Mark Bell's Power Project - Jay Feldman - Beware of the DANGERS of Intermittent Fasting || MBPP Ep. 852

Episode Date: December 14, 2022

In this Podcast Episode, Jay Feldman, Mark Bell, Nsima Inyang, and Andrew Zaragoza talk about some of the potential drawbacks of intermittent fasting.  Follow Jay on IG: https://www.instagram.com/jfwellness New Power Project Website: https://powerproject.live Join The Power Project Discord: https://discord.gg/yYzthQX5qN Subscribe to the new Power Project Clips Channel: https://youtube.com/channel/UC5Df31rlDXm0EJAcKsq1SUw Special perks for our listeners below! ➢https://hostagetape.com/powerproject Free shipping and free bedside tin! ➢https://www.naboso.com/ Code POWERPROJECT for 15% off! ➢https://thecoldplunge.com/ Code POWERPROJECT to save $150!! ➢Enlarging Pumps (This really works): https://bit.ly/powerproject1 Pumps explained: https://youtu.be/qPG9JXjlhpM ➢https://www.vivobarefoot.com/us/powerproject Code: POWERVIVO20 for 20% off Vivo Barefoot shoes! ➢https://markbellslingshot.com/ Code POWERPROJECT10 for 10% off site wide including Within You supplements! ➢https://mindbullet.com/ Code POWERPROJECT for 20% off! ➢https://eatlegendary.com Use Code POWERPROJECT for 20% off! ➢https://bubsnaturals.com Use code POWERPROJECT for 20% of your next order! ➢https://vuoriclothing.com/powerproject to automatically save 20% off your first order at Vuori! ➢https://www.eightsleep.com/powerproject to automatically save $150 off the Pod Pro at 8 Sleep! ➢https://marekhealth.com Use code POWERPROJECT10 for 10% off ALL LABS at Marek Health! Also check out the Power Project Panel: https://marekhealth.com/powerproject Use code POWERPROJECT for $101 off! ➢Piedmontese Beef: https://www.piedmontese.com/ Use Code POWER at checkout for 25% off your order plus FREE 2-Day Shipping on orders of $150 Follow Mark Bell's Power Project Podcast ➢ https://lnk.to/PowerProjectPodcast ➢ Insta: https://www.instagram.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ https://www.facebook.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/mbpowerproject  ➢ LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/powerproject/ ➢ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/markbellspowerproject ➢TikTok: http://bit.ly/pptiktok  FOLLOW Mark Bell ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksmellybell ➢https://www.tiktok.com/@marksmellybell ➢ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkBellSuperTraining ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/marksmellybell Follow Nsima Inyang ➢ https://www.breakthebar.com/learn-more ➢YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/NsimaInyang ➢Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nsimainyang/?hl=en ➢TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@nsimayinyang?lang=en  Follow Andrew Zaragoza on all platforms ➢ https://direct.me/iamandrewz #PowerProject #Podcast #MarkBell #FitnessPodcast #markbellspowerproject

Pepper, how's your family? How's it going? Now, we talk about meat a lot on this podcast, which is why we've partnered with Piedmontese and have for years now, because they have some of the best beef on the planet. All right, Piedmontese beef has cuts that are fattier in terms of their ribeyes, and they have also cuts that are leaner in terms of their flat irons, but you can get cuts for no matter what diet you're on. Andrew, how can they get their hands on it yeah head over to piedmontese.com that's p-i-e-d-m-o-n-t-e-s-e.com check out enter promo code power for 25 off your entire order and if your order is 150 a more you get free two-day shipping links to them down in the description as well as the podcast show notes hey go ahead got it mine's not as noisy as these guys Because I don't think yours gets adjusted pretty much ever. Might sound good? Yeah, just stay right around there and you'll be good to go.

Don't mess anything up. No promises. Oh, what do we got here? Oh, did we just get more chocolate? I mean, we got nothing over here. Sorry. Brad did not drop anything off. I gave us a spicy chocolate that one time.

That was really good. Dude, back up. So the reason why we have you on the show today is because we want to be able to eat as much chocolate as possible. But then there's the calories in calories out thing and i don't want to consume too many calories and get fat i thought what are some of the things that you found or what are some of the things that you're landing on with uh trying to sort through i guess uh energy and how our body metabolizes energy that we consume. Yeah, so I'm not the biggest fan of calories in, calories out, as I'm sure you're alluding to, but my focus is on energy.

So when I'm talking about energy balance, I'm talking about ATP levels in the mitochondria. So we're taking in carbohydrates, fats, protein, using them for all sorts of things. One of the main things we do with especially the carbs and fat is we're using those to produce energy, producing ATP in the mitochondria. And so that's really where my focus is, is the things that we can do to optimize that process, optimize our mitochondrial function. And yeah, we can talk about how calories play into that. Yeah. And in looking into that,

I mean, have you seen maybe some things that lead you to not be such a fan of the blanket statement of calories in, calories out? Or maybe do you even feel like that the way that we currently look at calories needs to maybe be recalibrated or needs more education behind it or something like that? Yes and yes. I mean, when we're talking calories in, calories out, I think if we want to actually dig into what I would say is the problems with that equation, I think we first have to identify what equation are we actually referring to. So are we talking calories in minus calories out equals change in body fat, equals change in weight?

You know, what exactly is even our starting point? I would say just based on the physics of it, none of those are particularly accurate. We can have changes in fat mass, changes in muscle mass, changes in weight that are independent of calories. But I think there's also a ton of factors that we want to consider that play into that equation, that adjust that equation. Quick question. Sorry. The change in fat mass and muscle mass independent of calories, what do you mean by that? So if we, even if we want to keep it in the same terms, calorie surplus, calorie deficit,

which I don't love, even if we kept it in those terms, calorie surplus doesn't determine on its own whether we're going to gain fat or gain muscle or gain any other tissue, right? Bone density, for example. Because of the activity that's done outside of the calorie surplus. Yeah. Yeah. So hormones are going to dictate those things among a ton of other factors, right? Our inflammatory state, what type of nutrients we're taking in, mineral availability, if we're talking about building bone mass. So we've got a lot of variables there to take into account. Okay. Sorry, I didn't mean to help you lose your train of thought. You were talking about the reasons why you just select calories in, calories out? Yeah. So there are a lot of other pieces to that puzzle, right? If we're talking calories in,

what are we even referring to there? Are we talking about calories into the mouth? We're talking about calories that get digested and absorbed. Are we talking about the nutrients that might then reach the colon and then get fermented by bacteria and produce short chain fatty acids that we're going to absorb? And then what are we referring to when we're talking about those calories in terms of what's going to happen? So this is pointed to a lot, but protein is going to be much more likely to be used to repair or produce tissue as opposed to being used to produce ATP in the mitochondria. So we know that those calories are going to be treated differently than calories from carbohydrate, calories from fat. And if we want to just keep it super simple, if we look at different isocaloric diets, we know that there are different

effects, different effects in terms of body composition, in terms of hormones. And this is something that's, I don't think, particularly controversial. The normal response is, yeah, of course, because different macronutrients will affect other factors that will affect calories out, right? Everything has to modify that equation. It's going to affect stress hormone production, right? And we know if we have a lot of cortisol, it's to drive fat gain fat storage it's going to decrease something like testosterone right and that's going to potentially decrease muscle mass or reduce the storage of nutrient or of like building blocks substrate into protein tissue into muscle so there's a lot of confounding variables that we have to consider when we're talking calories and calories out. And I think to make it, it's just to the, to the extent that if we were to say, if we were to try to make it as simple as calories and calories out, I think we're doing ourselves a huge disservice.

I think it's too far away that I think there are too many variables there that you think maybe it's just maybe a little too inaccurate or what is your, I think, well, yeah, I would say it's too inaccurate, right? We're not accounting for the effects of the digestion, right? How much of these nutrients are we absorbing? We're not accounting for all of the various factors that are going to determine what's going to happen with the substrate, how well we're going to produce energy from it.

And what we do with the substrate can be dictated by how well we slept, our stress levels, the activity that we did. I mean, we hear people talk about post-workout nutrition. So after exercise, nutrition might be different, right? So there might be a lot of variables that could potentially be happening all at one time. Yeah, how much sunlight you get, the ambient temperature, all those things are going to affect fat mass, muscle mass, what happens with the substrate that comes in. What would you rather see people do? What do you think may be a more effective strategy or what is a maybe more educated way to maybe look at some of this so that people can lose body fat?

Yeah, and that's where I think calories in, calories out came in, right? It's a simple way to make some changes. But I think if we're talking the simplest, the simplest suggestion for somebody who's starting from zero, if you want to say, all right, eat whole foods, right? Stay away from processed foods. That's not, that's a very different recommendation from one that I would give to somebody who's already trying to eat healthy, right? I think there's way more nuance that we'd want to go into. But I think if we're just saying, here's a starting place, calories in, calories out, I'd much rather say, here's a starting place, eat real foods.

I have a cool question. So I think what I want to understand is your approach to things. Because, for example, we had Bart Kay on the show, and that was interesting. And Bart is saying that people are only saying calories in, calories out matters. But if we're being perfectly honest about all of it, the individuals who are talking about calories in, calories out are talking about other factors. They're talking about sleep. They're talking about lifestyle. They're talking about a lot of different things.

Elaine does that because I know Bart goes after Elaine. Greg Doucette does that. They do it with quite a bit of nuance, even though they use calories to talk about certain things as far as the amount of food you're taking in. They do pay attention to all of these other factors. So as we were having that conversation, and even as we're having the conversation here, I don't see many people just saying it's just about calories in, calories out. There are some. There are some trainers who are just like,

you know, uh, eat less, move more. There are some, but if we're thinking about the people who we think about as leaders, as far as nutrition, even though they're talking about calories and calories out,

it's not just calories and calories out. So I'm curious. First off, I think it would help us to understand, you know, I know why you don't like calories, but what is your approach? Potentially, I don't know if you totally discard the calorie paradigm as a whole or if you just add more things on top of that. What is your approach?

And then how is what some of these individuals are using as far as calories? How is it wrong or how is it the wrong approach? So I think calories are a useful tool, right? It's a useful way to estimate how much food is coming in. We don't have a better way of doing that, right? Not going to just say I ate a pound of protein today, right? Because the meat is going to have different amounts of water and all sorts of other things in there. It's not that simple. So calories are really helpful as a measure. And I think if I'm working with somebody and I'm wanting to find out an estimation of how much they're eating, I'll use calories. I don't think we have anything else that's going to be even a close second to that. So I think it's an effective tool.

I just don't think that it is getting at the actual issues that would drive, let's say, fat gain. So when we're talking about really any health process, but let's just keep it, let's say we're talking about how to get somebody either not to gain fat or to help with fat loss. When I'm looking at those things, I'm not viewing that as an issue of, and this is the big issue that I have, or one of the big issues with the calorie equation. I'm not looking at that as an issue of excess energy. So that is the typical narrative, is that somebody who's obese, somebody who's gaining weight, they have too much energy, it's overflowing, so there's extra substrate going to storage. But instead, I think there's some really great support for the notion that instead what's happening is that the mitochondria in our cells are not producing energy effectively from the substrate that's coming in.

So we don't have an overflow. What we have is a blockage. And what that leaves is excess substrate that isn't being used. That then gets shunted toward body fat. We end up gaining body fat while being in a low energy state. So that's why we see elevated stress hormones. These are things that come about during a low energy state. If we go for a run, if we go for a workout, states of low energy availability. That's what we see when we're

looking at obesity, when we're looking at type 2 diabetes. And that lends itself to a situation of low energy, not high energy. And so instead, I'm way less focused on taking less food in. That's just a symptom. We're not actually fixing the problem. Instead, I would want to focus on fixing that problem, which is how do we effectively produce energy from the food coming in how do we actually convert it to energy we don't have excess substrate then that'll be going toward body fat and also that'll turn off our hunger signals so our hunger signals are especially dictated by the ATP availability in our liver and our hypothalamus in the brain and so if we have low ATP and this is the state of somebody who's leaning into that you know leaning toward obesity or in that sort of

degenerative state, they're in a situation where they have low energy, so they have high appetite because those hunger signals aren't getting turned off. And then they still want to keep eating, and then they're shunting a lot of that excess substrate to body fat. So my goal is to reverse those processes. So we're not focused on, am I eating too much? Do I need to restrict harder? Is this about willpower? I don't think any of those things are the answer. Instead, I would be focusing or I do focus on how well we can convert that substrate, convert that fuel to energy to help turn off those hunger signals. And then also turn down the stress hormones and reduce the storage of substrate as body fat. So somebody that is overweight, someone that's obese, they may be, if I'm hearing you correctly, they may be like

energy inefficient. Like they don't utilize the energy that's coming in efficiently. This is something that like when I've helped some people lose some weight, I've noticed not necessarily that same thing. I didn't come to that same conclusion, but I did notice that it takes a while for someone to start to lose weight. And again, we don't know exactly what that individual is doing lose weight to be healthier. But I think that you have to get healthy first in order to lose weight. And it sounds like you're saying something similar, maybe said a little differently. And it sounds like you're really after stress mitigation. So it's not that you don't believe in calories and stuff like that necessarily. But if someone plays the calories in calories out game and tries to really lower their calories and tries to go and bust out a bunch of energy,

they're, they're not going to feel well, they're not going to feel great. You're going to kind of bump the stress up and not to say that they're going to necessarily gain weight, but it's going to be very hard for them to gain any sort of traction and to be able to do that for a long period of time. Yeah. Yeah. What those recommendation, those recommendations lead to, right?

If we say calories in, calories out normally, the assumption there is that the solution is to eat less and exercise more. And sure, that might not always be what someone like Lane Norton is suggesting. I'm not saying that he is. But if we just, independent of someone's entire view, if we just take calories in calories out as the, as something that is accurate, then we're left with, all right, we have to eat less and exercise more. And as you're saying, that's one of the researchers who, uh, focus, who has, uh, you know, followed as someone who talks about this obesity situation as being a low energy situation has

talked about that. That's basically redundant. You already have somebody who's low in energy, like literally the ATP levels in their cells are already low. They're already in a mitochondrially dysfunctional state. And then we're saying, all right, eat less and exercise more. So turn the energy down even further. And then you're dealing with way more hunger, plus all the extra stress hormones. Someone's not going to feel very good when they're doing that.

And that's why it's not my focus. Now, you've brought up mitochondrial health multiple times. And we've had a few people talk about it a bit, but we haven't had anyone focus on that specifically. So what are people doing that is putting them in a mitochondrial inefficient state? And then what are the things that can be done? There's probably too many things, but what are things that can be done that you help people with to get into a mitochondrial efficient state? Yeah. So if we're keeping it simple, one of the most important factors for producing energy is we need enough nutrients. So not only do we need the substrate, which is basically the fuel, right? So that's normally going to be the carbs or fat, but we also need various micronutrients, the vitamins and minerals in

order to produce energy. So on the simplest sense, and this is something I think a lot of people can get on board with, if we don't have enough of a certain B vitamin, let's say it's thiamine or niacin, we're not going to be able to effectively produce energy with the carbohydrates that are coming in or the fat that's coming in. So that would be just a simple area where if we're eating a diet that includes adequate nutrient density, that's going to go a very long way, especially if we're eating a diet that includes adequate nutrient density, that's going to go a very long way, especially if we're resolving any potential nutrient deficiencies. That's going to go a long way for producing energy effectively. There's a handful of others that we can dig into.

So I would say that the fat composition of the food that's coming in, so looking at the saturation, monounsaturated, saturated versus polyunsaturated fats, that tends to have a big effect on how well we're producing energy in our mitochondria. The type of fuel that's coming in, carbs versus fats, there's certainly some differences there in terms of energy production. We also have environmental factors, right? So I mentioned sunlight earlier. Sunlight is something that's really great for stimulating our energy production. The presence of various toxic components in our food, and I'm not going to say toxin. I mean, I know that's such a buzzword

and probably some people have a pretty negative reflex. I'm talking about, you know, a legitimate, whether we're talking some certain types of pesticide or mercury or cadmium. I mean, these things are actually toxic and they actually inhibit our ability to produce energy in our mitochondria. We also have toxin production from our own intestines.

So if we're dealing with gut dysbiosis, if we have overgrowths of harmful bacteria, we feed those with fibers that are coming in. Those are going to produce, again, literal toxins. So one of the most commonly talked about is called endotoxin or lipopolysaccharide, also called LPS. And this is something that's normally so potently toxic that in research, they use LPS to determine if something can be anti-inflammatory or if it can be protective. They'll introduce the LPS to a cell, it'll have a defensive reaction, and they'll see, all right, does this other agent protect against it? This is also one of the main reasons why

infection will kill you is from something like endotoxin. And it'll cause sepsis, for example, if someone has a really extreme infection. So we can have very mild levels of endotoxin. It's called endotoxemia, but like very mild endotoxemia. That's seen in obesity, it's seen in diabetes, it's seen in fatty liver disease. And so that would be another area of focus, getting our gut health right. So we're not producing these toxins that directly inhibit our ability to produce energy in the mitochondria. And how do you have people, by the way, like test their gut? Like we had Dan Garner on who literally does stool tests, right? But when you're working with people and you want to attack the gut or see maybe what you can adjust there, what are the ways you go about it? Do you just add certain types of

foods that may be good into their diet or do you go through having them get labs done to see what you change? Normally labs and stool testing aren't my starting place. I'll use those if either if someone's getting stuck somewhere and we need some more information or we aren't seeing the expected improvements from a certain intervention. But normally symptoms are a pretty clear indication of what's going on, at least to start. They'll give us a good starting place. So if someone is feeling bloated after their meals, they have a lot of gas, and these are things that a lot of people live with and don't know are not normal or not healthy. Those could be pretty clear signs of overgrowth of certain types of bacteria or certain

fungus in the intestines, various other symptoms like stool consistency, how frequently you're going to the bathroom. Those are all pretty clear signs that we can use at least as a starting place for gut health, and we can then make changes and see if those things improve. Can the mitochondria be changed or helped or be more efficient through exercise, through lifting and running and things like that? Yes and no. So there are some specifics that certainly matter there. When we, I would say as a baseline, yes, consistent movement is incredibly helpful. So not being sedentary, I think is where the vast majority of benefits come from when it comes to exercise. So just consistent movement. And I would say for the most part, it doesn't even matter too much what it is. There's a lot of research even showing that

very mild activity, things like, you know, physical activities around the house, you know, gardening, cleaning, things like that activities around the house, gardening, cleaning, things like that. If you are consistently doing that and just not sedentary, that leads to huge benefits. And so there are certainly details, right? And we can get into some of the minutiae there as far as certain types of resistance training or certain protocols. But normally I would say the biggest factor is just not being sedentary. And that affects, I mean, that's not only because of direct effects on mitochondria, but if we're talking gut health, for example, and you're sitting all the time, that's a reduction in blood flow, reduction in lymph flow, circulations,

also compression on the abdomen. None of those things are ideal when it comes to gut health. So we have some experience with fasting. I think, and Seema and I, I'm not sure if Andrew still messes with it, but oftentimes we fast for 12 hours, 16 hours, depending on the day. I think Seema sometimes still does like one meal a day. You've had some conjecture against fasting, and we've also experienced where we kind of over-fasted, where we felt like, oh, shit, I think I went a little too far with that. Maybe we did a little too long for too many consecutive days in a row and things like that. What have you kind of found out about fasting?

Yeah, so I would say that it falls in a similar category to me as like a low-carb approach. And so what I mean by that is I think that it's a situation where we are treating a symptom and not actually fixing the root of the problem. So if somebody is feeling better when they fast than when they eat, I would say that's probably a sign that something negative is happening when you're eating as opposed to the idea that the fasting itself is beneficial. So I'd say it's more of a situation where we are relieving the negative or removing the negative input as opposed to providing a positive input. And so my goal there, my approach would be to instead fix the foods that we're taking in to support digestibility. Also maybe fix our gut health, you know, consider the factors in terms of digestion, stomach acid, bile flow, our motility, digestive enzyme production. And then, you know, in addition to adjusting the diet and see how far that takes us. Because

if we're feeling better without food in our intestines, that probably means that we are feeling relief from either the toxin production I was referring to earlier or inflammation in the intestines. And so we would want to fix that from happening on a regular basis as opposed to just avoiding the issue with fasting. And there are a couple of other reasons why fasting can be beneficial. I would say that's the main one is basically a relief from poor gut health and potentially poor food intake. Quick question, quick question. And don't forget, you were about to talk about the other things

that people find relief from fasting for or use fasting for relief from. Anyway, when you were mentioning like you feel better while not fasting than when you're eating, I mean, I could be wrong, but I don't assume that most people pick up the habit of just time-restricted feeding, not eating for 12 or 16 hours because of digestive issues. Maybe some people do. More people, I think, start doing it because they think it's going to help with caloric restriction. It's going to help them restrict their calories and eat less. That's why most people start it. And what we found is that by implementing that habit, because we are all big eaters, like we can eat quite a bit and I feel good when I eat. So it's like, it's not a,

it's not a digestive thing, but the habit of always reaching for food when you feel like you're hungry and feeling a level of discomfort when you are hungry. Right. So you always have to act upon that hunger. That's something that I think is, that helps a lot of people because now they're not always reaching for something when they feel hungry. It's less of a –

I think what he was referring to, and I don't want to speak for you, but I think what he was referring to is people sometimes talk about how in the middle of the day if they eat, they feel like crap and they try to go back to work and they're tired and sluggish. So kind of in the realm of digestion but kind of in the realm of just like I don't – Fogginess or something, huh? Yeah. Sometimes people feel tired and maybe that was a little bit what you're referring to. That's a piece of it. Also, I agree that most people are not doing it with the intention of saying I have a gut issue and this is the way I'll fix it. Some people certainly are.

Yeah, yeah, definitely. But I would say, yeah, a lot of people aren't. That doesn't, I would just say that that's one of the main reasons why somebody would feel better or might benefit from it. Okay. You're bringing up a different point, which is feeling a better balance with our appetite, feeling more in control with food. Yeah. I think, or maybe even from another standpoint, like a challenge, a mental challenge or a separation or being able to deal with difficult things, right? That's something that people will talk to me about a lot about when I say, Hey, you know, those, whether it's the Wim Hof breathing or the cold baths or

whatever it is. And, you know, I'm saying, I think there's some negatives there. They say, Oh, well, how, how else am I, how else am I going to become mentally tough? Right. And that is, we can kind of jump into that, but I would say that's a separate situation. And sure, we can say these things build mental toughness. But in terms of the physiology, in terms of whether they're actually benefiting us health-wise, I would say that one of the main benefits is going to come from the gut side, right? So that's where we're starting. And sure, there might be some benefits to the mental toughness.

Maybe there are some benefits to the relationship with food, but I would rather fix that relationship using other means and basically coming back to sorting out those mitochondrial issues. So that way we are literally in balance with our hunger signals. So by the way, also, so you're saying that a better way of going about things for most people is going to be through eating balanced meals throughout your day rather than having segments of your day where you're not eating food. That is a better approach. Yes. Yeah. And the reason why, so when it comes to the fasting, A, there's the gut benefits. B, there are also benefits in terms of the metabolic situation. So if somebody, and this is extremely common, if somebody does not oxidize glucose well, if they don't burn carbohydrate well to produce energy, this is extremely common, if somebody does not oxidize glucose well, if they don't burn

carbohydrate well to produce energy, this is basically the first thing that goes wrong anytime we have degeneration, we have some sort of insulin resistance. This is the case in virtually every chronic health disease or disorder or issue. If somebody is having trouble with that and they shift over to a low-carb approach or they shift over to fasting, they're going to be running on fat, maybe some ketones as well, and that's going to relieve that problem with the glucose oxidation. So that's another area that's going to bring some benefit to the fasting. Both of those are, I guess you could say, legitimate, but as I was kind of saying before, neither are actually solving the root issue, right? So we're not actually fixing the ability to burn that carbohydrate for energy. In the second case,

we're not actually fixing the gut health in the first case. And there's a major cost to fasting. And that's that because we don't have any fuel coming in, we have to get that fuel from somewhere. We have to liberate it from our own fat stores or from our own glycogen stores. Those things require stress hormones. So they require glucagon, adrenaline, and cortisol. And those, I would say, come at a major cost. If they're elevated over time, they'll tend to turn down our thyroid hormone activity, both the conversion from the inactive to the active thyroid hormone and also the production of the thyroid hormone.

And then the same thing will happen with the steroid hormones as well. So it'll lower testosterone hormone production, both at the testes and also in the hypothalamus to the pituitary as well. So there are major costs to relying on these sorts of interventions long-term. And short-term, even though you might not get that effect immediately, we're still kind of taking a step in that direction. And so I'd much prefer to get those benefits of fasting without those costs, without that stress. And quick question, what kind of time domains are we looking at when it comes to, you mentioned elevated stress hormones and lower testosterone, right? So if a person chooses to skip breakfast or skip breakfast and lunch, right?

And maybe they do have two meals a day. What time domains is it? Because I feel like if somebody, for example, eats two meals, they eat a good meal in the middle of the day and maybe a good meal in the evening, and then they wake up in the morning and they go about their day, it's hard to think that because— It's only considered fasting because we're so fat nowadays because we eat so often.

But eating twice a day is totally reasonable. Shouldn't be stressful. Exactly. Like that type of thing, I don't see it as actually being stressful. Even though stress hormones may increase and someone's doing some work or maybe they will take a walk or whatever, it doesn't seem like it should be so stressful. Even if somebody does that over years, where it ends up being detrimental for your elderly years. And that's just my assumption of somebody going about daily life.

Like that should not be that stressful, even though stress hormones are being released. So is it like if somebody fasts for 20 hours or 24? Like what are we talking about here? Yeah, so there are two questions here, right? First is when are we actually going to see those stress hormones produced in the short term? How many hours after not eating, depending on our diet. Then the other question is, is that short term stress going to be a problem long term? This sounds like it should be a normal thing that

humans do. Why would that even cause an issue long term? So in terms of that first question, the stress hormones will start to be produced as soon as the blood sugar drops. So, and this is, again, we're talking about somebody who's eating carbohydrates. If we're talking on a low-carb diet, it's a different story. So we'll dig into that after if you want. So if you're eating carbohydrates, let's say you have a really solid meal, blood sugar will be elevated mildly for several hours. Depending on the size of the meal, let's say it was a pretty large meal, let's say you get maybe four to six hours and you're pretty glucose tolerant, glucose sensitive, you're using that well, metabolizing well. At that point, the blood sugar will start to drop because there's no more carbohydrate coming in. And we can't go very long with our blood sugar low.

And if it dips too low, that's it, we die. There's very little wiggle room here because our brain needs that glucose to continue functioning. There's very tight regulation of our blood sugar. We're talking about a teaspoon of sugar in our blood at all times with very small changes leading to hormonal regulation. And so as soon as it starts to drop, you'll need to have the release of those stress hormones. It's going to start with glucagon. And then depending on how long you go and how intensely you're using the fuel, how high your metabolism is or what activity you're doing, it'll then lead to the release of adrenaline

or epinephrine and cortisol. So it is happening in hours, right? After not eating. If you're asleep, that's going to happen slower. So normally, let's say we're sleeping for eight hours. You won't tend to have those increases in stress hormones until around eight hours after you go to sleep, assuming you're storing the glycogen well and using it well. And that's supposed to wake us up. So this is a totally normal phenomenon. For example,

when we go to sleep, we're supposed to have a spike of cortisol in the morning. It's supposed to wake us up. It's called the dawn phenomenon. And ideally, I would say we want to then reduce that cortisol. We want to bring those stress hormones down by eating again, by consuming some carbohydrate again. So yes, in answer to the first question, it's going to happen relatively short term. We're talking four to six hours after eating or for sleep, you know, about eight hours after, or, you know, about after eight hours of sleeping. And then do you want me to go ahead with that second piece of the question? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. So I think in terms of answering this question, it's helpful to keep the context in mind of what exactly are these hormones signaling and what's the point of testosterone? What's the point of thyroid hormone? What's the point of cortisol? What's the point of having hormones? Of course, as I was saying, you know, it's regulating levels of glucose in the blood or regulating certain electrolytes. But more than anything, these are signals that are telling our body what is going on in the environment and how to best adapt, how to best exist for that environment. And so if we are in an environment where let's take the extreme, let's say instead

of fasting for eight hours, 16 hours, fasting for a week, right? We're dealing with a famine situation. This is a situation where those stress hormones need to be elevated at higher amounts. And it's also a situation where our bodies actually want to turn down their metabolism. We don't want to keep running at full force if there's no food available because we will run out of fuel that we have stored and we won't make it very long. So we need to have signals in place to turn down our metabolic dials. And that's going to be done through the thyroid hormones, through the sex hormones. And so when we're thinking about these things in less extreme terms, if we're talking just a 16-hour fast, we still need that same signal, right?

Our bodies take that as a sign that there's not as much food available as there could be. And so they want to decrease their metabolic rate to some extent. It's not going to be the same extent, of course, but we're still providing a smaller amount of that signal. And so in terms of the question of like, should not eating for 16 hours be such an issue? I don't think it means, I'm not saying that we won't survive doing that or you can't live a normal life doing that, but I would say that it doesn't make it optimal or ideal. And I would say instead, what we want to be working toward is a situation where we are giving our body the input, the fuel, the availability of a lot of potential energy so that it can

maximize its metabolic rate, maximize the thyroid hormone activity, testosterone, things like that, functions at its highest capacity, and that that's going to be the thing that's going to lead to improving our health and longevity on from there. Almost kind of trying to teach your body to be more efficient with the energy it's taking in? Yeah. We have to be careful with more efficient because sometimes energy it's taking in? Yeah. We have to be careful with more efficient

because sometimes people will take that to mean I should be able to function on as low calories as possible while still being functional. And I would say maybe that's efficient, but it's coming at a cost, right? It's coming at some cost to our function. So yeah, just careful when we talk about efficiency. Have you done some fasting yourself yeah so i uh used to do a decent amount of fasting i used to do ketogenic like a cyclical

ketogenic diet and full-on ketogenic diet so i've i've been there it's been a while but yeah what about the uh like the the whole like the hunger signaling uh something that you know because i don't fast as long anymore but something that you know in sema has talked about quite a bit too is like when we fast we went from oh i'm hungry i need to go devour food to i'm hungry it's gonna pass i'll be fine so for like certain people like shouldn't they at least practice that to kind of understand that when the hunger signals come it doesn't necessarily mean that you have to feast right now. You can probably get away with, you know, kind of certain,

like you'll be fine, right? You're not going to die if you don't eat right now. Yeah, it's helpful to know that as a tool, right? Whether we're talking mental toughness or appetite regulation or balance or comfort with those signals, we definitely want to feel comfortable, I guess, with the feeling of hunger to an extent. But I think that thinking falls in that category of fighting against our bodies, right? So this

idea that our bodies want us to be unhealthy. If we listen to our body's own signals, we're just going to overeat. We're going to eat the worst foods. We're going to get really fat. We're going to get sick. We're going to have all sorts of diseases. And that's the worst thing for our health. And so everything we need to do has to be oriented around fighting against those instincts so that we can be healthy. And I don't think that that's the case. I don't think we want to be looking at our hunger signals

as something to resist or something to ignore, but rather to look at them as information. And in somebody who's in a very dysfunctional state or like very degenerated state, but rather to look at them as information. And in somebody who's in a very dysfunctional state or that like very degenerated state, we have to be careful for sure. I'm not saying just go full on, listen to what, whatever those signals are and eat to your heart's content. I think that can certainly cause some problems, but I think we want to keep in mind that those hunger signals are there because there's a lack of energy. And so we don't want to ignore that, fight against it.

We don't want to rely on those stress hormones. I would say that we want to listen to that, but we also just want to make sure that we are responding to it appropriately. So if we respond to it by then consuming a donut, which I think there are so many issues with that, things that aren't going to lead to efficient mitochondrial respiration, that's not going to be conducive toward turning those hugging signals down. It's not going to be conducive toward our health. So that is... It's going to taste good. It is going to taste good. We got all our minds shifted on donuts right now.

Well, because that's what I was literally going to ask you next. Context definitely matters because like, oh, Jay just said I should pay attention to these hunger signals, but I just ate a chocolate bar or i ate a donut and oh man i'm really hungry because my body's telling me it needs more nutrients or whatever even though they don't say that but right so like what you're saying is like after a chicken breast if you're still hungry you probably should maybe some more yeah yeah and i i lived that like i lived that he's diving into some dark chocolate. Yeah, he said to eat.

So I might as well. I actually have some hunger signals going off right now. I think I need to dip into some chocolate. I'm supporting this theory. It's great. Sorry to derail you. And Seema's not on board yet. I'm not hungry yet.

No. You're. Oh, I thought you were still. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I've been there. Like I've lived that and I've lived the calorie equation, right? I've lived that situation where I, because I wasn't orienting what I was doing

toward maximizing mitochondrial function and energy production, I was left in that state where if I tuned into my hunger signals and followed them, I would then gain weight and I wouldn't feel as good. And it would lead to me not feeling my best, right? And with that shift in perspective, and we can talk about, like I'm not saying like there's some magical thing, right? I'm talking about, you know, certain dietary changes or changes to our environment. But now I am in a situation where I can listen to those hunger signals and they actually turn off when I've given my body what I feel like it needs or what I think it's telling me it needs.

And I can live in balance with that and I don't have to constantly feel that restriction and that drive and use the willpower to fight against it. And just real quick, yeah, to finish that thought. I've worked with a lot of clients who are in that same boat. So they might've thought that they had a sugar addiction or a food addiction or that they were overweight because they wouldn't stop eating, right? They would have the first scoop of, or spoon of the Haagen-Dazs and then they're going to finish the whole pint. You know, there's no stopping, right? I chose Haagen-Dazs. Not Ben & Jerry's. They don't know what's going on, man. Anyway, sorry.

Haagen-Dazs doesn't have the gums. That's true. That's true. But yeah, so I've worked with people like that. And I've felt that way myself. I've gone through that binge restrict cycle absolutely in huge binges right i mean you know it would be one one brownie and then it would be 10 it could be the whole the whole pan or the whole loaf of banana bread or whatever it was um but after getting somebody to a situation where they are

actually efficiently converting the fuel that's coming in into energy those signals actually turn off when they're consuming the foods that they're that i would say we are ideally meant to be eating they are then actually able to get to that point where they take a spoon of the ice cream and they take a couple more, but then they stop. They don't feel like they want more. It's not a willpower situation. It's not a restriction situation. It's a situation where the hunger signals are actually then turning off and they're able to put it back. And it's not based on how full you are. It's not based on filling up on a ton of protein and salad and drinking a ton of water so that you're physically full. It's based on the actual physiological signal in terms of ATP levels that dictate our hunger. And so that's, and again, I've had people

who, this was their whole life, right? They're like nearly crying when they're talking to me and saying, I had a bite of the pie or the cake at my kid's birthday party, and I didn't even finish the piece. I didn't feel out of control. I didn't feel like I needed to eat multiple pieces. I was just able to have a couple bites, and there's such freedom that comes from that. So that's the perspective or the goal that I have when it comes to hunger as opposed to finding ways where we can resist that signal better.

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You guys really do need to try these. You guys got to head over to eatlegendary.com and at checkout, enter promo code POWERPROJECT to save 20% off your entire order. Links to them down in the description as well as the podcast show notes. So this is an interesting thing because as you're actually talking about that, it reminded me of a conversation. We had Bill Maeda on the podcast recently. thing because as you're actually talking about that it reminded me of a conversation we had bill maeda on the podcast recently and bill talked about a situation where he would and he still does this where when he eats food it's like his body just like swallows up this is what happens and like i think all of us here too like when we eat um we literally will get a pump and then we

like we you know we can go do something but we not like, I don't physically feel tired after I eat food. My body knows what to do with the nutrients that are coming in. But I also think like there's a, there's a, there's a line here when it comes to the fasting stuff, because fasting isn't anything that we do every single day. There are days that we'll eat in the morning because we feel like we need to eat in the morning. And then there are other days where we just don't feel like we need to eat in the morning or the afternoon and we'll have one meal on a certain day. It's not like, oh, you have to fast for 16 hours every single day.

We did that in the beginning. But now there's like a balance between certain days when we feel like we need to eat in the morning and we need to have meals during the day. We'll do that. And certain days you just don't feel that way. Right? So what I wonder here is there definitely can be benefits to fasting, but do you think that you shouldn't be doing any type of intermittent fasting, that it's a more ideal situation to stay away from that and more so eat two, three, more three meals throughout the day? And there's no, you don't think that fasting is beneficial at all. Or there's just a much better way than utilizing any intermittent fasting. Because from what it sounds like, from what you've said, it sounds like you can fast, but this is a much better way to do things and you don't need to fast at all. Yeah, that is more of the position I would take. So just so I'm making sure I understand, when you are fasting, is it just because you wake up and you're not hungry? Is there any intentionality behind it going into it where you're already saying, all right, I'm going to fast for part of the day tomorrow? What's the context?

where like I've lifted and I've done jujitsu the day before. Okay. And then I've had a meal and then I wake up the next morning, but I still feel good. Like I don't actually feel hungry anymore. That's one thing that's been a shift throughout the past few years is that in the past when I was, you know, I was focused on tracking my calories and hitting a certain number during the day, but I'd also eat throughout the day. I'd wake up always hungry. It's like, I must eat breakfast, right? I have to, I never woke up and was comfortable with, I'm good. I can go podcast and work out and do all that shit. But there are certain days I wake up and I just don't feel the drive, the needs to eat. But also at the same time, my energy is great throughout the day. Like I haven't eaten today. I'm good. I did a little bit of work outside. We've walked around, we've podcasted. I feel no drive

right now. I will after I work out today, right? But I don't feel low energy and I'm going to eat a big meal. And then probably tomorrow I'm going to assume that I'm probably going to end up eating two meals, right? So it's interesting because in the past, again, I was someone who had a massive drive to eat all the time, you know? And now now I could eat, I could take a bite of that, but I feel no drive to. My signals for hunger have adjusted. And now it's quite easy to maintain a body composition, my physical activity, my mental clarity.

And it's not because fasting is magic, but my habits towards food has changed because of utilizing a bit of intermittent fasting here and there. It could be habitual. It could also be physiological, right? So I think I want to come back to this idea that your hunger signals have adjusted and now you're not as hungry as before. Or it could be that just my perception of those signals has changed. Like maybe those signals are still there, but I don't perceive it as being a stress to now go eat. So I want to bookmark that real quick. So when you said that yesterday, this was the example, right? So yesterday you worked out and did BJJ. Yeah.

And then was, you then ate a very large meal. So that's why you're not hungry. I had a good meal afterwards. And I also had a little bit of a meal beforehand because I knew I couldn't eat that much after jujitsu. Okay. So the feeling is that you ate a larger meal than normal last night. So that's why you're less hungry today. Is that, is that where you're getting? It was, no, what I was getting at was that like, for example, I didn't feel a need to eat this morning. I did eat a good amount yesterday, but I'm not, my choice to not eat in the morning wasn't because, oh, I can just go without eating, even though I'm hungry. It's just, I'm not that hungry. So I don't need to eat. You know what I mean? Whereas like, let's use an example. Sometimes people fall into a habit of,

I need to eat breakfast. I need to eat this, I need a snack. And even without there being a drive to eat, because there's a habit there, they'll choose to just eat. Yeah, I think the vast majority of time, of course, it's not always. I think the vast majority of the time, it's not actually habitual. It's that there is an actual signal there to eat. I think if that signal is not there, we won't eat, even if it's habitual. I don't think we will override that signal very much. I think instead we might say, I'm still kind of full for my last meal.

This is someone who may be struggling on the digestion side or their metabolism is lower and so they aren't going through their food as fast. And they'll say, I'm still full from the last meal, so I shouldn't eat. I'm just eating out of habit. But I think what's actually happening is there is a hunger signal because they are struggling in terms of their energy production. And so they do actually have a drive to eat. They're just not eating the right things. And so they're in a situation where they're constantly full, constantly quote overeating for their needs, but it's because their needs are artificially low and their signals are artificially high because they're not actually

using the food that's coming in very well. I have a question for you real quick about the habit thing, because for some individuals, there are cues that then lead them to eat. For example, watching a movie with the family at home. Some people are like, I usually have some dessert with this, or they go to a movie theater, or they're just chilling at home and they start watching TV. Then they usually hit the fridge, even though at that moment in time they're not hungry there are certain daily cues i'm driving back home from a stressful day at work not truly hungry but there's fucking mcdonald's that i go to all the time where i get that double cheeseburger that i really enjoy you might not actually feel really hungry but your habit is to go and eat that food at that point in

time so you follow through with the qc mcdonald's routine Go in there and get my fucking food. Reward. Oh, it's a juicy fucking, you know, whatever, right? So I do think that some of these can be habits. Sans feeling actually hungry. I think they can be. I think that can be in piece of it.

But so when you're... I would put that in a category of being stress-related is what I would think. That's someone's way of mitigating their stress yes when they didn't need to stop at mcdonald's for any reason sure ever the other thing too so when we're when we're five brownies in when we're halfway into the brownie tin at that point are we eating out of habit or out of hunger? Addiction.

Sometimes that shit just tastes good. And even though you're like, I don't need any more, you're like, I want to eat more. So is that the same as somebody who's going to McDonald's? They're in that same situation. They don't need to eat, but they're just going to do it because it tastes good. Would you say that that's pretty parallel?

Well, one thing, Mark actually, like he just mentioned this, but for some people, that food makes you feel better even though you're not mitigating hunger. It makes you feel, I felt good eating Ben and Jerry's even though I didn't need the Ben and Jerry's at that point in time. It just tastes great. But what's the physiology underpinning feeling good? It's not just like Ben and Jerry's. There's a Ben and Jerry's receptor inside that goes off when you consume Ben and Jerry's. There is a Ben and Jerry's receptor inside that goes off when you consume Ben and Jerry's. There is Ben and Jerry's receptor.

There is. There's also hyper-palatability of that food. But that still is working through chemical signals. And that changes, right? When you're 10 brownies in, it doesn't taste as good anymore. So, that's very true. Maybe for you. They have a higher threshold. It's more like 25 brownies. Then they'll'll be like the 26th one

is just a little bit less good gotcha i'll bump up my numbers yeah forgot who i'm talking to so the point that i'm getting at is i think behavior is a piece i just think it's a much uh it's a overemphasized piece and i think the physiology is the larger piece and i think it's the underemphasized piece okay and i think we're very quick to blame overeating or eating bad foods on habits, on availability, on hyperpalatability. I don't think those things don't matter at all. Obviously, if it wasn't available, then there's no option to consume it. But I think the vast majority of the time, the dysregulation of hunger is physiological and it's coming down to that energy availability. And so that person who is, whether they're going to binge on whatever it is

or they're going to mcdonald's to eat or they're just eating their breakfast because it's habitual i would argue that the signal is still there to eat they haven't actually quenched that signal but they are thinking they aren't particularly um i want to say, like they might be rather full still, right? Like you could eat a whole salad and still want to eat after. And I don't think that's because of a habit. I think it's because you're not actually quenching the physiological signal. Okay. Was there more you were, because I know you noted some things from what we were saying.

Yeah. So to circle back, you had mentioned that you felt like your hunger signals had adjusted with fasting. And so I'm not necessarily saying this is, this is what is going on here, but I have a lot of people that I work with who are coming from low carb or coming from fasting and they have similar experiences where their appetite goes down over time. I'm not necessarily saying. I'm also not low carb too. Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And again, yeah, I'm not saying this- I'm also not low carb too. Right, right, right. Yeah. Yeah. And again, yeah, I'm not saying this is necessarily happening for you.

It could be a piece of what's happening though. When we do that and we do, like these are states where we have to rely on those stress hormones. When you're not eating in the morning, and this is kind of what I was talking about earlier. Yeah. If we have dinner

and then we don't eat until lunch the next day, I don't think there's any way to get around that the stress hormones are what are propelling us forward. Those are what's providing the fuel since not coming exogenously. That's what's driving the energy production. Over time, as I was saying, that will turn down thyroid hormone production, thyroid hormone conversion. It'll turn down sex steroid hormone production. And those things are going to lower our appetite. Like the decrease in our metabolic rate will go along with decreased appetite. And so there's a couple things to consider.

One is I think if somebody wakes up and they aren't used to eating breakfast, or if they are in a state where they're very high in stress hormones, sometimes having something very small to decrease the stress hormones will bring that appetite up. I would say that's a good thing. A lot of people are trying not to do that. But instead, I would say if you just have a little bit of fruit or a little bit of fruit juice, that will drop. That's going to be the quickest way to drop those stress hormones. Drop that cortisol down and can stimulate your appetite. I would say that's what we would want to move toward. I would say that is more ideal than skipping the meal because that's going to

encourage our bodies to increase their metabolic rate. That's going to provide that signal of energy availability of a very abundant environment. And that would be the environment that we would want to work toward. So there may be an aspect of that going on with you, Encima, or it could be just an independent phenomenon that I'm seeing elsewhere. But that is a common thing that happens when somebody is relying on those stress hormones over time. This theory is really inconvenient because someone's got to drive to work and they got to probably bring some Tupperware with them, they got to pack their food. Because sometimes what we share is like, hey, instead of trying to figure out what to eat with your coworkers, how about you just fast

right through it? It's true. It is inconvenient inconvenient but so is exercise right so is sleeping eight plus hours a night like we do those things in the name of health but we don't think if we aren't thinking of eating consistently and consistently nourishing ourselves as healthy then yeah it's an inconvenience but instead if we're thinking that this is something that we're putting effort toward because it's supporting us i think it makes it much easier to uh digest pun intended how long you've been messing around with some MMA type stuff? So I started boxing. I started wrestling in high school and boxing as well and a little bit of kickboxing. And then in college, I did Muay Thai for a couple of years. And then afterward, I did Muay Thai again for a couple of years. It it's been on and off especially recently i've been traveling through latin america and uh staying in some small towns and so there's

not a lot of training facilities there but uh yeah so it's been it's been a while i guess so i started boxing and wrestling when i think i was 15 or 16 are you still pretty active with it or not as much as i can be i'm never i'm not trying to uh go professional or anything like that. So for me, it's more— How have you felt previously doing keto and fasting versus how do you feel now? Yeah, that's a great question. So just to answer as well— Because, I mean, there's a high energy output with that kind of activity. Totally, yeah.

And so normally for me, it's a twice-a-week thing because I enjoy the sport, I enjoy building the skill, and I like the movement. It's very stimulating. But so when I was keto and fasting in that place, and this was something I didn't realize till after, but I was, so I was lifting a lot at that point. I was doing some power lifting. Um, at that point I was off from MMA and Muay Thai at the time. So I wasn't doing any, any striking or, or martial arts. And, uh, so what, what I realized after, after bringing carbs in, in much higher amounts, after eating a lot more food, doing a lot of things to increase my metabolic, my metabolic rate is I found that I had much more of a desire to expend energy. So looking back when I would,

whether it's performing, you know, let's say I'm doing a squat, it would, I would whether it's performing you know let's say I'm doing a squat it would I would put as much effort in as I needed to get up but there was a part of me that didn't want to expend that energy so there's always a bit of a fight there and there's always just enough to to complete the repetition of whatever it was that I was doing whether it's a sprint or lift or anything like that and I felt a major shift once I moved away from those approaches, started bringing lots of carbohydrates in among other things, uh, to where I actually had a really strong desire to explode, to use energy, uh, throughout all my movements, but including in, uh, you know, kickboxing, Muay Thai and things like that. That was a pretty major shift for me.

Cool. So, uh, you, you were mentioning how some people take these approaches as challenges, right? I wouldn't say that we do it mainly as a challenge, but there is an aspect of it that does feel good not being, I guess, subservient to your physiology. I guess, subservient to your physiology in, in, in the term that like, you know, when you before, right. Some people feel like, okay, I have to eat this at this time, or I have to do this before I work out. Now we all still get really great workouts, but we're not always eating before we work out. Um, so I wonder is the perception of stress, would you just say that they're just much better ways to be able to perceive stress better or in a healthier way rather than obviously utilizing fasting or cold, as you mentioned, or heat or anything like that?

Because I do think that the physiology aspect, as you were talking about, is a big deal. But I really do think that people's habits, when it does come to dealing with stress, if they could deal with stress better, there would probably be an improvement of how they approach food or how they approach exercise or how they, you know, I don't know. My perception of stress isn't a negative thing. You know what I mean? I perceive stress as growth and it's not like I'm saying because of that, I'm going to fast for 48 hours. No, but just not feeling again, subservient to the physiology. I think that's a pretty cool piece, but you were mentioning before how that's probably a negative.

that's probably a negative yeah because i also because i want to mention like i know you're mentioning how you know if you if you don't eat during the day certain stress hormones go up or whatever for some people that may make them freak out and that actually may make them physically they'll feel very uncomfortable but again at this point i can speak for myself but mark probably speak for himself i don't feel bothered at all dude like it's it's weird a few years ago i would have never thought that i could feel this way or that i would be doing anything like this but a few years ago i'd be fucking stuff in my mouth when i feel a little bit hungry right don't feel shit now and every and again activities everything's good so i'm just wondering what your thoughts are on that general on that general idea yeah and as far as activity i know like you are feeling good i would certainly be curious to see if what sort of changes we are seeing hormonally

what sort of things we are seeing on paper obviously it sounds like you're feeling very good in terms of libido and focus and all of that. So that's great. And I think it's interesting that you mentioned it that way because there's certainly a piece of that, right? Being able to have some resilience, being able to know that if the situation is not ideal, you can get through it. I think that there's value in that. I think there's also value in being able to feel like you have some control over how you feel, your can get through it. I think that there's value in that. I think there's also value in being able to feel like you have some control over how you feel, your mood, your physiology. So for me, one of the most impactful things was recognizing that the stress hormones and carbohydrates tend to be in opposition of each other. Our blood sugar goes down, our stress

hormones go up to maintain that blood sugar. We take some carbs in, that's the fastest way to drop those stress hormones down. That was liberating for me to recognize that that feeling of hanger, that if my mood was off, if, you know, an inability to focus, any of those things could be resolved by actually providing myself some nutrients. I mean, that was something that completely changed my viewpoint of nutrition. I never recognized how dramatically the way that I felt could be affected by the things that I was doing, the things that were going on in my environment. So that was also very empowering and felt like it added, I guess, in some way, resilience with tools for me. But at the same time, I don't know if it's such a bad thing to feel the stress of stress. And so this is kind of what I was over,

what I was alluding to earlier, which is that if we get to a point where we're so accustomed to stress, if that is the place that our body's in, let's say we're going to the extreme of low carb plus fasting, uh, plus calorie restriction. And we're like, yeah,

I can go forever without eating. You know, I feel fine. I feel- I eat air. Right. Yeah, yeah. Breathe air in.

I think that we're doing ourselves a huge disservice. We should feel when we're stressed. We should, we also, if we want to work on our resilience and our ability to deal with that and work through it, that's great, right? Mental toughness, if that's something you want to work on, by all means. But I think we don't want to become numbed to the signals that our body is giving us that are saying, hey, just so you know, I'm turning those dials down right now.

That's the environment you're giving me, so that's what I'm going to do. I don't think we want to become numbed to those signals. What about the – I don't know if there's any research behind it. It's maybe anecdotal. Like, I don't know if there's any research behind it. It's maybe anecdotal. It's for sure for me. The cognitive benefit of fasting is, would you say that that's more of a digestion thing if I feel foggy after I eat?

And then if I don't eat, I'm kind of like, wow, today's a good day. Yeah, yeah. So that would be one of those two things. So one would be, again, relief from any sort of digestive issues that could be driving the brain fog when you do eat. There could be other things driving the brain fog when you do eat. Maybe we're talking about not getting a high enough carb to protein ratio in with the meal. And that's, you know, leading to elevated stress hormones or something like that. So there's a couple of pieces that could be there.

The other piece is the stress hormone piece. It feels good. So if you've ever had a cup of coffee, like on an empty stomach, you feel good. You're like excited. Maybe you're a little jittery, you know? Um, but your mood is good and you like, you're going to have a lot of energy. That's just relying on, on the stress hormones. And so just because it feels good, we just, you know, want to be careful. It doesn't necessarily mean that it's optimal or ideal. Yeah. One is good. Two is better. And you're probably talking about eating just three or four times a day, right?

Yeah, I think you can totally eat three times a day. I also think it's fine if someone's eating five times a day. I mean, it depends on the individual, how active they are, how big of meals they're going to have. But yeah, I think eating three meals a day can totally be enough to keep the stress hormones as low as needed. So I'm curious about your approach then,

because we've talked a little bit about it, but let's just kick fasting out right now because that's not part of what you do or what you feel is ideal. If somebody in the audience is listening and they're like, I want to explore what Jay's doing and I want to add this into my lifestyle, what does that look like, concepts? So from the diet side, I know we were talking very broadly before, but

we can dig into some specifics there. So the few things I would emphasize, one is digestibility. So what that's going to look like is reducing or ideally avoiding grains, legumes, nuts, and seeds. Feel free to, you know, we can't go back through any of these things. But so that would be one of the main things for improving digestibility. Also avoiding raw vegetation, raw vegetables, you know, raw leafy greens, things like that. Avoid those? Yes. Okay. Why? So for the same reason as avoiding the legumes, nuts and seeds and grains, and that would largely be due to their anti-nutrient content. So when we think about the plant, the seed of the plant is the part that reproduces.

And that's going to be those seeds, nuts, grains, and legumes. And so there are a lot of protective, defensive chemicals in there that are meant to deter predators from consuming those things. So these fall into the category of anti-nutrients. There's a handful of them. The lectins is a major category. That's where gluten falls into. I'm sure a lot of people are familiar with that.

I can't put kale in my shakes anymore. You can cook it. You can cook it and then throw it in, which isn't the worst thing. Okay. There's saponins, which are goitrogenic. They tend to depress thyroid activity. There are oxalates and phytates, things that will inhibit mineral absorption, things that will inhibit protein digestion. And so these all tend to be found in the seeds of the plant.

Might be ditching a lot of pesticides too. Yeah. Yeah. Those tend to be the worst from that standpoint for sure. You can reduce them by soaking and sprouting them or fermenting them. So like a sourdough bread is going to be much better if it's traditionally prepared, you know, actually long-term fermented and everything. That'll help to reduce those anti-nutrients. But that would be the large reason why I would reduce the or avoid the nuts and seeds, the grains and legumes,

and then also the raw leafy vegetables for the same reason. They tend to be high in those anti-nutrients. But the good news with those is it's much easier to deactivate those by cooking them. So cooking the nuts and seeds won't tend to do much. You'd have to soak and sprout them. But when it comes to the raw vegetation, you can cook those and that'll deactivate those anti-nutrients. Okay. What foods do we end up with? Yeah. So still a lot, right? I'm not talking about a carnivore approach here, but the, so on the digestibility side, instead, we'd want to focus on things that are quick and easy to digest. So from the carbohydrate side,

that would leave fruit, would leave roots and tubers and fruits is a pretty broad category too. So like squashes fall into that fruit category. A couple other things that we call vegetables. Tubers. Are you crazy? Aren't those nightshades? Yeah. So potatoes, sweet potatoes. I don't know. Some of them are in the nightshade family. For the vast majority of people, I would say those are harmless for a very small portion. They might be particularly sensitive, in which case I do think you want to be careful but i found that to very rarely be an issue um so fruits being a major one we've got all sorts of different iterations there and maybe we can talk about sugar and carbohydrates but i'm not fearful of things like dried fruit or fruit juice despite their high density of sugar and fructose um and uh so that would be the focus

on the carbohydrate side gained like 20 pounds from drinking some juice we know why okay we know why that happened to fill you in jay yeah please i don't know if it was maybe a month back my ass was like you know what i want to bring juice back a little bit because a little taste shut the fuck up i'm just laughing at your response we know why get off my case all right sorry go ahead i wanted to drink a little bit of juice and day one i managed day two i kind of managed but over the time i just started adding a little bit of juice. And day one, I managed. Day two, I kind of managed. But over time, I just started adding a little bit more cups each day than I should have had. And it ended up adding up.

And before I knew it, I was like 10 pounds up within a week. Because I drink a lot of juice, man. Okay. So I was just like, you know what? This is why i've chosen not to have juice right or there's certain juices you can have that you know won't won't be as palatable but that fucking simply lemonade man that shit hits that hits real well they know what they're doing they know what they're doing yeah yeah and that's my fault that's mostly sugar water too right lemonade oh yeah it is it's sugar water good

stuff yeah anyway yeah uh yeah so anyway juice but when you talk about juice what are you talking what are you talking about i mean maybe slightly more moderate amounts but i've gone through uh i've gone through periods where i would drink you know a couple cartons of orange juice a day yeah so yeah but uh anyway so as far as digestibility goes, focusing on those sorts as far as carbohydrates and then focusing on easily digested animal products as far as the protein side goes. So we're looking at, you know, meat and dairy,

seafood that's going to be low in the polyunsaturated fats. So it'd mean no salmon. So that's something maybe we can dig into as well. No salmon? No salmon. Oh, shit. Okay. And then, you know, as far as the fats go, focusing on more saturated and monounsaturated fats.

So dairy is a major source, things like butter, beef tallow, coconut oil, olive oil, maybe some avocado or macadamia nut oil as well. And that would be kind of the center pieces of the diet as far as the actual foods. And then as you were talking about earlier, Mark, eating at least a few times a day to keep those stress hormones at a minimum. So our omega-3 is not part of the equation here, I'm sensing? Yeah.

So I think I would say that one of the factors that inhibits our ability to produce energy the most is going to be the polyunsaturated fats. So that's the omega-6s and the omega-3s, the ones that we were told were heart healthy for a very long time. But they come with some major problems. So they're much less stable than the saturated fats. So it has to do with the amount of double bonds in the fatty acid chain. And because of that, they are very prone to oxidative stress, to lipid peroxidation,

creates a general inflammatory state that directly inhibits our ability to produce energy. There's also a couple other reasons why they are particularly harmful. So for one is fat is a pretty major structural component inside of every cell and inside of the mitochondria in particular. And when we're producing energy, it requires this layer of what would normally be a pretty stable solid fat. And we use, what we do is we create a

gradient between the inside and outer parts of the mitochondria that we use to produce energy. That's what creates ATP. So you can kind of think of it like a hydroelectric dam where there's the one part that's moving and using all the pressure from all the water on one side and goes through and we use that energy to make ATP. Well, the polyunsaturated fats are basically like very, because they're so unstable, they basically allow that water to leak through. They dissipate that gradient. And this might sound rather trivial. You know, We're just talking about a little bit less efficiency when it comes to ATP production. But this is arguably

one of the major determinants of lifespan and aging across all organisms, all species, is the amount of polyunsaturated fats that's in the membrane of the mitochondria. So I would say this is a huge, very major piece to consider. It's part of the reason why people are harping on now about the issues with seed oils, but I would definitely throw the omega-3s in that category because they're actually even more susceptible to peroxidation and more permeable in this context than the omega-6s. So yeah, that's my major issues there. I think it's a bad idea for people to have fish oil. In short, yes. I mean, especially fish oil.

So fish oil, most products, or at least a lot of products, are already oxidized. They are already damaged before you even consume them. But then they're so delicate that even just the process of digestion, the heat of digestion and everything, is enough to oxidize them. So if you're taking in the purest, highest quality omega-3s, there's still a very likely chance that most of it will become oxidized. Even if it miraculously doesn't and you take it in and you integrate it into the structure of your cells, then you're not going to be producing energy as efficiently. And because of that permeability, you basically leak out energy, you leak out potential energy. And yeah, so I'm not a fan of those.

I'm curious about this, Jay. When it comes, because I know we, Mark actually asked about physical activity, running, et cetera. And I'm curious because what I notice is that individuals who tend to be in better health, right? They have better physical habits. Those people tend to get away with more

when it comes to their nutrition without it impacting their health negatively. So I'm curious your thoughts on that specific thing. But then when it comes to someone who is sedentary, who maybe they do have a bit of body fat on them and they need a bunch of different habits as far as their food and their physical activity get healthier. Do they tend to have to be much more like stay away from the omega-3s, much more specific with things because they're not expending as much energy? And of course, this is anecdotal. But again, I just know and we've met so many people who are highly active, extremely healthy, and they eat okay, but there are many

things on this list that they probably eat in excess or too much, but they're still extremely healthy because of their physical habits. They seem to be utilizing that energy very well. So I know that's two separate things, but I'm curious about your thoughts on that. From the body composition side, yes, right? You can definitely get away with way more and still have a good body composition if you're much more active, especially if you're resistance training, if you have more muscle mass. But I think a lot of these things might be – you're not going to see them outwardly. It depends on the individual. I'm sure you have some people in your mind who you're thinking of. But I work with a lot of people who don't have any issues in terms of body composition, but they're still struggling a lot, whether it's due to various gut issues,

you know, they're going to the bathroom once or twice a week, what are you doing with an autoimmune condition, or they're not sleeping well, right? They're waking up throughout the night or they're unable to fall asleep. Libido is low. I mean, there's all sorts of issues

somebody can have. And also we're talking about things. So on the body composition side, I would say yes, way more leeway. But it doesn't mean that the health side won't necessarily catch up at some point or that maybe we're leading to some compromise as far as lifespan goes or talking about increases in dementia. I mean, just as an example, like you see oxidized omega-3s in the brains of people who have dementia or Alzheimer's. You see inhibited glucose oxidation in the brain of somebody who has these conditions as well. And that's really the central issue there. So if you're still doing those things that are going

to contribute to that pathology, I would still caution against them just as much if somebody, even if somebody is fine on the body composition side and they don't notice a difference when they consume omega-3s versus when they don't what you got over there andrew i was curious um because we haven't talked about dietary fat um you had mentioned protein and carbs and having enough carbs with the last meal or whatever um sorry not or whatever but i just can't articulate it the way you said it so i revert back to my lame language but um as far as dietary fat especially on in the like the bodybuilding scene it's keep the fats as low as possible because they're tracking and you know those cost a lot for

you know per uh per gram um but what's your stance with like the people you work with do you have a certain limit of fat that they have to get in or like yeah just i'm curious where your stance is on dietary fat yeah so i look at fat as being beneficial for a few reasons. One is I think it's a really great fuel for our muscles at rest. And that's because they don't need a very, they don't have very high energy demands at that point. So if we have high energy demands, carbohydrates are going to be the focus. And we can talk about the physiology there, the biochemistry of why we would need carbohydrates in that case. It's like for the same reason that our brains can't use fat for fuel.

Need to have carbohydrates or ketones and extreme examples, but we can talk about that too. But so I would say that fat is great for a low energy demand fuel for something like the muscles at rest and it helps to spare glucose. So if we're on a super low fat diet and we consume a meal that has some carbohydrates,

we're going to run through those really quickly and then we'll dip into those stress hormones pretty quickly as well. So I think it can be helpful to have some amount of fat for that reason. Also, it's a precursor to cholesterol and therefore a precursor to our steroid hormones. So that's particularly important as well for maintaining adequate levels of testosterone among other sex steroids. And also it helps a lot in terms of digestion. Getting good bile flow is one of the main ways that we keep our small intestine clear. It has a very strong antibacterial effect.

And that's going to be stimulated by taking in fat and also the fat will help to produce that bile. So because of that, I think it's important to get enough fat in. Normally, I don't recommend going below 20 to 25% on the low end for, again, somebody who is focusing on health. If you're focusing on bodybuilding or competition or something like that, that's going to be a different story. And I would say as high as normally 40%. And normally the higher end there is going to be for somebody who has more muscle

mass or is more active. They're going to be needing more of that fat for that reason. And then, so what I noticed when following somewhat of a bodybuilding style diet, which was high protein, very high carbs, very low fat, I was able to eat a lot, right? Like for breakfast, I would have tons of bread and tons of egg whites and, you know, that sort of thing. And then recently switching over to much lower carbs way higher fat we were talking before the podcast about 10 eggs a day like I'm still doing that and I feel fantastic because the way I feel is I'm fuller way longer because prior to that the high carbs and stuff like I would eat and because I could eat more i would get another meal within like the

next hour or two but i also felt like i needed that meal so now with the higher fat i don't feel like i need to eat again till dinner time what's going on there as far because like if you look if you compare the plates the the high carb is like gigantic compared to the high fat one so what is it that about fat that makes me feel fuller longer yeah so it's a great question and for one what i would say is i generally would aim for somewhere in between those two places fair uh what yeah i wouldn't want to be eating so much fat and so little carbs to the point that we can skip a meal without an issue and i wouldn't want to be eating so little fat that we need to eat in an hour after eating. The reason why fat has that effect

has more to do with the carbohydrate availability. So carbohydrate availability will determine how much carbs we burn. So it's not as much about the fat intake. It's more about the carbon intake in that effect. Of course, if we don't, like if we have fat, we will be burning more fat as well. But carbohydrate

availability is the main determinant. And in tandem with what I was discussing earlier, the lack of carbohydrates is a major signal from our environment that there's low energy availability. The reason for that is because anytime that we don't have food available, whether we're just going for a long run or we're fasting or we are in a famine, whatever it is, we have to shift to fat burning. That's our main fat. Our main storage of fuel is fat. So if we starve or if we're fasting or whatever it is, we're always running on fat. And so that tends to be the signal or it goes along with other signals that turn down our metabolic rate. So if we go toward a low carb diet or if we go toward, whether it's keto,

carnivore, whatever it is, that'll tend to come with that consequence, which is turning down our metabolic rate, turning down our hunger signals. Some people say, all right, this is great. Now I don't have to worry about being hungry and I can eat less. I would contend that that might not be such an ideal thing. And instead, it's coming at a major cost to our metabolism and to our total capacity or total ability to function. Even if we keep the protein fairly high? That'll help to preserve muscle mass, but typically will still come with the negatives of carb restriction.

Okay. Interesting. Yeah, because I just, same thing. It's like if I keep the protein high, I just feel fuller longer. On the flip side, when the carbs were really high and I put the protein really high, I just feel fuller longer. On the flip side, when the carbs were really high and I put the protein really high, I would get like pretty bad stomach aches and I'd be pretty gassy all over the place. So I think, yeah, you're right. Like finding a little bit of a balance, but for right now it's working really, really well where I keep the fat really, really, well,

10 eggs high. And, you know, I kind of, i don't really feel the need to eat in the middle of the day which in my opinion really really helps the uh the stress from having to stop what i'm doing go into the break room heat up a meal and then eat right because we just did two podcasts so if i didn't if i was relying on that meal it would be pretty difficult for me right now to kind of pay attention to this podcast because my stomach would be on the microphone, not me. So that's where like, I feel like the two meals a day has been really beneficial for myself. Yeah. Well, and to go back to something else you said, if you were having those digestive issues

when you were increasing the carbs, I would be considering what types of carbs you're eating. And now you mentioned bread, maybe try switching that up and see if you can have a pretty decent amount of carbohydrates. Yeah, they were, it was it was it was fake food it was not like healthy carbs or of any kind it was yeah a lot of bullshit yeah because i could because that's what you know a lot of people love about that style diet is like i get a shit ton of food i can eat what you know insert the worst processed foods that you can imagine but it fits and because it's high carb, low fat, I'm still under my caloric, uh, you know, restriction or whatever you want to call it. Yeah. Yeah. And so that, that would be something I would consider. And then the other thing too, and this would just go back to what we were

discussing earlier. Yes. Eating more consistently is less convenient and it's not conducive to working for a lot and working a lot straight through and, um, you know, working a lot of hours and neither is getting a lot of sleep and neither is working out and neither are a lot of the other things that we do that we know are supportive of our health and are worth that inconvenience. And so that's what I would be thinking of. Makes sense. Every time you eat, is it kind of like a meal for you personally? Or is it sometimes just like something smaller? Sometimes I'll have something smaller. Yeah. It depends on how the timing works out,

but sometimes I'll have a small snack between lunch and dinner or between breakfast and lunch or between dinner and when I go to sleep. Cool. I know you mentioned you use calories as a tool. Do you know how many calories you intake per day? It's been a long time since I tracked. I would say right now it's between 3,000 and 3,500 would be my guess. When I first shifted away from keto and fasting, it was between 5,000 and 6,000. But I also had another 20 pounds of –

it was between 5,000 and 6,000 calories after that point. So you went up after the keto and fasting, then increased your calories to 5,000 to 6 went up after the ketone fasting, then increased your calories to 5,000 to 6,000 for a period of time, and then you dropped 20 pounds over that period of time? So at that point, I had 20 pounds more muscle mass on than I do currently. So I was saying I had higher needs. I was also pretty active, but I was also recovering from under eating and low carb, which was a major reason why I was eating more. And it wasn't intentional. It wasn't saying I need to hit this many calories in the day or anything like that.

Yeah. I was tracking out of curiosity, but it was intuition and hunger first. And during the time that I did that, I did gain some weight. So in the first several months when I was doing that, I did go from maybe about somewhere around 200 to about 215, 220. And that was from, again, going from keto to having some carbohydrates in your diet. Yeah. Well, so I guess on keto, I was more like 185 and then got up to about 215, 220 at the max and then didn't intentionally change the amount I was eating or anything like that. I wasn't intentionally restricting, but then weight ended up naturally coming down to about 205 and I was pretty lean at that point. And that was where things settled

at the time. What's your background like education wise? You go to school for all the stuff or? Some of it. So I was pre-med in college and studied, I was a double major with exercise, physiology and neuroscience. And then I decided that I didn't feel like medical school was the best route to go to actually help people improve their health in the best way I could. And so after that point, just I would say stuck my head in the books, but it was really research papers on Google Scholar and PubMed and everything. But spent a lot of time doing that and writing articles for a couple of years and doing health coaching. And then, yeah, that was the background. Cool. And what's the name of your podcast?

I've seen your podcast before. What's the name of your podcast? Yeah, so my podcast is called The Energy Balance Podcast. And it came out a couple of years ago, you know, furthering my, like do a lot furthering with my research with that as a way to put that out.

And you, a lot of the discussion from what I've seen and kind of like recovered fasting people, recovered keto people, right? Yeah, yeah, definitely.

People just kind of like went a little hard in the paint, you know, maybe they just, I don't know, sometimes this stuff like means a lot to people

when they find something that they really resonates with them and they go all in and they turn their whole lifestyle into ketoness and fasting and maybe some people sometimes take it too far, I think. Born again keto.

So I wonder, why can't we have a balance with this shit? Yeah, you could. I think the diets can be great. I don't think that you can. Yeah. Yeah. There's a place for balance. I also think that even just the – I think that we're promoting those as healthiest and for people who are,

who are really committed toward being healthy. I mean, myself being one of them, you know, went all in and did full on keto and was doing full on fasting and, uh, felt like it was something that led to a lot of issues for me, like led to me feeling a lot worse.

So yeah, a lot of the people I'm working with are people who have been in that same camp. That brings up a question. I know you're about to wrap up Mark, but this, that makes me wonder because again, we've had the experiences where we've gone too far with like, okay, we fast every day. Right. And, and then, you know, he'd come in with like bags under his eyes and I come in with bags under my eyes and be like, what's up, man? Like, Oh, I should eat. Right. we learn from taking it too far to come to this place where

it's like it's not an everyday thing it's like certain days you can feel you know like eat bro like okay cool i'll eat and it's it's and so that's why i'm wondering like i i understand i understand the approach that you're talking about and i think that it's very beneficial but i do think that there i don't know some fasting when taken too far can be bad but when utilized here and there i don't see it as being that bad if someone does pay attention to the signals as you're talking about you know yeah so i think what we're dealing with when it comes to all right you're going to do one day of low carb or a couple meals of low carb you're going to fast for one day it's not going to be as detrimental in my view as doing that every day but that doesn't mean that it is supportive or

moving us toward anything better okay um and i would also say you know if we if we were working out every day yeah until we got to a point where we're like, man, I'm wiped. I need to take a rest day. And that was the way we did it. I think it would be much better if we recognized, hey, it's actually better if we do have rest days every couple of days or depending on how we structure our workouts.

And so that's kind of what that made me think of when you mentioned that fasting situation. It's like, it's not a matter of we just did it to, in my view, it's not a matter of we just did it too much, got to a point where we recognize that and then scaled it back. I think what we were actually doing is just introducing something that is an optimal, that is an ideal. Okay. Take us on out of here, Andrew.

Sure thing. Thank you everybody for checking out today's episode. Stick around so that way you guys don't miss Smelly's tip before we get out of here. Yeah, it's a pretty big tip, so you can't miss it. Everything podcast related, head over to powerproject.live. Yeah, it's a pretty big tip, so you can't miss it. Everything podcast related, head over to powerproject.live. Yeah, everything's there. So make sure you guys do that

and drop a comment down below. Let us know what you guys think about today's conversation. Hit that like button on the way out. Follow the podcast at mbpowerproject on Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter. My Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter is at IamAndrewZ.

And Seema, where can people find you? Make sure to chime in because we had a lot of cool discussion on this one about fasting, do's and don'ts, negatives, all that shit. So I want to know what you guys' thoughts down below. Those of you who do and those of you who don't. And Seema Iny on Instagram and YouTube. And Seema Yin Yang on TikTok and Twitter. Jay, where can people find you?

Yeah, I dive into all these topics in more detail and with nuance and everything, go through the research and all of that on my podcast, which is the Energy Balance Podcast. Also, people are looking for, you know, maybe a bit of a starter pack as far as my perspective and how to best restore mitochondrial function, how to best support our energy production. I have a free mini course and people can find that at jfeldmanwellness.com slash energy. And if you head over to jfeldmanwellness.com, you can find if you head over to jfeldmanwellness.com, you can find free articles, links to my podcast, and anything else there.

On Instagram, it's at jfwellness. YouTube is jfeldmanwellness, I think. Awesome. Thank you for your time today. Appreciate it. Yeah, thank you guys. Thanks for having me. The smelly tip of the day is

I just want to encourage people to just continue to explore, be a white belt, continue to try stuff, try some of the things that were mentioned here on today's podcast. If you're a long time keto-er, maybe it's time that you try some carbohydrates for a little while. Maybe, you know, try eating four meals in a day and kind of see what it does for you. If you're somebody that currently is fasting quite often. I know for myself, just kind of due to convenience and just current situation with like running, I'm running later in the day.

So now I have a pretty good breakfast. I usually come home from the gym. I have a snack. I go and I run and I come home and I eat again. So there's more eating going on right now than normal. and I come home and I eat again. So there's more eating going on right now than normal, but I just felt like that's going to be the best thing for me to fuel myself to get through these podcasts and workouts

and all the different things that I'm doing. But don't be afraid to explore stuff. I know that Nsema is always trying new stuff in the gym all the time. These guys are always talking about their jiu-jitsu. I don't know what's going on. I got to watch my fucking back all the time around here. They got this guy throwing some Muay Thai kicks. But, you know, continue to explore and continue to push the envelope on what's possible for you. Keep moving, literally moving in different directions. Like when I'm running, I'm practicing a bunch of different ways of running. And I ran 10 miles the other day. And on mile eight, I did an 821 mile. That's not

the fastest time ever, but it's fast for me and much faster than I ever even tried to run. And that felt really easy. It did not feel hard, even in the course of a 10-mile run. So all that has to do with is just consistency. Today will be day 91, and it has to do with me exploring and messing around with different things I've heard from different wacky people that we've had on the podcast. You're not wacky, though. Anyway, strength is never a weakness. Weakness is never a strength. Catch you guys later.