lot of students that I have, who will have a desire at some point to do some body recomp and you know, I think like that's, if there's if they want to go and like seek that out like secondarily. But I think there's this notion that we have to we have to diet down and then we're gonna go to muscle building that a lot you know, so I'm like, let's focus let's get you focused on building what you need to build like get your strength up like lay the foundation of getting some more muscle on your frame so that you are able to see your metabolism be a little bit more resilient and like less leveraged down into this like little box of I don't know that like 1000 to 1300 calorie range and a lot of women are in this like they're like I I can't seem to like eat anymore or I see my my body composition start shifting in a way that I don't like and I'm like we need to you know slowly get you eating a little bit more like relaxed some of the those like restrictive rules that you've had, and get you to a place where you're more you're more stable like I've what I would basically call more like maintenance and then And if you want to go and pursue that other stuff, but if you try to just go on, you know, try to do a fat loss phase, your protein is not adequate. And you're not resistance training. Yeah, we're going to end up in the same exact situation that you've been in. Right. So yeah, so that's the, the tactic that that I personally take with, with my clients and my students is like, let's get you to that. More to that mean, as level, like, let's get you feeling strong, let's get you feeling like you can sleep again, your recovery is better, you're feeling better overall. And then like, then if it's necessary for you to kind of dial things back. But the problem is, like I said, a lot of my clients come in, and they realize they've been under eating, they don't have a lot of distance left to cut, if any at all. And if they do, they're gonna end up eating less than their basal metabolic rate, or pretty close to it any attempt to feel not so hot if you're doing that for not a good thing. periods of time. So, you know, that's my approach.

Philip Pape 31:02

I mean, that's one of the reasons I wanted to invite you on, because I think we need to have more of that message. There are many, many, many, you know, dieting type coaches out there. Not enough talking about building first and I've seen it with clients as well came in wanting to lose weight and hold on, let's just hang out here for a while started lifting weights and you just see a transformation in their mindset in so many ways. I think just the act of lifting and the physiological and hormonal response from that just elevate your mood. There's, there's, there's, there's actual pathways, right, that make us feel better about what we're doing. And then as the waist size decreases, anyway, like, okay, as a side benefit, it is improving my body composition. So

Steph Gaudreau 31:41

sure, yeah, yeah, people I think just ended up coming to a bit of a more, I'm not gonna say it's without challenge. I mean, people are always like, Oh, would you started lifting weights? Like, did you did you get smaller? Did you lose weight or, and I'm like, No, I got bigger, I had to get bigger, close. But I was way was way happier, felt way better. So you know, I think it's important to have those conversations too. And recently, I was chatting with a friend of mine on her Instagram post, Jen Hossler. And we were talking about, you know, we're like, women, you will get bulky if you lift it, it's like, but we had to also be nuanced about this, like, if your, your muscles are probably going to grow. Like, you're probably gonna grow. I know, for me, I used to be a teacher and I would have all these, like, cute blouses with like, the little sleep cap sleeves, like, you know, and I was like, I can't wear that stuff anymore. I had to I had to get new shirts, and you know, those sorts of things. So yeah, it's no

Philip Pape 32:41

muscle tissues dense. No,

Steph Gaudreau 32:43

there is that, and it just makes you all around better at life. And, you know, we were talking earlier about, like, a more expansive life. And that's really, you know, you're, you're, you're feeling like you can, you can be with people and like, focus on the moment and not be worried about like, what your weight was on the scale this morning, or, you know, feeling like you can put that suitcase in the overhead bin. And it's nice that someone offered to help you, but you could do it on your own if you had to. Just like little things like that. You have experiences

Philip Pape 33:17

if I saw you on a plane, I would not really you got it.

Steph Gaudreau 33:21

You'd be surprised you'd be surprised by that. But yeah, it's uh, it's, you know, that idea of like, getting back up to that maintenance level or of, you know, shifting in terms of like your mindset on things. And I have a couple of newer students who on their own accord their boyfriends, and they were like, Oh, we decided like to get rid of our scale. And then they went through their closet and like, took all the clothes that weren't fitting them and put them aside, and those sorts of things. And it is a shift in your mindset is shifted, and like your approach, and especially if you've been used to being really restrictive, flipping that around saying like, having a an inclusive or an additive approach or thinking about like, what can I What Can I include here that I haven't included before? Yes.

Philip Pape 34:15

By adding things in Yes. Yeah, for sure. Hey, this is Philip. And I hope you're enjoying this episode of Wits & Weights. If you're looking to connect with like minded listeners on their health and fitness journeys, come join our free Facebook community. It's a supportive space where you can share your experiences, ask questions, and access free guides and weekly trainings. Just search for Wits & Weights on Facebook, or find the link in the show notes. Now back to the show. You mentioned much earlier when we started that you when you started working your nutritionist you weren't entirely compliant because of fears and fears and limitations is this Yeah, we're talking about

Steph Gaudreau 34:52

Yeah, so when he came back to me and we looked at my food logs and I've like literally taken screenshots of these so people can see like I'm not just making this up, there was definitely a day in my week where I was like about 1000 calories. Fish, there were many days where I was, like 60 grams of carbs. And I'm trading, I'm training for competitive level CrossFit.

Philip Pape 35:17

And that's keto, basically.

Steph Gaudreau 35:20

But I had done so much. I had been eating so low carb for so long that that was just kind of how I again, it wasn't even just a, well, everybody's talking about, you just need to like cut your carbs. So you can be lean, which was one of the things I definitely talked, I was like, I just still want to like saline, I was like really concerned about body composition, which, again, is we're talking about performance here. But also this like mixing this with aesthetics, right. So that's something to be aware of. But my cars were really low, my protein was pretty low, as well. And that just gave me an overall really low energy intake. And so the thing I was like running headfirst into was to change my protein intake, which is generally what I recommend for my clients anyway, is like, if we're going to start any more like, let's, let's start with a little bit more protein and see how that goes. But when I kind of like went through this three phase approached to working with him, the next time we checked in, and he's like, so what's going on with this, like carb intake, and I was doing a little bit better, but still far too low. I mean, again, looks like less than 100 grams of carbs a

Philip Pape 36:27

day, and you had to be it was in the two hundreds or something, right? Yeah,

Steph Gaudreau 36:30

like it was. It was a, it was definitely the thing that I was the most resistant to. And this was back in the day, like we weren't doing, you know, we wouldn't have Voxer or WhatsApp check ins or those sorts of things. It was like, once a month, I would email him with like, Margaret. So I think what I what I needed was more support in terms of just talking through those those challenges, those mindset challenges, or the beliefs that I had, or, you know, even something as simple as, and he did talk about this, like in the feedback. But again, you kind of need to talk to a real person to just work through it sometimes or hear that other people are going through this. But it's like, well, this is why we need carbs, especially in our post workout and those sorts of things. But it was still it was still scary because I had been in that, like, eat low carb, low carb for so long. That shifting that was was a mental bit of a mental hurdle. At that time it took it took a lot of time.

Philip Pape 37:32

Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I hear you're saying I and I've seen that as well. And it does seem to be more of the case with women and men for whatever reason, both the protein side with like, meat eating habits, you know, like, happiness scarfed down just tons of meat, that thinking about it, there's a difference, right? And then and then the carbs, especially especially if you condition with the low carb or the keto diet of late. And when you make that change all of a sudden, it's like, Why is everything feeling better? Why am I sleeping better, all of a sudden, I can lift more than that it just spirals into good stuff? Well, I'll tell you

Steph Gaudreau 38:03

this, some of it is very cultural. And I've even had clients tell me that they would go out to eat. And this is actually happened to me go out to eat your order, someone else brings the food out. And they give you the wrong dish. Like I've had, for example, I've gone out and ordered, you know, a steak with potatoes or something and in my dining companion who's a guy or a salad, and they bring it to me, right? There's just assumptions, or I had a client tell me one time that she was she was reluctant to eat all the food on her plate because she felt it would be emasculating to the person she was eating with. So we have all of these really. Yeah, narratives about like, if you're a woman you have to eat release dainty tiny portions and how that intersects with diet culture, and then how that affects how we eat as as athletic people. And it's impossible to just talk about it in a silo when we start to pull back and see all those layers and how they they affect each other.

Philip Pape 39:10

So I want to get a little bit into some couple questions. My community wanted me to ask you because it's super excited that you're coming on the podcast. Just have a few others then what about food intolerances. So yeah, you know, I've got clients, for example, and Hashimotos. Right, we have to avoid all sorts of things. Gluten, grains, beans there, it kind of sounds like the Paleo diet that, yeah, you're even more limited. And that limits are carb options, which is exactly what we're talking about why I want to segue. It's like, okay, well, we need 300 grams of carbs. I almost no foods that can give me carbs. Well, yeah.

Steph Gaudreau 39:42

Yeah. This is yeah, this is tough. And I do have a lot of students who have food intolerances clients as well. So like you said, whether it's it's dairy, which can make protein a challenge, or just harder, right delimits your options, or you know, like, like you said, Um, gluten containing grains, I think that the end of the day, you have to just find what works. And run with that. And that could mean for example, if you can tolerate, I don't know, we're talking about like tubers, so potatoes, sweet potatoes, etc. Like, let's get you as much variety within your limitations as possible. And, and work to toward the most variety as you possibly can get an understanding to and I see this a lot with these, with individuals that have this challenges. Sometimes they gravitate a little bit, they lean into I'll say, because of necessity, really fibrous, LivePerson vegetables as, as kind of the basis of what they're doing. And again, if they're doing long training, endurance training, or you know, intense training, it's like, how do we get the how do we get the density of carbohydrates that we need, especially around training? digestibility? Yeah, yeah. And so sometimes it's like, you know, this food is just so high volume, which is fibers great. Right, we need a fiber, or something else. Yeah, like, so it could be, for example, like, maybe they're able to tolerate something like banana. So eating banana postworkout, or something like that instead of fluffy salad. Because the salad might have some carbohydrate in it, and primarily from fiber, or what you put on top of it, but maybe they're able to tolerate something like white rice. And so like looking for those options. And yeah, I have so much empathy for people who are in that position, because it's just a little bit more limited in terms of what they can oftentimes tolerate. But usually, you know, if we work closely enough, we're able to sort of, like explore other options. And I'll say this, too. There were definitely foods that gravitated away from when I was eating more low carb, not not necessarily because of necessity, but because like, that's just what you did. And I would go to the grocery store, and it was like, I couldn't even see these. Yeah. He just blanked it out. Right. And so I oftentimes have that conversation with people that are like, Oh, I stopped eating fruit. Really? Right. So you know, potentially, potentially, you know, could you add in maybe some fruit or like I said, potatoes, I know so many people that were like, Oh, I you know, I reintroduced them and new on autoimmune protocol, I think that's one of the things you eliminate for a while, and then you can kind of welcome back in potentially, and just test and see how you do. And there are some denser carbohydrate options that aren't like gluten containing grains for people,

Philip Pape 42:37

so No, that's good. Regarding variety, I just what came to mind is, of course, there's many ways to cook things, too, right? So if you're gonna eat potatoes, like in a prison, where they're gonna give it to you the same way every day, you get to try and this you're not fried, but you know, cook them a million different ways. Yeah,

Steph Gaudreau 42:52

totally. And I will say, for people that are trying to just get in enough calories, like that's a concern for them. You know, sometimes we talk about like, oh, liquid, like don't eat your calorie or don't, don't drink your calories, you should be eating your calories. And it's like, actually, to some people that can end up working against them. So if you're somebody who is struggling to get enough food to meet your activity level, and you do have some more limited options, like could you put it in a smoothie and drink it? Post post workout or something just so you're able to like, chew a little bit less? And increase the density? Yeah, yeah. Again, oh, some people will be like, I need to do the opposite. And that's why customizing and personalizing is so important.

Philip Pape 43:29

Cool. Yeah. And there. I mean, there's something like there's highly branched cyclic dextran, too, I guess as an option for Yeah, for carbs. Yeah, totally. And then what about women fueling or fueling their training based on their menstrual cycle? Or menopause status? Things? Yeah.

Steph Gaudreau 43:46

So this is really, really interesting. Because if we look at, for example, what happens in terms of the menstrual cycle, and we're looking at protein oxidation or carbohydrate oxidation. So for example, let's take protein, protein oxidation or protein breakdown seems to increase in the luteal phase of the menstrual cycle. And I have seen that's like a bad game of telephone. I think people are well intentioned. But what I have seen on social media is it that translates into literally I saw one time, there was a post that said you should eat twice as much protein in the luteal phase. And I was like,

Philip Pape 44:21

this massive reaction to it. Wow, like,

Steph Gaudreau 44:25

oh, that's, that's right. That's a big, that's a big leap, especially if you're already getting a pretty adequate amount of protein. So I think we need to be a little bit cognizant of this cycle like cycle based eating cycle based training, even like we do not currently have enough research to draw universal recommendations on exercise. Like how to how to shift all of your exercise depending on what week of the menstrual cycle you're in.

Philip Pape 44:57

Would there ever be because it's content vary so much from person to person.

Steph Gaudreau 45:01

Well, that's the thing that, as of as of what we know, right now, the best recommendations that we have are an N equals one approach to that training, yeah. And again, this is kind of where you see like those circle graphs on social media, it's cut into four, four pieces. And each wedge is like when we hit the menstrual cycle. And it's like, in week one, you should do this. And week two, you should do this and be three, you should do this. And I'm like, most people are struggling to even find, like, some kind of consistency in their schedule than to have to plan for different weeks of like exercise. Now, does that mean we shouldn't be flexible? Of course, not like there's going to be some days where or so weeks where maybe you feel great, the last week of your cycle, maybe you feel terrible, you, you kind of play it by ear and give yourself flexibility. And that's where that n equals one approach is really important. You know, there are some things you can think about in terms of just overall nutrient intake, like, making sure and but I think what it comes down to is, again, like those basic principles, like you said, at the top of the show, and I'm really big on principles as well, like, when we include more variety we get we cover more of our micronutrients, right, versus having a just a few different foods that we eat, you know, making sure we're getting adequate protein intake and getting as high quality protein as we can means we're getting adequate amino acid intake. Right? So yes, there are some some things to consider you mentioned menopause, I mean, we have a risk of cardiovascular disease that increases as women, once we're in that menopause window, which is then going to be for the rest of our life, we see an increase in cardiovascular risk. So saturated fat intake, for example, could be really important to just kind of keep an eye on that calcium intake going to be important for bone health, along with other factors, right. So these these things don't exist in a silo in terms of how they're being metabolized and used in the body. That protein intake we talked about, if somebody's experiencing, for example, insulin resistance isn't necessarily Is it necessary to like not eat any carbohydrates ever again? Probably not, it's probably not going to be really work for people. There are some people who I think are like, I find this incredibly liberating. But that's where we had to be really careful about making sure you're eating enough again to like cover your, your carbohydrate need, but that might just be less sugar, less like refined sugar, less alcohol, or Whole Foods, more fiber. And it doesn't sound that doesn't sound trendy, slash sexy or proprietary. Unfortunately, this is just kind of like common sense or basic, like sound nutritional advice and

Philip Pape 47:44

principles. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And oftentimes, people ask these questions. Sure. It's the wrong question. Because yeah, doing these other things first,

Steph Gaudreau 47:53

right? Well, you know, there are things like energy balance. So you know, if weight weight increases, is a concern is like, are we just meat? You know, how are we helping you kind of eaten a volume of satiating foods, right, so that you're, you know, not just constantly eating because you don't feel satisfied. So those things can be on the table, depending on what the person comes in with. But I will say, a lot of people who I run into in this category are also dealing with, like food is an emotional coping mechanism. And other things that are, are more than just knowing how much food to put on your plate, which is, again, why I support and working with somebody who can who can help you tease through all these things can really be useful. Yeah,

Philip Pape 48:45

I agree. I mean, we can we can shout from the rooftops all the strategies, exactly what you need to do from A to Z. And you're gonna have you answered every single question. As you know, that isn't always enough when you're dealing with these other issues. So underlying, underlying all of this is being an athlete, and aging and how we maximize this phase of life is lifting, right? We haven't really talked too much about lifting like in specific, but let's do it. Yeah. So what are the I mean, and I've talked about a lot on the show, too, but I want to hear from you like, what are the real big benefits of lifting, especially for women over 40? And then we can segue into some basic recommendations on getting started there.

Steph Gaudreau 49:24

Yeah, so I think I mentioned earlier, we need enough mechanical tension, as part of, you know, how our muscle is actually going to like, grow and repair and build. So it's important that we're we're lifting challenging enough weights. Again, like a lot of people are like, ah, like I already know, I already know this, but lifting challenging enough weights so that you're able to have the stimulus to then rip, you know, you have your repair, you have your fatigue, you have your repair and then you have your adaptation. So we need enough stimulus to provide that adaptation, unfortunately, because society has a narrative that people who are like over 40 are basically one foot in the grave, which is ridiculous. You know, we should only do easy stuff, you should only do gentle exercise, you know, this is going to hurt your joints like we have, we've had. Like, if you've got a bad knee from, you know, something that happened when you were 20 Like, and of course, there can be pain without injury and injury without pain. And like, that's all a pain science is very complex. And I'm not going to pretend to be an expert in this. But disuse is also a huge problem. Like, if we're not using our muscles, we're not using our body, like things are gonna start to hurt. You know, we get those aches and pains. Do you need to go benchpress 400 pounds in your garage? Of course not. But we need to be sensible about this stuff and understand that physiologically, if we expect our bodies to get stronger, we have to apply a stimulus that we can then get an adaptation from. And so if we're only ever lifting tiny little weights, and I get served these reels on Facebook, Facebook must think you know, it knows I'm in my mid 40s. And it serves me the craziest reals. Like, I can't even tell you I saw one the other day that was like, Do this exercise to tone your turkey neck and I took a screenshot and synthesis of this is the content that we're getting, right? Where it's all everything is a tiny weight. Yeah, colored colored dumbbells and everything is done for like 20 to 30 reps, which is, isn't it? You know, is muscular endurance invalid? Of course not. But when we see these things, again, as women over 40, we're like, there's still a lot of verbiage like I want to get toned, I want to, you know, book XYZ, and then painting the picture of what it takes to actually get there is very misleading. So are we do we have enough stimulus? Are we lifting heavy enough? Are we following progressive overload? Are we taking care of our soft tissue, right? Because as we lose estrogen, through the menopause transition, our our ligaments, tendons, and you see I have, I've hurt my finger at jujitsu a couple months ago. So I'm dealing, I think with some of this as well, but it's like, we're just those, those connective tissues aren't quite as forgiving as they used to be. Right? Maybe our the rest of our life has become very sedentary, then we go into gym, and we expect our body to do a lot of stuff. So are we taking care of our soft tissue? are we introducing exercises that help us to stay stay powerful, and to also help with our bone? Density? Right? So plyometrics? are we including those again, these are like things that I'm talking to my, my students and my clients about, and they're like, Oh, by her jumping is bad for you. And I'm like, Well, we are going to have to help you start doing it with good mechanics. But sitting and doing nothing is also not helping, we will tend tend to lose type two fibers, right? That shift from type 2x sensor to slide toward type two, type one. And so are we able to move powerfully? Are we avoiding that? Dyna Peenya. Right, which is the kind of sister to sarcopenia, which is the loss of explosive power, you know, for feel like we're slowing down. But are we training in that way? Are we doing cardiovascular training, and that's like a whole other thing, too. But it's not like one or the other. There's a reason why the exercise guidelines in this country as well as in Canada, and I'm sure other countries includes both. So we have to stop painting one against the other, we have to stop thinking that we're like, too fragile to do this, in fact, doing these sorts of things in a sensible way. With a with a good plan, and paying attention to our bodies and giving enough recovery and the nutrition to support it is how we become more resilient. Physically. Yes, you may have to adapt things. And so I hear this a lot also from people in my community, which is like, I can't do squats. And I'm like, guess what, there's like 100 other ways we can work your you know, like muscles. So like, let's

Philip Pape 54:15

find out even if that's even a true statement and you want to be empathetic. You also want to unravel that and be like What do you mean because I know I just had somebody like three weeks ago who was saying that and it was like my hip flexors and this and that and the other end like can you squat to a box without any weight? Yeah, no problem. You can squat the squat put a broom handle and add a little weight let's see if you can do that and then the next step in the next step, but I think a lot of people are afraid because they haven't gotten haven't squatted since they were like eight and it's just a weird position and there's lots of balance issues and all this other stuff right so

Steph Gaudreau 54:50

scary to right people are free to paint is like a not a fun thing. And unfortunately and this is like even kind of a shift in like how PT is being addressed. And again, a non physical therapist, but friends with people who are more in the new school, which is like we had to be really careful about psychologically what we put in people's minds about, about pain or about what it means or about, like, giving them that like, then lifelong sense of limitation that you can't or shouldn't I have a client who was told she shouldn't hinge and I was like, Well, how do you do your How do you do your farmers carries? How do you sit farmers carries the chemicals like well, how do you do your farmers carries? And she was like, Oh, yeah. Okay. So she's like she's hinging, right. How do you how do you? How do you do anything? How to pick something up off the shelf? Yeah. So obviously, like, are we going to load this client with her Max, conventional deadlift, like on day one, of course not. But looking for ways to, to modify movements to work up to movements to, you know, drill sound mechanics, but without making people afraid, I think is so lacking in, especially in people over 40. And then like, just learning that, hey, if you've been I see this all the time, it's like, you've come off a period of inactivity, which is fine. But we also had to like, pull you back a little bit. Sometimes if you have that athlete mentality. Sure. The other side of it, yeah, because you're like, Alright, I'm gonna go go. So like, my first workout back was Murph, like, let's not do that, because you're probably not gonna walk for three weeks? Oh, yeah. Right.

Philip Pape 56:31

So funny. And there's a, there's a cause and effect, that sometimes it's turned around, like you mentioned a bad like, my knees are bad. So I'm not going to squat. Whereas it's like, Well, why don't we squat to help your knees? You don't like that mentality? How many? Do you find that this is just so common still, that people don't understand the very basic premise of lifting heavy and, you know, stimulus, adaptation, recovery and all that like I do? So do you?

Steph Gaudreau 56:57

Yeah, absolutely. Crazy. Yeah. This is the reason why it's a principle that I teach in my course, yeah, I teach to my students, because I, they might very well not be programming for themselves. In fact, there's a very low likelihood that they're doing their own programming. And in fact, some of them I'm like, stop, stop making up your own workouts. Yeah, follow this plan, or go work with this coach, like, because they're credible. And there's good coaches, there's even good templates just stop Bulgarian split squatting six times a week, or stop heavy, deadlifting, five times a week, like, if it's truly having enough, you're not gonna be able to recover from it any way that would that frequency so, but I want them to feel empowered, when they go into a gym, or they work with their coach or their trainer, they see the workout of the day that they're able to understand and rationalize also how the recovery pieces and the nutrition pieces fit in there. So that they're able to sometimes make that choice of like, you know, what, yeah, I haven't slept great. In the last few days, like I've been having hot flashes, it's keeping me up at night, or work has been bananas, and I've not really eaten very well, like, I don't feel great, my energy super low. Maybe today isn't the day that I'm going to push for a one rep max or something like that, I'm going to, you know, leave it to RPE a little bit more, or those sorts of things, and adapt the workout. So helping them understand physiologically How it works is really important, because a lot of people aren't professionals in this field, like they don't have that, that education and adult learners really need to understand the rationale, the reasons why, if they're going to adopt something, especially if it's a new thing, and it's a little bit like, I don't know, this kind of contradicts with, like, a lot of the stuff I've ever seen out in the world, or I've been told about how the body works. So

Philip Pape 58:58

I totally agree, because otherwise you're left in this, this level of uncertainty where the information out there just comes in fast and furious. And if you don't know any of it works, you're just going to pick something right? By explaining it and saying, This is why this is the absolute absolute best, but really, it is I mean, there are some principles that are just superior, right? And with confidence, like we do in podcast and like you're doing it with your coaching and training, then they can you know, maybe do it on their own, that's cool, or maybe get the help that they need. So an hour has flown by really fast and stuff. I've really enjoyed talking to you. Yeah. Yeah, so and you've got your podcast too, that reaches out to a lot of people as well is there what do you do for fun outside the fitness space?

Steph Gaudreau 59:42

Gosh, a lot of the things that I do even for fun are our fitness focus. I feel like you know, I was I was put on this planet at this time to encourage encourage people to, you know, to be active and, and to feel like the benefits of that whether or not it's Whether or not you ever compete is just like how movement benefits your life and it doesn't have to be horrible and something that you paid or that you know all that kind of stuff. Yeah so out let's see, I really like to I really like Lord of the Rings I really I really

Philip Pape 1:00:19

trilogy ever right?

Steph Gaudreau 1:00:20

Yeah, the best trilogy ever. I like secretly like to put together Legos. Lego sets in and stuff with my husband. Yeah, I like live a pretty, pretty low key life like it's, you know, it's I'm just trying to enjoy every day as much as possible. And, you know, do Brazilian jujitsu outside of lifting. I do rucking and I'm involved with some racking events as well. So yeah, right. Yeah. Well,

Philip Pape 1:00:48

well, just to respect your time, I'm gonna ask you my the same question I asked every guest. And one question Did you wish I had asked, and what is your answer?

Steph Gaudreau 1:00:59

Oh, gosh, okay. I think one of the things people, one of the things I wish people would talk more about is this idea of optimizing, sort of like biohacking, and like, what my thoughts are on that. So, you know, it's really easy to see this list of like, 18 things you're supposed to do before eight o'clock in the morning. And, you know, recently I made a mean Instagram story about, you know, this, this concept of like, you're not supposed shouldn't drink coffee for 90 minutes upon waking, and those sorts of things. And yes, there's like a physiological basis to this. But the person I saw talking about it said, like, drinking coffee before then is literally pointless is the words that this person used. And I was like, Wait a minute. So I think you know, we have to be a little bit careful sometimes in our zest to biohack everything because of a few factors. But one of the most important ones, I think, is like we kind of miss some of the other strategies and principles, as we talked about that are even if we can nudge them a small percentage, are going to pay back dividends to like how we feel our health and well being much greater than some of the like the little hacks in you know, optimizing things that we see a decade popularity, you know, or they come back around like, yeah, like cold plunge, or, you know, like morning sunlight and red light therapy, like all these things, like they're, you know, in a lot of ways, like there's a basis for these things. But for a lot of the average more average folks that I've worked with, and I don't say that in a negative way, like I consider myself to be an average person who just really likes fitness, I'm not, I'm not incredibly gifted at any one thing, and I don't get paid to work out. I think that sometimes we we kind of see like, what's hot, and what's popular and things like I feel a lot of pressure, like, I should do this thing, too. And if I'm not that I'm not doing a good enough job, or I'm somehow somehow failing at this, or I'm feeling a lot of undue like stress or anxiety about having to do all of these things. And so I guess if you have like the money, it feels like real fun to you. And it's something that you're curious about, and it feels like it fits in really well with your life. That's cool. But I also want to encourage people to sometimes just like, take a beat. And think about like, Am I doing some of these basics? And can I nudge these basics a little bit better first, before I put a lot of stress and pressure on myself to have to like, go through this list of biohacking things and optimize every single strategy. So yeah, I think that's just one that I'm seeing a lot lately, and I'm hearing from people is a lot of pressure to do all of these things. And I'm like, what if you did like, three things and did that really well? Yeah. And they're like, oh, yeah, I didn't think about that.

Philip Pape 1:04:10

Yeah, I mean, there's so and there's so many like grounding, and there's everything else. If you just did it all you you'd spend four hours a day just by the right kind of it gives you this little bit of anxiety, like all this stuff. So I like what you said, you know, the nutrition and strain pyramids are there's very, very, there's similar models to that, where supplements are at the top. So biohacking hacking would be like, like a beetle on top of the pyramid, you know, like standing on the tip. Totally. Okay, cool. So, where can listeners learn about your stuff?

Steph Gaudreau 1:04:39

Yeah, so you can check out my Podcasts, it's fuel your strength podcast. Fun fact is that this week is the eighth anniversary of the podcasts in his different iterations. Feels like really long time. So we have a podcast. I'm probably most active on Instagram, on social media. And then of course, my website, Steph gaudreau.com.

Philip Pape 1:04:59

All Awesome. Those will definitely go in the show links. And yeah, you were super responsive to me, so I appreciate it. Yeah, it's awesome having you on the show. Yes, refreshing take on women over 40 lifting and being an athlete all this awesome stuff fueling yourself. Thank you again for coming on the show.

Steph Gaudreau 1:05:14

Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.

Philip Pape 1:05:18

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