Stress is Making You Fat! Here’s Why and How to Fix It | Mind Pump 2754

Key Takeaway

Stress isn't just making you feel bad—it's literally changing how your body stores fat and burns calories. The key isn't eliminating stress (often impossible), but reframing it with purpose and practicing gratitude. Simply becoming aware that poor sleep or high stress will trigger cravings makes you 10x more likely to make better food choices. Add purpose to your stressors, practice daily gratitude, surround yourself with supportive friends, and use strength training appropriately (like MAPS 15)—this combination literally changes your hormonal response to stress.

Episode Overview

This episode explores how chronic stress affects body composition through hormonal changes (cortisol, insulin sensitivity, testosterone) and behaviors (food choices, exercise patterns, sleep quality). The hosts discuss practical, research-backed strategies for managing stress including reframing with purpose, practicing gratitude, building awareness around stress-triggered cravings, and using appropriate exercise protocols.

Full Transcript

Transcript of Stress is Making You Fat! Here’s Why and How to Fix It | Mind Pump 2754 from Mind Pump Show. Auto-generated from episode audio; may contain minor errors.

Stress, it's making you fat. Well, that's a little dramatic, but it is true that stress can change how your body stores body fat. And there's lots of studies that show that there's a relationship between too much stress and your body storing body fat. It's also connected to a loss of muscle. So, we're going to talk about that today. How you can fix this is the reason why you're not making progress. Your stress. Let's get into it. Everybody relax. Yeah, that's it. You're fixed. Yeah, fixed. Yeah, fixed.

Yeah, it totally works. Now, is um this is like there's a bit of this that's controversial, right? Because is this only in the context of a calorie surplus or can this possibly happen to somebody who is operating in a place of say maintenance or even a deficit and still store body fat from that? that? that? That's a great question. So, uh first off, and we'll get into this, but stress affects affects affects uh how you eat. So, it's hard to separate the two. Okay? So it does also affect your caloric intake, the types of foods that you eat.

We'll get we'll get to that. to that. to that. But independent of that, the data does seem to suggest that stress itself has this like special quality of increasing or changing I should say uh especially fat disposition or uh where you store body fat and this is probably due to hormones. Now that being said, uh your calories out does get affected by the stress also. So yes, the law of thermodynamics still applies, meaning you can't gain extra tissue without extra calories, extra calories, extra calories, but does stress affect how you burn uh calories?

calories? calories? Or another way of saying that stress is uh potentially also slowing the metabolism down, putting it more in this kind of survival mode of I'm taking on all this stress. I need to conserve, right? Energy, right? Is that kind of another way of saying it? Yeah. So, so stress does have a diff direct effect on hormones. So, we'll start there for a second. Um, everybody knows cortisol is a stress hormone. I do want to say cortisol is not a bad hormone. hormone. hormone. No.

No. No. If you had no, you would be miserable with no cortisol. Uh, you need cortisol. But what stress does do is it elevates cortisol because cortisol is this kind of energy producing hormone. Uh, now over if too much exposure to it, it can cause problems, but you need it. Okay? And cortisol in a healthy individual spikes in the morning. Yeah. And slowly comes down. At night it's problematic. You want it to go down uh throughout the day because otherwise you can't sleep. And you want it to go up in the morning otherwise you can't uh wake up.

And chronic stress uh can cause just constant elevation of cortisol or what becomes more common is an inverted cortisol curve where it it it's it's just slow to come up in the morning and then and so you wake up and you're like I need coffee. I need energy. I need something. something. something. I'm dragging. I'm dragging. I'm dragging. And then by the end of the day, you're tired but wired. And you're like, why am I having trouble sleeping? What's going on? And that's related to cortisol.

Now, elevated cortisol also affects insulin sensitivity. Uh makes it worse. Um it has has effects on all kinds of different things including anabolic hormones like testosterone uh and growth hormone which start to get dysfunctional as well. So from a hormone perspective, definitely definitely has an impact. Yeah. But I like I like having this question in relation to the whole calorie thing because I think this is where there's a divide in the fitness industry where the science community will, you know, will point to the the people that are talking about cortisol and hormones and say, "Oh, that's all fear-mongering.

It's all calories in versus calories out." But what you what we understand when when those hormones are in balance, when you have these these spikes of of cortisol when you shouldn't be uh like at night time and stuff like that, this throws off behaviors. Throwing off the behaviors ends up throwing off what you eat many times. And so they're not independent of each other. And so I get really annoyed by our our space when we when we do this when we start pointing at each other who's more right about it.

When someone's communicating about the importance of importance of importance of has a real impact has a massive definitely influence has a massive impact and this is an area where studies fail us because when we talk about these these people in studies where it's oh it's just the loss it's it's just the loss it's just the calories thing. So it doesn't matter that person's insulin's a little this way or cortisol that way if they were to eat these calories. But the reality we know is that that person who's all over the place insulin cortisol doesn't eat the way that control group does and therefore it affects their behaviors and therefore makes that impact.

Even if they didn't Adam even if they didn't uh we'll get to that by the way because it has a very very powerful uh influence on your eating behaviors. Okay. That's what stress stress is like stress eating is a thing right? Yeah. Uh so it does affect your behavior strongly and we'll get to that. But even if it even if your caloric intake didn't change your hormones will change the uh or influence how many calories your body burns anyway. So yeah law law of thermodynamics still applies but law of thermodynamics doesn't change but suddenly your caloric burn changes.

In other words, if you take a other words, if you take a man with really low testosterone and you put them on testosterone and you change nothing else, they get leaner. Well, what what would happen then? They build muscle. Yeah, he's what? It changed how it improved insulin sensitivity, built some muscle, metabolism boost. You know, he's leaner as a result of more muscle. And does he actually lose pounds of fat a little bit? That's what the data shows. You do the same thing with women with their hormones.

You start to see changes in body composition. So, do hormones play a role? Yeah. Is the law of thermodynamics also apply? Yeah, it all applies. It's not one or the other. It's all of them. Yeah. And one affects the other. Uh you can also affect your hormones through your diet uh through trying to manipulate the law of thermodynamics by undereating or by overeating too much. Yeah. So it all plays a role. But let's talk about how it affects behaviors. Uh stress has very powerful effects on the foods that we choose to eat.

Uh and it can look like this. It could either look like I don't want to eat. So extreme stress will do this in some people people people which typically is followed up by a rebound in appetite or more commonly when you feel uh chronic levels of stress you're you want to escape. Yeah. You want comfort. You want comfort and in the moment really hyper palatable food does that in the moment. the moment. the moment. It's it's normal. And so what people tend to do when their stress levels are not managed properly, which we'll get to, uh, is a increase of consumption of salt, sugar, and fat, which are the three main ingredients in palletability.

The trifecta, The trifecta, The trifecta, or to be even more specific, processed food consumption, fast food consumption goes through the roof. Uh, and that's just what stress does. How is it this related to what's going on with uh cortisol, insulin, and then how it impacts grein and the and that impact is now now now all of it. Okay, Okay, Okay, it's not just that. It's also neurotrans way more complex than that, but it's also that. But it's also neurotransmitters. It's also I feel crappy. I want to feel better psychologically.

I mean, there's I remember and we've talked about this on the show a bunch of times, but I remember that being such a like a a big hack for me was becoming aware of that those cravings for just like junk food or foods that I normally don't crave and connecting the dots to to poor sleep. And I remember just like because poor sleep is a stress. Yes. And then and it throws all throws the cortisol off, does all the things that you're talking about right now.

And so realizing just becoming aware that that's coming because I got like waking up and going like, "Oh, grogging. Oh god, terrible night of sleep. Wasn't good." So that like just going, "Oh, I'm going to have a challenge today." Made making those decisions and and being good like with my food choices that much easier. Just simply being aware versus, "Oh, I don't feel good." slamming that coffee or energy drink to get me going and then just like ignoring that and like getting my day going and then getting busy and then realizing I haven't eaten anything and then now I'm now I'm starving and oh my god the only super burrito the only that sounds good is a super burrito or something greasy fat like and and then then that be and then when when I wait till that moment of awareness or not even in almost mindlessly deciding to go eat or buy it's really difficult to make that right decision simply understanding the impact of what you're talking about knowing that man I had a it's been a crazy week.

It's been very stressful what's going on with my family. I had a rough night last night. night. night. Be aware the temptation's coming. Right. Right. I know like oh tonight around today around this time or tonight I'm going to be really want that thing. Like it's wild how much just the awareness. It doesn't mean it's easy and I still don't have to make that choice. You're just not caught off guard. But I'm not caught off guard. Totally. And and so and I'm aware and that has made a massive impact on making it easier to make which by the way is a good a good coach will do this for a client.

They'll tell them hey anticipate to feel like this and and their odds of success are so much higher much higher much higher right and a lot of times I tell them like listen I'm not going to tell you not to enjoy the thing or not do the thing just go do this first and then tell me how you feel. And a lot of times what will happen is they'll go eat and this is all I've learned to do is like my brain's going oh man I really want that thing.

It's like well let me go eat this first and then if I still want it I will. And then many times that right there will Yes. That's right. That's right. So stress and what's interesting about what stress does to the body so it has a negative impact on sleep either making you sleep a lot uh through depression or more commonly broken up sleep uh where you kind of either have an insomnia or you wake up at 3:00 a.m. and it's tough to go back to sleep or you're restless.

Uh, it has a a a negative effect on sleep, which then also has a negative effect on hormones, which then also has a negative effect on cravings and appetite, which your eating behaviors then go back and affect your hormones negatively, which also go back and affect your sleep poorly, which all add more stress. It's a positive feedback loop that makes things a lot worse. Today's program giveaway is Maps Powerlift. If you want to win, leave a comment below this video in the first 24 hours that we drop it.

Subscribe to this channel and turn on notifications. If you win, we'll let you know in the comments section. Also, brand new program launch, MAPS 1540 plus. So, it's like the maps 40 plus program except it's the 15minute version and it's half off right now. Go check it out. Go to 1540plus.com. That's540plus.com. 1540plus.com. That's540plus.com. 1540plus.com. That's540plus.com. Use the code December50 for the discount. Back to the show. All right, real quick. If you love us like we love you, why not show it by rocking one of our shirts, hats, mugs, or training gear over at mypumpstore.com.

I'm talking right now. Hit pause. Head on over to mypumpstore.com. That's it. Enjoy the rest of the show. It also does this. This is what we deal with all the time as trainers. Uh, a lot of stress can create a dysfunction around exercise. And what that looks like with people either is either I overtrain overtrain overtrain because I'm needing more cortisol because in the temporary cortisol feels good so I'm going to push it out through these hyper intense workouts or I'm distracting myself by moving all the time or I don't want to do anything.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so the relationship with exercise in a in the context of too much stress is dysfunctional. That's a very common one too to to overex exercise in this state because you do get an energy spike and a surge from that cortisol. Totally. Uh so yeah that I mean we see this common all the time with our clients. Totally. All right. So let's talk about the fixes. Now I'm going to we're going to go off of what the actual data shows to be the most effective way to deal with chronic levels of stress.

What people typically think they need to do with stress is eliminate it from their life life life or sweat it out. Yeah. Or sweat it out. But typically it's like I got too much stress. Uh I need to change I I need the stress out of my life. Here's why that's not a great approach. Need to meditate it out. Often times you can't because it's my job. job. job. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just reframing Just reframing Just reframing or it's my kids or it's life. And if you look at the data, you could look at people who objectively have more stress in their lives who do far better than people who objectively have less stress in their lives.

And you think, well, what are they doing different? There's a few things that they do different. One of them is they add purpose. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Stress, Stress, Stress, right? There's a difference between I have to go to work. Oh my god, I have to do this job. and I'm I'm I'm I'm lucky to do this job and I want to I'm choosing to do this job because of all these other things that are important to me. When you have a sense of purpose behind what you do, stress is not nearly as stressful.

Literally, how you perceive it makes a tremendous difference. And adding purpose makes a big difference. And saying that um saying that is easier said than done. And so, a lot of times when I'm helping or coaching somebody through this process, a lot of times you got to kind of just practice saying it before you believe it. Of course, Of course, Of course, you know. Mhm. Like you got to train yourself. Yeah, you do. You do. And so and and and that's it's a hard step for people because people go like, "Yeah, but I hate the job and I don't want it." And all the things is like, "Yeah, but it also provides that roof over your your kids' head and your wife and it also does this thing and it also does that." You're doing a great thing.

Yeah. Yeah. And you're good at it and you actually have been successful and you've been doing it for a long like it's like like you have to reframe it. You have to say it out loud and then you're going to continue with it because it's not like you do it one time you're like, "Oh, now I feel this purpose." It's like you have to practice that and then through that practice it starts to sink in and set in and then you start to to to to believe your eyes are set on the other side of that too.

Like a lot of these like obstacles that you're facing that are stressing you out. It's like avoiding it is going to cause way more uh stress than actually like pursuing your way through. True. It's funny too when they do studies on on men and women or in particular married couples when and it's a little different for men and women but just illustrates what we're talking about. talking about. talking about. When a wife tells her husband who's working real hard, let's say he's working 12-hour days grinding, and she's like, "You're such a champion for our family." family." family." Something like that, it changes how he perceives the stress of the work.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. When a wife goes to the to the husband and says, "Oh my god, today was rewardal." Yeah. She's like, "Today was so hard." hard and instead of trying to solve it for her like a lot of men do and he's like yeah man it is hard she suddenly feels different about yes and so it makes a huge uh that's just one example but you can do this for yourself you know I I had to go through this as a young father uh trying to when I was you know first became a dad accept that my life is different a lot of people will start going have kids and they'll say kids are so stressful it's it's it's a different kind of stress when you're when you can't let go of your previous life when you're like wait I can't go with my buddies anymore or I can't go do that thing anymore versus anymore versus anymore versus wow this is a new stage of my life this is who I am now this is what I do it changes uh quite a bit another one is uh to practice gratitude people have heard this so many times you guys this is so effective precisely because how our brains are wired our brains are not wired to notice positive things they're just and I think to Adam's earlier point about like really verbalizing that because if you're constantly saying things that you nag you out and you're you just catch yourself in conversations with people like bringing things up and you're not in that positive mindset, uh you know, it really comes out.

And so if you practice actually verbalizing positive things and gratitude, not just journaling and yeah, that's great. I I I practice that as well because that's a whole another uh part of the process. But like to actually say things that are going well and say that and maybe out compete the negatives. Yeah. Yeah. The last 30 days of my life have been, if not the worst and hardest I've ever been through. It's definitely a top three. And and it's not just because of the stuff that I shared on the podcast withdrawal was.

We've had a ton of other stuff behind the scenes that most people have no idea about that has put a level of pressure, stress, pain, all the things on me. And of course, I have a lot of great family, friends, brothers that uh are consistently texting me, "How you doing? How you doing?" And uh I mean, these guys have been on the other end of that text message. And I go, I I'm honest. This is the hardest, craziest thing followed by, but I have so much peace and joy and gratitude.

And I've said that every single time. And it's amazing uh how I feel going through this this whole process. But I do believe that a lot of that has to do with I've had to say that. I've had to say that, to believe that, to then feel that. And it's been crazy to think back. I mean, my own wife is just it continues to remind me. It's just like, she goes, "It's been so wild to watch you go through all these things that's been happening both personally, business, and and what you've gone through and just to see you happy and joyful, and everybody knows I'm the moody one and all this stuff that so you would think that my personality type would defer to just this raging pain in the ass to be around, but no, I've I've I've reframed the this this hard stuff as like, you know, know, know, I would there's nobody else I'd rather do it with.

I'm so blessed in so many things. It this could have been so much worse, but I still got this going. You know what I'm saying? Like it that's that's what's being said in my head constantly and I had to verbalize it and I've done it enough now that I really feel it and believe it. You know what's what you're saying? First of all, it's the data shows works. It works. Here's the challenge that people have. We've been told that it's invalidating. Oh, you have stress but now, you know, a difficult life and you're trying to think of the posit.

That's so invalidating of your struggle. No, it's not. It's not. It's not saying you're not going through difficult times. times. times. It's it's realizing and understanding this. You our minds are not wired to know notice the positive. They're wired to notice the negative. Period. End of story. Whether or not you're going through really difficult time or not, if something bad happens, you will remember it. Lots of good things happen all day long that you take for granted. Yeah. Or you don't. And look, I come from a family of poor immigrants.

And I remember as a kid growing up in my family and then being around other families and being like, "Wow, this is really it's kind of different. Why is my family different in some of these respects?" I'll tell you why. Because they were poor as hell when they came to this country. My dad had I mean he he slept in the in the same bed with six siblings until he moved out at the age of 18. So literally they I don't even know how you fit six siblings on siblings on siblings on they had they had to put two beds together.

My grandma would put a sheet over it and they would sleep head to foot up until he was an foot head to foot up until he was an adult. adult. adult. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh didn't have a bathroom in his house until he was in his mid- teens. They didn't have a phone and you know this is just the story of my family and they were always so like grateful and so and he would tell me about how he blessed he was that you know we have these things and it's cuz he he had that gratitude because he had that contrast which is gift which is actually a gift and I've practiced this by the way I've practiced this you have to do this consciously what I'm trying to say is if you consciously pay attention to blessings and I've done this where it's every other hour because otherwise they I forget.

So, if it's every other hour and I think, what am I what was great that happened the last couple hours? It changes your filter and you start to notice these things and it's really awesome. awesome. awesome. You guys know I I I've shared before. I I love Shaquille O'Neal stories and uh so many of them are buried and hidden because he doesn't talk about them. I saw a new one that I hadn't heard about that was really cool. And he tells a story when he's his early years in the NBA.

and uh he just terrible game. Uh didn't show up his best self or what like that. And his dad Oh, I love this story. calls him up and it was just like he's like, "What's up? You didn't you didn't Yeah, I was just basically telling him it was tough. I didn't I didn't you know I didn't bring my game. I didn't show up like this and that." He's like, "Get your ass on the plane right now." Dad, I've got to go to here. Get your ass on the plane right now.

Made him fly all the way across the country back from where where he's at. literally gets him in the car, drives till in the gets him in the car, drives till he finds a homeless man, and he says, "Get out. Get out and go talk to him." And then he leaves him. Literally leaves him and he goes, "Get out. Go take care of him. Go help him out." And left. Said he meets the guy, figures out. Now, at this point, he's already making good money. He has connections, all the things.

And so, he ends up like literally making a couple phone he asked the guy what he did before. He used to do landscaping, lost his job, he has a family, doesn't have a place to live, all these things. makes a couple phone calls, a buddy who owns condominiums and apartments, get him a play, pays for his living for the next year, gets him a job in landscaping, stuff like that. Literally, but it completely reframed like what he was pitching about. This guy gets to do what he loves to do for a living, get paid millions of dollars, and you can't show up.

You can't be grateful for what you have, what you do. Like, you're complaining. You're bitching. You're making excuses. Like, no. Let me show you. Let me show you what real it was. practice it. It doesn't happen naturally. By the way, what we're talking about changes the effects that your normal stress has on your body. So, what we're saying is your normal stress that you're not changing your life necessarily. You still go to work still, but because of these practices, your hormones change, your insulin sensitivity changes, your body changes how it reacts to this stress, and you become more resilient.

Another one the data shows is to be around good friends, especially good friends who are in the same life stage as you. You would be shock. It's remarkable how helpful it is if you're a young mom struggling with your kids or whatever to hang around other young moms going the same through the same thing or if you're a new dad or if you're an entrepreneur or if you're a new trainer or whatever. You hang around other people who are friends of yours that you you have good character who are going through a similar struggle and you'll find that uh it makes things feel a lot different.

I I would add that there that there's a fine line there and what that fine line is is it does have to be the right people that because you don't want to be over negative people. people. people. Well, I mean and a lot of people do this a lot miserate. That's right. A lot misery loves company and a lot of people surround themselves with people that are doing less in their lives to make themselves feel better and those people in those situations are not healthy for you and actually can bring that or exacerbate a situation like that.

So having people that really love you that you admire that that emulate things in life that you want to be like that you consider a brother or a sister or someone like that that you're that close to to you surround yourself around those people because they will they will elevate you. They will tell you the truth. They will help and that that is super powerful. But it can also work in the other direction if they're the the wrong wrong wrong you know who they are. If you go to them and you feel worse I've known people like that.

Don't talk to them. to them. to them. Yeah. Yeah. know for sure. Lastly, use exercise properly. Strength training is a really really effective way to make your body resilient, but it has to be appropriate, the right dose. Yeah. Right. Maps 15 would be the kind of program that most people who are feeling too much stress would would do great with and nothing else. Like don't add a bunch of other exercise. Yep. Yep. Yep. And if you do those things, you could you'll literally change how your body reacts and responds and your hormones and all those things to the current stress that you have in your life.

And again, this is backed by uh the data. I'd say that's probably I don't know what percentage if you guys had to guess. I'd say at least 30 maybe even as high as 50% of the the callers that we get get get 15. 15. 15. Yeah. And and and a lot of it's due not because they're not doing enough or doing the things. It's because they have so much stress in their life and they're they're training so adding it on top of everything. everything. everything. Yeah.

It's like I mean we had one today at least one or two today low calorie 15,000 steps only eating 2,000 you know 2,000 calories training four days a week plus playing some sports here and there like just like just like just doing all these kids job 50 hours a week. It's like man that is a lot and you're thinking going to the gym is is that with that type of intensity uh and consistency should be showing you the result. It's not. And that's part of the reason why is they're not taking care of the stress.

All right, I got to talk about uh a supplement that I've been taking now for 45 days, maybe two months consistently. And I talked about in a previous podcast. I noticed a pretty big reduction in inflammation. Wanted to keep using it. And it's for sure this. It's for sure this. And it's the it's the fatty 15 and it's the Doug, what's the name of the fatty acid? In fact, get that for me because I forgot the name of it. But it's a fatty acid that has really good anti-inflammatory effects on the body.

And I was talking to Justin about it because he's been noticing the same thing. thing. thing. Yeah, I've been noticing that. And I was going to ask you, does it have any relation to sleep in terms of quality? Yeah. Because that's something that's changed a bit for me. Yes. So C15 C15 is the name of the of the name of the fatty acid. found in high amounts in whole uh in whole dairy, which by the way, to get the amount of this fatty acid uh from whole dairy, you'd have to eat a lot of it because some people might be like, "Well, I have milk." You actually have to consume a decent amount.

amount. amount. It's so interesting that it's that it's it's it's not derived from that because it's considered vegan. It's Yeah. No, that's that's that's a good point. Yeah. They made the fatty acid. acid. acid. So, that's interesting. So, it's it's it's for people, but it's the same thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's the same thing. Yeah. So you're getting the benefits of dairy without consuming a product. This particular fatty acid, this particular fatty acid has these effects. So I I was getting lift and I still have a little bit of it.

Left hip pain. All truth, you know, truth be told, I probably have a little bit of damage in my left hip from just lifting like a idiot. idiot. idiot. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh and and since taking that, it's went down 80%. down 80%. down 80%. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, we commiserated about that cuz like for a while there consistently would wake up and the hips were the first thing to talk to me and I was just like, "Oh man." And I just regular workouts and just anything squatreated, any kind of hip hinge and I I would pay for it and I say, "I haven't had that experience in a while." while." while." It's the most It's literally the most effective anti-inflammatory thing I've done a long time.

And it's different than omegas. So it's like you would do it in conjunction with you could take it with omega-3s. Okay. Y I've been consistent with that. I haven't been with the fatty 15. That's why I have it right next to me. The sleep thing makes me really want to try it. I didn't Yeah, I didn't I didn't realize that. realize that. realize that. No, today I was uh was just telling Justin about my world record hip thrust. I tried to act impress. I really hate Hey, can I tell you I hate that it's an exercise you can't brag about because I want to brag about it.

I mean, you can call He call your boy Brett. Brett. Brett. Hey, bro. How much? Yeah. Yeah. Text him. I told your tires trash. Oh yeah. He's like, "Well, show me." Yeah. me." Yeah. me." Yeah. I I told I told Justin when I came in here that I'm going to have the biggest butt. butt. butt. I'm going to have the biggest butt in here. here. here. I'm coming after Justin. I think you have the juiciest, but I I think mine will be the, you know, powerhouse, powerhouse, powerhouse, bro.

bro. bro. Don't worry about it. I'm just kidding. If my butt was big, you know how disproportionate my body would look? would look? would look? You look You look like a Brazilian butt freaking minotaur, dude. How many? How many? How many? How often are you hip thrusting right now? now? now? Once a week. Okay. And then like how many till you cross over to the other side? You know what? Like what? Like what? Like too many hip thrust. You throw that line, dude. You know what?

I like it because it uh it's making me feel strong in my posterior chain, of course. But it feels good and it's a very simple basic exercise. exercise. exercise. Oh, you're just doing because we don't have a machine here. You're just doing And you're doing it. Where do you put the bench? Against the squat or the deadlift thing. deadlift thing. deadlift thing. Yeah. And I get the lower bench cuz that's the only thing I can't stand. Yeah, I'm I Yeah, six plates today. I was just repping that out, dude.

How you like that, Justin? Were all the trainers impressed? Were all the trainers impressed? I mean, I mean, I mean, I'm sure I'm sure I'm sure they were they were they were like, "That's cool." Yeah. Not bad. You look great in your bikini. bikini. bikini. Anyway, it was it was it was a good time, too. It was a good time. You say though, you you do notice a uh it translate over into your squat and deadlift. deadlift. deadlift. Squat and deadlift. Yeah. Yeah. And it's a safeense.

It's a safe hip hingeish exercise. I mean, I would anticipate maybe more even deadlift. No. What do you mean? Like it it translates. Yeah. Yeah. More deadlift. deadlift. deadlift. Oh, yeah. But I I you know, I'm not deadlifting a ton these days. Uh because I get carried away with it. I get strong real fast. real fast. real fast. I feel like you always say that and then I catch you like I'm going for 700 guys here and there the next day. That's why I don't I don't I don't I feel like he says it and then all a sudden I go walking by him like you five plates over there.

I'm like, "Okay, guys. Well, that's not heavy, dude. That's my That's my normal. Yeah, you throw that at me and I'm like, "Wow, dude." Hey, you're no good to us in a wheelchair, dog. You know what I'm saying? saying? saying? I can still talk. You know, I've had that thought. True. You know, I had that thought. I actually had that thought. What a morbid thought. I had such a morbid thought the other day cuz we've had some What if I broke my spine from dead? Well, I was I was thinking this is how crazy I've had some We've had some terrible stuff.

I won't go into it because it'll make everybody crapped out. Some bad things happen to my family recently and we've had some loss. But I was thinking I had these morbid thoughts like, "Man, what if something what if something happened to me?" And then I felt blessed. I'm like, "Dude, I I have a job where I could lose half my body and we'd be all right." You know what I mean? You just put my just put me in my chair and I would just do this all the time.

time. time. Sal's head like Matt's upper body. It's a futurama where they got, you know, like a little encapsulated head. That's it. That's it. That's it. We'll keep this podcast going forever. Hey, speaking of big dude, I did you what do you guys think of that picture I sent up my my belly dude? belly dude? belly dude? Such a hot. I don't remember him being wellfed. wellfed. wellfed. That wellfed. That wellfed. That wellfed. He looks like a like a like a little mini strong man. What were you guys doing?

It was Jessica, dude. Just so she which is so funny cuz you always tell the stories of like the the Italian grandmother who's falling off food. Was that like that like that like He ate it. She didn't forcefeed him. He he ate it. He loved it. But what she used to do, she broke like like steak and stuff, right? She broke. We got those uh what's the super industrial strength blender? What's that called? Vitamix. The Vitamix. Vitamix or Ninja. Okay. They both We bought the like the real bought the like the real powerful one.

She broke three of them because she would she would break them. The engine would burn out cuz she put tri tip and sweet potato. But like tip like sludge. like sludge. like sludge. Yeah. And she like the whole thing. And she'd make these little meals, you know, for him. And that kid, I mean, I'm sure he was one and a half eating 70 g of protein a day with that. Oh my god. And he got big so that picture in his little shorts and his little beef cake.

Oh yeah. Little heavy boy. heavy boy. heavy boy. How do you guys Do you guys uh feed him? I know you have like your kind of your foods they can have all the time and they can kind of roam and that's their their snacks. But they they typically eat the same thing you guys eat every night for dinner or is it different? It depends. It depends. We we always uh Jessica will always have uh ground beef and rice for them. Uh so they can pick that anytime they want.

Yeah. And sometimes they'll just eat that cuz we'll have something else that they're not interested in. Do you want your meat and rice? Sure. We'll give it to them. And that's such a great easy dish. You know, some just grass-fed ground beef, rice, rice, rice, steak and steak and rice is what Max eats almost. Yeah, dude. Steak and rice. Chicken and rice are like the the go-to stuff like that. I tell you when he went to his friend's house, he went to his best friend's house.

And you know, when we're now at an age where I'm totally like I'm cool about what everyone feeds him and does now. And like I feel like we've done such a cool job of like laying a foundation that he Yeah. He did uh two two nights ago with his his auntie Jerene. They they to have a tradition where they they do cookies and they taste test and we don't tell him you can't or you have a cert like and he comes back and mom's like how many did you have?

He I had two, you know, it's like you just have two cookies and he could have had more. He he had a dozen with him carrying with him when he came back and he he'll he'll say no to it. He went to our friend's uh his friend's house and his his dad ordered Five Guys burgers and he gave him the buns back. Talking about I don't want the buns. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Look at that. Hey, look at that picture. Doug, scroll down. Look at this. A hosp A hosp A hosp meatball, dude.

meatball, dude. meatball, dude. He's a hos right there. I love I don't know what it is about chubby kids, but they're the best, dude. His feet were as wide as they were long. He had a little square feet. Square feet. Square feet. Square feet. Yeah, they look like little little biscuit. biscuit. biscuit. He's lanking out right now, though. He is. He's growing. I want to see him next to Max cuz he looks like he's taller than Max now. He looks so much older than what he is.

My three-year-old, my daughter is cuz he's got some muscle genetics from his mom. mom. mom. Dalia is strong, bro. She's three. She grabs on to the the edge of the counter and does a leg legless pull-up just with her fingers. She pulls herself up to look over. I saw her do it the other day. other day. other day. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm like, "What? Did I Did Look at my head. Did you see what she did the other day?" day?" day?" What' you hit you with, bro?

She was jumping off the couch and she she jumps and does jump kicks which I don't know where she learns them. She does spin kick yeah kicks or she'll jump and hit me go and she hit me with her teeth and it didn't hurt her but she saw me bleeding and then she's like cried. like cried. like cried. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. And I'm like, "Oh, it's okay. It doesn't hurt." I'm like trying to reassure her the whole time. Bro, she told me too.

She go remember I told you guys I gave her like it actually bleeds. I told you guys I gave her like the least angry look of all time. But it like she was so upset. She she brings it up to me now. You made the meanest face to me the other day. I'm like, "Oh, honey, honey, honey, it's it's such a trip to me to see the um um um daughters, man. daughters, man. daughters, man. Remember when I brought up uh a long time ago about uh where kids are most likely to act up and do those things or are like the percentage?" Yeah.

With mom is so is so wild wild wild cuz I always Katrina always hears me talk about Max and she's like, "You know, you say that about our son, but our son can be a little [ __ ] with this and that." And I'm like, I don't know what you're talking about. I've never seen that before. Cuz he will he'll be he he he's he can be honory with her. But it's like that's just it is like he's he's finding that boundary with her and he's good once he tells her.

But I don't even need to see it. Like it don't happen to me. Like I did she's already corrected it with her with him and she had to deal with it that by the time it gets to me it's like he doesn't you know he doesn't challenge it whatsoever. It's such an interesting thing to talk about with her because she's like she's like she's like when they get to teenage sometimes they'll push dad a little bit. That's what I'll hear from other dads. They try. Yeah.

Well, they'll do a little bit and then they got to hear the Yeah. They never did and Yeah. They start kind of towing the line a little bit and bit and bit and and then uh you just bark one time. I'm I'm I There's a part of me that I'm wrestling with because there's it's almost like I want a little bit of it because because because it I know. I know that. I know. That's the part I'm wrestling with. It's like come on. What don't don't be careful what you wish for, right?

Especially if he inherits any of your tenacity. Bro, didn't you like not talk to your mom for like a year cuz they got they took your car? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like you literally didn't talk to her for like a Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's like That is some dedication, bro. bro. bro. I know. It's for sure. That's That's like some trauma, dog. Like some like some still kids still trying to figure out all the trauma stuff at that at that point. So, point. So, point. So, but he we're like I cannot for I think I tell you guys his best friend that they're inseparable, right?

They do everything together. Um he's he's hardcore into football right now. So at recess like his his best friend goes and plays football and my son's like, "Yeah, I know." And and I pick him up and I'm always like, "Hey, what' you do uh what you I always ask him what he did for his elective?" And then I Who did you play with at recess and what did you do? And uh I'm like, "You didn't play with Julian?" "No, no, he he played football." I'm like, "How come you don't you don't play with him?" "Dad, they're rough." And I'm like and I'm like, "Yeah, but that's that's part of playing son." He's like, "Yeah, can I tell you something?" And I'm like, "Yeah, of course you can." He they he always ask, "Can I tell you something?" I'm like, "Yeah, you yes, you could tell me." He goes, goes, goes, "Yeah, the the teachers don't really like it." And I'm like I'm like, "Why?" And he's just like, "Because they're they they get hurt all the time." And he's like, "So yeah, no, Dad.

I don't I don't I don't really care." And I'm like, "Oh my god, this guy's too much." Like Well, and Katrina, last her and I had a talk. We're like, "Okay, there's some things like like he don't even want he don't want to ride a bike, right?" So, we're like, "Okay, we're going to have to like he's getting to an age now where he needs to know how to ride a bike." Like, "You need to know how to ride." ride." ride." Have you tried? You probably already, but have you tried strider and all?

No, no, no, no. I mean like um something he really wants and then you say, "Hey, if you if you if you Oh, so this so this is what we just decided was, okay, there's things that he's really into playing is like all these things and there's always that." And that's we do a lot of that stuff. So, what her and I just agreed is like, hey, I think Christmas we're going to get him a bike and we're probably going to do the he's going to be a training wheel direction and so we'll do that and then what we're going to do is just start to the end of the block like and when he goes, "Hey, let's play Uno." Be like, "All right, cool.

First, we got to ride to the end of the block and then we'll then we'll play." So, we'll we'll do the the baby steps of like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, you got to do that first and then we'll play that." And I know he'll kind of be begrudgingly he'll do it. But, I think he'll start to get good at it and figure it out. and then I think he'll like doing it. But we're going to have to do that. Like we're going to have to use something else to get him to introduce it to him.

You have to do that in in some direction no matter what. Yes. And so literally, this was last night's conversation. Her and I like are agreeing that like, okay, he's getting that age now where all his friends are going to be swimming, riding a bike, doing these things and playing sports. And it's like if we can't get him doing some of those things and we don't find a way to kind of almost force introduce it. Um, but then also that delicate dance of like I'm not gonna make him do something he hates, but I'm like if I can go, hey, if you just ride your bike down to the corner, then we'll play Uno and we'll do the thing.

I think that's going to So, I'll report back. Did I bring up on the show how Aurelius did with the BB gun? I know I told you guys off air, but Well, I I of course got excited when you send that cuz your son's younger than mine. I'm like, "Hey, look at this." And I'm like showing him like, "We should get one of these." He's like, "That looks dangerous. looks dangerous. looks dangerous. Meanwhile, Meanwhile, I'll tell you what Aurelia said. So, we were shoot first of all, he's gifted.

He is gifted with aim. And you guys know how I'm I'm like the carnival guy. There's something there. I think think think there's something there cuz I've always Hey, when it comes to firearms, I've always been pretty pretty accurate. Not that I go to the the range often, but when I do No, he's for that for that age. For him to be hitting the can is very impressive. impressive. impressive. We put it flat. So, very impressive. So, we got a You guys know we have a huge backyard.

Yeah. And he took him three or four times to figure out how to aim. And then he was every time [ __ ] and he's hitting it far. Then he said, "But can you put it flat so I could shoot in the hole, you know, the mouth of the can?" And he was hitting it in the mouth of the can. That's impressive That's impressive That's impressive with the BB gun. I mean, it's to me, especially since I have an older son, watching that going, I'm going like, it's impressive that he's even handling the gun and and even somewhat aiming it like No, it's great.

And then we were But then here's, you know, here now you get a taste of my son. He's like, "Can I shoot birds?" Like, "No, no, we can't shoot birds." "What about crows? We don't like crows." I'm like, "No." "No." "No." You get crazy. Like back in my yard, um we have this whole dedicated We were really into this for a while with like the pellet guns and and BB guns and all that stuff. And you have the ones the targets that spin. I I drilled in all these ones, all of these trees.

And we had like uh you know, can strings like the whole thing. Dude, there's there's really cool ones that they have now that like move. like move. like move. Yes. And anyways, you can you can geek out on I did all that as a kid growing up. We used to have like when we live out in the country, we used to hang all that on bob wire fences and fill the cans up with water so the water squirts out when you hit it. Oh yeah. I was I was hardcore into wrist rockets and BB guns.

Really young paintball after that and then it turned into like we just injure ourselves. injure ourselves. injure ourselves. I can't wait. My son's going to be 20 when I finally get to do it with him. So fun though. Hey, hey, speaking of kids, the study came out on the effect that processed foods have on adolescent kids. It's a stronger effect on adolescent and it has a a longerl lasting effect lasting effect lasting effect of course of course of course which uh definitely points to developing brain that you introduce a developing brain to the engineered hyper palatability of these foods, it's going to have a stronger effect.

And I bet you kids who grow up eating a lot of this food are going to struggle more as adults because of the way that their brains mold. mold. mold. Well, I mean this we just talked about this where I brought up the whole sugar thing and I mean they've they've done this before where you see how the brain reacts to a dump a bunch of sugar um comparing it to things like cocaine. And I know that's like the fear-mongering that people do. Hot pocket bagel bites, but it's like generation.

That's that's like a a normal brain. You're like a little child's brain like that. You let them go. It shapes itself off of these signals. What's what's crazy to me is a majority of the food that is advertised and made by Well, this is true for everybody, but if you go down the aisles of processed food of processed foods, how many of them are geared towards children? All of them. The colors and the animals and the characters and the It's crazy. It's crazy. It's crazy. Yeah.

Where they position it on the shelves, like all the things. All the cartoons were based on Sony cereal. Yeah, that's it. If heavily processed foods were invented today and we had the science available now, I bet you can make a case that they would be banned on anybody below a certain age. I bet you I bet when you look at the data, you look at the data. Well, you can make the case. I don't say it would actually pass, pass, pass, but I think you could you you could have the case that it would be, you know, that speaking of banning, did you guys see that?

Uh, so I told you I think it's Denmark banned social media for under 16. Australia just followed. Oh, Oh, Oh, under 16. under 16. under 16. Interesting. Interesting. Interesting. And and they're saying that this is the first of the dominoes. They think that the whole that lots of countries are going to start banning social media for kids. kids. kids. I mean, I love that. I mean, you could you could make the case for 18 years, you know. You could make the case for it's undeniable when you actually look at the all the research and, you know, how how how how it's affecting all these kids.

It's it's unreal. It is because really you have to you also have to I mean don't I mean would you guys agree that for your teenage girl or boy 16 and 17 and right in the middle of high school it has to be some of the most detrimental time for them to get into that also. So I don't know how it'd be interesting what this will do right because what what did we all do when we we weren't allowed to drink alcohol at an at an early age?

You end an at an early age? You end up and and you you sneak it you do it. It's like this and then and you don't just do a little bit of it. you drink a lot because you because because you can't have it type of deal. So, does this promote that? Do kid do smart kids rebellion or rebellion or rebellion or Yeah. Well, do smart kids find a loophole around it or does another app get created that's like it bypasses I mean what stops them from It still limits it though because there's a difference between I have to sneak around to get on social media and I'm just allowed to be on it all the time.

time. time. Yeah. Doesn't doesn't the doesn't the the the the research around fascinating to you like the kids drinking age in Europe and the the difference of how they it's abused and used versus the United States and their age is much lower in in those areas. Yeah, there's some debate around that. But part of the here's social media is way more addictive. Yeah. But here's the other thing too though. American culture is binge uh it it tends to promote binge everything. Yeah. It's there's a thing about American culture that any type of consumption you can multiply times 10 here.

here. here. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So when they say well European kids grow up with wine at the table and so they don't Yeah, I get that maybe true. That might be So I'm not saying it's not true, but I don't but if you look at American culture with any consumption, we blow the doors off everybody. So I don't know if it's just Yeah. We want we want to win at everything. everything. everything. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean I mean more more. more more. more more. Yeah.

You do this, we have more. We can have more. like all drug consumption is through the roof here in comparison to other countries. All any consumption, food consumption, you know, just it's through the roof here. It does feel like that people are are figure are figuring this out somewhat or is that is that maybe I'm in my bubble? Like do you think that like consumer is I mean I was just watching a I mean I was just watching a clip from like a you know very big popular minimalist podcast like that's like a thing now.

You have tiny homes, minimalists, you have these guys that are talking. I heard this really cool guy respond to like all the stuff that he got away and the guy was asking him like um like how do you um how do you like how do you like not having this and only having x amount of this and when you go into a store and someone you know is trying like do you have this temptation? He goes no what I've realized is the guy who's selling this to me wants to get rid of the shirt and he wants what I have which is to not have the shirt.

the shirt. the shirt. It was like such a Right? Like his goal is to get rid of this this stuff and give it to other people. And he goes, I've already got that cuz I don't have it. it. it. And so I he wants what I have, which is to not have it. And it was such a cool way to kind of like flip it. Of clutter. Of clutter. Of clutter. Yeah. To to flip it on its head. It's But then there's that But then there's that other stat you shared.

Who was it? Nigi that shared that stat. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 11. So the just over the Black Friday 1.9 billion get my decimal might be off. It's like 11 something around there billion was was sold uh or I mean was financed for Black Friday financed financed financed and of that uh like how many billion well there were there was 60s something% was financed. was financed. was financed. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 30 something% people were like we're not going to pay this they won't even be able they won't even be able to pay it in 30 30 to 60 days.

So that's that's three, that's three, that's three, bro. That's one out of three people. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Is like, "Yeah, I'm buying this stuff and I'm gonna pay it off over months." Yeah. Or not at all. That's crazy. That's crazy. That's crazy. That has to come to a halt. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It has to. I mean, it eventually the the banks and the people like they can't afford to let people do all these pay now. Stop punishing people for saving money. Well, it's just it's like there's no there's no incentive to that anymore.

There's this weird I think again I think it's just there's there's a culture of consume and spend and you know like if you just gave a bunch like okay you know Trump said I don't know if this will happen he's like oh we're going to get rid of income taxes because of the terror whatever okay let's just imagine income taxes stopped or suddenly people had more money do you think they would save that or they would just go spend it all I don't know it'd be interesting because obviously they did numbers if they did that all consumer goods would go up dramatically dramatically.

dramatically dramatically. dramatically dramatically. Okay. They tax there' be more tax. Of course. Yeah. Televisions go up, cars go up, all the things. Well, let me rephrase the question. If everybody just got a bunch of money, do you think they would suddenly save it or they would different? I I'm so I'm I'm such a fan of of of But what you're saying, I get it because then there's another incentive that says, "Hey, buying things is more expensive though." expensive though." expensive though." That's right. And so you better really want it.

want it. want it. So you're going to burn it up real quick. quick. quick. So you you better really want that thing cuz it's really really I like that. I think it creates a the other. think it I think it creates a the other. I I don't think that that gets it eliminates anybody from living paycheck to paycheck or still like that's going to happen. But I think it would in incentivize at least more people than now now now to hold on to their money and not buy that thing because that thing is now 4x more expensive than what it was.

And I you know what I'm saying? I think it would be I think it's a better way to run the society than the way we do it right now way we than the way we do it right now where we're just we're trying to make everybody spin it somehow like we're all entitled to these things somehow and so we have to like you know bail everybody out. out. out. Yeah. Well, when you have your, you know, AI AI robot who can 3D print and build whatever you want, whenever you want, and work around the clock on it real soon here, like, it's going to be people are going to figure out that's not the not the not the I mean, it's going to be interesting to to see when that happens.

I Yeah, I don't know, man. I don't know. It's wild. Anyway, I was uh uh looking up some some data on skin health, and there's lots of studies on there out there on what helps improve the health of your skin, the look of your skin. But do you guys know how much of it points to the microbiome of the skin? So much of it points to the microbiome of your skin. Like if you have a healthy microbiome on your skin, you're going to have younger looking, healthier skin.

And a lot of products that serve to make your skin look better, the ones that work typically are because they improve the health of the bacteria that live because bacteria lives on your skin. Yeah. probiotic Yeah. probiotic Yeah. probiotic like soap is so like not a great idea. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, if I feel like we're figuring this out because the past was like all these chemicals and things that would kill and clean and like cleanse and well, think of it this way. They're like, "Here, uh, strip your skin of its natural oils, destroy all the the bacteria, replace it with this other fake oil or whatever." when really healthy skin doesn't need much of that because the microbiome of uh when when the microbiome is healthy the skin produces produces produces it'll produce it naturally what it needs and stuff.

So I where I'm going with this is you know because Calera Lab went from a small company to Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. exploded. exploded. exploded. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And people love them and the re the the the return rate of their customers is is it's crazy. It's in the stratosphere and I know why it works obviously, but their products are all based off of improving the microbiome of your skin. It's all natural natural natural compounds that help your skin enhancing your health on it. Well, it makes sense.

It's the largest organ in your body and everything that we've learned about the gut microbiome and the importance of that to all things is like it makes sense. Well, I remember I was trip out when we first started working with Caldera Lab their serum which is an oil. I remember I looked at it and it's an oil. I'm like, "Well, this will be for Justin cuz he's he's got dry skin. I'm I got oily skin. I'm not going to put oil on oily skin." That doesn't make any sense.

It actually balances me out. And for him, it does the same thing. Yeah. It's like a sponge. Just Yeah. And my skin is be normally is oilier, but when I put it on, it makes it more balanced. I'm I'm excited to, you know, Benjamin Button over there to start putting the beard oil on this. Yeah. He's got the Now he's got a beard. It's almost ready going on over there. Make that beard. Huh? Huh? Huh? I don't know. Let's go. Keep it going. You wanted me to keep like the Santa Claus style.

Keep it keep it going. Keep it going till the lady starts saying, "Okay, it's a little much. It's too much." She like his girls. Every my my wife was complimenting. I think I've seen nobody but everybody compliment everybody who's talked to him saying saying saying I was honestly surprised. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't think people I didn't think people would think it looked good. He's like, "Shit, I should have done this years ago." Great, dude. Let the top go. I missed out on so much opportunity.

If I can convince you to let the top go, you would look amazing, bro. The gray gray everything. how young your skin looks and how fit you are. Misery loves company. Don't buy into all that. that. that. No. Hey, listen. Listen. I He didn't look like me, bro. I age in accelerated race. race. race. Come on, dog. Go all gray with me. Come on, dog. on, dog. on, dog. Hey, my gray's don't gone almost. I'm losing it all, dude. I'm going to be doing what you got.

You're like me and Justin combined. Justin's going to be the last last man standing with this hair. No, he's he's still got I'm going to be I want to be like Doc from uh Back to the Future, just all white. Yeah. But no hair loss. hair loss. hair loss. No hair loss whatsoever. You know what? What if you were to really grow it out? What would it look like? Is give me an actor. Would it Could you get like a Kurt Russell type? Uh Man, I don't know.

Like it it's going to be wavy. Really wavy. Like at first it'll be curly and then once it gets longer, it like kind of stretches it out. And I've done it one time and it was just because I was going for this huge pompador that went like up and back and I hate curls. So I just grease it so it's straight. it's straight. it's straight. Doug, look up. Pull up. So they get s an image. Show Kurt Russell a Santa Claus. This is what I want.

Justin. I just It's great hair. I was looking at it when I was watching Santa Claus with my son. my son. my son. You know what's so funny? Cuz like Ever was like trying to prod me because he's like, "I've never seen you try and grow your hair out long cuz I always give them grief, you know, and he just like buzz cut it." Now that you go the opposite, I just buzz cut it. Why don't you grow it all the way out? Like what do you mean?

Yeah. Yeah. I want to put put the image up cuz I feel like just if anyone has a chance to to have if Justin had long hair, he would look like you know how some dudes like they just can't get rid of the 80s like they're like, "Man, I was cool in the 80s." 80s." 80s." Look at that great hair right there. Yeah. Well, yeah, he would. He would look like Santa. I mean, I don't know if it' look that good. I'll be honest. Isn't it Isn't that good?

Yeah, he's got he's got great hair. I don't know. don't know. don't know. That's excessive, though. Yeah, that's really excessive. That's great. great. great. Yeah, he likes his Yeah, Kurt Russell's a stud though, for sure. He's one of the I mean, if anyone if anyone has a chance to do to making that happen right there, I feel like like Justin does. His head already doesn't fit in his helmet. helmet. helmet. I'm not going to be wearing Yeah. Like my hats will fit, dude. I'm already on like that one last like notch.

I get mad that he wears hats all the time cuz he's he's got good hair. You have such good hair and you wear hats all the time. I've done it since I was a kid. I can't I can't I mean, who am I to talk? But if I had hair, I you would you I would be not wearing a hat as much as I wear. I might be wearing a hat here soon. I don't look good in a hat, though. I don't That doesn't look right on me, but we'll see.

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Go check it out. Go to seed.com/mindpump. Use the code 20pump and get 20% off. Back to the show. This segment of the podcast is brought to you by Mindpump Fitness Coaching. This is the number one course that teaches trainers and coaches how to build sustainable sixf figureure plus businesses and careers in fitness. Look, it's roundt based. So you can hear Adam, Justin, and myself teaching you how to build a better business, get more leads, close more deals, close bigger deals, and be more effective trainers. By the way, our course is nationally recognized.

In fact, it gives you 1.9 CEUs with or for your NASM certification. Find out more at mindpunfitnesscoaching.com. Our first caller is Anthony from Minnesota. Minnesota. Minnesota. What's up, Anthony? How you doing, Anthony? Hey guys, how's it going? Good, good, Good, good, Good, good, good, man. good, man. good, man. Hey, just want to thank you guys. I know you get a lot of them, but they're never going to be enough. The amount of education you guys provide is is just instrumental for me. listening to you guys for the past five years.

Uh it's helped me in my business and with myself. So, thanks again, guys. You got it, dude. How can we help you? Yeah. So, I had a question revolving around uh hitting two muscle groups in the same uh same workout and whether you should do the exercises consecutively with each muscle group or switch back and forth. For example, I'll do chest, tricep. Um should I do chest, chest, chest or do chest, tricep, chest, tricep? If there's any difference there, all chest, then I'll try. Real quick, Anthony, you're a trainer.

Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. How long you been training people for? Uh about uh about five and a half years. Oh, good for you, dude. How many of our programs do you have? I only just have the one, unfortunately. Which one? Which one? Which one? Uh well, a couple years ago with my ego, I bought the aesthetics. Okay. So, I was going to ask you, so if you have our programs, uh you could see how we wrote them. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that'll that'll teach you as a trainer.

One of the best things you can do, well there's a lot of things you could do that will help with your programming, but one of them is to look at established workout programming. Um, there's good stuff out there for powerlifting. There's good stuff out there for athletic performance. You have our programming which uh, you know, we have targeted avatars with each with each one of them and it'll teach you a lot of of on terms of how you would structure workout programming. And so what you'll find in our programs is that when there's multiple body parts done in a workout, you you finish the large group before you move on to the smaller groups.

And there and there's a couple reasons why. By the way, this isn't a hard and fast rule. Sure. Sure. Sure. But it's a general rule. So there's a reason for this. When you're working out your chest, for example, or on a push day, day, day, um your triceps are typically involved in a lot of the chest exercises. And if I go chest, triceps, chest, triceps, and really start to f fatigue my triceps, it really compromises my ability to do those compound lifts. So, if my triceps are really fatigued and then I go try to do another pressing movement, uh it's going to compromise my going to it's going to compromise my ability to press.

So, you typically will start and finish the larger groups before moving to the small, which is the biggest bang for your buck. So, the last thing you'd want is a isolation exercise to hinder your compound lift. If not to mention that, but you also got to consider the CNS too, right? So like just the repetition of doing the same movement in three to four sets in a row, you get better at it. A lot of times you'll feel that even as you you your strength progresses in the set many times and it'll peak after your first set is rarely ever your best set.

And so if you're always doing a set, then you go to another exercise and then come back, it's kind of like your first set again, right? And so, you know, you're you'll benefit also from just the technique of it, staying with it, and then finishing it and then going on to the next one in addition to what S is saying, too. Now, now here's where you could break that rule. Uh you have a weak body part that that you you feel just isn't developing well. My triceps, let's say my triceps, they just don't develop well, then you could work out your triceps before you hit your chest.

Especially if your chest is a strong body part and one that So, that's where you could kind of break this rule. I could think another way where I break that rule. Another way I could break that rule is if I know that I'm modifying intensity and I'm not going after a hard effective workout, but I just want to touch the muscles. I'm trying to get in and out. And so I'm kind of super setting those two things back and forth. So I'm trying to move through it.

I know I didn't get the best of sleep. I'm not the best on nutrition, but I'm going to show up to the gym anyways. I'm going to kind of hit I'm not pushing intensity. I'm not trying to m get the max out of my bench press. I'm trying to get the max out of my triceps. I just want to send a signal to my body that hey, we lifted we lifted these weights. And so there's another example where I might do something like that, but you're always almost better off doing it the other way.

We're talking about about about now. Anthony, when you train your clients, how do you do it? Um, you know, mainly I try to get a good, you know, dynamic warm-up in first, right? Make sure we're really kind of getting the mind muscle connection already from the beginning, you know. So if it is a chest, tricep dig, you know, using some bands, using li, you know, stuff like that to just get the body warmed up in those specific areas, too. And then, yeah, I do start with a compound movement.

It might be an incline bench press for example, moving into free weights and uh and then finally into like machines and really isolating the muscle. Um and sometimes I have a question maybe know the answer but let's say we're hitting chest uh you know two exercises and then two tricep exercises and we really want to focus on growth in the chest. Uh does it behoove us to like add another chest at the end or maybe not so much? depends total volume. You you want to consider uh the person's recovery, what they've been doing, progressive overload.

So, you could, but you could also just it would be too much. Well, yeah. Keep in mind that more exercises, more volume doesn't always equate to to more muscle. So, if if we're talking about like one of your clients right now who wants to focus on chest, but they've only been training for you for a month and it's like you adding another chest exercise to a like let's say a MAPS anabolic program is not going to serve you. like there's already enough volume in there for that person to build a chest for months uh before and then then you have to take in account if I'm going to add volume to this chest then I need to probably take away from somewhere else or you're just going to end up overtraining that client and so that's big mistake a lot of people make even young trainers will make is just like oh this is an area you want to focus on so I'm just going to do more of that stuff on top of what I was already doing when you really need to account for that total volume that total stress that you're putting on the body.

It's like, okay, well, he doesn't care so much about say his shoulders or he doesn't care so much about his hamstrings and so we're going to pull from there and we're going to increase more on on the the bench press. So, yeah, there's more to it. it. it. Also, generally speaking, if you're going to add another chest exercise, you do it at the end of the chest workout before we move on to triceps anyway. Yeah. On the left, it's the same kind of same general rule.

Perfect, guys. Well, hey, I really appreciate the guidance. Uh, keep doing what you guys are doing. You got to do it. And Anthony, if you haven't done our course, I highly suggest it. I think you would you would gain a lot of value out of it. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I'm get right on it, guys. All right, man. Thanks, Anthony. Thanks, Anthony. Thanks, Anthony. I'm surprised. I'm surprised. I'm surprised. It's like he's full of [ __ ] Yeah, I Well, I wasn't going to say it like that, but cool.

I mean, I can smell it through the mic. Come on. Come on. Come on. Well, here's the thing. I I I uh I'm surprised at his question. And he's a trainer for five years. Yeah, that's a very basic programming question. It's not it's not if you've been listening to us for that long and you only have one program, it's maps aesthetic aesthetic aesthetic or or just listening or just general workout programming. That's a very basic Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. uh workout programming um question or problem. So, I'm surprised when I asked him how long you've been a trainer, I thought he was going to say like a month, but five years.

I mean, it's been a long time since we've communicated this on the podcast, but because we typically talk about the programs to the general population, but I think one of the most valuable parts of all the programs are for coaches and trainers. I mean, if this was 22-year-old me and I was in the thick of becoming a as a trainer at that time, right, only two years in uh and had found a podcast like this, I'd own every program even if I didn't plan to run it.

Not because I plan to do it. It's just that like, okay, I'd like to see how these guys program for this type of client because I know in my 10 plus years I plan to be a personal trainer. I'm going to come across multiple people that are going to want to train this way. And yeah, I could go try and figure it out myself or I have mentors virtually here that I could go and go, "Oh, okay. I see how they did that." And then unpack it.

I mean, that's how I learned uh, you know, powerlifting programming. You know, I saw Westside Barbells uh programming. I saw dinosaur training that taught me about full body workout. Like uh programming makes a big difference. The order of the exercises, reps, sets, total volume, how it lays out in the week, how the weeks all lay out together, how the months, like it makes a big difference. And what this communicates to me with a question like this is there's still a lot of trainers out there that just look at exercises as exercises and we're going to do this today and we're just going to put these and it as if it doesn't make a difference.

It makes a huge diff difference like to the tune of two or three times as fast results or at worst zero results in injury. I think that's because we if the industry communicates how important nutrition is, which it is so important so much and where you see things like, you know, nutrition is 75% of the results or 80% of the results. And it's like, you know what, you're right. If you have a poor diet uh and you you have a subpar uh training program, like you're going to see little to no results.

If you have an incredible perfect diet and you have a subpar train, you'll probably see some good results. And so because of that, I think people just go, "Oh, well then the program doesn't really matter that much as long as you're doing something or you're doing you're doing what you like or you're doing exercise." And it's like, "Oh, no. It can be far more effective than that." Way more. Way more. Way more. Our next caller is Emma from Iowa. Hi, Emma. Hi, Emma. Hi. Hi, guys.

How you doing? Hey, I'm good. How are you? Good. Can we help you? Good. Okay. I'll go right into my question. Okay. Okay. Okay. So, I've been on the show once before and I've been diving deep into recovery metrics lately. metrics lately. metrics lately. I've noticed that my HRV drops for a few days sometimes when my workouts, nutrition, my sleep are solid. I have a 2-year-old, so most of the time it's solid. Um, I'm a busy mom. I work full-time. I have some side jobs. Um, I strength train.

At the time I wrote the question, three days a week I was running aesthetic. I have now went to split and I'm at the last phase of split. Um, so life stress, kids, all the chaos that happens. Um, how do you know when a low HRV score means you actually need to back off training versus when it's just reflecting daily stress, my hormones, and life chaos? Well, let's pretend like you don't have the HRV score and you just told me those are the two programs that you lean on.

I would tell you that those are probably not appropriate. not appropriate. not appropriate. I mean, those are our two like highest volume programs. And so, my mom of two without anything else would be enough for me to be like, "Yeah, maybe right now we run something a little bit different." different." different." Emma, are you would if if I talked to people who knew you really well, would they say that you're like you just overachiever, go do too much, super busy all the time? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And I married one, too. Like, gasoline on the fire. Yeah. And and it sounds like you're tracking a lot of things. Yeah. Yeah, Yeah. Yeah, Yeah. Yeah, I Yes. So, I've been working out for 10 years. Just tracking the data is been my It's my habits. It doesn't feel hard. It's just what I do. Well, what it does, it gives you a sense of control, which it sounds like that's something you like. So, and so that's a stress. Yeah. We got to change your relationship with this so it's not so stressful, huh?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like tracking HRV. You know who should track HRV? track HRV? track HRV? Nobody. Nobody. Nobody. Athletes. Yeah, Athletes. Yeah, Athletes. Yeah, like hardcore athletes in season by their coaches their coaches their coaches and even then it's like uh the best coaches that we talk to like they don't even communicate it to their coach. They don't they use it just as another feedback tool, but they don't tell the athlete. They don't go like, "Hey, you're loaded." loaded." loaded." Put that stress on them. Yeah.

It's overrated. No, no, you need to stop that. And those workouts, you picked the two most high volume volume volume Yeah. that we have inappropriate workouts. Like whatever results you're getting right now are in spite of like that you're doing weight. Like if you did more appropriate programming, do you know how much better your results would be? I would love to see you on a one of our maps 15 programs. Maps 15. I do. I do have it. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then And then And then but can I plead my case?

I I already know what it is, but go ahead. ahead. ahead. Yeah, let's go ahead. Go ahead. Let's hear it. Tell us. hear it. Let's hear it. Tell us. Okay. Okay. Okay. So, the reason I like Matt Split is it keeps me in the gym 5 days a week, which gives me that hour. So, I have a basement gym, an hour kid-free, jamming the tunes, lifting weights. So, we can still do this. Okay. So, still we can still do this. Okay. So, what it looks like is mass 15, you're in just as many days.

Okay. Slow down the workouts. Make them 25 minute workouts. And then the other 30 minutes walk on a treadmill or mobility or mobility or read or read or read or some ab workout. or some ab workout. I get the break. I get it. Yeah. Yeah. I get that, too. But you got to be able to But you got to be able to have a break and not like work out. Yeah. It doesn't have to be high stress on the body. It could be something more recuperative.

I would love sauna. I would love yoga. I would love like so do the strength training and then the back 30 or 40 is all mobility, all yoga, all sauna, all I mean a list of all the recovery, a cold plunge, what do you want to do? Like you can do a lot of other things other things other things but pushing the body more uh during that time. time. time. Do do you like results? I love results. Oh, okay. Then just do what we're telling you.

telling you. telling you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You get so much better results and stop tracking HRV. Stop tracking everything. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's not helping you. I promise. Yeah. Yeah, that's why. Yeah, I'm surprised surprised surprised you're smiling. you're smiling. you're smiling. Yeah, she knows. That's why. What kind of work? What kind of work do you do? What do you do for work? do for What do you do for work? Okay, so I I am tech a receptionist. My 8 to5 and then I do photography on the side and then I also answer 911 for a county that's close to us.

Yeah. Yeah. Were you an athlete? You should have like two more kids. You're not that busy. Yeah. Uh, well, actually, I do have four kids. One step and three three daughters. daughters. daughters. Emma, Emma, Emma, oh my god, it's great. You know what? You're going to get crazy results with Mass. You will. You will. You're going to get You obviously only though. only though. only though. You're obviously resilient. Only though, if you promise us that the other rest of the time is recuperative type stuff. type stuff.

type stuff. Yeah. Don't replace jump roping or doing something else that's like more high in like do something recuperative. Do yoga, do mobility, you know? read. Yeah. Or walk on the tread. Walking on a treadmill would be awesome. I mean, just a nice nice stroll. Put the podcast in. Not a crazy like power walk trying to like like like not a 15 incline hill climb and like get out like a walk. Like literally a walk. Dude, you're going to get so strong. Your body's going to sculpt and shape.

Your metabolism probably six, seven weeks in is going to kick up. You're going to see your body get leaner. You're going to feel amazing. And it's going to give you more energy to do all that other stuff that is so important. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yes. Yes. Yes. Listen, do you have M you have mess 15? I do have MAPS 15. Okay. So, Okay. So, Okay. So, what did we release recently? Which 15s? We have other 15s that we just released. We'll give her a muscle mommy 15.

There you go. I'm going to send you muscle mommy 15 also. So, you got two 15s. Awesome. 15s. Awesome. 15s. Awesome. And then and then we're going to do this, Emma, because I'm going to we're going to talk to you again so I know you did it. did it. did it. I'm going to have you back on in 60 days. Okay. days. Okay. days. Okay. This is the nice conversation. We have to have this. Don't do what we tell you in 60 days. I'm going to take all your programs away.

programs away. programs away. Don't do that. Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. Can we have you back on in 60 days? days? days? I would love that. All right. Good. Please do it. You're going to get really, really good results. results. results. Hit your protein intake. That's the only thing we didn't talk about, but just I guarantee she tracks protein. If you do that, hit that while Okay. Okay. So, if you do that and you do what we said, you're you're going to be great. great. great. This going to be great.

I'll take some Can I track photos? Can I take photos before and after? Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, that's fine. Sure. Sure. Sure. Yeah. But don't obsess Yeah. Don't obsess over the scale in the mirror every day. It's like take go a take some before before before every 30 days. Every 30 days, do a photo. photo. photo. Yeah. There you go. That's it. Deal. Cool. Cool. Cool. I can do that. Yeah. Let's do this. We'll see you in 60. 60. 60. All right. Thanks, guys. Byebye. Byebye.

Byebye. I knew it. I knew if she's going to tell me the program like aesthetic and split. Yeah. Highest bodybuilder. Whenever you meet somebody, four kids, three jobs, and you're tracking everything. Everything. HRV. Who tracks HRV? Yeah. No, too much. If your workout and your diet is another you're if it's stressful and I don't mean Yeah. But you got to remember someone like that doesn't think it's stressful. She would she claim it as like the habits. It's it's a routine. I just Yeah. It's the whole like I got to feel like I got it all under control.

And that's uh that could be be be I mean once you unlock though somebody like this who has discipline and consistency consistency consistency you know how strong I mean you know she's going to get so strong and see such crazy results going to blow her mind. mind. mind. Yeah. No it'll be incredible if she does it. Our next caller is David from Arkansas. Arkansas. Arkansas. What's up David? How you doing David? I'm doing great. How are y'all? Good man. Good man. What's happening? No not much.

I'm excited to be here. Thank y'all for everything really. Um, I started listening to y'all about 3 years ago, right before I became a personal trainer. Um, y'all actually helped me decide that's what I wanted to be for my career path. career path. career path. Nice, man. Nice, man. Nice, man. Awesome. Nice. How can we help you? So, in my question, I'd asked how do you balance work life and trying to be an aspiring entrepreneur? because I want to start my own online business, but I'm also a amateur bodybuilder and I also work at a gym currently and I'm married.

So, it's just a little bit difficult to find a good balance of everything. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, I was wondering how y'all how y'all did that in the beginning. How How old are you and do you have kids yet? yet? yet? I'm 22 and I don't have any kids. Oh, good. You're fine, bro. There is no balance. It balance. There is no balance. It doesn't. Everybody wants this like perfect balance work life stuff. Like there's times in life and what that balance looks like. It doesn't look like a daily balance.

It looks like there's periods of times when I'm sprinting at work and then there's periods of time when I'm very present and connected to my wife. Like it's that's what it looks like. And if you're if you're building something, hopefully you have a a good partner that you married that knows that you're off and you're building a future for the two of you. and she understands when you got those 10 12 hour days sometimes and she supports that. Um, but this idea of gonna have a nineto-5 and come home and then I'll always have this dinner and we're going to be together and it's I'll have weekends off and I have this nice and I'm going to build a company.

It's like it's probably not going to happen. It doesn't mean that it maybe somebody who has done it or got lucky, but most people that build a successful business had to really grind and sacrifice a lot while they were doing that. But then you can always have the vision like we did early on. I remember when I sat down with these gentlemen and we we said long before anybody was paying attention, we were making any money, the goal was to scale up and scale out. So, as opportunity grew and we could make more money and there was an opportunity to make even more money, do we look at each other and said, "Well, does that pull us back in and make us work more hours?" Yeah, it's more money, but do we have to work more?

We'd look at each other and go like, "Yeah, it's not for us. We'll take less money because we want that balance. We want to be able to still have weekends with our wives and do those things." But early on, man, it was a grind. early on, man, it was a grind. We were all working full-time jobs. Then we'd show up to a studio from 8 to sometimes 11 midnight, you know? So, not a lot of time with the wife at a lot not a lot of time with the wife at that time, but she knew what we were building.

And so, uh, that that's what balance looks like to me. Yeah, David, it's um I'll use a fitness analogy, right? You can't both be the strongest that you can you could possibly be and have the most endurance. You have limited uh capacity. Um, you have limited ability, limited time. So, if you want a little of everything, you could do that. If you want a lot of one thing, you got to devote more time and capacity and energy into that direction. Uh now, I'll say this because you're married, you want your wife on your team.

Trying to do this without her on your team is is you're going to suck. So, uh a husband isn't very effective when his wife at home is not on the same page with them. So, what does that mean? Does that mean you bid her? No. It means you got to get her on your team. And typically what what they respond well to is a timeline. And so what you what what a lot of guys will do is they'll say look I'm just trying to build this business and and then it goes on for two three four five.

It's like what okay what's the goal? Like when are we going to stop this? But you could say something like honey I need the next 12 months to bury myself and I'm going to bury myself. I'm going to work hard. I'm going to give it a year and it's going to look like this so she knows what to expect. Can you support me in this because here's the goal. I want to build this life for us. Uh that tends to bring uh people together. You don't want to do this open-ended like, you know, type of thing or don't even communicate it.

So, a lot of guys will make this mistake. They don't even communicate. They just go and expect their wife to be on the same page and she's like, "What's going on here?" So, you got to communicate that. Look, here's what's going to sacrifice. Here's the goal. Here's what I want for us before we have kids. I I need a year to really get after it, make it happen. After this year, if it doesn't work, then we'll re-evaluate, but here's what, you know, I think I can do.

Can you do this with me? Um, and then get her on your team. And then you know this, like if your wife is on your team and you feel supported uh by her and she's proud of you while you're doing this, you could you'll probably drag yourself across glass. So that's the important thing about uh to to understand with this is uh your wife could be your best asset, but you it's your job as her husband to get her on the same page. And it's not going to happen by force or by guessing or just expectation.

You got to communicate very clear with her. And then when she's on your on your team, bro, then it's you're you're unstoppable. unstoppable. unstoppable. I I also empowered Katrina to be the CEO of our relationship. Meaning, listen, I'm going to do this thing. I'm going to bury myself into this vision. And I know sometimes I can get tunnel vision. And if you feel like we haven't had time together or I'm we're starting to drift apart because I'm so focused, you have the power and control to set my calendar and I won't ever say anything.

So you and so she still to this day does this because I still can run like this where I put my head down because the season of the business that I got to have to pull myself back in and all a sudden I'll open up my calendar and I'll be like why am I blocked out on Friday, Saturday, Sunday? She's like cuz we're going here. Mom's taking the kid. You and I are going here. And she's like we need it. It's been a while. And so and I don't I don't gripe and and I would never book that myself.

I know that if I was were to keep going when I'm in it, I'm like there's always something I got to be doing where she knows and she knows us and where we need to be. And so I've I've we've always made that agreement that if you feel like I'm start I'm like I'm cuz there's I can do this. I'm guilty of being home and she can see me look through her because my my brain is still on business. And she totally gives me that latitude to be that way when I'm in it, but only for so long.

And then she'll be like, "Okay, it's time to bring my husband back this Saturday. We're going here and we're doing this." And I don't say nothing. I go and we we we connect again and then I get I get refueled and then she goes, "Go kill it again for us." And then I go do it. Now, here's the other thing, too. You mentioned you're a bodybuilder and entrepreneur. You're probably going to have to pick one. That doesn't mean you don't work out if you pick entrepreneur.

Uh and it also doesn't mean that you don't work if you're a bodybuilder. But if you want to really excel uh at either one, you're going to probably have to put most of your focus in that to to try to excel because I know bodybuilding and bodybuilding is a very time consuming, selfish sport. Uh so it'll be really hard to really push and apply yourself entrepreneurally while also unless you're leveraging it for your business. But even that I would say is we I mean I use that to get the original attention right for mind pump but I after that it was you but I couldn't wait to be done with that so I could focus on the business.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So hopefully that helps you. No absolutely. But the idea was to leverage it cuz in the start of everything I was 300 lb and this past September I got down to 194 doing men's open bodybuilding like heavyweight. So, I was wanting to use that as a leverage point. Well, I mean that just so you know though that that's enough right there. People if people have watched you go from that overweight to being able to step on stage that that's enough proof you know what you're doing.

That's enough proof on the like to get and I remember when Katrina asked this when we were we were competing and I was on year I think it was on year three of this. I remember she looked at me and she's like, "Hey, is this going to be our life? like am I going to be married to like a competitor? I'm like hell no. Like the mind pump thing is almost there. I'm like trust me once this thing once it outgrew me once because at that time I still had the biggest pull on on the internet as far as all of us together.

But once the show even slightly outgrew my personal brand, I switched my name to Mind Pump Atom, got rid of bodybuilding, and I was done with it. Yeah, you're you're you're done, dude. You got that before and after, and you know you're good. Yeah, it's it doing more competing isn't going to help that much. much. much. I mean, it's not it's only going to distract from the from building the business. You've already proven that you know how to and you're building what? A coaching business, personal training.

Is that your focus? your focus? your focus? Yes, sir. That's that's the plan. Are you in our course? Yeah. No, he looks great. Uh, I'm not. Oh, bro. You got You got to get in our course. That's what we do. Yeah. I'm looking at your photos right now, too, bro. You got you you've already you've already proven you know what you're doing. Yeah, that's great, dude. Any any more trophies you gain ain't gonna gain any more clients. None of my clients have ever been like, "So, how many trophies do you have?" No, they just like to see the before and after.

after. after. Yeah. None of them did that. Like, they see see where my body was, see what I can do. And it's like, okay, it's, you know, that's that's it. Like, you've already you've done an better transformation than I did. You look you incredible. It's not serving you anymore other than feeding your ego. That's all it is now. Gotcha. Gotcha. Gotcha. Cool. Cool. Cool. No, I I appreciate that. Mhm. Yeah. Now, now the next step is just got to get you in our course, bro. Yep.

Yep. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Plan on doing right after this. this. this. All right, brother. All right, dude. Let's have someone call them. them. them. All right. All right. Thanks, man. Thank y'all. Thank y'all. Thank y'all. Take it easy. Easy. Easy. Easy. Hey, you look great. Yeah. You know, you know what work life balance conversations uh are about cuz they are they're it's important. It's important to understand. It's what that's for though is for your life. Yes. Yes. Yes. Right. You can't live your life.

I mean, I guess you could, but boy, would that be dysfunctional. But there are seasons where you got to place a lot of energy. It's like look, it's like this. You're gonna at one point you're going to have an infant. You know what that season's going to look like? You're spending a lot of time trying to support your wife during the, you know, those initial six months or whatever. I mean, I'm always more when I when a when a father or a mother is has a child also in the picture.

I'm more delicate with that conversation. If you don't have have have those years are gone. Yeah. If you don't have a kid, [ __ ] you ain't got no reason in my opinion. And if and then your only thing is you better pick the right partner who gets that. That's if like if you're going to go be an entrepreneur and you go build that, you have to have a partner who's willing to support that understand. understand. understand. From my understanding just when you look at the psychology of uh you know men and women uh when you give a timeline and a distinct goal and you're like this is why oftenimes you'll get that support and I'll say this speak speaking to women men when they feel that strength and support from you where you're just like you're pushing them out the door.

go do this for us, honey. He'll do all anything. He'll walk across fire. Yeah. fire. Yeah. fire. Yeah. So, and it's an incredible team when you work together. work together. work together. I mean, you hit it on the head. I think that's an I think a lot of men will say something like, "I'm going to go build this thing, but then they don't map out the plan." Y Yeah. I mean, the the Adam Lane Smith episode that that go live. It did. And there's a I talk I share about one of the challenges that Katrina and I had recently had.

And the mistake that I made was I failed to communicate like a plan. So, it's just like, hey, we shouldn't do this with Max or hey, we should do this versus saying like, hey, here's the things I'm thinking that we should implement and you know, if we can try and then communicating to her like that changes that whole conversation versus I'm going to go build a business. It's like, okay, well, what for the next 15 years trying to build a business and like how long as a wife do I sit back and just watch you fail at this thing before I tell you like let's do something else versus I go here's my plan.

I'm going to use my physique. I'm going to transform it. I've done that. Now I'm going to go out and I'm going to build attention and build a community and for the next year I'm going to do these things. I'm going to go now you're on the same page, right? And then at a year I'm going to know if this is for me or not and uh you know can you hang with me that and then she's like okay cool I know what I got to do versus like I'm going to build this business and then 3 years later she's like you've been trying to build this business for three years.

It seems [ __ ] [ __ ] [ __ ] Our next caller is Natalie from Minnesota. Minnesota. Minnesota. Hi Natalie. Hi Natalie. Hello. This is so crazy. They all say that, but it really is. How you doing? Good. Um, so first of all, I just want to, as everyone does, thank you for everything you do. Um, I've been listening to you every morning for over 6 years now, and it's a great part of my morning walk. Um, you've completely shaped the way I think about fitness and wellness. And, um, as somebody who works in the functional medicine space now, I really appreciate the holistic perspective that you bring.

um you've really transformed my relationship with my own health and I'm very grateful. very grateful. very grateful. Awesome. Thank you. Um so my email was crazy long so I'm going to try and make it shorter um and just tell you a little bit of background. Um I'm 26. I've been in the fitness world for a long time. I used to be a personal trainer and a group fitness instructor and I definitely had a pattern of overtraining in the past. Um I'm no longer working as a group fitness instructor.

I think it kind of started to push my body a little bit too hard. hard. hard. Um, and I also have not um, trained any clients for quite some time now, but it's something that I really love. Um, I have a complicated health history uh, with gut issues, stress, and um, a history of being um, underweight due to those issues. Um, I lost a lot of weight from 2020 to 2022. Um, and I still haven't really gotten my cycle back due to being underweight. Um, and I've also come off birth control since then.

So, I know that there's a lot of hormonal issues probably going on. Um, over the last year and a half, I've really focused on healing, um, increasing my protein intake. I've gone from, um, at one point being under 100 lb at, um, 57, so very underweight, too. Um, now I think I'm around 130 or so. I try not to really weigh myself. Um, I do know that that's healthy progress, but um, as someone in the fitness industry, I struggle with, you know, the body image side of it.

Um, and it feels like the weight, uh, will show up in my stomach or thighs or, you know, where the women don't really want rather than muscle. Um, so my goal is now to build much more muscle and strength um, without slipping back into overtraining. Uh, I've run maps anabolic and muscle mommy twice. I'm currently going through anabolic again. I love solid core for uh low impact strength um and core work. And then I do love running. I'm a runner, but I try not to do it too much.

I haven't run for a while due to an injury. Um but I love cardio mainly for the mental health benefits. Um and I love walking a lot. So I try to focus on the walking rather than running. Um, so my questions are, um, how should I structure my training so that I can keep building muscle while including things like solid core and occasional running without overdoing it? Um, nutritionally, how should I think about going about how much I should be eating. I try to track my protein.

I think I'm getting about 120 to 150 g. Um, but I don't I try not to track my calories. Um, just because I don't want to slip into unhealthy habits there. Um, and then lastly, is the way that I'm gaining weight um, normal for someone rebuilding um, after being underweight and under a lot of chronic stress? So, I hope that that was um, somewhat concise. Um, and I really appreciate your guidance. Yeah. No, we appreciate you. So, um, you're moving in the right direction. You are.

You are. You are. You're really moving in the right direction. And it sounds like you came from a very, very, uh, tough place. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you're doing good. So, yep. So, here's the thing with stuff like this. Um, we can look at all of the symptomatic behaviors symptomatic behaviors symptomatic behaviors and we could try to modify those and and that's okay. But if we don't address where they're coming from, um, then it's going to be very difficult. And so, what I mean by that is if we address the root of why uh you struggle with some of this stuff, then the behaviors will match.

And I think you have the information. And I think you know a lot because of your background and what you do. You you know more than most people in terms of exercise, nutrition, stress, hormones. You said you work in functional medicine. medicine. medicine. I do. Yes. I So I think you probably could coach yourself really really well, but we have to address uh where all those things kind of come from. Were you Were you ever, if you don't mind, is it okay if I ask you some direct questions?

Yeah. Do were you ever diagnosed with an eating disorder? eating disorder? eating disorder? I was not. Okay. Um they they really couldn't figure out because they they were flagging that that that could possibly be an issue and they were never able to diagnose me with anything. Okay. Um because I've always I've always fueled myself. I've always eaten healthy. Um so it was really difficult. Okay. when you talk about not wanting to track or you know because you'll slip back into to certain behaviors. What behaviors would would you slip back into?

into? into? You know, as a girl growing up in diet culture, just trying to not slip into controlling what I eat too much to change my body. Um, and I'm also a type a perfectionist as you probably assumed. So, I just don't want to become over analyzed with that. Um, I want to be able to enjoy my life. Um, because I already have a lot of like dietary issues or gut issues, sorry. Um, I've had SIBO. Um, I've gone through all of that. Um, and so I know what my triggers are.

So, I'm already like a little bit too hyper aware and so I don't want to get nitty-gritty into tracking anything more. No, that's great. Yeah, it's really really good awareness. So, um, how do you feel about do you get repeating thoughts about your fitness, your progress? Do you do you criticize yourself? yourself? yourself? I do. I do. I do. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah, I know that I have a lot of body dysmorphia. dysmorphia. dysmorphia. Okay. There's there's a way to counter that. And so, it's not by stopping the thoughts.

That's impossible. Like, if I were to tell you to not think about a zebra, you're probably now thinking about a zebra. So the way to counter that sounds hokey is to counter it with truths that you know are true, right? right? right? So if if your repeating thought is, I'll just make one up. You're not good enough or you're not, you know, my body looks this way. Your body looks whatever. What I want you to do is say something that is true, that is positive. And I don't care what it is.

it is. it is. My squat's stronger than it's ever been right now. right now. right now. I'm moving in the right direction. I'm becoming healthier. I am worthy. uh of being cared for. I am a person that I want to care about or whatever. And what you're going to do is you're going to repeat these to yourself out loud when you catch yourself with the repeating negative thoughts. This sounds silly, but it's really powerful. It is really powerful, especially if you do it on a consistent basis.

So, I'd start there. It sound it feels hokey at first, by the way, and awkward, but that's the point. This is also this is also where uh depending on where you're at in this journey um you know investing in like a really good coach is is valuable where they're just they're helping you with that reminding you of that once a month and kind of outsourcing it to someone. Yeah. Right. So it's just like you you come I meet with you once a week and we get on these calls and you're like Adam I fill this and this and then I remind you of how great you're doing and all the positive things and it's just like sometimes it helps to have someone do that.

If you have the ability to do that on your own, then I think you're doing a great job. You're moving in the right direction. You're already moving in a great Right. Right. So, you're doing great. Um, but that is the the next step to this is reminding yourself of all the other positive things that you you're doing when that when that creeps in. So, repetitive thoughts, psychologists will will comment on this or or talk about how repetitive thoughts uh actually repeating thoughts turn into beliefs. beliefs.

beliefs. So they actually start to things that you that are true because they're repeated. That's why it's important to counter when you become aware with a truth that you believe but that is good and positive. So you just boom, no, here's the truth and you just say it out loud. Say it out loud. Um it's really powerful at shaping uh behaviors. Something else I'll help you with is because you need a direction. So we need a direction with your training. Let's go get strong. That's the best direction I can put point you is to get strong.

Yep. If you if you can take your laser focus, which I think you have, you you're probably a pretty focused person. Am I Am I correct? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Can you focus on getting stronger? getting stronger? getting stronger? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You want to do powerlifting? Mhm. Mhm. Mhm. Can you train like a powerlifter? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Let's do it. I want to get strong. I want to get strong. All right, let's do it. Let's do it. Let's point you in the direction of powerlifting. And and Doug, is it too soon for me?

Oh, we should give her Give her Maps 15 powerlift. powerlift. powerlift. We just We haven't even released this yet. You're gonna be the first one to get it. get it. get it. It's Maps. It's MAPS 15 powerlift. So, it's it's two lifts a day except some days it's one lift when you're focusing on the core lift. And you're going to hit PRs in this. Okay? Okay? Okay? We're going to send that do that program and let's and all I want you to focus on with your training is can I get stronger and then feed yourself accordingly.

The the last thing I have a little more questions on just because I I I'm not fully familiar with. Tell me a little bit about the core classes. Uh Solid Core. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um yeah, it's huge right now. Um it's like 50 minutes. Um it's on a Pilates inspired machine, but it's more of it's more strength focused. Okay. Okay. Okay. Um so it's less Pilates. Um it's full body. Um but each class will have different like muscle group focuses. So they'll every class has core and oblique work on the machine and then um they'll have a lower body and an upper body.

So it'll be like center glutes and shoulders. So then there's like movements focused on that with the cables um and the the machine. How often are you doing that? I go one to two times a week. Okay, we're fine with Mass 15. This is fine. This is this is was my concern with MAPS anabolic. Maps anabolic is plenty of strength training there. There's no ne there's no reason to do any more. But if we pull you back down to mass 15 powerlift, then we can afford to do this this core class, then you're good.

Yeah. So, you can still do that core class. Stick to your when you're doing cardio that it's lists. So, if you're on there walking, just walking. Um, do you track steps? Where your steps at on a regular basis? I'm like I walk a lot. Um, now that there's snow on the ground in Minnesota, um, I it's harder and it gets to be really cold. Um, but I love walking. So, I do walk more than most people. Probably like 15,000 steps a day. Yeah, you're good then.

Yeah, it's that's that's that's you're good. And then with your diet, I know you're tracking your protein, which is fine. Do you eat until you're satisfied or do you eat what you think is appropriate? is appropriate? is appropriate? I definitely eat till I'm satisfied sometimes beyond even like when I'm trying to get more protein in because I'm trying to okay okay okay actually fuel because as I want to get strong I want to make sure I'm actually eating enough to get strong. Um but there is a little bit of a mental block there sometimes where I question like am I eating too much?

But no no no you're doing great. You're doing great. Let's have you back on the show uh in a couple months. I want to hear about your strength gains. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I would love to do that. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. But I do just have one other question about the powerlifting. So the my access to gym equipment is like there's a gym at my apartment building. Um and it just has a Smith machine. Um so that's what I've been using for like squats. Um but there's no like free weight barbell.

Um so I'll use dumbbells too. Um like what what how do you think I should? For for the deadlift, you can I'll let you use dumbbells, but you can use a Smith machine for everything else. Just modify your technique. It's not ideal, but it's okay. Okay. So, I the strength is still possible there. possible there. possible there. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I guess I always I get concerned about that. that. that. No, no, no. You're okay. Just modify the where necessary, but the presses, the squat, you know, you're going to have to set up the squat differently where it's more like a hack squat, but you could still chase strength for consistency.

That's fine. it. I would try to every once in a while make it to a normal gym if you can just so you can mess with barbell stuff. I think it would be great. Yeah. But I would never make you do that and then it sacrifice the consistency of it. If it's like I consistently will do it here, then that trumps you're still going to get stronger. That'll trump it. But then I'd also be like, "Hey, if it's a Saturday and you can go work out or what that, maybe go to your local gym where you have barbell stuff that you can practice.

It it would serve you." serve you." serve you." But the deadlift one is the only one I'd say switch to dumbbells. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Natalie, what is what about what we're saying challenging for you? Um, Um, Um, there's I actually feel really good about it to be honest. Um, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm I'm excited. I feel like I've been kind of crossing that line of I want to go to solid core but then I also want to lift but then I don't want to do too much so that it does actually gives you the opposite results you know and I'm not actually gaining strength and I'm overdoing it so that I can't and so I feel like the 15-minute seday is really going to be what I need so that I'm not overtraining.

Um, and you know, I, as I said, I've listened to you for a long time, so I trust you. Um, and it might be hard to, you know, like not be in the gym for a full hour, but if I can just push through that and yes, yes, yes, make uh make long rest periods. It'll they can that 15-minute workout will easily stretch to 30 just by having long long rest periods between. So, So, So, yeah, that is something that I always struggle. I mean, I was griffinous instructor, so obviously I'm want to like make it a circuit or super set.

I'm glad I'm glad you said that. Then go the opposite with this. Make turn maps 15 into maps 30, please. Let's get you strong. I'd be happier to see that it's taken you 30 minutes than you get it done in Make it 30 minutes. I feel good about this though. I feel really good about this. We're going to have you back on in 60 days so we could check in on you. Okay, that's great. Thank you so much. This has been so much fun. So, I can't wait.

Thanks, Natalie. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, Oh, Oh, she's doing a good job. Yeah, I feel for her. She's doing a good job. job. job. Yeah, she's self-aware. She's a kid. She's only 26 years old. Uh but you know, the repeating thoughts that uh that's a difficult one. But if you replace it with pause, in fact, I was just reading an article about this uh this morning and um that can be tough for people especially when they're thoughts that are, you know, ones that break yourself.

break yourself. break yourself. I mean, I think this is so this is tough for everybody. I actually think I mean uh the webinar that Kyle and I had just ran like the third the third thing that where people fail uh we were talking about with just accountability having a coach having support and help and I said one of the biggest things uh that a coach and a trainer does support-wise is literally just help people disconnect from the mirror and the scale and connect to all the other things that strength training and eating correctly does for you.

And that's it's hard for the average person to do that. Much less if you have any sort of issue or condition or or struggle or type of personality. It's like the average person, we've been conditioned to look at the mirror, look at the scale, and judge that. judge that. judge that. And that's your relationship. And it's like it does so many things for your energy, your libido, your hair, your skin, your mood, your relationships, your sleep. It's like the list goes. list goes. list goes. You can't develop a complete relationship without paying attention to all those things to all those things.

And so even the average person, I mean, you talk about somebody who admittedly has struggled with some of this stuff, it's like, no, I I mean, I think the average person uses those two metrics and has a really hard time. I mean, most of I'm sure your career was the average person coming back to you saying like, "Hey, the scale is not moving or I look the same in the mirror." And then going like, "Yeah, but how's your energy and didn't you just tell me about your libido and look how strong your squad is?" And it's like you have to help them make that connection.

Yeah, that's right. All right, I know you like that episode. If you did, check this one out. 30% body fat. For men, this is way too high. This is actually a bit high for women as well. So, today's episode, we're talking about how you can go from 30 to 10. What is 10% body fat? This is when you have a visible six-pack. Can you go from 30 to 10%, yes, it's possible, but not if you guess along the way. So, we're going to talk about how you can do that in today's episode.

Now, there's a huge range, right, of like body types. Some people can run uh a little bit heavier uh and or a little bit higher