2679: The 10 BIGGEST Gym Mistakes That are Killing Your Gains & More (Listener Live Coaching)

16:25Adam Schafer:All of them will dig a hole. One of them does the best job and requires the least amount of effort. That's what it's like with certain exercises. There are certain exercises that if you do them, like a deadlift or a squat or an overhead press or a row, that are like the backhoe. they will get you there much faster. And then there's lots of other exercises that have value, but they're just not nearly as effective. And if you skip those best lifts, I mean, you're basically trying to do this on extra hard mode, which if that's what you want, cool. But most people, I think they want results for the effort they put in.

17:01Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, this one's interesting to talk about because I do still think you see this, but I would have said 10, 15 years ago, this was the number one problem. Yes. 10, 15 years ago. Big difference now. huge difference i mean the fact that i could work in a gym for 10 hours in a day and actually go i recall days in the gym okay in like some of the most busiest gyms in the bay area working a 10-hour shift and not see one squat yep or definitely not a day i went months without

17:32Adam Schafer:seeing a squat yeah i went months without seeing a deadlift for sure oh yeah but even this not

17:37Sal Di Stefano:seeing the squat rack be used in an entire 10-hour day is crazy we're what a 180 now oh yeah now you have gyms that most big commercial gyms have got at least four to five squat racks and there is normally a line of people waiting to use after the next person which that would i mean that's one of the coolest things i think what a win a huge win huge win to think that this was probably one of the biggest reasons why people weren't seeing results 10 15 years ago to now seeing that much. I still think there are a lot of people that miss the mark here, but we've definitely moved the needle in the right direction in regards to more people are figuring this piece out.

18:15Adam Schafer:Totally. Next up, you don't rest long enough in between sets. We kind of mentioned this earlier, but what makes strength training strength training is the rest periods. In fact, the rest periods make strength training strength training more than the exercises do. This is true, everybody. It's crazy, right? It's the rest periods that make strength training, build strength, build muscle, boost your metabolism, get those hormone benefits. And it's not because you necessarily need the rest. This is, I wish they called them something else. Like we have reps, sets, and rest period. And because it's called rest, I think people think.

18:48Adam Schafer:It should be like gain periods. Gain periods. Or maybe pause. I don't know what the right word would be, but people hear rest and they think, oh, that's because you need to rest because you can't keep going. But I can keep going, so I'm not going to rest, therefore making it more effective. No, no, the rest period is so that you can shift or focus on energy systems that contribute to building muscle and strength. If you keep going, you move into a different energy system of the body where you're building endurance, which if you want that, that's great. But if you're doing strength training for the benefits of strength training, which is the muscle, the sculpt, the boost, the metabolism, the rest periods are what make a strength training.

19:23Adam Schafer:So it's not that you need them because you need to rest. It's you need them to get the results. And the rest periods should be at minimum a minute and a half. At minimum, for many people, two to three minutes is what's going to give you best results. By the way, the data on this is clear.

19:36Sal Di Stefano:I think the reason why that is is I think that people think by shortening the rest periods and keeping going like that, they're getting the benefits of both. They think that they're getting the best muscle building benefits and endurance benefits. Very few people, when you tell them that, go like, well, I do want endurance. It's like, yeah, but do you want it more than being able to build muscle? And there's a better way to get endurance, by the way. Yeah, and I think people just want to get through it. uh, I just want to get through this.

20:02Adam Schafer:Let's get over with it. Like that's a common thought. Well, I'll tell you what, as a trainer, when you train people and you do it right, uh, this is a skill to learn how to get your clients to sit down. In fact, I mastered the art of, of conversation because this is what got my clients to chill out. Cause I would get new clients and we'd be, we'd do a set. They'd wait 20 seconds. Like, all right, let's go again. They'd pick up the weights. No, no, no, we got to rest. So I'm like, you know, I'm going to distract them with really good questions and conversation. so they didn't realize that we're resting for two minutes or three minutes, and they got better results, of course.

20:32Adam Schafer:Master the three-minute conversation. That's right. Next up, you don't give yourself grace. Listen, if you plan, if your goal, which it should be this, if your goal is to be able to do this forever because that's what you want, right? You want to be able to be consistent for the rest of your life so that you have good health or better health for the rest of your life. You have good mobility for the rest of your life so that you feel great, right? You don't want to get in shape and get out of shape. You want to do this forever. This journey is going to be marred and littered with failures. Okay.

21:04Adam Schafer:You are going to have a lot of failures. I don't care. The most consistent person is going to have a lot of failures throughout this process. If you don't give yourself grace, if you hammer yourself with shame and self-hate, you're done. This will be a relationship that you will eventually hate and you'll stop. You won't be able to do it forever. The only way you could pursue a lifestyle of health and fitness is if you accept the fact that you're going to make mistakes. And when you do, you give yourself grace and you get back on.

21:30Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. I would say the word that is interchangeable to grace for this one would be patience.

21:35Adam Schafer:Yeah.

21:35Sal Di Stefano:I think that both go hand in hand. And I think it's a similar point. I think a lot of people think that they're going to build muscle and lose body fat a lot faster than they're going to. And so I think -

21:50Adam Schafer:Takes time. Good point. Yes.

21:51Sal Di Stefano:Understanding that, and I do think it goes hand in hand with grace. Part of that is the ups and downs of the process. Part of it is it's just a slow process. Like it's, it takes a long time to build five pounds of muscle. It takes a long time to just burn five pounds of body fat. And so if you understand that and simultaneously give yourself grace, because not only does it take a long time and you need to be patient, you're also probably going to make mistakes along the way, which is only going to prolong that process even more. And so understanding both the grace and the patience thing, I think are so important.

22:25Sal Di Stefano:It's so key. Yes. To someone's consistency, because if you go in with these high expectations of I'm going to get after it for this amount of time and you think you're not going to make any mistakes and you think it's going to happen faster, boy, you're going to be set up for disappointment.

22:39Adam Schafer:Yep. And then when you make a mistake, you beat yourself up, the shame spiral starts and you're done. By the way, master trainers are master grace givers. This is what makes the best trainers, the best trainers is they're really good at extending that to their client. So the client's honest with them and then the client feels it and then they give it to themselves. Next up, uh, you don't try different rep ranges, right? So now this doesn't mean you try different rep ranges in every workout, but you train in a particular rep range for a while and then try a different rep range. Everybody has their favorite rep range.

23:09Adam Schafer:Okay. I love low reps. I love low reps. I like reps around five or six. You get me above 15 and I just want to leave. I don't, I don't like it. It sucks, but I do it because your body adapts to the rep range that you're in. And each rep range has its own value and each rep range has its own downside. And so it's important to explore the full breadth of strength training rep ranges, which are between one and 25. It's a wide range, everybody.

23:35Sal Di Stefano:I think that what fits in here also is rest periods and tempo. Yeah. I think all three of those are levers that we don't tend to manipulate or pull enough. we all tend to fall into a rep range we like a rest period we like a tempo we like and you might be changing exercises up here and here but they're they're all in this similar way of training and so i think understanding how all three of those are great levers to manipulate and and as you train and also a part of programming and so i think a lot i think all three of those are included in this point.

24:12Adam Schafer:Next up, you're not prioritizing technique and skill. When people look at exercise, it's a means to an end for them. It's like, this is just to work this area. This is just to get sore. This is just to sweat. Exercises are a skill and the better you can perform the skill, the better the results you're going to get and the less chance of injury, but definitely the better the results. Look, if you go to, you want to hit a golf ball as far as possible with a club, I think everybody knows there's a technique. You just swing the golf club as hard as you can. That ball's not going anywhere. If you have good technique, you get a lot of distance.

24:47Adam Schafer:If you want good results, treat your exercises the same way. A properly performed or high-skill performed exercise, like a squat or a deadlift or an overhead press, versus a poor technique version of those, the results are so vast in terms of the difference. Like one, I get terrible results and I get hurt. The other one, it's safe. And oh my God, my body's progressing incredibly. So treat them like a skill. Don't treat them just like as a way to work a body part.

25:17Sal Di Stefano:This is one of my favorite tips that we give to clients in general, or just especially beginners. I also think this helps manage the first ones where we're talking about going too hard or not hard enough. Like I think we approach workouts so much as like this punishment or beating our body up when we'd be far better served if we were to go in and approach it as a skill that we're trying to improve and get better at. I think that naturally will create this kind of progressive overload. It will give you way more return on the exercises. It's a much better way to approach exercise is, hey, these are all skills and I want to get really good at these skills versus, oh, how much can I punish myself or how hard can I make this or how much can I sweat?

25:58Sal Di Stefano:How good can I get at these movements will serve you far better than any other way. It's funny how, you know, athletes get this, but they don't necessarily understand that you apply that same principle to working out. It is so funny. Yeah, because, I mean, you're not going to practice at 100 % because, yeah, you're going to take yourself out of performing really well for the game. And it's a very similar concept. If you just approach these lifts, especially the ones that move the needle the most, you can get better at them. And getting better at them, you don't go 100%. You just really work on all those little nuances and do it with not too much intensity.

26:37Adam Schafer:Then eventually you realize, wow, look what I can do to perform at a high magnitude. Totally. And then finally, you skip the body parts that you don't think are fun. You know, the guys skipping leg day. Every teenage guy right here.

26:51Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

26:51Adam Schafer:You know, women who skip, you know, shoulders or arms or chest or whatever. The body, yes, you can avoid body parts and focus on ones you want to bring up. But over time, training the whole body with balance produces the best results for every body part. Okay? Training your legs over time will improve your body's ability to develop your arms. The body works this way. There's these very fascinating studies where they'll take a person and they'll immobilize one arm like it's in a cast. And when you do that, you're going to get atrophy, right? Muscles are going to shrink. It's like when you break a limb.

27:25Adam Schafer:That's just what happens. Then they'll have some people exercise the other arm and they have other people not exercise the other arm. Do you know what happens when they exercise the other arm? The arm that's immobilized atrophies less. The body likes to be in balance. So over time, if all you want is better looking shoulders, you're better off over time training the rest of your body. So don't skip those body parts.

27:49Sal Di Stefano:It's interesting that we chase this because it's a pretty established fact that we as humans are attracted more to symmetry than we are size.

27:58Adam Schafer:Yeah.

27:59Sal Di Stefano:So it's not like bigger shoulders, bigger butt, those things. I know these are common things that someone chases, but the eye, it's more pleasing to see symmetry than it is to see just excessive size. But yet all of us are guilty of probably approaching our training and our workouts with this, I need a bigger chest, or I need a bigger butt, I need a bigger whatever, and you're just all focused on that versus going like, trying to bounce. Now, I think bodybuilders are the exception here. I think this is one of the areas that they do a really good job because you're judged on that. That's what they're judged on.

28:31Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. When you get up on stage, the guy with the biggest chest does not always win. If he's not proportioned to his shoulders and his back, he won't win. And so you're judged on symmetry. And so how many times have you lost size on a body part and then being complimented because you're more in balance?

28:49Adam Schafer:What's funny about this, by the way, is that building a butt has become so popular that you're now seeing women only do that. And they're starting to get the skinny leg and the butt look. And it's like, that doesn't look right. No, it doesn't look right. Balance and symmetry is everything. With not just aesthetics, by the way. The reason why we find balance and symmetry attractive is because it displays health, mobility, and performance. Like if you have a developed body part and others don't support it, that's called injury and poor performance in the real world. So don't skip those body parts.

29:19Adam Schafer:All right, so getting messages from people ever since I talked about the Organifi Horny Stack, the Shilajit. I haven't heard back from... What kind of messages are these? I know, I'm waiting for Drew and the team over there to... Just say, either keep talking about it. This is Shilajit and Happy Drops. Happy Drops, people are already reporting that it increases their libido. Shilajit has been shown to do this with fertility and stuff, especially for men. You combine the two and, you know, take them both consistently for a couple of weeks and watch what happens, everybody. but it's a good time.

29:53Adam Schafer:And they're gummies, which is even more fun. I know, I know. I love it. I love calling them, calling these stacks. I don't get their approval. I just do it. I know.

30:01Sal Di Stefano:That's why I'm waiting for that. We're just rewinding everything. There's only been a couple of these commercials that are ran. It's typically after a few of them where I'll hear back from that side. So they'll either love it or hate it. I mean, the Christmas blend, they were happy about that. It was the last stack that you talked about. I think they liked. And so, so far it's been positive, but the horny stack is still a little more on the edgy side. That's all right. It's true. Let's see how they receive it.

30:22Adam Schafer:All right. I got to talk about something hilarious. So I'm having this the best time with my daughter because she's getting into like lifting. And it's so fun because she's still my daughter. So I'm still dad, which means I'm not cool. And she's still a teenager, which means she's going to, you know, she knows better. But my daughter, she's wonderful. She's so disciplined. She's got all these great characteristics. Anyway, she's getting into lifting. And so as we're talking, she's using language that I'm just so shocked that a 15-year-old girl is using. Things like gains, you know, things like.

30:56Adam Schafer:She said progressive overload. Progressive overload, bulk, cut. And I'm like, what is going on here? I'm like, is this, is it because. TikTok, dude. You know what? So I looked this up. So there's a lot of lingo, which I think we kind of don't realize now, has made it mainstream. That's gym language. for example bro uh is kind of gym language uh which now everybody says in fact i was at where was that bro science for sure i was moving uh my oldest into college and we were in an elevator so funny and the elevator was getting full with kids right uh and and there was like a bunch of girls in there and as it was getting full you know it kept stopping at every floor because all these kids were moving in it was the first day and uh the kids were saying we're all joking like all right don't let anybody else in that's it if the next one comes up tell them we don't fit because we're all packed like sardines and of course when it opens kids squeeze their squeeze themselves in and the girls they would look at each other and go bro bro and i'm like what are you saying you're a girl so funny so there's that gains has made it uh mainstream yeah swole yeah swole this is all stuff we said in the 90s that now everybody understands uh now are we see are we even

32:07Sal Di Stefano:seeing that uh to people that make don't train too is it it's because i think lifting has gone

32:12Adam Schafer:more mainstream yeah and it's kind of like common like pr is another one because i've even i like to your point about bro i've heard i've heard i've heard young girls talk to each other like that

32:21Sal Di Stefano:yeah yeah yeah i have nieces that i've heard say stuff like that and so that's made away and they're not like big workout people so that's interesting bulk and cut those are those are i've gone

32:29Adam Schafer:mainstream i said pr beast mode that's a thing i think it's so great yeah it's so funny that this gym like culture and lingo is kind of making it out way better than skibbity you know oh god what was that i know you have you tried looking up yeah dude and there's some video attached to it was just like really wild well not just that but like have you tried looking up just their

32:50Sal Di Stefano:their yeah their lingo in particular of course i yeah i do that just to embarrass them that's our job my entire goal is to yeah pick them up and say those kinds of words in front of their friends do you guys you guys use like urban dictionary or what how do you stay on top of what the kids are saying to you or do you just straight up there's actually videos where there's

33:08Adam Schafer:like parents who are walking through a tutorial and it's so funny i've seen some funny ones where

33:13Sal Di Stefano:or a dad there's a there's a guy yeah i've seen this one yeah there's a dad that has like two daughters and he says it yeah yeah and he puts them in like a whole but he does it like in a whole you know i'm saying he like uses all yeah yeah yeah when he's like communicating to them

33:25Adam Schafer:in front of their friends like stop it is it is your job do you know what you're saying yeah i'm gonna say this right now like this is like your job as a dad is to tease your teenage kids and embarrass them. It's the best thing. Yeah. It is the most amazing thing ever. You know, it's funny you say that. I love it.

33:42Sal Di Stefano:I have to challenge that just because of the recent book that I read. And it was, in fact, and we just had a moment. We just had a moment yesterday where this happened. So crazy. So Katrina and I just finished that book. And I told you that one of the main tips from that was leave sarcasm at the door. And Katrina, I was upstairs. It was yesterday. This just happened. And I come downstairs and she like, Max was in the living room. she like pulled me in the pantry real quick she's like oh my god he just had a meltdown i'm like really what happened and then she's telling me what happened and i let her finish and go you know what you did right there don't you and she's like what she goes i was just playing with those yeah you were being sarcastic oh and i said you were just having fun and teasing but it did his brain doesn't understand that and so what she did was he had like his his treats and she was trying or like you like his snacks or whatever and she was like no i want you to eat this or finish this first and then she pretended to like eat them and he just like had a complete meltdown and then she had to be like max you have to be able to share with me i'm like what you did was you were playing with him and you were being sarcastic i said but he doesn't his brain doesn't and we have to understand that and she's like oh my god you're so right she's like we just now we just talked

34:55Adam Schafer:about that so i don't do it to my younger kids yeah not the younger ones but when i do it to my daughter uh i don't push it i do it because she thinks yeah i mean i think it's interesting because

35:05Sal Di Stefano:i know i have i mean look at katrina and i both are i think we're all kind of similar uh sarcastic people and i just never thought of that as like a negative thing but when you understand the way the brain develops as a kid and that they don't get that humor yet and then for i've made that

35:24Adam Schafer:mistake with my with my four and a half year old where he did something and i laughed because it

35:27Sal Di Stefano:was funny but he took it personal yeah yeah yeah yeah it's just the younger ones it is it's dicey like that but uh yeah but then i mean they're gonna get it at school when they get older with their friends and so it's like the ribbing it's you know it's you want to get home you want to have a safe place so i understand the argument for that as well uh so yeah i've been trying to check myself with that i'm conscious of that because it does affect them yeah yeah and and to your point and he talks about this in the book is that um you know with their friends and stuff that's where they'll learn that it's like that you leave let them with their with your parent you're a different you are different to them and so their brain doesn't process it the same as their their friends so even though they're feeling it they're doing it they're learning it with their friends this is because we even see this in max max says all these funny things and they tease each other like all the batman characters in lego and it's totally funny and playful if katrina and i try and do it it doesn't land the same way i'll give you a win and a fail

36:25Adam Schafer:that i did with my with my daughter so here i'll give you a win right uh dropping off at school and then yelling out the window, I love you, you know, real loud. And she kind of smiles and giggles, but she's embarrassed, right? That's okay.

36:36Sal Di Stefano:That's a good example, though, of being playful and fun in a loving way. You're telling her I love you.

36:42Adam Schafer:No, I'm not teasing her. And then I'll do the stuff in front of her friends while I use the lingo. And then her friends laugh, and then she's like, Dad, you know, that's kind of fun. But then I had a fail a while ago where if we pull up to school to drop her off, she tells me to turn the music down always. It doesn't matter what I'm playing, by the way. She just wants the music down. So one time we pulled up, and as soon as she opened the door, I blasted uh what's it called mariachi music I don't listen to mariachi music she got really mad yeah she got really mad because I actually did embarrass her so that was a little too far so it's definitely I think yeah I to me it's just an interesting

37:16Sal Di Stefano:one for me because I know it's uh I mean I always love learning stuff or I would have never I would actually would have thought of that as a positive thing in the past like I would have said like a my kidneys have some thick skin this but then when it was a neuropsychology book that I'm reading and so like when you understand the the the neuro development of their brain and where they're currently at and then you understand how it's processing and you go oh shit okay maybe that's not the best thing you could tease your kid you could tease your kid and it becomes an insecurity 100 it's actually most likely will become that because and you won't know it because they're not going to show that to you but inside they're going to hold it that way it's like and so i'm like and i mean i share that story with you like i'm how crazy is that that uh like one of the most impressionable things ever was my uncle teasing me about my hair when i was like what it was just it was cute but to you yeah no it was like i was it was i was mortified yeah you know i'm saying that like i mean i'm seven or eight or i don't remember how old i was really young and you know he teasing me about that and like that's like forever stuck with me it's like that's wild that's imprinted but it's where your brain my wife will do it where like my little one

38:19Adam Schafer:my two and a half year old.

38:20Sal Di Stefano:Well, I'm far gone with that now.

38:22Adam Schafer:Too late. Cool story.

38:25Sal Di Stefano:We'll be in therapy for that. Yeah, exactly. My kids would tease me every day. And it's like, it's just like our love language.

38:32Adam Schafer:So my wife would do this with my two and a half year old, where she'll say something, but she says it in like a cute way. She'll mispronounce it. And then she'll repeat it back to her because it's cute. Yeah. And I'm like, don't do that. Cause she's going to get insecure about how she's saying things.

38:44Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. I also think that your guys' kids now are old enough that you could actually talk about that. Right. So you could be like, hey, does that bother you when I rib you like that? And let them be like, yeah or no. Like, no, Dad, I love it. You know what I'm saying? A lot of funny little anecdotes to that, though, too. Because I've been really trying to kind of peer in a little bit more to their world. And I was playing video games with Everett. We got the new Zelda, and we're just playing it together. And I suck. I really suck at video games. And I admittedly, I'm like, OK, pal, I'll play. but you know like don't give me too much grief you know like because i've gotten pissed off before because i'm like concentrating i'm competitive you're too competitive yeah and i'm just like trying to like figure out always and there's so many buttons like now and like i have to go through and not i'm like where's my sword and i have to go like hit z1 and then like scroll scroll scroll and then get this they're like dad what are you doing oh they get so frustrated with me and i'm And it's like the one thing I'm like, I suck at with this.

39:49Sal Di Stefano:So they're just like piling on, piling on, piling on. And I'm like, do you throw the controller walk out? Yeah, I don't want to play. You guys can do this. I'm like, shut them up. But I'm like, well, this is like poetic justice, right? For me. And it's feedback for me if I feel like that. But they don't know how to tease. We're working through that with the teasing part of making it more fun and lighthearted. So I'm cognizant of that. when I'm teasing them and then they're teasing me. And so we're kind of working through that, but they, they find some good funny spots where they like hit me and I'm like, Oh yes, you got me.

40:24Sal Di Stefano:But you know, it is, it's like, I, I found myself like almost like getting like super. I mean,

40:31Adam Schafer:you are a hardcore athlete. And when you play, when you're in any competitive environment like that, especially young men, because I didn't play a lot of sports, but I was in competitive environments, either in sales or, you know, running clubs, stuff like that. the love language between young men is to hammer each other yep yeah it is literally i mean i'm

40:50Sal Di Stefano:this is true i've told my wife this many times extreme degree oh i've been in the most extreme version of that listen well this is like you've uh you've theorized on the evolutionary purpose of that right i mean you're testing them yeah it's like who's can you handle it yeah yeah that's i mean i don't know how if that's been proven to be true or not but it seems pretty logical well the

41:08Adam Schafer:The guy in the group who's too sensitive to it is always the guy everybody's like. He's the target. Yeah, like that guy's not going to, he can't hang or whatever. I mean, because this is what guys do. I told my wife this. I said, one of the big things, because you ever hear the nicknames girls give each other? They're so cute and great and sweet. The nicknames guys give each other?

41:26Sal Di Stefano:Derogatory, always.

41:27Adam Schafer:Oh, they're a real problem. Yeah, yeah. Like if you're overweight, you're going to have a nickname based on being overweight. If you're short, your nickname's going to be about being overweight. He's rat face. You know what I'm saying? Rat face. Thanks, dude. Yeah. Yeah.

41:38Sal Di Stefano:So didn't you have a guy, a buddy who lost the testicle and the one ball pat forever? No mineral. The guys will always do like derogatory. It is true. But I mean, that makes sense to me that, you know, if you go to war, especially back in the days when very young men would go to war, right? Very, very young. You want to know that these guys, yeah, they're not going to fold when they get teased because they're going to have a lot more pressure than that when we go to war together. And so it makes sense that that's kind of built in our DNA to organically kind of test each other that way to make sure.

42:13Sal Di Stefano:And so, yeah.

42:13Adam Schafer:I find it endearing. I mean, you guys know that. We're off air. We just, we crush each other. And it's like, it is hilarious. I mean, you guys will hammer me about stuff that just, and I just think it's the funniest thing. And it's loving.

42:24Sal Di Stefano:Well, I think that we all have that similar thick skin like that. And I think that that's something that, but again, I try and remember, like, I definitely got that from my friends. Yeah. It wasn't like a thing. No, you get it from your mom or dad. I didn't get it from my parents at all. Yeah, yeah. I got it from my friends. I got it from my friends.

42:41Adam Schafer:Yeah, my parents called me beak face. Oh, my God. That would crush me.

42:45Sal Di Stefano:Seriously. I mean, it was pretty easy for me after I read that and had that big hot moment to go like, oh, my God. I would cry. That makes so much sense. That's definitely not who I want to hear that from. You know what I'm saying? Totally. Yeah. I can handle it from my friends all day long, but your parent or your uncle or someone like that like it's gonna land ever but again back to my point i think you guys have old enough kids now which i think is cool that you guys could you could talk it out too yeah you'd be like hey does that bother you when i because i don't want to you know i'm saying no no dad it's cool you know it's like okay cool then i feel like we can have that fun there versus like you know my son's so young it's like it either lands or doesn't land and it's most likely not gonna land yeah i i went through that and i stopped teasing them about their hair because you know the you know i mean Even when you talk, I asked them about it.

43:33Sal Di Stefano:I was like, does this bother you guys? They probably said yes. And they were like, yes, stop. Yeah, you're like, oh, shit. What were you saying about their hair, dude? I kept calling them broccoli hair. Yeah, yeah. Like screech. Anything I could come up with. Because it just bothers me, you know? But it's like, what do I care?

43:51Adam Schafer:This is their style. Why am I an asshole? Teenagers crack me up because they try to be different so hard, but they actually are the same. i want to be rebel but you all look the same nobody's rebelling y 'all have the same haircut

44:04Sal Di Stefano:you're all dressed the same it was like mullet then it's like broccoli hair i'm like i'm i'm really like curious what's next dude because i i hope it's like shaved head or something we could probably go back to our our because a lot of stuff is being repeated right now there's a lot of a lot

44:20Adam Schafer:of there was a kid in my my daughter knows who did i forgot what she called it i'm so mad but he shaved everything except for the back there's a term for it no it wasn't a rat tail it was like a flat like and there's a name for it i'm so mad i can't remember what it was she's like oh this guy totally gave himself a something and i'm like what's that she's like you shave everything except you leave the back i'm like that's such a guy thing what to do i mean we probably had so i'm

44:45Sal Di Stefano:sure you look back remember when it was popular to do the side steps in the side of the hair and do some cool i mean there's some stuff like that little ice sort of bricks yeah yeah yeah so We've definitely done some things that are probably. You know you've done it. Although, I did it to Max. I did it to Max when he was like three. I cut his hair like that. So, yeah, yeah. But again, I think a lot of the stuff is making its way back that it's kind of cool to do some of this stuff. So I'm sure we could probably look back at some dumb stuff we did that hasn't been done yet, and you could probably predict that that's coming around the corner.

45:16Adam Schafer:All right, I want to give a shout-out to my parents. Today is their 48th wedding anniversary. Oh, no way. Yes. You know, one of my favorite things when I was a trainer that I used to love. I used to love training people who had been married a long time. And then watching my parents, it's such a wonderful, if you could be around a couple that have been married for a long time that have a good relationship, it's so great to be around them because you realize how much, you become so much wiser and tolerant of each other. Like my parents, when I was younger, they would get in some blowouts about certain things.

45:49Adam Schafer:Now they can tease each other about stuff that used to cause issues. And it's like, it's so, because they've been together for so long.

45:56Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, I mean, you almost truly become one. I know that's the point of marriage and unity is like that, but you got to understand that just because you walked down an aisle yesterday and you were individuals the next day, you're not going to be completely one. It's like it's a process of getting there. Do you guys start to notice that in your own significant other? Oh, totally. Taking on some of your characteristics? Totally. That trips me up. Yeah, I mean, Katrina and I have been there a long time now. a long way longer than any other relationship I've ever been in. And like the, the, I mean, the joke right now in our house, this has been happening a few times where Katrina is like talking to me and she's like skipping so many important details for me to even understand.

46:37Sal Di Stefano:And then she stops and she's like, you always read my mind. Why can't you? And I'm like, I said, did you just hear how you just started talking right now? I'll make her go back and be like, she's like jump cutting. Oh, total jump cutting. It's like crazy. I'm like, just repeat out loud. and then pretend I'm anybody else trying to figure that out. And she's like, but you always know. I'm like, okay, I'm good. I'm like, we're good. You know what I'm saying? We're that much one, but I'm not that good. I think the best thing is ESP. Yeah, because she'll go in and she'll be talking and she'll be like, you know, that one thing.

47:08Sal Di Stefano:And then she'll go the next thing. And I'm like, I don't even know what the one thing was that she's alluding to. And then she's on the other thing. She's like, you know, the other day when so-and-so and like so-and-so, the one thing. I'm like, Katrina, you literally know, you didn't give me any information right there. and I'm supposed to know what you're trying to tell me. You know what my wife does?

47:23Adam Schafer:I don't understand this. Maybe one day if we're together for 48 years, like my parents don't understand her, she'll talk while her mouth is full, but she won't talk. She'll do that. And I'm like - Mumble? No, not mumble. She does this voice inflection. She'll drink water and she'll - And I'm like, how do you think I know? It's obvious what I'm saying. No, it's not. I have no idea what you're saying when you do that. So I'm hoping like 40 years. You'll be able to. She'll be like, oh, yeah, I know.

47:52Sal Di Stefano:It's funny because it keeps, like, coming back to me because we're trying to really train the boys to be better about manners and all that, you know, and, like, sitting in for dinner. And then, like, you know, she's correcting them. And then I'm, like, kind of sitting back. And then I'll start, like, talking with mouthful of food and, like, shit for her.

48:08Adam Schafer:And I'm like, oh, me. She's like, yeah.

48:12Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, you. You know, that's an area that I want to get better at that it surprises me how much effort I find that for us, considering I did come from, as dysfunctional as my house was, we did have family dinners every night. That was a staple thing, no matter how messed up we were or how crazy it was, just a half hour before. It's got to be rock solid. We had dinners every night together. And I actually find that very difficult for me to be consistent with that right now, which is a shame because my son is so young.

48:44Adam Schafer:so it's you know he's how do you guys do it then you just eat your own and then you feed him yeah

48:48Sal Di Stefano:so a lot a lot of times like you know his he's feeding schedules a little bit sooner than us and so a lot of times Katrina will have have him eat and then then we'll eventually eat and then even when we eat it's like one of us is on the counter one's at the table or the timing is off a little bit and so I find that I mean we're making a conscious effort and so at least a couple times a night I mean a couple times a week we will make sure that we time it all and put a lot of effort into it but that's just it is it uh i i realize it it actually takes effort total effort uh to to make that happen with something that i felt was so routine for me as because you would become because it was so routine i just assume that oh this will be very routine for me and my family but it it quickly has gotten away from me many times and i think probably doordash has a lot to play with that too is you know sometimes you're just like oh i'm really hungry right now oh doordash that right now and it's like you're not all saying oh dinner's at six and we prepare it the hour before and that's when we'll all eat it's like oh max is hungry right now okay let him eat right now well then you and i can door dash this later and so i find that happens a lot more than i would like it to and i know how valuable uh dinner times are at night and so we and he and the way why i bring this up that it's been a challenge is i even my son will oh family dinner night he'll do that like where we're like uh yeah it's family dinner night like and that's where her and i look at each other like boy we need to definitely be way more consistent with this if he's groaning as if it's out of the normal you know it's like it needs to become more than normal and and then sure maybe once in a while we have a get to watch a movie while we're eating or do something special pizza night on friday like that's becomes more of the anomaly and the consistency is around that but the fact that my son is saying something about sitting at it means it's not as consistent yeah

50:34Adam Schafer:Yeah, yeah.

50:34Sal Di Stefano:So I didn't realize how challenging that would be for me, considering where I came from. God bless my wife.

50:41Adam Schafer:She'll ask me, like, what time are you home today? And then let me know ahead of time, and she'll really try to time it so that when I walk in the door, dinner is on the table or about to be put on the table. Everything's timed, and we wait until everybody sits down before we eat. And I love it. When I was a kid, my dad worked a lot, but we always, always, always, at least had dinner together.

51:03Sal Di Stefano:I mean, doesn't it make you kind of appreciate that they did do that consistently?

51:07Adam Schafer:The effort that goes into it.

51:08Sal Di Stefano:Considering how busy he was, how busy your mom was, to make sure that was organized.

51:12Adam Schafer:Well, you know how hard it is to time two or three courses to be warm at the same time? I've tried doing it. I'm like, I'm barbecuing. We're having meat. That's it. But my wife will have three different things and time it, which is skill.

51:24Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

51:24Adam Schafer:Have you guys always been consistent with it, Justin?

51:26Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Yeah, that's one thing. That's a staple. And to your point, there's other things, too. like church and like these other things that I was like, Oh my God, it was just like so consistent. I was like, yeah, you know, like, but for some reason dinner's always been like, this is, this is where I catch up with everybody. And so I just, I personally had always just like been adamant about trying to make sure that everybody, because to Courtney, I know her love language, it was just really about cooking and, and, and, you know, even going further than that to where it's like through her day, She's also in the garden and she's bringing things in.

52:03Sal Di Stefano:And it's such like a, that's like such a disrespect thing for me to not like honor that. Sure. So, so I'm trying really hard to kind of establish another level with that though, with the kids, because they don't, you know, they were kind of like taking advantage of it and not appreciating it. Yeah. They wouldn't eat like certain dishes and all this kind of stuff, given like a hard time. But so it's, it's been a process, but yeah, it's been. And that's something that I've always kind of appreciated because we can talk and communicate and get a lot out of the kids that way. We don't get their attention like that.

52:40Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, there's times where I find Katrina's really good about it sometimes when she's preparing the meal and to integrate Max into chopping something up. Oh, that's the best. And I would love for that to be an every night thing. It's been work. It's been way more effort than I thought there would be.

52:57Adam Schafer:It takes effort and planning, period, end of story. And when you're a kid, you don't realize it because mom makes it happen or whoever makes it happen. But it takes schedule and planning.

53:05Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, and I do. I mean, it's an opportunity for me to give kudos to my mom for being able to do that. I know I've talked a lot about a lot of the bad stuff or whatever like that, but that was something that we were really consistent with that I'm looking now as a dad six years later, I go like, oh, wow, that's not like it just happens magically. Like that was a serious effort put forth to do that. And I would like more of that. And I just have to be better about being consistent with that.

53:32Adam Schafer:I'm going to change directions here because we have Tom and Ben. Ah, they're here. From Rock Recovery Center. And I just got to say, I love all of our partners. We don't work with anybody that we don't appreciate, either their products or who the people are both. But this has been one of the more rewarding partnerships. Tom and I are in regular communication. and anytime he has somebody come through, through Mind Pump, that is either for them or a loved one that needs help with addiction, he always asks them permission, but then I'll get messages from him and he'll say like, oh, you know, Susan came in and her son needs help.

54:06And would you mind

54:07Adam Schafer:recording a video for me? Just letting her know that you appreciate it. And so that's what I'll do. I'll send a video and it's so rewarding to just hear about these people because, you know, I don't have personal, um, you don't have any personal experience with it, but there are people that I know that are relatively close to me who've dealt with addiction. And that is so hard. So to hear that, you know, this, this process and to be able to feel like I can somehow contribute to the success is like, and it's just so rewarding. So I'm excited to have them on the show. Yeah, I know me too.

54:34Sal Di Stefano:I remember when we first were taught, I mean, I was, I was working with the two of them last year and it, it didn't even cross my mind and he brought it up. He's like, Hey, do you, what do you think about us doing some sort of a partnership? And I thought, I haven't really thought of something like that. I said, but what you guys are doing, I know the guys are so behind it. And so I said, for me, I would just hope that it would make sense for you guys, you know, business wise. And that it would help you enough that it makes sense for you guys to do that with us. And so that was really the only hesitancy that I had when we first were meeting with them.

55:11Sal Di Stefano:Because it's not like a typical, it's not like a normal business. Not at all. It's not like a product that everybody loves and then they go buy. it's like okay i'm sure we have a lot of people that have family or friends that are probably battling with it and i think you guys are an incredible resource and so if they if they can get service and help from you guys and it makes sense then i would love to do it and it's probably become one of the more rewarding if not the most rewarding oh we get those videos

55:35Adam Schafer:we get videos from people who are going through it who found them through us it's like i tear up every single time i want to mention uh something new that we're doing which i think is awesome uh we have this quiz so uh it's a it's called the muscle mommy movement quiz and you can go on and find out what avatar you you probably fit in and then you'll get some tailored advice to you um and i think this is super cool our our new advertising company put this together it's got integrity behind it because a lot of times these quizzes are i don't they're ridiculous you know but this one's great and the the the avatars are the comeback queen the efficient powerhouse the strength novice or the lifestyle integrator.

56:17Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

56:17Adam Schafer:So what you do is you go musclemommymovement.com forward slash quiz and you answer the questions and see where you fall. And then there's some advice that you get based off of which avatar best fits you in terms of diet, nutrition, exercise and that kind of stuff. Really fun.

56:34Sal Di Stefano:One of my favorite parts about the new marketing team is that a huge focus of theirs is adding more value, nurturing more, and servicing our people better than we had before, where previously so much of our marketing team was focused on the acquisition side and just how fast can we add more people, more volume, more volume. And I really felt like that got away from us. I mean, we built this on just the small group of people that we were servicing and helping so much. And it grew organically like that. and admittedly as it grew to the size it did some of that stuff got away from us and i can tell by the way they're structuring and putting things out the focus is way more on getting and this is connections yeah this is just another example of that it's like hey even within the muscle mommy community there's a lot of different people that would say they fit in that category not in fact a lot of people that love the muscle mommy probably aren't even mommies you know but they they that that look that people, so, okay, how can we serve those two, those, those people that are not even technically a mommy, but they like that way of training.

57:45Sal Di Stefano:And so that's really where this quiz is to help them like, oh, okay, this, this group of women that are more like this, more like that yet. They're all, they all have a similar goal, but different enough that the messaging is going to be different for them. I just think that that's a super fun testament to that.

58:00Adam Schafer:We should take the test, even though we're not muscle. See where we all fall in. Maybe we'll bring that up on the next episode. Element is an electrolyte powder. You add to your water that tastes amazing. No artificial sweeteners, no sugar, and it has the right amount of sodium. Most electrolyte powders are too low in sodium to make a difference. Not Element. 1 ,000 milligrams per serving for better pumps, better performance. You just feel great, and again, it tastes great. Go try them out. Go to drinkelemente.com forward slash mind pump. On that link, you'll get a free sample pack of the most popular drink mix flavors with any purchase.

58:35Adam Schafer:Back to the show. Our first caller is Dennis from South Carolina. What's up, Dennis? What's up, man? Hey. Hey, guys. How are y 'all? Good, good. How can we help you? Hey, I got a... Well, first of all, just thank y 'all for all y 'all do. I know y 'all hear that, probably acknowledge him, but from the bottom of my heart, it's helped me tremendously with this journey that I've been going through, and I know countless others. I hear it every day with listening to y 'all. I haven't been a listener of y 'all's for probably more than a year, but I've kind of caught up because I listen to you all the time.

59:06So I'm deep into your archives of all your stuff.

59:09Sal Di Stefano:I appreciate it. Thank you, Dennis. So I'm just going to read what I got here a little bit about my background. About a year ago, I was about 373 pounds. When I wrote this email, I was 245. My email says 235, but I was actually 245. I smoked for 15 years and I would drink every night. And I was always giving a reason of why to relax, to go to sleep. It doesn't matter. I did that seven days a week, ate like crap, and then woke up about a year ago and said, I got to do something. This is getting out of hand. I've always been big into weightlifting, always been big into the body building, seeing that mentality.

59:52I will eat rice and tuna fish whenever I need to. Like that's where my brain is. But I'm also that way when it goes to drinking and smoking. And I'm like, I obsess about other things. But in any case, I work out five days a week for about an hour. I get about 15 ,000 steps a day. I just now started wearing a weighted vest to kind of because I'm dropping weight. So I wanted to add more weight so that my calories would kind of stay the same burnt. I'm sure y 'all will have something to say about that. I eat about 3000 calories a day, 3 ,100 calories a day. I just had my DEXA scan done about three weeks ago.

1:00:38I can get into that if y 'all need me to. I take creatine, HMB, BCAAs after working out with a little bit of protein powder. I eat four meals pretty much from nine to five is my wheels are about two to two and a half hours spaced out with all my protein uh I usually do about a cup of rice or a sweet potato or something as my carbs and then a cup of veggies um I do not eat fruit just so you all know um and uh that's really about it my main question sorry to be so long-winded is I've trained really hard for the last year. And I'm not saying that I haven't made progress. I have obviously made progress, but I'm seeing, I'm noticing my chest on my lower is retaining fat.

1:01:25I can't get rid of it. I've, I've tried every exercise known to man. I've, I've done what I thought that I needed to do that in my lower stomach. And I cannot get rid of this. I would assume it's just stubborn fat. And so I don't want to be concerned if y 'all just say, Hey man, it's just going to take time and you just got to keep working at it. And it'll eventually come off. Then I'm okay with that, but I don't want to be doing something wrong and not causing that. If that makes sense.

1:01:50Adam Schafer:Yeah, no, you're not causing that to happen. It is stubborn body fat. I think you're doing way more than you need to, but if you love it, um, I think you're doing okay. I can tell you have that bodybuilding background. Can you tell me a little bit about that history? Sure. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, like I started, uh, lifting weights, probably 18, 17, 18 years old, big into weights. And I got into actual bodybuilding early twenties. I didn't, I didn't compete. It was just, it was honestly just a mindset. It was, you know, lift us up as you could, uh, eating very strict, all the vitamins. Like I had a case of vitamins that I used to take that was an everyday thing.

1:02:27I no longer do that, but that's where my background came. And I just kept researching. I researched bodybuilders all the time just because they're the most in shape people on the planet. So, I mean, if you're not listening to them, I'm not saying to be like them to get to 6%, 4 % body fat, but they just, they had it down, but it's hard to do. And so I did that for years. And then I had, and then life hit me upside the head. I was thirties. I partied. Then I, then I would go back into it and train and I would get down to, you know, an in shape feature. And then I'd know there's something in my life would happen.

1:03:00And it's been a roller coaster, which I've heard you talk about in the podcast. That's probably one of the worst things to do is to go in and out of gaining weight, losing weight, gaining weight, losing weight. Um, and so this is like my final straw. I'm not, this is it. So I'm, I will maintain something along these lines for, from here till I'm not on this earth anymore.

1:03:20Adam Schafer:What makes you convinced that this is different? Um, my daughter, number one, I, I've, I have a daughter that she doesn't live with me, but I, I know I just, it hit me one day a year ago that I got to be here for her instead of being selfish for myself and wanting to drink and smoke and do all the stuff I used to do. I really, uh, I really wanted to focus on having and maintaining a life for her. and the older I get, the more I know that my health is more important for her and not just for me. So I guess not being selfish was my biggest thing. I just said, this is, I got to stop. And so this is the longest I've ever been consecutively on this strict of a, like, I don't, when I say I don't cheat, I don't cheat.

1:04:08Now I'm not against it. I'm not against if my wife wants to go and grab a burger or something. I'm not going to say no, but I will take the buns off and I'll like, that's just what I do. I am strict, strict.

1:04:20Adam Schafer:Well, what you said was, I mean, it's a very powerful motivator. There's nothing like being a father, but do you mind if I dig a little deeper? Sure. Absolutely. Yes. Part of my brevity, cause I hear a lot of me and you. Okay. So I know you said it's for your health and longevity. Why are you worried about stubborn body fat on your pecs and your lower abs then? Just because I, yeah, that's true, man. That's a good question. I don't know because I guess I feel like I'm working so hard and I want to look a certain way in my brain. I want to look a certain way. That's where my head is. I'm going to help you with this.

1:04:52Adam Schafer:I'm going to help you with this, Dennis, because, uh, your, your true motivation, I know there's a part of you that is doing it for your daughter, but there's a very strong part of you. That's actually stronger. That is more focused on how you look. It's more focused on for you and all that. And I get it because that happens to me all the time. And here's my warning to you, Dennis. If you don't change that, I promise you, you'll fall out again. I promise you. I would bet everything. I'd bet my whole company on it that you'll go back to the old extreme where you get back into drinking, smoking, eating or whatever.

1:05:26Adam Schafer:So if you don't, if that part right there is what you're going to have to tackle and wrestle with, otherwise it's going to be on and off again.

1:05:33Sal Di Stefano:especially when you're you're pushing and doing it as hard and as as strict as you are because you you said it already it's like man i'm i'm putting all the work in i'm dialed i'm disciplined and i ain't seeing these result like because because you're still tied to the physical results from everything you're doing right now you feel that's where people break because they go fuck man i've been killing it i'm doing everything perfect i'm not getting the look i want why am i even wasting my time doing this and that's what causes the off and on right there versus going man I'm just a dude that works out five days a week I'm healthier I'm stronger this is what I do than I've ever been I'm I mean I'm I'm adding mirrors back to my life by the way I'm taking care of myself and being actually very proud of where you came from and where you're at and how consistent you've been and it's more become just a lifestyle that you live and you know what over time it's it is going to just you will get better and the and the body fat will continue to get especially if you're that dial but if you connect your how dialed and how hard you're making an effort towards this, towards a way you look, that's going to let you down.

1:06:35Sal Di Stefano:And what's crazy is even when it gives you results, it'll still let you down because you'll just move the goalpost and you'll be keep moving the goalpost versus man, you're, you're doing great. And I think that was Sal's first, you know, really questioning, like you're doing a lot, like you're training, you're training a lot, you're moving a lot, you're putting a lot of effort.

1:06:54Adam Schafer:I mean, you're, you're, you're, you're treating this like a bodybuilder with your routine, in your diet. I mean, I see your email and you're breaking it down. I see, you know, peptide stack, testosterone. You're doing it like a bodybuilder is, which, you know, for the purposes of looking a particular way. And I'm just going to add to this, Dennis, you will never be satisfied. It will never give you what you're looking for. And eventually you'll bounce in the other direction. Now, here's the second thing I'm going to tell you that I think this is going to sell you on what I'm saying. If you do this for the right reasons, you'll actually get the look that you want.

1:07:30Adam Schafer:But here's the kicker. You can't care about the way you look. So you got to stop caring about that and really just refocus on the most important reasons and placing that first, which is health, longevity, mobility. And it'll start to direct you in actually a more appropriate way of doing things, it'll reduce your risk of injury and you will get the look you want. There'll be a point where you're going to look in the mirror and be like, oh my God, this is, but if you don't do that and you chase a look, it's like trying to catch your shadow. You'll never get there. It's always going to be in front of you, no matter what happens.

1:08:07Adam Schafer:And I've been to 6 % body fat. I've done all this. It's never enough.

1:08:12Sal Di Stefano:It's actually really good timing that you're calling in right now because Sal's series just kicked off. And this is a lot of his series is about his lifelong struggle with exactly what we're talking to you about right now. So definitely make sure you're following along. I know the first episode just went live. I don't know when the second one's coming.

1:08:31Adam Schafer:The second one will be up by the time this is. And this is Mind Pump TV on YouTube.

1:08:34Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, Mind Pump TV, YouTube.

1:08:36Adam Schafer:You know, we'll send you the link to the first episode. Check it out, Dennis. And you can see, like, I hear me and you. That's why I went straight. That's why I went real straight with you. So, because I'm not, there's no advice I can give you fitness wise. I mean, I could give you a program. I could tell you which program is better, but if we don't, uh, if we don't take the route and really tackle that, um, it's not going to help and you will fall out. I'm going to tell you this right now. It will, you will go back, dude. Uh, I just, I'm sorry. Go ahead. No, no. Do your thing. Go ahead. I was just going to say, yeah, I, I honestly have never thought of it the way I've been putting it.

1:09:11And as soon as you said it, I was like, well, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. But I guess also deep down in my being and what Adam said, yeah, I am doing all this stuff.

1:09:24Adam Schafer:Oh, you cut out.

1:09:28Like, if it takes me another year to get to wherever I want to get to, so be it. But I want to make sure that I'm not messing it up.

1:09:38Sal Di Stefano:No, you're doing the right things, bro. Your diet, your supplementation. I think you're doing more than you need to. Yeah, yeah, exactly. You could do less and still get to that place. Totally. But it's like Sal was saying, if you love working out five days a week, keep it going. But you're doing more than enough to continue to change your physique, continue to get stronger, to continue to lose body fat, and you're feeding yourself appropriately calorie-wise. You've got a good focus on protein. You're hitting all the right vitamins and supplements. You've got your hormones balanced out because you're taking TR.

1:10:06Sal Di Stefano:I mean, you're doing all the right things. It is just a matter of time. but I think Sal's just wanting you to let you know the sooner you let go the sooner you'll be happy with where you're going and where you're at Dennis here's something I'm going to do something

1:10:17Adam Schafer:I've never done before I don't know who you are so what I'm going to and I'm never I probably will never do this again I'm going to have Doug send you a link to my series and he's going to give you my cell phone number and I want you to text me when you have questions or whatever struggles with this oh absolutely that's awesome thank you so much that means the world to me as soon as we get off, you'll send that over to you. And then you watch the series and then let me know what you think. And then, uh, we'll see if we can't get you on the right path, my friend. Cool. Can I, can I just a small follow-up question just because I've watched two or three videos that y 'all posted recently about the Rhonda Patrick, I think is her name.

1:10:52Adam Schafer:Yep. Yep. And so I, I know that you said Sal, cause I saw you on, um, Instagram say, you know, she's not wrong. I get, I get the philosophy behind what she's saying and what you're saying but as a person like i've told you what i do is it better for me to do walk or am i strong enough i should be doing hit to get more fat off my body or it doesn't even matter it won't make a difference it won't yeah you're checking all the boxes if you want if you want more extra stamina and endurance you can it'll probably you'll probably have to reduce your strength

1:11:22Sal Di Stefano:training yeah but it's intense he's already he's already teetering on overdoing it too much that's just flirting with that like you're you could actually scale down to four days a week or three day a week and see as much results as you possibly are. And I have no idea what the outside forces are going on as far as stress levels in your life. And so if, depending on how that is, what you're currently doing right now could even be a little too much. So adding something that's high intensity, like high intensity, like interval training won't help. It'll only, it'll only flirt with that line even more.

1:11:52Sal Di Stefano:If not cross over that line, what you're doing right now, brother is more than enough to continue to build a good physique. It's just, it's going to be, it's a slow process. It's going to have peaks and valleys, but you're not trying when you, your first original question, you ain't fucking it up. You ain't doing anything that's messing that up. You're on the right path. Uh, but I agree with Sal, like we got to get to the place where we're reframing kind of the goal, because even when you reach whatever this, this picture is, it'll change. It just does. It'll, it will, it'll be, it's that, it's that, it's that shadow.

1:12:23Sal Di Stefano:Like you said, you'll never catch it. You know, is the, is the weighted best thing a smart idea or stupid idea if you like it if you like it i just feel like i'm i i got so used i did what y 'all said and started you know at six thousand steps and then i know what my body adapted to it and then i got eight and then i had 10 and then i was just able to walk without my heart rate going up and so i i said put this on and do the same walking it should add a little little extra

1:12:49Adam Schafer:something i assumed it does it makes it harder if you want to make it harder and you enjoy that but is it making a big difference? Not really. Okay. All right. Cool. Well, thank y 'all so much for all your help. I really do appreciate everything y 'all do. You got it, man. Thanks, Dennis. Yeah, I had to get straight with him because I saw his email. Well, you

1:13:07Sal Di Stefano:could tell when he was talking to you and he said it, you could tell he's hearing himself and he's like, oh, shit.

1:13:12Adam Schafer:It's for my health.

1:13:15Sal Di Stefano:You could see it literally as it's coming out of his mouth. He's saying it and he's going, oh, damn. You're right. It's the wrong focus.

1:13:22Adam Schafer:Yeah, and we just fool ourselves. And I do it all the time. And again, it's that shadow analogy. And you just will never catch it. You will never. The most, it's so crazy. People on both ends of the spectrum are the most unhappy with their bodies. People who are totally unhealthy, obese, don't think about anything. They're very unhappy. People on the other extreme, the shredded, you know, whatever, they're just as unhappy with their bodies. It just looks different. It's a similar dysfunction, just in the opposite direction.

1:13:51Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, you have to tell the audience, too, just why we're concerned about. Because what he's doing isn't crazy over training or something like that. But the biggest concern that I have when I hear someone like this is they're doing all the things. And they're putting so much effort towards moving the needle for an aesthetic look. And when you're not getting that look that you're seeking, that's when you throw your arms up. You go, like, effort. Why am I doing all this stuff? versus figuring out maybe three days is a very easy routine for you to work out. And sometimes you get 10 ,000 steps. Sometimes you get eight.

1:14:28Sal Di Stefano:Sometimes you get 12. And you don't have this crazy regimen. It's just, hey, I'm a guy that walks. Hey, I'm a guy that gets to the gym three times a week. And it's easy. And the results come slowly. But it's something that you just do in a part of your life. And you're not constantly measuring the work you're doing for the money you're getting paid. You know what I'm saying? So that's kind of what that trap is. and that's what leads somebody to the on-off. Our next caller is Scott from Canada. What's up, Scott? How you doing, Scott? What's happening? What's up, gentlemen? How can we help you? So I sent in the question there.

1:15:02I don't know if you guys can see it or not. Pretty much I suck at dips and pull-ups, and that's all I really want to get better at. Have you guys ever heard of street lifting?

1:15:15Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, like all the bar guys. and the kings yeah yeah it's like power lifting but they just train like max dip pull up and squat so pretty much i'm super interested in that but i can only uh train at home right now i can't really get out because i got a i got a one and a half year old and we got another one on the way so i got a dip station and a pull-up bar and some dumbbells and a couple kettlebells and I want to get as strong as I can on the dips and pull-ups. And I'm kind of lost. I've tried everything, doing negatives, bands. I don't know if it's overtraining. My job is pretty labor-intensive.

1:15:56I'm walking 10 to 15K steps a day and lugging around pails and stuff. So I'm just lost. I don't know how to get stronger.

1:16:05Adam Schafer:Yeah, tell me about your job. What is it that you're doing? Is it blue colliery? Yeah, it's painting, but it's a lot of commercial. So it's a lot of carrying heavy pails around and ladders and yeah. How's your sleep with the kids? Sleep's honestly not bad. Like we get to bed around eight, nine. So I'm sleeping at least seven, eight hours a night. Okay. And how's your diet? Yeah. How are you eating? The diet's pretty solid. So back a while ago when I was about 17, I was 230. and I ended up dropping down to 130. In a period of about eight months, just, it was really disordered eating, but I just didn't know how to lose weight well.

1:16:50But over the course of the last, you know, five to six years, I've just slowly been increasing calories, focusing on, you know, getting stronger in the gym and I've worked my way up to 3 ,200, 3 ,500 calories and I don't really ever miss protein.

1:17:06Adam Schafer:Oh, good. Okay, what does your routine look like? So right now I'm doing a Monday push day, which is I'm doing dips, pushups, and an accessory movement. It's kind of inspired by the MAPS 15 style that you guys talk about. And then the next day is a pull day. So it's pull-ups in some fashion, whether it's dips, bands, or sorry, bands or negatives or something like that. And then it's rows with the kettlebells or the dumbbells and then usually curls like an accessory. and then same idea with squats. So it's about five or six days a week, but it's like half hour a workout. All right. That's not bad, but you know, I think what might help, how many pull-ups and dips can you do?

1:17:48Adam Schafer:Cause I'm going to give you some numbers to work with. So pull-ups I'm looking at like one to two clean pull-ups and dips. I'm looking at anywhere between three and five, but some days I feel strong and I can get them no problem. And other days I just feel exhausted and there's no chance. Okay. All right. So here's what we're going to do. Um, every day you're going to practice and you want the pull-ups and dips the most, right? Yeah, for sure. Okay. So most days you're going to practice doing them, but real low intensity and you'll practice them two or three times a day. So rather than doing a set of two where you're pushing yourself or a set of, you know, eight or whatever dips, you're going to go up and do one pull up.

1:18:28Adam Schafer:And if you need to jump yourself up there to make it easy, do so.

1:18:31Sal Di Stefano:Or use a band.

1:18:32Adam Schafer:Or use a band. And you're going to practice, you know, So just two or three times a day, you'll go up there and do a couple of those and then come back down. You're going to practice those most days. And then maybe once or twice a week, you can do some of the accessory work. And you're going to adjust your intensity based on how you feel. And what I mean by that is you're probably never really going to train hard. You're just going to practice pull-ups and dips. Think of it this way. It's like you're trying to get a kickflip on a skateboard. You're just trying to get the technique. Don't worry about the intensity.

1:19:01Adam Schafer:Don't try to make it so that you're super tired and fatigued. This is not bodybuilding. This is different than bodybuilding. We're trying to get good at specific exercises. Okay. I see what you're saying. Yeah. So what about the rest of the work workout routine? Like, so should I still be including some sort of rowing movement on pull days or still trying to get better at the pushups too? Or how do I incorporate the skill training with the rest of the programming? Or should I ditch one? I would leave almost everything else out if you really want to get good at those two lifts. And you could do something for like your legs and maybe your core once or twice a week.

1:19:43Adam Schafer:But you're just going to practice a lot. That's all you're going to do. And treat it like practice. You start to get fatigued, you're done. Yeah, most optimally, you'll just have it set up.

1:19:52Sal Di Stefano:So if randomly throughout the day, you can do it like multiple times, just one rep, and then maybe an hour later, another one rep. And then you just keep kind of attacking it randomly throughout the day. And it's just one of those things. Like you said, it's a practice. You see it, you go attempt it, and you do it without fatigue. So you make sure you get through the mechanics of it. You get as low as you can and then grind through it and then try it again. So it's just like one of those things. Just think of it as a constant practicing type of a movement. Okay. And for the diet where that's concerned, before the next baby comes, I'm looking to hopefully lean down.

1:20:38Is that something that I should be doing while doing this sort of skill-focused training?

1:20:46Sal Di Stefano:Not a great strategy while you're trying to also get strong with this. That's just not ideal. And also getting ready to have a kid.

1:20:52Adam Schafer:It may help because you're lighter. That's the other side of it, though. So, I mean, I would eat at maintenance. I don't think you should go in a cup while you're doing this. Okay. So just eat at maintenance. All right, guys. Thanks a lot. Just think of it like practice. You're not doing a workout. You're going out there and every time you walk by the pull-up bar, you do one and you come down and then you're done. And then you try it again later. When it comes to dips, you do four or five and you're done. You start to get real fatigued, tired or sore, you're done. But you're just practicing the lift.

1:21:23Adam Schafer:then what you'll find is you'll start to get better and stronger relatively rapidly. If you treat it like bodybuilding, it's going to take a lot longer.

1:21:30Sal Di Stefano:You're not trying to get all sore from it. Okay. So when there comes a point where I work my way up to a solid amount of reps with my body weight on the dip and pull up, how long should I wait before I include weight, like on a belt or something? Is there a rep range you guys suggest for that?

1:21:49Adam Schafer:No, but I mean, I like to get up to be able to do like 15 to 20. A couple of teen or so, yeah.

1:21:55Sal Di Stefano:I was going to say at least 10. You want to get to a point where you can at least do 10 body weight before we start loading it with like singles, doubles, and triples and stuff. Yeah. That would be a great progression though for sure. I'll tell you what, Scott. What I'll do is I'm going to have Doug put you in our private forum. Yeah, let's follow him. As you go through this process so you can kind of check in with us, let us know what you're doing. Because we're doing something really unique and custom here, right? So this isn't like the typical go follow this program. And we have only so much resources.

1:22:22Sal Di Stefano:We haven't seen you lift or do anything. So we're going to put you in the private forum, share with us as you're going through it. If you have challenges, you have questions and we'll get, we'll get to where you want to go. So we'll help you. We'll help you through that process. Okay. Is that on Facebook? Yes. Okay. I'm going to have to make an account then. I'm not on any social media. Okay. Hey man, that's a lot of people.

1:22:43Adam Schafer:I know we do have,

1:22:44Sal Di Stefano:we have a lot of people that do that. They just do it. So you don't even have to add anything in there. Just create one and then Doug will add you. And we'll just for the forum. Yep. Okay. That's awesome. You guys are amazing. I love hearing about your fatherhood stories. And Sal, your journey is great, like with the faith-based sort of thing that's going on. And I can't wait to see your series.

1:23:05Adam Schafer:I appreciate that, man. And God bless you, dude. I appreciate you guys a lot. Thanks, man. And congratulations on the new baby, dude. Thanks, Scott. All right. Thanks, guys. Take care. Take it easy. Yeah, this practice model isn't typical workout programming. No. Yeah. It's very specific. It is the fastest way to get good at a particular exercise. This is the thing.

1:23:27Sal Di Stefano:Like I had mentioned before with like junk volume, like it's irrelevant. Like the rest of those movements are irrelevant. Like if he wants to really get good and hone in on it specifically. Just do that.

1:23:37Adam Schafer:Yeah, prioritize it. That's it. Dude, I know you have a story of this too. I did this with pull-ups. At one point, I wanted to be able to do over 20 pull-ups. And all I did throughout the day was I'd hop on a pull-up bar and do like. and at the time I think my max was like 15 so I do like five I thought one two three four five done and I just do that throughout the day in like in no time I got my pull-ups up to the craziest

1:24:01Sal Di Stefano:part about my story is that I actually wasn't even intentionally trying to do this for fun I was just for fun like it was like I had to walk past that thing it was like I don't know a hundred or 500 times hit some reps in a work and I'm by myself out in the middle of nowhere I was just bored it was just I'd hop up I'd do it to us and then go to the next thing and then hop up again just just messing around. Like it was literally. Yeah. Then before I knew it, I was repping 25 pull-ups. I was like, no, that was not intentional at all whatsoever. So it's such a hack, but I wanted him in the forum so that we could, because I.

1:24:32Sal Di Stefano:That's right,

1:24:32Adam Schafer:because he could overdo it. Yes. Yeah.

1:24:34Sal Di Stefano:But this is like one of those things that's hard for people to wrap their brain around.

1:24:37Adam Schafer:Because it doesn't feel like a workout.

1:24:38Sal Di Stefano:No, no. So I hope he posts in there and shares some so we can kind of help him through this process.

1:24:44Adam Schafer:Our next caller is Randy from Tennessee. Welcome back, Randy. How you doing, Randy? All right. Good morning, guys. Thanks for having me back on. I appreciate it. Yeah. How are you doing? If I recall, you were having trouble sleeping and you thought it might be eggs? Yes. That was my initial question. I'll just give you an update on my situation and then ask my follow-up question here. Okay. Yeah. It turns out it wasn't the eggs. I mean, that was kind of a crapshoot thinking it might be the eggs, but I had to give it a shot with thinking that might be what it is. Last time I was on, you all thought it might be my cortisol levels elevated at night.

1:25:16turns out that was an issue um i did the uh equilife's uh bedtime cortisol test and i did their um what is it the hormonal stress test and uh the hormonal stress test that was very revealing it showed that throughout on typical day or the day i did the test throughout the morning afternoon and early evening my cortisol levels were very low right late evening it's suddenly really high Yeah. Inverted cortisol.

1:25:44Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. That was definitely there. So I worked with one of their health coaches. She recommended some supplements for me to take to help with that and some protocols to do. I can go through those if you guys want, but to get to the point, I've been doing that stuff and I've been able to fix the cortisol issue. I did the bedtime cortisol test again just a few weeks ago and it showed optimal levels at night. and i've definitely noticed some improvements to my sleep since working on that nice um and i i feel throughout the day too like back in i think it was in march was the last time i was on i could definitely feel throughout the day throughout the mornings and mostly afternoon my energy levels were down i was feeling lethargic it'd take me until about lunchtime to get going on most days and then the evenings after about dinnertime i'd suddenly get this like boost of energy and be wide awake now it's like the other way around which is much more optimal i can have energy levels coming up much quicker in the morning.

1:26:36I'm able to get going much quicker. In the evenings, about nine o 'clock, energy's down. I'm getting tired and it's like time to go to sleep. So definite improvement there. I feel like my sleep is still not optimal despite improving quite a bit. Most nights, I don't wake up nearly as much in the middle of the night as I used to, which is good, but I still tend to wake up after about five and a half, six hours and then can't go back to sleep after that. Even though it kind of feels like my quality sleep is good, duration still isn't great. And I think what's going on is there's a tendency for my body temperature to be elevated at night.

1:27:09That seems to be an issue. And so my question now was, and it seems to correlate to when I do my workouts too. For reference, right now I'm running MAPS cardio and I'm in phase three. And I'm doing the four workouts Monday, Wednesday, Fridays, and Saturdays. It seems to correlate in the days I do my workouts. Those nights, body temperature seems to be more elevated at night. I was wondering what kind of correlation could there be between when I'm doing my workouts and how I'm doing them and how that might affect body temperature at night when I'm sleeping.

1:27:40Sal Di Stefano:What time are you doing your workouts? First thing in the morning. It's not the workout.

1:27:45Adam Schafer:It's not the workout. It's not the workouts, but they are probably too intense for you. And that's why you're waking up. So you might be getting a little bit of a sugar dump at night, the stress response. So you can see that with a CGM. But even if you don't, I mean, if a workout plan is causing insomnia, that's one of the clear signs that it's too much stress for your body. I was wondering about that because I thought for sure, you know, the MAPS cardio program wouldn't be too much for me. For reference, I don't know if you guys remember last time I did mention last year for pretty much the back half of last year, I was overtraining, just doing too much volume and intensity and weightlifting and running.

1:28:25and I ended up injuring my back about a week before Christmas. It was either a slipped disc or a herniated disc in my lower back. Fortunately, the back is better. I don't have any issues with the back now. I have to give a shout-out to, I hope I'm saying his name right, Dr. Aaron Horschig. He's a squat university guy. I bought his book, Rebuilding Milo. Fantastic book on how to assess and treat weightlifting injuries. It was pretty much the chapter on the back in that book that helped me fix my back.

1:28:53Adam Schafer:Yeah. old old habits die hard randy so yeah so if if this is optimal and you were here with over training you're over here now but you're still over training and insomnia especially on the days you work out is a clear tip it's one of the clearest signs it's a big one that it's too much and i know cardio i know the program cardio it's a lot i'm on maps 15 matt if you switch to maps 15 and just focus on walking with it your sleep will fix within a week that's what i i suspected um The other thing that happens is it seems to be a tendency, whatever muscles were worked in a specific workout, those, like the next one to two nights, those specific muscles will feel like sore when I wake up.

1:29:35Adam Schafer:Yeah, it's just too much. The sores will go away during the day when I'm moving around. Everything during the day feels fine. It's just because those particular muscles that got worked most recently tend to get sore and inflamed when I'm sleeping is what it feels like. And I'll tell you what, I mean, just to hammer this home, I mean, if you don't fix this, you'll invert your cortisol again. Oh yeah, of course. I'm aware of that. And so, and so here's what happens sometimes. Sometimes people take themselves out of a excessive stress state. Let's say it's inverted cortisol symptom. Then they come out of it and they don't give their body enough time to acclimate and heal afterward.

1:30:09Adam Schafer:Just because your cortisol is back to where it was doesn't mean you're, you're done. So, you know, I would go, like I said, mass 15, focus on steps. Don't do anything crazy with cardio or anything like that. and you within either days or a week you'll notice an improvement in your sleep yeah i noticed an improvement in the last in last week since for reference before i started i'm about to finish up maps cardi before i did that i did map symmetry and that was fantastic my body felt i did that and reverse dieted my body felt great on that whole program and like you just said so that's when i got the point i thought okay i'm good to go now i can start pushing myself again that's right that's right that's right yeah do you have mass 15 i have mass 15 performance i did that at the start of the year that's perfect that was good i like that one yeah run that yeah a last piece

1:30:55Sal Di Stefano:of advice uh maybe best investment ever eight sleep i just i swear by that bro i mean you want something especially if you get hot at night and you have you run hot if you're someone like that oh my god eight sleep is a game changer funny you mentioned that i did buy an eight sleep system You did. I got, I got about a month ago, set it up. It seemed to help a little bit, but not a lot. And that's when I started to think, okay, it's probably not just body temperature. It's probably my body is still sensitive to overtraining.

1:31:26Adam Schafer:It helps. It helps with sleep. But if you're overtrained, there's nothing you can, yeah, there's no, there's nothing in the bed. You could have somebody caressing your head and massaging you all night. You still wake up. You know what I mean? Right, right, right. Yeah. So exactly what you guys are saying is what I thought the case was. That's it, my friend. And MAPS 15 it, and you'll be great. And then stay like that for a while, Randy. Give yourself like six months of allowing your body to heal before you try to scale up again. You'd be so surprised how much you can progress on that program. You'll progress.

1:31:54Adam Schafer:You'll actually progress that entire time, by the way. We're not taking a step back. Oh, I'm aware. The unfortunate reality for me is I'm in the Army. I've been in 12 years, and so sometimes there are things in the Army I have to train for. Of course. Like my unit has a 12-mile foot march coming up end of September, and I'm stationed here at Fort Campbell, home to the 101st Airborne Division. I forgot about that. I forgot about that, Randy. You need to live. Once a year, we have to do a 12-mile foot march and we have, you know, with combat gear and a 35-pound rucksack, we have to try to finish in three hours or less.

1:32:21Listen, you're still in the military.

1:32:22Adam Schafer:You need to live in MAPS 15. I know. You should just live there.

1:32:25Sal Di Stefano:It's the best compliment for that. Yeah, dude. You're already doing a lot.

1:32:27Adam Schafer:It's going to be the best. It'll make everything better.

1:32:29Sal Di Stefano:You live there and then when you know you have something like that coming up, you train in that short period of time for that event. Specifically sport. Specifically for that and then you're back to MAPS 15. Right. When you know you've got a challenge like that, you train for it. Especially when it comes to cardiovascular endurance. Yeah, four weeks. It does not, not even that. A couple weeks you can get. Yes, you can get cardio. I always tell people that anyone who played sports in high school knows this. It's crazy how quick. We do Hell Week, right? Everybody did it in basketball, football, whatever sport you played.

1:33:00Sal Di Stefano:And you come from completely deconditioned summer shape where you were just hanging out with your buddies and some of that to one week of hell of running cardio. And the next thing you know, you already have the great. Now, of course, you continue to improve, but 80 % comes back right there. So you could get a long ways just in a week or two of training for whatever said event. You don't have to be training for months to get that endurance. Oh, yeah, I'm aware of that. That was my first thought was next month till that foot march, do the cardio training. I got to do for that. And after that, go back to like a match.

1:33:30That's right. There you go. There you go.

1:33:31Sal Di Stefano:You're on the right track. Yeah, I have to say one more thing. one, Sally, you said one thing last time I was on that was a real light bulb moment for me. And the past year and a half has been like a real life transition period for me. I was married for five years and then my ex and I split a little over a year and a half ago. We finalized our divorce a few months ago. And Sally, you said last time when you got, when you went through your divorce, I think you said it was two days after you and your wife at the time had that conversation where you decided to get a divorce. Two days later, you hit several PRs in the gym.

1:34:03Adam Schafer:That's right. And it was because the stress of that, dealing with that kind of major life change can be like a performance enhancer. Temporarily. Yeah. And it can give you a false sense that, oh, I'm progressing and I can push myself harder when really it's, I would say it's more like an artificial enhancer because it's just spiking cortisol. My body thought a bear was attacking me. It was a stress response. And I was, I was hypomanic for a little bit before I crashed. Yeah. So after you said that last time, that was, I had a moment where I said, okay, I gotta be honest with myself. I've got underlying stress here that I've not dealt with.

1:34:35And I totally started dealing with that. Good for you, Randy. That's great, bro.

1:34:40Sal Di Stefano:You're self-aware. You're on the right track, brother. You do good. Yeah, I think so. You are good stuff, man. All right. Well, thanks again, guys. I really appreciate it. Take it easy.

1:34:51Adam Schafer:Yeah, it's good. He's going to, he's going to do great if he goes mass 15, but yeah. Right. When he said cardio and I was like, okay, we're doing it. It's not, not the eggs.

1:34:59Sal Di Stefano:I forgot he was military guy too. Me too. And then I remembered him. Yeah. Yeah, 100%.

1:35:03Adam Schafer:Our next caller is Kyler from Michigan. Kyler, what's happening? Hi, guys. How you doing? Good. How can we help you? Good, man. What's up? So just to reference my email, starting off, just pleasure to talk to you guys. I've gotten a lot of advice in the past from you just watching, including, Sal, your story about your father's vitamin D deficiency, which I found out I personally do have as well. Um, Adam, your recommendation for Atomic Habits, that book was amazing. And Justin, in general, your training advice and style has been very applicable to my personal life. So thank you guys. Awesome.

1:35:47I found you, uh, around COVID when that started, uh, started diving deep into YouTube and watched a lot of your content and haven't missed a video since, uh, to reference my starting point about 11 years ago. I was 327 pounds. I was morbidly obese at the age of 21 and height of 5 '7". I turned my life around. I dropped the weight in about nine and a half months down to 185 pounds. Wow. Wow. I started powerlifting with a few friends, got into that heavily and had to stop due to getting my second hernia. I took a year off, had some lingering pain that prevented me from coming back right away. Started getting into bodybuilding and a few other modalities of fitness.

1:36:37I've tried almost everything along with diets over the years. And this year, I actually went for the big push. At the beginning of this year, I said, I'm going to finally get to my goal, which was 163 pounds. I know an arbitrary number, but it was half of my heaviest body weight and it was a lifetime goal. And I was finally actually able to hit that in February, March, April, May of this year. And that's the photo reference that I sent in was actually me at my leanest. And ever since getting there, I have experienced both an overuse injury due to excessive cycling. I do believe it's pedendal neuralgia, along with recently a grade two rotator cuff tear.

1:37:27I'm just kind of running into an issue to where I seem to be pushing myself too hard on a consistent basis while fixating on the dieting aspect. I know that I kept my calories too low for too long, and I focused on the scale number, which wasn't a good idea, at least in the long term. I stayed there too long and I'm struggling at this point in my life now that I've essentially achieved the weight loss that I've always went after as far as what to do going forward. How do I proceed with my fitness at this point in time as far as the style I should be focusing on, where my calories should be at?

1:38:08I've always used my own self-programming over the 10 years and I feel pretty accomplished with where I've gotten from that. but your guys's advice about anyone else's is what I was interested in and how I should proceed considering my current main modalities of training are a combination of weighted calisthenics, kettlebells, uh, some mace works, sandbags, things of that nature. Um, I did recently bump my calories up from the deficit point of 2000 to 2250 now up to 2550 but mentally I struggle with eating at maintenance or in a surplus due to my history with being overweight and I did also have disordered eating in the past which was related to binge eating which turned into competitive eating and excessive cardio to keep that in check.

1:39:05And, um, based off from references you've made in the past, uh, I do believe that I have a tendency to push too hard and might fall into the category of a cortisol junkie, considering I do enjoy higher intensity workouts without classifying them as uh what is that called um i can't think of the word right now not high rocks the other one crossfit yeah sorry kyler let me start by congratulating you on

1:39:39Sal Di Stefano:how far you've gone dude i'm so impressed that he got injured and you didn't bounce back the fact that your first injury didn't cause you to put a ton of weight on in that year is

1:39:48Adam Schafer:super impressive that normally always that's what happens so most people most people never get to the place that you're at okay but the ones that do there is another step now so you're done with that phase that what that all the grit and everything to get you here right what that phase looks like is i have this goal and i'm fixated and focused on this goal and you got there most people don't even get there, but you did. Now you have to get to the next goal or the next level, which is there is no goal. And now you have to just enjoy the journey. And this is going to be just as hard as the previous time was, if not harder.

1:40:29Adam Schafer:It is a complete mental shift because the challenge now for you is that you, because you were so fixated on that goal and you got there, you don't have the operating system to continue. If you stay with the same operating system, it's going to result in overtraining, under eating, obsession, injury, illness. This operating system, which worked for the goal, no longer works now for the stage that you're at now. It's like you're driving a car and you made it to the top rev of first gear. You can't stay in first gear anymore. You're going to burn out your engine. You got to go to second and third gear and fourth gear.

1:41:09Adam Schafer:So the next level is how do I fall in love with just the journey? How do I become a guy who just likes to work out?

1:41:19Sal Di Stefano:This is just what I do.

1:41:19Adam Schafer:How do I become a guy that just enjoys eating healthy? And what that looks like is a bit scary because the fear is if I move out of the old operating system, oh no, I'm going to gain all that weight back. That old operating system got me here. If I move out of that, what's going to happen? Well, I know, I can tell you this. First off, I don't know what's going to happen if you move out of that operating system. I think if you do what I'm saying, I know you'll do well, but I can guarantee you what'll happen if you stay in that operating system. And for sure, you'll injure yourself, crash out, burn out, and you'll be out of it.

1:41:54Adam Schafer:Your body will force you. So we have to move out of it. And again, it's about enjoying the process. So what that's going to look like from a diet perspective is you're going to slowly take your hands off of controlling everything. Now, what that's going to look like is more of a reverse diet. And then on a day-by-day basis, you're going to stop focusing on it. Now, if you start to go off the rails, which may happen, if you start to take your focus off of it, right? Right now, you got your hands around your diet like this. You start to take the hands off of it. You're like, okay, I did that for a couple of days and I just went crazy.

1:42:24Adam Schafer:Go ahead and grab it again. And then try again and slowly take your hands off to the point where you're comfortable and you enjoy eating in a healthy way. So that's going to be a bit of a process with the workouts. Yeah. You're, you're, you're going to do what you enjoy and you're going to stop chasing intensity. Right now you say that you love the intense workouts. That's actually not true because it's causing you so many problems. This is why you're like, this is dysfunctional. Like this doesn't make any sense. What it is, is that you, again, you were in an operating system that worked for you and you're afraid to let go of it.

1:42:59Adam Schafer:So really it's not that you love it. It's that you're afraid of letting go of it. so you gotta move into something where you enjoy the process you're actually in it you're like man i feel this feels really good i feel really joyful this is giving me good energy like i feel healthy and it's not dominating my life because the first operating system probably dominated your life right so now you got to get into something where it's not dominating your life it's just making

1:43:24Sal Di Stefano:your life better we probably need to hear what a seven day week looks like for you so we can probably stair step you back because ripping off the band-aid typically doesn't work in this situation either. And so like, give me, give me a week, what the activity exercise movement, uh, looks like. So I can probably give you some little tips on what I do from there. Okay. So a typical week, at least, uh, in reference to when that photo was taken at my peak, It was push-pull leg splits six days a week, along with anywhere between 30 to 60 minutes of higher intensity cardio, usually a 16-mile-per-hour average pace on the bike for a solid 60 minutes before I got injured.

1:44:12After the injury, I was no longer able to do the bike. Still, to this day, I can't do the bike because of the injury, so I have reduced myself to just walking. I know you guys said steps are king. So I said, if they say I can do walking as much as I want, then I'm going to do that. So I ended up switching to just that. But then the push-pull legs program still seemed to be too much, especially in the caloric deficit. So I backtracked to, what was it, an upper-lower, upper-lower arms and or accessory day. then uh i actually ended up trying based off your recommendation as well a full body split three days a week and just focusing on walking on my off days which is where i am currently at majority of the time okay uh i can't quite do all of the exercises that i currently want to due to the rotator cuff overhead work is limited at least to unilateral on the right hand side currently.

1:45:12Dips cause a bit of too much of an internal rotation and golfer's elbow has been flaring up in my right arm, limiting my pull-up capabilities.

1:45:21Adam Schafer:How long, Kyler, how long are your full body workouts? Typically the shortest one is 40 to 45 minutes. Usually if I cut rest times, which I know you guys recommend not to do so, I've tried extending them, which takes my workout to a minimum of an hour to an hour and a half. Okay. So let me answer it. Let me ask a different question. How many exercises per body part are you doing and how many sets per exercise? So I reduced it actually, uh, when I extended the rest time, I actually ended up reducing the number of sets. Now I'm down to three and depending on the day, I would say it's usually nine maybe ten different exercises uh that i usually end up doing just because i do have that i guess you call it fomo uh when it comes to missing out on working a specific body part because i'm trying to go for overall development not just aesthetically but also performance wise okay okay be honest with me okay because i'll help you but i can't help you if you're so i want you to be really, really honest with the situation.

1:46:27Adam Schafer:If I had you do a MAPS 15 performance protocol where you're in the gym about 20 minutes a day. Most ideal, probably. That's ideal, but I need to know from you for, like, you got to tell me, is that doable for you? Or do you think you're like, no, man, I got to be in the gym more? I like being in the gym. And again, normally I work out at home. So it is one of my favorite things to do because it essentially saved my life but why i'm here is to get advice and recommendations from you guys because i value your opinions you are the professionals and essentially i told my wife at the end of the day if they tell me to do something i'm going to do it wow i like that good job i'm going to send you mass 15 performance let's do that i want you to follow that maintain your steps and continue reverse dieting and then what i'm going to do is i'm going to have you back on the show in a few months so we could just check in.

1:47:21Sal Di Stefano:You're actually doing a really good job, bro. When you started, the decisions that you made from where you were and where you're going, you're on the right track.

1:47:29Adam Schafer:This is a normal transition for someone like you. You lost 160 pounds. That is a radical, radical, people just don't appreciate this enough. It is a dramatic lifestyle change. It is the way you live versus how you used to live is so different. You're a different person. And so you got there, but now we need to move you to the next level because what served you then is not going to serve you anymore. And this is a very normal transition. This is exactly what happens to anybody who gets to the place that you got to. Now the next level is going to get you to the forever part, the mental training part of it.

1:48:07Adam Schafer:That's right. Yeah.

1:48:08Sal Di Stefano:Are you on, are you on Facebook too? I'd like to put you in the private forum so we can, we can stay connected. Okay, cool. I'm going to have Doug, I've Doug put you in there. Thank you. I really do appreciate all the kind words and everything you guys have said. That means a lot. And again, I do promise that I will take your advice and follow whatever steps you tell me to. I did have an additional question of curiosity based off from my caloric intake currently. Again, I was dieting at 2000 to 2250. that was just with the steps and the full body and or upper lower three to four days a week. And now being at 2550, I also increased my average step count to where a low day for me is about 13 ,500.

1:48:58And that's with 30 minutes on the treadmill in the morning before work, 30 minutes on my lunch break, and then getting the rest however I can throughout the day. At some point, does that become too excessive considering it has led to general leg fatigue?

1:49:14Adam Schafer:No, your calories are too low. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Are you okay? Look, will you be happy if you built some muscle? Yeah. All right. Go up 500 calories. What, 500? Yeah. Get up to 2 ,900 calories and watch what happens. Mass 15 performance, 2 ,900 calories, and you're just going to build muscle.

1:49:35Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Yeah. And you can keep the walking the way you are.

1:49:37Adam Schafer:And you just keep doing what you're doing with the walking. Mm-hmm. Okay, so 2 ,900 calories, math 15s performance, and walk as much as I want. As much as you want. But, okay, hold on. Keep it low intensity. Hold on, back there. No, no, no, no, keep your walking where it's at. You slipped that in there, Tyler. Don't be doing crazy inclines. He's like, cool, I'm going to do 35 ,000 steps a day. I heard you slipped that in there. No, no, keep the walking with what you're doing. Yeah, yeah. Okay.

1:50:01Sal Di Stefano:You're going to be in the forum now, so as you go through this, I want you to reach out, tag us, and talk to us as you go through this. So you have any challenges? you have any questions uh you're thinking about doing something uh just message us in there and we'll walk you through this but you're you're you're going down the right path bro you're doing the right things you're making the right steps you got this and i appreciate the trust i appreciate

1:50:23Adam Schafer:the trust you'll you'll never you'll never have to worry about trusting us again after you do this watch i wasn't worried to start if i'm being perfectly honest but good stuff brother all

1:50:33Sal Di Stefano:right well we're gonna set you up you're in there and we'll see you again and then we'll talk to you in there and then we'll do a follow-up on the actual show fantastic thank you guys so much for taking my call and helping me good job man thank you yeah normal uh i mean he the answer he gave

1:50:49Adam Schafer:at the end was like okay if you trust this because he's submitting he's just gonna do it and i know it's gonna be scary uh but he's gonna be blown away uh by the end of this super impressive uh

1:50:58Sal Di Stefano:i mean obviously the the total number is impressive but what really struck me was when he was on that path, lost that weight, then got hurt. Got hurt to where he had to completely pull back for almost a year on stuff and to not put that weight all the way back. Cool, man. The discipline to go through that at that time right there, very few people can take the weight off and keep it off, much less suffer a major injury and not put it back on. I mean, that's some serious discipline. one.

1:51:30Adam Schafer:Look, if you like our show, come find us on Instagram, mind pump media. We'll see you there. Thank you for listening to mind pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB super bundle at mind pump media.com. The RGB super bundle includes maps, anabolic mass performance and maps. Aesthetic nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by Sal, Adam, and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints and over 200 videos, the RGB Super Bundle is like having Sal, Adam, and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction of the price.

1:52:16The RGB Super Bundle has a full 30-day money-back guarantee, and you can get it now plus other valuable free resources at mindpumpmedia.com. If you enjoy this show, please share the love by leaving us a five-star rating and review on iTunes, and by introducing Mind Pump to your friends and family. We thank you for your support, and until next time, this is Mind Pump.