Dynamic Dialogue with Danny Matranga - 148: 10 Fitness Mistakes To Leave Behind in the New Year + Giveaway!

Episode Date: December 22, 2021

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Welcome, everybody, to another episode of the Dynamic Dialogue podcast. As always, I am your host, Danny Matrenga. And in today's episode, I'm going to go over 10 mistakes, habits, and pitfalls to leave behind in 2021 as we transition to a new year. At the time of recording, it is December 21st. We are just 10 days away from a new year. At the time of recording, it is December 21st. We are just 10 days away from a new year. And I know that often I will harp on the fact that you can create new beginnings, whether it's January 1st or December 21st, right? It really doesn't matter what the day is,

what changes is, whether or not you're willing to go for it. But one thing that I do think is really important as we close out this year is to have an honest conversation about some of the habits and behaviors that might be holding us back. So I have found 10 things that seem to be recurrent with either coaching clients, coaching applicants, people who reach out to me via direct messaging, whatever it may be. These are things that I have consistently seen that are holding people back and that I would describe as fairly common. So a lot to learn here. I'll give you tons of actionable stuff to overcome this stuff. Things that you can do to replace these habits with things that are probably more aligned with better health, better fitness, better performance, better productivity, all of that stuff.

So stay tuned for that. But before we begin today's episode, I want to let you guys in on a little giveaway. So I have partnered with one of the sponsors of this podcast, Legion Athletics, to give away two products of your choosing. isolate protein or the plant plus protein, fish oil, multivitamin, the lunar sleep supplement, pre-workout, whether that's the stimulant free version or the caffeinated version, right? Any two products from Legion can be yours. All you have to do is enter this very simple giveaway. So first I will be selecting a winner on January 10th. That means you have 10 more days in December and 10 days in January. So there's plenty of time to enter. And it's a very, very simple contest. You can receive one entry for leaving a rating and review of this podcast on iTunes and on Spotify. So there's an entry for a written and five-star review on iTunes. There's also an entry for a five-star review on Spotify. That is a new feature. If you listen to the podcast on one or the other, just pick one.

If you listen to the podcast on both, doing both will result in two entries. Additionally, following my coaching company, Core Coaching Method on Instagram will net you another entry. on Instagram will net you another entry. So you can enter a maximum of three times and a winner will be selected on January 10th. It'll be pretty easy for me to parse out and see who has done each and every one of these things. But if you want to really make sure that I got your entry, feel free to send me a screenshot of your rating and review. And I might even share it right here on the podcast. Sharing reviews is really, really encouraging for me. It's cathartic and it just helps keep me grounded. So anyway, guys, you have the chance to win two Legion products of your choosing as my gift to you for the holidays. All you have to do is leave a rating and review on your preferred streaming

service. And if you'd like an additional entry, you can follow core coaching method over on Instagram. Okay, guys, so 10 mistakes to leave behind in the new year that I find are currently hold people back. Number one, this is a big one that I have seen a lot more lately. And that is to stop training through chronic pain. And what I mean by this is if you are dealing consistently with chronic pain at a tissue or at a joint. So let's first parse out the difference there. So training through a pain at a tissue might mean when I do bicep curls, I get pain in my biceps tendon. And maybe dealing with pain at a joint might be when I do walking lunges, I get pain in my hip bone or right in that hip socket. And so I find that joint, soft tissue, and even localized muscle pain are fairly common, but still some things like nerve pain, whether that be nerve

pain in the arm, nerve pain in the legs and low back, oftentimes things like sciatica. These things are fairly common and people just train right through them. They say, well, this hurts. I will work around it. And while I think training through pain, as long as you're being intelligent, is a good idea, right? Motion is lotion. Something that happens way too often is people continue to push through pain. They make injuries worse, and they don't get these things treated. And if one of your joints or one of your tissues is dysfunctional, that is going to set you back. So if you can, link with a qualified professional who has the ability to diagnose the cause of specific pain. These can be physical therapists. That's generally your best option.

Core works with Kratos Physiotherapy, which is our kind of in-house telehealth physical therapy service. So you can actually get diagnostics done on sports specific or weightlifting specific injuries and pain points right from your home with our qualified physical therapist and CSCS doctor, Dr. Brandon Baranzini. That's the best way to do it. Link with a therapist who specializes in resistance training, physical fitness, and athletics. Get your pain assessed, diagnosed, get a treatment plan, implement it so you can train harder instead of constantly having to make sacrifices, constantly having to make adjustments to get around pain. You can also try things like chiropractic,

massage, or any of the different modalities people go to for recuperative work or diagnostics with regards to injury and pain, but it's absolutely my preferred route to go with physical therapy. I find that there is the most evidence supporting its efficacy for this stuff, but in the new year, if you can, try to stop training through pain and try to get treatment and diagnoses for your pain. We all will incur soft tissue stuff or the occasional joint stuff when you train really, really hard. It's a normal feature of pushing your body to its limits. But you should not be suffering in your training. And if you're making sacrifices or having to limit your output, it's very much in your best interest to link with a qualified health professional to get some diagnostics done and to get a treatment plan implemented as quickly as

possible. Some of this stuff can take five to 10 minutes a day, and within a month you might be out of pain. So absolutely worth it. Number two is stop going in to the gym without a plan. Whether this is a training program, a comprehensive and complimentary nutrition program, a training schedule, etc. This is something for novices. Going to the gym and doing what feels good and going to the gym and doing what's available and just putzing around is fine if you are a novice, okay? It's fine if you're just getting in the rhythm. It's fine if you just want to blow off some steam. But people who come to me usually come to me with specific goals. And my first question is, do you have a training program in place and a complementary

nutrition strategy in place to support that training and to support those outcomes. So if it's a body composition goal and you want to lose body fat, you should have a nutrition protocol in place that supports a high protein calorie deficit and a resistance training program with assistance level cardio. And if you do not have this stuff planned out, if you do not have this stuff scheduled, this is something you have got to get figured out. Because if you are going to the gym multiple days a week and spending multiple hours a week in the gym, but you are not following a plan, there's no rhyme or reason, there's no method to the madness, you are shortchanging yourself and you're already investing your time. You're investing your money

in a gym membership. You're likely investing your money in supplements. You're investing your money in gym clothes. You're taking the time to get in the car and drive to the gym. You're investing your money in a gym membership. You're likely investing your money in supplements. You're investing your money in gym clothes. You're taking the time to get in the car and drive to the gym. You're taking the time to train and drive home and maybe take a shower and all of this stuff. And if you are doing that, I think you could do yourself a tremendous favor by making sure that that work is productive. And one of the best ways to do that is to follow a program both in the gym

and outside of the gym with regards to nutrition and lifestyle. Obviously, I have a coaching company and this is what we specialize in. But one-on-one, fully tailored online coaching isn't for everybody. So you can actually head over to corecoachingmethod.com, peruse our pre-written programs like Female Physique 1, Female Physique 2 Advanced,

Power Build, Foundations. These are different programs, all of which have different adaptations. For example, Power Build is great for developing musculature and power, and Foundations is wonderful for developing aerobic fitness, stability, and strength. Whereas Female Physique are more bodybuilding programs oriented towards helping women develop the posterior chain, muscles like the hamstrings and the glutes, and they take some unique female physiological things into account with some of the educational content in the program. So don't head into another year and guess with your workouts. If you are already going to the gym multiple days per week, you deserve to be following a

structured plan that will help you. Okay, number three, as we move into the new year, I think this is a big one that we could all learn from, myself included. We could all do a better job with, and that is not mistaking slow progress for no progress. Now, the more time you've been lifting, the longer you have spent in the gym, the slower your progress will be in most cases. The leaner you are and the closer you get towards your goal body weight if you're trying to lose fat, the slower things will tend to go. The more muscle you have and the longer you've been lifting, the more you try to build, the slower things will go. will go. And something that I often see, particularly with intermediate and advanced lifters, is they mistake slow, trudging, plotting progress for no progress at all. When in fact, the longer you've been doing this, the more reasonable you have to be about the time frame it's going to take to achieve physiological change. When you are a newbie, all you have to do is look at the damn weights and you're going to see some changes.

And that's awesome. And we have all been there. We have all reaped to the benefit of newbie gains. But when you reach that level of intermediate to advance, things happen a lot more slowly, and you need to be okay with that. Acknowledge the fact that all of these physiological processes take time. Like think about fat loss, for example. Your body has to mobilize small, microscopic forms of, you know, chemical fatty acids to be burned at the tiniest subunit possible, and that will slowly but surely, you know, chip away at stored body fat. But it happens incredibly slowly, one molecule of fat at a time. Same thing with building muscle. You have to actually take individual amino acids, assemble them into protein, pack them into muscle, allow that muscle to fully recover and repair to get larger. And it's going to do so at an

extremely slow rate, the longer you've been lifting. This is not magic. This is a slow physiological response. And we cannot speed the body up short of taking steroids, short of taking shortcuts in some capacities. For the most part, as intermediate to advanced natural trainees, whether you're looking to lose fat, even if you're new, when it comes to fat loss, you have to be patient. But if you're looking to lose fat, if you're looking to build strength, if you're looking to gain muscle, you need to remember that it is important to be patient. Now, getting on to tip number four, this is something that may speed things along for you if you've been doing this a long time, because stagnation and complacency and going through the motions seems to be a really common theme that I see with people who apply for coaching or just

people who reach out, and that is not pushing your limits. So I think that pushing your limits in the gym is really important, and I think a lot of people have a tendency to overdo limits. So I think that pushing your limits in the gym is really important. And I think a lot of people have a tendency to overdo it. And I don't want you to hear what I'm not saying. I'm not advocating for only training to failure. I'm not advocating for anything that could result in injury or tissue damage. And I'm not advocating for an amount of training intensity that's beyond what you can recover from.

But one thing I would challenge all of you to, especially if you're into weightlifting and physique development, is to take a week here at the end of the year where you probably will be fueling up on some additional fuel, food, you'll be getting lots of additional sleep if you're on vacation, and take some of your sets in the gym to failure. So if you have something programmed, like let's say you're one of our clients at Core Coaching Method and you have a 10, 10, eight, eight set of squats. So you're going to do four sets, 10, two sets of 10 and two sets of eight. And you'll probably increase weight from the tens to the eights. Maybe on that last set of eight, you take that set to failure. And what I mean by that is if I've programmed for you an RPE eight or nine, instead of leaving two reps in the tank,

see how many reps you can get with that weight. Even if that means you go eight, nine, 10, 11, push yourself at least a few times to failure, particularly on compound lifts or isolation lifts that are stable. Don't do it on things like squats very often or deadlifts very often, but really push your limits so that you can see and assess just how close you've been training to that failure point. Because one thing we know for sure is that proximity to failure and intensity do have a big impact on how productive our training is. So I think it's really valuable on occasion to push those limits, put yourself out there,

expose your body to some stress and see, hey, you know what? I learned when I trained to failure that I could do 15 reps with what I was putting on the bar to do 10 reps. And I need to make an adjustment so that my training is calibrated closer towards the intensity that's going to drive results. And I think you can do that very simply by pushing your limits on occasion. All right, tip number five, this is a huge one. So this is something that I have done many times, particularly when I am busy, particularly when I am stressed, and quite frankly, even when I'm not. And that is preparing food and preparing meals, but not actually eating them.

So meal prep is a really effective way to get ahead, to make sure that you have everything that you need to be successful with regards to food. So preparing breakfast or lunch, dinner, or all three in advance, stuffing them into Tupperware glass containers, having them in the fridge so that you can take them to and from your work, your daily tasks. If you work from home, it's already available. It's a very sensible thing to do, and it tends to be very financially savvy to prepare meals ahead instead of perhaps grabbing them out at local restaurants, eateries, or even just grabbing things at the grocery store. Shopping in bulk, preparing food ahead can be a really, really smart way to kind of put your nutrition on autopilot, but also save some

money. But something that I see happen a lot is people prepare food only to not eat it, or they eat it for one or two days before the majority of the food goes bad in the fridge. So I'm challenging you guys in the new year, if you are not yet meal prepping, find a menu that works for you. Find a series of three or four breakfasts, three or four lunches, three or four dinners that might work for you that you can prepare in advance. And you don't have to always prepare a breakfast, a lunch, or a dinner. For me, it's really easy to start my day off

with a protein shake. I usually have two scoops of the Legion Whey Plus, one scoop of the Legion Genesis, and one scoop of the Vital Proteins Chocolate Collagen paired with a serving of banana and a serving of raspberry, and occasionally I'll have some oatmeal. That is a really easy breakfast that I can have every day that I don't need to prepare in advance. But preparing a lunch or a dinner in advance can really be helpful. So just take an honest inventory of your situation and see which

meals might make sense to prepare ahead of time. And if you are already meal prepping, start eating the damn food. Commit to eating it. Don't prep it, pack it, bring it to work, and then go out and get lunch with your colleagues. Eat the food, make sure it's aligned with your goals, and stick to your guns. Hey guys, just wanted to take a quick second to say thanks so much for listening to the podcast.

And if you're finding value, it would mean the world to me if you're finding value, it would mean the world to me if you would share it on your social media. Simply screenshot whatever platform you're listening to and share the episode to your Instagram story or share it to Facebook. But be sure to tag me so I can say thanks and we can chat it up about what you liked and how I can continue to improve. Thanks so much for supporting the podcast and enjoy the rest of the episode. Thanks so much for supporting the podcast and enjoy the rest of the episode. might be pushing out there, whether or not they are using things like Photoshop or anabolic steroids, right? Our space has become totally clouded with pseudoscience and misinformation. And it's also clouded with people who are completely and entirely full of shit. They will lie to you and they just want your money. And I think one of the best things we can do

is get ahead of that and make, you know, some very, very simple adjustments to our behaviors and our routines with how we interact with these people and how we interact with these companies. And we live in a free market. So where you spend your money means a lot. It really leads to some trends and some changes in how companies market and how companies reach out to consumers. If you give bad people and bad companies your money and avoid doing that with companies who might be a little bit more integrous, a little bit more transparent, you are casting a vote in how the industry is shifting and shaping itself in the new year.

And so I'll give you an example. I've been approached by dozens of supplement companies over the years, dozens of gym clothing companies over the years, none of the big ones as far as gym clothing companies. But I think it's important to, like, let me explain to you my thought process on this. I, for one, am not a huge advocate of taking a lot of supplements. I don't want to make my money on affiliate marketing. I am fortunate enough to have a roster of online clients, a coaching company, and I still work with clients one-on-one and that drives 95% of my annual income. The money I make from affiliate marketing through the partners I have like Legion and LMNT is nothing more than supplemental. And that's why I do a pretty poor job as far as influencers are

concerned of plugging these products. But the reason that I chose to work with these companies is because they're products I love. They're products that I was paying for for many years. They're products that I believe in. They're companies that I think do a good job of being transparent. They put information out there for consumers so they can make educated purchasing decisions. They don't hide behind proprietary blends or sensationalist claims. They tend to be really legit. And I'll be the first to tell you that adding morning electrolytes from my partners over at LMNT might help you be more hydrated, but it's not the difference between having a world-class physique, world-class performance, and being shit. It might make a 5% to 10% difference. And for me, that's significant. But if the opportunity cost of paying that money for

electrolytes isn't in the budget, I don't want you to pay for it. There are more important things out there. Same thing with Legion. Legion does a phenomenal job of putting fully transparent labeling on all of their products. And you can actually go to the websites, see what each individual ingredient does, and there's a link right there to the research, the actual study where these things have been proven to be effective. And I would challenge you, before you buy anything I recommend, to do some research and actually follow up. Go to the webpage, check out the product, look at it. Nothing you guys buy is going to make or break the food that ends up on my table. And so I've tried to be tasteful and thoughtful with the brands and the companies that I work

with. And I want to work with companies that I think are doing a good job and creating really cool, unique products that are ethical, that are, you know, effective and that aren't sensationalistic. So in the new year, much as, you know, I've done this as a consumer too, I would encourage you to be really, really mindful of who you spend your money with and what you spend your money on. And quite frankly, maybe you spend less money because you're trying to make better decisions. And that could be good because you can invest that money. You can spend it on your future. You can spend it on your

education. You can invest it in an index fund. You can take a trip with your family. You can buy some books, some audio books, whatever. But I would encourage you as we move into the new year to be mindful that there are still a lot of influencers and companies in the fitness and health space that are very, very much what I would describe as shysty or dubious. And to always be aware of who's selling you what,

how they're selling it to you, and what their motivations might be. If all of these partnerships, or if at any point any of these partnerships disappoint me or fail to come through on what I think is really important, I will terminate the partnership because the amount of money I generate from having these relationships is paltry. And I'd prefer to make my money from working one-on-one with clients, from generating revenue from my coaching company. That's what helps me sleep at night. But if I take a product, I enjoy it, I like it, I use it, and I recommend it, I will form a brand

partnership, especially if that brand is legit. So moving into the new year, just be aware of that. Tip number seven, something to pick up in the new year and to leave behind, stop forgetting to write shit down. Okay. Write down workouts, write down habits, write down commitments, write down your goals, put them places where you can see them, log your food in a food journal, right? Putting pen to paper or using an app to track things or taking notes on your phone is such a valuable tool. It's such a great way to gauge your progress. It's amazing to have something that you can recurrently go back to. And with regards to goals, I don't need to tell you

that writing down your goals is a good way to push towards getting them done. You already know that. You've heard that from every damn self-help book under the sun. But here's something that works really well for me that I would share that maybe you might try in the new year. I write down a few big goals and then I write down a few sub goals. So for example, I'll use a fitness specific goal. Let's say my goal in the new year is to deadlift 500 pounds. I might then turn that into the sub goal of deadlift two to three times a week. And I might turn that sub goal into the microal of following a program specific for the deadlift. So start with your big goals, write those down, put them places where you can see them. Some places I might recommend are on your bedroom door, that way you see them every time

you leave the room, your bathroom mirror, that way you see them every time you brush your teeth, which for sane people is twice a day minimum. You might put them in the car dashboard right around where your odometer might be so you can see them every time you get in and out of the car. Perhaps you do some of the more extreme methods like putting them on your refrigerator so you see them every time you go into the kitchen. And depending on your living situation, you may or may not want your life goals plastered everywhere where everybody can see them. Some people have roommates, some people have families, some people have, you know, dogs like Cooper who are really nosy and invasive, whatever. But write that stuff down, make it very clear and take the damn data.

I find that it can be incredibly valuable. And that's why even though some of my clients through core coaching method, they do a phenomenal job of logging stuff digitally. I am just a fan of printing out your workout log, taking it with you to the gym with a pen, throwing it in a binder, a composition book, and logging it as you go. I find that that can be really, really helpful. Another thing to leave behind in the new year is comparing yourselves to other people. Leave that shit in 2021, please. I have been horrible over the years with regards to comparing my physique, my business, a lot of different things to other people. And one of the things that has done is it has prevented me from acknowledging some of the people in the space who have been really influential in my growth and development. I look at some of

these amazing coaches out there who have done amazing things, who I have had the opportunity to learn from, and I get intimidated, or I used to get intimidated, and I used to compare myself to them, and I used to be like, man, I'm never going to be like that or look like that. And over the years, I have grown a knowledge base and developed a physique I'm very proud of. But instead of celebrating what those people had to offer, what they had to teach me, and acknowledging that I am totally entitled to learn from them, grow from them, and stand on the shoulders of giants,

I got intimidated and I compared myself. And that has been really negative. So what I would try to do, if I were you guys, is do an audit of your social media. Unfollow accounts that generate feelings of envy or sub, or let's just call it inadequacy. And then if you do have accounts that you follow because they're educational or they're motivational, don't compare yourself to them. Interact with them.

Tell them I learned something from you. That was really helpful. Thanks for posting this. There are plenty of people who probably work in the industries that you work in or are interested in the things that you are interested in who are farther along on their journey than you are. And that's totally okay. But one of the best ways to get through that comparison is to actually celebrate these people. Let them know that you're impressed with what they're doing and that you're trying your best to follow in their footsteps and learn from them. That can really reduce the stigma of comparison. And just never forget that comparison is the thief of joy. Number nine, something to do in the new year

is really work on auditing your sleep hygiene and doing everything you can to make the most of your sleep. Sleep is integral for long-term cognitive health, metabolic health, muscle growth, fat loss, creativity, productivity. We know that sleep is one of the ways we can really nurture and nourish our body. And sleep hygiene has become a term that many people are familiar with. But heading into the new year, I would encourage you to do a few things to create a space that

you can maximize your sleep in. And so these are some really actionable tips. Number one is to get some blackout curtains so you can create a very dark space in your room. Number two, try to keep your bedroom south of 70 degrees, but probably north of something like 50 degrees. Keep your sleeping temperature somewhere between like 55 and 65 degrees. I find that that works best. You can experiment with things like pink noise and white noise that you can play on a loop using an Alexa device. I, every night before I go to bed, ask my smart home device to play pink noise in my bedroom for 10 hours. And it will play a soft ambiance background noise that is consistent with calming, soothing sounds.

Pink noise is consistent with things like crackling fire and rain. And while you could play those things instead, I find pink noise is slightly less stimulating. Something else I might recommend are nasal passage expanders, whether they're the hard plastic nasal passageway expanders or the Breathe Right fabric expanders that allow for a better enhanced airflow to the brain through nasal breathing. Nasal breathing is great for getting into a parasympathetic state, but a lot of us deal with things like congestion, allergies, deviated septum, or you're like me and you have all three. And that can lead to things like mouth breathing and snoring and not getting sufficient actual oxygen to the brain. And when you think about

how valuable that is and how important it is to clear our brain from all of its different byproducts, from all of the thinking and processing we do all day, that's something that you can really do. Another tip is to get a book light that emits light in a non-blue frequency, so like a soft orange, and read before bed instead of being on your phone. Take your sleep seriously in the new year because continuing to shortchange it isn't just robbing you of gains. It's also robbing you of your health and longevity. And my last habit to leave behind in the new year or leave behind in 2021 as we transition to 2022 is to stop planning in the micro and start planning in the macro, but stop focusing on the macro and take action in the micro. So what do I mean by this? I mean plan

months and years in advance, plan workouts out a month in advance or years in advance, plan nutritional strategies, months and years in advance, plan, you know, a lot of this stuff as far out as you can. But then when it comes time to take action, take action on the micro, the actual task to task or day to day stuff. I find that too often people go to the gym with a actual task to task or day to day stuff. I find that too often people go to the gym with a plan of what am I going to work out today? And they end up focusing the entire time on finding things to do.

When if you've planned out your whole week, your whole month, your whole year of training, when you show up, you get to focus on execution. So I think that's a really good way to wrap things up, guys. Those are 10 habits and behaviors to shift and leave behind in 2021 as we transition into a new year. Again, you can enter the giveaway to win two Legion products of your choice by simply leaving a five-star rating and review on iTunes, a five-star rating and review on Spotify, and following Core Coaching Method. Spotify, and following Core Coaching Method. There is up to three entries per person. You can DM me those entries personally if you'd like to make sure I catch them, but my team and I will be on the lookout to make sure that we are all good to go. Thank you all very much for following along. Enjoy your holidays and a Merry Christmas to you from me.