Dynamic Dialogue with Danny Matranga - 368: How politics can impact your health, 3 foods to eat more of + Q and A

Episode Date: April 23, 2024

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Welcome, everybody, to another episode of the Dynamic Dialogue podcast. As always, I'm your host, Danny Matranga. And in this episode, episode 367, we will be discussing some what I believe to be imminent stressors coming down the pipeline in 2024, Things that have the ability to really affect your health, your wellbeing, your relationships, your peace of mind, especially as we head into the back half of the year. We'll also discuss three foods that I would eat more of and three foods that I would eat less of to improve my health, performance, cognition, productivity. These are not foods that are inherently good or bad, but the foods I'll be recommending are quite health-promoting.

The ones I would avoid are, well, in my opinion, worth avoiding. Lastly, we will get into a Q&A portion of the episode as I will be unveiling in this episode and moving forward a fairly new episode and podcast structure that I think you guys will like quite a bit, whether you are new to the show or you've been fans for a long time. Thanks for listening and enjoy the episode. This episode is brought to you in part thanks to some of our amazing partners like LMNT. LMNT makes the best electrolyte product on the market. In fact, I've actually started drinking my LMNT each and every morning before I have coffee so as to optimize my circadian biology, make sure that I'm hydrated, and make sure that I'm getting ahead on my water intake throughout the day and not reliant on stimulants, but instead being somebody who's reliant on

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Okay, folks, welcome in to the episode. Let's start with some housekeeping, unpacking the new structure of the show, why things are changing, and why I think they're changing for the better. When I first started doing this podcast, it was early 2020. I had gotten all the equipment. I had gotten everything set up. I was going to do this on a semi-regular basis. And then boom, COVID happened. We had the pandemic of epic proportions. It's also a huge influence on the episode topic today, given that it's been almost four years. But I started doing a podcast, interviewing guests, connecting with you guys, talking health, fitness, performance, productivity, and I really, really like it. I quite enjoy recording and coming to you guys in this format. Now, enjoy recording and coming to you guys in this format. Now, unlike many other podcasts, for the most part, I do this solo. Meaning when I sit down to talk, I am solely responsible for

the content that is created. I don't have guest hosts. I don't have people to defer to or people to bounce off of. So it allowed for shorter episodes that had a relatively quick and to the point topic that I could address independently, one kind of item at a time, keeping episodes short and sweet. Now, I would love to keep doing that. However, I do think podcasts are more of a intermediate to long-term medium and 20 to 30 minute episodes are really cool. But I think for you guys, the sweet spot might be closer to 30 to 60 minute episodes. And that will likely lead to me producing these episodes from a bi-weekly twice a week basis to more of a once a week basis. However, instead of having certain episodes that are Q&A,

certain episodes that are what I would describe as macro topics, and that they are big and kind of macro in scale, and certain things that are interview or specific, I'd like to just combine these all into one gently longer, not all that much longer, but slightly longer episode with segments. That way I have a little more structure and I have the opportunity to come to this podcast fully inspired and with a lot more to talk about because I am allowing it to be a little longer instead of trying to produce more in a more frequent way. The reason this helps me, guys, is because unlike so many people in the health and fitness space, I actually still work in the

health and fitness space. I don't just make Instagram and TikTok and YouTube content. I actually own a fitness studio with physical therapists, personal trainers, clients, patients, people coming and going all the time. There's always something that needs to be done for the studio, for the equipment, for the clients, with paperwork, with various small things. In addition to the fact that I meet for several hours a month with my content team to produce videos. I have dogs. I have a wife. I have a home. We have a couple homes that we own that need to be managed. There are just things between my life, my wife's life right now

that make it really hard for both of us, not to mention the care that our parents need, to have the time for me to break away and record these podcasts in an inspired way, which isn't to say I couldn't do more. I do have the time. That's a big excuse, right? Like, oh, I just don't have the time. I think I do, but I don't have the inspired time the way I do on the weekends. And so I have moved my recording to weekend mornings. Actually, at this moment in time, as I sip my coffee, actually at this moment in time, as I sip my coffee, it's 5.54 AM on Saturday. So I'm up early recording this podcast for my once weekly drop instead of kind of forcing the issue to do more during the week when so much of my time is spoken for at the studio filming, you know,

with my content team, or of course, kind of the main thing, working with my online clients, managing our training app and, you know, living a home life. So I think this new format in the show will be great. I think you guys will like it a lot more because the episodes will be longer. And I'm really going to lean into some feedback I've gotten from some of you guys and some of my longest term listeners who have reached out via DM or email. And I am going to attempt to blend multiple topics into these episodes while remaining somewhat respectful. I think in an effort to keep things just about fitness, I become a little clinical and a little dry. And I actually lose some of the passion I have for health and fitness topics by forcing myself to keep myself in my lane, so to speak. And I think

podcasting is a medium where things can blend. And I think if you know me and you know how I think and you know how I look at the world, you'll know that while fitness and health and performance is my main thing and it's how I feed my family, it's not the only thing I'm passionate about. And I think you guys will get a much better listening experience if we blend other things into the podcast without allowing the podcast to become chaotic in your face, hopefully overly partisan or whatever else you don't want being mixed into your podcast. I know a lot of people don't love politics in their podcast or religion in their podcast or

finance in their podcast. And we'll try to stay away from those things as much as possible. But one of the things that's fascinating is when I talk about health or when I talk about some of the macro forces at play that influence our well-being societally. It's hard not to talk about these things. So I think expanding a little bit will make for a much better experience. And I really appreciate you guys bearing with me while we go through some cool changes. Now, getting into the first section of the episode today, I want to discuss what I believe is a pretty big impending time bomb, if you will, on people's stress, on people's health, on people's relationships heading into 2024. And that is, of course, the United States presidential election. I remember when I started this podcast in 2020, it was around April. It was closer to March, but around April.

And April, in most political years, not to get overly analytical and deep dive the political machinery that drives the United States, is typically when primary season ends, where people who are running for a various political parties, you know, kind of seat at the table. It's where that ends. And we are staring down the barrel of usually two candidates who represent the two major parties here in America, the Democratic and Republican Party. And those two candidates will jockey for votes. With the goal of winning the system we have here, for those of you who are not from America, it's a, okay, it's hard to explain, but basically in a democracy, you have the person who gets the most votes wins. In a democratic republic,

like the one we have here, the person who gets the most electoral wins in a democratic republic like the one we have here the person who gets the most electoral votes wins if you win california you get all 50 plus of its electoral votes if you win like rhode island you get like three and the the race is to essentially like 270 the first person to get to 270 is gonna gonna. So you add up your electoral votes and you win. And so without getting too partisan, we have the same candidates running for election. Joseph Biden running for re-election and Donald Trump, interestingly, running, I guess, for re-election because he won in 2016. It's the first time we've had two incumbent presidents running again. Trump, who won in 16, Biden, who won in 20, both of whom are running against each other again in 2024. And I think what you will see, and this kind of brings me to something that

I'm very much on the lookout for, is a ton of partisanship. You're going to see a ton of stress. There's a lot of fatigue. People are not super enthusiastic about these options. However, the political machinery that be, the kind of mechanics that run Washington, the donor class, the political class, a lot of the stuff is already in place. And I know people are passionate about having other options or having younger options, but it was probably always the case that we would be staring down the barrel of a Trump Biden rematch. And I think that this is going to create a ton of stress, a ton of pressure, a ton of partisanship, a ton of unnecessary conflict if you don't know what's

coming and you don't know how to prepare for it. And I want to try to keep my politics out of this as much as possible. I have my opinion about the election. I have my opinion about the United States position in the world. And I have my opinion about who is and who isn't, let's say, morally and ethically fit to hold the office of the U.S. presidency. And that opinion may not be your opinion. However, I'm aware that the opinion you hold might also be different from the opinions of the people you work with, who are in your family, and who you communicate with on a day-to-day basis. And from what i learned in 16 and certainly 20 um having a differentiating political opinion from people you care about or from people close to you can lead to a tremendous amount of conflict

and we are again staring down the barrel of an election cycle that will last from April to November with increasing partisanship, increasing news media coverage, increasing us versus them. And I think it really creates a ton of stress. During election cycles, we tend to watch more cable news, which can be very anxiety-inducing and stressful. news, which can be very anxiety inducing and stressful. We tend to get much more partisan activity on our social media. This could be things like, oh, they're going to do this. They're going to come and take that. They're going to force you to do this. This is what will happen if you vote for them. These people, those people, a lot of negativity, a lot of, again, us versus them. And this is so ubiquitous. This is so deeply entrenched in American culture that if I think back to the way people were acting in 2020, even in 2016, when the temperature was substantially lower politically in America

overall, you feel a ton of stress, a ton of pressure. There's lots of fighting. There's lots of adversarial, let's say, conflict between people who normally would not have adversarial conflict. And that is a very, very real thing. And I think that a lot of people experience election-related stress. They're worried about the outcome. They're passionate about the candidate or the belief system or the value system that they have in place. I really want this candidate to win because they represent this to me. And I really want this candidate to lose because they represent this. And there's tons of things at stake. And this is actually, but I would say, not to get too political, but I do think this is probably the most consequential election in American history. However, I think that if you are completely sweating it seven months out, you're going to pay a price and you're going to pay a tax for this stress. If you are going on social media looking for fights or being fed content that explicitly runs antithetical to what you value so as to agitate

you, you will have more stress. I have found that many social medias feed you either information that is antithetical to your values and beliefs so as to make you angry. An example of this would be, and again, I'm not sharing my political position. I'm just giving an example. Okay. Let's say you are an advocate for a woman's right to choose whether or not she gets access to an abortion. You may see content that displays abortion access restriction nationwide, and that makes you agitated and more likely to interact. And I think that's a great example of how social media is turning to meet the moment. I am seeing more stuff on my feed that is negative or antithetical to what I value so as to bring agitation out of me. And I think you will see more stuff designed to elicit

an emotional response from you as we get closer to the election. And that is a meta thing. Even if you're not a politics person, quote unquote, I'm not a politics person, right? I know a lot of you who say that. I'm not into politics. That's fabulous. Well, it's going to be everywhere. Your family's going to want to talk about it. It's going to come up at work. It's going to provide stress. If you remember some of the buildup we had to the 2020 election here in America, it was a very, very tumultuous period. And I think preparing for that, being able to unplug, having a way to kind of disconnect, limiting social media, muting certain terms. And I'm not telling you to take your head and stick it in the sand and not be passionate about the democratic process, not be passionate about your political beliefs. This is a country where

all of that is allowed. And I think if people build thoughtful, principled political beliefs and engage in a thoughtful, principled discussion, we can move forward. But we're not doing that as a culture. We're screaming on the internet, engaging in shitposting, and cowering in the corner after watching hours of fear-mongered cable news. And that is only going to ramp up and up and up and up and get worse and get worse and get worse. And it probably won't fade until 2025, until after the election is done. And so you know it's coming. I think it gives you time to prepare some things that I would do. I would switch to more written mediums for the acquisition of your news. I know it sounds lame, but things like newspapers or blogs over things

like social media and cable news. I would strongly recommend reducing your exposure to cable news because it can be very stressful and very constant during the election. I would recommend that if you're already engaging in conflict on the internet about this, that you try to disengage. And it is something that a lot of people will cruise right on through with. It will not bother them. They, again, are not quote unquote politics people. They're people who no matter who is president, it won't affect them. And I think that's awesome. I think people who are able to unplug like that have got it figured out. But I have seen tons of increased stress, tons of increased anxiety, tons of increased animosity from people as we get closer and closer

to this kind of societal moment that has a lot of people on edge. And I think you do yourself a favor to remember that, you know, hey, when we go through a collective societal stress, the way we did with COVID and the chaos of our last presidential election, that could leak into your personal life. And you need to safeguard from that. You need to safeguard from the performative nature of our news. And you need to safeguard from the intensity of it all. I'm not saying stick your head in the sand. I'm not saying ignore what's happening. I'm not saying these things don't have consequence.

I'm saying if you can avoid paying for them from March till three months, four months after the election, that would be substantially better on your health than putting your partisan hat on in April and going full-blown keyboard warrior for six months, allowing all of the political chatter to permeate your brain and create excessive stress. We want to avoid that if we can, and I think it's coming down the pipeline. I'm looking out for it. I'm already mute inserting certain things on Facebook and on X to limit my exposure, focusing more on football, focusing more on wildlife videos, and just trying to stay out of the chaos of politics, the partisanship of politics. As long as I can cast a vote, move on with my life, easier said than done, but I don't want to pay for the stress of it all, the partisanship of it all,

said than done, but I don't want to pay for the stress of it all, the partisanship of it all, and end up taking out these emotions on people who I care about, but may disagree with politically in certain areas. So just something to be aware of, not something that's talked about often, but I think this is a huge macro stressor for a lot of people, and it's very worth being aware of. stressor for a lot of people, and it's very worth being aware of. Okay, so transitioning out of that segment, just kind of a macro, hey, here's what's coming. I think it'll affect your health, even indirectly, even if you're not super into politics, but just know the inflammation, the discourse, the stress, the political global tension is rising, and you would do yourself a favor to be aware of it and be like, hey, I'm not going to let this do what it did to me a couple years ago, or I'm not going to let this let me fight with other people that I really care about. Speaking of things that you

should care about, I am of the opinion that you should care more about the inclusion of health promoting foods into your diet. And these are not just foods that promote muscularity. They're not just foods that increase strength and muscle and performance. They are foods that, in my opinion, are clearly linked to improved health, improved body composition, improved metrics of cognitive performance, brain health. And I'm also going to share with you three foods that I think, in general, you should look to avoid. I'm kind of kicking around a new nutritional philosophy. The idea of having a green box, an orange box, and what I would call a, shall we say, red never don't touch box. What's going on guys? Coach Danny here,

taking a break from the episode to tell you about my coaching company, Core Coaching Method, and more specifically, our one-on-one fully tailored online coaching program. My online coaching program has kind of been the flagship for Core Coaching Method for a while. Of course, we do have PDF programming and we have app-based programming, but if you want a truly tailored one-on-one experience with a coach like myself or a member of my coaching team, someone who is certified, somebody who has multiple years of experience working with clients in person online, somebody who is licensed to provide a macro nutrition plan, somebody who is actually good at communicating with clients because they've done it for years, whether that be via phone call, email, text, right? This one-on-one coaching program is really designed to give you all the support you need.

With custom training designed for you, whether you're training from home, the gym, around your limitations and your goals, nothing cookie cutter here, as well as easy to follow macro nutrition programs that are non-restrictive. You'll get customized support directly from your coach's email, or they'll text you, or they'll WhatsApp you. We'll find the communication medium that best supports your goals, as well as provides you with accountability in the expertise you need to succeed, as well as biofeedback monitoring, baked-in accountability support, and all of the stuff that you need from your coach when you check in. We keep our rosters relatively small so that we can make sure you get the best support possible. But you can apply today by going over to corecoachingmethod.com, selecting the online coaching option. And if we have spots available, we'll definitely reach out to you to see if you're

a good candidate. And if we don't put you on a waiting list, but we'll be sure to give you the best shot at the best coaching in the industry. So head over to corecoachingmethod.com and apply for one-on-one coaching with me and my team today. I have pretty much nothing in my red do not touch box, but there are foods that if I eat them, I have a hard time not overeating them. So those foods I would put in my red box. Those are foods that, you know, for somebody who's not going to overeat them, they're okay in moderation. But for somebody like me who has a track record of always overeating them, I don't have them in the box. So like my red box would be honey, mustard, pretzels, and like green Doritos, not allowed in the house. I have never once showed myself that I can have those in the house and not overeat them. My yellow box would

be like things that I'm like, hey, not super health promoting. However, I'm good with these in moderation. So those are things like tortilla chips, maybe or rice crispy treats or diet sodas that definitely don't have a particular health promoting effect, but I can enjoy those in moderation. I've proven it to myself. And the green box is like, dude, these are good for you. They promote health. They promote performance. They promote wellbeing. Eat as much of these as you reasonably can and include more of these in your diet. So my first green box, eat more of these foods, are actually a category of foods, not a food specifically, I'll share my favorite,

but it is foods that have been fermented naturally, foods that are cultured, and foods that include probiotics. Some of the best options for this are things like Greek yogurt, skir or Icelandic yogurt, kefir, however you want to pronounce that, kombucha, sauerkraut, kimchi, and even pickles. These foods have naturally occurring probiotics. Many of these probiotics fall into the lactobacillus family of probiotics that are healthy for humans. And we have microbiomes all across our bodies, be it the skin, the vagina, the stomach, the small intestine, the oral microbiome. All these microbiomes play a clear and definitive role somehow in some way enhancing our health performance and ability to thrive. We know now more than ever just how closely and connected we are

with these microbes that make up our gut. And including foods that naturally contain these products, or I shouldn't say products, I should say these organisms, works better than any probiotic supplement. You are better off eating a high fiber, high fermented food diet than you are taking the best probiotic supplement in the world. And again, things like kimchi, yogurt, sauerkraut, all of them can improve your digestion, can help with quote unquote gut health, could help with gas, could help with bloating, could help with so many of the things you hear people talk about when they talk about their gut. Another thing that I think you can expect and anticipate from having better quote unquote gut health is better immune system response, better immune

regularity. If you take care of your gut and you include more probiotic rich foods in the diet, you will probably have a better immune response in the presence of a pathogen than if you do not. So we know you're going to have better digestion. We know you're going to probably have a better immune response. There's tons of links between gut health and the mood, but I don't want to overstep and be like, oh, if you eat some fermented food, you'll cure depression. Yeah, fuck that. I can't say that, right? But I do think if you eat more fermented foods in general, let's shoot for one to two servings a day, I would say two to three if you're a real boss, you will have better digestion, better immune response. And here's another big one,

better nutrient absorption. The inclusion of these microbiome populating bugs in these products, in these consumables, does seem to have a link to better nutrient absorption. There are some nutrients that we absorb better when we have a proliferation of the right bacteria in our gut, period, end of story. So definitely want to include more fermented foods in the diet. Put that in the green box. And again, your grocery store list probably looks something like kefir, skier, Greek yogurt, sauerkraut, kimchi, kombucha. Those are my personal favorites, but there are plenty more. Now into the red box, we are going to place alcohol. So that is first on the list of what I would avoid. If you have listened to

the podcast at all or you follow any of my content, you'll know that I am social media fitness space's number one alcohol hater. It's really not even a hate thing. I know so many people who drink in moderation and responsibly that have amazing physiques and great health. I do think it can be done, but I think you want to keep your drinking to like every other day or a couple of times a week. And you want to try to limit it to one, two at the high end for men in terms of beverages per serving or per drinking episode, shall we say. But we needn't play about alcohol. You know, it's bad for you. You know, it's a stage one carcinogen. You know, it affects mental health and mood by contributing to enhanced

symptoms of depression and anxiety when you overindulge. It can tank your sleep, especially your REM sleep. It is an addictive compound, so too much can cause addiction. Excessive alcohol consumption is linked to tons of health risks from cancer to gut issues to, again, a plethora of issues for the heart and liver. If you can get your drinking to a moderate level, I would do that if you are drinking more than what would be considered moderate. That would be in the United States, one drink a day for women, two for men. But if you look at governing bodies from around the world, you'll see moderate levels listed at no more than like two drinks a week. So it's really hard to say where the right

line is, but I would say the high end of that line is more than one a day or just daily drinking. I don't think daily drinking is healthy in any capacity. Even if you're sticking below 14 grams of ethanol per serving, I would look to space it out. Try every other day, alternate day, occasional or once a week drinking if you're drinking regularly. I just don't see any positive health effect from this. I think it's one of those things that when you put it in the red box or at the very least the yellow box, you will get tremendous, tremendous health response from this. You will feel better, sleep better, perform better. And quite frankly, you will increase your chance of not dying more than the removal of a lot of the foods people worry about. Here's another food for the green box. Something that I try to eat a

lot more of. Something that I think you guys would benefit from. Kind of boring, but it's actually the old potato. Potatoes are amazing. They're nutrient dense. They're loaded with different things, including uniquely vitamin C, B6, potassium, and fiber, especially if you eat the skin and especially if you eat potatoes that have color, like the ube purple potato or the sweet Japanese yam. You can also look at yellow, orange, red potatoes. There's so many different potatoes, more colors equal more polyphenols, unique vitamins, unique minerals, fiber, partially insoluble. But one of the best things, I should say partially soluble, one of the best things

about potatoes is they keep you full. They contribute a ton of, again, micronutrients and antioxidants. You can cook them a million different ways with awesome, additionally health-promoting things like olive oil, avocado oil, various herbs, various spices. They make a wonderful starch for anybody who's including carbohydrates in their diet. And I think they can be prepared in many different ways and it keeps things fresh. Big, big fan. Number two on the red box list or what I would avoid list is processed meats. In doing some research for my alcohol presentation that I did at the Real Coaches Summit in Las Vegas, I studied the carcinogenic table a little bit and noticed that processed meats is in the class one stage of carcinogens with alcohol, which to me is enough cause to consider avoiding them.

These are things like cured meats, processed meats, jerkies, salamis, bacons, etc. Now, turkeys, salamis, bacons, et cetera. Now, do I think these foods are bad? No, but I am trying to include less of them. So for example, if I was having bacon every day for breakfast, I might switch to just having bacon on the weekends. If I was having a salami and cheese sandwich every day for lunch, I might switch to just having a chicken breast sandwich that I make with chicken breast from home. I actually think deli meat can be a great protein option for a lot of people. However, it is one of those ones that I would stay away from if possible. Not that it's like, you know, it's really not bad. It's probably worse to be deficient in protein than it is to include processed meats here and there. But it is just one of those things that, hey, it's a stage one

carcinogen. If you can get your protein from other places, I would try to do that or spread it out and be more moderate. But if processed meat is the only protein you get, then I certainly wouldn't cut it out. I would just be smart and try to supplement around it. Another one for the green box. Want to eat more of this? Leafy greens, spinach, kale, arugula, lettuce, fibrous leafy greens that are loaded with vitamins A, C, K, folate, calcium, and iron, low in calories, high in fiber, great roughage to help keep you regular to help keep you full. You can aim for a salad a day if you want. That's what I tend to do. Or you can also just include leafy greens and cruciferous greens with more of your meals.

The last food I have for the red box, something that I would recommend avoiding, The last food I have for the red box, something that I would recommend avoiding if you could, pastries. Pastries are again, another one of those foods that is incredibly delicious, best enjoyed in moderation. So maybe it's a red or yellow, but it's one of those ones that when I start my day with a pastry, which doesn't happen very often, I have next to no satiety and I'm extremely hungry later in the day. I find I tend to want these foods in the evening or in the morning and they don't do much to keep me full and they never really stop. They never really stop me from having more. If I have one, I'm going to have like three more. And it's really strange for me, somebody who has a lot of control over my eating behavior, to be so pulled by a food or by a taste. So that's one for me that I try to avoid.

So if you are able to include more leafy greens, more potatoes, more fermented foods, good job. If you're able to reduce your exposure to alcohol, processed meats, and pastry slash baked goods, big time improvement in health. I would argue you'll probably have more energy, better energy, way less calories coming in. And these aren't foods that you necessarily have to avoid. I would just make sure that you have those foods in the red or yellow box and you put a lot of these leafy green potato and fermented foods into your green box. Honorable mention for the red box, and this might be a hot take, is actually plant milks. I have had a lot of digestive issues with plant milks, oat milks, almond milks, etc. These things have

caused me a ton of digestive distress because many of them contain thickeners like carrageenan. A lot of them contain sugars, binders, and they're really high in calories. And I'm not saying that you should just go chug a bunch of cow's milk. Not at all. I am just saying, pay very close attention to your inclusion of plant milks in the diet. It's one of the few things that I think gets a pass for being totally healthy, but it can cause issues in some people. Okay, so moving into the final segment of the episode, this is a Q&A. I fielded all of these episodes, or sorry, I fielded all of these questions from over

on my Instagram. That is by far the best place to ask these questions of me. You can ask me these questions when I post a question box in my story. You can send me a DM. I may or may not get it, but I have a couple of really good questions here from a bunch of different people. So the first one comes to me from Terry Katz hair. And the question is thoughts on TRT bioidentical pellets versus injection. So this is not dissimilar to pellet based birth control or the birth control implant, which slowly degrades in the body to release a pseudo-consistent

amount of a hormone that will tell the body it's pregnant. So for example, you get this progesterone implant, it decays by 3% per day for 30 days. So after 30 days, 99% of it's gone, whoop-de-doo, that would be how that would work. You can do the same thing with a testosterone pellet. You can embed it in the skin. It will slowly degrade. You'll get a steady and consistent drip of it, and it will work as a form of testosterone replacement therapy. But how does this compare to something like an injection? Well, I would rather have an injection so I could time my dose. I could really, really make sure that my dose was accurate and I can avoid the implant of

a pellet. Now, do I think both of them work essentially the same? Yes. However, I know more people who have done their testosterone replacement or hormone replacement therapy using injectables and I am of the impression that bioidentical hormones that are injected directly into the their testosterone replacement or hormone replacement therapy using injectables. And I am of the impression that bioidentical hormones that are injected directly into the bloodstream have some of the highest bioavailability. And if I'm doing any therapy, I want very high bioavailability. So I would go injectable over pellet there. Okay. Next question from MCG underscore any best way to schedule strength sessions four times a week and running sessions three times a week as a newbie runner well annie you kind of answered

the question here yourself a little bit so you you're lifting four days a week and you're running three days a week you can either train seven days a week, alternating lift, run, lift, run, lift, run, lift, run, or you can do the following. Two upper body lifts with a endurance session after, two lower body lifts with no cardio after, and one day of just cardio where the output or the running volume is highest, that would be something like upper body with a five mile run, legs, rest, upper body with a three mile run with some speed work, legs, rest. Final session of the week, long run, eight to 10 miles, followed by a rest day. Just don't do your distance work on the days you train your

lower body. And if you don't want to take rest days, lift, run, lift, run, lift, run, lift, run. If you do want to take rest days, upper body plus run, legs, rest, repeat. That's how I would handle that. Next question from spinning vinyl gold. How do I learn how to let go of eating junk and learn how to enjoy eating healthy food? Well, it's very difficult because junk food is quite good. It is everywhere and it's hard not to indulge with, especially in social settings. Or like I said, if you just go out and about junk food is everywhere. So one thing you have to do is just to accept that. Just accept that the junk is everywhere. Have a real dialogue with yourself about it. Slow down a little bit. Focus on how you feel when you're at a party or

a social event and you see a bag of the green Doritos out and you feel your body and your mind like, ooh, let's go have that. Let's have more of that. Let's keep going back. Begin to learn to have a dialogue when you are in the presence of. Begin to learn to have a dialogue. When you are in the presence of foods, you have a tendency to overeat. And check in with yourself. Check in with your inventory. Be like, whoa, I really wanted to go grab a big ass handful of those green Doritos, but I'm pretty full. I just ate. I have no reason to do that. You have to have a dialogue. You have to have self-awareness. If you are going to live in this food environment and you're not able to have a conversation with yourself about the foods that you are surrounding yourself with, you're going to be in big trouble. Okay. Cause there's a lot

of things working against you in this food landscape. So the first thing you have to do is have a good internal dialogue around food. Hey, I'm going to grab a couple of those, put them on my plate. I'm not going to come back or, Hey, I'm not going to have that today because it doesn't serve my goals, but I know that I want it. I can tell that I want it and I'm going to allow myself to have it not today, but in the future. Um, as for enjoying healthy foods, man, you got to learn how to cook, got to learn how to season your food, got to go online and find some healthy recipes. Healthy food can taste really good if you learn how to season it and cook it and prepare it in a way where you feature more proteins, more fibers, and you get less of your flavor profile from additives, condiments, and just generally hyper palatable, you know, kind

of base ingredients that are really high in calories. It can be done. It just takes practice. Okay. Miss Madison Scott asks, what is the difference between BCAAs and regular amino acids? So the AA and BCAA stands for amino acids and the BC stands for, don't do it, branch-chained, okay? So branch-chained amino acids, BCAA. These three amino acids, leucine, isoleucine, and valine, seem to play a particularly important role in muscle protein synthesis.

And they are named such because they're structurally unique and that they have a branching chain off of their molecular structure. These three amino acids often come from milk and dairy, although you can get them in other places. And because we know they play a particularly important role in muscle growth and repair, many people supplement specifically with the BCAAs because they are essential amino acids. They are in the category and the family of amino acids that we have to get from diet. So people supplement with them often. However, if you eat animal-based proteins, you are not a vegan, you are not a vegetarian,

and you get adequate protein daily, supplementing with BCAAs is effectively useless for all performance outcome measures. So BCAAs are probably best for vegans and vegetarians, although I would recommend they take a full-spectrum plant protein anyway over a BCAA, no matter what. But that is how they are different, and that is what they do. This question is from eguzman143, who asks, how often can women work lower body? I would say you could work lower body as much as seven days a week if the volume is low, but that won't be likely to contribute to growth, especially in strong muscles like the glutes. So I think the sweet spot is two to three hard sessions a week, probably two. And if you're going to do three, that third session should not

be as intense as the first two. But if you look at the programs I've done for my clients who compete in women's bodybuilding, if you look at the programs that I've done for my eBooks and for my kind of current women's training program group, Elite Physique, you're going to see two to three. Two to three leg days a week with low to moderate volume on each leg day, sometimes a high volume session here and there. But for the most part, two to three moderate volume leg sessions is perfect for most women when it comes to growing and developing the lower body. Okay. The last question we have from VNVOVSCO is, can you make a video about skinny fat people? What is the best thing to do if you are skinny fat? So skinny fat is just having a higher body fat percentage and lower lean mass percentage at a

relatively light weight. So you're not heavy, you're not a big person, but you have bad body composition. You have no muscle and you're mostly fat. What the hell do you do when you're skinny fat? Well, the answer is actually pretty simple. What you do when you are skinny fat is this. Train to build muscle, eat a high protein diet, minimize your intake of ultra processed, hyper palatable foods. You don't need to be in a deficit, but you probably should be at maintenance. And if you can jam your protein up way higher and engage with resistance training. This will cause compositional changes to the body that will make you look different over time, even if your weight stays the same. If you feel that you're really chubby, you can just go straight into a high protein deficit

and, you know, lift here and there. But I would just start training like a bodybuilder in a small deficit if you are skinny fat. Okay, folks, there you have it. That is the new episode format. We got to about 45, maybe 50 minutes here today. We had a discussion about some things coming down the pipeline that I think will affect your stressors and external stressors, especially in your familial and work life. We talked about foods to include more of and foods to include less of, as well as answering some of your health and fitness questions. I'd love feedback on the episode today. If you would love to give it to me, just send me a DM on Instagram or an email and leave me a five-star rating and review if you enjoyed the show. I'm sure this will become smoother and better over time.

But I look forward to doing these episodes more than I have before. It seems more focused. It seems more like more value is being transferred in a longer episode than splitting these up into just like a Q&A episode and then a topic episode, combining it all into one. I hope you guys liked it and I will catch you on the next episode.