2939: This Forgotten Exercise Builds Your Back, Bulletproofs Your Shoulders and Boosts Your Bench

15:07Adam Schafer:It's also great for thoracic mobility. So, all right. What is that? Right. So think of somebody who's older, who's got kind of that rounded upper back. I don't mean necessarily the shoulders are forward, but you notice the upper spine, the back. So in an extreme case, it would be like a humpback. Right. So you watch cartoons and they got like the scary bad guy with the humpback or whatever. You know, I was at the gym the other day and I saw this in a couple elderly kind of older individuals where they, you know, they're coming in, they're working out, but they've got that really rounded kind of thoracic area that the thoracic part of the spine, which is that upper back area.

15:43Adam Schafer:And improving mobility there would be moving it in the opposite direction. Now, we could always work on rows, try to pull the shoulders back, trying to bring the chest out. This is kind of what you would do. But here with a cross bench pullover, the resistance is making that thoracic mobility go in that direction. It's moving the shoulders in a position, pushing the chest forward to improve that mobility. This was one of the big benefits I got from this exercise. I have a tendency to have a little bit of an over rounded thoracic area. And when I do pullovers, it's better. Why? The bench is pushing up on my thoracic part of my spine.

16:20Adam Schafer:I'm using that resistance. I'm expanding my rib cage, pulling back, and it stretches it and moves it in the opposite direction.

16:26Sal Di Stefano:Well, and since you're in the corrective direction, too, one of the things, again, that's so great about this is how easily you can regress this.

16:33Adam Schafer:Yeah.

16:33Sal Di Stefano:I mean, it's one of those movements where, as a trainer, I could put my hand as far as I want them to go. Like, here, let's just get there and then have them pause, connect there. And then over weeks, we're getting deeper and deeper and further and further. And you could start really, really light. I mean, I've started clients with just a little light 10-pound dumbbell that they're doing and get work on that range of motion and connecting and then deeper and deeper. And so it's a really easy movement that, as a coach, I can really regress and progress somebody really nicely over time without risking a lot of injury, which is always a great go-to move when you're a coach.

17:09Adam Schafer:And again, it's great for the lats. You want to get that nice V taper in your lats. You want to stretch the lats, load them in a stretch position. it's one of those exercise that does it it's also good for rib cage expansion now i'm going to be clear here it's not going to give you a bigger rib cage the reason why i'm saying that is in the 60s and 70s bodybuilders used the dumbbell crossbench pullover as a way to give them a bigger rib cage you might be thinking like why would they even want that well back in those days bodybuilders they used to like to show off their kind of side chest pose and bodybuilders still do this today that a side chest shot is a one of the kind of staple poses that you do as a bodybuilder and when you do it you want to stick your chest out you're on the side you're kind of flexing your bicep but back in the 60s and 70s they really would stick their chest out and they used to all brag about who could put a glass of water on top of their upper chest but you needed a big rib cage to do it and it gave them that thickness from the side right so that you didn't have this flat rib cage and they thought that the pullover made the rib cage bigger now this is not what's happening It's not giving you a bigger rib cage.

18:11Adam Schafer:You're not going to change necessarily how your rib cage looks. But what you are doing is stretching and strengthening all the muscles that connect the ribs to each other. And this is important, everybody. If you've ever pulled out a rib, if you've ever done an exercise and you're like, oh, it feels like a rib is out or something happened there. What happened is you've pulled or tightened one of those intercostals or one of those muscles that connect the ribs together. Why is that important? Why would I want strong muscles or strong connections between? Well, first of all, they float. So they attach to the spine.

18:43Adam Schafer:Then they come around and nothing connects them together except for the muscles and connective tissue in between. And when that's strong and stable, it gives you better ability to rotate. It gives you better power. It makes you more stable. It gives you more torque. It gives you more stable when you press overhead, when you press in front. Protect against impact. It protects you against impact. It's very important. And when those muscles are rigid and tight and not strong, your ability to do a lot of exercises goes down. And this is one of the only exercises that, through the movement, you're expanding the ribcage and bringing it together, thus strengthening some of those muscles.

19:22Sal Di Stefano:I saw you did that, and you had the story today, and I saw you did your spirit. Oh, my favorite old-school exercise. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Were you reading something, or was that just on your mind?

19:29Adam Schafer:No, it was just on my mind. Today's my day-in-the-life thing or whatever. And I was like, you know, what are the lifts that you never see? people do in the gym that are just so awesome um and that was the first one that came to mind because some exercises i know why we don't see them it's because they're really hard like a front squat like why doesn't anybody front squat they suck yeah they're really hard

19:48Justin Andrews:but i pull over it's like you guys you got to do this i just saw it was a trailer i think it's barbell films but uh they're they're gonna like it's like a short documentary that they're making of like 1920s lifters no way yeah really which i thought would be rad so hopefully they come out with that soon but yeah i i saw this trailer it was cool they had all those uh you know old time lifters and that you know bodybuilders to to uh you know the performers we should research who's

20:15Sal Di Stefano:behind it as far as like the director who thought to put together probably make for a good interview just to talk obviously if somebody put that together there's a reason why they put that

20:22Adam Schafer:together and a lot of people don't know much about that era yeah that would be an interesting conversation it was a cool era what's interesting to me is that all those they all had like regular jobs like they all had hard jobs they weren't like farmers yeah you weren't making a ton of money yeah and yet they had the time to go lift weights and and do that and look amazing and be real

20:40Sal Di Stefano:strong did they want did they also care about care about what they thought was building their ribcage to to exaggerate the vacuum pose too was that also the vacuum pose came because of the

20:49Adam Schafer:then it became about like how you looked so it was small waist yeah like that's what i mean like

20:53Sal Di Stefano:how dramatic of like a big rib cage small tiny waist like yeah yeah that's when they started

20:58Adam Schafer:doing that stuff i got to talk about that you brought me you brought up the the day in the life and in there i did you know like a little segment where i talked about what i liked and didn't like about you guys it's kind of funny but i got to talk about being in the room with you when you negotiate adam so yesterday i just got to tell the audience this dude it is so puckers up so so do you everybody does of course it's the most he's like don't don't put it on me dog everybody gets uncomfortable listen you brought it up listen like negotiations with adam like if you either have to leave the room or you have to really focus on trying not to talk or it's so uncomfortable.

21:31Adam Schafer:It's true. Cause you, you feel like he's like going too hard. I'm going to see how this lands. Where's he going with that? That's so hard, dude. It's so difficult to be in. I like it. But he pulls it out every time. Afterwards. I like it. Oh, that went well. Yeah. In the process. I thought you were going to lose that dude. Where'd you get that from? You know, I think. Cause it's definitely a skill, but it's also a talent for sure.

21:54Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. I've done it a lot right at this point, right? I mean, I'm almost 45 years old and I've had a lot of conversations like that. What I'd say it really stems from is, and I wish I remember like the moment that this unlocked for me, but, and I want to attribute it to a Jack Welch book called Winning. And if I, if I, if I hope I'm referencing the right book that I got it from of just radical candor and how important that is in business negotiating. And just being so honest. And when you really think about it, it's really difficult to do that. There's a part of our human nature that wants to hold back or appease the other person.

22:38Sal Di Stefano:And a lot of people, like a lot of salespeople are manipulating this and that. and the more I've learned to lean into just saying what's on my mind and what I believe to be true uh it comes off sometimes a little uh rough or brass but what I what I have found in that process is at the end of the day uh even if people go back and forth and can be combative with me they tend to respect the conversation the the honesty and and sometimes I know I could like uh probably pushed too far. And I, and, and I'll say that I'll just be like, listen, I just, I'm being just direct with you. And so, or I'm just being straight with you.

23:20Sal Di Stefano:Like I could BS you. And so there's, I've learned to even be like, if someone gets really. Yeah.

23:24Adam Schafer:Cause you have to be both. Cause I was thinking about this yesterday. Cause again, yesterday we're in the room and you're negotiating and it just sits every time I'm in the room, I'm always like, my God. But I think you, you have to, you have to be both the best and worst person to negotiate against i would say best because uh you're gonna get you're gonna get it straight out and you're not it's not like you're trying to rip anybody off i've never heard you in fact i've heard you negotiate with partners and not push too hard because you're like we can't deliver like we i'm only gonna do what we can deliver i've heard you say that many times so it's like a lot so that makes you the best you're also the worst because somebody trying to get a little bit of what ain't gonna happen it's not gonna happen with that dude it's just not gonna

24:07Sal Di Stefano:get a leg up and i think what you're what you're saying is i think it's just the it's the um it's just being really or and i have a lot of conviction when i am honest about something and i've also too

24:17Adam Schafer:i've done my homework and my research i was just gonna say because you know what you what you're worth it's not like you're just going in to get the best yeah like that's why you're so confident

24:26Sal Di Stefano:so yeah a lot of like so katrina and i because katrina manages a lot of obviously our partners now. And so I'm not in the thick of it as much as I used to be when we, when we first started. And so when she wants to bring me into a conversation and she'll be like, Hey, I got a call set up for you. I want you to talk to so-and-so from this, this company we work with at this time. And like, I won't just go into that conversation. And then, then something like you saw yesterday play out. I'm like, Oh, I need to know this. I want this. I want this. And then I'll, I'll study all the stuff. And then I'll be like, okay, I feel, I feel very confident about this.

24:56Sal Di Stefano:I think this is fair. This is what I want. And then that's exactly what you're going to get from me is I'm just going to go straight for that. And I'm not going to, I'm not going to waver. And I have, I have conviction that I believe it to be true. And I just will, we'll shoot it that way. And it, and it's not, I don't think it was natural. I think I've, I've practiced that so much. I've practiced because it's not easy. There is a part of me. um we talk about this with uh our journey of interviewing people it's in my it's in my nature to want to be liked by people and friends like you know like i i think we all have that and so you know there's you there's a part of that you're you're wanting to do is like you like you don't want to feel rude or mean or you don't want to come off aggressive and so you internally you're wrestling with that but you know you need to be honest and truthful and so it's like they all have a conversation sometimes i'm like you know what that wasn't fully honest like i i didn't say what i was i felt i was trying i was trying to appease that person or i was trying to be too friendly and it's just like gosh dang it and it's and those are the ones that never go well if it doesn't go well and so i would always evaluate afterwards and it's just like that's my fault it's my fault because i wasn't truthful i wasn't honest i wasn't direct and yeah and like i said i've had a lot of people uh afterwards will will say things like hey i want i thank thank you for

26:11Adam Schafer:being honest yeah i think that the big part of it because on its face i think someone would think that a good negotiator is just somebody that gets the best deal and i don't think that's necessarily it that's part of it but i think the other part of it is uh that you can't get the best deal unless you lack integrity but if you have integrity which i think you need to be good in business for a long period of time right lack of integrity might get you only so far but then it's not gonna get you so super far but i think it's because you know what we're worth but you're also know what's gonna they're gonna get and what's gonna value them and so you're not gonna go like again i've heard you say to to i've heard you talk with us and say i'm actually not going to charge that much because we can't deliver yeah so it's not like you're just trying to get the best deal yeah but that's what makes you confident that makes you go and yeah and i think and i think

26:59Sal Di Stefano:in in making a deal uh it's so uncomfortable though it is uh i mean it can be uncomfortable even for me too because there's like i don't yeah i don't want to you get excited there's a there's an adrenaline to it for sure um but a really good negotiated deal uh both parties walk away and uh and and like maybe in the moment they don't feel happy because maybe the opposing person who's on the other side of it from with me is trying to yeah you know weasel or get a deal but if if i did my job really well, then they should be happy. Like they, like they'll get what they deserve and we'll get what we deserve and it's fair.

27:38Sal Di Stefano:And that's a good, that's a really good deal. And, and I, and I pride ourselves or myself on going into a situation like that and keeping a, I want, I want a lifelong partner that we make it, which is why if you've been listening to the show for a very long time, most of our partners have been with us for a very long time because I try and find what i think is very very fair but you know i think what you guys get to see and where it can be uncomfortable is when you know the other side is trying to weasel or do that you're just like yeah this is not going to go well for that person because you're not going to that's most of it yeah

28:12Adam Schafer:yeah yeah waiting and listening to their reaction well there's a lot of bluffing that happens that's what's uncomfortable as you hear the bluffing from the other side but you're not sure yeah and so you're like oh god are we gonna like what's gonna happen we lose this or whatever and adam don't get he's like he's going and so i'm over here like sitting that uncomfortable silence so i'm over here distracting i'm going on instagram

28:36Sal Di Stefano:that's probably the part that's fun is what you're calling a bluff is is fun there's there's something about when you feel confident you know you've done enough research and and you got enough

28:47Adam Schafer:one thing that i learned is when i'm in the room with someone who is who knows what they're doing I will never even if I disagree I will never jump in or speak out there's a scene in the godfather oh yeah there's a scene in the godfather that illustrates it well when uh I think it's in the first godfather where uh Marlon Brando's character he's negotiating or talking to these to these other guys and they want to start selling drugs and they want uh the Corley-Only family to jump in and they're offering all this money and uh you know the the lead guy uh Marlon Brando's character is like he's saying no and his oldest son pipes up a little bit hey dad but what about and he looks at his son gives him a look and so his son quiets down after that he looks at his son he goes never uh speak out against the family in front of other people that's what ends up getting marlon brando's character shot is because the other people saw oh if we kill him then the oldest son that's right that's right so it just illustrates that you did you put you was it the right book doug yeah you're right okay yeah it's a long time ago what was the quote don't ever take sides with anyone what was that oh yeah don't ever take sides with anyone against the family this is michael

29:51Sal Di Stefano:corleone yeah i totally now you say that i'm like oh i remember that scene that's such a great that's such a great scene and that was it was right book yeah doug yeah correct book yeah yeah yeah jack welch jack welch jack welch winning right the arguing the lack of the honest communication and the biggest dirty little secret business yeah all right i got some uh some cool studies

30:10Adam Schafer:on shilajit we haven't talked about them in a while or about uh the supplement shilajit or the gummies that Organifi has, which, by the way, Shilajit's getting popular now, although it's been used for a long time. It's everywhere. It's everywhere, but some of Shilajit is not the real stuff that comes from - Or not palatable at all. Yes. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. That's another one. But it's not the real stuff. They'll make it in a lab. It's not the real stuff. Real Shilajit. Prima V is one of the best sources of real Shilajit, and that's the one that Organifi uses, so they sourced it really well. But anyway, I looked up the studies on it, and it's pretty remarkable on how well it works for certain things.

30:54Adam Schafer:So it does raise testosterone pretty reliably in healthy middle-aged men. So we talked about that. Bone mineral density in postmenopausal women with osteopenia. So they actually gave it to women with osteopenia. This is before osteoporosis, postmenopausal. No changes in their lifestyle. out so they weren't having them lift weights or anything and they saw a a improvement in their osteopenia then it's good for fatigue related strength and collagen breakdown and then here's what i like skeletal muscle gene expression so check this out they gave obese adults uh 250 milligrams twice a day for eight weeks and what they show was an upregulation of of a cluster of extracellular matrix genes that support collagen connective tissue at the gene level uh and it's like this this interesting strange compound that oozes uh out of the mountains yeah it's like tar

31:49Sal Di Stefano:right it's like tar out of a tree or something no it's not a tree it's not a tree old organic

31:54Adam Schafer:material that's been pressurized and break and broken down over thousands of years it's so wild

32:00Sal Di Stefano:yeah i think i asked you this before and i was wrong because it's not it's not an adaptogen but

32:04Adam Schafer:it kind of acts like one it does and it's used in ayurvedic medicine so ayurvedic medicine use has used shilajit for a long time. So it's one of those interesting -

32:13Sal Di Stefano:I know. What would you, what category of, would it fall if it's not an adaptogen, but it has adaptogen-like properties? It's not a mushroom and it doesn't have, so what -

32:21Adam Schafer:You know, you probably could label it as an adaptogen. You know, maybe Doug, look up on that. Because it helps with stress, right? Yeah, see if it, in Ayurvedic medicine, if they label it as an adaptogen. I'm not sure if it's a classic adapt - It is. It is. Oh. Yeah. No. And it does act that way.

32:41Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, very good. Well, I mean, I listened to when you describe it, and I'm like, that sounds very - Sounds like it. Yeah, it sounds very much so like a traditional adaptogen. So it is then. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

32:50Adam Schafer:I just saw a Venn diagram that went viral on X, and they labeled it the addiction economy. You guys, this is really bad. It is not good. I'll pull it up right now. So when it comes to addiction, typically men have more addiction issues than women. So I don't know if you guys knew that or not. That's like a statistic. Okay. So this is what -

33:17Sal Di Stefano:Women have it more than men? No, men.

33:19Adam Schafer:Men tend to have addiction issues. Oh, of course. More than, okay. So -

33:22Sal Di Stefano:I have theories on that. You have guessed why you would think that would be?

33:25Adam Schafer:We might be more dopamine driven.

33:27Sal Di Stefano:I'm not sure. I mean, I would think it's because we hold more shit in. That may be it. That might be it. but wouldn't you you know and so you you one of the things that women are better at than for sure than us is like sharing and communicating with others which maybe think more coping yeah and so it's a coping method you would think for us is that we're holding it all in and so medicate with drugs alcohol things like that are theory yeah i mean that would be my guess i think i think yeah

33:53Adam Schafer:it says uh biological differences social pressure and behavioral tendencies yeah you go i mean that would fall under social uh pressures and behavioral tendencies so check this out okay so these are what would be classified as addictive uh behaviors or qualities for certain things so check this out this is of this is young men so this is uh how old are these men aged uh 18 to 29 so uh men 18 to 29 one out of every four men watch pornography daily so they consider that addictive okay almost one in four so almost one in four gamble daily i didn't know that i did not know gambling was that big of a deal for young men.

34:33Adam Schafer:I'm sure that went up too.

34:34Sal Di Stefano:Oh, in young men, it's crazy. It's like a high school problem. This is like a problem that my buddy who was a principal, they have problems with all the kids that are doing it now. You're supposed to be 18 and older to be able to do it, but obviously there's new goals. How they're regulating it.

34:49Adam Schafer:Yeah, so the majority of young men play video games daily. They consider that addictive kind of. So trip off this. This is where it gets crazy. So the Venn diagram shows what percentage of men do all three daily one in eight one out of eight men between 15 to 29 watch porn gamble and game every day so all of them all of them oh wow on a daily basis

35:16Sal Di Stefano:bro that's more than 10 percent wow that's crazy well what's crazy is all of it yes like just one

35:23Adam Schafer:of it is already one of them's destructive right you're doing all three of them that's very and i bet you if you looked at those young men because if you're doing all three of those daily you're probably not socializing at all you're super isolated you're probably have no sense of purpose because like how much time do you have to have a sense of purpose when you're playing video games gambling or don't talk to girls obviously that's what i'm saying yeah so and with that is probably a high rate i would guess of depression yeah and anxiety what do you think justin do you think it's

35:49Sal Di Stefano:part of uh the conspiracy theory that i sent over to you in the the social media one i mean what's

35:55Justin Andrews:sure is there a new one well well it's not we brought this up i think a long time ago that darpa like they've so was it lifelog is what it used to be called they had a program for collecting data from individuals the cia and so then it weird and they fact checked it on there

36:14Sal Di Stefano:we could fact check it as well i mean doug should look it up life life log cia program uh how long

36:20Justin Andrews:did it run and when did it shut down yeah because it was literally the day after they shut it down

36:26Adam Schafer:facebook started become oh let me guess because we're already we're giving them our information

36:31Justin Andrews:for free so we need a corporate uh so so it can't be uh attached to the government now oh so now we have to live in the private sector and they also were alluding to the fact that maybe even amazon

36:43Adam Schafer:uh was another one oh so i don't know so yeah so the theory this way they collect all the

36:47Sal Di Stefano:information yeah so the idea was get it get get document or basically get people to share all of their personal for free for free without without it without it you know and that way it's not good look at february 4th 2004 is when facebook launched when did the when did life log february 4 2004

37:07Sal Di Stefano:what they're not even hiding i mean what i mean that's way i mean the fact that they didn't even wait 24 hours so i mean that's like literally somebody it was like a click of a button on the computer dog it was like let's in this one we're opening this one wait so look up life just life

37:21Adam Schafer:what is lifelong so was it them collecting information uh-huh and what are they what were they collecting all the data that we would give on yeah yeah just probably scan the internet

37:30Justin Andrews:oh and looking for yeah problematic people it was a 2003 research project by the u.s military

37:37Adam Schafer:designed to track and archive a person's entire daily existence into a massive digital day of Of course, you don't need that anymore because everybody does it themselves. We give it to you. We give it to you.

37:47Sal Di Stefano:Willingly. And Facebook also owns Instagram. So they've got Instagram, Facebook. And WhatsApp. And WhatsApp that we are putting all this. Wow. Geez.

37:58Adam Schafer:So there we go.

37:58Sal Di Stefano:And then if Google, because the part of the theory was Google and Amazon were also attached to all this too. And it's like if you've got all of our search history, you've got all of our documents, pictures. Tracking where we go every single day.

38:10Justin Andrews:the store like we're all feeding into this like super computer every day yeah yeah do you guys

38:17Adam Schafer:remember the movie uh ex machina yeah and remember that robot and how it's like she studied she basically she gave it she basically told him she studied all of his searches all the things so she could turn into like the perfect yeah yeah person to manipulate him right exactly so fit all his

38:32Justin Andrews:categories of his interests and yeah he'd fall in love with her oh god that's crazy isn't that wild

38:38Sal Di Stefano:that's crazy that can't be that's it's got to be a crazy coincidence i mean i what's so crazy about that i mean i feel like it would be so brilliant of them to just wait 15 days to throw

38:50Adam Schafer:people up but it's like they'll lose that data bro you gotta get all that data no but i mean like

38:55Sal Di Stefano:to like at least show that it was i mean that's like just purely like we don't give an f we're gonna we're gonna do we're turning this one off we're turning this one right on you know

39:06Adam Schafer:I mean, it's all kind of scary. Like when you look at like how, because when you're addicted to drugs and alcohol, it's pretty obvious and everybody knows it's bad. I don't think there's anybody, I don't think anybody would be like, oh, that's, you know, that's okay. But like porn, gambling, video games every single day, that's destructive. It is. It's destructive on you. And there's young men right now, more than 10 % of men in that age group are doing all three of them every single day so they're stuck in their room do you think i mean

39:38Justin Andrews:i like this idea of of myspace like coming back and not having algorithms to like dictate what you look at and scroll through and all that i'm not sure if people are going to buy into that but like you know some kind of a social network that doesn't add in all this like i'm bits of i'm

39:56Sal Di Stefano:super curious on how it's going to pan out i'm following it too i'm so people might not like it

40:00Adam Schafer:they might not like it because it's not that's exactly what my theory is i don't think i don't think i mean they say they want it but then they get it and they're like this sucks yeah it's like

40:08Sal Di Stefano:a brick phone you know i mean there's a part right uh that i think you even have we all have to admit that you know you're you're getting fed stuff that you're interested in yeah you know so i mean i i have now purchased a lot of things they've gotten way better yeah that have been popped in my feed because it's something that I would like or want. And it's because they've figured out, you know, I buy all the things I've liked and tracked and been to. And so sure, there's a part of me that goes like, oh, I'm totally being manipulated. But there's the other part of me that's like, oh, I'm glad I found that thing.

40:40Sal Di Stefano:You know what I'm saying? And it could be innocent too, right? Like it's not just like, I bought a lot of stuff for my wife that is just like, oh, wow, that's a cool outfit. I would have never found that or saw that or I'd never heard of that brand or like, you know? And so because it's getting, so it's like, you know, if that if you shut the algorithm down and it's just purely like you know og facebook or og my space where i'm connecting to my family friends it's like you probably it's interesting like i

41:05Justin Andrews:you know i used to be really hard to find new music as well because like there's no real like one i heard somebody talking about this the other day i think it was um what's his name one of the beatles the main main singer paul paul not paul john lennon john lennon yeah his son was talking about this i know i can't believe i forgot his name but uh yeah he was talking about like when mtv he used to hate it because it was like you know all this like pre-prescribed like pop you know music and um but he's like there's no if you if you could pinpoint one like specific place where it's like well there's like a culture here you know there's like something that you follow it because then you you see like you get introduced to a lot of things and people and you see you know reflect at school at work and you know and he's like there's just like a multitude of cultures now yeah it's like it's so to be able to just stumble across something is pretty rare that you're gonna like and but now when i've seen bands like it's it's um actually interesting because you'll you'll see some bands that they'll just put out like one track and they try to like you know emphasize the fact that they're introducing you to this sound like i just came up with this riff and then they're playing this riff and you find out this band's been around for like 20 years yeah you know but it's like they're they're trying to like throw chum out there uh so people will just like it'll come up on their facebook algorithm like oh that's interesting i i i've been introduced to about 10 or 12 new bands that way oh cool yeah yeah it's

42:36Sal Di Stefano:so hard to unify us and i'm sure that there's lots of cases you can argue why that it's so beneficial that we have all this diversity and different things and you but you know i saw i was watching something that was highlighting like just like uh oh it was a book that it's a book that i mean right now the bob eiger uh book uh disney well disney guy and talking about how you know um there was a time just what 30 30 40 years ago where you know we we were all watching the same yeah channel at the same time yeah like a show came on at 7 p.m everyone was like the most popular show in country everybody was watching we're all talking about the same yeah yeah exactly so then the next day at school or work we were all talking about that because the only way you saw it was you had to catch it which caused all of us to you know like at the same time and so man so much uh easier to keep kind of everybody on the same page now everything's so well think about how like how

43:32Adam Schafer:fragment how different my wife is actually a pretty good stickler about this usually but my kids will want to watch something and they'll disagree because you know kids are kids i want to watch this i want to watch that so the temptation is to be like okay we're gonna give you 20 minutes of tv you get to watch the tv and then you watch an ipad and she goes no you're gonna pick something have to watch it together it's very different experience yeah to sit in the same room and watch together versus all of us doing our own thing it's a very different oh i saw so much less

44:00Sal Di Stefano:social oh it was such an unlock for me to uh for when we because it's now been where are we at I mean you could probably go back on the podcast when I first announced that we completely removed the iPad from Max. We're coming up on a couple years now. And yeah, but he gets to watch TV. We totally let – but we watch as a family.

44:20Adam Schafer:That's right.

44:20Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, it's on and it is so different. In fact, being a seven-year-old, he rarely sits through anything all the way through. He normally is watching and then he's playing with his Legos or he's wrestling with me on the couch. It's just like it is way different. It is nothing like when we allowed an iPad and he could watch a cartoon on there because he was locked. I mean, it was all-consuming. And that was the big switch for me when I realized that, when he could be on the couch next to me and I was allowing him to watch a cartoon. And then I would try and engage him. And he almost couldn't hear me until I put my face in front of him and was like, hey.

44:58Sal Di Stefano:And you could tell it was innocent. It wasn't like he was being rude. He was just locked in. And I'm like, wow, that's like, this is, we got this got to go. Now, you can put, but putting it up there, huge difference.

45:08Adam Schafer:Huge difference. You know, as we were talking earlier about this addiction economy with young men, which was really alarming, like I said, that Venn diagram went viral. I'm like, what would be the solution? Like, just clear cut solution. Because you could say, turn those things off, don't do it, whatever. But people don't operate that way. Usually it's like, do this rather than just don't do that. Right. And young men in general, you know, therapy can be valuable, but therapy works better with women typically than men. And it's just we're wired.

45:38Sal Di Stefano:Not only that, I don't think that's to solve.

45:41Adam Schafer:No, but my point with that is just therapizing or talking about things doesn't work. Not that it's bad or that it doesn't work, but men, the data shows us, they tend to be better with like a goal. Like do this instead of like, let's talk about this. and talk about our feelings. Application, here's how you're going to fix it. And I'm thinking about, what could young men do? And I'll tell you, I'll give you the prescription. If you're listening, you're a young guy and you feel lonely and you're stuck in this pattern, try this, lift weights, go to church and volunteer. If you do those three things right there and you do them consistently, even if you don't believe in them, even if you think it's crazy, if you just did those three, lifting weights, going to church and volunteering a little bit, that would change so much for you.

46:21Adam Schafer:So much for you.

46:22Sal Di Stefano:I'll tell you something else that I, so I shared this on my story actually, just last night or the night before. So one of the things I've been trying to practice with, so I've been doing the sauna every single night. And many times I'm by myself. Sometimes Katrina's in there with me, but most times I'm by myself. And since I'm in a sauna, no tech, I'm in there for 20 plus minutes anyways, I'm like, you know what? I want to try and be consistent with gratitude practices. And the reason why that was sparked was I found myself shopping, looking for things that I don't need and desiring more stuff.

46:56Adam Schafer:That's good self-awareness. So you're like, I need to be more grateful. Yes, exactly.

46:59Sal Di Stefano:And so I'm like, what am I doing? You know what I'm saying? When I really do an evaluation of my life, I have a better life than I dreamt of as a kid. What do I need more? So anyway, so I practice. And then what I wanted to do while I was doing this, and I shared this in my story, the notes of like, i didn't want to be so generic of i'm i'm grateful for my wife i'm grateful for like like what i wanted to look into was things either people or things that i would have say when i was 16 years old been like man be so amazing so i'll give you so funny right uh you've noticed have you noticed me using the sim like crazy yeah this came from that oh because you're like man if i if i had that when i was 16 i lost my mind well if you if if 16 year old me said i had the baddest simulator race car simulator at his work and you like he would and i oh he would just be so disappointed in me right so i'm sitting in there and i and so what i try and do is re and so what i shared is like what it what it ends up sparking is like this thing that i that's sitting on a shelf somewhere collecting dust or maybe a thing that i haven't taken care of and appreciated because I've got two or three of it now.

48:16Sal Di Stefano:And so I think what's happened in bringing this full circle to what you're talking about is that a lot of men, we're such a consumer. We have so much access. We have so much stuff that we've lost appreciation for a lot of great things in our life. And we've defaulted to these addictive, mind-numbing things when you may not even have to go out and go that active. It's like maybe just revisit some of the things that you thought of years ago you really wanted to do or have and you already have it yeah and maybe go show some appreciation towards it and so i that this is just me sharing personally what i that's great noticed like yeah and another thing to share like you know i was car shopping right as if i need that and and actually what it sparked up is like you know I love them being I actually enjoy the process of cleaning them and detailing it's like man I had two or three of them that weren't even detailed and clean and it's like you know what like I'm going to spend the day doing that and just so yeah there's like it's unlocked some things for me that and of course while I'm doing all those things I'm not I had such a great moment

49:29Adam Schafer:with Jessica recently because there's definitely times when she's so like a kid so grateful and joyful over things that i'm like like we were we went car shopping uh for her and there were two options of suvs and one was the nicer more expensive one okay and it was the one i thought for sure she would want so i was kind of pushing her in that direction and we were talking and she goes no actually i want this other one i'm like i thought she wanted it because it was the cheaper one she's like no that's the one i like so i'm like oh okay so i get it and you should see her with this car it's not like it's the most extravagant whatever car but she's like i want to do a photo shoot with it i want to come park it somewhere and take photos of it she's so like grateful and just which is like that i tell you what as a husband you know if you provide for your wife and then you do something and then you see that that it just makes me want to go you know Work twice as hard.

50:26Sal Di Stefano:So obviously, you know, we talk about my stuff. So for a lot of my early years, I attracted a lot of other girls that liked a lot of the material stuff that I did. Just to echo what you're saying, I love that trait about Katrina. It's such a great thing to have. And if you would have asked me when I was younger, I would have thought that I would have married or been with someone that was more like me. What I have found through dating and everything and where I'm at now in my life is like it actually makes the the buying things for her and doing stuff way more enjoyable for me because she appreciates such little things she doesn't need the most expensive thing or she doesn't care about name brand it's like she likes what she likes and she's so appreciative of it so it also is way more fulfilling and i get way more joy totally for for doing it so i could totally relate to like how awesome that is to have a partner yeah she's

51:17Justin Andrews:like a little kid it's so funny it's well it's interesting you talk about like kind of getting back to like hands-on and you know like looking at those types of things and what i used to enjoy a lot was like building things with my dad and like even when we first started a podcast i was like at our my first house and we were like building ramps together and the kids were really little like just that entire process was like so fun for me so like it's cool because school kind of like introduces that again and so like everett has this like little project and he's like he always he just comes up with ideas i get really excited about you know it's like i'm like oh man but i'm like i don't want to like step in and like do the whole thing for him you know because i'm just like oh it's so cool it's fun uh so him and his buddies like came up with this idea like they have um he has a couple classes where they allow these like skateboard little finger skateboards yeah and so like you know back in the day they'd had like the fidget spinners like some some teachers were cool about you having because it's like dude I mean it's so boring you're sitting there so he has a couple of teachers that are cool about that so he thought it's his idea he's supposed to come up with a project to pitch and kind of sell to his classmates it's like you know maybe this is something that they would actually buy and so he's creating like this little skate park you know for the fingerboards and so you know I was kind of with him planning.

52:46Justin Andrews:He did most of the planning. He's done all that stuff. And anyway, we were starting to kind of, you know, put stuff together and like, you know, poor Courtney's like, you know, she's completely the opposite brain of that. It has to be all already completely, uh, you know, there has to be a blueprint for it. There has to be like instructions. Like, you know, like we always say it's kind of funny, but it's like, she's rule follower. I'm not, you know, it's like, we're completely opposite entrepreneur yeah and so yeah and i love projects and so anyway so she she had to take them because i was still coming home from work um to go and went went to this like craft shop you know and i was like i want to take him home depot but you know it's all good uh and came up back with like materials and i'm like this isn't gonna work this is gonna fall apart and like it's not even good so anyway we started kind of going through it and i'm like you know what my dad is like an amazing like wood craftsman like he literally was going to be a woodshop teacher back in the day he makes like cabinetry all this kind of stuff and i'm like i want him to learn like that skill like you know because he's already shown interest in projects so i brought him over there and it was great just i took pictures i'm like watching from afar him teaching him like every little part of the process how to like plan it out how to measure properly how to like use the table saw how to do this that we walk out of there and he's got this like little ramp he made and it's so sick dude and so anyway like i go online i'm like geeking out on this and they have like little uh railings like our coach edsy that like you know so i'm like gonna go back and like little tiny like bolts and drills i'm gonna be doing all that for him but

54:25Adam Schafer:uh yeah it's just it looks cool is it a project that you your dad and your son me my dad and my son wow that's so great it's a cool like three generations yeah did you guys see that did you

54:36Sal Di Stefano:see the clip uh speaking of like woodworking and like that type of job did you see the clip i sent you guys about electricians no oh did you get to pull it up it's uh i sent it to the uh mind pump the the three of the four of us that uh yeah i know we know text thank you um it's uh it was an interview sean ryan did with i don't know who it was i thought it was a guy from dirty jobs at first but i think it's somebody else oh mike roe i thought it was him but i think it's somebody else um he was breaking down like how behind we are on electricians oh he was giving examples of like a couple electricians that he was just with like that prior week that are all like young like early 20s making like 250 a year and they had they had been poached three times in

55:20Adam Schafer:the last year from other to just what a great career to get into right now oh my god yeah

55:26Sal Di Stefano:supposedly were like 100 ,000 something. Doug could pull it up, the post. Oh, yeah, there it is right there. Yeah, the trades are in such high demand right now. That's not Mike Rowe, right? It looked like it was Mike Rowe. Oh, it is him. Okay, yeah, okay.

55:41Justin Andrews:And he's a big advocate for the trades and how school just like, it's so weird that we were so pushed into these institutions. And they were wrong. And now, yeah, completely tried up on jobs. I have friends that work in the space. So there's two replacements for every five retirements.

55:59Sal Di Stefano:And so we need 400 ,000 more electricians. And it's growing by the minute because for every five that retire -

56:07Adam Schafer:Because of the data centers and stuff. That's what he's talking about. Yeah, it's huge.

56:10Sal Di Stefano:He's like, the data centers, the demand for it is so high that we were under by 400 ,000. And for every five retired electricians, we have two replacing it.

56:21Adam Schafer:With the AI explosion, this is going to be a very high-paying job. With low supply, high demand.

56:29Sal Di Stefano:That's the point he's making. You've got young, early electricians in their 20s making$250 a year, getting poached three times in a year.

56:37Adam Schafer:What is the kind of education it requires to become an electrician? So you're out of high school. You want to be an electrician. Do you just go?

56:44Sal Di Stefano:Oh, you have to go through a course. I think it's at least 18 months or longer. That's what I'm wondering.

56:50Adam Schafer:What does that look like to be an electrician? So you want to start working as one. I'm out of pocket. I'm assuming there's an apprenticeship or something. Yeah.

56:58Justin Andrews:Apprenticeship, and then you work your way up to tradesmen. Yeah. Journeymen. Journeymen.

57:02Adam Schafer:So it's like you're probably, let's see. Oh, what does that say there, Doug? High school diploma, cool. So four to five year paid apprenticeship.

57:10Sal Di Stefano:Paid. Yeah.

57:11Adam Schafer:Versus going to college and paying for college. Yeah, exactly. Wow. So you get paid the whole time, and then you come out, and you make a crap ton of money.

57:18Sal Di Stefano:I also thought there was like a trade school. Is there a trade? Is there like a two-year?

57:24Adam Schafer:Six months to two years. Okay, yeah. I was kind of close. Would you need that or would the apprenticeship cover it? Apprenticeship usually.

57:31Sal Di Stefano:I think you get there faster, I think. Again, speaking out of turn here. I think that if you go through the trade school, you get through that journeyman process faster, I think.

57:43Justin Andrews:But they say a non-union contractor apprenticeship is the standard most valued route. most value yeah so it's uh roughly 2 000 hours of paid on the job training yeah what is that

57:54Sal Di Stefano:how many how many 2 000 hours would be that's per year yeah uh i mean that's probably 40 hours

57:59Justin Andrews:weeks for a year yeah okay 52 weeks 40 hours that's around as far as blue collar is concerned

58:05Adam Schafer:uh because that's considered blue collar is it like a really hard rough job or is it is it it's physically demanding for sure it's very physically i've never worked with electricians My dad did everything but that. Oh, yeah.

58:17Justin Andrews:I would say plumbing's probably, yeah, more difficult. Getting dirty. Yeah. Yeah. Just because, yeah, the kind of tight places and underneath the house. Yeah.

58:27Adam Schafer:But, yeah, I mean, I don't – it's definitely physically demanding for sure. Oh, okay. You know, hey, here's the deal. Like, fellas, I know – because back in the – you know what they used to do? They used to tell guys – this was our generation. You don't want to go work that kind of hard work. You want to sit at a desk. Actually, you don't. yeah that sucks i think you're better off moving like go out and move dude you're active all day

58:51Sal Di Stefano:long instead of like well and i mean part of that was also because as a engineer you can make a lot more money as a computer engineer you can make a ton more money but where we're heading is electricians are going to be up there in pay especially when you compare to computer engineers because ai is going to go take their jobs writing code so how true okay and this is conspiracy so

59:11Justin Andrews:just brace yourself okay um yeah so no i i ai the data centers like so how how true is it how much water they actually need because i've heard there's like to cool them there's i heard there's a bit of a conspiracy with that like they don't need that much water really yeah i don't know i

59:28Sal Di Stefano:just i just i thought that was the reason why elon's trying to put them in space well putting

59:32Adam Schafer:them in space uh covers uh two things power because they direct solar 24 7 and then second is cooling because it doesn't need to take away powerful cooling. He was talking about, he was just on an interview and he said, we are running headfirst into a power problem.

59:48Sal Di Stefano:Justin, it says, based on what Doug just read, 300 ,000 to 5 million gallons of water per day.

59:53Adam Schafer:That's what it needs.

59:54Sal Di Stefano:For a large data center. For sure. That's insane. Yeah.

59:57Justin Andrews:So MidSide uses about as much as a thousand households. Oh, wow. Yeah.

1:00:02Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. He was cool if we could use that because once you use the water to cool that, I'm assuming the water becomes warm from that. It gets you transferred to warm all the pools in the United States. That's a brilliant idea.

1:00:15Adam Schafer:He was talking about how the problem we're going to run into is power. It's not processing. It's power. We're going to run into a power problem. We're not going to have enough power, which is why SpaceX probably is going to do so well. So hopefully my shares... Right now they're up and down. But I'm betting on that.

1:00:34Sal Di Stefano:I'm not betting against you. I'm going to join you, but I'm just joining you in December. That's my decision. Yeah, I mean, based off of what I saw, listen, the behaviors around people, I think, sometimes are almost more important than picking the stock, right? Sure. Pick the leader. Yeah, exactly, right? And so I think that December is when the largest percentage of people who have shares in SpaceX will have the ability to cash out. and because they're going to make so much money.

1:01:06Adam Schafer:But most of the shares are owned by him. They are. And he ain't selling out.

1:01:09Sal Di Stefano:No, no, sure, sure. But there's enough that it's going to dip. Yeah, it should. It's going to dip. And so the question becomes, does it climb enough right between now and December that the dip is still higher than the way it opened? Or I think it's going to bounce up and down all the way until December, then we'll see a little dip, and then we'll see a run. Then you'll jump. Yeah, no, I could be totally wrong. Don't take my stock advice. I've been wrong more often than not. So I'm warning you. Don't take our advice. on anything other than fitness. We're just having fun. Just a couple idiots talking on a podcast.

1:01:38Sal Di Stefano:You know what I'm saying? That's it.

1:01:40Adam Schafer:I got some cool data from Caldera Lab on their eye serum. I know, Doug, you use the eye serum. I do, on a daily basis, yes. On a daily basis. And so this one is good for, okay, so check out what they did. They did a four-week clinical study on the eye serum. 78 % so less visible dark circles. I did not know the eye serum was good for dark circles

1:02:02Sal Di Stefano:Oh, it brings the inflammation down right away.

1:02:05Adam Schafer:75 % less puffiness. 87 % of the under eyes appeared smoother. You don't have to do the Criss Angel eye makeup anymore, dude. Dang, dude. You know, it's got peptides in there, stem cell extracts, and it won Best Eye Serum in the Manual Grooming Awards. You know, I got to use this one more. Yeah, I got to use this one more. I don't use it enough. Do you put on night, Doug, or when you wake up?

1:02:30Justin Andrews:Morning and night, personally. So I have a tendency towards really puffy eyes. And so I'm doing whatever I can to minimize that. That does everything.

1:02:39Adam Schafer:He does all the face stuff. I do it all. When you get older, I think this is when you get older, your eyes get a little puffy.

1:02:44Sal Di Stefano:So I have all their stuff. It's right on my sink. But I talk about the three that I use most consistently. The eye serum is not one I use consistently, but it is one I will use when I have a poor night's sleep and I have that eye puffiness. Because I can see visible difference. like immediately. Oh, cool. So I keep it there and it's just like, if I'm brushing my teeth in the morning, I'm like, oh yeah, I look like shit. Then I'll do it and I notice it.

1:03:10Adam Schafer:You mentioned the eyeliner or whatever. There's one time I did that because I dressed up as a vampire and I did the eyeliner or whatever. I bet Jessica went crazy. And I thought it looked cool. Yes, so you liked it. I look like Adam. Yeah, he's just too bad. Adam looks like an eyeliner. Okay, if anybody, I can't even talk shit

1:03:28Justin Andrews:because like, you know, anybody who's ever even been in a band before he's probably done that.

1:03:33Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, your rock genre, bro, is guilty of that for sure.

1:03:36Adam Schafer:Hold on, did you ever put my leg? I don't remember if I probably did. Oh, he did, dog. He did. But probably. Shut up, dude. He's like, maybe. Hey, you know clearly as a man, if you put mascara on before in your life.

1:03:48Sal Di Stefano:I don't remember doing it, but I sure did. I can't remember putting mascara on.

1:03:51Adam Schafer:Maybe I did, maybe. He's covering the bases. Yeah. Pause. Maybe.

1:03:55Justin Andrews:No, I know for sure, because my cousin used to live with us. She was like four years older than me. She caught me a couple times and put makeup on me, didn't I?

1:04:05Adam Schafer:I was a victim. I saw some old Halloween pictures. I forgot to tell you guys about this. My mom sends it to the group, and it was a picture of me and my siblings for Halloween. So this was probably 1989, probably, maybe 1990. So it's a long time ago, okay? I was dressed as a woman. My sister was dressed as a man. And my brother was dressed as a woman. this was a Halloween costume back then that was a popular thing it was a popular like what are you going to dress up I'm going to be a girl don't do that now

1:04:39Justin Andrews:one of my best friends is a girl she dressed up as like a hobo oh yeah I remember that

1:04:44Sal Di Stefano:that was super common when we were younger what do you guys think a man that was so common that was hella common that was a 90s costume That was a 90s costume all the time. Super calm. Now everybody dresses slutty.

1:05:04Adam Schafer:It's like a huge difference. Wait, hold on. Can you even say hobo? You can't. Hobo's insensitive. You can say it, but I don't know. I've been saying bummer. It's like an old word now. Nobody uses it.

1:05:14Sal Di Stefano:It's messed up. What is it? What's the point? It is not, you can't even say homeless. It's unhoused. Unhoused. Why do we keep changing words? It's so dumb. Hey, what would you guys, since you brought up Halloween costumes, what do you think was your best Halloween costume you ever did?

1:05:31Adam Schafer:Oh, God. Ooh. Oh, God. Oh, you know what? Mine was as an adult. I was 18. I was a personal trainer, so I just became a personal trainer. And me and my buddy dressed up as Hans and Franz. Remember Hans and Franz? Yeah. Oh, that's a good one. Yeah, and everybody loved it. That's why I was one of my best. Sure. And then I had a costume when I was a kid. My mom used to make my costumes when I was little because we didn't have the money to buy them. Same. So back in those days, in the 80s, if you bought a costume it was plastic they didn't have nice now you have nice costumes for kids yeah but when you were a kid you went to the grocery store and it was literally a plastic apron that you would wear and a plastic mask that would just you would sweat with just that rubber band holding a rubber band and so my mom made me a costume she made me a robot and she took boxes and covered them in foil yeah put them on me yeah sick yeah what was yours what was yours yes so before stranger

1:06:23Justin Andrews:your things like you know like i i was a ghostbuster with my friend and same thing my mom made the whole costume so i had like a vacuum hose that went down to like connect to this like huge shoe box with like a flashlight was my like oh that's cool but i mean that wasn't my favorite that was like cool for for that time but like it's funny because my favorite my personal favorite one was you know johnny from uh karate kid but then it but then they got their own series and And everybody's like, oh, yeah.

1:06:51Adam Schafer:But when I first did it, it was like everybody loved Daniel. Daniel. Nobody was Johnny. Nobody was on Team Johnny.

1:06:59Sal Di Stefano:Was my house the first house you wore that to, or did you wear that before? I wore it before. Oh, you wore it before. Yeah, one time before that. Damn, you've recycled that a few times then. I have. Probably about four or five times. I was going to say, I thought my house party was the first time you ever wore it. Yeah, I don't know why. Because I remember keeping it, I was like, oh, that's awesome. That was awesome back then. Because that was a long time ago. That was 20 years ago. I got to say Ultimate Warrior for you, right? You know. I saw that picture. That was a great one. I've had some good ones, bro.

1:07:22Sal Di Stefano:I did Slash. I was pretty good. Oh, yeah. This is an adult. Oh, yeah. I wasn't like my kid. When you were a kid, what were you? Okay. I mean, I can't even remember a lot of my kid in costumes. They weren't very good. Yeah. I got into Halloween later. So my kid costumes, I can't even. The furthest one back, I remember, I was a devil. My mom dressed me up as one time. But yeah, I don't remember.

1:07:41Adam Schafer:Do you remember how dangerous, like, well, considered today, by today's standards, we did risky things as kids. When I was a kid, we would get a pillow sack. That's what we used to put our candy in. And we'd be gone forever. Forever, walking all over the place, all like miles. And we'd come home when we were done with a pillow sack full of candy, and there were no limits. My mom wasn't like, eat five and then save the rest. We'd go in our room and just eat until we got diabetes.

1:08:07Sal Di Stefano:I think Doug's Uncle Billy was one of the best. Baby Billy. Uncle Baby Billy. Baby Billy. Yeah, Baby Billy.

1:08:13Adam Schafer:When you were a kid, what was Halloween like, Doug? Well, yeah.

1:08:18Justin Andrews:So very similar if you've got the plastic costume, if you want to be Batman or whatever. But I mostly made up my own costumes like pirates and other things like that. But one of my favorite ones after that, as I got a little older, was Indiana Jones.

1:08:34Sal Di Stefano:Oh. Yeah.

1:08:35Justin Andrews:I had the whole thing. I had the hat. Better than Baby Billy? I mean, I had everything. I had a bullwhip. I had the whole nine yards.

1:08:42Sal Di Stefano:I thought Baby Billy was...

1:08:43Justin Andrews:But Baby Billy was unique, very unique.

1:08:45Sal Di Stefano:Well, it was unique. and also I think what makes a great costume is like when it, like you look the part. Like you really, like there's no, like one of the best is like when you're like, oh my God, that's a character. And it's a unique character, right? So it's not like a Batman, Superman, that's like kind of generic, but it's like - You're like his stunt double. Exactly. A character you're like, oh my God, that is so -

1:09:04Adam Schafer:Some of the best costumes are when couples dress together and it goes together.

1:09:07Sal Di Stefano:I did peanut butter and jelly with a girlfriend one time. Did you?

1:09:10Adam Schafer:You know what I saw? Which I've seen now since. Was it jelly first? You know what I saw a long time ago, which now I've seen done before, but a long time ago. It was probably, I want to say in the late 90s, a boyfriend and girlfriend dressed up as a plug and an outlet. Yeah.

1:09:26Sal Di Stefano:I've seen that.

1:09:27Adam Schafer:Yeah, and then they plug in and turn on. I've seen that. Which was like brilliant. I've seen dice.

1:09:31Sal Di Stefano:I've seen all kinds of them. Yeah, those are good like that. But yeah, I think Doug's was one of my favorites where you see somebody like, yeah. See, now you see it more common.

1:09:41Adam Schafer:She has two plugs. What's going on? Thanks, Justin. then we'll just stop there. Element is the best electrolyte powder you'll find anywhere. First off, no sugar and no artificial sweeteners. So it's sweetened naturally. And again, no calories. It also has 1 ,000 milligrams of sodium per serving. Why so much sodium? Here's why. If you need electrolytes, if you're somebody that needs electrolytes, let's say you work out a lot or you eat a diet that is whole food-based or especially if you had a low-carb diet or especially if you like to fast, It's the sodium that makes the biggest difference. Potassium and magnesium are also important, but it's the sodium that prevents muscle cramps and headaches.

1:10:22Adam Schafer:It's what helps with sleep. It's what helps with fatigue. It gives you athletic performance. It's also what helps you get that pump when you strength train. That's why it's got that much sodium. Element is the one that has it, and it's the best one. It's the one we work with. So if you're interested, you can go through our link, get a free sample pack of the most popular drink mix flavors with any purchase. go to drinklmnt.com slash mind pump here comes the show our first caller is jason from california

1:10:50Justin Andrews:what's up jason what's up jason what's happening man hey guys uh crazy to be here uh my name is jason as we just said i am uh 37 years old i am a firefighter paramedic here in southern california and the reason for my call is i've had some major life changes recently uh but before that uh i've been a fitness fanatic for a long time. I love strength training. I love weightlifting. My numbers before my accident were like, I was able to squat 385, deadlift 315, bench 285. So they weren't crazy, but they were good. I was proud of it. But since then, about two and a half months ago, I was in a major car accident.

1:11:27Justin Andrews:Totaled my car. I have a broken left clavicle, a right 10th rib, a broken C7, T678, a torn PCL and MCL in my left knee. So with all that, I've obviously been able to not work out as I want to. And I'm looking for advice on what I can do, what I shouldn't do. I am pre-surgery. I am scheduled to have surgery probably in the next month or so. So I'm doing a prehab with PT, but that's focused solely on my leg. So I want to know, should I be doing anything upper body? Can I be doing anything about upper body? And what shouldn't I do?

1:12:09Sal Di Stefano:Were you hit by a semi? Yeah. That's a bad accident.

1:12:13Justin Andrews:I ran through a wall.

1:12:15Adam Schafer:Holy cow. Holy shit. Really? Hey, man. Thank God you're still here, brother. And so, all right. Tell me about, so the surgery's for the knee.

1:12:23Justin Andrews:Yes. PCL reconstruction, I believe we're going to do. I have a follow-up appointment with my surgeon next week. We're going to discuss that, but that's what it should be. And then I'm going to be non-weight-bearing for four to six weeks, and then I won't be able to return to work for nine to 12 months after that. I'm off work now, but I'm going to be off for a very long time.

1:12:40Adam Schafer:Got it. And are you, just this side note, you're working with someone who's going to do more of an athletic procedure because there are ways to repair a knee that is like average person and then like athletes. Have you had that discussion? Is that?

1:12:54Justin Andrews:Yeah, he's the former like orthosurgeon for the Lakers. Oh, you're good. Oh, nice. Good.

1:12:58Adam Schafer:And then with the C7, T6, T7, like anything, did anything have to get done there? Are they healed? What does that look like?

1:13:06Justin Andrews:No, there's going to be no surgery with that. The only surgery that I'm going to have is for the knee. The clavicle is healing itself. The spine is healing itself. They were kind of like micro fractures. but like still when I like lay down and try to do leg lifts I can feel it on my like mid spine basically so it's still healing so I'm trying to be very cautious I don't want to hinder my progress but I want to promote my progress essentially and I love working out I love strength training and it's been like I go through like depression stuff with everything but like particularly being off work and not being able to work out which was a huge mental like relief for me yeah no dude this

1:13:41Adam Schafer:This is a tough one to answer because of all of the injuries and because it's only two months out. Yeah, you're so close to surgery. But you do have a history of strength training. And you kind of know what your body should feel like, what good pain feels like, what bad pain kind of feels like. So without me actually training you, because if we were in person and I trained you, I would watch you move. And then that would help me dictate. Yeah, limitations. That would help me dictate what to do with you each time. um so the best advice i could give you jason is you you've got to go real easy you focus on the basics and you're not going in for a workout you're going in for stability and range of motion stimulus so an example of that would be like um you know i'm doing a row and oh boy like i gotta stop right here because i feel like if i go a little further it feels unstable so now what you're going to do is you're going to play with that range of motion that's the that's the way that you're going to get stronger, not adding weight to the bar or to the cable.

1:14:42Adam Schafer:Can I ask you this since you mentioned Rose?

1:14:44Justin Andrews:Yes. Is the 10th rib attached to the lap?

1:14:48Adam Schafer:Ooh, that's a good question.

1:14:49Justin Andrews:We need to look that up. Because that is still healing. Like when I take a deep breath, I still feel it even two and a half months out.

1:14:55Adam Schafer:Okay, that could be intercostal that you might be feeling, but I'm not sure if it's attached to the lap. We'll look that up and see if that's the case. Okay. I was wondering that. Yeah, nonetheless, what I would do if I were you is I would try an exercise and I'd see how it felt. And like I said, because you have extensive history of strength training, you know what it feels like when there's good pain. You also know when something feels wrong. And so what you're going to do is you're going to play within that. Gradually push that threshold. That's right.

1:15:24Justin Andrews:Honestly, like isometrically holding positions is probably your safest, most effective bet in terms of like preserving muscle. and still being able to get that stimulus.

1:15:36Sal Di Stefano:Let's use that example. The 10th rib does connect there, right? So it is connected.

1:15:39Adam Schafer:It's the 9th through 12th ribs.

1:15:40Sal Di Stefano:So let's say, so obviously that would be high risk to do like some barbell rows. But can you take your arms and create that row, right, with your arms and then create an isometric in that position? This is a great, so my rule of thumb with you if I was training would be always default to isometric and tempo as the way to progress intensity not more weight more reps so it's like hey i can sit i know that that that's a high risk area so i don't want to go barbell row but i can i do this with my arms okay i could do that and intensity squeeze flex and squeeze and make that like yeah that feels okay then you find your limit that way that's right safer and then maybe i grab a really light row and then i row and then again that still feels pretty good i'm going to intensify that squeeze like i'm going to do that instead of just keep adding weight all the time which is what we

1:16:31Justin Andrews:tend to do bands are great too to really like limit a lot of the impact so you know that's something like physical therapy they use at all time but it's really just you know gradually getting in position uh you know intensifying it with tension uh holding it and and just like feeling your way through it so you don't like exceed that uh threshold yeah so here's a couple

1:16:52Adam Schafer:things to consider which i don't need to tell you but just kind of bring them again to the surface you're two months out from those injuries so that's a strong consideration. You mentioned depression. That's tough in fact that would be the number one thing that I would focus on. I would not focus on building muscle and strength and improving performance. I would focus on movement to make me feel better and so it could also look like more general movement and less specific I don't know how you feel about doing movement in a swimming pool. But it's one of the best ways to exercise when you're healing from something just because of the support and the buoyancy.

1:17:32Adam Schafer:It's low impact. Right. So the antidepressant effects from exercise, there's lots of reasons why it helps us feel better. But one of them is just movement. And so it's really depressing to not be able to move. So if you can get in a pool and kind of exercise vigorously in there because it feels relatively safe, that would be a great way to help you feel better and that could be a daily thing yeah unfortunately with that i can't do to my clavicle

1:17:57Justin Andrews:and my knee is super unstable like the the side to side motion any any instability like if i'm not on a flat surface it just like knocks and comes out of place oh yeah so unfortunately i've tried that but it's a no-go and then adam referring to what you were saying about like you know the isometrics and that hold so i to talk more on that i am not doing anything left arm and that leads me to another question I don't know if I asked like should I be doing things with just my right arm like my workout routine right now is just like I'll do one exercise per body part every day or so when I can and I'll just do like shoulder presses and then shrugs and I'll like move my weight down my body I know that I'm getting unequal right now and I know your answer is going to be the symmetry afterwards which I already have but should I be doing that or should I like kind of - There's an irradiation effect you'll get from that, which actually will translate over to your other side.

1:18:53Justin Andrews:So you will be able to preserve somewhat of muscle there as well just by working that one side.

1:18:58Adam Schafer:Yeah, Jason, you can even look these studies up. They're really interesting where they'll immobilize one limb and they'll have groups of people. One group does nothing. The other group exercises the free arm or free leg. Exercising the other side actually minimizes muscle loss and atrophy in the limb that's immobilized. like a systemic effect kind of thing correct yeah correct so i know that the logic is like oh i better not do anything because then i might create more of an imbalance but it actually helps yeah uh to exercise so you're doing the right thing uh physical therapy your therapist because they're working with you directly is going to give you much more specific advice yeah and what you can do and you're two months out bro take jason big deal yeah we gotta calm down a little

1:19:37Sal Di Stefano:bit i am yeah take it easy uh what i hear from you is i don't know how long you've been listening to the show um but if you've been six years okay so i don't know if you're it was around that time if you remember when i came off of testosterone i went through a little bit of depression because i was trying to get my levels up naturally and then right after that i tore my achilles and boy it just it like ripped my heart out it was already bad enough my testosterone levels were tanked then i was that when you started a basketball out of nowhere yes yes out of nowhere yes it's Totally stupid. Yes.

1:20:07Sal Di Stefano:Right. And I share this story because how much it beat me up on the depression side of not, of not like my, I was forced to slow down because my, I couldn't do that. And so the advice I'm going to lean into with you, because you don't seem like the type of person that I'm worried about being lazy. I'm more worried about you doing too much too soon, too fast. Something that helped me during that time was actually reviving some other hobbies in my life that I hadn't done in a long time. Whether that's music, listening to Lego type stuff, like what at reading, like try and draw back to some things that you're passionate about, that you love, that it doesn't require a lot of your body.

1:20:48Sal Di Stefano:I know this is not the advice you're calling in for right now, but just being somebody who's been there. It helped me through that time. Because if you're constantly focused on the body getting better and you're frustrated because you're not, that's where you have the tendency to push versus leaning into something else that you enjoy, that you love. And it's like, oh, you know what? I can't do the training and the time and movement I was doing before as much, so that extra time I'm going to do something else that I enjoy that I haven't done in a long time that maybe has been replaced by exercise or being busy with life.

1:21:21Sal Di Stefano:I would lean into something like that. I don't know what that is for you, but that helped me during that time of recovery and getting back to be patient and not rush it. So that's kind of the advice I give.

1:21:31Adam Schafer:are you using any peptides or you have any plan on using any? I'm on the Wolverine stack. Nice. Nice. Good, good. Yeah.

1:21:38Justin Andrews:Yeah. And you guys are a hundred percent right. I am, I am all in or nothing at all. Yeah. I hear that. And it, it's been tough cause I have picked up those old hobbies. Like, like Justin, I'm a musician. I've been picking up the guitar and doing all that stuff. But I still like daily want to go work out. So it's a struggle that I need to figure out on my own. I know you can't give me any advice on that, but like, yeah, I hear you. And I appreciate the, reiterated advice. Yeah, bro, that's super tough. Injuries suck.

1:22:06Adam Schafer:If I can ask you kind of a personal question about this. You're a firefighter paramedic. Was it your buddies that came to grab you in that situation? Were you in your same jurisdiction?

1:22:16Justin Andrews:No, it was a different department and I didn't know anybody there. It was like two and a half hours away from home.

1:22:21Sal Di Stefano:Okay.

1:22:21Justin Andrews:It was in Lancaster, if you know where that is. And I'm in Orange County.

1:22:25Sal Di Stefano:How did you go through the wall? How did that happen?

1:22:27Justin Andrews:I fell asleep at the wheel.

1:22:28Sal Di Stefano:Oh, crap. Was it late at night or was it just long work?

1:22:31Justin Andrews:So I was out there to visit a friend, and I worked the next day. It was around midnight. I started driving home, and I was like, I'm too tired for this. I booked a hotel room, paid for it, started heading there, and on the way, just fell asleep and missed the time.

1:22:47Sal Di Stefano:No way. You even had the whereabouts to book the hotel, and you didn't make it to the hotel. Damn, bro. You must have been tired. That's tough, dude.

1:22:53Justin Andrews:I mean, so I recently separated four months ago from my fiancee at the time, and so I was just working, working, working. day off going to see friends going to do whatever i was just over stimulated i did it to myself 100 oh bro you got good friends surrounding you i do i have a great support system my uh work union has been great my friends have been great i'm going out to dinner with my crew tonight so it's a it's it's a great thing jason you ever up here in northern california yeah uh no not really

1:23:25Adam Schafer:but why you want to come up and come uh come sit in a live episode hang out a little bit yeah if you ever got time to come up this way we're in san jose i would love to yeah all right dude i got

1:23:33Justin Andrews:all the time in the world yeah yeah all right dude i'll have my assistant reach out yeah yeah

1:23:38Sal Di Stefano:book a book a time up here come visit say hi hang out for the day but yeah keep leading keep leaning to that stuff because you're not somebody you're gonna get back bro yeah you're gonna heal you're gonna about muscle memory is incredible for somebody who's been working out this life it'll all come back dude so just be patient with it uh and everything i'm hearing from you you're uh i relate to uh you're more likely to hurt yourself going too fast too soon than you are to not do anything be lazy and become this fat guy who never works out later on you'll be

1:24:07Justin Andrews:fine you're gonna be fine i haven't had some major body composition i'm sure i get it i get it i'm

1:24:12Sal Di Stefano:like 10 pounds heavier and lost all the muscle yeah yeah it'll come back though bro you must add a ton of muscle you still got some yeah yeah it's it'll all come back yeah cool you'll be good

1:24:20Adam Schafer:all right dude i'll have my assistant reach out dude we'll schedule you coming up here and you

1:24:23Justin Andrews:can hang out in an episode thank you i appreciate all your advice all right brother thank you

1:24:26Adam Schafer:That's crazy. Yeah. Bro, you think, too, that you knew. What's crazy is this two months later, because those are major injuries, dude. Yeah, huge. And he's asking about exercise. It's like, bro, this is two months after.

1:24:38Sal Di Stefano:Well, and he's on the Wolverine stack. What do we say to everybody about this? Like, that's the negative part of that stack is it's so effective. Yeah. You feel, and that's why he's where he's at right now.

1:24:47Adam Schafer:He's like, hey, I feel good. Yeah, and so. I was just wondering what it's like to be the person to save people and then to be in that position where people are saving you. That's got to be such an interesting. Yeah, but do you think, I mean, he's so out, he has to be out of it. Yeah, but just to know, like you're on the other end of it and know what that happened. He's probably more aware of how lucky he is than anything. Oh, I mean, it's super humbling. Yeah, yeah. Our next caller is Shannon from Washington.

1:25:12Sal Di Stefano:Hi, Shannon. How you doing, Shannon?

1:25:14Justin Andrews:Hi, guys. How's it going? Great. How are you? How are you? Good, thanks. Okay, I'm going to read off my notes here a little bit on the side. I'm so excited. My heart's just beating.

1:25:25Adam Schafer:Thank you.

1:25:27Justin Andrews:So I'm a fairly new listener, actually. I was previously really into the health and longevity stuff and listening to mostly that. I even became a nutritional therapy practitioner. Haven't started practice, but got certified in that. Started listening to you guys at the beginning of this year when I transferred into the trainer position at Planet Fitness. Don't laugh. I have three questions today, if that's okay. One about carbs, one about glute growth, and also what next. But first, just a little background. I'm almost 62 years young. I'm 5 '5", 118 to 120 pounds, about 18 % body fat. I've stayed within five pounds of this weight for over 10 years after gaining and losing 10 to 20 pounds over and over and over again.

1:26:19Justin Andrews:Literally lost hundreds of pounds over my lifetime. I've made the commitment to myself that I'll continue strength training and eating healthy for life. I'm pretty happy with my physique, but also look at my body as a sculpting project. So it's fun to kind of focus and fine tune where I can, trying to keep it interesting. I like to have the look of a figure and physique competitor. My upper body's probably, you know, probably there, but the lower body's not. But as far as occupation, I'm working four days a week right now at Planet Fitness as a trainer. I'm also working on building my own business around nutrition and writing an e-book.

1:27:02Justin Andrews:And I also spent a lot of time helping my 94-year-old mother who's still living on her own. As far as nutrition, my diets evolved a lot. It went from the low-fat, I was the fat-free queen, to paleo, to keto and intermittent fasting. and just the whole health longevity stuff. Once I started focusing on health and longevity rather than weight loss, my body fat finally melted off. I have a rhythm to how I eat, building my meals around 30 to 50 grams of protein. I'm obsessed with protein, knowing that I need more at my age. And also since I'm lean and wanting to maintain and gain muscle, what finally worked for me was just really simplifying things.

1:27:48Justin Andrews:I'm mostly animal protein, non-starchy veggies, healthy fats, plus Greek yogurt, cottage cheese, protein powders, and a little fruit. Excuse me. I don't normally track calories or macros, but I've been tracking for the last couple of weeks because I knew you guys would ask. I'm averaging roughly, I know I shouldn't say this, 1 ,500 to 1 ,900 calories. But there are some higher days that I didn't track. So if I, you know, go out or there's a family function, I just, you know, I go at it, but I don't try to track it. So there's a few days of those in there. My protein's actually usually 170 to 200 grams.

1:28:28Justin Andrews:I know that's a lot, but love my protein. My carbs are landing around 60 to 180, depending on if I have popcorn. And fat's usually around 60 to 100. uh i'm actually through tracking i realized i'm eating more carbs than i thought i was they're mostly though from my little uh treats like my sugar-free fudge sickles at night and my uh popcorn that i kind of have purposely been adding just to bring up carbs a little bit a little bit of a training background i started lifting in the early 80s inspired by

1:29:02Adam Schafer:rachel mcclish cory everson flex magazine miss olympia first one yeah they were just beautiful

1:29:09Justin Andrews:I was obsessed with that look and all that. Anyway, and then starting in 2007, I started working out with home fitness programs. You guys probably know the ones. I did those for 18 years and was a coach with that company. And then, let's see. And then at 50, I actually did a figure and physique competition just to kind of ring in the 50th birthday and did well in that. And that was all just training at home. Dumbbells and a bench. What else? For the last year, I've been working four days a week at Planet Fitness and do all my lifting during my breaks. So I have a 10-minute break, a 30-minute break, and another 10-minute break.

1:29:55Justin Andrews:So I've just been fitting my workouts in during that. That's awesome. And I've been doing an upper-lower split with the shoulder and glute focus. So using mostly dumbbells and cables. when I saw that you guys had just released something similar. I'm like, oh, that really piqued my interest. I've been curious about that. I've also been working on pull-ups just because it's a fun goal. For my 61st birthday, I was able to do 12. But then I slacked off a little bit due to elbow pain. Now I'm back at it, currently averaging 5 to 7, but working my way back up to 10 for my 62nd birthday. I'm not a big cardio person.

1:30:36Justin Andrews:I only run if someone's chasing me. I lift a build and sculpt muscle and use my diet to keep the body fat down. I'm pretty sedentary though on my three home days, Wednesdays and weekends. I'm mostly on the computer working on my business or helping my mom, but I'm trying to get better at adding in some walking and I know I should really be adding some mobility. So to the questions for glutes, despite focusing on glutes twice a week, I don't feel like I'm getting the growth I should. The main movements are the Smith machine hip thrusts. When I can get on at the Smith machine at the gym is really hard to get on.

1:31:18Justin Andrews:Bulgarian split squats, I do every time. And depending on what's available that day, I'll do hanging dumbbell sumos, cable step downs cable kickbacks and 45 degree hypers um i know my that training right there could probably be refined much better but that's just what i'm currently doing sometimes i'll do the dumbbell rdls but i have i have a lot of elbow pain if i do any if i'm holding anything over 35 pounds um you know for dumbbells so i kind of started backing off on those and I'm embarrassed to admit this but I don't I'm not currently doing any squats leg press and even though I actually have a squat rack at home that's barely ever been used long story but I bought it on accident a long time ago and but then when I was doing all those home fitness programs they were just dumbbells you know so I didn't wasn't using it then so I have that available um am i missing something obvious what would you change yes you want the obvious

1:32:29Sal Di Stefano:answer yeah so first of all let me ask this do you do you love the sculpting and shaping thing yes you like okay so so do i i love that uh you have to let me put some clay on i know i knew you're gonna say well yeah i just you you this isn't a even though we can get into squatting and we get into some movements and we could have we could we could critique uh the exercise selection that that's not the problem here you i have you have to allow me if you maintain the leanness that you've maintained for 10 years it's because majority of time you're in a deficit only a small amount of time are you ever in a slight surplus and that is not enough to add more more more size to your glutes it's impossible it's impossible so i i would you need to let me get you comfortable with adding body fat for a period of time so I could build the glutes so I can then carve away and sculpt and show you what you want.

1:33:26Adam Schafer:I don't think you're surprised at what Adam's saying because when you mentioned the calories you kind of stopped and you're like I

1:33:32Justin Andrews:know you know can can I add something on that though yeah normally there is quite a fluctuation in there because like I said, I help my mom a lot. I go over there. She's got a mixed nut jar that I cannot stay out of. One day I calculated it. I ate like 1200 calories of nuts. She also has chocolates and Oreos, which I was starting to have a problem with. I finally had to quit sugar to get myself to stop.

1:34:02Adam Schafer:I'm going to stop you. Okay. You're 18 % body fat.

1:34:05Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

1:34:05Adam Schafer:So even if you You're too lean to build any muscle.

1:34:08Sal Di Stefano:Even if you have these periodic days that you have the extra 1 ,000 calories, that's my point. 95 % of the time, you're in a deficit. 5%, you have these 1 ,000-calorie nut, chocolate, whatever things. That is not enough for us to build.

1:34:23Adam Schafer:I'm going to tell you something right now. Super simple. The solution for what you want is super simple. Everything you're saying as you're talking, you're giving us all this information, and it's very glaring. It's not your workout. Yeah. It's not your workout. It's very glaring what you need to do. So the advice I'm going to give you is going to be life changing. It's going to be super simple, but it's going to be the most difficult thing you ever did because you're afraid of eating more. You're afraid of eating more, hon.

1:34:53Justin Andrews:You guys, I didn't even want to call excited. You're going to say that. Let me negotiate.

1:34:58Sal Di Stefano:Just there's no negotiation. It's either you want to, you don't. So it's like, it's night and day.

1:35:05Justin Andrews:Well, here's something that I've always been so like rabbit holing and curious about. And, um, I love being lean and I know that I could get better gains. Like I have to decide which is more important, you know? Yeah.

1:35:19Adam Schafer:But the options are, you're, you're creating a false, a false dichotomy. That's right. It's not be lean and be fat. It's be too lean and be lean with muscle, which by the way, I'm going to tell you something. Here's what else is going to happen. It's a much more comfortable. You're going to have less pain. Yeah. You're going to have more energy. you're going to have more vitality and you're going to look better longevity you're going to look better you're going to feel healthier you're going to be like oh my god this is life changing but you got to get through the scary part your calories are way too low the the way too low the

1:35:48Sal Di Stefano:temporary the the thing i want you to get comfortable with is only the of being fluffy which will feel that way for you everybody else in the world would go oh my god she looks amazing she doesn't like but for you i know we'll feel you'll feel oh my god my waist has gone up oh i can't see my abs the same way i saw my abs like you'll feel all that way but i'll be like we're packing the clay on right now relax i'm going to get this metabolism up we're going to build this ass and then we're going to then we're going to carve it down then you're going to be lean and ripped again you'll be eating more calories than you were and you'll have more booty than you had

1:36:19Justin Andrews:before so you won't feed the booty that's right yeah you have to feed the booty you're also going

1:36:24Adam Schafer:to have less pain hungry part of the reason why your elbow bothered you you'll get these because your calories are so low yeah yeah yeah let me ask something though that i've always been curious

1:36:32Justin Andrews:about is there a way to zigzag the calories around your workout days and still have like high calorie days and lower calorie wrong question try to keep you in maintenance wrong question for

1:36:44Adam Schafer:you this is very simple hun I'm telling you like exactly what you need to do the challenge is going

1:36:49Justin Andrews:to be whether or not you're going to do it I know so you got to let go for a second so here's the

1:36:53Adam Schafer:deal okay uh because you remind me of so many trainers I've worked with you're obviously a fitness fanatic so I know what the challenge is like uh either you're going to try to do this on your own or you should, or you should, I think you should work with a coach not because you don't know what to do, but because you're not going to do it. Yeah. And a coach is going to reverse die you. And probably by month two or three, you'll be bought in. Yeah. They'll get you at your comfort zone. First 30, 60 days. You're going to be a lot of freaking out by month two or three. You're gonna be like, what is going on?

1:37:19Adam Schafer:I feel amazing. I cannot believe how strong I am. Oh my God. I look great. I wish I did this before is what's going to happen about month two or three.

1:37:28Justin Andrews:yeah scary yeah no i would love to do that at some point right now it's just not uh not an option for me um okay so are you are you listening to the are you listening to the journey that i'm

1:37:40Sal Di Stefano:doing with karen right now are you are how often do you listen uh i've been listening but i haven't

1:37:46Justin Andrews:heard much on that lately yes unless you're doing it someplace else but i but i've been staying up

1:37:51Sal Di Stefano:to date on your podcast it'd be worth your while to get in her muscle mommy group so at least you are communicating with her on a weekly basis so that's i'd love that yeah i think that would be a great place um i can have doug send you a link to get in there um and off the top of my head

1:38:05Adam Schafer:your calories need to be yeah never lower than 2 000 probably around 2500 yeah on average yeah

1:38:12Sal Di Stefano:not sometimes but we had to get we had just like corinne i had to stair step her to there at that point so we'd coach would stair step you up 200 calories every other week or so and until you get to a place like that. But at the end of the day, like this is a, this is a very easy answer. It's very difficult to do.

1:38:29Justin Andrews:Right. And just my biggest, uh, you know, pushback on that has been that I didn't want to take the time. I didn't want to start tracking calories again. I've always hated doing that. I will admit doing it the last couple of weeks, I'm going, okay, this isn't that you kind of get in the groove of it and it's okay. Uh, it's tricky. Just I've fallen into such an easy pattern of eating that I love. And I just know that I just need to add to it. Here's another question and adding calories. So, you know, the next thing I was going to talk about was carbs is, is it okay to have more of my calories with fats?

1:39:03Justin Andrews:Like I love my cheese, my butter.

1:39:06Sal Di Stefano:Absolutely.

1:39:07Adam Schafer:In fact, I think you need to, if you're eating 170 grams of protein and 1500 calories, you're eating boiled chicken breast, tilapia and protein shakes.

1:39:16Justin Andrews:No, I'm eating all of it. I'm eating steak and ground beef. I'm not the eater that's trying to lose weight anymore. I eat lots of this stuff. I love my fats. I love my meats. I love all of it. It's just that the calories aren't always adding up, especially because on my work days, since I lift during my breaks, I pack like I pack a shake that has just protein and collagen and creatine I bring a yogurt smoothie bowl with protein powder in it and sometimes a little bit of olive oil in it a couple string cheeses in an apple like I have to do stuff that I can just sneakily eat because I'm using my breaks

1:39:58Adam Schafer:to lift no that's great but something's not adding up Can you give me the macros on those days you were tracking? Because 170 grams of protein and 15 calories, there's not possible there's a lot of fat in there.

1:40:10Justin Andrews:Yeah, on those days when I'm at work, there's not as much fat. I do eat a couple string cheeses on those days.

1:40:17Adam Schafer:Can you tell me what those macros look like, proteins, fats, and carbs?

1:40:22Justin Andrews:Let's see.

1:40:23Adam Schafer:Thanks.

1:40:26Justin Andrews:on let me look up monday that was a different so on monday which was a work day i did 1620 calories 165 grams of protein 44 fat 179

1:40:41Adam Schafer:you're not eating ground beef you're not eating ribeyes yeah yeah well that that one was okay

1:40:47Justin Andrews:then yesterday i had taco salads with ground beef so that one was yesterday was also a work day it was 1800 calories 1880 175 grams of protein 97 grams of fat 104 grams of carbs you should much

1:41:04Adam Schafer:better day you should be no lower than 80 to 90 grams yeah you don't want a 40 gram fat day that is not we don't ever want to go lower than that's not going to support your skin hair nails hormones your nerves yeah yeah you got to bump your calories on that's going to be really scary for you but you're going to feel so good when you do it you're going to build muscle you're going to get really strong very quickly but you got to bump your calories are way too low yeah and walking around my taste right now for a woman to walk around and maintain 18 you're sacrificing longevity

1:41:33Sal Di Stefano:well yeah you're in you're in a deficit you're you're you're catabolic most of the time an ideal A very small fraction of the time, you're hitting maintenance to a slight surplus. Most of the time, you're catabolic. That's why we're not building. That's right.

1:41:46Adam Schafer:And longevity body fat percentages for active women typically are in the low 20s, not below 20. 18%.

1:41:54Justin Andrews:I've been hearing you guys say that. I was hesitant to even call. But now that I'm on the roll tracking, I'll continue tracking. And you said it doesn't really matter whether it's fat or carbs.

1:42:04Adam Schafer:Whichever one you like. I definitely don't want your fat going below 80, though. Because that's essential. 44, you missed essential fat there.

1:42:12Justin Andrews:Yeah, and I usually try to, I'm usually better about adding it in. And our dinners, when we actually do the dinners together, there's always like broccoli with butter and there's always, you know, a meat. Anyway, and I do cheese quite a bit.

1:42:26Adam Schafer:Yeah. Well, look, I'm going to tell you, I know it's really hard. I'm going to challenge what you said about the way I love to eat this way because I don't think you do. I think you think you do. but when you experience what it feels like to fuel yourself, it's very different. It's very, very different. The nutrition that you're having now is a relationship that is not serving you, but it feels like it is because it feels very controlled.

1:42:51Justin Andrews:Well, it's simple. And so what, I tend to get very focused on stuff. And right now I need to focus on building my business. And I get afraid of, because I will get tunnel vision, you know, that that's why I didn't want to compete again. Like I just get tunnel vision and, you know, push other stuff aside. And I, I need to be focusing on the business and stuff, but I know I can do both if I'm careful about it, but I just didn't want to spend a ton of time preparing food. And you don't, you actually

1:43:22Sal Di Stefano:don't Shannon, you don't have to be that careful. Okay. You are, you are so low body fat percentage that we can get away with not tracking like crazy and go have the five guys. You can get away with that. And I'm going to say to you exactly what I said to Corinne two days ago when we sat down and met. So I've continued to push her up. She's 12 to 15 pounds heavier than she's ever been right now. And she's asking, what are we doing this week? And I said, I want you to add 200 more calories. And the look on her face when I say that to her. And the thing that I said to her and remind her is like, you have already proven you know how to get lean and shredded.

1:43:57Sal Di Stefano:That is easy for you. It is hard for you to get bigger, fluffier. That's the work. So what I'm asking you to do is to do the work. Do that. And don't worry about what it looks like, feels like, because you can come back anytime. It's so easy for you to rein it in, tighten up, and get lean. You've proven that. You're 60-something years old, and you're shredded. You have proven you can do that at the highest level. You've competed. Same thing with her. is like you what why like stop worrying about that we can go get that anytime we want let's let's put the work in on on adding and building and pushing calories and guess what if you push a little too far one week so what push a little harder next week because i know i can turn you i can turn the two of you the other direction real quick real easy i'm going to tell you you add 500 calories

1:44:47Adam Schafer:consistently to your diet you're going to have more energy and more motivation for building your business. Your body is running on fumes.

1:44:53Justin Andrews:Yeah. I'm excited to bring back. I had to take nuts and nut butters out of the house cause I couldn't control myself. So that'll be a fun way to add some calories.

1:45:03Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Get them in.

1:45:04Adam Schafer:You know what? Here's what we're going to do because I have, I don't have a ton of confidence. You're going to follow what we say. So here's what we're going to do. Here comes the accountability. I'm going to have you come back on in 60 days and in 60 days, we're going to have a conversation and see where you're at with it all. Yeah.

1:45:20Justin Andrews:Right.

1:45:20Adam Schafer:Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

1:45:22Justin Andrews:And as far as carbs around the workouts, are carbs that important? Like, do I need to start packing more than my apple and stuff?

1:45:32Adam Schafer:I think the higher calories will make you feel amazing. You can play with the carbs and see how it fuels your workouts. Carbs are not essential. So, and you're getting, you know, you're getting some, but sometimes, listen, I have people who kind of go low carb all the time. I bump their carbs up and they just feel amazing. So base it off of how you feel.

1:45:50Justin Andrews:One time I played around with blending cooked sweet potato into my yogurt protein smoothie bowl. And maybe I could do that to add a little carb during the day. I have to like just quickly scarf my food. No one's looking.

1:46:03Adam Schafer:We'll see you in 60 days. 60 days. Bump those calories. You will build your butt. You will build everything. Yeah.

1:46:08Justin Andrews:And then also just looking for recommendations on, on what next should I stick with the upper lower split like that?

1:46:15Adam Schafer:I'm not worried about your program. I mean, I could send you one of mine, but I think what you're doing is perfectly fine. This is not a program thing. This is all just too little nutrition, too little nutrients. But I could send you a program. If you want Muscle Mommy, I could send it to you. No, no, she wanted it up or lower. That's what she did. Upper lower, I could send you up or lower.

1:46:29Sal Di Stefano:The four-day split we just wrote, right? That's the one you wrote. Yeah, that would be awesome. We'll send you that one. Yeah. Yeah, we'll send you that one.

1:46:35Justin Andrews:Thank you so much, you guys.

1:46:37Sal Di Stefano:You got it.

1:46:37Adam Schafer:We'll see you in 60 days, Shannon. That's right.

1:46:39Justin Andrews:All right. Thank you. Super fluffy.

1:46:41Sal Di Stefano:20 pounds. Stop, dude. What are you doing, bro? I want to see you eating on this next call.

1:46:48Justin Andrews:All right, Sharon.

1:46:49Adam Schafer:All right. Thank you. Thanks, guys. Bye. Bye. That's a lot of denial going on. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. She's like, I love eating this way. Oh, boy. It's like, this is a terrible example or comparison. It's like, my boyfriend, sometimes he gets mad. And he throws things at me and hit me. Well, why don't you leave? I love him. I don't think you love him. I think you're in an abusive relationship right now.

1:47:11Sal Di Stefano:Well, the math didn't add up either when you were doing the 100. How many? I was like, wait a second. That should be well -

1:47:18Adam Schafer:Straight up, and I hope she watches this because she can take it. And I've worked with people like her. She's withholding information. She probably doesn't want to hear. She knows what the right advice is. She doesn't want to hear it. But the truth is, listen, if you watch this, Shannon, if you just do it, just do what we say for 30 days, it will change your life. But it'll be so scary. It'll be so scary to consistently eat more. But oh my God, you want to talk about muscle and strength and energy, pain. In her email, there's things she shouldn't talk about here, but she has areas that hurt. She's trying to wonder what's going on.

1:47:50Adam Schafer:What's happening is you're just underfed.

1:47:52Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, yeah.

1:47:52Adam Schafer:And you're trained all that. Pain is one of those side effects.

1:47:54Sal Di Stefano:She's catabolic 90 % of the time. That's right. 90 % of the time, she's catabolic. And so, yeah, which means her body's breaking down most of the time.

1:48:02Adam Schafer:And you should not live at 18 % body fat as a woman. You don't live there.

1:48:07Sal Di Stefano:Especially as we age. Especially as you age.

1:48:10Adam Schafer:If she has something catastrophic happen and she needs to be hospitalized, that's going to be tough. It's not going to be able to support her. Our next caller is Jennifer from South Carolina. Hi, Jennifer.

1:48:22Justin Andrews:Hey, guys. Thank you so much for taking my call. How can I help you? I'm just going to read directly from my email so I don't stray off course, okay? No worries. I'm 52 years old. I'm 5 '5". I was introduced your show about seven months ago. Your first few podcasts I listened to made me aware that everything I did in my workout routine was everything you say not to do. I have since listened to your show and I've gained so much knowledge. A little background, I have been in the gym since I was 16. I've always had a competitive mindset. I started swimming at age seven and was a top competitive swimmer in the summer league races.

1:49:00Justin Andrews:I started running in middle school, which led into road biking and then eventually into triathlons. I ran cross-country and track in high school. I got into mountain biking, participated in some adventure races and triathlons. I've always been conscious about my size, and that has a lot to do with my hard work and dedication to being healthy. The problem for me is that my weight never goes down. It seems the harder I work, the bigger I get, and it is very frustrating. As I got older, the mentality was more is better in the gym and less is more in the diet. Since listening to your show, I've had a lot of mental rewiring.

1:49:39Justin Andrews:The first program I ran was MAPS Anabolic, and that was a mental challenge because it went against everything I thought to be true. I started tracking my calories and became more aware of my protein. I had a few months in the concierge program, but I had to let that go for financial reasons. I've since done power lift and muscle mommy and just started up or lower. My calories have been between 21 and 2200 for about six months with protein around 170 and my steps are 8 to 10. I still like to swim at least once a week. My sleep is seven to eight hours a night. My energy levels are good. The scale has only gone up about three or five pounds since upping my calories to the 21-22.

1:50:23Justin Andrews:I meal prep all my meals and stick to whole foods. My lips are constantly getting stronger. I have attached my DEXA scan for you. I just had that done recently. I didn't know if that was something you guys could take a look at without revealing any numbers. I had my RMR done, which was 1449. My lab values are all within normal. I'm on hormone replacement for estrogen only. So my problem is not due to any lack of dedication in the gym. I love working out and lifting. The problem is that my body refuses to go down on the scale and my clothing size refuses to go down. And I have never shown any significant body comp changes reflecting any of my hard work and dedication.

1:51:11Adam Schafer:Yeah, I get that.

1:51:12Justin Andrews:So I didn't know what you guys think.

1:51:15Adam Schafer:Yeah, no, thanks for calling in. But by the way, you're kicking butt. Yeah, you're doing a really good job, actually. You're doing a really, really good job. So where were your calories before you bumped them up to the 21, 2200 that you're at now?

1:51:27Justin Andrews:Oh, I never counted, honestly, but I'm sure they were at 1500. I mean, it was, you know, packets of tuna for lunch and apple, you know, never really focusing on hitting my protein target of 170 is where I'm trying to hit right now.

1:51:43Adam Schafer:Okay. Okay. And then how long would you say before you moved into this direction, how long were you doing the like more work less food kind of mentality and approach how many years with that probably forever okay yeah so and how long have you been doing this right here

1:52:00Justin Andrews:uh i just finished a six months with you uh following it strict okay excellent job yeah so in six months the scale went up a few pounds but your calories are higher and you're strong by the

1:52:12Adam Schafer:way i can see i see in your in your uh email that you're a bench of 135 yeah i've got yeah it's actually gone up a little bit since that that's exceptional okay so here's what it looks like now first off uh because you had such a long history of doing it a particular way takes a while to get the metabolic rate to start to really respond which it's starting to uh by the way i could tell by the by the strength gains but what it looks like is slowly building and then you do the cut later and then you see the fat loss but i don't like cutting you when you're only at 21 to 2200 calories still too low to cut you keep going if you were to cut to 1500 right now you would see some weight loss, but then it would plateau and we wouldn't have anywhere to go.

1:52:52Adam Schafer:So I would want to see your calories get closer to 26, 27, 28 before we would do the cut before we do the cut. So essentially stay the course. You're doing everything right. Let me ask you a few questions over the last six months since you've bumped your calories, you're doing the strength training. I see you're swimming in your email. Any changes in how you feel?

1:53:14Justin Andrews:Yeah. I mean, my energy levels are good and I feel a lot better. Um, you know, I, I've always looked forward to going to the gym, but I look more forward to it now because I feel like every day I'm going up a little bit more, um, focusing a little bit more on my technique, working a little bit more on the intensity. Um, my biggest struggle I think right now in the gym is that, that three minute, that three minute rest and stuff.

1:53:43Sal Di Stefano:I was just going to ask you, I was just going to ask you, How are their rest periods going? For an athlete, those are great.

1:53:48Justin Andrews:I follow them. But after about a minute, I'm antsy. But no, I follow it. And I just think, you know, when you have been in the gym for like a really long time or the same gym, you know, for a really long time and you see the same people. And then, you know, they get the results or they've just had a baby or something and they come back full force. and it's just, you know, I'm just kind of waiting for my little golden moment and I can't find it. It makes me crazy.

1:54:20Adam Schafer:I asked you how you felt because I wanted to point something out and you said you felt a lot better and it sounds like you just have more energy, more motivation. You just overall, you feel like you have better vitality. Would that be a fair statement? Okay. I wanted to point that out because you've been improving the last six months. Yeah. things are changing that didn't come out of nowhere things are changing the aesthetic changes happen a little late a little later because we still got to get to a place where we can cut from we don't want to go back to where we were before which is what would happen if we cut you right now if we cut you now we definitely would see some fat loss but it would plateau and then you'd be stuck at 1500 calories again and you would feel the way you did when you were eating so low and

1:54:58Sal Di Stefano:it's important to note that when you take somebody who potentially was around 1500 calories eating and not seeing any sort of change in their body, and I get them all the way up to 21 to 2200, and we see little to no gain, really, in body fat, that's a huge accomplishment. That's a big win. And it's like, now in the next six months, can we do that again? If we went from 500 or 1500 to 22, can we now go from 22 to 28 in the next 600? And again, even if the scale doesn't change very much, that's a huge win. And it's hard because I know you're putting the work in, so you're like, but it's like, this is the right way to do it.

1:55:32Sal Di Stefano:If we're going to do this and we're going to keep it off for the rest of your life and you're going to have that golden moment, you're going to feel amazing. This is the path. This is the right way to go about it. And so once we get up to that 2 ,800 calories, then we bring you back down to 22, which is where you're at now. And you just, the weight, the body fat just comes off and you feel like you're being fed. You've got good energy, like all the signs that you feel now, vitality, all those things, but also leaning out. And then it looks like this beautiful, you're not having to force it. It's just happening for you, but it's going to take a little bit of time because that's why Sal asked, how long were you on the other side?

1:56:08Sal Di Stefano:Because if you, the longer you've been on that side, the longer it seems to take my clients for their metabolism to respond the way we want to respond. And so just be patient. You're doing great. You're doing really good.

1:56:19Justin Andrews:So if you're putting on from say 20, 21, 22, going up to 26 in the next six months. So what does that look like? should it be 100 calories a week, 50 calories a week? And then where should my protein still be at 170? And then I get kind of confused.

1:56:35Sal Di Stefano:So protein, for the entire period of this whole process, your protein's solid and just stays around there. It always comes from carbs and fat. And it's normally whichever one you're more comfortable with. My only one thing with my female clients I keep an eye on is make sure your fat's not too low. So if you're not getting at least 60 to 80 grams of fat a day, I would tell you to go fat. But if you're getting that, then I'd say wherever you want it from, fat or carbohydrates. This is a generic answer, but it looks like about 200 calories. We will bump there. I normally hold a client there for a couple of weeks.

1:57:10Sal Di Stefano:What I want to see is the scale staying the same. I don't want to see it rising. You might see an initial little bump and then it kind of level out and sometimes it dips back down and then levels. But I want to see that kind of hold for about a week or two before I bump again. And so I'm just going to keep incrementally doing this 150 to 200 calories it's normally about every two weeks or so sometimes it's three if i want it to be if i don't see weight kind of stabilizing but i'm looking for weight to stabilize for a solid week before i bump again like that and that's kind of what it looks stair-stepping all the way through that process maintaining your steps what you're doing maintaining the workouts the way you're doing uh everything that is all staying the same and those calories are coming from either carbs or fat.

1:57:51Okay.

1:57:52Sal Di Stefano:Yep. All right. And play with those. Play with those, by the way. Like if you have the flexibility in the diet, because while I'm coaching someone, I like to, it's like some people just run more optimally on a higher fat diet. And they're like, man, Adam, my skin, I notice a difference. My hormone profile, I sleep better. Some people, carbs, they're like, oh my God, Adam, those extra 100 grams of carbs, my workouts are amazing now and I feel good and my muscle belly. So play with it. sometimes go more fat and see how you feel for a while sometimes go more carbs go a blend of the two and and and so i would encourage you to play with the two of them

1:58:28Justin Andrews:Okay. That's kind of where I figured that, yeah, what you guys are going to say. And especially, especially about bumping those calories up to 26, 28.

1:58:36Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Yeah. You're doing so good.

1:58:38Justin Andrews:It should be interesting what that looks like. Cause 22 feels like a lot.

1:58:41Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. And so that has a lot, by the way, too. So back to, I gave you a generic answer every two weeks. Sometimes that's longer. Cause a client of mine, it's like 22 is already right. And then I go 24 and you're going, Oh my God, this is so hard. So I got to kind of, sometimes I have to kind of pull you back then at 23 for a little bit and then go back to the next week. back. So it's hard to give like an exact answer that looks like, but the ultimate goal is in six months from now, we're eating close to 2 ,800 calories. What that roadmap looks like is very individualized. It could be every week going up a little bit.

1:59:10Sal Di Stefano:It could be every two weeks. It could be, we go up for a few weeks and then I have to pull you back a little bit for a while to give you a diet break. Cause you feel like you're just stuffing yourself every day. So that's where the individualized kind of coaching happens is like, but overall that's the, your goal should be set on getting stronger, getting those calories up to there before we even think about the cutting process. And then the cutting will be a lot easier. That's right.

1:59:34Justin Andrews:All right. Well, all that is doable. I'm up for a challenge always. You're doing good. To finally get any kind of results.

1:59:40Adam Schafer:And I want you to keep having fun with the activity too. I know you're swimming now. You have such a background of athleticism. Have fun with that. Don't ever stop doing that. Enjoy it because that's going to keep you consistent forever.

1:59:53Sal Di Stefano:don't do it to burn and try and lose body do it because you like doing it because you love doing

1:59:59Justin Andrews:it it's something yeah okay yeah that's that's that's that's the hard divide right there it is

2:00:04Sal Di Stefano:a very hard divide that's why i wanted to say that because sometimes when sal gives someone permission like that that's like permission to try and burn it off it's like no no no don't that's not what he's saying just go have fun have fun if you love to swim swim because you love to swim don't swim because you're like oh i think i burned an extra 800 calories today that i don't want you to get into. And later on, we can lean into that on the cutting process when I go, hey, pick up another day of swimming so we can increase that caloric deficit. But we're not there yet right now. Right now, we're in build process.

2:00:31Sal Di Stefano:So I want you to build, stay active, but don't go out of your way to do that stuff trying to burn.

2:00:36Adam Schafer:Now, Jennifer, if you want somebody to coach you through that, we have coaches. You just let us know and I'll set you up on a call and you can see what that looks like and they'll walk with you the whole... She had the concierge.

2:00:44Sal Di Stefano:She was at the concierge for months. Oh, cool. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, good.

2:00:48Adam Schafer:You got great information then. Oh, perfect. Yeah, I did.

2:00:51Justin Andrews:They were very great and very helpful with all that. And I hated to have to bump out, but I got some life activities that are happening. And so I had to make a choice and unfortunately I had to drop that one. So I guess in six months I'll do another DEXA scan and we'll see what happens. I wasn't real happy with that. That one kind of told what I thought it would.

2:01:12Sal Di Stefano:That's the starting point. That's all that matters. It doesn't matter what it says. It's like where we go from here is what matters.

2:01:16Adam Schafer:And don't discard, like always remember, don't discredit, like I feel better, I'm stronger, I'm moving better. Like those are all signs you're progressing. It's not just the scale. Yeah. Yeah.

2:01:27Justin Andrews:Yeah. It's very different after listening to you guys to go in and do a whole mental rewire, which has been excellent. and then to actually challenge myself personally after being on the bench in years past, but being stuck in a certain weight and not realizing that I really could. And now at 52, I'm doing, I'm like, what? I'm loading, you know, with 45s. That's just insane to me. You know, it feels pretty badass.

2:01:57Adam Schafer:That's awesome. By the way, 135 pound bench for women is very, very, very impressive.

2:02:02Sal Di Stefano:Very, very impressive. You're doing a great job.

2:02:05Justin Andrews:right now you're doing great all right well i'll just i'll stay the course and stick with it all right keep it up good job jennifer yeah perfect thank you guys thank you she's doing great yeah

2:02:14Adam Schafer:she's doing great doing really good so if she stays consistent this is going to be amazing for

2:02:18Sal Di Stefano:her in six months yeah just you know good opportunity to talk about how um the longer that you were in that that extreme mindset it seems to be that way for sure yeah that this is uh this can be the really difficult part is, and then obviously she hears the show and we give advice and then we get these great testimonies, people calling in, oh my God, I lost all this way. Because we took your advice and they see it in six months or nine months and sometimes this takes a year, two years for somebody to rebound their metabolism for so many years of the yo-yo dieting and the chronic extreme training with the chronic low calories.

2:02:54Adam Schafer:I had a client that took me a year and we would bump it so slow and we would see this fluctuation of the scale that was really scary, and it just took us a long time. But she had a long history of under-eating.

2:03:05Sal Di Stefano:One of my last clients I took on when I was in the gym was a case that took me two years, and she was a collegiate-level softball player, had put on a lot of weight, and her mentality was just cut hard. She was strong. She was capable. she put but it took us literally two years before it really started to move like that and during that process we had a lot of these were you know reverse dieting and then i would show her just to prove to her i knew what i was doing like i could shred 10 15 pounds off you real quick but i you have a lot more that you want to go so we had to keep going this way so yeah it took almost it took her that was the longest though i've never had anybody take that long i remember how frustrating it was for me also had a sports medicine degree so she like knew her shit yeah so even harder it It was like trying to get more of that stuff.

2:03:55Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

2:03:56Adam Schafer:Our next caller is Becky from Ontario. Hi, Becky. Hi, Becky.

2:04:00Justin Andrews:Hi, how are you? Good. How can we help you? It's great to be with you guys. I've been a big fan now for about a year. I've been listening and binging on all of your podcasts. I'm just going to read my email because I'm really nervous. Thank you for all you do to help people with their health and fitness goals. um i'm looking for some listener coaching from sal adam and justin regarding my metabolism and nutrition post-menopause i'm currently uh 52 years old i'm five foot two i'm 140 pounds um i recently made a massive lifestyle shift um for five years uh from 2020 to 2025 i was vegan and I was a runner.

2:04:46Justin Andrews:I didn't really lift weights or anything. But over starting in 2025, April, March, April, I went back to eating meat and dairy. I stopped running. I started lifting a couple times a week and Pilates three times a week, as well as pickleball two hours on Sundays. I started realizing pretty quickly, though, that I felt like I was overtraining. So in December, I stopped playing pickleball on Sundays, and I stopped the Pilates, and then I started training with a coach two days a week. I really haven't seen any fat loss. I feel like I'm stronger, but I don't see any fat loss. In fact, since April of 2025 till now, I've gained 15 pounds and 9.6 is fat and five pounds of lean mass.

2:05:46I'm kind of not sure what to do at this point.

2:05:49Justin Andrews:I've been trying to pay attention to my protein intake as well as I've been starting to track calories and I'm starting to think maybe I've been under fueling. So when I was tracking, I was getting, you know, any, I think under 1500 calories a day. And now I've been trying to work on reverse dieting in a bit. And I, the last few weeks, I've been consistently around 17 to 2100 calories. And I'm just wondering, is this the right way to go? I know you always say that reverse dieting takes time and trust the process, but it's really difficult because I weigh more than I ever have. Um, so I guess I just want to look for some input input from you.

2:06:32Adam Schafer:Yeah. Well, thanks for calling in and it is very hard. So I have a few more questions to ask you if that's okay. Sure. So what made you stop being a vegan, uh, and a runner?

2:06:41Justin Andrews:What were, what were the, I wanted to start, uh, lifting weights.

2:06:45Adam Schafer:Okay. Was there something that happened? Was there energy injury? Was it like you got some health markers come back?

2:06:52Justin Andrews:Um, not really. I just didn't like, I just, I just really wanted to get strong. I wanted to get, I wanted to get, uh, sculpted and I wanted to look good. And I knew it wasn't, and I started listening to your podcast and that was the one thing that changed.

2:07:06Adam Schafer:I love it. What are the differences that you felt since you switched, uh, to, have you, you said you think you're stronger? What do you mean by that? Or what are you noticing?

2:07:15Justin Andrews:Stronger. I mean, I, I just did, I just entered it, uh, into a deadlift competition and I was able to lift one 75. Let's go. So my top weight there is 185, and I can bench press 90. That's great. That's incredible. Yeah, I've never done anything like that before. So I know I'm stronger, but I'm not seeing it on my body. There's this layer of fat that I just can't drop.

2:07:46Adam Schafer:It's going to take a little while because your caliber is so low, hon. And so you may gain some body weight, but the other option is to just do what you were doing before, which wasn't working either. So we got to keep moving in a direction where we have a little runway. I see in your email that it says you were shocked to find out that you were eating around 1 ,090 calories a day. When was that?

2:08:08Justin Andrews:Yeah, I just decided to randomly track, and I was like, whoa, that's really low. I expected it to be more than that. Yeah.

2:08:16Adam Schafer:It's important through this process of reverse dieting because what can be disheartening or what can be discouraging is to watch the scale either go up a little bit or not change at all or to see that the body fat's not coming off. But what tends to happen is we ignore some of the other things that are happening like strength, energy, mobility, sleep, libido. If you're noticing improvements in all those areas, it's because the reverse diet's working. It's doing exactly what it's supposed to do. The fat loss doesn't happen until later when we have some place to cut from because there was nowhere to cut from before.

2:08:51Adam Schafer:Your calories are so low, if we cut you, it would have made you sick. And we're still too low. So, you know, 1 ,700 to 2 ,000, if we cut you, we would bring you down to 1 ,200. And you might see a little bit of fat loss, but then you'd plateau, you'd lose strength, and you would feel crappy. It wouldn't put you in a good place.

2:09:09Justin Andrews:I just find it hard to eat right now because I'm finding that, you know, I'm pretty full eating what I'm eating right now. So I don't know if I need to just eat more meals per day or no, what'll happen.

2:09:21Sal Di Stefano:So what happens, and we get this question a lot, especially on live callers of like, what exactly does the reverse diet look like? And it's so hard because everybody's going to be a little bit different. Like somebody we put on a reverse diet, it's like, Oh my God, my appetite's through the roof. I can eat so much. Other people will be like, I feel like I'm stuffing myself. This is so hard to get this food down. And so what'll happen is you'll hit you're probably pushing to a good point right now where you said your calories are you'll stay there maintaining that while continuing to lift and get stronger then all of a sudden out of nowhere you'll start to feel this appetite increase and that's a great sign it's probably because you built a little bit of muscle you're getting stronger now the body's saying hey it needs more calories then we lean into that then we bump the calories again then you'll be at another place again we're like oh my god it's a lot of food we we stay there for a while then all of a sudden strength goes up again in the gym, followed by that comes appetite.

2:10:11Sal Di Stefano:And so it kind of looks like that. And it's just stair-stepping process. And it's not like this clear, like, okay, we're going to add 200 calories every three weeks forever. It's like, no, you're going to add it. You're going to keep it there for a little bit. And then you're going to, and you should see the results of the strength in the gym. And then not long after that, you typically feel the appetite come up a little bit. And then it's like, okay, we can bump the calories again. And that's what it looks like.

2:10:32Adam Schafer:And there's, and there's more to add to that too. So when you say you're feeling full explain that to me is it like your stomach hurts you're bloated is it just uh i feel like

2:10:40Justin Andrews:i'm satisfied yeah i'm just i feel like i'm satisfied like i don't have hunger i'm not hungry okay you know um i'm i'm hungry at my mealtimes but i'm not hungry in between i've

2:10:50Adam Schafer:never been a snacker okay okay good now how long before all of this would you say you were uh eating very little or kind of under eating how many years was that oh my whole life Okay.

2:11:02Justin Andrews:Probably. Yeah. I mean, I would say so for sure. And I went through a period too, when, when I was intermittent fasting, so I would, I wouldn't eat breakfast. And then since I started listening to you guys, I started eating breakfast because it's a good, you know, it's an extra meal that I'm getting more protein in. Okay.

2:11:17Adam Schafer:So I'm not, I'm not to dismiss what you're saying. Okay. So, cause, cause that's how you feel. Uh, but there is a very strong strong psychological component to appetite. So I can get somebody, I'll use myself as an example, because if you've listened to the show, you've probably heard me tell the story, but as a kid, I felt like I was really skinny. I was always trying to gain muscle, always trying to get size. And so I conditioned myself that full felt a particular way. And really what it was, I was just stuffing myself. Later, when I was eating appropriately, I felt like I wasn't eating enough.

2:11:49Adam Schafer:I had to recalibrate what that actually felt like. On the other end of the spectrum, from people under eat for years and years and years or for the whole life. What they're used to satisfaction feeling like is being underfed and being I'm overstuffed is actually, this is actually how much, this is what you're supposed to feel like. And you kind of got to oftentimes tell people, listen to your, to your body. But there are cases where I tell people, actually, we've got to ignore your body signals right now. You're not eating enough or you're eating too much. And so I think that's a little bit of probably what's happening because you've had such a history of under eating, that eating more of an appropriate amount feels like, oh my God, I'm eating so much food and I'm not full or I'm too full when in reality it's more appropriate.

2:12:30Sal Di Stefano:And this is the power of a good coach, right? A good coach takes in the information that you're giving them. And then there might be a time where I'm like, okay, I'm going to ask you, I'm going to push you in that direction. I know you feel that way. I'm going to push you a little bit. And then I want to see how you feel and respond. And so there's this kind of this ebb and flow of taking in the data from you and what you're feeling and what we're doing. A little bit of me stretching you sometimes, having to pull back sometimes. And a good coach will walk you through all this because Sal's right.

2:12:58Sal Di Stefano:When you've been eating a certain way for so long, we're all guilty of this. I'm guilty of the same similar story as Sal. And I've talked about it on the show many times. Like, man, I've realized I ate to be this big guy for so long that my view of a full plate is totally distorted. And I'm like, I have to recalibrate that completely. And you're no different. You're just on the other side of the spectrum of that. And so some of that is rewiring that.

2:13:23Adam Schafer:You're not used to eating what would be an appropriate amount to strengthen, build muscle. The reverse diet's going to feel uncomfortable, in other words. So you just kind of accept it's going to feel uncomfortable for a little while until you start to get used to what it feels like. And then, of course, we'll have the cut on the other end of it. And then we're going to see that come off.

2:13:41Justin Andrews:should I be in the gym more than two days a week?

2:13:43Adam Schafer:No, no, I think you're perfectly fine. You're getting stronger. You're doing great. Yep. I like strength training twice a week, uh, on your days off. You're tracking your steps. Is that, are you doing that?

2:13:52Justin Andrews:Eight to 10 ,000 steps a day. And I do, I do still do like really long hikes. Like I've got a, a long hike this Saturday, 32, 32 kilometer hike this Saturday. Oh,

2:14:05Adam Schafer:you're great. Yeah. I like it. You're great. Hey, the day before that long hike, I want you to feed yourself. Yeah. So yeah. So make sure you get up to 2 ,500 calories the day before that'll help you. Yeah.

2:14:15Sal Di Stefano:Fuel up before fuel up right after feed the body on those long. I mean, but your, your activity level is great.

2:14:21Adam Schafer:Yeah. Stay the course you're, you're moving in the right direction for sure. And always remind yourself energy, strength, vitality, because those things will help, help keep the core, keep you on course when you're, you know, cause otherwise we get too focused on the scale and the body fat when it's not even time for that yet.

2:14:38Justin Andrews:Okay. Is there a specific cue or some way I'm going to know when is a good time for me to start cutting?

2:14:44Adam Schafer:Typically, we want to get you to a point calorically where we can drop you. You're at a nice maintenance of something that feels comfortable. So someone like you, your activity level, the hiking, spring trail, that stuff, I probably would want to cut you closer to 2000 calories. I think that's a nice maintenance caloric intake where you're not going to feel like you're starving. You've got nice energy. So that probably means we need to get you closer to the higher twos with your calories first. Yep.

2:15:11Justin Andrews:Okay. So you're thinking 2 ,800?

2:15:12Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Around there. Yeah. Around there. Give or take. Yep. I know. It sounds, it sounds crazy. It sounds crazy. It's actually one of my favorite things to do with clients is you tell them that early in the, in the process and they're like, they cannot imagine eating that much. And then they get there and they're like, I can't believe I eat and I'm hungry and I eat this every day and I maintain the weight I like. It's just, it's an amazing thing when you unlock it, but it takes patience. the psychological part is hard we've got a lot of rewiring to do from so many years of doing it a different way and so be patient with that and know that if you need help we have coaches that's what they do so if you need help from us and you want that support um if you want somebody to walk you

2:15:52Adam Schafer:through the whole process uh we have amazing coaches and that's what they'll do and they'll

2:15:56Justin Andrews:change it and adjust it along the way that sounds great thank you yeah you got it you got it well

2:16:02Adam Schafer:Thanks for calling in.

2:16:03Justin Andrews:Thank you very much. Keep doing what you're doing. Thank you.

2:16:06Adam Schafer:Thank you. Yeah, similar. Similar to some of the previous callers. It's just there's the consistency there. But what's interesting, the most interesting thing about this is, and I've heard this so many times, I feel like I'm stuffing myself. And it's because you're so used to under eating that that's your comfort zone that when you start to eat.

2:16:25Justin Andrews:Yeah, especially going from vegan to eating meat again. I'm sure that's satiating. 100%. You got to get through that.

2:16:32Adam Schafer:And I know the opposite of it. Like, it took me a while to understand what a normal meal looks like because normal to me in the past was a lot. Totally. Look, if you like the show, come find us on Instagram. It's Mind Pump Media. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy,

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2:17:35Justin Andrews: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. Cozy season is ahead and you'll be spending way more time inside. Is your home ready? Don't worry. With Wayfair, you can upgrade your space without breaking the bank. Score up to 70 % off during their Labor Day clearance on furniture, area rugs, mattresses, and more. Plus, surprise flash deals you can't miss. Whether it's one room or the whole house, Wayfair has pieces for every style and budget.

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