Dynamic Dialogue with Danny Matranga - 361: 20 Habits That Make Fat-Loss Impossible

Episode Date: February 15, 2024

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Hey, everybody, welcome into another episode of the Dynamic Dialogue podcast. As always, I'm your host, Danny Matranga. And in this episode, we're going to be discussing 20 habits and behaviors that most people engage with that keep them overweight and unfortunately, under-muscled. All of these habits and behaviors are pretty consistent across the United States in the general population. So even if you're fit, the people you love and care about probably do these things. And knowing how to talk to them about it can be a really good way to help them improve their health. And even for those of us who are pretty fit and focused on our health,

even I make some of these mistakes. So here's 20 habits you might drop or adjust if you want to be leaner and have a fitter 2024. Enjoy the episode. This podcast has some awesome partners and one of my favorite, of course, is Legion Athletics. Legion is my go-to supplement manufacturer for what I like to call my big rock supplements. This would be my protein powder, my pre-training formula, my post-training formula and creatine, and my kind of ancillary vitamins and micronutrient protection. So why do I like Legion so much? What sets them apart? It's quite simple. Legion uses all natural ingredients. All the formulas include natural coloring and natural sweeteners, no artificial sweeteners,

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a little on the thicker side and you aren't a fan of animal products. Also, I love Legion's pre-workout, but specifically the pre-workout that does not contain caffeine. That would be their stim free pulse. I'm a huge, huge fan of beta alanine and L-citrulline, but I don't like taking in wildly high amounts of caffeine. So if you are somebody who likes pre-workout with caffeine, you can try pulse. Or if you like it without caffeine, because you maybe want to enjoy your morning coffee or monitor your caffeine consumption, try the pulse stim free. My favorite flavors there for sure are the new grape and the amazing, amazing tropical punch. As for my creatine, I get that from Legion's Recharge, five grams each and every

day. I take it on the days I train as well as the days I do not because Recharge also contains L-carnitine, which can help with promoting muscle recovery and decreasing soreness, as well as some ingredients to help with creatine utilization. And of course, my favorite supplements for my ancillary micronutrient health are Legion's multivitamin and Legion's greens powder. Not only do these two products contain a ton of high quality vitamins and minerals, they also contain unique adaptogens like KSM 66 ashwagandha and reishi mushroom, which I like to take each and every day to promote my health. If you want to cover all your bases with a high quality protein, creatine post-workout or the ancillary micronutrient health stuff like greens, powders, and multivitamin, I

encourage you to go over to legionathletics.com and check out using the promo code Danny. That'll save you 20% on your first order and you'll rack up points that you can use the same way as cash every time you use the code and you'll also be supporting the show. time you use the code and you'll also be supporting the show. Okay, folks. So getting into what I believe are the 20 habits that make fat loss the most difficult across the most people. Speaking here mostly about Western adults, of course, these are, you know, the people that I work with, the cohort of people that my company works with in fitness coaching, like these are the things that I think make the most people retain the most weight, which is to say, these are the things you want to avoid if you'd rather have better body composition.

So the first thing, and these are not in order. These are just things that I believe if you change, make getting lean much easier. But the first is allocating too many calories to coffee and alcohol. And I say coffee and alcohol specifically are two of the most likely to drive fat gain things you can consume because one, you can consume them habitually. You bookend your day. I often say with these two things, it's always coffee in the morning. It's always a glass of wine or whatever your drink of choice is in the evening. And the calories tend to add up very quickly. Let's say you have the average latte. That's about 300 or so calories. And maybe you pair that with a glass of wine at, let's call it 150 calories. That's 450 calories a day coming from things that are, if at all satiating, like

probably not satiating at all. They are not contributing to any feelings of fullness. They're not contributing to any feelings of, shall we say, satiety. They're there. They're just calories. And they are quite tasty. And interestingly enough, the alcohol in the evening may actually lead to more food intake, which is like, okay, you want to avoid that if you're trying to lose body fat. But you're allocating nearly 500 calories a day, in many instances, a lot of Americans do this, to just alcohol and just coffee. It is pretty crazy. If you have one latte in the morning with whole fat milk, oat milk, you name the plant milk that you weirdos like, you have one latte in the morning with that and

sweetener, that's closing in on 300 calories., you have one latte in the morning with that and sweetener, that's closing in on 300 calories. You have one alcoholic beverage in the evening, that's like 100 to 200 calories. And you do that every day, you contribute an extra 400 calories to your diet and that adds up very quickly. 400, 500 calories a day adds up very quickly. If it's 500 extra calories a day, just coming from, you know, your morning bookend beverage and your evening beverage, that's an extra 3,500 calories a week. That's a pretty substantial amount of calories you could remove from your diet by simply dropping this bookend habit. And this is very prevalent where I live. I live in a community where, you know, gosh, there's like a

craft coffee house on every corner. And there's tasting rooms all over the place. I live in Sonoma County with neighboring Napa County. And people just love to come out here to be bougie with their drinks, with their coffee and with their wine. And I just, it's like ubiquitous here. People do that. And when I get clients at my studio locally, and I'm able to get them to reduce their consumption of, you know, coffee or opt for an option, uh, like just, you know, espresso or, uh, you know, a standard black cup of coffee, um, or using a lower calorie milk or a lower calorie drink and going to a, a non-nutritive sweetener or flavor. So they're

going to a calorie-free sweetener and then bring the alcohol down. They almost always lose fat, eat better, sleep better. It makes sense, but this is a habit that I think so many Americans engage with that if we changed it, it would make a really big difference. So the second one that I think is interesting, and a lot of people would hear me say something like, okay, you should not drink smoothies if you want to lose weight. People would hear that and they would think, and I would think this too, wait, so you're saying like fruits and vegetables are bad? No, I'm actually not. And I think drinking a smoothie is probably better for weight loss than eating the way most people eat. I will, however, say this.

If you're in a position where you're just adding fruits that you could have otherwise eaten into a smoothie, if you want to lose weight, I would recommend skip the smoothie and instead actually eat the fruit. Chew it, digest it, don't pulverize it into something that goes down easier that is still, yes, quite nutritious and may be filling. Just eat the fruit instead. I really think that will make you feel fuller longer. And I think you will get a greater impact from the fiber when you have to really pulverize

it with your own chewing and your natural digestive bodily processes do the mechanical digestion, not a blender. I think you'll feel fuller longer. And so that's a big reason why when I find out that people are eating, drinking a lot of juice or drinking a lot of smoothies and they're trying to lose weight, I typically say, hey, if you can eat that fruit and eat the contents of that smoothie just separately, what we might call deconstructed, I would definitely recommend doing that. Okay. The third habit I see, and this is very common

here, and that is building meals around starch or building a meal where starch is kind of the primary source of energy. Lots of pastas, lots of noodle dishes, lots of bread-based dishes, and there's actually nothing wrong with pasta and various starches when controlled for calories. It's really just the neglect that the food groups that you should most build meals around, if your goal is fat loss, is unequivocally protein and fiber. To make it simpler, it's protein and vegetables, meat and vegetables, or dairy and vegetables. you plant protein-rich plants and more plants. I don't really care how you build your meals around protein and vegetables. I just think if you want to lose body fat consistently, you need to build the meal around protein and vegetables. It helps keep you full, which is the number one reason everybody fucks up their diet. They get hungry and they can't hack it. So more protein, generally good, more fiber, generally good.

And guess what? Most protein sources and most vegetables and fiber rich foods, they're pretty micronutrient rich as well. Dairy, eggs, many of the plant rich plant foods, of course, many of the meats we consume, especially things like seafood and oftentimes even red meat, they're super nutrient dense. They're loaded with vitamins and minerals. And you just don't get that when you build meals around refined carbohydrate. Not that, you know, pasta is bad. I love pasta. It tastes really good. But if most of your meals are built around like pasta or really refined breads, like so many people who live in the West, their diets are essentially built on just those two things. You miss out on the nutrient density and the fiber

and the protein in meat and vegetables. And I often hear the axiom like, oh, I'm a meat and potatoes person. I like my meals simple. I like meat and I like potatoes. And I'm like, dude, if you're actually a meat and potatoes person, you would be jacked. If you're a fucking hamburger and French fries person, it's a great way to be fat, but it's like, okay, meat and potatoes. Like if all you ate was steak and like, you know, roasted potatoes, the, the ability, those two foods have to satiate you, you probably actually eat a reduced caloric load compared to the way most people eat. And you get a ton of nutrients from the meat and potatoes are also quite nutrient dense too. So I always laugh when I hear somebody say, I'm a meat and potatoes person because my visual of what a meat and potatoes person should look like is like a absolute jacked unit

of a person. Um, but I really know what that means is I like a pretty simple, simple, yummy kind of basic diet. Um, another thing that I think you can do, this is the fourth habit that is very much worth breaking. Um, if you want to lose fat and keep it off. And I call this like setting yourself up for home field advantage. And so, you know, in honor of the Super Bowl being like literally in what it's Tuesday. So in honor of the Super Bowl being like five days away, let me give you a football analogy to help you lose weight. The Super Bowl is played on a neutral field, which means it's not played at the home stadium of either of the teams competing intentionally. Every once in a while, a team will end up playing the Super Bowl in their home stadium, but they pick the stadium before the season so that hopefully the two teams that make

it won't have a huge advantage because they're not playing at home. So it's a neutral field. That's because a home field advantage is good for winning football games. And if you want to lose body fat, you should probably also have a home field advantage. And the number one way you can do this, in my opinion, is by not bringing foods that you have a tendency to overeat into your house. Those are like opposing fans. And you don't want to bring too many opposing fans to your home field. You want to bring more, you know, emphatic, enthusiastic fans of your team, or in this case, your goals, which would be things like snacks that are rich in protein, snacks that are rich in fiber, snacks that you can graze,

but not overeat, more meals or components of meals that you can throw together quickly that are protein rich, fiber rich, and calorie controlled. You want more of those things in your home stadium or your home setting and less of the other things so that you can stay more focused on the task at hand, which is winning the game. If you have a bunch of shit or a bunch of opposing fans in your stadium making noise when you're trying to call plays, that is not an ideal situation. You want home field advantage. You must have control of your home space to the best of your ability. With kids, it's hard. With other factors, I completely understand it's hard, but you want to have home field advantage with regards to the foods you bring into your space. So mastering the foods that you bring

into your home is huge. And so many people neglect this. I want you to think about the things that you bring into your home that you typically over consume and reduce the prevalence of you bringing those foods home. It will make a huge difference in your fat loss. The fifth thing we are terrible at in the West, a lot of us don't get enough sleep. And it's not because we don't know it's important. I'm pretty sure like, like people know they need to get more sleep and they know, they don't know how, or they know how, they don't want to make the sacrifice. It's not like people haven't heard Andrew Huberman tell them they need to get more sleep 800 million times. The reason people don't get more fucking sleep, in my opinion, is because

when they go to wind down, they get vacuumed into addictive technologies like Netflix, TikTok, you name it, and they flush 90 minutes of what could otherwise be sleep time down one of these apps. And yes, maybe they're bombarding their retina with blue light and that's disruptive or they're having too much caffeine or they didn't do enough fucking cold plunges that day. I get it. I think what people do is they make a fairly conscious choice before they go to bed many nights to allocate a considerable amount of time to a very addictive technology. And they bake that into their routine. And then they're always like 60 to 90 minutes short of a good night's sleep. And it's just like, man, maybe you could find

another time for the TikTok or for the Netflix, because, you know, you have 24 hours and maybe allocating all of it to right before bed isn't a good idea because you're not sleeping. And you know what? If that's the only time you get to wind down, then, you know, screw it. Maybe you do make the sacrifice on sleep because you want to enjoy the program or you want to enjoy that app. And so be it. We need enjoyment in life. But that is a huge reason why people don't get enough sleep. They have essentially a meeting for 90 minutes with Netflix or with TikTok before bed every night. It's like a scheduled meeting, laying in bed, using these technologies or playing the one more episode game. And so I think dropping that habit can be huge. The sixth thing, this is

probably the best thing you can do to change your work environment to help getting lean and staying lean be easier is to set a mini timer on your phone or just be diligent about getting up from a seated position every five to 10 minutes. 15 to 20 might be more reasonable. And I don't mean like get up and do Bulgarian split squats at work. That's weird. I mean like just get up and do some extension. Get up and walk around a little bit.

Get up and stretch a little bit. Like actually get up and move intentionally. So you break up your periods of sitting, even with like 10 to 15 seconds of movement, you'll feel a lot more limber across the day. You'll feel a lot more mobile. You'll burn some calories doing that movement. Sure. But you will escape being sedentary for long periods of time, which can contribute to a lot of discomfort and just feeling like shit in your body. So probably the easiest thing you could do to just feel better at work, move more, burn some calories, and just stay connected to being fit is like every 10, 15, 20 minutes or so,

get up and move a little bit if you work in an environment where you're sitting a lot. What's going on, guys? Taking a break from this episode to tell you a little bit about my coaching company, core coaching method, more specifically our app based training. We partnered with train heroic to bring app based training to you using the best technology and best user interface possible. You can join either my home heroes team, or you can train from home with bands and dumbbells or elite physique, which is a female bodybuilding focused program where you can train from home with bands and dumbbells, or Elite Physique, which is a female bodybuilding-focused program where you can train at the gym with equipments designed specifically to help you develop strength as well as the glutes, hamstrings, quads, and back.

I have more teams coming, planned for a variety of different fitness levels. But what's cool about this is when you join these programs, you get programming that's updated every single week, the sets to do, the reps to do, exercise tutorials filmed by me with me and my team. So you'll get my exact coaching expertise as to how to perform the movement, whether you're

training at home or you're training in the gym. And again, these teams are somewhat specific. So you'll find other members of those communities looking to pursue similar goals at similar fitness levels. You can chat, ask questions, upload form for form review, ask for substitutions. It's a really cool training community and you can try it completely free for seven days. Just click the link in the podcast description below. Can't wait to see you in the core coaching collective, my app-based training community. Back to the show. The seventh thing that I think can make a really big difference habitually, if you do this all the time, is really paying attention to the wrong data.

We are a data-fascinated culture now, and I think a lot of people freak out about all these different data points that may or may not matter, but in the context of weight management and general health, did you get enough sleep? Did you eat enough protein? Did you eat enough fiber? Are you eating too many or too few calories? Uh, and are you getting, uh, enough micronutrients like period done? End of story. Those are the data. Oh, did you exercise? Those are the data points that most people should be tracking all the time, not a fucking continuous glucose monitor, which I'm not shitting on if that's your vibe. But like, look, if you're using that and you, or you're tracking your HRV for performance for health, but you're not very regularly tracking all of these things, you're crazy. And trust me,

I know people who are tracking those things are probably also people who are tracking the basics, but you need to focus on the right data. And I often use this analogy. If you're reading all of the movement data from your Apple Watch, calories burned, heart rate, all that shit, but you're in an effort to lose weight, but you're not tracking the calories you eat, you are crazy for that. It's just a terrible, in my opinion, it's a terrible trade. Number eight, maybe if you want to lose fat, don't eat out at restaurants so much. It's remarkable to me the disconnect people have in their mind when it comes to eating out. When you go out to eat, the restaurant is invested in pleasing you. And to please most people, you add as much flavor as possible, usually through the inclusion

of added fats and calories. And you give portions oftentimes that are substantial, which means a shitload of food because people like getting really tasty, big portions. That's like basic one-on-one eating out. Now, if you eat at a bunch of fancy restaurants, you're used to tiny portions and paying a lot for it. That's not my point. My point is the portion and the caloric density of food that is prepared at most restaurants is designed to please most Americans. And guess what most Americans have in common? Overweight or obesity. So, you know, those portions are

aligned with providing pleasure and calories. And if you want to make losing weight easier, I would generally try to eat out less frequently because it's more difficult to avoid large portions. Yeah. You can go out to eat and be like, can I just get chicken and salad? And that allows you to maintain all the social components of eating out. Sure. But it does kind of, it's kind of a drag. Um, and you know, I think I might rather just eat out less frequently and occasionally indulge and be like, yeah, but I just don't do this very often because when I do eat out, the calories are just so damn high. I have to either adjust my whole day to do this. Um, you know, so I would just bring the amount of time, number of times you eat out down, uh, or especially if it's like fast food and stuff like that. Number nine,

um, this is an easy one to fix, Like just not drinking enough water. I know some people drink more than enough water and walk around with their like, you know, ridiculous gallon jug, like a way of my gallon, give me a gallon a day. That's cool. I love it. And you know, I used to get my gallon a day too. Gotta get your gallon a day, like your big milk jug of fucking water gallon of BCAAs a day, walking around with your antifreeze, you know, like you, you think you're cool walking around with your gallon of blue BCAAs, but everybody in public's like, oh, hey, a gallon of antifreeze, that guy's a meth cook. But it's, you know, as long as you're getting enough water, if a gallon a day is the right proxy

for you, so be it. I think for most people like 80 to a hundred ounces is more than enough, but not drinking enough water is one of those things that it's just like, I don't, I don't get it when people tell me like, Oh, I don't, I really don't drink enough water. I'm like, dude, that is the fucking layup of working out, like of being fit, of feeling less shitty. That is the layup of feeling less shitty. Like you will not find anything easier than this. And I, it's like, oh, you want to work out? Downsides. Takes time, makes you sore. Okay. You want to eat healthy. Downsides. You can't eat unhealthy and enjoy unhealthy food as much. Okay. You want to be hydrated. The only real downside is you'll piss more. And it does suck to run to the bathroom

like 20 times a day. I get it. And when you start drinking more water, you piss your, like a racehorse for like, you're always peeing all day. But I, this is the layup of healthy habits. It makes you feel better. It makes you more energetic. You tend to be less lethargic. Your skin looks better. Your muscles look fuller. Your workouts go better. Your brain works better. Your skin, I think I already said that works better. And it literally just means like remembering to drink water. And so that's a really easy thing you can do to feel less shitty. And I think more people should do that more often. Another habit that people I think engage in is they just don't challenge their muscles. You know, I'm a huge

advocate for resistance training. I think it's a big deal. I think it's the best allocation of time relative to return that you can get exercising, but even things like backpacking or, you know, dance or sports of any kind, they work your muscles, they strain them in a unique way. And I think that resistance training is just like a much better way to do it. It's more, you know, approached, it's more methodical, it's more mechanical, but anything that challenges your muscles, even working a physically laborious job, that is good for your body. Your body thrives when it gets an occasional strain placed upon it. It has to, you know, have a reason to stay muscular and to stay strong. So you got to load your tissue and not loading your tissue is like one of those things that if you want to lose weight,

if you're not loading your tissue and challenging your muscles, you're going to lose muscle too. And that's never a good thing. Another habit that people do that just, I think keeps them overweight and keeps them fat. They just don't eat enough lean protein. A lot of the protein sources that they eat are like cheese and really fatty cuts of meat and pork and red meat and stuff that yes, it has protein and yes, it has nutrients, but the calories per gram of protein that you're consuming are absurd. I think if you consume, consume more lean protein, things like many fish, poultry, lighter cheeses, yogurt, dairy that is lower in fat, eggs, egg whites, these things, yogurt, dairy that is lower in fat, eggs, egg whites, these things, the total calories per gram of protein that you're eating comes down and you can eat more protein and you can eat more

food from other sources without eating a shit ton of calories makes a big difference. There's a lot of people out there, like the only protein they eat is like super fatty protein, which isn't to say the protein is less valuable. It just means that for every gram of protein they eat is like super fatty protein, which isn't to say the protein is less valuable. It just means that for every gram of protein they get, they incur a lot of additional calories. So it's like if you ate a salami sandwich every day for a year, you know, versus a turkey sandwich, the amount of calories that you'd be getting just from the salami having so much more fat would really add up over time. And so I think you should opt for more leaner protein more often. Okay, this is number 12, and that is not planning movement post meal. So this is very common in the US. You eat a ton of food and then you go crash

on the couch. And that's a terrible idea. I think the best thing you could do after a big meal is probably go for a small little walk of like 10 to 15 minutes. Help get the food moving around, burn some calories, sure. Help regulate your blood sugar, absolutely. But just sneak some steps in and don't like just eat and then go lounge. You know, I really think there's something to be said for going out and moving. I think, you know, there's always a perfectly appropriate opportunity to eat and then just chill. And, but I really think a lot of us have, have the five to 10 minutes to just go on a walk and shit. If you have a dog, take the dog with you. You know how dogs feel about that. They look forward to it. You look forward to it. You feed yourself a meal. You take the dog for a walk. I think it makes a huge

difference. Mark Bell, somebody who's been talking about dog for a walk. I think it makes a huge difference. Mark Bell, somebody who's been talking about this for years, the idea of, you know, a small walk making a really big difference. I couldn't agree more with that. I think that's that and drinking water, two things that most people could start doing tomorrow to lose weight. Um, okay. Number 13 on this list. This is a very common thing. I, people, people really don't understand how much watching TV and using TikTok or whatever app it is, make you fat or, you know, make it easier to gain fat when you aren't eating and you are like bombarding your brain and your retina with this micro content or any content,

really any distraction from the food you're eating, it leads to a significant overconsumption of calories. And it kind of makes sense. Like your brain is focused on all the different things you're bombarding it with. It's not, you're not paying attention too much to the food you're eating and the satiety you may or may not be feeling, you're just enjoying stimming out. You're slamming your brain with micro content and you're slamming your taste buds with food you're barely even chewing. And if you eat a little slower and you just focus on the food, you'll feel fuller faster. But if you always eat with the TV on or always eat while you're scrolling, you might not feel full at all because you're just distracted. And I think distracted eating does lead to a lot of weight gain.

And if you don't believe me, just try eating slowly and not on your phone and watch what happens to your appetite. You might find you actually get fuller a little quicker. Okay. Another weird habit people have is they just like look at food and they think they know how many calories are in the food and they're like so fucking off all the time. Um, it's not even funny. Like, you know, people will look at something and they'll be like, Oh, I, I think that slice of pizza probably has 300 calories. And it's, you know, like a slice of pizza that you like cook in the oven and slice six ways that has 300 calories. But like the slice of pizza you get from the guy who sells pizza by the slice, that's like an 850 calorie pizza pizza.

So what people are doing is they're just like projecting what they want the thing's calories to be or what they think the smallest iteration of that food's calories would be onto the food. And when you go out to eat or you're buying food here and there, a lot of times you underestimate. Hell, they've studied this. Normal people underestimate by a lot, and even dieticians underestimate by quite a bit. And so people have the general bias to want to eat less and have things be less calorie dense. I get it. So it would make sense that you always underestimate. And I'm sure if you ask people like, Oh, how much do you think you spend at Target every month? You know, if you ask a lot of my clients or you ask the average, like 30 to 45 year old woman, Oh,

how much do you think you spend at Target every month? There's probably a bias to underestimate. Or you ask like the average dude, okay. Um, you know, how much do you gamble on sports every month? Oh, they'd probably underestimate. Like we will underestimate things that are in our best interest. So, uh, I think this is a very common one. It's just the natural under assumption of how many calories are in things. And we don't really do a good job of tracking. Um, Ooh, 15, this is big, not eating enough fiber. It's like, you know, Hey, 25 to 30 grams a day for women, 35 to 40 grams a day for Ben have like four to eight grams of fiber with every meal or a little bit with snacks here and there. It's not that hard. Um, it's huge for cholesterol. It helps clear bad cholesterol, excuse me, by binding to bile and lower blood sugar. Um, it's great for your gut. It's what the bacteria and the microbes in

your gut eat. It's not that hard. It keeps you crazy full. And like you get it from fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. So usually get it from nutrient dense sources. You need to eat more fiber. And that's something that most people just don't do. Um, another thing is like snacking, biting, tasting, grazing, sipping, all these micro events where calories entered into the diet. This is very common. But the problem is like, it's not that it's not the fact that you had like one little handful. It's that you probably went back and had one little handful like six times. And because you rationalized this only one little handful of chips. And then you went back and did it six times. You really didn't account for the fact that

those six small trips to the chip basket ended up being like 400 calories or so. And if you are, you know, like most people trying to diet 400 to 500 calories below your maintenance, well, there it went. And I hate that it's like more true for women than men. Like it is easier for men to get around this than it is for women. But, you know, just the grazing, biting, tasting, a lot of calories sneak in this way. And it can really hurt specifically the ladies out there trying to lose weight because they have less calories to operate with. Number 17 is, this is very common, just going for the most extreme behavior change immediately. So selecting for a very difficult, very challenging diet and exercise routine when you haven't done

shit in like years, yeah, that never goes well. But people do this all the time. I don't understand why. Just definitely better to start slow, sustainable, and with something that fits your routine. Another habit people have is spending too much time like Googling over inspo on social media. Generally not good for your wellbeing to look at a bunch of very attractive people who are fitter than you and compare yourself to them. Doesn't typically go well, not something I'd recommend, something I'd recommend dropping from your daily habit stack, so to speak. Number 19 is assuming that you cannot enjoy food while trying to lose weight and be healthier. You can enjoy food and you can enjoy the foods you love most. Portion control just matters. And because in America, people just really don't want to have an honest conversation about caloric intake and caloric density. And they say, oh, I just can't have that food and lose weight.

It's like, no, you can't include that food in small enough doses or amounts because you have a tendency to overeat it. But it's not the fact that that food makes you fat. You just can't not eat too much of it. And so you want to have it in small doses if it's possible. And if not, if you know you can't have it in small things without overdoing it, swap it with something else you enjoy that you can. The last one, and this is tough, but I think it's true for most people. You have to get your partner on board supporting you. And a lot of people really struggle with this because they just don't have a supportive partner. And I'm

really empathetic to that because having somebody who is on board with your health journey makes it a lot easier. And I think a lot of people who are in board with your health journey makes it a lot easier. And I think a lot of people who are in relationships, they still go at it alone because their partner just doesn't support them. And I think not being a supportive partner or not knowing how to ask your partner for support or thinking you should do it alone or can is really tough. It's better to have somebody supporting you. So try to get your partner on board. And if you are the partner of somebody who's looking to lose weight and get in better shape, you know, help them out. All right, folks, there you have it. There's 20 things I think we

need to change if we want to live healthier, leaner, and with better body composition, feel better, move better, all of that stuff. And I hope you enjoyed the podcast. If you did, please hit subscribe, leave me a five-star rating on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. That's the best way to help me grow and help me reach more people. I really appreciate your listenership, and I will catch you on the next one.