Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2589: Five Ways Real Food Makes You Lean & Healthy & More (Listener Live Coaching)

Episode Date: May 3, 2025

In this episode of Quah (Q & A), Sal, Adam & Justin coach four Pump Heads via Zoom. Mind Pump Fit Tip: 5 ways REAL food makes you lean and healthy. (1:53) What compound has Sal excited? (28:28) Like fathers, like sons. (32:55) Dahlia has hit the gangster stage. (37:08) Kids say the darndest things. (38:44) The ultimate duo for gut repair and inflammation. (39:43) Justin has a bone to pick. (42:10) Interesting bragging rights. (48:50) Chlorine and dry skin remedies. (51:24) #ListenerLive question #1 – With a goal of overall health and longevity, how could I implement cardio into MAPS fitness programs without overtraining? (55:27) #ListenerLive question #2 – Is it worth bulking to build a butt if I cannot connect to these muscles? (1:05:12) #ListenerLive question #3 – Where do you draw the line of turning down big private sector opportunities to follow a path you’re more passionate about, even if it slows down your financial goals? (1:10:53) #ListenerLive question #4 – I can't seem to lose the body fat I put on during the reverse diet. What happened? (1:30:10) Related Links/Products Mentioned Ask a question to Mind Pump, live! Email: [e-mail] Visit Transcend for this month’s exclusive Mind Pump offer! ** 25% off all GLP-1s - This includes the GLP-1 probiotic which people can order through their specialist. ** Visit Luminose by Entera for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! ** Promo code MPM at checkout for 10% off their order or 10% off their first month of a subscribe-and-save. ** April Special: MAPS HIIT or Extreme Fitness Bundle 50% off! ** Code APRIL50 at checkout ** Mind Pump #2437: What Happens to Your Body When You Quit Ultra-Processed Foods for 30 Days Paraxanthine safety and comparison to caffeine - PMC KPV Peptide Benefits, Side Effects & Dosage - Jay Campbell Sperm racing in LA: Inside the first-of-its-kind race that's taking the internet by storm How To Minimize Chlorine Exposure + A DIY Chlorine Neutralizing Skin Spray Recipe Visit Pre-Alcohol by ZBiotics for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! ** Promo code MINDPUMP25 for 15% off first-time purchasers on either one-time purchases, (3, 6, 12-packs) or subscriptions (6, 12-pack) ** Visit Brain.fm for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners. ** Get 30 days of free access to science-backed music. ** The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America’s Wealthy MP Holistic Health Mind Pump Hormones Facebook Private Forum Online Personal Training Course | Mind Pump Fitness Coaching ** Approved provider by NASM/AFAA (1.9 CEUs)! Grow your business and succeed in 2025. ** Mind Pump Podcast – YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources People Mentioned Kelly Manzone (@kellsbells88) Instagram  

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind pump with your hosts, Sal DeStefano, Adam Schafer, and Justin Andrews. You just found the most downloaded fitness, health, and entertainment podcast. This is mind pump. In today's episode, we had live callers call in and we got to coach them on air, but this was after an intro. Today the intro is 53 minutes long. In the intro we talk about diet strategies, fitness, fat loss, muscle gain, scientific studies. We also talk about family life and current

events. It's a good time. By the way if you want to be a caller on one of these episodes, email us your question at live at mindpupmedia.com. Now this episode is brought to you by some sponsors. The first one is mphormones.com. At mphormones.com they'll test your hormones. They can administer testosterone, other hormones to balance you out, optimize all those hormones, but they also work with peptides. Today we talked about BPC157 and KPV capsules for gut health. By the way, right now there's 25% off all GLP1s. a GLP one for example is Terzepotide or some agglutide brand name being ozempic 25% off right now go to mp hormones

Calm this episode is also brought to my luminous by in Terra their skincare products have the highest amount of GHK you You'll find anywhere this stuff is turbocharged. It really works. Go check them out. Go to enterraskincare.com forward slash npm. That's E-N-T-E-R-A. Skincare.com forward slash npm. By the way, use the code npm and get 10% off your order. We also have a sale this month. MAPS 15 Performance and the RGB bundle of programs are both 50% off. If you're interested go to mapsfitnessproducts.com and then use the code May 50 for the discount. Alright here comes the show. If you're trying to get lean and healthy stop eating fake food you won't get there. We're gonna talk about real food

in five strong ways backed by data and science and experience in which real food will make you lean and healthy. Let's go. Yeah, we talk about this a lot but I don't think you have formulated it in a fitness tip. No, so when I say real food what I'm referring to, this is just to get your attention, when I'm referring to one ingredient. Yeah exactly. Food that wasn't engineered right so heavily processed foods when I'm talking about when I say fake food, yes you can eat it so I know it's technically food but when I say fake food that's what I'm talking about

and real food is whole natural foods and I'll talk about the first reason why and this is the biggest reason by the way why real food leads to almost always leads to a body that's more lean and healthy, and that's because you naturally eat less. This is one of the largest effects of heavily processed foods is that they make you overeat. It's such a powerful effect. It's duplicated in study after study after study, and this is primarily, it's not the only reason, but it's primarily why we have an obesity epidemic. It's probably one of the biggest reasons why we struggle with being overweight is that our diet now is comprised of a majority of

this fake, quote-unquote fake, or heavily processed food, which has been carefully scientifically engineered to do one thing and that is to make you overeat. So if you just stay away from that, you naturally eat less. In other words, not because you're trying to eat less, you feel just as full, but you're eating less calories as a result.

Is it the volume of it, or the fiber? What is it about the whole foods that makes it so much more satiety producing you can add? Because obviously you know, I know that always balance if you I know that we can we can You know manufacture or produce something that's this big that's four or five hundred calories, right by making something like that But normally whole foods you get four or five hundred calories is more volume So is it the volume of the whole foods? Is it the fiber that comes with it? Like what is it exactly that is so much more satiety

producing than processed foods? There's a lot of components that go into that, but the umbrella term would be palatability. So you could take a heavily processed food. Oh, you think it's more about palate fatigue than it is? 100%. Yeah, cause you could take a heavily processed food. Oh, you think it's more about palate fatigue than it is? 100%. Yeah, because you could take heavily processed food and throw a bunch of fiber and protein in it,

which will make it produce more satiety than if it didn't have it. But because it's engineered to be so palatable, it's still going to cause you to overeat, even with the same volume, even if all things were the same. So it really has to do with palatability. So palatability is, you could loosely define it as the enjoyment that you get from eating something. So like the

experience, the taste, the addictive properties or qualities. And that right there causes a few different things. One, you eat faster, and two, because it's essentially tapping into this enjoyment process, this experience, again, it's engineered to do so, your body signals that say stop eating, don't kick in till later, till much later. Okay, so it's like this, I'll use an example.

We're pretty strict at home with TV with my kids, okay? So it's like this, I'll use an example. We're pretty strict at home with TV with my kids, okay? So my son gets 20 minutes of TV a day total. However, he can watch Unlimited Mr. Rogers. So you guys remember Mr. Rogers when we were little? So for people that know, Mr. Rogers was this TV show on public television back in the day. And if you watch it now as an adult, you'll realize just how slow it is.

It's so slow. It's not exciting. There's no cuts. There's no, it's a very, it's very different from what you would see today for kids. Have your kids watch Mr. Rogers and then watch them stop watching at a particular point. Now have them go on their iPad and tell them to come off when they're ready and they won't.

Because it's really messing with the wiring of their system of the enjoyment where the kid doesn't want to come off. Whereas Mr. Rogers you kind of like you're done after a couple episodes. I'll let my kids watch as much as they want and they watch an episode and they're like, okay, let's go. Let's go play It's not so enticing and so addicting that it just keeps them stuck Heavily processed foods are so well engineered that they just that you just eat more of them And it's it's about 600 calories more a day This is what they in the best studies ever done on nutrition or the ones done on heavily processed foods because they're in a lab. They're actually controlled. They'll put people in

these two rooms and the control for macros. One room heavily processed, one room whole natural foods and they'll have the groups and they'll tell them eat as much as you want and they'll just observe them and then they'll switch the groups over. They'll actually have this group go back in this room and this group go in this room and they've repeatedly studies. It's like 600 more calories a day which by the way if you're trying to lose weight, typically you'll cut your calories by about five to 600 calories.

If you're trying to gain weight, you typically bump them five to 600 calories. Those are both aggressive. So, and this is just happening naturally. So when you stick to whole foods, without even trying to, you just eat less food. Yeah, it just seems a food science. There's such a multitude of factors that go into that

with the size and being able to condense a lot of, you know, the nutrients and the ingredients to where you could put it in chip form where it's even more like has more crunch to it. So therefore, you can sort of like put down a lot more than you normally would be able to eat tortilla wise into like whole foods, you have to add a lot of spices they figured out the perfect combo of spices and everything else to keep your interest high and then switching that out we always go back to that like tub of ice cream versus having like salted french fries and like just going back and forth between the different types of novel tastes and so like to be able to do that they make it so easy because it's like you have this like smaller condensed version that's like packed with sugar or packed with salt and it's like this constant easy way to to consume.

It's really hard for people to back out of too because when you eat a lot of processed food it robs you of those natural good flavors. I remember this was when I competed and having to like be so strict on Whole Foods for that that was the longest period of time I ever like did not stray from that and I remember how wild it was. Here I am late 20s and for most of my life would say fruit was kind of bland whatever you know I'm saying I never craved it never cared about it you late 20s and for most of my life would say fruit was kind of bland, whatever. You know what I'm saying? I never craved it, never cared about it.

You know, in fact, the times I ate it was like, oh, because it's around, we're at the pool and watermelon's out, I'll have some. It was never like, oh, I want this until that, until I was eating nothing but whole foods for an extended period of time and then biting into an apple or a banana or some grapes, it felt like the same type of feeling I got if I were to eat candy. But eat a bunch of processed foods for the next couple weeks or months consistently

and then go back to it and it's like it goes away. So that's the other part about this that makes this really difficult is once you've kind of opened Pandora's box it goes away. So that's the other part about this that makes this really difficult is once you've kind of opened Pandora's box and you eat processed foods every day all the time and then someone like us is trying to convince you to eat whole foods because there's so much better for you to stay human. You're like, oh my God, I just have no desire for it.

You're actually pointing to the second point, which is whole foods are healthier in both body and behavior. And we'll get to the body part, but behavior is what you're talking about. So because they're so well engineered, so you have salt, sugar, and fat are the classic ingredients for palatability, but food scientists have taken it to the millionth degree with chemicals and colors

and ways of making certain flavors linger and others disappear. and then it's like the texture on the tongue, like, it's really a science everybody, it's a crazy science. And what happens is your brain starts to adapt to this introduction of this crazy experience. That's what it is literally, it's a crazy experience. If you took someone from a thousand years ago

and brought them today and introduced them to heavily processed foods, they would be like, what am I eating? Like what's happening here? Your brain starts to adapt to it. So what happens is you have receptors that don't regulate, you have brain chemicals that start to change. So when you eat a lot of candy, you eat a lot of grape flavored candy. Real grapes taste like nothing. Blam, they don't taste like anything. Because your brain literally has molded and shaped itself to this. And then from a behavior standpoint, here's what happens.

There are lots of values to food, one of which is the experience, because that's a real value. So I'm not one of those fitness people, we're not one of those fitness podcasts that says food is just fuel, that's a lie. Food is also experience. We can't deny that.

However, when you make the experience so overwhelming because you've engineered it, your behavior starts to tilt towards valuing just that. So what you have in modern societies are people that are completely unaware of any of the values of food aside from the experience. That's all, in fact, that's how they make every choice. So you have a group of friends talking about lunch,

what are we gonna have for lunch? This is what the conversation sounds like. What do you feel like? I feel like this, oh, let's get that. There is no awareness around how this affects my health, my energy, my digestion, because it's such an overwhelming experience that we're now so numb to,

that that's all our behavior points to, is that. So it actually is unhealthy for our behavior, it's unhealthy for our brain, and it's also unhealthy for our body, because the way they engineer these foods includes so many chemicals that, you know, sure they've passed certain levels of testing but there is no test in the world that combines all these over long

periods of time to see what it could potentially do to your body. In fact we're we're discovering some of these now I mean they just banned artificial food dyes which have been legal for decades because now we're able to show them the data that's not good for you. I mean I also don't think we're a podcast that demonizes processed foods either. I think it's just a level of awareness. If you're somebody who manages weight really well and stays in good shape and you eat processed foods

occasionally or even frequently, then I'm not talking to you. But in my experience. But you're rare. Yeah, you are. You're rare. Because most people that eat a lot of processed foods struggle with weight and they struggle with that urge to eat more and to overeat and so that's who I'm

communicating this to. It's like hey if you've figured it, if you've figured the formula out that hey as long as I eat these things and do this by this time and get my workouts in I can have the occasional processed food in my diet, I'm cool, dude. I don't care. But it's that's not the case It's always these people that are struggling with calorie control and it's primarily because of this and if they were to just get rid of that and again not Demonizing it just we're letting you know making them aware that that's how powerful this is But if you just prioritize whole foods you'd be surprised on how easy

it is to control those other things. And the positive thing is that if you were anything like me, where vegetables and fruit was bland and boring, you can get that back. That's right. So it's not like you lost like, I mean, almost 30 years it was bland to me and then later on, which is what has actually kept, always keeps me kind of in check, right? I allow plenty of processed foods in and out of my diet. What keeps me from going off the rails and eating mostly processed food is I know I start to crave that crap. But whenever I feel that I know, oh, it's time to kind of rein it back in because I don't want to lose the enjoyment of fruit and vegetables

and these things that are good for me And I know if I continue down that road even if I'm keeping my calories in check and not getting fat I know I'll lose that the the pound ability of healthy food. Yeah, you you show me a Household that is obese and I'll show you a household that consumes mostly heavily processed foods, right? Okay, almost every single time. As a trainer, when I train clients and I figured this out, I actually threw away, why do I say throw away? I stopped advising people on all the other nutrition tips

and tricks and advice that I used to do. I actually pushed it all aside and this is all I would do, just eat whole natural foods. I literally replaced everything for the average client that I trained with just that. And the average client will lose 10 to 15 pounds alone from not trying to eat less, from not trying to count anything,

from not trying to do anything at all, aside from just eating until they're full and eating whole natural foods. It was like clockwork, it was like magic to the point where people would come to me afterwards and literally think they couldn't understand it. Like I'm actually more full than I used to be. Why am I losing weight as if there's some magical thing that's happening? And I'll tell them you're eating less calories and they would literally debate me. No I'm not. I'm

totally full. You should have seen dinner last night. I'm like, trust me, you're eating less calories. This is so powerful. I still, I can remember the first conversation that I started to do the same thing where I stopped writing a meal plan out and checking their weight and activity level and then figuring out their macros and here's your calorie balance where you need to be. And I just went, these are the foods I want you to eat from. And they would look back at me. I'll never forget the first time that the guy sat across me. He was like 80 pounds overweight he says where's my calories need to be I said I don't care you don't care yeah I said if you stick to just eating from these foods that I wrote down all these foods choose them however

you want eat the protein first that's all I'm asking you to do let's just see what the calories land I'm not even worried about it I feel confident that if you just do that this way it's gonna come. And I remember the look on his face, but I also remember how effective it was. And going forward, that was exactly how I coached all my clients, was I'm not gonna write out these, make up these arbitrary numbers of like, you need to be at exactly 2,750 calories.

And it's like, man, if I just got rid of all the processed foods and gave them that, and the thing I didn't realize I was also doing that came later was the psychology of that too, was that you weren't telling them they can't. The power of- You're not saying eat less. Yeah, the power of telling a client,

like say you can't do this, you can't do that, it's like just go get this, if just go focus that, was massive too, was focusing on that versus the what I can't have was a huge difference. Next up it's just whole foods are better for your digestion. They contribute to better motility, they contribute to a more diverse microbiome, they digest slower which is good. So processed foods are essentially broken down, pre-digested ingredients put together in a package. And when you eat those, they tend to get processed

through the body a little faster, or on the reverse, they can cause things like digestive issues, like slower motility, which can cause all kinds of other problems. Whole natural foods, especially when you include things like vegetables and fruits, this is the fix for most people when it comes to digestive issues. This right here alone tends to be the fix. And again, that was a wonderful side effect I would get from clients who would start eating this way is they'd be like, oh, you know what?

Regular bowel movements are nice. And I'm not getting bloated anymore. My heartburn is kind of going away. Like this is wild. It's amazing how nature's got natural limiters. Yes. It sort of gives you that signal, and so you just naturally, oh, I'm good, I'm full. And it's hard to get that from processed food. You know, not to switch directions right here,

but this point reminds me of something else that we've seen. I've seen this more recently with the introduction of GLP-1s, since we're speaking of digestion. One of the, like you've heard people, some of the negative side effects, one of them is people, oh man, I just messed up my digestion. 90 plus percent of those people that have said that to me

aren't changing their food choices. They're just eating less of the same garbage. They're eating less of the garbage. And this is part of why the GLP-1 works so well is because it slows that process down and almost forces you to have to eat whole foods because if you eat anything that is like fast digesting it throws you off like crazy. So you don't even want the process. And I remember feeling this when I went through this. It was like there was no desire for that food because it's like instantly your stomach knows like oh

the last time I tried it didn't even feel right only thing that seems to feel right is this chicken and rice or like things that were lean and healthy and easy to digest and so that's one of the things that's a positive but some people look as a negative because they still keep eating the way they keep eating fire Cheetos and then wondering why I'm just I don't understand why the GLP ones not working for me just mess up my digestion really bad. Well, you're eating fire Cheeto still that's the reason why Next is you know what's in it So I could buy rice and a potato and steak and a banana. I know what's in there if I buy a banana

Banana, that's the ingredients I get some steak. it's beef. That's what's in there. Heavily processed foods oftentimes have ingredients that, you know, maybe if you're well versed, you recognize, but do you really know what it is? Do you really know where this comes from? Do you know how this affects your body, especially in combination with these other ingredients that are put in there to increase its shelf life and its texture and the color and the whatever. You just don't know. And by the way, I know a lot of this stuff is tested.

So you get the super science zealots who are like, everything's a chemical. Okay, technically that's true. But there are individual variances on how we react to these things as well, and sometimes you don't know what's causing what. Now if I eat a banana and it causes issues, it's a banana. If I eat banana candy, I don't know, is it the banana extract, which is probably

not even in there, is it the yellow number whatever, is it the other stuff that makes it, you know, the shape that it is or whatever? You have no idea. So you just don't know, even if you look at the ingredients you don't know, but when you buy whole natural foods, you know what you're eating. And here's the other part of it, by the way.

Calculating macros. I know people think it's easier with heavily processed foods because they look at the box and they go, oh, one serving is this many calories. Actually if you take an extra step with whole natural foods and you weigh it and measure it the first time, you're far more accurate with whole natural foods because heavily processed foods are allowed to have a margin of error which is I believe 25% yeah 25% you know okay so if you eat a 2,000 calorie let's say you we do 2,000 calorie diet based off of processed foods and so you're like oh, this is exactly 2,000 calories no

It's probably it could be as high as 22 23 or calories Yeah Because the FDA gives them a 25% margin of error now if I take a banana and I peel it and I weigh it, I know exactly what the macros are. If I take a steak and I measure it, chicken breast and measure it, broccoli, I measure it. Yes, you have to measure it one time, okay? Once you do that, I know exactly what my macros are with the heavily processed foods, the margin errors, and so now good luck. How can you figure out how many calories are in your boxed whatever,

because you don't know if the box, the label is 25% off, how are you gonna figure it out any other way? Are you gonna measure every single ingredient that's in there? Do you know how much of it? It's impossible. It's absolutely impossible.

Not only that, you have to think too that if the FDA allows that 20 to 25% to be off, it's, and you are marketing your food as health food, if the FDA allows that 20 to 25% to be off, it's in you are marketing your food as health food, it's in your best interest to go to 19%. That's right. I mean, it's in your best interest to say you are- It probably has more than it says, because they wanna market it lower.

Of course, I mean, that just makes sense. If the FDA is gonna give you that much wiggle room, you're marketing your thing as a low calorie snack, you're not going to overestimate, you're going to underestimate. I mean that's just simple. I mean there's no... By the way, there's many lawsuits that have happened because remember Detour? Yes. Bars? They were off by a huge margin.

By the way, the only... So here's the thing, I was gonna make this point, is there's been lawsuits of this, and the only lawsuits I've seen, it's when it's egregious. Yes. It's like, so I wonder if it's like 26% or it's- No, no, no, no. It's like, are they-

I think Detour was like- Oh, it was egregious. Yeah, it was like double the calories, half the protein, it was like not even, it was literally a Snickers bar that they were marketing as a high protein snack, and it was just not that at all. So delicious. And there's been other cases, I know Detour is one of the most famous ones because it happened during our time as trainers and when that bar got really famous. But this has happened, but every case I've seen it's these egregious situations. It's never, uh, they're not going to get sued for being 20% off because

they're allowed to. Yes. So yeah. So you have the people that are... That means by the way a 500 calorie whatever could have 600 calories. Like when you're taught, when I'm working with people in reverse dieting or cutting like they're moving a few hundred calories a day. If it's all whole, excuse me, if it's all heavily processed foods, we could be totally off and have no idea because the box says this, but the reality is something completely different.

Whole natural foods, that's what's in it. You measure it once, you see it, that's done, done deal. You are super accurate in comparison. Finally, whole natural foods require more presence and planning. All right, now you might think that's not a good thing because I just want to be fast. One of the worst, one of the biggest, I would say,

negatives of heavily processed foods, which is what we value, which is speed, convenience. That's actually a negative, everybody. What it's done is it's encouraged this unawareness and mindlessness around food. Now you can eat it on the go. That's right. In fact, I'll make this point right now.

You like, let's think of like a junk food that you might like. Let's say you like French fries or you like donuts. I bet you if you took the time to make the donuts from scratch, you probably would be better off because of the presence that it took and the energy that it took to go with, versus buying it real quick and eating it real quick. Sure. And I think that's more of a behavior thing that tends to happen.

Heavily processed foods encourage lack of awareness. They encourage this speed of meet this desire of I need to feel this experience. I need to taste this thing, boom, boom, boom, real fast, done deal, I'm outta here. That's the term fast food, right? Kind of came from that. Whole natural foods requires a little bit of planning, which means I have some more presence,

which means I can say I probably should eat a little more of this, I'm probably eating too much of that, and it just results in a better situation. And I mean, what a better way to hijack all your systems to cram food in quicker. Yeah. And I mean, what a better way to hijack all your systems to cram food in quicker. Yeah. And I mean, this is where all these other things where chewing your food makes a big

difference and you're not drinking drinks with your food makes a big difference. And it's just it's that awareness and that presence for your body to really process it and pay attention, you know, to a lot of the feedback that you're getting as you're eating and digesting it instead of just cramming it in really quickly and moving on to the next thing and eating mindlessly. What about micronutrients? I feel like I've always felt that there's no way that this processed food that we've fortified with all these vitamins and minerals to make like whole foods It's got to be equivalent to the micronutrients found in the whole food. No, that's no way

I know it's just is we I know science says it is it just doesn't feel like it can be and so I and I feel Like this is another one of those somewhat unknowns of like there's other benefits to besides factor in there for just we know We know a lot of what's in food There's a lot of stuff We still don't know but let's just stick with what we know so forget the unknown because I can make that argument to I could Say look we've discovered a lot of things about food, but there's things that we don't know there are cofactors and these micronutrients There are these hormetic, you know compounds that have this effect on the body that we still haven't really discovered how they we know We know certain

Combinations of certain things changes. We don't understand this all yet, but let's put that aside Let's just let's just say the stuff we know they're only gonna add in Processed foods what they have what has some popularity or some data or something supporting RDA stand So you hear about sulforaphane? I'll bring that up, right? We hear about that all the time, sulforaphane. Helps detoxify the body, anti-cancer. Well now they're gonna start adding it to certain health foods. But before we started talking about it, it wasn't in there.

The only way you got it was you ate broccoli, or you ate broccoli sprouts, right? So of the stuff we know, they're only gonna add it to food once there's awareness and popularity and some people talking about it. So good luck getting these nutrients in your foods, even the ones we do know. And then of course there's the argument of the stuff we don't know. Eat a vegetable or a fruit or some meat or whatever.

And there are things in there and combinations of things that we still don't fully understand. So how far are we? Could you keep someone alive with complete processed food for the rest of their life? Yeah, will they thrive? Probably not. In fact, there are situations where you have kids with severe autoimmune issues or whatever that have to live almost entirely

on shakes and processed foods, and you can kinda tell. You can kinda see it. And you talk to athletes, the athletes I would talk to who are the best ones to give you anecdote about this, I would say are bodybuilders, because bodybuilders are so ridiculous and meticulous about their diet.

And talk to bodybuilders when they've included processed foods versus not including processed foods in their pre-contest prep. I know you've said this, Adam, and they'll tell you everything was the same, but it feels different. It just doesn't feel the same. Interesting stuff. Anyway, I gotta tell you guys rarely do I get excited over a new, I don't know if you label it a supplement, that I've been reading about. I was reading about it because caffeine,

caffeine when you eat caffeine or you take caffeine, is broken down into three metabolites. One of them is parazithine. Parazithine is what they think, actually the data now really supports this, is what gives caffeine all of its awesome effects. The other two metabolites are what give caffeine its negative effects. So here's what they did. So they're isolating it now. They took it out and they did studies on it and here's what they found.

Parasithin gives you the wakefulness, the energy, the feel-good, no jitters, no anxiety, doesn't affect sleep poorly, doesn't have the same drop off crash, like basically none of the negatives of caffeine, all the positives. So I was reading all these studies on this, and I'm like, this is crazy. And the reason why I'm excited is because

when you consume caffeine, you already get parasitin. So it's not like this new thing that we're discovering, this new chemical. It's like, well. It's just the benefit of it. Well, we've already we've already like it when you take when you drink caffeine about two-thirds of it Is turns into parazithine so two-thirds of it turns into this so we've already used this like I had energy drink earlier Whatever parazithine them. I'm already having it, but I also have the other two Metabolites so I'm getting excited. So I'm like, oh wait, this is something our bodies are already used to we've already felt this

Studies are saying you get none of the negatives. So then I'm getting excited, so I'm like, oh wait, this is something our bodies are already used to, we've already felt this, studies are saying you get none of the negatives, so then I'm reading reviews, I'm going on Amazon and reading reviews of people who've used these products and whatever, and they're like, I quit coffee, I quit energy drinks, I feel so much better, it's really crazy, yeah. So since you went down that rabbit hole, I think I brought this up a long time ago on the show and you kind of shot it down. I was under the impression a long time, I wish I remember where I read it, but I remember

reading up on caffeine and its effects on the body that we get. And I understood it to be like almost like a downer where it's what we feel the higher the energy rush that we get is our body fighting against where it's what we feel the high or the energy rush that we get is our body fighting against what it's doing. No no it blocks receptors that allow circulating levels of like energy producing compounds to increase so it's actually a block certain receptors that then give us this wakefulness feeling. Okay so that is kind of a negative it's negatively I mean it's yeah I hear what you're saying right like and that's it's the body trying to overcome that Yeah, I mean is you that positive. I wrote down a little bit of stuff around it, but yeah, it's

it essentially the compounds increases circulating levels of the things that give you that energy by Blocking their reabsorption. I think I'm not if I'm not mistaken but parazithine does it better and doesn't cause a lot of the negatives and it's way less toxic so like caffeine by a certain level will hurt you. Any addictive properties to it like caffeine? I that's a good question people are saying and I don't know. So how is this compound is it in just in pill form, or are they trying to put it in drinks?

Right now, there's only a few companies that are making it. We're not working with anyone, so I'm not gonna give anybody a shout out. Yeah, no, I mean, I'm curious. Well, at least until we try it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, I'm gonna make sure we try it, because I'm tripping out.

I mean, I'm curious, it sounds interesting. It does. It sounds like it won't work as well, but it sounds interesting. The reviews are like people like it works so much. It's great. I love it. I can't believe I stopped drinking energy drinks and stopped drinking coffee. It's probably an individual thing too. You know, like some people are pretty receptive to caffeine versus not. So I wonder. I'll

bring I'll bring you guys some. Did you order it already? Of course you did. What even sent you down that rabbit hole? What were you doing? I read I was reading, I don't know how I went down that, I think I saw a post on X, and I'm like, that's interesting. Oh, what does that say? A stronger locomotor activating effects? Lower toxicity, lesser end-viosinic properties. Stronger locomotor activating effects,

greater wake promoting properties, and stronger dopamigenic. Wow. Dopaminic properties. Wow. Yeah. Wow. Better for the brain apparently and yeah,

pretty interesting. Supposed to be good for the brain too. Dude, the threat. I don't know. Did your wife tell you about our sons this weekend? Oh, so you were telling me a little bit. They were talking about dinosaurs? So I just heard, I didn't even know about it.

I didn't see it happen. We hosted the staff at the house this weekend, right? We barbecued for everybody. Everybody came over. Good time, thanks for having us over. Great time, it was a really, really good time. Had a good time with it. See the whole team there and everything like that.

Kids were there. Katrina's telling me this late last night, last night as we were in bed, she's just like, hey, did I tell you about Max and Aurelius kind of got into it? I was like, what? No, they were playing so good. She goes, no, no, not like that.

They got into a little Sal and Adam argument. I was like, what do you mean Sal and Adam? She goes, Jessica and I were cracking up because it was just like, oh my god, this is like their fathers right now. So come to find out, obviously, Aurelius is hardcore into dinosaurs. Max has been into dinosaurs for a long time. And Aurelius is getting frustrated with Max, because Max

is trying to say that dinosaurs are not extinct. Aurelius is like grabbing Jessica and like mommy, tell him that dinosaurs are extinct. And he's and max is like well No, there's they came from birds and we still have birds And so and so Jessica's trying to explain to a real yes that like well, you're both kind of right like that At least is getting pissed. You don't say and max is getting front max is telling Katrina mom tell him that Both are going to their moms try to get their moms to agree with him that you know Dinosaurs are still around and dinosaurs are exist extinct and listening to them kind of debate back and forth. Oh, yeah

Hilarious, I'm so mad that I missed that she goes. Yeah, no, they were totally but you could tell they were both getting frustrated because Because Jessica and I wouldn't you know conform to either one They were both kind of right and neither one of them wanted to settle for both of them being right Still messy. Yeah He's like trying to explain to and he's been asking me about this this lizard iguana or whatever that has the The thing that opens up and it's like a descendant from dinosaurs and like and I can't even he's been actually adding one Yes. Yes, he's been actually actually one. Yes. Yes He's been asking me the name of that that that reptile or whatever kind of lizard that is, right?

Right, and I haven't been able to remember name and so he's bringing that up to just like but mommy What about that, you know, is he doing the whole thing? This one's still alive and he's so he'll monster Yeah, you can make an argument. Yeah, what is it? What is that? Can you look that? Yeah, that's actually I bought my son a toy that has the one from Jurassic Park where yes come out. Yes spits That's the one that's the one and so yeah, you know what's cute about those two so they're so there's they have something in common where Like my son will play with other kids, but if the other kids kind of a jerk My son doesn't want play with them your kids like that too very much like fine. I'm not gonna play with you Yeah the other kid's kind of a jerk, my son doesn't want to play with him. And your kid's like that too. Like fine, I'm not gonna play with you.

So they're both, they both like to play and share. The two of them got along great. But watching them, they saw each other, they haven't seen each other in a while, and then 10 minutes later, they're holding hands, running around like, come over here, come over there and play. And I started laughing because I was with the guys

and they saw them, you know, everybody grabs Max's hand and they're holding hands running down. And we're laughing and I'm like, that's what I do with the guys and they saw them, you know, you know, everybody scabs Max's hand and they're holding hands running down and We're laughing. I'm like that's what I do with Adam Well at one point, you know the difference of the two of them which was really interesting to see happen was oh, yeah There it is. What's it called? So I don't forget Okay, send it to me so I can make sure I show my son because I know he's been bugging me like crazy But so here's the difference of our kids At one point the boys our staff when I'm referring to the boys they were playing ping-pong

Oh, yeah, and Aurelius was just like drawn to it right away It came over and wanted to play and they were playing and Max was just like so sad He wanted to my to Katrina was just like mommy. I'm so sad Aurelius doesn't want to play with me anymore and Katrina looks over. Well son. He wants to play to Katrina was just like mommy. I'm so sad. It really just doesn't want to play with me anymore And Katrina looks over. Well son. He wants to play ping-pong. I know I'm so sad He doesn't want to play with me anymore. Well, you should go play ping-pong with them. No, that's okay She's like well, you have to understand that he doesn't have a ping-pong table at his house And so of course he wants to well mommy can we buy him a ping-pong table so he'll play with me? Yeah

Doesn't work that way son. We we don't just we don't do that I just be getting kids my daughter my two and a half year old. She's I don't know She hit this like gangster stage. She's like pushing kids down and like Yeah, I do my have my friend over and it's that age You know where they get kind of possessive of her toys and stuff and my buddy's little girl She my daughter has a bunny that she goes to bed with, and it's like, if we lose that, she's not going to bed. So we have backups of this.

Which, by the way, you know what's funny? We lost the original one, so my wife went and got the backup one, and my daughter looks at it and goes, huh? And my wife's like, oh, she took a bath. And she's like, because it's all clean and brand new. So I told Jessica, I said, we gotta trade them out often so they both wear and tear it,

cause it's not gonna work pretty soon. But anyway, this little girl runs up to my daughter to like, to like grab the bunny. And my daughter was like, my bunny, pushes her down. I'm like, uh oh, here we go. And she's been doing this dude. She's been doing this thing. Like, and even with her brother, like yesterday,

he was drinking out of my wife's cup and She wanted some and he's like I'm not done and she just blasted him in the face and he's like Losing it. He's like oh, you know and we had to go over there and separate him I'm like, what do we say to her? It almost seems like any time I mean Katrina will tell you her stories too like when you're the younger girl and you have an older brother or brothers Like you tend to be kind of like that you have to I feel like you to be able to hang with the boys Rough and tumble, but it's kind of funny because a lot of times the girl ends up being more of the bully

Yeah, she like overcompensates like so it's kind of crazy how you see that happen my buddies you know, we're trying to the newest thing right now is is teaching max to like put things away and Kind of start to do chores taking care of his room and stuff like that and he's it's been cute like getting up and and seeing that because they go off to school before I leave the house most days and Coming in and seeing his bed all made and try not to make like a huge deal about it, just like, hey, so you made your bed, good job, dude. And been putting his toothbrush away and this stuff.

And so the other day, he didn't make his bed and we're picking him up from school. Katrina's mentioning it, you know, she's like, hey, I noticed you didn't make your bed today. And he goes, yeah, my legs were tired. What? Your legs were tired? Your legs were tired? Your legs were tired your legs were tired when he does shit like that dude I you have I can't help myself I'm gonna die laughing you

walked to school fine you played all day in the sandbox so if I but your legs your legs were too tired to make the bed this morning. I gotta tell you I talked God, dude, that's funny. That's great. I gotta tell you, I talked to your sister the other day. She's having some good health. Oh yeah, I was gonna ask you, sorry to interrupt you, but I've been wanting to ask you this anyways. You recommended to her the BPC 157 with the KPV pills. Capsule, yeah. For gut?

For gut repair and inflammation. It's like, I mean, game changer. So I use it and so what BPC and KPV will do is it'll reduce inflammation. It'll also accelerate the healing of the gut, the healing of the lining, the mucosa lining. Oh, that's the BPC side. Both. Oh really? Both of them do that. Yeah. And they both also have antimicrobial, but KPV in particular, antimicrobial properties, so it in particular, antimicrobial properties sort of help with any bacterial overgrowth. So the research on KPV, for example, is for things like ulcerative colitis, for Crohn's

disease, for those kinds of gut issues. But they put it in a capsule together. So does it stop overgrowth? Does it eliminate it? Like, what's it? It is not a SIBO. So does it stop overgrowth? Does it eliminate it? Like what's it? It is not a SIBO treatment. Okay. But it will help.

But what it primarily does is when you have like leaky gut syndrome, right? So this is when your gut is constantly inflamed from whatever, the junctions between the cells and the gut start to open because the gut becomes inflamed. What happens is food passes through when it shouldn't and you start to open because the gut becomes inflamed. What happens is food passes through when it shouldn't and you start to develop kind of autoimmune issues or reactions to certain foods. Or you just don't feel good. It heals that.

Reduces inflammation and it heals the gut and it again, the mucosal lining of the gut which is protective starts to rebuild. So it's a longer process but when you take the BPC and the KBV capsules, you find after 30, 60 days or so, it's like, well man, I can eat things I couldn't eat before and I feel way better. So just talking to her, all the treatments she's going through, I thought this would be a good...

Oh, that's good to know too, because I got those and what I didn't do was take it consistently. So it's actually one of those things that you have to... Of course. See, I always got to ask you this. I mean, there's certain things like... Take it every day. There's like things like BPC-157 that you have to see I was gonna ask you this So I mean there's certain things like every day There's like things like BBC one five seven that I can inject and I know right away direct to an injury Yeah, right away. I can feel the improvement then there's other things I feel like that you're like you need to build it up. You need to be consistent with it. Yep. Okay Yep, so I never gave that yeah, and our partners at mp hormones

Calm that's like one of the top sellers for good health, like by far. They always tell me, yeah. She was actually just asking me about that, if I got that over to her. I wanna know about, Justin, you came in, you were super angry, talking about your weekend with some kid messing with you. Yeah, yeah, I was a little frustrated, yeah.

Well, cause I'm so proud of my son. My oldest was competing for gymnastics and we held our own competition for Nationals at the arena there in Santa Cruz, the Warriors, Santa Cruz Warriors Arena. And he qualified for Nationals, right? He qualified. So yeah, he got first place for both of the events he competed in except... Bro, that's crazy. He's so good. Yeah.

He's really good to do that. Yeah. And he's, it's been, it's been hard for him cause he's like one foot out in his, we've really had to coach him up and try to get his mindset back into it just to like finish strong. Cause he's kind of like, wants to explore other sports and all this stuff, but like his coach sees a lot in him

and is really trying to fight for him to like, his coach sees a lot in him and is really trying to fight for him to like, and he's really good at it. And so we're kind of in a pickle with it. Because I know he wants to do something else. But at the same time, like, dude, you're really good at this. I don't know if it's really the move to stop what you're doing. And so I don't know, he's just been a lot more disciplined and focused and he hit nationals. And so he's, he shows up and he, and he just crushes it. And what gets me frustrated is like, I'm, I'm pumped and I'm like, man, I'm so proud. And, um, and then I find out later they go to do the awards

and in, so Courtney's there and she had to do a lot of volunteering because we're hosting and so she had to do a lot of you know all the announcing and putting all the paperwork together for all the athletes and all this kind of stuff and so she put it together and like has Ethan is like you know the first place but this other kid gets like no I'm first place she's like what are you talking about you're first place and Good cuz that same competition. There's different Heats or I don't know what you call it But there's different times of the day where other athletes kind of compete at that same event And this kid was older. He's like almost 19 years old. He's like 18

Big kid pretty much a grown-ass adult and he's a level like a junior or a, I forget what they call junior elite, I think is what they call him, but like he's like three levels above Ethan, right? So this fucking kid, okay, he competes three, every level down below him just so he can sandbag points

so he can get into nation know nationals with with a higher point percentage there's another there's no there's another this is why i was like you can't do that there's another sport you can do shit like that too what what sport is so dirty so it's like it's the equivalent of like me with that shit hold on me me me competing you know at my age range and then going three years below me and dominating these younger kids. So wait, is it different levels of age or also different levels of experience or how is it?

Age and experience. So that'd be like a black belt in Jiu Jitsu entering the blue belt division and getting first place. There's other sports that do this bullshit. Why would they allow that? Exactly. And so we're talking to coach about that and he's like apparently it's legal But like and not a lot of gyms do it

But you know, this is one of those things where it's like it's his integrity thing, right? So this coach that let him do that. I'm a blast this coach You have no fucking integrity Wow. It's just I Like who does that who feels good about that? Yeah, you know, you know, like and here's the thing like yeah It's not a big deal. You know, you just but you just took a trophy that my kid worked really hard to get Yeah, it just right away from you know, it's so He was pissed he was absolutely livid dude and I get it like who does that? Yeah, it sucks What's up weird is there is there another pathway like okay, so this older kid who?

Did not belong competing at any of those levels trying to get points so he can go to his national thing, too What is is there another pathway for him that you could have done or he could have competed more events But instead he took the easy route because he can. All I had to do is hurry up get my there's another sport that does this and it drives me crazy till I figure this up because I we've had my buddies and I have talked about this. What's interesting to me is that he'll go to Nationals and just lose if nobody else did that he's gonna suck because he got there through yeah essentially cheating. Yes. Wow.

Yeah, it's a cheat. You know what that reminds me of? I can't believe it's legal, dude. It really pisses me off. That reminds me, when I was a kid, I competed in judo, okay? And sometimes your pool was so small that there were only two or three people in your pool.

So if you got last place, you got a third place. So you got your ass kicked by everybody in your pool, but you get a third place trophy. Or a second place trophy. And I remember, that happened once to me. I got second place out of three people, and I remember being like, throw it away. Cool, I beat one guy, I lost the one guy.

Second place. Bodybuilding can do some of this stuff too, where you, let's say let's especially now at the age I am now let's say I went to go compete again And I want to I want to compete against everybody or I want to go to go to you know Try and get into Olympia or whatever it and I'm getting my ass kicked By basically everybody else I can enter into Masters in the same show Go into Masters because I'm older and

Then now I'm competing against just those guys and then now at least you're competing against guys You're right. I'm not going but you're not going It's not but it's still it's still frowned upon because if I've already won trophies and I've already reached the level It's kind of like going down a lot But it's not like doing like at least just that's your age though Like it would be like a pro bodybuilder yeah competing an amateur to win so we could say I was pretty much had a beard, you know Just like oh when he I saw the picture of him staying next to my son I was just like Yeah, so does this mean your kid can't go to nationals then no he still goes national

Okay, he just didn't just lost the trophy. Yeah, he does this mean your kid can't go to nationals then no he still goes national. Okay. He just didn't just lost the trophy Yeah, he lost first place and that's probably that's probably why they make it like oh they can do it because it's like it's not like He robbed his trip to nationals, but he doesn't get a trophy there. It's gonna drive me crazy Yeah, I know someone listening to podcasts right now frustrating I know someone listening to podcasts right now knows that there's another sport that does this because I've we've we've debated this before my buddies and I like that's so unfair that they can do that but there's other sports that allow this shit yeah where they can do that dude speaking of sports did you know it's there's a new competition that they filmed and I saw a clip of it on Instagram do you know

what you know there there's a new competition they're doing you know what they're doing is a brutal one no're doing? Is it a brutal one? No, it's sperm racing. Oh. What? Doug, look up sperm race. Oh, great. Keep your filters on. Yeah, why does it say welcome back?

Yeah. How do we sign up? Literally, it's under like a microscope, and they're racing sperm to see whose sperm wins in the race. OK. Now, wait a second here, because once they're out, they die pretty quick. So how do we get them racing each other in live, right?

Oh, I didn't even think of that. Bro, they only survive for so long. Yeah. I can't even think. that. It's gotta be like a warm vessel. Bro, they only survive for so long. What are they racing in? Yeah. Yes. Yes. And do we have to like get it out together to get it so they can actually compete? Yeah.

Are they at the same time? Yeah. All right, next up, Adam and Justin going to competition. You have 15 minutes to prepare yourself for the sperm race. Now there was a clip on Instagram, I should send it to Doug because I'm bad at research. There's a competition. And I guarantee you some crazy shit.

There's a lot of details that I need from this. Did you find it? I did find it. Okay, it's coming in all weird there. How they evaluate it. Yeah, dude, I'm like, what are we doing? I don't know, apparently. No, that's not it. Mass casualty. No, that's it. like, what are we doing? Like, yeah, yeah. I don't know, apparently. No, that's not it.

Mass casualty? No, that's a. Whoa, what happened? No, it says the world's first sperm race goes off with a bang in LA. Oh. That's their headline. Not in Dutch.

Yeah. Getting cute with the titles here. Yeah, no, so watch, see, like, they're watching it, and you see who wins. Now they're allowed aggressively advertising all over your page there, man. They're everywhere., man. I mean a commercial for them. I know Is this like this like thoroughbred status? Like if you're you're the guy that always has the fastest, you know, like you'd be like, I don't know

but I kind of feel like It's kind of interesting brand your rights, right? You know, I'm just thinking of selling it at that point. You know naturally, I'm a champion. I got really fast sperm. I feel like my sperm would beat you guys. I don't know how easily we can beat you guys. So random. Doug's trapped now. Hey I want you, maybe Sal you can google because if I have Doug. Doug's trapped now. Yeah. There we go. Hey, I want you, maybe Sal you can Google because if I have Doug do it could take till next week. I'm gonna have you Google up vitamin C, a neutral, someone, one of the fans heard me talking about chlorine and

what it does to my skin. Oh. Said that if I rub vitamin C on my, on my skin before going it neutralizes the chlorine. Oh, I've never heard that. Do your Google magic and tell me. Before I look like an idiot and try it. Yeah, he gets skin rashes, so that would be interesting if that worked. So it's vitamin C cream. It's like a lotion. It's like a spray. How to minimize.

Oh, well there you go. Just do vitamin C. No, I found it. How to minimize it. Vitamin C neutralizes chlorine and other chloramines. Vitamin C or absorbic acid is a powerful antioxidant that can neutralize chlorine, pop up, that can neutralize chlorine and chloramines effectively.

When applied topically, vitamin C converts chlorine and chloramines on the skin into the harmless compounds, hydrochloric acid and the the hydroscorbic acid. Oh, yeah, no, it's real. I'm totally gonna do that. So you can, oh wow, look at this. You can make your own. That's what she said.

She goes, I can either buy it or make my own. One cup of distilled water. I'm gonna try this, dude. Can you send that link to me, please? So one cup of distilled water, one teaspoon of sorbic acid powder, and you put it in a spray bottle and then you can you send that to me yeah I'll send it to you yes I'm gonna try that yeah because I

tell you that's the one thing that keeps me it messes you up yeah I mean like I love having a hot tub and pool and everything like that but I'll only get in it so much because it just gets exhausting I have to really do a thorough job after swimming of like really scrubbing my skin or it just gets exhausting. I have to really do a thorough job after swimming, of like really scrubbing my skin, or it just dries me out. I gotta ask you this. Now you've used the Luminose on your skin

after getting sunburn in Mexico. Have you been using it more on areas of like psoriasis? Yeah, oh I love it for that. Oh yeah, I love it for that. Yeah, because the GHKCU in there is supposed to be amazing for that. It is, it is. And we've worked Yeah. Oh, yeah, I love it. Yeah, cuz the GHK see you and they're supposed to Amazing for them. It is it is and we've worked with a couple different companies that have that product They have the best like as far as I don't know if it's the potency or what they mix it with Yeah, because we I've probably done I think with all of our contacts with peptides and also that I've used like three or four different

of the creams The luminous ones though, whatever they're mixing it with or wherever a high the creams. The Luminose ones though, whatever they're mixing it with or whatever. It's a high dose of GHKC. I can tell. I can feel it. They all work and they're all positive, but that one is like.

There are lots of good, there's good skincare products that are out there, but this is like, I mean, this is like, this is like steroids versus creatine. The creatine works, can't compare to steroids. You put this on your face within two applications, you can tell, literally. My wife has some, so we have it at home.

Her friends will come over, she'll have them put it on, and then they'll put it on again later, and then all of them are like, what? Oh, I think you can tell right away. Yeah, I think you can tell right away. No, but for my psoriasis, it's been amazing. I mean, I've completely, it's been years now, after we got, first it was Caldera, I mean my psoriasis it's been amazing. I mean I've completely it's been years now After we got it first it was caldera. I mean used to use caldera a lot I still do use both those that I toggle back and forth all time, but they're just a peptide. This isn't just we had stronger

Yeah, you know, it's it's it's way better for that Especially if I you know going back to the pool point like my skin gets dried out. It just exacerbates that so if I using that afterwards Is like a Mandatory, so I'm really excited the vitamin C. I had never heard that before never yeah, that's really cool makes sense No, no, I'm totally gonna do that You can drink alcohol and enjoy the next day. You just got to use the pre alcohol supplement z-biotics So this is a probiotic that's been genetically modified to break down acetaldehyde. This is a negative byproduct of alcohol consumption. Breaks it down in the gut. So you take Z-Biotics, then you go drink, and then guess what?

You feel way better the next day. Go check them out. Go to zbiotics.com. That's Z-B-I-O-T-I-C-S.com. Forward slash mind pump two five. Use the code mind pump two five and get a massive discount. Back to the show. Our first caller is Kenny from Florida. What's up Kenny? How you doing Kenny? What's happening?

Hey what's up guys? How's it going? Thanks for having me on. I really appreciate the opportunity. You got it man, how can we help you? So my background, I'm 31 years old, five foot nine, 190 pounds. I'm a father of two boys,

two and a half year old and an 11 month old. I'm a father of two boys, a 2 1 2 1 1 1 1 month old. I'm a former college baseball player and fitness has always been a pretty big part of my life, so I've been weight training pretty consistently for the last 15 years. My father passed away when I was a senior in high school at the age of 39 due to cardiac arrest. My primary motivation now is to be the best and healthiest father and husband I can be and ensure I'm doing everything in my control to make sure that doesn't happen to my kids. In 2020 when gyms were closed I got away from weight training and started running a lot and really began to like it. I wanted to do one hard thing each year so I ran my first marathon in 2021, did an Olympic

triathlon in 2022 and then another marathon in 2023. But after that, I was physically and mentally drained, so I knew I wanted to take a break from running. Shortly afterwards, I found your podcast, and listening to your show confirmed what I was already feeling, that I needed to stop running and get back in the gym. So I've been working out three times per week ever since, primarily consisting of resistance training. I've completed MAPS anabolic, MAPS performance, and I'm currently in phase three of MAPS aesthetic.

I feel much better now and have not carried this much muscle since I was in college over ten years ago. However, I've pretty much completely ignored cardio for the last two years, and I know that it can have a positive effect on my heart health, which is more, or which is very important to me considering my family history. So my question is, with a goal of overall health and longevity, how could I implement cardio

into MAPS fitness programming without overtraining? Yeah, good question. Love it. Now, why are you asking about the overtraining? Do you feel like you're hitting, you're reaching a limit right now? Do you feel like you're kind of, you know, I feel I feel great right now. I feel just like Historically, that's like my tendency being a college athlete like if I ever did take a break from training when I jump back into it I just have a tendency to overdo it and like okay. I'm about to puke I should stop

You know take a break and I don't know I, I hear you guys talk about over training a lot. So I don't want to just like, OK, let's run a mile before I do this Maps Aesthetic program and then not see the results that I'm currently seeing. Got it. What Maps program? Are you running Aesthetic right now? Is that what you're on? Yeah, I'm in phase three of Aesthetic.

Yeah. OK. So if you feel good, you got good sleep, you feel good recovery, no issues otherwise, no like nagging joint pains. Yeah, I feel great. Someone like you with your genetics, right? So you played college baseball, you've competed in some pretty high level endurance events. You probably have a higher capacity for work, for workouts than most people.

Even though you're a father, I don't think it's probably like when you were in college, you're still pretty good. A real easy way to reap the benefits of cardiovascular training would be to do hit style cardio. So, you know, like 12, 15 minute hit sessions, a couple days a week will give you a lot of the benefits. And then on top of that, just moving. Just staying active throughout the day, so making sure you get your 10,000 steps a day.

And that covers the bases when it comes to the exercise portion of health and longevity. The rest comes from diet, sleep, lifestyle, you know, that kind of stuff, relationships and that kind of stuff. 12 minutes HIIT post-foundation days is perfect. That's what I would do. Listening to what your goals are, what you're already currently doing, right after you finish your lifting,

go over and mess with the different modalities if you want to do stair master one day, treadmill another day, elliptical row or whatever, but do these 12 minute hits. And the way that programming looks is like, I go all out for the 10 seconds as hard as I can and then I just let my heart rate come back down. Could take me 45 seconds, could take me a minute and a half, doesn't matter, until I feel I've caught my breath and my heart

rate come back, then I sprint it again, do it again and you just do that for 12-15 minutes at the end of your foundational days. That will do a ton for you, just that alone. And then maybe on your focus days, you could have maybe like a little bit longer run that's like more moderate intensity, maybe a mile or two. I mean, before those days, that's going to be plenty, dude. Okay. Yeah, I mean, that sounds good. I just, like I said, I didn't want want to you know, jump back into it and then

And then have a be a detriment to you know, all the strength gains that I've seen sure running It's good awareness and you are following the probably one of the highest volume programs we have aesthetic So if there was a program I'd say be careful of that. It would be that there's a lot There's a lot in that and so if all of a sudden you started having three days of long runs, it would be too intense probably for that. And you know, also remember consider this, there's performance adds to longevity to a point. Okay, so when you go into extreme performance,

you start to sacrifice longevity. Now I'm not comparing extreme performance to the typical American who doesn't exercise at all and eats garbage. But I'm using the context of how do I maximize longevity and how do I maximize performance. So what I mean by that is, you know, there is a balance that adds to longevity.

When you start to push for extreme performance, then you start to sacrifice longevity. And so what you see is, for example, top level athletes, their longevity is not better than somebody who exercises in a balanced way, it's actually worse. And in some cases, it's as bad as a typical, you know, the average American. Football players would be an example of this, for example.

But it has to do with the nature of the sport. So remember that as well. So because of your background in athletics, the only reason why I'm telling you this is if longevity is really the key, you're going to see performance gains, but you'll sacrifice longevity, just keep hammering performance to get faster, more stamina, stronger if you keep pushing that button all the time. Yeah, it's really just at that point adjusting your intensity as you're going through that because, you know, retaining the skill of athleticism and, and, um, multi-planar movement and, you know, being able to recognize positions like that's really where if, if you're trying to maintain and keep that type of athletic feel and, and ability, um, you

know, mobility is going to is gonna be your best friend. And that's really to just stay connected and stay able to recruit within those long ranges. And that's gonna carry you so much further than trying to just hammer your body for stamina. Yeah, yeah, I think I'm done with the long races for sure. I like where I'm at right now a lot. And I still do like adult rec sports and stuff too, so.

Oh, you're good. Oh, you're good. You're perfect, especially if you're doing that. So are you doing that right now? Well, basketball just ended, so I mean, that was definitely cardio, but like, you know, beer league softball and stuff that doesn't really Yeah, the basketball I was not doing anything else that's fine. Yeah. Yeah, you're fine if you're doing that, that's your cardio right there. Yeah

Okay, do sweet bro. Yeah, good man. I don't Kenny All right. Appreciate it. Thank you guys. Take it easy. I think, I'm glad he said that at the end. Like playing is the best for health. Yeah. It's gonna take you the furthest. You get the community to enjoy it. Especially if he intermittently does this.

I love, you know, you have a season of basketball, that's over at rec leave, and that's all you're primarily doing. Then you get out of that, then you go into a MAPS program. If he does that, he kind of undulates that throughout the year. that's all you're primarily doing then you get out of that then you go into a MAPS program yeah if he does that he kind of undulates that throughout the year fine he doesn't even need to schedule cardio that'll keep him plenty health it does crack me up though that you know a college baseball player will go and play you know beer softball I hate

those guys you know I mean you're playing oh he's just cracking it out like what is happening here have I told that story on here if I told that story on here? Have I told that story on here before? I know I've told you guys. You signed up for like a? We signed up. The short story. I'll tell you what I'm talking about. The hustler, like the pool shark guy. No, so my buddies and I, the first time we did this,

it was here in the Bay Area. Now, I come from small town, right? So, you know, in our small town, we're pretty good athletes. You know what I'm saying? But now I'm in the Bay Area. Him and I, we sign up for a thing. We get all of our buddies together.

And we're all ex-athletes. Couple guys play baseball. most of us were basketball players, some of that, and I have no idea how this thing works. It's like the rankings, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Are you A, are you B, are you C? D's like the lowest or whatever,

and so we put ourselves in C. We're like, let's go in C and feel it out first. Let's dominate. No, no, no, no, that's not what we said at all. We said, hey listen, this is literally the conversation. We all get we all get together for listen don't like ease into it don't go all out let's kind of feel this because we don't want to stand out like we we put ourselves in a lower stand yeah we don't want to stand out like we put ourselves in a lower we'll be undercover just so we could win so we like literally told her we're done playing bro first inning we're down like 13

zero we're like getting there we're like hey we can fucking play now. Let's go. It was like I am I have Okay, try yes, dude, and you got like the whole the whole league is like a bunch of X Same idea. Oh, literally one of the teams we played was literally the junior college team They were offseason this what they all got together and did and we were just getting hammered That's I mean hammer. I we didn't win a. We didn't win a game the whole entire fucking season. Yeah. That's how like, that's how terrible we were and how good everybody else was. I'll never, never forget that.

Our next caller is Myra from Colorado. Hi Myra. Hi Myra. How can we help you? Good morning. Hi gentlemen. Thanks for having me on today. I'm super excited to be here. How can we help you? So, have me on today. I'm super excited to be here. Awesome. How can we help you?

So I have a really poor connection with my glutes as a result of a trauma. It's a trauma response. Really the only time that I can feel them engaged is when I'm using the hip thrust machine and doing thrusts. Even holding like an isometric bridge, not so much. And squats are definitely out of the picture. I have started throwing in an As to Grass Squats, which has been slightly helpful,

but really not as much as I was hoping. Okay, is this physiological or psychological trauma response? Both. Okay, so acupuncture, have you tried acupuncture? I have not. Okay, that might help. That might help you feel what you're looking for. So the question is, is it worth trying to connect

or train them because you can't? What's the question? So my question is, would it be more beneficial to run a bulk to try and build that muscle or continue to focus on feeling that connection first? Both at the same time. Yeah. Yeah both. Yeah, do both at the same time also We talk a lot about trying to feel the muscle and connect to the muscle and it is important I will say this it's not necessary like phase one. It's actually not necessary

Okay, because it's impossible not to. If you do a floor bridge, your ass is working. Just playing stuff. Even if you can't feel it, it's getting worse. It is getting worse. Yeah, and I just, in fact, it's so funny, this is your question, I just read a study yesterday where they were looking at EMG results from exercise.

So what this is measuring is muscle contraction or connection in an exercise, and they were comparing it to the subjective assessment of the person doing the exercise. So the person doing the exercise is like, I feel this a lot here, then they would check the EMG. You know what they found? They were not really correlated, okay?

For example, men oftentimes don't feel their glutes doing a squat, but we know the glutes are definitely working. We know that for a fact. So it's not necessary. Now, I'm recommending acupuncture, however, because yours is the result of something that happened. And acupuncture, in my experience with what you're saying,

I actually have anecdotal experience with clients with situations where they couldn't feel a part of their body for certain reasons the acupuncture actually made the difference. Thank you I will try that. Yes now are you are you following any of our programs Myra? I have ran anabolic twice and so I'm kind of going through it a third time but I've tweaked it to go over three days and then I'm kind of going through it a third time but I've tweaked it to go over three days and then I've kind of added some more back exercises because those are my favorites. Cool, cool. Can we send you a program? Muscle Mommy would be great especially if you like adding back.

Yeah let's give you Muscle Mommy. That would be fantastic. Thank you. You got it. You got it. So follow that one after you're done. Okay sounds sounds great. Yes, thanks for calling in. Thank you so much. Bye bye. Yeah, I actually had clients use acupuncture. Break down and cry sometimes after something like that. Well, I had a client who had some trauma as a kid, and as a result, didn't feel anything

from her belly button down to her like thighs. It was almost like she just couldn't. Disconnected from that. Yeah, now she had neurological connection. So everything worked. But mentally disconnected. Just couldn't.

Because of the trauma. Just couldn't feel it. And the acupuncture brought back the feeling. Now, I don't know how you would explain that from a Western medicine standpoint. I know what they would say in Chinese medicine, but I've also had acupuncture work for clients who had physiological disconnection. So I had a woman who injured her back and one of her rhomboids, she just couldn't connect

to it and it didn't get back a hundred percent, but it was significantly better from acupuncture. So what she would do do she would get acupuncture then she would train with me. So yeah don't they target it so it like kind of goes cross-body like in terms of the like how do they I don't know do you explain a little bit of it I'm totally unaware. I don't know that Chinese so acupuncture uses Chinese medicine explanations so like the meridians energy flow and the chi. Yeah I had to guess, I would have to say, I would guess it has to do with the nervous system and the needles going in through thousands of years of them practicing. They figured out how to get the nervous system to react in a particular way. So, yeah.

Is it the same thing that's going on when you have trauma when you're a kid or what or what not that at a period of time in your life and you have no memory and you can't recall because you've blacked it out, right? Like there's a great speculation. I didn't even put that together. Yeah, I would I would think so your body literally is making you forget Yeah, that's a great speculation. So I would think it's similar to that probably where it's just like something bad Like there's periods in my life where You asked me and I can recall something before jump right past protecting you. Yeah Obviously there stuff there right that you don't want to do and so your brains like okay We don't need to remember that I would think that's the same

That's the weird part because you think some of that yes stored in the body sure like the memory of it Sometimes by the way, it's the opposite. So people have pain Yeah, just doesn't go away. Then they'll do intensive therapy and the pain gone. You know? And they had MRIs and everything, couldn't figure out what the hell this pain was coming from. It's very, very, very complex.

Our next color is Dylan from Virginia. What's up, Dylan? What's happening, Dylan? Finally get to meet you, man. Other than Instagram DMs. You're gonna meet Joel as well. Yeah, right on, man. How can we help you? So I'll start off with the subliminal like being everyone does.

I found y'all six years ago. Actually when I first got married, y'all through your advice helped me to go from 180 pounds six foot three to 230 pounds of 12 percent body fat. I got to be a personal trainer. I actually work at the fire department. So I'm on working towards getting on the fitness committee as well. Helped a lot of the guys, my peers and stuff lose a bunch of weight, gain a lot of muscle. And even through low sleep and all the stuff in the stress that goes with the fire department, and all the stuff in the stress that goes with the fire department. I'm still able to get a PR of 500 pound deadlift and 450 squat.

So that was all the y'all's information. So I appreciate that. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, dude. So my main question is actually towards Adam today. And even though I know that y'all, like obviously it's fitness podcast. I know you all deal with a lot of life stuff. And right now, in my life, I'm working towards like I love the

fire department. I know Adams talked a lot about like he's big into business and everything. I know that he has talked a lot about that that he with his passion for fitness and stuff. I'm kind of looking to see some direction on your thoughts on like, I'm looking to gain some financial goals, but the fire department isn't like a super big financial provider. So where do you draw the line of turning down the big private sector opportunities for something that you love, like y'all with fitness Not being the best paying all the time So i'm kind of looking for some direction on like where do you draw that line of doing what you're passionate about?

versus big financial opportunities in private sector When uh when it's 10 o'clock at night and you're on your phone and you're not supposed to be what are you looking up? What are you researching? What are you doing? Uh, normally has to do with the business with the fire department, mainly. Oh, okay. So it's not to get better at the job. It's not okay. Well, then so then you're somebody who put plies yourself. I was going to, I thought maybe you'd be doing things related to the real estate, the houses,

construction, stuff like that. No, I do. Um, it's, it's kind of like, construction, stuff like that. No, I do. It's kind of like I have a little bit of an issue where I have, thankfully I have a lot of opportunity in my life. And from time to time, I feel like I skip a lot. Like where it's like I see this opportunity, I'm like, oh man, that's a great opportunity. Like, let me jump on that.

But then I'm into that a little bit. And then I see something else, I'm like, oh dude, that's a great opportunity too. So it's like I find myself like floating a lot because I get excited else and I'm like, oh dude, that's a great opportunity too. So it's like, I find myself like floating a lot because I get excited about the opportunity without like, and sometimes it's hard for me to fully engage in something because I'm always like seeing the opportunities and it's hard for me

to just dial in the one at times. Yeah, I mean, my advice, cause I think even though you may not think the firefighter thing has big potential, I mean, you get up to be a fire chief and can make some really good money doing something like that and incredible retirement. So if you were passionate about that, that's the thing that you're sitting up at night looking into and reading then maybe I leaned, I'm going to lean into the thing that I find myself doing when I'm not getting paid. That I when I have downtime I'm researching, I'm reading about because it's I'm obviously into it

And so leaning into that is is gonna end up no matter what the kind of anything the firefighter thing You might have like this dollar amount like oh I can only make this much like I don't know if that's the right way To look at it I think it's more like what are the things that you're most passionate about and then leaning leaning into that You know, I know that if you've been listening for this long, you know my story of being in the cannabis industry and you know at that point in my life I was chasing a dollar amount and I had reached that, passed that and realized how unhappy I was. Now temporarily I was happy for the year and a half of spending the money and kind of filling

this hole that I had to make myself feel better. And then I just woke up one day and realized like, okay, cool, I checked that box. I'm actually not really happy. What is the stuff I'm into? And I was like, man, fitness, but there's no money in that. I could see the cap on that. I knew what the two positions above me were going to be and making them. I want to make more than that. And so, but I thought, well, who cares?

I already did the money thing. So why don't I go back to doing what I love? Now the irony is I found a way to make more money than I ever made doing the other stuff, doing what I love to do. And I think that's the moral of the story here is you got all these things that, and you already, I can tell by the way you approach fitness,

by the way you approach real estate, even the way you're approaching firefighter, like you're the type of guy that if you put your mind to something, you're going to be successful. And sometimes guys like us, uh, what you actually need is that little bit of pressure of, I have to make this thing work. I got, I'm going to go all in on this thing and I'm going to cut this other stuff out and I'm just going to focus on this because that's the only way I'm going to

eat. And people like you tend to, to rise to the occasion. Now, it's scary to initially let go of the other things that are consistent and are paying you, but you're also not the type of person to lay down. You're not the type of person who's going to like, Oh, the first hurdle that you have, you're going to give up. Or if you trip and fall, you're going to quit. You're the type of person. If you know that about yourself, then don't be afraid to put

yourself in that situation. Don't be afraid to back yourself in a corner because the best version of you probably put yourself in that situation. Don't be afraid to back yourself in a corner because the best version of you probably comes out in that situation. And if you're the type of guy who's always got like all these things cooking and you're you can get complacent with that. Like, I'm good. I'm making a good, I'm making a nice living. I don't, I'm not starving. I can get the stuff I want, but I'm also not thriving. I'm also not doing the thing I love the most all the time. And so find a way to put yourself in that situation, even if it's scary, because the

best version of you will most likely come out. And I felt that with these guys when we first started, like there was never a doubt in my mind that we would figure out, I had no idea what it was going to be, how it would manifest, like the way I had no idea what it was going to be, how it would manifest. I had no idea the financial side of this was going to pan out. But what I did know is I loved doing it and I had partnered up with other guys that had the same attitude of we got to win and at all costs we'll figure it out. Yeah, so what did you do? So I fully understand that. That's the exact thing. One of the reasons why I'm asking the question

because exactly what you said is what I'm feeling. And like me and my wife just moved into a new house. So now it's like we've risen to this other level now. So now it's like even more so on a financial aspect, like I have a goal of I would love to pay the house down. So in the case that anything ever happened to me, like I know my wife and kid are taken care of and they don't have to worry about that burden. So in those moments, I'm curious in those moments where you were, where you were taking that leap, was there

anything, was there anything that helped you be okay with the risk that you were taking on that? Uh, that's, that's the crazy confidence I have in myself. I just know, I mean, and you've heard if you've been listening to podcasts this long, like this goes all the way back to my childhood, like I wasn't the most athletic. I didn't have all the opportunities. I wasn't privileged, but I knew my work ethic is like, I knew I could lean into that. I'm not the smartest, but I also know that if I'm going to outwork the next guy at whatever it is that I do until I figure it out. And so having that confidence in yourself is like,

if you know that about you, and only you know that, are you that guy? Are you the type of guy that does something for a little bit and then it gets hard and it gets boring and you quit? Are you the type of guy that's like, I'm gonna figure this out? And if that resonates with you, just lean into that. Like I won't lose.

It's just a matter of time. How long is it gonna take me? Is it gonna take me? You know, that's how these guys were when we started this podcast. We're like we knew we sucked at podcasting We knew that we had no this is not our craft We weren't we didn't know what we were doing, but everyone's like I'll figure it out We'll figure it out and it might will we figure it out in a hundred episodes or two thousand episodes later We will figure it out and we won't stop until then. And that we were totally confident in that. We had no idea how long it would take.

But that was where the formula of us doing like five episodes a week came from was not because we thought that was some great business strategy. That was like how much effort we could put. That's like the max we could do with Doug editing everything by himself and us putting content like five is like about the max work effort we could do. While also trying to keep our full-time jobs to pay the bills and keep those things

going. So lean into it. Whatever it is that you feel most passionate about and don't be afraid of that if you know that about your character. If you know that about who you are. Dylan, how old are you Dylan? One-nine. Dylan, how old are you Dylan? What, nine? So here's the other thing too to consider is that most wealthy people are not wealthy because they make a lot of money at their job.

They're wealthy because they took that money and leveraged it. In other words, if you look at two jobs, both of them cover the bills, one of them makes a lot more money but you don't like it, the other one makes less money but you're passionate about it, you can still become very wealthy with that by taking that money and leveraging it in investments and properties and stuff like that, especially at your age.

And that's kind of why I'm trying to work towards that. Yeah. Trying to, the part that's hard is that now I have a wife, I have a two year old, I have another kid on the way. So for me, it's the question I actually have written out is how you balance ambition and business with the desire to provide beyond your basic needs with still being present in the home. And what have you learned from that?

Yeah, you I mean, look, here's the funny thing. I hope you married the right woman. Yeah, that's, that's the funny thing. I hope you married the right woman. Yeah. That would be the worst fact. No, she is. Okay, to me, that's the answer right there. The answer is a partner that is patient, trusting you that you're gonna go out there

and figure it out while she holds down the fort and supports you. Because what you can't have is a partner who because you ended up having to work 12 hours that day to make it happen, guilts you for not being there as a dad cause that probably already rips you apart inside. Like, and if she's not like that,

then you're gonna be okay. You know, if she's, she looks at you and says, go get it honey, I trust you're gonna figure it out for us. And you know, this is a short period of time. Now obviously it's not ideal to have to work 12 hour days, six, seven days a week when you have two kids, right? You wanna be a present father, but you might be at a period of your life right now

where that's what you need to do to get there. And so if it is, then you do that. And how she handles it and handles it in front of your kid is everything. Yeah, but you gotta see what's in your heart because I think sometimes men will use the work as an excuse because that's where they feel most comfortable.

So if you really do value time with your kids versus I gotta be at home more so my wife doesn't complain, those are two different, two completely different heart postures. If your heart posture is I do want to spend time with my kids then I wouldn't worry about it. I think you're gonna find a way to prioritize what's important. But if your heart posture is I just want to work all day and I don't want to deal with all that at home and I just saw I escaped which happens to a lot of men then that's what you need to examine because

then no matter what that's what's gonna happen even if you're there it won't be present. Yeah, there are times where I definitely like, that resonates with me a little bit, because there are times where it's like, maybe there's a problem that I'm having trouble solving at home, and I'm so good at my work that it's like, it's easy for me just to go there

because I know how to solve these problems. Yeah, so it does definitely happen from time to time. The ultimate mistake a father and a husband will make is being passive. And what that looks like is avoiding problems. So there's an issue, I'm going to run from it, which is what they would say, the sinful nature of a man. Your wife's talking in, you're just like, I'm going to go I'm gonna go over here, and I ain't gonna think about it. It's very easy for us to disconnect. So if you find yourself doing that, do the hard thing,

which is not go to work, it's to stay and deal with the issue and lead your family, lead your family. That's your job as a father and a husband. And that'll pay, and I'm telling you from personal experience, it'll be far more fruitful than going and doing the thing that is easy, which for you might be working. Yeah, I definitely appreciate it in the times.

That's one of the things I love about y'all's podcast is that I like that honesty that y'all bring with struggles that y'all have had. Because that seeing y'all and how good of dads y'all are, it's nice to know that there was a moment of imperfection to say that, hey, it wasn't always this way, we had to work towards it. 100%.

They're still imperfect, nobody's perfect, man. Yeah, yeah, for sure. It's always like that, man, it's always gonna be a struggle. But yeah, that's the big thing, man, as a father and a husband, you're responsible, you're the CEO of your company. So you're responsible for all of it all of it

And when those problems arise and you see them your nature is gonna be to disconnect Go do something else something you're good at something. It's easy for you, but stay there and face it. That's how you lead your family Yeah If I do you have time for one more question? Yeah, that's related. Let's hear it So obviously was being a fireman, sleep is kind of an issue, especially like last year, our house ran nine thousand calls.

Oh, my God. So where we're up, there have been some mornings that we get in and we get done with the shift and we walk in our bedroom with our bed fully made. Like, well, I was dumb. Just put our bed linens back in the closet. Like just no sleep at all.

And then obviously, when you're trying to like we're talking about like doing these other extracurricular I was dumb just for our bad linens back in the closet Like just no sleep at all And then obviously when you're trying to like we're talking about like doing these other Extracurricular things sometimes you go straight from there straight somewhere else. Yeah, so sleep is kind of a tough thing at times Are there any I know that you all talk a lot about are there any tips that you would say are good? To get that baseline start working towards Having a better sleep when I'm off trying to focus on that Yeah, I'm like any type of Recommendations on that besides the sleep routine stuff. You know the blue light blocking glasses and

Not eating by our feelings great blue light blocking glasses. Yeah, so besides all that Actually the most the healthiest thing somebody can do in a job like yours is to take naps So I do not like naps. Yes. I know I know guys like you don't like taking naps, but it's actually the best It's the second best thing you could do aside from getting an eight hours of sleep every night So and it does wonders for the brain and the body. So, when you look in, when you do that, are you looking for to get a combined, like let's say I get four hours sleep,

are you looking for to get like four hours worth of naps? Are you looking for like just a standard like hour and a half nap? It's unreasonable to try to make up the time. I mean, that'd be great if you could, but what it probably looks like is, yeah, is you're either gonna take a 20 to 30 minute nap or you're gonna take a 90 minute nap.

Those are kind of the two timeframes. In between, you'll wake up feeling like you're half asleep. I don't know if that's ever happened to you. Take like a 45 minute nap, you wake up, you're like, oh. So it's like 20 or 30 minutes just to take off sleep pressure so you can function. Or you go for 90 minutes for a full nap nap so you just got to determine which one's better and literally just even if you don't want to you just you know go in a

quiet room close your eyes lay back bring it up that you saw a hammock brain FM and a sleep mask there you go yeah yeah that's the hack for that but it's not easy especially for a guy that doesn't like to do it. No, I know Well, I will say this it's kind of funny When I first got brain FM, I've used it at the station because it's tough to sleep there he's always expecting that call and I went to bed playing in the background and I woke up to one of my crew members Yelling at me saying like hey, are you gonna go on this call and I slept through the call?

So it works That's a great brain FM commercial clip clip that for me I actually had to work at dialing it back to only an hour so I wouldn't sleep through calls That's hilarious You and I you and I chat quite a bit on Instagram so stay in touch with me Let me know how things are going but I Really do feel like you know the answer to this you just need to lean into it and I would know it the little bit

I do know about you I don't think you're a guy who, if you go all in and put yourself in a scary spot, you're not gonna figure it out. You will. You'll figure it out. You'll be all right. And maybe this juggling all these things

is just kind of your way of excusing yourself from doing the thing you're supposed to do. So whatever that is, lean into it, and I believe you'll make it happen. All right, well I appreciate it. I appreciate you all the time. All right, Dylan. All right, man. Thanks for calling in. Yeah, absolutely. Good character, you could tell, 29.

Yeah, you know, it didn't dawn on me until right before we got on, and then I saw the full name and went, oh, should I talk to this guy all the time? He's a regular, he's been listening to us for a long time and what he does, he didn't talk a lot about it, but how we got to talking a lot was when I started sharing some of our real estate stuff and he's big into finding these properties and he goes and does a lot of the work himself. So he'll find a little fixer upper, buy it, put all the work in and then six, nine months later, sell it for a nice little profit. So he's fine.

Yeah, no, he's going, what it. Yeah, sell it for a nice little profit. He's fine. Yeah, no. What it is, is he's doing a bunch of different things. Too many irons in the fire. Yeah, and obviously the firefighter career is a very consistent, solid paycheck for him. And obviously real estate is inconsistent. The mercy of the market. But I mean, he's making a good, consistent salary. If he invests conservatively at at 29 keep chipping away at it

He'll be fine. I remember the first one of the first times I realized this I met a man who was a Mean a multimillionaire in the Bay Area owned all these properties like what do you do for a living? He's like, oh, I'm a cashier at the local grocery. I'm like what well statistic with all the teachers Millionaire next door is such a great read and that's one of the things they break down as the top five It's like the top five professions that are Multi-millionaires you wouldn't even guess because it has nothing to do with that It's everything to do with living well below your means having the discipline

Whether you make 80 grand a hundred grand 300 grand living well below that taking the money that like you said And leveraging it to grow on the side. And what it is, is you just have to start so small at first. I mean, God, I love the analogy of like, we compare it to building muscle or losing body fat. It's slow, it's arduous, it's not going to come really fast. It seems like, oh my God, I didn't get any results from that one workout. Of course, that one investment or that one time you saved is like not gonna make the, but you do that every day for months, years.

Shits starts to compound. It builds and grows. Yeah. Our next caller is Betty from Utah. Hi Betty. How you doing, Betty? Hi, you guys. How are you? How's it going? I am, I am starstruck. I can't believe like I'm actually talking to you guys right now. I'm so good. How are you? We're good, how are you doing? Doing good. How can we help you? Okay, so should I just like read my email and then we can go from there? Would that be the easiest? That's probably the easiest way to do it. Okay. Also, I just wanna say thank you for everything, like along with everybody else in the whole world,

like you've changed my life and many others. So we'll get to that later, but thank you. Thank you. Okay. Sorry I'm very excited a little bit nervous so here we go. I said hey guys I'm a huge fan I love every episode which by the way I started from episode one and made it to about 400 and then decided to skip ahead so I don't miss any like new stuff, which probably I did otherwise I wouldn't be here. So, um, I've been listening for a little over a year

and I listened to you all day while I'm at work. I started my fitness journey as a runner after I had my baby and I was running for about a year and I got all the way down to 114 pounds, but I also wasn't eating much. And by that I mean not a lot at all. When I got divorced, I couldn't run in the morning anymore. And so I got a job in my gym membership. And so begins my love affair with lifting. I've been lifting for 13 years. Sorry, I'm going to scroll down.

I love it so much. I've gained a tremendous amount of strength and confidence. For context, I am 38 years old. I'm 5 feet tall. I'm 146 pounds. My scale claims I'm 23% body fat. I don't know how accurate that is my patent size is a size four so I am pretty small I can pull out 200 pounds I deadlift 265 and I can bench 165 Wow oh my god you're strong great numbers sorry I'm very nervous um early last year when I found you guys I Yeah, we Sorry Early last year when I found you guys I started my cut and was able to drop down to 135 from

155 pounds took me about five months I looked and felt great. I managed to keep most of my strength but I did have to cut my calories pretty low to get there, like probably around 12 to 1300 calories. I went on a three-day vacation with my husband, and when I got back, I had gained 10 pounds, and I was a little surprised. I swam while I was there.

I got all of my steps. I didn't eat or drink like, too crazy, but I did like really enjoy myself. But after I got all of my steps. I didn't eat or drink like crazy, but I did like really enjoy myself. But after I got back with the life of me, I could not get that 10 pounds off. It wouldn't budge. So I reversed I ate for about four months, I increased my calories to actually, oh, 2300, and I was eating 150 grams of protein. And I got up to 154 pounds and I was about 90 to 95% consistent. Like, this is my thing.

It's what I do. It's what I love. Like, so I was pretty good on it. I started my cut in January and I'm down to 146, which is great. But it feels like I need to drastically cut my calories low, even get things moving beyond that. I have no interest in ever being 140 pounds ever again. I was pretty much a skeleton. But I can't believe the body fat that I put on during my reverse diet. I am a trainer and a coach and my clients have fantastic results. Why don't I? Ha ha ha ha. Right now I'm bouncing between

MAP-15 and Anabolic and I can't decide which way to go. I'm also wondering what happened. How did I gain that much weight in three days? And then I included some pictures. Blah blah blah blah blah. Thank you. So 10 pounds, you gain 10 pounds in three days. Yeah. Well definitely it was a bunch of water and stuff. Yeah. But it's stuck. Yeah. Yeah. And it's usually like when I go on vacation, I anticipate I'm going to gain a couple of pounds is just what you do, you know? And it's usually gone in three to five days.

And it did not go away. No matter, it didn't matter how hard I tried, how hard I cut. And I tried like, fixing my stuff, like, I would do like higher calories in one day, lower calories than another day to try and like break things up a little bit, you know, but didn't matter. So I was like, okay, I listen to you guys. I was like maybe I'm ready for my like reverse diet and I would like really be focusing on my getting strong which my body puts on weight easy and When I say weight, I don't just need that like I can put on strength and muscle pretty good it's losing the fat that I have an issue with and

So the scale was starting to make me nervous. And so I took your guys advice and just stopped weighing myself during the reverse, reverse diet. And that's how I got up to 154. And I weighed myself 154. And I didn't panic, I kind of anticipated it and I got back down to 146 super easy, but I can't seem to get past it. Are you testing body fat too? I have it on my scale so I don't know how accurate it is but so according to my scale I'm 23% and when I was at 135 I was at 21. According to my scale again I don't know how accurate it is. So low 20% is good Especially if you're as strong as you are like I'm like your bench press in particular super impressive. I don't know too many I haven't met too many women who can put up 165 in the bench press at your size That's like that's like competitive level strength

So now now Any any signs of hormone imbalances? Because you know, do you have any signs like hormone imbalances? Do you have any signs of libido changes, hair changes, sleep, anything like that? So I was actually listening to one of your episodes a couple days ago and you were talking about the cortisol imbalance. And that seemed to resonate with me. My sleep is good once I'm asleep,

but I have a hard time falling asleep. But once I'm asleep, like my house could burn down and I wouldn't have any idea. Like I sleep, I sleep really deep. But so I'm trying to like limit my caffeine. I don't drink a ton, but I do. So I'm limiting my caffeine and I'm in the midst of trying to help my sleep be better.

So I just started that a couple days ago, so I haven't really noticed a big change, but I don't. I don't know. Whenever I see or hear, when someone's tracking diligently and they're getting like strange weight gain, rapid weight gain, like you did, I always ask to look at hormones. I always laugh, let's see if there's anything going on

with the hormones that could be causing like severe water retention. Yeah, because that's 10 pounds in three days. It's like physiologically impossible to gain 10 pounds of body fat in three days. I know, so that's why I didn't panic too much, because I was like mathematically that's not possible. Right.

But it didn't go away. But water retention for sure, and water retention that sticks around can be a result of some hormone imbalance issues, or hormone issues. So I would get that checked and looked at. Aside from that, if you feel good, if your fitness is good, if you're not getting crazy mood swings, you feel healthy, no crazy joint, like no achiness, joint pain type of stuff, I would stay the course. I

would just stay the course and wait until you get your hormones checked. And the second thing I would do is go with a functional medicine practitioner, if that comes back normal, to see if there's anything else that's going on that can be causing water retention. But just so you know, low 20s is a great percentage of body fat. That's where you wanna always be. You always wanna kinda walk around

between 19 to 24% body fat. If you're fit, that's great. Did you feel anywhere in your body particularly that you felt like that weight kind of sat? Or is it like more in your stomach or is this like kind of a- No, it's like it's everywhere. Like there wasn't like, oh my gosh, and all of a sudden my pants don't fit. It was like everything's still like pretty much fit normal, but I didn't notice like

my face wasn't puffy puppy like everything just seemed okay but I was like whoa and I've gone on my week-long vacation before and I'd like I can't I went to Hawaii this is before I went to on this vacation I went to Hawaii and we were gone for ten days and I came back and I had lost a pound. So it's like I don't know what happened between then and there but and so that was probably when we got back from this vacation I think it was August of last year so that's when this whole thing kind of started. Any changes in menstrual cycle? No in fact it's actually like the best it's ever been in my life.

So like clockwork. Oh good, okay. That's a good sign. Yeah, that's a good sign. Energy, libido, and everything else is okay? Energy is iffy, but I am, again, I'm trying to address that with my sleep. I'm hoping if I can really hone in on my sleep,

that'll help with my energy and Okay, everything but it depends on the day but most places leave like I'm usually okay until about 4 p.m And then I really get really really tired and have to have my energy drinks I can go to the gym and you know here we are so yeah lean into the lean into the sleep hormone thing I mean let's let's check that box and make sure now if everything comes back and you're great the next question I'd have is okay so how long were you

at 2,300 calories for and it was at the highest you'd ever reverse dieted to that is the highest yes and I was there for about a month. But that was working up from like, okay, so when I was at 135 and I was hanging out there, I was at about like 1700. And so I slowly brought myself up over those four months. But you know, like I can gain super easy. It's moving that was hard. So let's say all the hormones, that was fine. Then the advice I would have is to lean into the building muscle and actually doing it, even though psychologically it might be difficult for you to keep pushing the calories.

But since you do build muscle relatively good, is like, you know, just saying, hey, I'm going to really lean into this building muscle thing for a little bit longer and see if I can get these calories up to say 28, 2900 calories. Same way you did, real slow, incremental like that and just trying to get stronger. Hopefully we see, even though you're very strong, hopefully we still see some strength improvements that way and ultimately getting your calories up to a higher place where your body weight doesn't change and shift, and then coming back down again and seeing if you can find yourself at a new low. And another approach is just to stay at like 2,200 calories, stay at maintenance and just

focus on getting stronger through your workouts. And just live there, just live there for a while. And the other question I have for you, this is more of a root type question. You're sitting at a good healthy body fat percentage. It seems like you're healthy. Is this more of just a frustration thing? Why my body's not reacting? A little bit. I feel like I know my body pretty well, so when it does something I don't expect, it's like, excuse me ma'am, I have been with you a long time. Why are you behaving weird? And so it was more like my question was more out of curiosity than like, than like frustration. I mean, it's frustrating,

but like, I've worked, I've dealt with like, okay, I've dealt with my weight my whole life, but it's not because like because I was super unhealthy and tried to get healthy. It's just like I grew up with a mom that was always like, I'm on a diet, I'm so fat, I'm a little a lot. And so I really, really worked hard to move away from that mindset. So when I was a runner and not eating, I was like, oh, look how skinny I am. And so my husband now, but my boyfriend at the time, we were going on a vacation and I was like, cool,

I get to try on your bikinis. And I did. And I turned around and saw my ass in the mirror and was like, oh my God, no, no, no, no, this is not better. But like, this isn't better. So that's really when I got my gym membership and started lifting and like it's totally changed my life and my outlook. It's like I love it so much. I preach it. I tell everybody about you guys. Like I just, you know, I live and breathe it and

I just, I feel like I'm doing everything right. And so I'm like, well, how come this isn't working? Like, I reversed dieted my clients, they have amazing success, like, so I don't know, it's like, how come this isn't working for me? So it's more of a curiosity and trying to just like understand what happened. If you were my client, I would tell you to hover around 2100 calories

and just stay there for a while. And stop chasing something by manipulating your diet but more importantly you would say go get your hormones checked let's go get our blood we're gonna full blood panel see everything while you're doing that test your hormones but then just just just stay at that maintenance level and just live there for a while let your body get comfortable you get comfortable with it and just kind of detach from this like I need to chase up or down type of thing? Yeah. Okay.

Okay. So there's like 150 grams of protein seems adequate. Is it too much? Is it? No. What you've explained you've done on the diet and everything like that, you're good. You really are.

Okay. You're doing it right. And makes me feel actually a little better. Yeah, good. I thought there was something else that I was going to say. I don't know. I'm very nervous. I'd love to hear back from you after you get your panels because I just feel like we're going to get some better insight on what's going on. It sounds like you know what you're doing. It sounds like you're pretty consistent with your

track here and that. So I don't know if there's going to be room for air there. I think it's going to be something we might find something enlightening on that on that end especially with the way the the weight came on and stayed like that for that long period of time. Are you are you in our trainer forum? I am. Oh great yeah so follow up with us please. Yeah yep I'm about and the 30% through with the trainer course. Beautiful. That's the best place that you're in there. Reach out to us. So, would you recommend right now, like I'm kind of battling on whether I should do like

right now I'm doing Maps 15. But I'm also kind of like bouncing back and forth between animal. It kind of depends on how I'm feeling that day. Does that seem like that's okay? Or should I like stick with one or the other? Because I'm trying to like focus on my sleep and see if I can like bring my cortisol down because we were talking about that and it resonated with me. So I'm trying to decide which path to go. Math 15. Stay with Math 15. Stay there. Less volumes,

a good experiment. And don't fall in the trap of like, oh, I got great sleep, I feel great. So now I'm gonna do Maths and, ride out math 15 no matter what. So if you feel great and you can do more, still do math 15 and stick with that consistently for a while while we figure all this out. Okay, sounds good. All right, buddy. And you have time for one more question?

Yeah, let's hear it. Okay, okay, it's not, this is not fully related to me. So I have a friend who also is a trainer and she is amazing. Her name is Kimba. Hi Kimba. And she has a client that she's had for about three years and she was in a crash scheme, not like a bad one, but like kind of her shoulder a little bit. And ever since that happened,

she cannot fire her right glute, like especially when she's doing like RDLs. Like she took a video and I could see that this that the right side or the left side was like firing and engaged and good. But the left or the right side was like dead, it was nothing. And she said that her client said that she can't feel it. And she used to be able to, this is just since her crash and she hurt her shoulder.

Would the shoulder and the glute be connected? Or? Yeah, I'd have her go get tested by a neurologist to see if there's any nerve impingement or damage that's causing a disconnection to the glute. Okay, cool. Yep, that's the first place I'd look Tell her and then I Justin I'm very

Interested in your like Indian clubs that you do. Oh cool. You do you have like a Like a class or like an online thing that I can watch so I can learn how to do it I have some videos that we shot when we were running like a subscription model on the mind pump IG page for a while with Kelly Manzone and She's brilliant one of the best instructors out there And so what's your Instagram? What's her Instagram? Do you remember? Kelly Manzone

That's her name. I just have to look it up. But yeah, she does a lot of videos. I will go ahead and DM you if you reach out to me those videos. I have them on my computer still. So I'm happy to send those out and then there you go. Kels bells. then there you go Kels bells I might actually I'll see if I can put those in the in the trainer form oh yeah I have like I also work in I have a lot of your

writing programs but so I also work in a lot of like mobility work from maps performance just periodically throughout my week and so I've become like weird person in the gym that has their own mobility stick and like Hangs out on the turf and does like all the isolation like holds and stuff and one of the cool I don't worry. I've had a lot of people come up and ask like what are you doing? What's this about? And so awesome. I'm kind of leaning into the mobility side because it seems like there's a lot of the people that are

so much value there. It's crazy. Yeah, yeah. Watch watch how that increases if you you know, really stand out with that like people need that. That's such a there's such a trainer hack to get clients to is doing something that's like that that then you can then articulate and explain why you're doing it to people and then introduce that to It's a great way to get clients. That's a great ad for sure. Yeah.

For business. And so I'm really trying to make that more of my niche than just strength training because a lot of the people that are in my gym and around me are like, well, I can do this. What do I need you for? But if I can like, and I've taken this from your guys' podcast, if I can be, if I can help them like alleviate their pain Yes, then I'm immediately showing value and I am like see I know something you don't I can actually help you You know, so I'm really trying to learn really more about like mobility and my corrections exercise and stuff in the Indian clubs I was like that is so cool. Like that will that'll spark some inches probably if people are like, what is this thing

that this girl is doing? Totally. Yep, yep, that's beautiful. Yeah, keep doing that for sure. It's gonna pay off. That's awesome, Betty. Hey, cool. Well, you guys, I am so grateful for you.

I'm glad that I found you. I don't even remember how I found you, but from the first episode I was hooked. I, I've laughed, I've cried. I've done everything listening to you guys. And it's really nice. And it's really refreshing to hear from people that like, get it. I want to say, you know, you guys are about health.

You're about longevity. You're about everything that I stand for where a lot of people that are in this industry just Mostly go on how you look and that's you know, that's not what I'm about. And so it was so nice to find you guys to Validate what I what I was trying to say to the world and like helped me actually learn how to speak it So I just wanted to say thank you. Thank you, Betty. Thank you. Appreciate that. Yeah, we'll see you in the forum Yeah, okay. Sounds good. Thanks guys. I appreciate that. Yeah, we'll see you in the forum. Yeah. Hey sounds good. Thanks guys. I appreciate it All right. Bye. Bye

Yeah hormones she's 30 38. I think there's got to be something there. Yeah I mean while you gained 10 pound weight gain in three days. Yeah, that's interesting. It's not body fat And she's reversed diet issue. She also could be like I mean she is very if she's 23% body fat That's a great place. She's already built like somebody who holds muscle, builds muscle. She might just be finding this place. This is where you're happy. This is where your body, and this is a hard part about social media and the stuff that we promote as fit and healthy. And it's just like, you got to push to these other. Yeah. Low 20 is a great place. Yeah. Low 20% and that strong. So you're, you know, she's got

a ton of muscle on her and she's on a little five foot frame. She might just be finding like this is where my body is most happy. And you know, it's just tough because some people can walk around at, you know, teens and for a woman and that feel healthy. They can't bench 165. Yeah, no, that's a fact. Right. For sure. Totally. Look, if you like the show, come find us on Instagram. Justin is at mind pump Justin. I'm at Mind Pump DeStefano, Adam's at Mind Pump. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body,

dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Super Bundle at mindpumpmedia.com. The RGB Super Bundle includes maps anabolic, maps performance, and maps aesthetic. Nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by Sal, Adam, and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints and over 200 videos, the RGB Super Bundle is like having Sal, Adam, and Justin as your own personal trainers but at a fraction of the price. The RGB Super Bundle has a

full 30-day money-back guarantee and you can get it now plus other valuable free resources at mindpumpmedia.com. If you enjoy this show please share the love by leaving us a five-star rating and review on iTunes and by introducing MindPump to your friends and family. We thank you for your support, and until next time, this is MindPump.