Barbell Shrugged - The Number One Reason You Have to Lift Weights - Diesel Dad Episode 34

Episode Date: August 6, 2021

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This is the number one reason why you need to be lifting weights. Welcome to the Diesel Dad. My name is Anders Varner, and we created this channel because there's a lot of dads that are fat and unhappy, and I don't want you to be one of them. Now, you can go to the internet and type in immediately into Google,

why is lifting weights important? And what you're going to get is this laundry list, literally millions of responses that Google's gonna shoot back at you. And people are going to talk about building muscle and building strength and building lean body mass and hypertrophy and the three things that go into it. We're going to go over all those things. You also are likely going to find information about how to boost your metabolism and the three reasons that muscle and your metabolism are so closely related. We're going to go over that. By the end of this though, we're gonna go over that by the

end of this though you're going to know that the number one reason that you need to be lifting weights has nothing to do with your metabolism has nothing to do with muscle and it has everything to do with building a system and structure of learning and creating an ecosystem around your body that forces adaptation so that you improve without thinking about it. Like literally it's impossible for your body and your body composition and your brain not to improve by lifting weights.

But first and foremost, we need to understand the basics, right? Like what is lifting weights and why do we do it? Well, the very first thing that we need to understand is that muscle mass is extremely important, especially as we age. You don't need all the muscle. You don't need to be world class at building muscle, but what you need is enough muscle on your body to be able to get through the day.

If you want to categorize the amount of muscle that you need in some sort of way, you should likely be able to get to a position where you have range of motion in your joints, the ability to back squat at least one time your body weight, deadlift at least one and a half times your body weight, press about 50% of your body weight over your head. And those are going to be able to set some basic parameters where you can ask, do I have enough muscle in my body? If you cannot perform those three feats well guess what you need to get in the gym there's also three mechanisms for increasing muscle and you should know these because these are like the basics of understanding once you get into the gym and you believe everything that I'm saying in this video of how you can start to understand a strength training program

that is backed by science as well as just common knowledge in the strength world but if you're just getting into lifting or you you want to start lifting but don't really know where to start these are the three things that you're going to hear people talking about ideally you understand the word hypertrophy that literally just means building muscle and there's three ways that you can build muscle. The first is a thing called mechanical tension. Mechanical tension is literally increasing load over time.

And that way, your body is in an ecosystem in which being stronger is mandatory. And the only way to handle and deal with and adapt to the new stimulus of increased weight on the bar is to build more muscle. That muscle equates to more strength. You get stronger, you get bigger, and your body adapts to these new stimuluses that you put it through each week. In addition, you also have number two, which is called metabolic stress.

Now, if you've ever heard about people talking about getting a pump in the gym, this is kind of the category in which being, getting a pump falls into, right? It's metabolic stress. It's putting your muscles through a lot of reps at high intensity with decent amount of weight so that muscle swelling occurs. A lot of fluids fill the muscle belly, and it looks like you're getting really strong

and really jacked and pumped up, and then you go straight to the pool. That's metabolic stress. The third component is muscular breakdown, muscular damage. And that is where when you're lifting weights, a lot of the muscle fibers are going to tear. They're going to be injured. And over time, with proper nutrition, you're going to heal those muscles and they're going to grow a little bit. As an overall category, the most important one is going to be mechanical tension. And that you need to get strong. You just need to get strong.

Strength is the key component to all three of them. The stronger you get, the more reps you're going to be able to do at moderate rate to get a bigger pump, as well as you're going to break down more tissue, your body's gonna get more efficient at healing itself, you're going to grow more muscle.. Your body's gonna get more efficient at healing itself. You're going to grow more muscle Now, how does this play into losing fat and reaching your goals? Well, we understand what hypertrophy is we understand that you need to be lifting weights

We understand the three ways that you can lift weights in order to increase muscle and strength You understand the metrics that you should be shooting for in order to consider yourself to be strong enough and now we need to understand how that's going to help you lose the fat that you're you're super interested in right so when you start to talk about how your muscle and your metabolism are linked together we we need to have the basic understanding of our metabolism is kind of like the engine that that runs our life that handles all of the chemical and hormonal reactions that go on in your body so from from running your

brain running your organs circulating blood all this stuff takes a lot of energy throughout the day and if you are not active and you are not lifting weights you basically don't need any additional calories outside of the amount of calories that you need to just keep your brain turned on, keep blood flowing through your body, keep getting oxygen to your muscles. All of that stuff is a relatively low number of calories.

However, if you would like to achieve a body that you are proud of, to lose the weight that you need to lose to feel proud of yourself, there's a reason that lifting weights is so important. And again, there's three major steps to it. The first step is the amount of energy that you're going to be burning while you are lifting weights. So if you're lifting for 20 minutes at a higher intensity, you're going to be burning a lot of

calories in that 20 minutes in which it's going to increase your activity level. And if you're eating to a caloric level that does not sustain the work that you are putting in, now all of a sudden you're going to be using stored excess body fat to sustain the amount of energy you're putting out, right? If you're not eating the calories, you have to find the calories from somewhere and it's most likely going to come from body fat the second process after you've expended the energy in the gym now your body has to recover from that and it has to go and build the muscle to adapt to the stimulus that you just put it through again this takes a lot of calories this takes a lot of energy to do. Therefore, not only are you getting the boosted metabolism in the gym,

but you're also getting the metabolic increase out of the gym for hours and days after you train. Now, the third component is going to be when you are holding on to the muscle that you have built. It is more metabolically challenging to maintain muscle than it is to maintain fat. That's why we talk about increasing our protein throughout the day because you want to be able to not just break down muscle to get strong and work out in the gym, but you need the calories and the protein to be able to build the muscle back and you need the protein and the calories to be able to build the muscle back and you need the protein and the calories to be able to maintain the muscle over a long period of time. So now you have kind of a couple key components of this video in this podcast that I want you to understand. Number one, what are some basic requirements to say that, hey, I lift weights, I'm strong, I can function in this world,

I have healthy joints, full range of motion, and I can squat my body strong, I can function in this world, I have healthy joints, full range of motion, and I can squat my body weight, I can deadlift one and a half times my body weight, and I can press over my head 50% of my body weight. These are really good metrics to be able to say you are strong enough to be an asset on this rock that we live on. If you cannot do those things, it's a very tricky thing. Your joints are not going to be strong enough and healthy enough to maintain a really healthy, positive existence for the rest of your life, especially as muscle starts to decline later in age. In addition to that, you understand how to build muscle. You understand the three components from

lifting heavy weights to lifting moderate weights for a long time, and then the breakdown of muscle and repairing it and how that relates to your metabolism and how you process calories and how you have to increase the amount of energy you're using by working out. You also have to increase the amount of energy you're using to repair those muscles. And you also have to increase the amount of energy you're using to maintain the amount of muscle that you have on your body. Now, say none of that makes sense to you and you don't care about any of it. Totally cool. I got it. But check it out. This is the number one reason that I think you need to understand how to lift weights. I want you to know that it's okay if you feel like you suck at everything. I want to repeat myself. I think it's okay if you think you suck at everything. And when I say everything, I mean literally everything.

You suck at your job and you hate it. You suck at looking in the mirror and you hate your body. You suck at getting out of bed because your mindset's all jacked up. You suck at being a good husband. You suck at being a good father. You suck at everything. It's okay because Because guess what?

45 pounds weighs 45 pounds. And I don't care how good you think you are at life and how bad you think you are at life. 45 pounds is 45 pounds. And when you put it on the bar, your body will adapt to it. And when it adapts to it, the next thing you do is put 50 pounds on the bar. And over time, you will learn a system. You will learn a structure. You will learn that you as a human being have the ability to become good at something. If you put enough time under tension under the bar, this can immediately have a ripple effect on the rest of your life. If you wake up in the

morning and your brain sucks and you don't feel like getting out of bed and every thought you have is negative and you're dealing with a bunch of depression, guess what? You can go to the gym and you can squat. I know you can. I know you can wake up in the morning and walk in the bathroom and look in the mirror and say, God, how did I get here? How did I put on this 30 pounds? How did I put on these 40 pounds? How did I put on this 50 pounds? How did that happen?

I talk to dads all the time that have put on between 90 and 100 pounds, especially last year in quarantine. And they go, I don't know what happened. It's been five years since I worked out. How did we get here? Well, guess what? You might suck at thinking about your body. You might suck at remembering all the steps

that got you to where you're at, but there's a path forward. And you can go to the gym and you can back squat and you can deadlift and you can put weight on the bar and watch your body adapt and get better at something. You can immediately see the ramifications. You will immediately feel better. It's going to be hard while you're in there you're going to be sore but if you just show up and you just have the ability to put a little bit

more weight on the bar you will learn this thing called progressive overload and what you will become the case study in how just adding and intentionally adding a little bit of weight to the bar and making things a little bit harder in your life and taking a little bit more ownership in just one area of your life, which is getting to the gym and putting a little bit more weight on the bar, will immediately allow you to see opportunity and hope

in every aspect of your life. Because if you can go to the gym and hold yourself accountable and put a little bit more weight on the bar, maybe tomorrow you'll can go to the gym and hold yourself accountable and put a little bit more weight on the bar, maybe tomorrow you'll be able to wake up and go, I'll lie to myself. I'm going to say that I'm stoked for today. I'm going to say that I'm excited and I'm going to just act as if I'm already strong or act as if I'm already happy. And then I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to force myself to look in the mirror and find one positive thing about my day.

And then tomorrow I'm going to do the same thing. I'm going to look at my body and say, I like my ears. Sounds superficial, right? But what about tomorrow? If you say, I like your eyes or I like my eyes. And then the day after that you go, well, I'm starting to see a little bit of definition in my traps. It looks like I've lost five pounds.

The scale is starting to come back. This feels good. I'm going to keep going. What happens if you walk out of the room and your marriage sucks, but you force yourself, even when your wife is sleeping, to look at her and go, I love you and make that happen. You see, when you go to the gym, it's impossible. It is 100% impossible for your body not to adapt to the stimulus it is impossible your physiology will not allow you to get weaker if you continue lifting weights it is a it is the single place that you can go where you cannot fail no matter how bad you do it your body will adapt to the stimulus and if you keep putting weight on the bar and you keep showing

up and you keep doing the thing you will see the results it is physiologically impossible for your body not to adapt to the additional five pounds that you put on the bar every single week it has a natural survival instinct inside there that says if we put that bar on our back and we're not strong enough we're going to get crushed we are going to break our spine in half and we will die. So what it does is it gets better. And that may feel like where you're at in your life. And I promise you that if you go to the gym and you start putting a barbell on your back and you sit down and you stand up and you put weight on the bar in a progressive manner time and time again, week after week, day after day, and you do it, your body will adapt. Your mindset will adapt.

You will feel like you are capable of achieving things. You will feel more confident when you walk in front of the mirror and stop hating the way that you look. You also are going to get to a place where you will realize that even the relationships, even the people that you surround yourself, all of it will get better because you will have a mindset that has changed, that has created a space, an opportunity for you to realize that small tweaks, like five pounds at a time, will allow you the ability to make small tweaks in every area of your life, to slowly turn the dial

in your favor, to slowly balance the scales so that the outcome is achievable and it's desired. Lifting weights is the number one thing that you can do to improve your life. If you're listening to this show and you do not lift weights, and I often take it for granted that everybody that listens to these shows already lifts weights or is already trying fitness,

but instead of just going to the gym, start to look at it as a behavioral pattern in a larger system of incrementally making things a little bit more difficult each week can have a ripple effect on your life in which you're able to make small tweaks to your life, small tweaks to the way you think, small tweaks to the way you talk to yourself, small tweaks to your ability to say I love you to your wife and try to be better, to try to be a better father, to try to be a better husband, to try to be better at your job.

And all of a sudden, by just making those small tweaks, making it a little bit harder each time, trying a little bit harder, trying to find little shortcuts, trying to find ways that you can set that trajectory to getting to that dream state, to finding out where you wanna be, to know what it looks like when you lose the 100 pounds,

to know what you're capable of when you have a hobby. The ability to get up and go play. How are you going to be a better father? How are you going to be a better husband? How are you going to be a better person? How are you going to have a better conversation with yourself? It all starts in the gym. It all starts by adding a 2.5 pound plate to each side of the bar each week.

It all starts with just getting up and going committing to the fact that this may fucking suck for a little while but if I can just push through this and make it a little in and consciously choose to make it a little bit harder next week well maybe I can do that at work maybe I can do that at home maybe I can do that when I'm getting frustrated with my kids maybe maybe I can do that in my in the kitchen maybe you can add a little bit more vegetables. Maybe doing your best just isn't enough. Maybe there is a better.

And you can do that and practice that theory in the gym every week. It's so easy. There's tangible differences because last week, what you thought was the most you could do or the best you could do isn't anymore. Your body adapts to it. Your mind adapts to it. You immediately become a better weightlifter and you immediately get stronger. You immediately have more muscle. You immediately see the differences in the mirror. You immediately see the shifts in your mindset. It happens immediately. Lifting weights is the most important thing that you can possibly do for all aspects of your life. Movement, strength, getting your muscles, all the science stuff you can find on the internet.

What the internet's not going to tell you is that it's the cornerstone practice. It is the number one thing that you can do to become a better person. It literally is the definition of how you get better at everything by adding two and a half to the bar each week. Just add five pounds. It's so simple and you will immediately see the difference. And if you need somebody, if you need someone to hold you accountable to it, if you need somebody to be your training partner, if you need someone to hold you accountable to it, if you need somebody to be your training partner, if you need someone to be there with you, well, you'll find those people because they're in gyms.

They're holding themselves accountable to, they need people around them. And then you start to develop this inner circle of people that you enjoy being around that share common goals. And now all of a sudden you don't have shitty relationships with people. You're not surrounding yourself with people that have bad, bad vibes, negative outlooks on life. You're surrounding yourself with people that are taking action. It all happens in the gym. That is the sweet spot. The people in the gym doing the thing, trying to get better. That's who you want to surround yourself with. That becomes your inner circle. You see, all this stuff is related and it just starts with with going to a place that's

healthy and happy and finding a way to get better at it to spend more time there I've been in the gym for 25 straight summers worked with thousands of athletes I worked with hundreds and hundreds of dads that just want to get better and they start with personal goals paying attention to the way they think, paying attention to the way that they look, feeling confident in the image that they see in the mirror, wanting to get better, which translates into the relationships

and the inner circle that they have with their wives, their significant relationship, their best friends, their kids. And it translates into the experiences and the hobbies that they have in life. And it all starts with getting in the gym and trying intentionally, consciously to add a little bit more weight to the bar, to force an adaptation and to see each week incremental improvements and a path to getting from where you're at to the dream state of where you're going.

My name is Anders Varner. This is the Diesel Dad. Come get strong with us. There's a link in the bio if you want to schedule a call with me. We'll talk about this in depth. I can't wait to meet you. The Diesel Dad Mentorship is smashing. People are reaching their goals. They're getting confident. They're literally transforming their lives, not just in fat loss, but in the way they think, the way they view the world, and how they feel about themselves. I can't wait to help you on your journey. If you have between 25 and 50 pounds to lose, get in there. Schedule a call with me right now. The link is in the description to get on my calendar. I can't wait to talk to you. We'll see you guys next week.