2701: Lifting Heavy vs. Lifting Light, Which Is better? (Listener Live Coaching)

25:08Shockwaves. Immediately, even if you're awake, you feel like, oh. Yeah. That's the training of the CNS. Yeah. That wiring exists in your mind because, and very powerful, by the way, to be woken up that way. Yeah. To the point where if you hear that sound, it gives you this really strange feeling. No thanks. It takes everyone back to middle school and having to get up and go to school. You didn't want to go to school. I remember taking one of those just smashing it. Oh. and it's that specific sound. Everybody knows that. Dylan should insert it in this episode. Because my roommate could hit and snooze all the time and so I just yanked it out and then broke it.

25:40Doug, did they have those back then with you? They sure did. It was like a little bird, a bird that actually did something. Doug woke up to a rooster. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Did you have that alarm clock? Oh, absolutely. Okay, everybody had that alarm clock. It was brown, right? A little brown square thing. Do you know what an old alarm clock was, by the way? Like ancient? Before that. Yeah, way before that. People would have a candle. Like a steam. whistle? The candle melted all the way down to a certain amount? There was a nail. There'd be a metal plate. They'd put a big candle on it and they'd stick a nail in it at a particular point.

26:11And when the candle would burn past a certain point, the nail would fall and hit the metal plate and wake them up. Brilliant. That's so cool. And they knew just how long it took to... That's brilliant. That's actually kind of cool. I know. Probably a much better way to get woken up too. But what I was going to say is if you wanted to change your reaction to the sound of that alarm clock, you'd have to retrain your central nervous system? What would that look like? Well, you'd have to listen to that sound and then something else would have to happen. So you have to listen to the sound and then something cool would happen and eventually you would change your behavior.

26:39So this is what happens when you're trying to change your behaviors around food. And this starts with awareness. Oh my gosh. Okay. I'm eating right now. It's because I'm stressed out. I got to become aware of it. Maybe I should eat differently. Still not easy. Still eating the wrong way, but you're bringing awareness and eventually start to develop different behaviors. This is again, a conversation I have with my buddy tim i'm like listen dude i said over the next year if you and i keep working together because i'm gonna try working with him what you're gonna find because you're gonna stumble the whole time it's just how it works but over time you'll find that uh eating right or healthy in a balanced way is going to feel less and less stressful and more and more natural and that's really the key to longevity with this is that how's his uh eating is he a good eater bad eater what's his deal he struggles he struggles with like anybody uh he's not like super overweight or anything like that um but he struggles because uh of the shame associated so he'll try going on a diet and then he'll fall off the diet and he's like what's wrong with me why am i in this garbage you know the whole cycle it's very common you guys know how many people we worked with was the same thing over and over again how did this happen you guys just linked up recently and you're like i'm gonna start so he's uh one of my good friends uh from the church we go to um we have a group of friends that we're all you know doing life together really great guy and my wife suggested that he be in my series so i actually recorded it oh you did yeah so he came in and i trained him and then also he's like really really good uh with theology super smart guy like so we talked oh cool and worked out in the series and after that i'm like you know i think i'm gonna train him i think i'm gonna have him come in once a week and just help the guy out you know that's nice really cool super nice dude i was reading something um and i i'm pretty sure you've read the same thing about this old boxer that they call him the unliftable man.

28:27I read that. Yeah. Johnny, what's it? The unliftable man? Yeah, he weighed like 180 pounds? Yeah, he's definitely not that heavy. But what he could do was really like reorganize the weight distribution of his body. He would also place his arm on someone at a particular point so that the leverage was really hard. The leverage. He was like a master of leverage. I mean, I feel like some wrestlers have this gift. Oh, yeah. You see some guys, they just know how to put their stance and where to put their hips to where it's just like. Like Muhammad Ali was like twice his size and couldn't lift him up.

29:02He had all these celebrities who were trying to lift him. Oh, interesting. And he'd do this thing with his arm so he would kind of change the leverage and anchor himself. Put like a pressure point on them or something and kind of diffuse their strength. What? Yeah, I don't know. Was he any good at boxing too or did he just get famous because of this? He was a kid at boxing, yeah. He's an old boxer. Old time, yeah. Oh, yeah, I've never heard of this. That's really cool. Do you look up his name, Doug? Who is it? Yeah. You'll see some pictures. Oh, right there. Johnny Kulon. Is that his? Yeah. Who it is?

29:24Yeah. That's the stuff that fascinates me, though, because it's like some people just really have a mastery over their body in a way that it's not obvious to everybody watching, but then when you're actually facing somebody like that, to have those kind of techniques. See, there's pictures of Muhammad Ali trying to pick him up and stuff like that. Oh, wow. They couldn't do it. It's so wild. I was talking with Dennis. You guys know Dennis Roberts. He was a world-class grappler. This guy competed at the highest levels. Wrestled the Russian bear at one point. Well, he didn't wrestle in wrestling.

29:55He actually went and took a seminar by him. So we were having this conversation. And I was telling him, I was like, what's the difference between, because he's world-class. And I felt this in jiu-jitsu. I remember thinking I was awesome and I could hold my own and I could beat a lot of guys. And then world-class guys came in and I was just, I felt like I was just. At the beginning of the game. Like I felt like I was a child. Yeah. I felt like they could have ate a sandwich and beat me up at the same time. It was so embarrassing. But anyway, I asked him about that and he goes, oh yeah. He goes, when I was a purple belt, purple belt is pretty high level already.

30:26Right. And he was already at that point, like kind of world-class. He went and trained with, uh, Hodger Gracie. Hodger Gracie was a world champion. And he said, when you watch Hodger Gracie compete, he won these like world-class tournaments, like the world championship tournaments. and he would do a mount and a front choke, which is the most basic jujitsu move ever. Okay, it's like you're a - Like a jab cross. Bro, it's like an NBA game and someone's just doing a layup and nobody could stop him. You're like, why can't you stop this guy, right? And so he would watch these matches and he'd say, I'd see him mount these world champions and they just wouldn't move.

31:03And he's like, why aren't you trying to get out? He goes, I went to train with him. He would mount me and he's like, I can't move. And I'm like, what do you mean? And he goes, the way he was so precise were how he positioned his body weight and where he placed himself. He's like, I felt like I was glued to the floor. And Dennis is a big dude. He's a giant guy. How frustrating that had to be. Oh, yeah. So you talk about leverage and movement and stuff like that. You know, that reminds me, this is total weird, but you just were reminding me of something that I remember the first time, this is to the point of leverage and understanding how to use your body and leverage.

31:38I mean, I remember the first time I tried to massage my wife the same amount of time that she massages me. You got exhausted? Oh, yeah. Like 10 minutes in. Like 10 minutes in, I'm done. I'm like, I'm significantly stronger than this woman is, yet she can press on me for two hours while also having a sandwich or doing something else, multitasking. And with every bit as much pressure or more pressure than I can apply. She knows how to position herself. But, yeah, it's like she would always talk about that. It's all how you leverage your body and do that. And obviously, they probably learn that as they go through their schooling and stuff.

32:09But I remember the first time realizing that, like, why can I not? And I understand adaptation, right? So I understand that, like, okay, there's going to be a little bit of that there that I don't really do this. So maybe I'll adapt and get better. But it's not just that. There's a huge thing. Oh, no. Massage therapists that don't understand that don't have longevity. They end up having injuries. Yes, and that's what she takes. She said those are the ones that get hurt all the time, have a hard time. They have to quit after so long because they can't handle it because they haven't learned how to properly leverage their body.

32:36Dude, I took my kids to the Happy Hollow again. I've been going there every week. It's so easy. It's so close. I can't do what my wife does. You found like a dad hack. That's what it is. There's so many dad hacks. In fact, I was at a playground with my kids, and my son's like, chase me. So I'm like, okay. And I do the dad hack chase, where it's like you don't run. You just cut them off. You just walk, but you cut them off. You're a zombie, so you just walk slow. You understand angles. Angles, yeah. So he's like running, and I'm like just, you know, I'm still strolling, right? Because I don't want to run.

33:03It's exhausting. So anyway, we go to Happy Hollow, which is just, again, I can't do what my wife does. She can hang out with them at home and have a great time. I have to get out of the house. If I'm at home with them, I lose my mind, so I take them out. So we're at Happy Hollow, and they have these lemur exhibits or whatever. A lemur? You know what lemurs are? No, no, what's that? A lemur is like a, I don't know, is it a monkey? It's like a striped tail, like a little furry. Oh, okay, an animal. I thought it was like a thing. I was like, what's a lemur? No, no, no. Yeah, I know which one you're talking about.

33:28They have like the circle eyes and the eyes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we're going through, and my two-year-old she starts going i like to move it move it i like to move and i'm like oh my god it's from the movie madagascar dude accurate she was singing it because she recognized the levers it's so funny uh so i uh was was overseeing everett's like he was doing this test for pe which was interesting it's like they they make them do like a uh at home tests uh not just like physical stuff while they're there so like it was interesting he's like having to come up with 10 different stretches and then say which like muscle groups like were part of this stretch and i'm like oh wow i'm like oh i can finally help you i'm like i actually know this but i'm like i'm trying really hard not to like give him all the answers and like you know so i'm kind of like coaching him through it and i'm like why don't you do something real simple like in the doorway and like you know focus on you know your pecs and this and that and so i'm just kind of like loosely saying for him what to look up and on his like ipad and all this stuff and this is getting towards like late at night and so i'm thinking he's supposed to like take a picture of himself doing the stretch and then kind of like highlight what muscle group whatever so i leave him alone and then i'm i'm kind of getting ready for bed i'm like how's it going we're almost done with this he's like oh yeah i'm done i figured out a hack i'm like a hack what do you mean a hack he's just like well so and then i was like i guessed exactly what he did too i don't know why i guess but i was like you just took a picture of your face didn't you what he took pictures face and drew his arms and his legs like every one of the stretches like you can't turn this in this is a test.

35:15Like you can't just hack your way through this. Oh, so mad. He's going to be an entrepreneur. Yeah. I know. I'm like, okay, cool. Yeah. You did it like two seconds. I'm like, no, you got to actually do the movement. I love it when there's an opportunity for me to be able to help my, my daughter at school because 99 % of the time I can't help her. She's like, I'm just doing like math. It's crazy. I look at it. You're on your own. You lost. You got, you asked me a while back, Sal, which, uh, in it, this happened this weekend for us um you asked me if max was playing uno yet and so he learned uno this weekend and so he's like and he's really he's good he's like into it and stuff and we had a really interesting moment so we're all playing with the family and stuff and he's playing with katrina and uh he came down like the last two cards and he should have played the reverse card first and then played his final card and he would have won and he didn't play that card first katrina won and like he started crying and the whole family was like oh they felt bad Katrina's like yes she was like all excited and everyone's looking at her all kind of sideways she's like this is the first time he showed any emotion about losing because up until this point he you beat him and he's just like oh he's cool with it good job daddy and then he's like ready to go do something else he doesn't want to play anymore so everybody no one of the family understood you know because they're like Katrina and Katrina's so you know empathetic and sensitive and stuff like that so to see her like, yes, I like that.

36:36He's like crying. And so everyone's like, easy, hon. In your face. He's like, yeah, no, you don't understand. Like I said, our son has not shown a little, any sort of competitiveness up until this point. He finally cried over losing for the first time. My wife is all excited. Oh, wow. She's like, thank God there's some competitiveness in there. Aurelius, he can't lose. He's terrible at it. He just gets so mad. He can't handle it. So when I play with him, if I beat him, I have to make sure he wins like two or three other times. Otherwise, the whole game's over. He's pissed off the whole time. So funny how different that can be.

37:08You know what I'm saying? I mean, he's also younger. So I think as they get older. But your kid's always been pretty good. No, Max has always been like that. Dude. We're trying to get him to taunt and talk trash and care about doing it. But normally, he gets excited when a tie happens. Oh, we both win. That's so cool. Oh, my God. No, dude. You're supposed to want to win. So it was pretty funny. I got some really good studies on Brain.fm, by the way, you guys. Like really, really good. Oh, nice. Yeah, yeah. So I pulled up some studies on how it works and what it does, and it's really interesting.

37:42So they use – there's a scientific foundation behind Brain.fm. So people don't know, you listen to music, and it's engineered to induce different brain wave states. states so it can induce a brainwave state that would match or mirror focus or meditation or sleep or whatever so in other words you can get your brain to uh behave in a way as if it were focused by listening to certain things called neural entrainment and the studies on it are really interesting so there were several studies entrainment neuroentrainment so they found that In some of these studies, first off, fMRI studies found that the tracks enhanced sustained attention in participants with ADHD.

38:31And the brain imaging revealed targeted activation in the areas you would expect. So not only do the people self-report, wow, I'm way more focused. By the way, the reporting was 20 to 30 % above placebo, which is significant. Like there's very few things. Because there's already the placebo effect that's built into everything. That's right. There's very few things that can give you that big of a, for focusing, that can give you that big. An addition to it. Aside from drugs, right? You take a medication, you can start to get those perceived effects of focus. This is non-drug. It's just music. I wonder how it does, not to get you sidetracked here, but I wonder how it does compare to like an Adderall.

39:08That's a great question. It'd be interesting to see those compared. The length of the effect. I wouldn't guess it to be as strong as a pharmaceutical, but boy, if it even somewhat rivals it, it would be really interesting. Well, the test that they were using showed 30 % gains in focus metrics, and then the EEG and fMRI provided objective correlates. So it is definitely not just the subjective thing. They're like, they take the test, 30 % more focused, then they look at the fMRI or the EEG, and they're like, yep, the brain is showing more focus. This is crazy stuff. I remember when Justin, Justin was the one that turned me on to the focus side of it.

39:46I used it from day one on the sleep and meditation, and I thought that was great. And I had seen him always using the focus. I thought, you know what, this will be interesting because I've always talked about how I'm not a very good reader. When I sit down and I read, oh, I get so distracted so easily. And you wouldn't think, it's a bit counterintuitive, to think play some of this sound, so play noise while you're reading. You would think that would be. But when I saw how well you said it worked for you for focus, I was like, I wonder if I play that in the background while I read a book. Huge difference.

40:15Yeah. Huge difference. So the fMRI research, so when you're in a flow state, so if people aren't familiar, flow state's like you're in the zone, right? That's what that is, right? And there's lots of studies on this, by the way, on flow state. The military has been heavily invested in figuring this out. The book Rise of Superman covers all that stuff. Yeah, so top athletes are like this, whereas the average person, oh, my God, the clock says 10 seconds left. If I make the winning touchdown, we win. like top performing athletes, they become calmer and their brain goes into a flow state. Whereas other athletes tend to have more anxiety and less of that.

40:50And they can actually show this. They can, they can, they know what a flow state looks like in fMRI studies. And again, the military is heavily invested in this because they want like fighter pilots or astronauts or whatever, Navy SEALs to be able to like, can we train this in people or is it just whatever? Anyway, uh, they, the fMRI, uh, research shows that they get a flow state. from listening to Brain.fm. So it can induce, yeah. That's wild. Isn't that crazy? Yeah. You would think that we would start to use things like that at like schools. Like you would think like it would make sense. Well, I know.

41:24It works over like broadcasting it through the speaker. And then I know that wasn't like part of their advertisement of it because they want it in ear, but it really does have an effect. No, it does. I remember when we first had the guy, the scientist on the show, and he talked about that they advocate for the over ear like setup. But I've played it on my bow speakers in the same room. And I can still feel. If I was a teacher, I would 100 % have that. Yeah, like just playing in the background. Like just real lightly while your kids are reading, studying, and doing so. You would think that we know this much.

41:54There's enough research and support to support it. It's like, okay, well, why are we not doing that? Do you know why? Why? Because there are. FCC stuff. Yeah, dude. There are. It's like too strong. It's too powerful. No, there are some laws. Because it's an actual effect. Yes. There's either some laws or some regulations, or there's fears that this could become a problem. You can manipulate people with it. So when you're broadcasting something that shows an effect on someone's behaviors, I believe there's regulations that are against me. You mean kind of like how we make movies in the news on television all the time and we influence everybody?

42:31Kind of like that? Well, I mean, the fear is you're watching a commercial, and it's playing a sound that's making you more likely to buy. I mean, they do that already in grocery stores. They figure that out. They know that that music that you hear playing when you're strolling through the grocery store is not by chance. Right, but it's not engineered music. It's just the kind of music that they find that. Yeah, they figure that out. So I wonder if a grocery store would get in trouble for playing engineered music. Yes. I'm almost positive that you can't do that. Oh, interesting. You know where these laws first started?

43:05Somebody could probably totally get away with that, though, for a long time. Without nobody knowing. There's no way going around auditing grocery stores. Imagine if you hacked that and then you had just random scents. You know how you're hacking into that. Now you're hitting from all these different angles. Well, you guys know that the movie, the entertainment industry, they were messing around with subliminal messaging. Yeah, yeah. And that became illegal. Remember that movie? Yeah. Thank you for smoking. He talked about it in that movie. Did they? Yeah, yeah. You ever see that? That was the guy who lobbied for, he was the lobbyist for, what's the big three?

43:39The drug, alcohol. You've seen Thank You for Smoking, haven't you? I think so, yeah. Long time ago. Yeah. And they were pushing it up. Yeah, well, he talked about how they used to do that. They'd show like he'd freeze the screen and there would be like a cigarette, but you don't see it in real time. So while the movie's going, you can't get a cigarette. Yeah, you can't see it. It just flashes. It just flashes in there. But our brain picks it up. Yeah, they made that illegal. But the average person who, like, when you're watching it in real time, you don't see it until they slow-mo it. And then you see, oh, my God, a cigarette came up on the screen and you didn't see it.

44:10Do you know what movie? They don't do it to sell anything. So they're not doing it subliminally. But there is a movie. It's a cult classic. Great movie. One of my favorite movies. That's a great movie. They Live? No. Oh. No, no, no. Anytime I say cult classic, that's where we go. That's a great one. No, this is a good movie that has things flash. And people who love this movie have gone back and found them. but there are flashes of oh wait Tyler Durden you're talking about Fight Club Fight Club Fight Club does that so you can actually find you'll be able to find where when he's talking or whatever Tyler Durden flashes on the screen I've done that I've watched it again and like you can see a lot of cool like subliminal stuff yeah yeah yeah but they made that illegal so I think that's why Brain.fm can't say play this on your speakers meanwhile we can get propagandized everywhere else yeah that's what my point was is we do it just fine with everything else get assaulted by everything Oh, my God.

45:02Speaking of, I don't know where we're going to go here, but I don't know what this means, but I love the conspiracies around it. So remember TikTok was owned by Chinese companies? Yeah. And they're like, you know what? Someone else has to own this, otherwise we're going to ban this. So Israel bought it. The next best thing? Well, I know that. How did they buy it, though? Like, who owned it at that point? Yeah, I don't know. Look it up, Doug. This is so mysterious to me. But I know the president of Israel came on, and he basically, I mean, he said in his words, like, this is one of the most powerful weapons.

45:29Now we own it. Yeah, literally called it a weapon. Like, whoa, dude. Weaponize this fight. Wow, dude. Okay. Well, he's right. He's 100 % right. Not that he's nefarious or anything, but he's right. Like, social media platforms are the most powerful weapons for changing or altering or influencing public opinion that we've ever seen. Well, it seems like they actually didn't buy it according to this. Oh, really? Yeah, so that might be. Doug, just fact check you. Yeah. Misinformation. Who bought it then? I don't know. Let me see. Wait a minute. Who owns Google, Doug? There you go. It's out there. I'm pretty sure that a company there.

46:10I saw it. Yeah. Who knows? TikTok can we believe in now? It could be completely false. It's complex. That's funny. TikTok's ownership is complex. Is that what it said? Really? Yeah, but I still want to know who absorbed TikTok after they banned it from China. But why did he come out and say that then? Why did the president of Israel come out and say, like, hey, this is one of the most powerful weapons? I don't know. Well, so it's a consortium of investors. So they may be one of them. I don't know. Like they're a big investor now. Would you say consortium? Yeah. What is that? Consortium. It's like a group.

46:41Just a group. It's a nice way of saying a group. It's a fancy way to say it. We're a consortium here. We're a consortium. Well, I mean, look, it doesn't matter who owns these things. There's always special interest. It doesn't matter. You're right. It doesn't matter. There's not going to be money that's manipulating it one way or the other. You know what I'm saying? And you are more easily manipulated. This is a fact. This is a psychological fact if you're scared. If you're scared, you're easier to sell to. You're easier to manipulate, move around. So it's in the best interest to keep you scared.

47:15All social media is like this. That's just human psychology. What are you reading there, Doug? So Israel is not a direct investor. However, the purchasing group includes American billionaires known to be staunch supporters of Israel. Oh, that's why. That's why they said that. Okay. It's less conspiratorial. But yeah. You brought up psychology. I actually just listened to this really good conversation. You know that roughly 40 % of our happiness is determined by our intentional activities that are direct correlations between the ratio of which things happen to us. So things you do intentionally versus things you feel out of control.

47:49There's actually a ratio. So if you go about your life believing that everything happens to you and you don't control anything, and therefore you're miserable, life sucks, once you get to the place where more things in your life happen because of you, because you did something, and it can be small actions that you take place, when that ratio becomes higher than the other way around, happiness occurs. So they actually have a direct correlation to that, which is why we've had such great success when somebody's depressed or something like that with working out. Why? It's a controllable action they do.

48:18I can go to the gym and go lift weights on top of all the other benefits. Yeah. On top of all the, exactly. And that's, it's a, it's one of those steps and you can, and the goal is to make a bunch of these incremental things so that a person that is going through this depression, because they feel like everything happens to them, they can start to say, well, actually I got up and did this thing. I controlled that. And then I went and did this other thing. That's another thing. And then I did this, even though there was these two really bad things that happened to me, I actually had four things.

48:43It's lots of locus of control. And they, they find that there is a direct correlation to the ratio. So once that ratio exceeds like 50 % of the things you are controlling are happening to you, the happiness curve flips. Wasn't there a study with students on it? It was like a prison study where they gave the students more autonomy versus less. So they felt like either they were being controlled or they had some autonomy. And the difference between the students and how they felt. I don't remember that. Yeah, I can't remember the study. So they were showing that because they had more autonomy that they were happier?

49:17They felt like they had more autonomy. Because they had more control. More choice. I mean, that kind of highlights that point. Which, by the way, one of my favorite quotes is, none are more hopelessly - The illusion of choice. Yes. None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free. This is the argument for - Free will versus - Yeah, we have a two-party system. Predestiny. And so I get to choose which party. Eternism. People on the outside are like, it doesn't matter who you choose, because they all kind of do the same thing. But you feel like you're more in control, because you feel like you picked one side or the other.

49:49That's funny. I have now noticed a clear difference because I've gone now for a long period of time without eating grass-fed meat versus eating grass-fed meat. For sure, for me, there is a higher rate of inflammation when it's not grass-fed. For sure. So are you coming off a run right now of not getting a lot of grass-fed? That's right. Oh, okay. For sure. You did look fatter this last couple of weeks. I think I made a point to tell you that today. I see you eat a pound just before even breakfast. It's like second breakfast. Yeah. No, I probably eat about a pound and a half of red meat a day, maybe two.

50:22But do I really fatter? Yeah. Well, I think that's why you didn't win the hanging from the bar competition was all that inflammation. That's what I blame it on, too. Your fingers were all full of water. Your face was full of water. Oh, come on, dude. I know you see Justin out there practicing all kinds of other challenges now. Are you doing that? He sent it to the editing team. He's like, hey, what are we doing? Let's do a real manly challenge with this bullshit hanging stuff. Who can hang me? It's so bad. You know why he's mad? Who can read the longest? Because so many people were let down because everybody had Justin as the clear-cut winner.

51:02So now he feels like he let everybody. I think that's what it was. Everybody was like banning on me. Nobody thought I was going to win. I never said I was good at hanging. I don't know. It's not my thing. You let a lot of people down, dude. Yeah. Adding salt on it. First of all, there is leverage. There's body types. Justin's got a heavy bottom. He's got a big old heavy bottom. It's not. It's not. That's hard. I didn't weigh myself until. I hadn't weighed myself. And I'm heavy. You did your heavy kicks right now. Bro, I did not. You're the same weight. I went home again. I'm like, that can't be right.

51:34Are you? I hadn't pulled my bathroom scale out in over a year. I hadn't even cared to get on the scale. and I didn't feel like I was that heavy. But then Justin got on, I got on right behind him and the thing didn't move. I'm like, whoa, wait a second here. Dude, wait a minute. Because typically when I'm not, my training volume isn't high and I'm not hitting calories and protein, so with that, I have like what I think the worst case is. I put on a little bit of body fat and worse, I lose a bunch of muscle. But I typically go down in weight. What did you think you were going to weigh? 220? No, I would have thought 215.

52:05Oh my, you were 15 pounds off. Yes, yes. and then you know at once i knew then it started to add up like oh that's why the shirt feels like it's it's wild though how like what a difference it makes knowing versus not knowing just not knowing yeah i was totally oblivious to it and then i was like that's are you are you gonna go out of time now i definitely laid off the ice cream you know what i'm saying hey that's what ice cream every night will do for a couple weeks no last second i know this is what happened that's why you're in you're getting effort in the gym you had your headphones on you were doing full No, last week was the first time I trained four times in a week.

52:41I haven't trained four times in a week. It's funny. I trained a bunch last week. Yeah, I trained four times last week. It got under my skin. Definitely. Yeah, it got me too. I was like, okay, I can't lose the hanging thing and be overweight. I feel so weak. Got to get some shit together. Damn, not weak, dude. It's just one movement, Justin. I don't like it. Hey, listen. Just so everybody knows, everybody has a different personality. If I really want to mess with Justin, which I'm kind of doing a little bit right now. if I talk if I talk crap to Justin it's better than if I try to empathize that makes him feel worse like right now I'm like man you're strong bro you're doing okay he's so bad right now shut up what makes you feel better I think Sal and I lost the other competition which was the the scream one who would die first oh oh yeah yeah you and I were a close one why would I die first that's what I know I was one I thought you for sure would be one why would I die first you're scared of everything yeah but you're not capable you don't even know how to wash your laundry or do anything He's going to murder you?

53:37Yeah, but that's being capable. He's not capable. You wouldn't do it. You know what I'm saying? I don't know. Didn't you have a samurai sword for Intruder? I did, bro. A long time ago? Yeah. Why wouldn't I do the first one? It was me and you, though. You would die first, not because you're not capable. You're deadly. But it's a guy with a scary mask, bro. You'd be, ah! Dead. Yeah. That's fair. Or I would be so, you guys wouldn't see it coming. I would be like, I heard something. I know something. or see that mask and I'm out of here I'm not even gonna wait to see you guys might wait around for sure Doug would be last he would survive that's what I think because he could hide yeah because he scurried he could hide scurry real quick jump around good job I'm like a rat yeah he'd run between his legs sneak attack I mean if he had to hang from somewhere he'd be good you know what I'm saying oh yeah Justin would be hide in the closet Justin would be second because in that position where you're laying on your stomach he'd end up stabbing Justin in the glutes there's so much hide there the knife you get embedded like ow turn around done but anyway but definitely you Adam

54:49Seed is the world's best probiotic if you know about the benefits of probiotics like better digestion less inflammation better skin fat loss it's true studies show probiotics can enhance fat loss go with Seed again the world's best probiotic Go check them out. Go to seed.com forward slash mind pump. Use the code two five mind pump. Get 25 % off your first month's order. Back to the show. Our first caller is Lexi from Canada. Hi Lexi. Hello, hello, hello. How's it going? Thank you guys so much for taking my question. You got it. How can we help you? Okay. So I'm Lexi. I'm a full-time trainer. I take clients in person and online, and I specialize in newly postpartum and breastfeeding moms.

55:31My business has really taken off in the past year or so. And I credit a lot of that to you guys. The way you guys educate has really informed my perspective and the way I train people, the way you talk about the importance of strength training, fat loss versus weight loss, overtraining. These concepts are so relevant to my work with postpartum moms and really my ability to communicate and articulate these concepts. I feel like a lot of that has come from you guys. So I just wanted to thank you for that because I feel like I owe you a lot of my success and it's really had such a big impact on my business, my life, and ultimately my family's life.

56:04So thank you for that. Thank you. That's great. Okay. So my question is actually about me and it's how do I maintain a healthy relationship with food and fitness while dealing with SIBO? Obviously I'm a trainer and nutritionist and I'm finding this really difficult as almost everything triggers me. I've been able to maintain a good relationship with food through years of bulking and cutting and building my physique, but this is really throwing me. So I'm just wondering if you have any advice. Okay, great. Good question. Are you, did you get diagnosed with SIBO or is this a self-diagnosis? No, I did.

56:37I'm working with a naturopath and I did the lactulose breath test. Okay. And so now you're on antimicrobials or using a prescription antibiotic? So she suggested, because I've been doing this for about 10 years, she suggested doing a hybrid approach of both the microbials and the antibiotics. So I'm doing both. Oh, great. How long have you been taking those? I'm just starting like right now. I just came from the gastro actually. Oh, awesome. And then did you get tested for parasites? I didn't. No. Okay. I would also suggest getting tested for parasites. It's relatively, it's way more common than people think, especially if you've never treated yourself for parasites.

57:21So I know we live in, you know, you know, Western societies, everything's clean. So it's like, you know, well, parasites are not that common, but you know, if you've been on earth for a while and you've been eating and you've eaten things like sushi or raw foods or vegetables at some point in your life, it's common enough that you may get a parasite that it probably makes sense to test for it at the very least. And parasites can cause conditions that promote SIBO. Okay. So they can change things like gastric emptying and all of that. And so, uh, and what that would look like is you would treat SIBO, um, and you would get a little better, but then it would get a little worse.

58:02So I would just talk to them and say, Hey, does it make sense for me to also test for parasites? I think if, if, if you test positive, uh, for one, then you should probably test for the other, just to be sure. That being said, you just started the SIBO protocol. And if all you have is SIBO, which is also, it's probably, it's probably just SIBO. So I don't want to freak you out by the parasite thing. It probably is just SIBO. When you treat for SIBO, the success rate's pretty good. So it's pretty good. Now, while you're treating it, you may get a little bit of a Herxheimer effect. Are you familiar with that?

58:38Is that like the die off? Yeah. So when you start, you kind of get worse before you get better. This is when, uh, you get this, this massive release of, of toxins from the die off. And so you start to kind of feel crappy. So be in communication with your practitioner because sometimes what they'll do is they'll lower the dose or whatever. But you're, if you're just starting to treatment now, the light is at the end of the tunnel for sure. Yeah. Just keep in mind that once you finish the treatment, then there's a healing protocol. So it's like, cause what, sometimes what happens is like, Oh my God, I'm better than you think.

59:14Yeah. You're like, Oh, I feel great now. You know, cause I've did the treatment and I think sometimes like 45 days, 60 days or whatever. And then you're like, cool, I'm going to go back to doing this other thing. And the gut hasn't fully healed yet. And you can kind of throw yourself a back and sometimes you need to treat SIBO two times or three times in a row but super common very treatable very treatable what are the must must do or don't do's during this time as far as like training diet those things is there any like must don't do these things during this process yeah I mean you're uh you treat yourself with your exercise and diet like you would if you're getting over an illness so this is not the time yeah yeah it's not the time to push and hammer yourself?

59:55Yeah, I did end up, I just started doing just because like, I found the only thing that was really helping with my symptoms was like, either fasting for long periods, which is not something I recommend for my clients, but I was just kind of desperate. And it was the only thing that helped my symptoms. So I noticed that I had to like adjust my training anyways. So I switched to map strong, which I loved. I feel like I just went really low weight and just focused on like the skill of learning the exercises and it's been amazing. So would you suggest like just continuing with that? If you feel great, go for it.

1:00:29Yeah. If you feel good and you're progressing, uh, it sounds like you're adjusting the intensity appropriately. Uh, I'd say go for it. Um, but yeah, yeah. But yeah, light is at the end of the tunnel. SIBO super treatable. Yeah. Okay. Well, I appreciate that. Yeah. The success rate's pretty high. So, and again, I would contact them and say, Hey, I'd like to also do a parasite test just to be, you know, sure. Because if you get rid of your SIBO, the parasite will cause it to come back just because of the way the body gets affected. But again, at the, at the end of this, once it's all solved, you're going to feel like a completely new person.

1:01:05But personal experience, Lexi, I treated myself for SIBO so many times and we get better and worse, better and worse until I finally, you know, treated myself for parasite and that solves everything. uh, yeah. And it's like, it's like, I'm normal now. Yeah. That's good to know. I'll keep that in mind for me. It was all triggered. Like I got diagnosed with celiac after the birth of my first child, like 10 years ago. And so that triggered celiac and then I got diagnosed for that. And then I removed the gluten and it's still, it's just been 10 years of issues. So I'm assuming it's linked to that, but I'll definitely keep that in mind.

1:01:40Could be. And, and, you know, SIBO causes this kind of low level, uh, immune reaction. So you're very susceptible to developing food intolerances. So if you eat something too often, oh, this food is good. Chicken is good. It doesn't bother me. Suddenly chicken bothers me. And then your list of foods get, this is what happened to me. Like here was my list of foods. And then it got smaller and smaller and smaller. And I'm like, okay, I guess I'm just supposed to eat. Everything became an enemy at that point. Yeah, dude. I was like, I can't eat anything. And my triggers were carbohydrates at one point, all carbs.

1:02:11Fasting felt great. Of course it feels good because you're not feeding the bad bacteria. so yeah but then i struggle because like i'm not fueling my training and that's what i love to do and i feel like i'm stuck like i can't really go after body composition goals or like performance really anything you know yeah and what's here's some other good news on it by the way i love the population that you're serving i think that's such a great population i think they benefit so much from working with a coach you're going to deal with a lot of clients who have gut issues especially in that population women especially postpartum uh gut issues are super common and so this experience with you is going to make you better at empathizing and working with your clients so because you can learn all this stuff but once you experience it like it makes you so much more effective so there's definitely a silver lining yeah it's it's actually crazy and i just feel like after being through so many years of being dismissed by like Western doctors and my symptoms dismiss and my pain dismiss, like being able to empathize with people on that and like expose them to the world of functional practitioners and stuff has been already really healing for me in a sense.

1:03:21Awesome. Awesome. Three antimicrobial supplements that have been shown in studies to be as effective as pharmaceuticals and you may already been using them. And I like them because they're also antifungal because of antibiotic can kill bacteria, but cause fungus to come back, which is probably why your practitioners have you combined to one is called FC Cidal. The other one is called dysbioside. And then there's another one called a trantol. Those are the ones that have the best data. Okay. Sorry. Could you say those again? So I can remember them. Yeah, no problem. F Cidal is the first one. Dysbioside is the second one.

1:03:56And then a trantol. And in fact, I can have Doug message you. Yeah. Yeah. And you can buy those on Amazon. do you have any thoughts on bpc 517 love it or oral for sure yeah oral bpc 157 with kpb is great uh during treatment and post treatment for healing the gut okay thank you i really appreciate that you got it thanks for calling in doing great thank you guys did she say uh 10 years ago i know i'm like when did you have a kid when you were 10 She looks like she's early 20s. Recording 20s. I was like, damn. I know. I didn't expect that. It's wild. Just to the parasite thing, we totally dismiss it because we live in clean societies, right?

1:04:45And you don't get a parasite every year like people do in third world countries and stuff. But if you're 20s or 30s. We're exposed to them all the time, man. They're everywhere. You can get them from any place. you can even get them through intimacy with a partner. So if your partner has it, you may, you, you may likely have it. So yeah, it wasn't until I treated myself for that, that things didn't a hundred percent get better. Yeah. Our next caller is Matthew from Massachusetts. What's up, dude. What's up, Matthew? Hello guys. This is a bit of a surreal experience. I guess I have to hop right into it.

1:05:22You ready? Yeah, let's do it. Awesome. So my question revolves around finding the root cause of my persistent movement asymmetries. First of all, I'm 26 years old. I've been listening to you guys for about seven years, lifting for about 13 years. And over the last six years, I've dealt with these asymmetry issues. My right foot is pronated and externally rotated. My left foot supinated. I have restricted left hip internal rotation. We've got scapular winging mostly on, I believe, the left side. And then my rib cage is also asymmetric, the right side compressed and the left side rotated. I've experienced a lot of overactivity of my right SCM and my upper trap.

1:06:03Over the last four years, I've seen about four physical therapists, two chiropractics, and I'm a personal trainer myself. And I've looked into postural restoration to look at their intervention since they're a little bit more specific. I haven't really made any progress. And I was wondering if you guys have worked with any clients like this in the past, or it could help me get to the root cause of this. Okay, so there's two directions we could go with this. First off, tell me about the pain. It's a, so there's mostly pain in the left hip, and it feels like a pinchy, bony stretch kind of, and that's when it goes into an internally rotated state.

1:06:47I also get pain around my right neck, right underneath the ear where it comes and then into the SCM itself. In fact, you can almost see that the right SCM is hypertrophied over time. Okay. Pulling my face forward. When did you get, when were you aware of these things? Probably four years ago, I started being more aware and it's consistently gotten slowly more worse over time. I think that some of these were present when I was younger as well. I just wasn't aware. Any prior injuries or traumas? No. I had one injury when I was training for a marathon a couple of years ago. It was along one of the tendons that goes underneath the bottom of the foot out to the fifth metatarsal.

1:07:37Okay. And that had me not walking for about a week. Okay. I never fully let that recover, but I don't know if that's still a problem. Okay. Ever been diagnosed with neurodivergence, ADD, high-functioning autism, anything like that? Nope. Okay. So have you been to a neurologist? I have not been to a neurologist. Okay. There's two directions I would go with this, and I'll tell you why. So the first direction, and sometimes you see this, actually, you often see this. with exercise specialists is this hyper-focus on balance. Now, here's what, and this may or may not be the case. So I'm going to give you the two directions, okay?

1:08:22So direction one, it could be a hyper-focus. So if you have a tendency to be where you can be, lack of a better term, so don't take this personally, but neurotic about things, like hyper-focusing on things. If you've ever been told you're a hypochondriac or, Or, hey, man, you focus too much. Or you count your macros too often. Or you pay attention too close. Or you have a lot of anxiety. What you can do is you can hyper-focus on things that are real. But then through that process, they get worse. So pain and dysfunction are both physiological and emotional. Great episode with Jordan Shallow coming out where we talk about this.

1:08:59You can't separate the two. You can't separate the physiological stuff that's happening from pain and the emotional connection or emotional experience of pain. You can't separate the two or dysfunction. So one route can be hyper, hyper focused, which then causes things to be worse. And I'll give you an example. Most of us walk or breathe without even thinking about it. It's automatic. But if you're always thinking about how you walk, your gait changes and everything changes, especially if you're hyper focused on either real or perceived imbalance. So I could take anybody. I can take a normal person who has no issues and I can tell them, I want you to think about every step you take while you're walking.

1:09:40And what you'll see is their gait will start to change as they become hyperphobic. You're not supposed to think about these things. It's supposed to be natural. I can do that with anything that's automatic. If I, right now, everybody watching this podcast, and if I told everybody, this is funny, you can actually do this with your friends. You are now blinking your eyes manually. Right now, everybody just became hyper aware of how often they're blinking their eyes and that starts to change as well. So that's one route. The other route would be sensory input or how your body is perceiving sensory.

1:10:08So you can either be hyper aware, and this could be a neurological thing, or it could be under aware or not receiving enough sensory. So you'll see this sometimes in kids who are toe walkers. So sometimes kids who do a lot of toe walking, there's some sensory input stuff. That's why I asked you about the neurodivergence. There's a higher prevalence of this in people that way. And it could be a combination of both. So is any of what I'm saying, does any of what I'm saying resonate? So I've definitely become somewhat obsessive about the movement stuff over the course of the years. I wouldn't say I'm neurotic, but I have been a fitness enthusiast and somewhat obsessed for a very long time.

1:10:56to go to the second point for sensory input. A lot of the people that I'm talking to now are talking about visual input and balance based input for how your jaw aligns the rest of your body. So I've actually worked with a optometrist and we'll be seeing a dentist in a couple of weeks, I believe to try and figure out if there is a missing sensory input issue. Okay. And then I'm going to just caution you. Okay. You may be chasing a boogeyman. And if you keep looking, I've worked with people like this, where they went to physical therapists, acupuncturist, chiropractor, and every one of these people will find something.

1:11:40Then I'm going to a ear, nose and throat specialist. Now I'm going to a neurologist and there's all these possible possibilities and they're chasing, chasing, chasing. variables now that yeah yeah so it's impossible to separate your experience from all of this so it's impossible to separate the emotional because it sounds like it's caused you a lot of distress uh so um one of the questions you can ask yourself is would a good personal trainer watching me work out notice all kinds of crazy asymmetries if the answer is no uh then it might not be as bad as you think if it's like i have to go to this specific specialist who measures things and then says oh yeah, there's a 33 degree difference here, five degree difference there.

1:12:19Or you go to a specialist like, yeah, you're misaligned on this joint here. Uh, like I could take anybody to, we all have asymmetry. Yeah. Well, is this affecting the way you lift? Like, are you hyper aware of this and like, be a, are you able to self-correct as you feel, uh, compensations happen? Or is this something that like, you know, like, can you sort of like ignore it and, and, um, relax and just get into the mechanics of the lift? Um, I can, but then I feel like the soreness in my body to be very, uh, asymmetric the next, next day. Okay. Maybe that just means I'm going too hard. Right.

1:12:58But for example, like if I were to bench press, I would feel that my, uh, my right upper pec works very well, but then I don't really have any chest activation on my left side that I can feel. And it's mostly dealt. If you use dumbbells, it's like a huge strength imbalance. Yeah. Um, uh, kind of, it's not, it doesn't feel like a huge strength imbalance. It just feels like I'm using different muscles. Right. But if you're, if you're doing a one arm dumbbell chest press on one side is how big of a difference is it with the weight that you use or the reps? Um, I haven't really gone heavy in a long time since I've been dropping off the weight as I try to fix this problem.

1:13:36I would say that the right side can probably move 10 pounds more than the left side. Okay. 15. That's within the realm of normal, I would say, maybe kind of borderline. I would almost have you stick with just barbell training and remove this like focus. Yeah, this unilateral obsession and work through, like I said, pause if you have any kind of compensation is happening and self-correct, but like just try to systematically establish that uniformity in your, in your movement. Yeah. The other thing you could do also from an activity standpoint is limit your strength training to once a week and then do some other activity that doesn't have you focusing so much on biomechanics like Brazilian jujitsu or cycling or something where you're just doing a movement and see how that, if that helps.

1:14:28But again, it's really hard to separate the two of those things. If this has been, just to put it to you this way, if this is a real neurological issue and it's like a big deal and you've noticed it for five years, what you would see are glaring, you would typically see glaring differences in muscle development. You're gonna love the episode that we just did with Jordan Shallow. I know it's coming out in the next week or two and a lot of what we talked about was exactly this stuff. I mean, so that'll be a really interesting. Yeah, that sounds great. I mean, there is a glaring asymmetry that I can see just in my neck and where my right SCM inserts versus the left.

1:15:09So, I don't know. It's confusing to me. I would almost like it if it was just a mental game that I need to just get over to return back to normal. But it does seem like there's some part of this that's real. Well, I'm going to tell you this, Matthew, a mental, if it was just mental, it would be harder to deal with and fix than if it was physiological. That's just truth. That's the hardest thing to do. So, uh, so I wouldn't wish that on anybody, but if that's the case, the answer literally is to stop thinking about it, which is like, so how do you do that? How do you do that? You can't not think about something.

1:15:44Like if I told you right now, don't think of a zebra, you're thinking of a zebra. so you have to think of something you have to focus on something else you have to literally go play sports for a while that's right go play basketball go play go you know go swimming go try to get good at something else yeah yeah go do something else that you're not hyper focused that's right uh and in the mean that's what i would do in the meantime if i was you is i'd say oh i'm gonna go try and get good at this other thing um and then in the meantime um a neurologist would be the direction i would go because uh if there is a neurological issue they'll identify And if they're like, no, there's no neurological issue, then you might be chasing a boogeyman.

1:16:20So they would be able to identify some type of sensory input difference as well. That's right. They would test your, they would test and see if there's some kind of neurological issue that's going on. And if there's nothing glaring there, then I'd say, all right, I'm going to just, I'm going to go somewhere else. Did you play sports at all? Are you into sports? Yeah, I played a pretty high level soccer growing up. and I haven't played in a while since I went to college yeah strength train once a week with barbells go play soccer and then just go have fun playing soccer and see if that meet while you go to these other professionals okay do you guys have any people that are more in your network you think that talk more about this type of stuff or will the podcast coming out be the best resource I'm assuming you did you already reach out to Brink in the forum yet no I'm not in the form oh let's put you in there we'll put you in the private forum where Dr.

1:17:17Brink is at and Jordan Shallow they're both in there yeah they'll both do a good job that would be great yeah you got it man keep us posted I'd like to hear how this unfolds as you continue to dig deeper on this yeah thank you I certainly will and before I go I just want to say thank you for everything that you guys do you've been a pretty consistent and positive force in my life and many other people's thanks man thank you very much have a good one you see that yeah that that's a i've had great timing for the episode we just we just did i mean like that was like i mean that was the whole two hours or whatever it was with shallow you know it was just a deep rabbit hole around pain there are things that we're supposed to be aware of that we're doing and they're supposed to be there are things that are supposed to be in the background i mean you could literally if like you said addressing the autonomic system well i don't think it's supposed to be autonomic well i want to i want to point out something too like i don't know if i ever barbell back squat especially when i move decent weight and i don't feel a difference on left or i've always get a little more sore on one side or the other you know there's a little bit of discrepancy always you have to have especially when you're moving heavy weight perfect mechanics to not feel an imbalance in soreness i mean i don't know about The body corrects these imbalances too.

1:18:38And you have to allow a lot of times for that to occur by removing, like you said, like sometimes you could hyper-focus on something and it'll create this distance between where you started from. And so it's, yeah, I just, I think it's just to the point of like, yeah, like I think it's important that we address like imbalances and corrections, but now we have to like integrate. And so if you're not going to integrate and allow the rest of your body to work simultaneously together, it just has a way of self-correcting if you let it. And look, the last thing anybody wants to hear when they're dealing with a chronic issue is it's all in your head.

1:19:21That's the last thing anybody wants to hear. And the reality is oftentimes it's both. Oftentimes there is a something that's happening that's physiological. but then the mental part of it, either the, the, the, the struggle around it, the challenge, the focus causes much, much, much bigger problems and makes it look right. I'll give you an example of people watching this right now. If you were to just close your eyes and for the next five minutes, hyper-focus on the feelings in your right foot. I promise you, you'll notice things about your right foot. Like it's itchy. It feels weird. It's kind of tilt.

1:19:55It's kind of turned wrong. You become hyper-aware of something that you shouldn't be hyper. And you can do this with almost anything. Now imagine you notice something, and for five years, you're trying to fix it and focus on it. So that's why I'm like, look, go rule out the major things like PT, neurology. Once the major things are ruled out, like, okay, I may be making something that's not necessarily there or there but not nearly as big. And the only way to get away from it is to think about something else and focus on something else. Pick a different target. Yeah, what's your guys' take about him going to see the orthodontist and stuff like that over this?

1:20:30because couldn't that also be because of all that? Like he's going to clench down on one side more, and so then they're going to see some sort of a discrepancy potentially there? Well, he has seen physical therapist, chiropractor, sets up here. He's done some interventions. He also sounds like a very educated trainer. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the next place would be a neurologist, rule out the major stuff. He's trying to rule out almost every angle he can think of. Yeah, dude. And yeah, it's, it's like you said, it's kind of like chasing. And it could be. And the reason why I went that direction is because it's always a possibility, but also because he's a trainer, the way he's talking about this stuff.

1:21:09And he was a high performing athlete for a while and there was no major injury. So I'm like, okay, what, this might be something that you're hyper-focused on. Our next caller is Kelly from South Carolina. Hi Kelly. Hey guys. How are you guys? Good. How's it going? Good. Um, I'm just going to read my email cause I'm super nervous, But so grateful to be here. Love the show. You guys have taught me so much and completely changed how I train. Just can't say enough good things about what you guys do. I love how you talk about your families and glorify the Lord. So just everything's great. Thank you.

1:21:41I've been strength training consistently for a year now and I've made some good strides as far as strength. I hired an online coach last year and have been with her close to a year. I'm a 48-year-old woman and perimenopause. Recently started with Transcend. I've been with them a couple months now, and they've helped with a lot of symptoms I was having. I know you get tired of hearing this, but I really want to lose fat. I started at about 210. I'm 5 '8". I've lost about 10 pounds over this year while eating in a slight deficit, about 1 ,800 to 1 ,900 calories, training three days a week, and getting an average of about 8 ,000 to 10 ,000 steps.

1:22:18I know my shape has changed some, and I know I've lost some fat and gained some muscle, no DEXA scan data or anything, just like an electrical impedance scale. But my question is, how should I approach my nutrition? Should I change anything? Do I need to just continue to stay in this slight deficit, or should I increase calories and do a reverse? Yeah, good question and great job, by the way. So I'm going to ask you some more questions for better context, okay? Okay. So this is over the last year that you've been really kind of doing this? Yeah, and like the first 10 pounds came off within the first couple months, and then I've just pretty much been stalled.

1:22:58Okay. As far as the weight goes. Tell me about any changes in, let's say, strength. What have you seen over the last year? Definitely gone up in strength. So, like, I know there are good things. I just, you know, want it to be faster. I thought I would be farther along as far as how my clothes fit and things like that by now. Yeah. So strength has been a huge increase? Yeah, I would say so. Any changes in energy? Not that I can recognize. Okay. And how do you feel about your workouts and all that stuff? Are you feeling like, oh, man, I'm kind of liking this? Yeah. Yeah, I love it. I mean, I did hurt myself deadlifting at the very beginning because I had no clue what I was doing.

1:23:42but got over that and I love it now. Okay, good. And so you've definitely built some muscle while losing 10 pounds on the scale. So it's probably more than 10 pounds of body fat if you've gotten stronger. That's why I was asking you that. So do you have an idea of how much stronger? Do you have an example of an exercise, what you used to do and what you could do now? Let's see. I mean, like when I started squatting, I could do the bar and I'm up to maybe like 150, 155. Whoa. Yeah, that's good. Wait, you went from a 45-pound bar to 150? Yeah, that's good. Yeah. There's a really good chance you have actually lost a lot more fat than you think you do.

1:24:19Oh, yeah. You've gained like seven, eight pounds of muscle at minimum if you're doing that. Yeah. That's a very big – you're moving in the right direction. Yeah, I think you've done a lot better than you think you've done. Yeah. So I would say – I get how it feels, though. I do. I do. So this is now when the snowball starts to take shape, that snowball effect. That's what I keep hearing. and I just, I wanted to get going now. I mean, I would personally reverse diet her right now. At 1 ,800, 1 ,900 calories, getting strong like that, I would lean into the getting strong and really try and put, especially if you're enjoying, if you're enjoying like seeing the strength go up and you like what you see and feel from that, I'd actually encourage going up in calories just a little bit and continue to do that until I get to a place like say 2 ,500 and then come back down.

1:25:05And then I think you're going to see a big drop from that. Yeah. At 1 ,800, 1 ,900 calories, I think her body's just kind of slowed and adapted, so she's not seeing big swings right now. It's kind of low to cut from because we would end up around 1 ,400 calories, and then you would plateau. It's hard to live there, yeah. Yeah, and that'd be very difficult. But I wouldn't be surprised, Kelly, if you went up 200 calories a day and saw a little bit of fat loss. I wouldn't be surprised at all, especially with the strain gain. yeah so what you say you're training three days a week as your trainer have you on one of our programs are they is she doing her own thing are he doing his own thing no um so i was doing like um you know push pull legs but i had bought anabolic back in like august of last year and that's when i hurt my back and you know just it was my own fault um but then i switched to her but i've recently went back to anabolic and i'm on phase two now and i like the two days a week but it just works better for me so good and then here's the like the other part that we're not having got into you started with transcend a couple months ago what do you are you on hormone therapy with them yeah so i'd take progesterone and testosterone and the dha this will make a difference oh yeah and i like a couple months you're only two months you're only two months into it in here yeah about six months into hormone therapy like things really start to take off i I would love to see a 200 to 300 calorie bump.

1:26:30And then what you can do since you're around 8 ,000 steps, kick your steps up to 9 ,000, 10 ,000 steps a day consistently. That way you don't see anything major weight gain on the scale. But those extra calories I think are going to fuel you building muscle, which will speed the metabolism up, which will do what I think Sal is. Especially with the hormones. Yes, yes. Yeah, the hormone therapy, the changes really start to happen. and the aesthetic ones like month four to six is when things really start to kick up. So that's another part that we need to consider. Yeah, I like the reverse diet. And I wouldn't be surprised if you got leaner within the first few weeks doing that.

1:27:06So just 200 calories all at once and just kind of stay there? Yeah, stay there for a little while. I mean, a perfect world is you stay there for, say, two weeks and you see no weight gain. And if that happens, do it again. Yeah. So that would be – now, there absolutely could be a couple pounds on the scale. I'm not worried about that. Like, that's impossible. But I'm not worried about – I also think if you kick up your steps to 9 ,000 to 10 ,000 steps, you won't see that. And if we can get away with bumping 200, 300 calories and no weight gain, I want to do it again. And really pay attention to how you feel in the gym strength-wise.

1:27:38Really push that. So these weeks coming up as you're doing your training, stretch yourself to add a rep or add five pounds. Like, really think like that through the workouts. and I think it's going to really serve you. Yeah. Okay. I love you. I love you in our muscle mommy group too. You'd be great in there. You would. Have you, have you seen us talking about that yet? I have. Yeah. Oh yeah. You got to come inside. I did the quiz and it said I was a strength novice. So I mean, I guess I agree with that. Yeah. Go to muscle mommy movement.com and check out the group. Yeah. Yeah. Get inside the group.

1:28:08So another thing too, Kelly is that I've had clients who've on the scale lost 10 pounds, but they keep hearing from people around them that they trust that they look like they lost a lot more. and that's always a sign that it was a lot more body fat than just the 10 pounds and we've built some muscle so consider that as well but i'd like to have you back on in about 60 days can we can we can we follow back up with you in 60 days during this kind of reverse diet all right let's not a bad idea too if you have access to one of those dexa scam places where you can get kind of where you're at i said i see that you you hadn't done that right a little more definitive yeah i mean yeah worthwhile doing that because that man that's can be really encouraging when you go three four months you don't really see the scale go down very much or very little but then you get the dex scan you go oh my god i built 10 pounds of muscle and i've lost five pounds of fat you know that's your squat with 300 increase in strength yeah that's a that's a really good that is good by the way that your number is also good anyway 150 pound squat for a woman is really good yeah so you're also you're not just didn't get just stronger you're actually pretty strong yeah yeah that's exciting that's really exciting yeah we want to lead into that thank you guys let's see you in 60 days yeah all right sounds good all right all right thanks bye yeah you know uh when we uh you know when we are judging ourselves it's really really difficult but somebody put on that much strength you know she down to 18 900 calories that's not a lot yeah yeah i think that's what she needs to be fed more she needs to eat more with especially strength numbers like that she's if she's really consistently hitting 8 000 steps that's pretty active it's not You know, I didn't even ask her this.

1:29:46It's just such a tough position to be in because oftentimes what people have experienced, and I should have asked her this because maybe this is her, is they've lost and gained weight so many times in the past. And so they're used to being able to, well, I can lose it quick. Cutting hard. By cutting real hard. I've lost 20 pounds before and cutting real hard. So now they're doing it the right way. Yeah. And they're like, okay, it's taking forever. It doesn't happen as fast. But the right way, it's not like you're going, oh, one's a fast way, one's a slower way. It's like, this just doesn't work.

1:30:14That's the reason why you gain the back so many times. This is the way it works. And the right way is faster. It's just harder to tell. That's right. Because of the scale. Because we use the scale as the way to measuring ourselves so much that the faster, better, right way doesn't seem like it's faster and better. It feels like it's slower because you're wanting to see a number on a scale. It's like, no, you can't go off of that. And this is a great example where a client like this I love to have, like at Dexa, because I know the psychological part of training for a whole year and feeling like I've only moved two pounds.

1:30:45She threw the hormones at it too, man. You do the hormone replacement therapy. This is why I really wanted her to feed. When she said that, I'm like, you got to feed. You got to feed her because she's going to get strong in the gym, build some muscle. Our next caller is Amelia from New Zealand. Hi, Amelia. Hello. Kia ora, guys. Yeah, first off, I'd just like to say a huge thank you. I just love how simple everything you guys make, including your amazing programming, as well as just the content that you put out. So it's, you know, you guys reaching millions of people, both directly and indirectly.

1:31:16So thank you very much. And yeah, I'd like to talk to you about the impact of HRT, specifically estrogen and testosterone, and what they could have on my life, particularly around body composition and training slash lifting goals. And also, what should I expect as I progress through the HRT journey? So for context, I'm a 34-year-old mum of three kids, four and under, as in I had them within three years, while also doing my PhD in health sciences and supporting my husband on our 500-car dairy farm. Wow. I have had severe endometriosis. I was confirmed at age 19, along with stage 1 ovarian cancer.

1:32:03And most recently, I've had confirmation of adenomyosis as well. And due to poor life quality, so chronic pain and other symptoms associated with the gynecological history above, I had a hysterectomy in March this year. Best thing I did in terms of life quality. I was on pain medication all day, every day pretty much, and couch ridden for often a week to 10 days every cycle essentially. I also stopped breastfeeding my third the day before surgery so obviously that has an impact on hormones In early August of this year I started getting some random pains and numbness which I then saw my physio for and she in conjunction with knowing my lifestyle and also my body wondered if it was hormone related and which sort of finalised pushed me to go and see a menopause specialist who confirmed my suspicion that I was in early menopause as a result of having the hysterectomy before the age of 35 just reduced the health of the ovaries.

1:33:19So I started estrogen replacement therapy late August and there's no need for progesterone given I don't have a uterus. we also got my testosterone checked which was 0.4 nanomoles per litre so I don't know what that is in your guys speak but essentially it's very low well below the range so I'm going to start HRT late November because it's not recommended that you start testosterone until after you've sort of got estrogen all sorted in terms of ideal replacement numbers in that regard and in May early May I did a DEXA and I was 42 % body fat I was actually I'm going to go and get another one today because I've just finished symmetry um so I want to see if there's the imbalances can sort of sort of themselves out um and I have a good bone density score um in terms of general lifestyle I strength train like frequently um I have previously competed in powerlifting competition so my squat got up to 160 kilos um deadlift 200 kilos and bench press 97.5 at my previous or my last my most recent competition you're strong um yeah yep i i that's definitely my strength um um yeah but then pain and kids um sort of stopped me from lifting but I definitely want to get back into lifting.

1:34:50So yeah, I've strength trained essentially on and off to some degree for the last two decades. Like I used it as dry land training for competitive swimming growing up, obviously powerlifting competitions and then during and post pregnancies as like, you know, just to whatever degree I needed to. And yeah, as I said, just finishing up symmetry and I'm going to head into Muscle Mummy on Monday and I'm just doing a deload week at the moment. in terms of nutrition i eat balanced diet with minimum 100 i've said 160 but it's actually closer to 180 grams um of protein per day i do have a smoothie or a shake um in there just because three young kids morning absolutely chaotic it's just easier for my life um so i'm not currently tracking but i have previously hence why i'm able to sort of judge around that that grams of protein so I'd estimate between 26 to 2800 calories a day drank three litres of water including electrolytes unfortunately we don't have LMNT here but it's something similar with good amount of sodium and that sort of thing sleep getting better but obviously still inconsistent with young kids case in point my middle literally just woke up a little while ago so then I had my oldest awake at quarter past 11 last night um in fact he's just awake now um so yeah so this is my current focus at the moment getting good um in terms of my my routine before bed and that sort of thing so yeah so just want your advice on how i can sort of optimize body composition uh and that sort of thing um given that i'll be yeah getting better at my ert um and then obviously starting trt late november good Doing a lot of the right things, right?

1:36:40You are. And the HRT, this is all doctor prescribed, doctor monitored. I just want to confirm that. Yeah, yeah. Okay, you're good. You proceed the same. There is no difference. If anything, the HRT will help your body respond better with recovery. A mistake people often make with HRT is they are like, oh, good, I'm on, my hormones are balanced, I'm going to ramp things up. I'm going to push things. But just pretend like you're not on it. train yourself accordingly. And then that'll just help the process. I've seen people over train because they went on testosterone or because they went on, are you, do you check thyroid house thyroid by the way?

1:37:17Uh, yeah, healthy. Um, all good. And vitamin D is good. Okay. Um, the only thing with my most recent blood tests was that my GGT, so liver function was slightly elevated, but, um, I had a look back in my history just yesterday. Um, and it's actually decreased um like sort of trending more towards the healthier range so what are the what are your biggest offenders in your diet um well probably like that protein shake like i mean i know that it's better to eat whole foods um and my snacking so at the moment i'm actually because i'm in a deload week um i am doing sort of like a low carb higher fat just to try and sort of you know, do a bit of a kickstart, um, literally just for this week.

1:38:06Uh, and then I'll get, you know, back up to my maintenance calories. Cause I, I'm definitely in a deficit at the moment, um, this week, cause you know, I'm feeling that hunger. Um, so yeah, I'll be ramping that back up to, um, yeah, to, to my maintenance next, next week. Um, when I start or actually I'll probably do it on Saturday. Yeah. So you're doing a lot of things right. You need to track and get an accurate number of what you're averaging before we can start to move forward and then put you in a deficit. If you are indeed averaging around 2 ,700 calories, you're in a good place to go in a deficit.

1:38:45Being in a consistent 2 ,000 calories, you'll see some body composition changes for sure. I like lower carb for someone like you because oftentimes what you see with women that have endometriosis or any issues like that, they tend to have issues with how they respond to like glucose or sugar, and they tend to respond. This is in my experience, okay? That's why I asked you about thyroid too because if your thyroid was off, then I wouldn't necessarily go lower carb. But in my experience with people like you who've had those kind of issues, lower carbs seems to work better. but we don't know where to go unless we get an accurate number.

1:39:26And what you need to do with your tracking is count everything, including snacks and get a real number and be like, okay, I'm averaging this every single week. And if it is indeed around 2 ,700 or higher, you're in a great place to go in a cup. Yeah. Great place. You drop that 600 calories below, stay consistent. You will see the needle move for sure. And I actually, especially with your, and I'd actually only run those cuts for like two or three weeks and then go back to maintenance, two or three weeks, go back to maintenance, It's kind of toggle back and forth of like a good cut, a good aggressive cut, like Sal's saying, for just a couple weeks and then go back.

1:39:59So even considering how strong you are, you like strength training, like I definitely want to fuel that, you know, and I think going back to maintenance, those weeks you'll fuel that and then go back the other way, just kind of toggle back and forth. And Amelia, historically, when I've worked with people who do some snacking and they give me an average of what they think, nine, let's say nine out of 10 times, they're actually, they actually higher than they think. I've never actually had somebody go, well, I think I'm eating this much. And then we start to calculate and it's like 300 calories higher, but we don't know.

1:40:31So I would track for two weeks and I wouldn't try to go on a diet while doing this. No, I would just try to eat normal. Yeah. Cause you want an accurate number of kind of where you're at. And then from there, like I said, But if you're above 2 ,600 calories, you could cut and you'll be okay. Cool. Thank you very much. You know, tonight, sorry, I was just going to tell you that. I don't know if you saw, we launched the Muscle Mommy group. And tonight, Dr. Lauren is in there speaking and she's a hormone specialist. And so she's incredible. So if you haven't hopped in that, yeah, if you haven't hopped in that group, it's such a great group.

1:41:05It's an incredible community of women that are all strength training and trying to build muscle. So it'd be a great, a great group if you're not in there. Yep. I did forget to mention I'm on your guys' concierge coaching. Oh, good. Okay, good. Oh, you're wonderful. I prefer that than the muscle mummy. That's even better. No, that's even better. That's individualized for you. So that's even better. Yeah, exactly. Awesome. I had no idea. So I most recently spoke to Will last week, I think it was. Oh, great. We sort of had a plan to sort of do essentially maintenance for muscle mummy and do almost sort of like a condensed muscle mummy.

1:41:42So not the full program is and probably cut out the last phase of 5x5s to sort of align starting power lift and a bulk at the end of November when I start my TRT to try and get the optimist. Yeah, yeah. Oh, you're in good hands. Yeah, I love that. Oh, it's going to be great then. Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. I also forgot to mention, I'm also on metformin as well to help with the insulin management. Have you guys metformin? Yeah, I'm familiar. Yeah. Yeah, very familiar. Yeah, on the low dose of that with my doctor as well. So, yeah, lower carb. I think lower – that just confirms what I thought. Yeah, lower carb would probably work better.

1:42:27Not zero carb, but just lower carb would probably work better for you. Perfect. That sounds amazing. Yeah, thanks. I just wanted to sort of, I thought the question, you know, was quite good to sort of reduce the stigma of, you know, like taking any replacement therapy during menopause. Great question. Great steps. You're doing all the right things. And you're really strong. I love it. Excited to see this. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. A little plug. For the phase three of symmetry with the track bar deadlift. Yeah. Started at literally just the bar for eight. And then by the end of the three weeks, I was up to a hundred kilos for eight.

1:43:07Yeah. Pretty, pretty stoked with that. Good job. Solid. Amazing. So good. Thanks, Amelia. Yeah. No, thank you very much. Really appreciate your time and continue doing what you're doing. And hopefully I'll see you on some of these calls. Sometimes I see our trainers working with people. So if I do, I'll say hi. Yeah, definitely. Thanks. See you guys. Bye. Yeah. If she's indeed around those calories, which I don't know about you guys, but have you ever had anybody estimate and be? Oh, yeah. It's always, especially if they're snacking is a good point. But if she's there, she can cut. She'll be fine.

1:43:42Especially with the strength that she has. Oh my God. Yeah. I like the idea too of toggling back and forth because she likes to build muscle, be strong. Absolutely. I'm going to lean into that. Yeah. Like a two, one or something like that. Yeah. Absolutely. Look, if you like our show, come find us on Instagram. We'll see you at mind pump. 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 mindpumpmedia.com. The RGB Super Bundle includes MAPS Anabolic, MAPS Performance, and MAPS Aesthetic.

1:44:18Nine 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. The 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