Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2591: The Best Bodybuilding Exercises for Every Body Part & More (Listener Live Coaching)

Episode Date: May 7, 2025

In this episode of Quah (Q & A), Sal, Adam & Justin coach four Pump Heads via Zoom. Mind Pump Fit Tip: The best exercises for every body part for bodybuilding. (2:20) Colostrum for gut health. (14:48) Selling the muscle memory investment strategy. (18:19) How sauna use improves vo2 max when combined with exercise. (30:20) Reducing puffy eyes with Caldera. (33:08) Are lambs immune to snake venom? (36:04) Why the change in dog poop color? (38:17) The weirdest thing the guys have eaten. (42:07) Creatine side effects. (49:52) #ListenerLive question #1 – I am having issues with being injury-prone. Any guidance regarding better warmups and cooldowns, as well as information about possibly changing my training style? (54:53) #ListenerLive question #2 – How can I train in weightlifting to gain more muscle and mobility to be able to work on these calisthenics skills? (1:10:12) #ListenerLive question #3 – How would you suggest approaching training for bone health and overall strength? (1:21:15) #ListenerLive question #4 – How can I change my body to want to eat and reverse dieting with the goal to still lose about another 25 lbs.? (1:28:27) Related Links/Products Mentioned Ask a question to Mind Pump, live! Email: [e-mail] Visit Organifi for the exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Promo code MINDPUMP at checkout for 20% off** Visit Caldera Lab for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Code MINDPUMP20 for 20% off your first order of their best products. ** May Special: MAPS 15 Performance or RGB Bundle 50% off! ** Code MAY50 at checkout ** Colostrum Therapy for Human Gastrointestinal Health and Disease Building Muscle with Adam Schafer – Mind Pump TV How does taking a break from resistance exercise affect strength and muscle gains? Justin’s Road to 315 Push Press Effects of regular sauna bathing in conjunction with exercise on cardiovascular function: a multi-arm, randomized controlled trial Are sheep really immune to snake venom? Is Creatine Safe? Key Findings from Studies Visit MASSZYMES by biOptimizers for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Code MINDPUMP10 at checkout for 10% off any order. ** Mind Pump #2312: Five Steps to Bounce Back From Overtraining MAPS Prime Pro Webinar Mind Pump Podcast – YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources People Mentioned Peter Attia (@peterattiamd) 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 Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. You just found the most downloaded fitness, health, and entertainment podcast. This is mind pump. Today's episode, live callers called in and we got to coach them on air, but this was after the intro. Today's intro was 52 minutes long in the intro We talked about fitness science fat loss muscle building

Current events family stuff. It's a good time If you have a question that you want to ask us on air if you want to be on an episode like this one email Us at live at mind pump media Calm now this episode is brought to you by some sponsors. The first one is Organifi. Today we talked about their brand new colostrum supplement. This is great for gut health in particular. I love this for gut health. Go check them out, get 20% off. Go to organifi.com, that's O-R-G-A-N-I-F-I.com

forward slash mind pump. Use the code mind pump, get 20% off. This episode's also brought to you by Caldera Lab. They make great skincare products that are natural, that balance out the microbiome of the face. They reduce wrinkles and fine lines. Doug loves their eye serum. We talked about that today.

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If you are interested, go to mapsfitnessproducts.com, but don't forget to use the code May 50 for the discount. All right, here comes the show. T-shirt time! And it's t-shirt time! Oh, shit, Doug. He knows my favorite time of the week. We've got five winners this week. Two for Apple Podcasts, three for Facebook.

The Apple Podcast winners are Flora17 and Angela WMTB-Clyme. For Facebook we have Tyler Davenport, Holly Lee, and Amber Yamada-Martinez. All five of you are winners. Send the name I just read to iTunes at mindpumpmedia.com, include your shirt size and your shipping address. We'll get that shirt right out to you. When it comes to aesthetics, the way you look, or bodybuilding, what are the best strength training exercises for every body part? That's what we're

gonna talk about today. The best exercises for how you look when you're strength training. Let's do this. We're gonna narrow it to one exercise for that body part. Yeah, well try to. Well at least you have a case for it. I think yeah, I think it'll create good discussion, right? Because some of these movements aren't even in our, what we would consider our top five, right? If you've listened to the podcast long enough, you've heard us talk about the big five movements,

and we talk about why the average person could just do that, have a great physique. But beyond that, when you are trying to isolate a muscle group or develop a body part, I do think there's a hierarchy of exercise. I think that what we talk about, the big five, I think lays the foundation for everybody, bodybuilding or not. Like you get good and strong at the big five, it gives you the biggest... Performance, bodybuilding, function.

Everything, right? You get good those five and that covers basically everybody Especially for first couple years now beyond that it's like okay now. I'm really trying to sculpt my body What other movements and I did want to make the context of like aesthetics and bodybuilding because if we were talking about athletic performance Overall strength they could change right all right, but this is like they could change, right? But this is like pure insight. I got you, Justin. You just have to know context. I'll sit this one out.

I just gotta know context so I'm not like just shooting out a bunch of nonsense. He's so mad there's no rotational stuff in there. No, actually I did put a double. Oh, did you put some rotational stuff in there? I did, I did. Oh, okay. A little bit. All right, so let's start with quads.

So quads, now we're gonna break up the whole body into body parts, right? So just like a bodybuilder would do. So when it comes to quads, right, the muscles on the front of the thighs, I put front squats. I think front squats, barbell front squats, are just a great quad exercise,

better than even a back squat. Now a back squat overall is one of the best exercises, but again, we're talking bodybuilding, and I'm also thinking in combination with the rest of the exercises that we're gonna be talking about. And are we trying to stay, because the bodybuilding community might push back

and argue with you a hack squat. Sure. Because you could load it more. Sure, sure. But I think most everything you had here, you did your best when I looked at the exercises you chose to be as functional and free weight as possible. Accessible.

Yeah, because somebody listening is like, oh, hack squat, I don't have a hack squat, but I have a barbell. Right. So I could do a front squat. Okay, so I like setting the table with that because each one of these could be debated and argued, oh, this is better for this for these reasons,

but you did pick a bunch of exercises that you, if you have a set of barbell and barbell and dumbbells you could do them all you do them all yeah yeah so friends go and I know you like the front squats at least yeah and they're gonna do the genie version of it which is fine yeah I'll allow that whatever is not true I used to front squat like you're supposed to do this yeah I didn't yeah I did myiceps too. Dig up the picture of me doing that with 350. Well, Adam actually used to be an athlete. Oh, wow.

I said nothing mean to you, but now. Aw, man. Just wait. It's coming. All right, next is hamstrings, stiff-legged deadlift, or Romanian deadlift, I think is more accurately called. It's the best hamstring development exercise you could possibly do.

It works the entire hamstring structure. I know a lot of people like leg curls, but really that is mostly the leg bicep. And you're not getting the other parts of the- And you can't load that anywhere near. I don't even think that's close. The only thing I could make an argument for either close second or replace arguably is a good morning. Because you could load more. Because the limiting factor now becomes with the stiff leg, a deadlift, you gotta hold on to that. A little more risky, I guess you could say.

The form on a good morning is harder for people to get, even though they're almost identical in terms of the motion. All right, glutes. For the glutes, hip thrust. Now, barbell squats build the butt, deadlifts build the butt, but hip thrust build the butt. Targeted. Yeah, and they build the butt in people who have trouble

feeling their butt or connecting to their butt when they do things like squats and deadlifts. This is why so many people like hip thrusts. The people who have trouble developing their glutes tend to find success with the hip thrust because it's hard not to feel your glutes. It's hard not to get the glutes to be active in a barbell hip thrust.

So it's a great butt exercise. No debate here. Yeah, yeah. Most isolating type of exercise for the glutes. 100%, 100%. Again, this is why when I saw the way you listed these exercises, I thought it's important to explain to people that we're talking beyond the big five

because the big five is gonna get you a long ways with all these body parts, but now we're targeting specific things. I'm taking into consideration, you know the big five. Here's the next level to that, hip thrust for sure here. Now here's where we might get some debate with the back. I put two exercises.

Now I know a lot of bodybuilders or the bodybuilder types wouldn't even put a deadlift in there as a back exercise. Strength athletes, of course, athletes in general, of course, but sometimes you'll hear bodybuilders, many times you'll hear them talk about the deadlift as not being really a good back exercise. I really got to disagree. I've never seen more back development in myself, in clients, in the people around me, than when they've gotten really strong at the deadlift. I think it has to do with how much you can load it with, the tension it creates. It just develops a really thick, strong looking

back. So I put deadlifts in there. Yeah, that's true. The only pushback you'd probably get is from bodybuilding, right? Yeah, because we all know how much it builds and develops your back and your posterior chain in general, but it must be more from isolating. Exactly. It's the hypertrophy biomechanics dorks that always want to debate this. And again, I just challenge anybody who has never tried to deadlift to build your back to go do that and see what happens. I mean, obviously you've heard me argue this on the pockets was one of the biggest changes in my back development was getting into deadlifting, was doing that. And this was already after you after I'd already been trained 10 years and built a decent physique.

I had a decent physique. Yeah. So I, I would, I'd already built a good physique without ever really deadlifting, but deadlifting just exploded my back. And I think the reason why you have to, why it's important to understand is, because that's how, someone will look through the lens of mechanically what's going on, and you're like, oh, there's exercises that take the back through fuller range of motion, like a pull up or a row, like how could you?

This is just a symmetric exercise. But watch, if you take somebody, start at whatever number, let's say you can only deadlift 200 pounds your first time deadlifting, and you're pretty strong because you've been lifting weights for a long time too, you take that deadlift and you get it up to three, four, 500 pounds, and watch what it does to all those other movements that you argue

is the better movement. So make the argument that a barbell row is one of the best things you've ever done. Okay, it's one of the best ones for sure. I will challenge you that if you double your strength in deadlift, you will barbell row more than you've ever barbell rowed your life. Same thing with the with the lat pull down or a pull up or any other back exercise. If you get strong at deadlifting you will build a back bigger

than you've ever built before. Now I did include another back exercise that's more of a direct lat exercise just because the back is so complex and I put a pull up and I think for the lats just the, the latissimus dorsi muscles, a pull up, a pull down, pull up. I think that's one of the best exercises you could do. And the reason why a barbell row isn't here is because a deadlift is here. If I took out the deadlift and the barbell row would have to be on there. Yeah.

Yeah. So, all right, next chest, inclined barbell press. Uh, if for aesthetics and and bodybuilding I think this would develop the the aesthetic looking chest that you're looking for. A bench press is a great chest exercise but you always run the risk of having an overdeveloped lower chest versus upper chest. This is because of the upper development of the chest. That's right. That's right. Are you focused on that? Yeah, no debate here again with me. I just think that you add in everything the points that you're making in me. I just think that you add in everything,

the points that you're making, in addition to, I just find that it's one of the more neglected movements. And it's a shame that it's neglected because I think it's superior already. And it's definitely superior if you neglect it. Like if you've been bench pressing, like a lot of young men have been doing for a long time where they love to do flat and decline because they're stronger doing that and you

avoid or you do less of the incline bench get strong at your incline bench see what happens totally and then for shoulders here you go Justin a little rotation in the hand here Arnold press now the reason why I put an Arnold press over a you know shoulder press or dumbbell shoulder press is, an Arnold press is the fullest range of motion that I think you can do with a shoulder press. It really brings the dumbbell all the way down, elbow all the way down your foot. It's full range of motion. It's a very full range of motion and I think it develops really nice looking delts as a result. So if I had to pick one it would

have to be the other. That's interesting. Are you using much of this in your pursuit right now of getting your shoulder press to 315? I didn't even ask you that. I did in the beginning. I did a lot of rotational pressing, and two, even like bottoms up pressing. So I was trying to stress more instability. As I say, bolster the support system.

Yeah, bolster the support system for that. And two, to express rotation for reinforcement was a high priority for me. But yeah, where I'm at now is really just the technical side of it. Good. And then next up, biceps. Again, you had to pick one exercise.

There's a lot of good bicep exercises. But I picked alternating supinating dumbbell curls. Because of the supinating dumbbell curls because of the supinating action you're gonna get some brachialis, brachioradialis, the bicep also supinates and then of course at the top it's like a full curl it's just a full bicep exercise in comparison to the other ones. If I were to debate you it would be a supinated pull-up. Oh supinated grip pull-up yeah and then you're really yeah you know why I didn't pick that? It's just difficulty. Hard.

Yeah, it's a hard, I mean, that's your only argument, in my opinion, is that, because if I'm, if we're making the case that we're trying to help the general population, and I'm not there to coach this person, maybe they don't do a supinated pull up correctly without engaging their lats more, but if you understand how to do it and or I'm talking to somebody who's more of an advanced lifter, I'm going to make the case that the supinated pull-up

is even better. Now the alternating part is just to have it in its length and tension position. Just honestly it doesn't make a big difference. It's just how I've always done them but I don't think it makes that big of a difference. Maybe so the person can focus more but not a big difference. Next up triceps dips. Yeah parallel bar dips. Great full range of motion. Tricep exercise allows the elbow to move back and forward as you press. I've rarely ever met anybody who's really strong at these, doesn't have great triceps. It's a classic exercise. Yeah, no, the only honorable mention here is the close grip bench press, but I wouldn't debate you guys on dips on this.

Especially you loaded, right? That's right. Not just body weight, but getting to the place where you load these and do these in the full stretch position is just incredible. And then calves, standing raises, calf raises. Calves are kind of boring, but this is where we do the everybody part. Next. Standing calf raises is a good, you're getting everything, the gastrocs are getting the soleus. I know seated hits the soleus parts,

like this flat muscle that's underneath the bigger, meatier part of the calf. So, you know, most people do standing calf plus seated, but if you have to pick one, then I would just do standing. So that's the one. And then Doug put abs up there, totally forgot about the core, Doug, thank you very much.

Forgot about core. If I had to pick one, this is good, so we could discuss this a little bit. Declan sit-ups? I say decline sit-ups. Yeah, decline sit-ups with a nice full crunch all the way up. I like that.

Yeah, that's a good core strengthening exercise. A lot of people don't do that right, though. They pull with the hip flexors, and they come up with this real straight back. That's true. You need to roll yourself up. I mean, we have to assume everybody's doing these movements right.

That's right. Or reconsider them, right, so I guess that's kind of irrelevant, irrelevant because it's like if you're not doing any of these exercises, if you're doing these exercises wrong, then they automatically don't become the best exercise. What's the saying? Every exercise is a low back exercise if you are. Yeah, yeah. Yes. So much truth.

That's so true. I saw, in fact, I saw Doug doing the decline sit-ups this morning, right, weren't you doing those? It was yesterday. Was that yesterday? Yeah. Do you still worry? You feel those? Yeah, I do feel those. Yeah, they're gnarly man. Yeah, I was gonna I need to say something to you Justin you do this. You've been back battling with gut health back and forth We've talked about colostrum a couple times

For gut health there are like an immune an immune boosting as well But for gut health in particular colostrum has some pretty interesting data supporting it. Now I can't do colostrum because it's from dairy. So otherwise I would have done it by now. But for someone like you, I would say, what are the benefits? Like what- Repairs the gut, helps with the mucosal lining,

reduce inflammation, it's actually a gut health protein. A gut health protein. A gut health protein. Interesting. Does it help someone like him still, even if he's drinking whole milk? Yes. Oh, it does?

Yes. Okay. Yeah, colostrum's got some immunoglobulins in there. Because it's derived from that, no? No. Oh, it's not? Colostrum is the milk that comes out when a mother first has her calf.

After a certain period of time, the chute is good. It's like the yellow, yeah, the first version of calf. After a certain period of time that she just. It's like the yellow, yeah, the first. Oh, so it's not derived from that. No. Oh, okay, so even if he's drinking milk all the time, he still would get benefit from it. That's right. Oh, interesting.

That's what Organifi had. I hadn't even considered that. They have their first colostrum supplement, so they actually sell it now. So you have, I put it here for you. Okay. And you can give it a shot and see. It does pull up colostrum for gut health.

I'd love to dive into some of the data on this. Is it flavored or is it no? This is unflavored. Unflavored. Yeah, so it's not gonna taste it won't taste bad at all. It's gonna taste like dairy, you know Yeah colostrum like like, you know our wives and they had the kids the first milk that they produced Yeah, it's called colostrum and it's got growth factors in there and immune boosters It's different than traditional breast milk. Yeah, isn't that cool? I thought I had kind of a bad rot, no? Yeah, there you go.

Strengthens the gut wall, reduces intestinal permeability, and supports the gut microbiome. So when people ask me about colostrum for building muscle and this, that fat loss, it's like gut health. That's where the data, in fact, they it when they, for people who will get diarrhea often, it's like one of the first line things that they'll get. Oh interesting, I mean it makes sense, I mean obviously I know that it's been promoted that way for building muscle too, but it and but that's a byproduct of having a healthy gut. Yeah. You talk about this all the time

where it's like oh if my my gut is off. Oh it makes such a huge difference. Yeah, huge difference. Also they're fine with like probiotics right, like it's like, oh, if my gut is off. Oh, it makes such a huge difference. Yeah, huge difference. Also, they're fine with probiotics, right? Like, there's performance benefits now. That's different. The probiotic one's really weird, dude, because they take healthy people and they give it to them and they get better endurance and strength. Ah, so it's not just related to them.

I didn't know that. You give it to healthy guts? They give it to people without gut issues. They do it with athletes. Everybody's fine. Here you go. Half you guys get this, half you guys get a placebo. And the probiotic group improves their endurance

and strength faster. It's wild. It's got to, it has to do with, I'm sure it has to do with the central nervous system because of the way the microbiome, your neurotransmitters, much of them are created by your microbiome. And it's such a complicated interplay between your body

and your microbiome. So I don't know, I'm guessing. But there's many studies, not just one. There are now many, many, many studies. I mean, we're literally, we're years away from probiotics being advertised as performance enhancing supplements. Not for gut health, not for skin health, not for, it'll be like, you wanna get jacked.

Jacked and fast, take his probiotic. Take yogurt, you know, or whatever. We're pretty much controlled by our bacterial cells, right? They pretty much influence us more than anything else. A little bit. I mean, that's what it feels like. Yeah, they do a little bit. Hey, I got a study on muscle memory

that's kinda cool, Adam. Yeah, it's there. Yeah, it's actually. Yeah, it's actually. I'm fascinated with this in particular, as we think about all the things that we're always all geeking out on, and not to bore the audience, because I know I've brought it up so many times,

but I've tripped out a lot the last, I don't know, say five years or so on just how easy it's been. And I don't say that at all, by the way, it comes off or probably sounds a bit arrogant to the audience and I don't mean it that way. What I want to do is inspire people that are, you know, debating, getting on the building muscle train and doing it consistently and hard for a while. But I really feel like one of the side effects of that three-year run I had of becoming a muscle meathead for a while, that I had no idea.

I didn't go into it all going, oh, this will also be a nice plus because I know all the research around muscle memory. I didn't think like that at all, but what I'm finding from that, I've lost a lot, but I've also kept a lot and I also find very like I so funny you're bringing this up I'm like I haven't done shit for like the last month I've been moving yeah but I've been doing physical stuff that's part of why I haven't trained I've been like just my diets in check I'm not overeating but I'm lifting boxes and hammer and stuff I mean I've been just like it's like moving and doing stuff and so I've been getting my ass kicked up

You have more muscle than what it probably you couldn't get at 20 So and lifting and so Katrina made a comment. She's like, did you train today? I had just taken my shirt off to get in the pool with her and I'm like, no I said I've been training a couple weeks on just like you look like you have and I hadn't looked and I kind of like And I looked I'd like Was it do my shoulders? I've got a workout the last couple days. I'm like, dude, my shoulders look like I got a workout the last couple days. I'm like, it's so weird to me.

And to your point, I look better at 40-something years old, not trained, just being active. And what I mean by better, my shoulders are more defined, I have more chest muscles. Then I did it, 26 peak training my ass off to get there. It's just crazy. I'll never forget, when I had my studio years ago, I'll never forget this little guy walks in,

and he was, I wanna say it was late 60s, early 70s, might have been in his early 70s, and he comes in, and he's just kind of this shorter dude, maybe five, three, and he had these little muscular forearms, like these little ball forearms, and he walks in, and I'm training a client, and he's looking around and he I think he was waiting to have breakfast next door my studio was next to a breakfast place and he looks down at the kettlebells and he goes oh and he looks at me and with a Russian accent he goes you may I try so I'm like

okay and he takes the I think it was an 80-something pound kettlebell and he swings it and then presses it a couple times and puts it down and I look and I'm looking at his fore pound kettlebell, and he swings it and then presses it a couple times and puts it down. And I'm looking at his forearms, I'm like, and he had a Russian accent, and kettlebells were popular in Russia. So I'm like, this dude's, so I told my client, you know, let me go say something,

I walked over, I'm like, you train a lot, don't you? He goes, no, no, no, I haven't trained ever since I left the Soviet Union. I'm like, what? He goes, yeah, I used to compete and this and that, and you see?" He goes, no, no, no, I haven't trained ever since I left the Soviet Union. I'm like, what? He goes, yeah, I used to compete and this and that. And you see this guy's forearms, and they were just jacked. They were just stuck with him through all those years,

but obviously if he competed in the Soviet Union, he trained his ass off, probably since he was a boy, all the way through. So it stays with you. And so what happens with this, and when you look at the data on this, and I'm gonna bring up, I'll talk about the study in just a second.

When you build muscle, your body increases, your muscles increase the number of satellite cells that are within them. When the muscles shrink from de-training, the satellite cells don't go away. So it's like this. It's like you're gonna go build a huge building downtown.

And so you're getting ready to build it, so what do you gotta do? You gotta buy the crane, you gotta buy the equipment, you gotta hire all the workers. There's a lot of equipment you gotta buy and workers that you need to build the building, okay? And it takes time. Then you build the building, okay?

And then the building falls down, it's destroyed, but you never lose the workers You never lose the equipment. It's all there waiting. Yeah waiting for you to one day say build it again Yeah, so it's gonna happen much faster because you have to gather that stuff because it's all ready to go That's a good analogy because it that's exactly what it feels like. It's like boom. Yeah, and and also It's almost like this too. you're asking those workers at Crane to go build a building they've already built before so they even know how to do it. They know exactly what to do.

Yeah, they've already got the blueprint, they already know how to do it. That's right. So not only is it, they get to work, wait master, it's like they get it built in the fraction of the time that it took them to build the very first time. They don't need permits, they don't need, everything's done to do it again

and they just gotta go out and build it again. So all that time that you had to do to set up is gone. So what the study did, it's a pretty cool study, and I think that this study illustrates it, but I think the effect is even more pronounced the longer you have the muscle, like you, right? I think if you built muscle and you keep it for 20 years, and then you lose some of it,

this effect I think is even more pronounced. But here, this is a randomized controlled trial where they took 42 untrained adults. So they're not trained adults, they were untrained. And they took half of them and they had them lift weights for 10 weeks and then take a 10 week break and then start up again. The other group lifted or trained for 20 weeks total.

Okay, so they didn't keep, they felt like they had this muscle for years and years and years. Nonetheless, the group that took the 10 week break lost lots of strength and lost the muscle. They got them back into strength training five weeks. Wow. So what took 10 weeks took five weeks

the second time around. And that's all new training. And as I say, let me tell you, I think how profound that is, because that's already profound. And I remember in my 20s having moments in my lifting career where I fell off. And unfortunately, back then, I would fall off

and I'd feel like I looked like I fell off. I looked like I didn't lift weights at all. Back when I was in my, that was the thing, that was part of the, drove the insecurity, was that. Like if I wasn I didn't lift weights at all. Like back when I was in my, that was the thing that was part of the drove the insecurity was that like if I wasn't in there getting a pump and build a muscle and eat to be big, if I let that go for a month or time, it felt like I took all these steps back. But now over decades, it doesn't feel like that. It's like if it's totally, it's totally different how it feels. There's a lot of permanent muscle I think you built

too through maybe through muscle hyperplasia. Have to be. Have to be. That's what I meant by the whole shoulder thing. Remember, I tell the story all the time of the competitive female, our trainer of mine who told me I had weak shoulders. They look way better now after peak years of building them as a 20-something year old. I just find it

really fascinating and I don't mean for it to come off at all as arrogant. No, I think it's cool and I think for someone listening right now. I just wish more people talked about it because nobody told me that. Like, it would have been part of my motivation if someone told me like, Adam, this is gonna be like investing for you. You're young right now, you don't have kids, bury yourself in this fitness thing. Work hard on it while you can. Work hard. Pay off way into the future. Nobody's told me that. You know what everyone's told me on? You better young right now, you don't have kids. Bury yourself in this fitness thing. Work hard on it while you can. Yes, work hard. Because it'll pay off way into the future. Nobody's told me that. You know what everyone's told me on?

You better do it now because when you get old, it's the test of. It goes away. It goes away, it's so harder. Flabby. You probably won't do it. It's always a hustle. Yes, so part of my motivation at actually a young age was more like I'm gonna create this momentum so I'll be working out, training hard until I'm 80

so I'm this 80 year old. But no, in fact, actually it's given me way more flexibility. It's easier to stay healthy and maintain. It's wild. This just happened to me because I, you know, I've cut down on my training, which by the way, remarkably I'm able to maintain a decent amount of strength and muscle with way less training. I had to take a lot of time off because I injured my back and my hamstring.

And I literally had two workouts where I kind of felt normal. And yesterday my wife's looking at me and she knows my past and my history and I've already talked about it on the show. She looks at me and she goes, what are you taking? I'm like nothing, nothing. She's like, you look, I'm like, I think I just kind of had two workouts.

She's like, no way. I'm like, honey, this is like muscle memory. It was really fast. It works really, really fast for me. Now I won't be able to get beyond what I did before. No, no, and that's, I think that's important, right? Like obviously, uh, cause some there's, I'm sure there's people that was like, you look like shit. What are you talking about? Like I don't look, I don't look anything like, for now that you said that, some bodybuilder, I feel like we give

insecure kid who's 27 still, you know, there's like two people that comment that all the time What are you? I probably slept with her girlfriend So I it's it comes from a place I get I just I wanted to come off that way I don't want to come off. It's like it's definitely not me bragging It's definitely I'm so surprised by it and it's such a cool thing That I just don't think enough people talk about or sell because that would have helped motivate me even more As a young guy trying to lift if I actually someone that's why I like to use the investment I mean you can sell it so it's a great selling it is a great sign boy. Hey, listen, it's like hard now

When you're older wait easier to keep it's like the money thing You know like a lot of times and this I know we don't communicate this to the younger generation of two, we're always like flashy and buy all the things, like you know what's so dope is that if you live a life where you live well below your means for decades while also building and saving and investing and making money, you don't got to live like that forever. You actually can get to a place in your life where you like get to blow quite a bit of money and still have a lot of money because you have so many things working for you and it's like if that's what this is. Yeah. And I wish someone communicated me that to me as a young kid also about money because I unfortunately had to learn the hard way.

I worked really hard. I got to that place. I blew all my money, lost my money, had to get it back again to realize like, Oh, I need to live well below my EANS. Then did that for a long enough period of time to go like, Oh, okay, this is cool. I can, well, I think, you know, on top of all that too, is just the knowledge experience and just the way that you train now so much more efficiently and smart. That's what I've been experiencing too. I'm like tripping out that I could ramp back up to a level where I was strong. I felt like strong This was like I swear. It was like a decade ago that I felt this strong, you know And it's and it's now just applying everything we talk ad nauseum about on the podcast But really just like owning that and also feeling your way through that with your body knowing your body in that maturity And also feeling your way through that with your body, knowing your body and that maturity, it's such a superpower.

So to be able to establish that early and like really put the work in and it's a grind and it's fucking hard and it just seems like it takes forever for you to get that kind of that peak level. Well getting back to that, it's crazy how you can be effective at it. You've only been training hard consistently like this for this particular goal for how long? Two months, right? Almost three months.

And you already surpassed your previous record, right? Yeah. Your lifetime record. Lifetime record, yeah. Isn't that great? It's crazy. I'm tripping. It doesn't make sense to me personally on paper,

but it's like, it's just experiencing it. It's cool, man. Well, I mean, you bring up such a good point too, and you're right. I'm sure that makes the thing that I was talking about and just compounds it. Not only do you get all this benefit from investing for so many years of muscle memory and that great side of it, then the wisdom side too. Wisdom is big. Because as- How much more progress would all of us made in our youth if we weren't so stupid.

I did not listen to my body. No, no. Everything was in spite of what my body said. Yeah, I bet when you hit that, the last time you hit those numbers that you surpassed already at your age, you were probably. Overdoing it. Yeah, probably crazy training and sport for two, three years straight and like, yeah, you're probably peak pushing your body.

Veins popping out, my eyeballs out of my head just to get it. You know, and I'm like, I'm joking and everything in between sets and then throwing up weight that I never even attempted at a younger age. That's so cool. Yeah, it's a trip. Speaking of fitness, I got a cool study on sauna use and how sauna use improves VO2 max

when combined with exercise. You wanna know how much? Sauna use combined with VO2. So 15 minutes of the sauna after exercise three days a week. How much more do you think it improved VO2 max in individuals? It's impacting VO2 max in that situation? Yeah.

Because the dilat, what's it, I don't know. Just vascular health, that's the dialy. Interesting. Yeah, two times. Double? They led to a two time improvement in VO2 max. Interesting. Yeah.

Wow. I mean it's not really even stressing your cardiovascular. It has some interesting exercise like effects on the body. Yeah, it simulates it, right? I heard an interview, I wish I remember who was interviewing Peter Atiya when they asked this question to give him the credit, but they asked him a question like that,

like, you know, looking back, like, you know, I forgot the way he framed the question, but it's basically asking him things that, you've been doing this for so long, like, what are you way more bullish on today than before, and he was like, sauna. He's like, the research on that is just, it's like you should do, everyone should do that.

Really healthy for you. Yeah, the thing, all these crazy benefits from something that's so easy to do, right? It's so easy. It's not hard to sit, it's like very relaxing actually. So it's not a hard ask for people to sit in a sauna for 15, 20 minutes a few times a week, yet the benefits are so profound from just doing that. That was one of the

top things that he said was probably that he's changed his mind on or that's so much more profound. I agree. I feel like the more and more we've read on that, it's like, dude, it's like this has got to be a staple in everybody. When I would use sauna back in the day when I would test my stamina, when I would do like Jiu-Jitsu and stuff and I'd use a sauna, I attributed it to my ability to acclimate to heat, because when you're doing jiu-jitsu, you'll have a gi on, you're wrestling so you get hot, and I did get more stamina, because I thought it was,

I'm sure that played part of it, but no, it actually gives you more stamina. It actually improves your VO2 max, which is wild. You're just sitting there, hey, stop working out, and I'm just sitting here, We'll make it twice as effective. I wonder how big the sauna market has become in the last decade. Can you look that up? In the US way bigger. I mean, I remember when we were, when we were early trainers, uh,

there was none of these. Nobody has sauna in their house. Yeah. And these, this has become, there's like tons of competitive brands now. All the Viking countries knew about this forever. They've been used, that's part of their culture. It's been part of their culture for a long time. Yeah. But not here. No, what does it say there, Doug? Yeah, boy. Yeah, so in 2023, $859 million.

Yeah, I wonder what it was in like 2010. I mean, reaching a billion dollar market, it's big. That's almost there, yeah. Yeah, and I bet 20 years ago, I bet it was nothing like that. That's great. It's interesting, because I do sauna maybe two, three times a week. You do?

But I had to stop doing it in the evening because my heart rate would go up Yeah, so what got rid of your droopy eye? Did I actually have droopy eye, I mean, I don't know Droopy eye I don't know if I like that, you know You're trying to paint a contrast here. Why, bro? Why do you say that? I felt so attacked.

I had a fucking duck. No, dude, he uses Caldera Labs eye cream. I use their eye serum, yeah. How do you like it? I mean, it helps. Obviously, I do have some puffiness in my eyes, but it does reduce it. I know, I look at myself and I'm like, yeah, if I could only get it all the way down.

But it does- Stress levels for you. Well, look, I've got stress, all right? I know Doug, I know the levels that you create in here. You use the eye serum pretty regularly. Oh, every day, every day. So I use that and what it does is- What do you do at night before you go to bed?

No, in the morning. Okay. Yeah, I mean, I wanna look my best right here. Yeah, I'm at night before you go to bed? No, in the morning. Oh, okay. Yeah, I mean, I want to look my best right here. Yeah, I'm doing it for you guys, right? Oh, thanks. No, but it does reduce down the puffiness, for sure. No, right here, right underneath here. I need to use it.

No, I've used it before. I've done it, and we talked about it the last time we brought it up. Just rub it on your whole face, then. Just rub it on your whole face. Just rub it on your whole face. Drupie eye. I got fat face, Doug's got droopy eye.

You got beak face. Stop it. What do you want from Justin? That's Justin's favorite thing to say to me, dude. I got fat face Doug's got droopy eyes. You got beak face Justin Stay on the topic D. Use their sunscreen, right? Yeah They leave like a white because it doesn doesn't. No, there's no like big, what do you call it, like a chalky kind of residue, it's not like that. You gotta really look into the chemicals and stuff. Can I use it for my son? Yeah.

Their sunscreen? Yes, absolutely. Well they're saying now that like regular sunscreens are like super bad for him. Oh I know, I actually contributed. The hormone disruption and just now. I actually contributed. The hormone disruption and just the. I might stop putting that on you.

Probable carcinogen. You just gotta look at like yesterday we were at the store and we were buying, my daughter came with us, my 15 year old and she's like, get this candle warmer for me. And I'm thinking about the candles you put under it. And what it does is it warms the candle, releases the scent, right?

And it's all xenoestrogens. We found some, that's why Jessica texted yesterday. Yeah, and we found some non-toxic ones. But you have to look at this stuff, because we're just bombarding it. I mean, you look at what products have been created for us, and it's all petroleum-based, everything. And that's really been the biggest problem.

It's like they've been able to recycle a lot of material That they because it was big business back in the day. Like how can we you know, keep using More of this this waste and they figured out so many different ways even making it into like sugar Yeah, it's like it's mind-blowing So to remove us from all this petroleum based Existence I think is a first step. Yeah, yeah, all right, I'm gonna, this is cool, Justin, you're gonna like what I'm about to tell you.

Okay, so I just, I saw a clip on X, I think it was, and I'm like, that can't be real. So I looked it up, and it is real. Okay, how, I'm gonna start with, I'll start with this. How was Satan depicted in Genesis? What was he? The snake. The snake, right?

And what is one of the animal, what do they refer to as Jesus as an animal? What do they call him if they're gonna call him an animal? Lion? No, he's a lamb. Oh, the lamb, oh, right, right. Did you know where we get antidote for snake venom? From lamb?

Lamb blood. No way. Lamb blood. Yes, dude. Good trip. I looked it up. Look it up, let me see. Do it. Fact check this guy Doug. Go ahead. Go ahead and look it up. This guy. I'll read you right here. Go ahead. It says right here. Lamb's blood, he'll look it up, specifically from sheep is used to create antivetam for rattlesnake bites. So does that mean like a lamb could get bit by a rattlesnake and be totally fine? They get an immune reaction and they can actually start to defend themselves. So I wonder if that's a way they've evolved over time because they've been bitten by so many times.

Well that would be the secular argument. I gotta play that way nowadays. I used to not have to play that way. While sheep's blood has been used in the production of antivenom. Wow. Isn't that cool? Interesting. Yeah. Isn't that weird?

It is weird. Isn't that weird? I know, I like that kind of stuff. I'm always skeptical of reptiles, let's be honest. What do you mean, skeptical? They're cold blood. Oh, huh? Yeah.

You don't trust them? They're different, yeah. They are. They're fork tongues. Yeah. You know, are we seeing, is it just me or are there more lizards, just random lizards all over? I don't remember as a kid seeing lots of lizards anywhere.

I see them all over the neighborhood now. I think it's where you live. Must be less predators around. No, do you remember them a lot? Well, you grew up in the country. Yeah, so they were, that was a big thing for us as kids, snakes and lizards. We don't have any more because of my cats, dude.

They've been eaten, I'm like, like lizards, but we grew up in and Rocky hot near water lake so that was like a very very common thing to see here's something I brought this up the other day I would love Doug to look this up just to see if I'm correct you guys remember when we were kids Okay, 90s right early 2000 definitely 90s when there was old dog poop on the lawn early 2000s, definitely the 90s, when there was old dog poop on the lawn. What color was it? White.

There was white. You brought this up the other day. I have not seen white poop in a long time. That was a really interesting fact. We were on our, so the audience knows we were, so we do our little daily walk. 200 steps a day. Yeah, so we're not super sedentary.

We do our walks every day, and we were walking around the block and Sal asked When was the last time you saw white dog poop and right away? I went like oh my god I were that you took me back to a kid of picking up dog poop around the house and yeah typical Teenage boy who has a chore and your chore is to pick up dog poop you wait until you know Your your parents yell at you four times. You know I'm saying It's like it's like a four hour job.

And I remember it'd be all hard and white and stuff. And white, yeah. And so you brought up, when was the last time? I was like, that's probably the last time, when I was a kid in the late 80s, early 90s, was the last time I'd seen that. It just reminds me immediately, I told the story I think maybe once on the podcast,

but I just got bored. Because you have to do chores, and I used to like try and entertain myself And so we were picking is so many dog shit It was just a neighbor jar and so we just took like my friend and I were That was our job We had to like get rid of the dog poop and I just decided to start throwing it and I threw it across We didn't like our neighbor. He was a total dick.

Uh, and anyway, he deserved this. So I threw it and it landed on his roof and we kept, we thought it was hilarious. So we just kept going. It is hilarious. It kept going. Hold on. All over his roof. Just launched it, dude.

Apologize. Oh, how did they find out? Yeah. Just launched it, dude. I had to go over there and apologize. Oh, you got caught? Yeah, I got caught in the last one. He came out of his house and one of them almost hit him. You had to go on his roof. Wow. So tell us why. Okay, so you told us on the walk,

why is it no longer white? Because, and I thought it was because they don't put the same minerals in there. It's true. White dog poop, often seen in the past, is this common now due to changes in dog food and dietary habits in the past? Many dog foods were high in bone meal and meat which meant dogs often consumed excess calcium The excess calcium would sometimes be excreted appearing as white coating on dried dog poop today Modern dog foods are generally better balanced and don't necessarily contain as much calcium.

No, no, no, hold on a second. That's bullshit. They're better balanced now. Before they had more meat, I think they're less balanced now. Do they put meat in it still? Yeah, they still do. Is it the same?

The bone meal would have all the calcium, right? Less calcium. Isn't dog food derived from like dead horse meat? I don't know, I think that's illegal. Yes. Like they might, I mean who knows? I don't think you dead horse horse meat. I don't think that's a legal. Yes, like they might I mean who knows I don't think you can serve horse meat. It's not a survey the humans I don't think that's it's not even the dogs either. I don't know what the dog laws are It's horse meat and dog food put that I don't think you can check it out. I thought that I thought that was true

I think it's all the leftovers Floor of the factory. I always think stuff like this So is so interesting is like how long like how long to find someone goes Scratch their head went like why is it? Like let's let's dive into the science of that a little bit Yeah, I was like it used to look like powdered dough like we went for years It wasn't like it happened like one time and then someone figured it out was always one Yeah, it's like a little bit of moss to it to like something to get like the bacteria that like grew was like like spongy man

You know I had a lot of dogs in commercial available dog food now told you To it to like something to get like the bacteria that like grew is like like spongy man In commercial available dog food now told you good typically what does that mean? Why wouldn't it just be like no, it's not it's illegal It's not typically Well, maybe somebody slides it in. Yeah, I don't know. It's like a horse meat dog food Horses are commonly slaughtered for pet food. Oh, so that was a They don't want you to know that they do that. Horses are commonly slaughtered for pet food. Oh, so that was a common misconception. Horses are typically not, I mean, nobody eats,

I think horse meat in general is illegal, right? That I don't know. Why? Because horses are, you know, there was this, I saw this PETA ad, and it was like, where do you draw the line? And it had like a dog, a cat, a horse, a cow, a chicken or whatever.

And then someone took a picture of it and then drew a line, I draw it right here. You know like, I'll eat cow, I'll eat pig. Here's the line. But yeah, it's like, there's some animals that are dogs and horses or we value them differently. We do, but if this was a long time ago and it meant surviving, you would eat it.

People ate horse, I've eaten it. Oh, you were you've eaten horse in Japan. Yeah, no shit raw Raw horse, bro. Yeah, that's that sounds gross. It does You've also eaten raw chicken, huh? Yes. I have they serve you know that they serve raw chicken. They're like sushi. Yeah, it's actually good Oh, really? Sashimi. It's raw. Yeah, that's not good oh really sashimi it's raw yeah that's not good it tastes good no way now I mean we rob you eat raw beef and you eat raw fish why would not they serve a pigeon like squab as they say right where that's it that was like in a New York like some restaurant what's the weirdest thing you guys have eaten a Doug you for sure have one yeah I don't

know he wins with horse Hopefully nobody here said dog, because I'm going to leave. I have not eaten dog. Okay, I just leave the dog. That I'm aware of anyway. Yeah, be that you're aware of. My wife would win if she was here. Oh really?

Yeah, because she traveled the world with Cirque, so she's eaten guinea pig. That's not that crazy. And then she had the craziest thing she ever had, which I'm like, I don't even know how you're here. She was in some like weird village, because remember she traveled to Cirque, and then they would go off and do things

when they would have time off, and there was a bar, it was an outdoor bar, she said, and they would kill a snake and bleed it into a cup, and then add vodka. So you'd have fresh snake blood with vodka and do a shot of it. And she did that. That's kind of it. That's probably Thailand, yeah. And she did that. That's kind of wild.

What's the thought process of that? It doesn't sound safe. No idea. No idea. I mean, eating snake is not that uncommon, though. Yeah. Yeah, snake meat is supposed to be pretty good. In fact, I remember we considered cooking it

and eating it one time. I wonder. Because we used to kill rattlesnakes all the time out there. Oh, you were going to do it here? Yeah. Oh. Yeah, yeah.

Because we used to kill it. And I can't remember as a kid who had told me or Whoever I don't know who was like, oh, yeah. No, you could cook that up. It's actually really good. Mm-hmm. What? Oh, yeah The outside chicken nuggets, yeah, if it was up to me it would be one time I had a medium rare steak Yeah, I had what's it called the black Yeah, I had a what's it called the black big huge rotten like duck egg. Oh yeah, that was like when I was It was part of this whole fraternity thing and like I was living at this house and That's disgusting. Yeah, dude. It was it was so I threw up everywhere. I was oh. Do you think I'd put that down and be cool with it?

Not to totally switch gears, but I'm sure the audience will appreciate that I'm switching gears. Somebody messaged in, because they heard me talking about the chlorine in pools, and said that I can spray vitamin C. You said this already. Yeah, you brought this up already.

Oh, I did. Yeah, you did bring this up. I haven't done this yet. I wanna do this. No, you brought this up, we looked it up. Did you send me over how to make it? Yeah Oh, yeah, we sent it over to me. That's why I was bringing it up because I think you'd sent it to me Yeah, I don't I don't read anything Look like you're paying attention you asked me I told you and you caught you conversed with Rock you'll do and so it's you catch it in the ocean.

Rock eel is really ugly. That's not that crazy, though. I feel like it's a fish. Right. I mean, yeah. You come back to this sushi, but just like I'm not done. I got more stories. You guys think I'm sold nuggets.

I'm pretty cultured. Doug, have you had Rocky Mountain oysters? I have not. You ate some testicles? Yeah, cow balls, right? Yeah, I don't believe I've had them. I may have had them in some other form. That's kind of common, too.

The thing I saw that was the weirdest was in Cambodia, there were these ladies selling these big trays of bugs. Oh, no. Some were tarantulas. No, no, no, no, no, no. Yeah, and this guy that was on my tour bus ladies selling these big they had these big trays of bugs oh no no some were tarantulas yeah and this guy that was on my tour bus this Vietnamese guy he bought a bag full of tarantulas and he was eating like chips I couldn't do it yeah that's just that ruined me for a little bit I mean it's it's kind of tricky though when you think about how we've all,

like how easily we're all conditioned to eating the way we all eat, and anything outside of that's so gross, and you know what I'm saying? This is a cultural thing. It is a cultural thing, because if you grew up eating tarantulas, and it was a normal thing,

and your parents did. Well, when I was a kid, It's like potato chips. Yeah. Well, when I was a kid, I told you guys a story. We visited, my cousin had just married this guy who lived in the hills of Sicily,

so they're like farmers like that. And they killed a goat right in front of me. It was all tied up, all sweet, I was playing with it. And they just came in and they stabbed it, and it was, I was bleeding, and then they cut it and chop it up in front of me and then we ate it. This is for you.

But because I saw that process, it was a strange feeling. Yeah, I remember eating it going, I just saw them kill it. We did that with chickens and I had a hard time with the chicken after, I had a hard time. Did you have to kill the chickens? Yeah. You did? Oh yeah, break its neck, slit its throat,

stick it in a cone upside down, bleed it out, put it in steaming hot water, pluck it, did all of it. Oh, you did all that stuff? All of it, yeah. I raised a man, had to kill him. I was like, remember I told you I worked on an organic parry before organic was a good thing?

But I didn't know you killed chickens. One of the things that we did was a mobile chicken coop, which was really actually- That's smart. Yeah, brilliant ahead of its time and everything like that when we were doing it and raising these organic chickens. And then at the end of raising them, he was like, all right, it's time to slaughter and why we were like this total mom-pa place So it's we had like a makeshift set up like yeah this bowling boiling pot of water out outside and then we took a

orange emergency cones cut the tips off so that you could shove their heads down down it and weed out because when you Have you cut a chicken's head off or slice their throat, they take- Oh, they're still gonna run. Oh yeah, they still kick and flop and do all sort of that. So shoving in the cone kept them from doing that. I had zombie chin you when I did that. And you let them bleed all the way out

and then you dip them in the steaming hot water and then- Wow. Did it was eating chicken weird for you all the way up? Yeah, no, it took me a while. I can't remember how long it was, but I remember being a young man. I was in high school doing that and you know acting tough while I was doing it. Like no problem, you know like I was totally game. Like whatever my boss said I'd be doing it. I'm like I'm not afraid whatever. Did some

really gross things working there and but I remember afterwards when like having a real hard time for probably a year or two. Yeah I like, I'm cool on the chicken, boy steak tonight, you know what I'm saying? It did. I know, it's not fun. Yeah, it messed that up for a while. We're so far removed from our food. Yeah, yeah.

Oh, dude. I do think there is some value to that. That's why I wanna go hunting. I've never gone hunting before, but I wanna go hunting because I feel hypocritical almost. Because I'm so far removed from my food That I want to go and do the whole process and yeah, you know Yeah, I think there I think there's tremendous value to that. I think people we people should I mean

I think it should be a skill we should all try to learn I mean, I think it's unfortunate that we don't teach those types of things in school I think every kid should learn all that and be a normal practice, especially if you plan on eating that for the rest of your life. I mean, it sounds like, makes sense. Makes sense to do that. Yeah, yeah. I got a study on creatine side effects.

You guys wanna hear it? Side effects? None. No, they did a big study. That's great. They do a big study, they looked at a bunch of studies, and the side effects from creatine matched the placebo. In other words, it's a super safe supplement.

Super safe supplement. The only side effects some will make it is gastro effects, in which case take smaller doses throughout the day. I mean, we're this close to beginning to recommend it to kids all the time. I feel like it's real, real close to that. So I've been taking 15, who's doing it with me? Are you guys taking 10, 15 grams a day?

10, 15 a day? Yeah, I've been doing it since the series started. Okay, so I've been taking about 15 grams a day, but if I do it in like four or five gram doses, split up, that's totally fine. I did the full dose. That's what I do five, a couple times a day. Yeah, if I take all at once, then it's not good.

I noticed that the first time. Remember I said it didn't bother me? Yeah. Yeah, I was getting down on those gummies. And you had diarrhea? Well, no, actually it like blocked me up. Oh't bother me? Yeah, I was getting down on those gummies. You had diarrhea? Well, no, actually it blocked me up. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah.

I just noticed. I felt like crampy. I felt more like I had more, but closer to constipation than I did. It didn't give me diarrhea for sure, but it gave me more constipation. So, it definitely upset my digestion. Are you noticing any benefits

from the higher dose of the CreaTeen? I'm not sure, because you're also training hard. Yeah, I'm training hard. It's hard to, I don't know if I can isolate as easy as and I know that's like your favorite thing to do is like Okay, am I feeling you right now? I don't know Focus that is getting jacked. He's getting a lot of jacked comments. Yeah, there's a lot of stuff I'm throwing a lot of people say how he looks the most jacked. Yes. He's the most jacked I've ever seen him Yeah, you put on like 12 pounds muscle I'm throwing up myself right now. I thought a lot of people say how he looks the most jacked. He is, he's the most jacked I've ever seen him.

Yeah, yeah. You've put on like 12 pounds of muscle. I wish you would have fricking. I know, makes me so mad. Makes me so mad. I'd track anything. Makes me so mad he didn't too. I'm like, bro, come on, you're already doing this.

I'm a little heavier for sure, I was like. It would have been really cool. Seven pounds heavier. You're seven pounds heavier on the scale? I think so. But you look, are you leaner too? Yeah, leaner. Yeah, I'm definitely leaner.

It would have been really, it would have been really cool for the audience to see someone who doesn't care about this stuff that goes about programming to get stronger. Definitely would have sold more programming. Yeah, definitely would have probably helped the business out. That would have been, not a bad idea maybe.

Such an idiot. Yeah. Are you doing other body parts too? Cause it looks like your whole body's responding. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's supplemental really. I haven't even been like, obviously I've been training my legs. Just, just enough.

Like I've been doing front squats and things to kind of supplement. Um, what I'm trying to do with my push press and to like, I'm in a split stance a lot more. So I've been doing lunging. Um, but I mean, all of it is affecting, dude, this lift itself, I've been in a split stance a lot more, so I've been doing lunging. But I mean, all of it is affecting, dude, this lift itself, I swear, we had talked about it literally is the upper body squat. It covers everything.

I feel this all the way down my body every time I lift it. Especially the way you do it. Now, are you gonna do what Adam did, where he just stopped afterwards, he was done, stopped working out? Or are you gonna try to at least keep some of this? Oh, we'll see.

I mean, I don't wanna like, yeah, I don't wanna hype that up because I will wanna like take a nice little like break in terms of intensity, but I'm really enjoying how I feel right now on the strength and everything, the movement wise. So the athleticism, if anything, it'll be less intense, but more range of motion and more, um,

Bro, Movement focus. He's already feeling like a fraction of how I, cause one, I was tracking everything I ate. I was documenting on Instagram. You have to stop everything. And that's why I'm not doing that. Why did you stop everything? I'm still, I don't eat like an, I don't eat like an asshole. I'm still like keeping my diet in check. When's the last time you worked out?

Well, it's been a while. Yes. And so, Yeah, it's been a while. Yeah, there's actually a comment in a recent video. Did Adam stop working out? Yeah. Oh. See, I mean, there's a couple. I mean, hey.

That doesn't do anything to Adam. He's scary. He doesn't. He cares nothing. Especially when my wife makes comments like, you look good. Have you been lifting? I'm like, I haven't, actually. Just some boxes.

If we could tie it to money somehow Yeah, then I might fire out of it motivated Courtney commenting on how you look and everything oh yeah, yeah Oh, yeah, I mean she comments on it, but it's funny cuz she gets a little like she pulls it back Oh, I need to you know no it's just I don't know it always annoys me cuz it's always like She gets like it more insecure when I get in better shape And then it's like I'm like no, honey. Like it's has nothing to do that That's how you can then you just convince her to have more sex with you. I do I hope this helps. Good stuff.

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That's M-A-S-S-Z-Y-M-E-S.com forward slash mind pump. Use the code mindpump10 and get 10% off. Back to the show. Our first caller is Josh from New York. Josh, what's up, man? How you doing, Josh? What's up, guys? Thanks for waiting.

How can we help you, brother? Well, I wrote because I've been having issues with, um, you know, recovery time and it just seems, you know, constantly dealing with injuries whenever I'm trying to train, you know, I feel like I'm pretty diligent with my form ups and whatnot, you know, probably could be a little better with my cool downs and stretches afterwards, but it just as far back as I can remember. I've just always been having issues with, you know, setbacks. Um, I have a couple ideas and theories, but you know, I wanted to hear what you

guys had to say about it, or if you dealt with similar people in the past. What are your, what are your theories? I'd like to hear what you guys had to say about it or if you dealt with similar people in the past What are your what are your theories? I'd like to hear what you think Well, I've been going to the doctor. I have you know list of issues from the past You know, I got like Lyme disease. I have hyperthyroidism, you know Graves disease Pre-existing injuries from the brain core. They definitely took their pound of flesh. And it just seems, just that kind of list. Joints, aches and pains, pulling muscles left and right.

Probably my current lifestyle probably doesn't help either. I work as a CEO. I'm a volunteer firefighter as well. So, you know, I stay pretty active, pretty busy. Okay. All right. What maps program are you following right now, Josh? So I was doing a performance, but you know, I had to stop that due to you know shoulder hug both

of my shoulders actually at the same time so that was almost two months ago you know I hurt him so bad that you know I could barely lift my arms afterwards so here's it here's what happens or here's the checklist when it comes to injuries. Now if it's like, you know, one injury or two, you know, you typically want to look at technique and form and are you able to, are you doing exercises that are appropriate for your body? Are you able to move properly? Do you have enough stabilization?

Et cetera, et cetera. When it's repeated injuries, when it's like a string and it seems to be a trend, and also I think this is probably you just looking at your background. I'm looking at your background, military, volunteer firefighter, law enforcement. Usually what it is in that case is poor sleep, so not enough sleep or bad sleep, it's just not good,

and or over stress, over training. So if it's repeated, now here's the challenge, when I say that to people, if they're used to having poor sleep, then they'll probably just be like nah, I sleep the same as I've always been, unless it's really bad, then they'll be like yeah, it's sleep. The second thing with the over training is we often judge how much we're doing based off of maybe what we could tolerate before. See, maybe I only work out four days a week. You know, I don't do, I don't think I'm overdoing it, but the

the string of injuries, the fact that you're talking about having repeated pulled muscles, shoulder pain, and this is like a long standing kind of thing, I would say sleep and overtra training is where we're at, or overstressed and under rest. And so I'd scale way back and I would prioritize sleep. How is your sleep? Do you get a full eight hours every night? Do you wake up in the middle of the night?

Do you need a lot of caffeine during the day? Oh no, my sleep is terrible. I've pretty much ditch caffeine. Um, you know, I had a feeling you guys were definitely going to hit on over training and whatnot. My endocrinologist, he was on me day one. Like you need to stop for, you know, a month or two until we get medication balanced, get your life balanced.

Like, okay, that makes sense. Medication balance get your life balance like okay that makes sense so when he gave me the go-ahead I Started easing back into it super slow, you know not overdoing anything mainly starting with mobility Working on that and then slowly incorporating strength training again So I do feel like I have scaled back Yeah, how'd you feel when you were doing the mobility when you were just doing mobility? How'd you feel? again. So I do feel like I have scaled back. How'd you feel when you were doing the mobility? When you were just doing mobility, how'd you feel?

At first it was, it was frustrating. You know, felt like I could slash should be doing more. But, you know, I got used to it. I, you know, started focusing on, you know, the benefits and the positives of it, you know, it makes sense with the condition that I'm in right now. I'm not in my 20s anymore. I can't just jump into stuff and start grinding away like I used to. Tell me about your sleep. You said it's terrible. Give me some details. Oh yeah. I wake up quite frequently during the night.

Even with me doing volunteer work, when it's during my regular work week, I will try and prioritize the sleep and make sure I get sleep unless there's like a big emergency going on. It feels kind of bad to say that out loud, but I'm useless if I'm not, you know, performing at an optimum level. So I do recognize that.

So the data on sleep and injury is, there's nothing, it's in the same universe. Yeah, biggest contributor. It's not just like, you know, it's the highest contributed injury. Nothing comes close to, in fact, one night of poor sleep will almost double the rate of injury. So if you're chronically under-slept, number one, you're kind of used to it, so you probably don't know what it feels like to really feel rested. But you're going to keep it, so so I'm gonna be honest with you Josh, there's nothing we can tell you to do exercise-wise

that's gonna help this until you get your sleep fixed. And it's great that you've scaled down and you've scaled and focused on bringing the intensity down and whatnot, but you're not recovering. If you're not sleeping, nothing training-wise is benefiting you in that regard, which is a frustrating reality,

but it is the reality of the whole thing. Mobility and walking is about all I'd let you do right now. At the most. That's about all I'd let you do just to keep you sane and moving and stuff like that until we address the sleep situation. I would go with a sleep expert, work with a sleep expert, and nail this down.

Your entire life will change if you could get your sleep in order. Like everything will change. And if you don't then you're gonna be, you'll maybe you'll get a hot streak for two or three weeks but then you'll be right back where you're at again with an injury and set back again. So if you don't listen and you do that then you know your body will make you listen. Yeah but I would I would work with a sleep expert and I'd say look I need and that's the priority like that You have to fix that you can't do anything else unless that unless that gets fixed

Okay, yeah, you know I had a feeling we were definitely gonna touch on that I know it sucks for an answer Yeah, but look I'll help you feel better about it. You start to fix your sleep. Yeah. It'll change your life. Your whole life is gonna change. How long have you been having poor sleep for? Probably since I left high school and joined the Marine Corps.

Oh, Josh. Listen, your brain volume has reduced, you've got less gray matter. There are things that you will start to see that'll reverse that you don't even know are happening because it's been so long. It'll take like 60 days of good sleep and you're gonna start to come out of some clouds.

A new human being. Yeah, like it'll feel like superhuman is the difference. But you need to work with a sleep expert because if it's been that long, there's some issues there that need to get addressed. Okay, yeah, I mean, I noticed I was definitely having problems. I've tried to go through a couple of MAPS programs,

but work, life just kind of kept getting in the way and I would have to stop halfway through it or, you know, reset or stay in a phase longer than was planned. Yeah. What walking in mobility only Josh until we figure this out. Like, because I get how it would feel horrible to do nothing. So I'm okay with that. But it's got to be walking in mobility until you start to string those weeks together of getting your sleep in line

Anything else is just too high of risk for where you're currently at. It won't benefit you. Yeah Well, it'll actually make me worse. It'll make you feel worse. Yep So currently I'm in Physical therapy for you know, trying to rehab this shoulder Yep issues and that's pretty much I was waiting for the go-ahead from the therapist physical therapy for trying to rehab this shoulder issues. And that's pretty much, I was waiting for the go ahead from the therapist. She said, start working on your mobility again.

And, you know, walking. Yeah, okay, I can do that. No, yeah, that's it. And like I said, tackle sleep, like that's it. I gotta fix this. So you work with a sleep expert and you work on it and you should notice pronounced improvements within the first 30 days but you got it you got to get that address otherwise laser focused on that yep that's your that's good that's gonna hire world right now that's gonna

affect your health it's already is it's affecting your health in some pretty negative ways and there's not much you can do exercise wise to remedy that. All right, yeah, I was kinda hoping for some guidance regarding warm-ups, styles, different. No, just mobility, bro. Movement pattern, yeah. Yep, just- I mean, that makes sense, definitely.

Yeah. Yeah, and you go look up the data yourself. Look up sleep deprivation and injury risk. We've done quite a few episodes. I don't know if you've listened to how many. Okay hopefully you've heard some of them but we've done a lot of episodes talking about. But you I mean you if you know you have a hormone doctor you can I need to work with a sleep expert and they'll refer you. Oh that's a good one. I got a little notebook here. Yeah, yeah. You're, you're, you're taking notes.

Yeah. There, there are medical professionals that, uh, understand sleep. So have them refer you to a sleep expert. They'll do a sleep test. You probably have to wear something to go to sleep and they'll test you for things like sleep apnea. Yeah. Yeah. All that stuff. and they'll test you for things like sleep apnea. And they'll just take you, go ahead. A few months ago I started putting, what is that, I forget what it's called, but basically on your phone you can Bring an FM.

Put a wind down mode and it puts into night mode and stuff so it blocks certain notifications. So it basically tells me when to go to bed. I go, okay. Yeah, well. They'll been trying to do that. Yeah, but you're a volunteer firefighter. Your house is ablaze. And what you're doing with your phone

is you're taking a cup of water and you're throwing it at it. Squirt cut, you got a squirt cut. Yeah, this is gonna be an overhaul. This is gonna be a total overhaul. And it's gonna be some big changes, but it's gonna change your entire life. It's gonna change everything.

Yeah, it's worth it, Josh changes, but it's gonna change your entire life. It's gonna change everything. It's worth it, Josh. Oh, I believe it. Yeah, I'd love to hold you accountable to it too, or I'd like to hear back from you in a couple months, you know, like 90 days. You wanna do that? I'd like to hear from you what you've got set up

and going on. If you made some progress. Yeah, because there's a lot of other people that are in a similar boat that just aren't taking the leap either, and I'd like to hold you accountable to go do it because I think I think it will make an incredible impact and hopefully that'll inspire somebody else to take the same steps. Here's a deal Josh, military, law enforcement, you know what they taught you to do is what you've been

doing for a long time and this might even be part of your nature. You endured it and worked through it. Yeah, you're just like, I'm just gonna trudge through and keep moving. You're used to it now. It's been since high school you've had shitty sleep and you're just going and you're going to the point where you don't even realize how bad it is.

You know it's bad, but you don't really realize until you peek out from under the clouds and you're gonna be like, oh my God, whoa, this is way different. Your hormones are affected, you're gonna be like, oh my God. Whoa, this is way different. Your hormones are affected, your immune system's affected, your cognitive function's affected, your heart is affected, your liver is affected, your muscle, everything.

So, especially for that long. So it's a big, big deal. And you're not gonna know how big of a deal it is until you start to come out of it. There's so many unrealized gains once you tap into that? You have no idea. Yeah. Um, yeah, at first I didn't believe it, but listening to you guys and doing a little bit of research and reading on my

own, it makes sense. Yeah. Well, you said that the data is out there. Yep. Doesn't lie. Trust us. Yep. Trust the process. I want you to follow back up, Josh. I want you to get there. I want you to follow back up Josh. I want you to get this I want you to follow back up Like 90 days 90 days. Okay, 90 days back on the show 90 days I want to hear back from you and hear what we're at Okay, yeah, we can do that. All right. All right, brother. Thanks for calling in. Yep All right. Thanks guys. Enjoy. You got it. I hope he listens. I hope so too

That's why that's why I wanted to put it on a mic like that. I'm like I'm gonna fucking call you, bro I feel like you're gonna hang out and be like I ain't doing that shit Yeah, just sleep it no, that's everything it literally is it's everything like every like how your body just regenerates and It dude recovers hormone balances everything It's not the hardest part is what Sal said though Is that when you've been in it for that long, you don't even know how bad you're just you're just a zombie moving forward Yeah, I don't know how many people I've talked to you There's no idea where I'm trying to help somebody like I was just literally this last weekend

I was talking to my boy and this was actually more hormone related than it was sleep related and he's like, oh, I'm fine I'm like your fine is not good You have just learned feels like know what it feels like. Yeah, you've adapted to that. That's how amazing our bodies are so resilient, right? They're so resilient. And so it does a really good job of figuring out how to survive off of whatever you provide or give it. But it does not mean you're good. And you don't know it's good until you get good.

And then you go, oh, shit, I was really bad. And that's kinda like what happens when you talk to somebody who's been chronically under-slept for a decade or more. I knew it right away. When he's getting injuries like that, I was like, wait, there's no real reason to get the injuries. No, he listed all his injuries, autoimmune issues.

I look at his question, I see his background. You can see it in his face, he's chronically poor sleep, chronic, since high school, so it's been years, and that, I mean, listen, they will, you have changes to your brain within a short period of time. Over that many years, he's like in a cloud, he doesn't even realize, and it is not just useless

to try to do different workouts, it's actually detrimental detrimental it's actually bad for him to try and do different workouts that's how bad it is with that kind of negative for sleep crazy our next caller is Valerie from Arizona what's up Valerie hi how are you guys what's up sorry there you go no's a little quiet. There you go. No, we see you. Okay. Awesome. How are you? Good. Doing great. Good. So I have a question about weightlifting for calisthenics and mobility. I have many fitness goals and ultimately want to get stronger and more mobile to be able to achieve calisthenics

skills such as levers, handstands, pull-ups, muscle-ups, et cetera. I feel pretty weak overall and my mobility is definitely not there to be able to do skills like the pistol squats and dragon squats. So how can I train to gain more muscle and mobility and be able to work on these skills? I know that practicing these skills and the different progressions is really the way to achieve these skills, but how can I help my body along to see a real progress and strength and skills? I'm 31 I've been an athlete in my entire life, but was never the most flexible. And so it's been hard to gain more that flexibility mobility as an adult.

Yeah, good question. You're right. There's nothing is better than taking those movements and regressing them down to something that you can practice and then slowly progressing up to the skills you're looking for. Okay? Nothing will come close to that. Now when it comes to strength training, you can do basic lifts that will contribute to some strength, but they're not going to come close to replacing the regressions. In fact, 95% of what you should do, if that's your goal, if that's your main goal, you're like, look, I want to be able to do levers and handstands and muscle-ups. 95% of what you

should do is regressed versions of those and practice them for you. Now that being said, if I saw you attempt a pistol squat, there is a possibility that, I mean, can you go, can you sit ass to grass with both feet on the ground? Can you do that? Yeah, and that's taken probably eight months to even get like Below 90 okay, that's never been like a strong suit at all and growing up like I played volleyball my entire life And we did weightlifting and college and stuff. It was never

That deep into mobility like it was but it was a lot more shoulder focused but I still feel like I've lost them or I've never really gotten that mobility still. So then the thing that I would do with you is so it's more it's most likely your ankle mobility is probably what's limited and so working on the ankle mobility and in conjunction with practicing this Pristil Squat. So it'd be like, you and I would warm up and we would do a real good combat stretch. And then I'd use like a band or like a suspension trainer to assist your body weight.

And we would work on the depth to where you can get all the way down comfortably and then come back up. And that's what a regression would look like. But it also would be mobility focused. So it'd be what's your limiting factor of why you can't do the full range of motion calisthenic movement you're trying to do,

addressing that mobility thing, and then doing the thing to the greatest depth that you can and assisting you if I need to, and that's gonna get you there faster than anything else. You going and bilateral squatting 200 pounds is not gonna help your pistol squat. Yeah. Although I do find, if we were to structure,

like you're still working on the foundational type lifts, like your squats, like your overhead press, and all these main lifts, but range of motion is the issue. That's what I would work on and tailor back a lot of the load. So we get down into depth in terms of your squat, but now we hold and we take an isometric pause squat. And we incrementally work our way down in terms of like the angle of that. And then also too, in conjunction with that in the days in between, we're going to skills. And so you're working in conjunction with that and the days in between, working on the skills

and so you're working on your body weight skills with your pistol squats or working with the rings or even obviously these types of tools like props with the TRX straps or the Olympic rings are going to be very helpful with those other goals. But yeah, for getting into new ranges of motion, we have to incrementally, really strategically work on that and recruit and hold those positions and recruit in those positions. So even more so than just the mobility of it,

we have to work on the strength in that range. You know what's really cool too about flexibility and mobility, Valerie, is there is a way to dramatically improve and increase the speed at which you gain mobility, and in particular, flexibility, and that is to practice it all day. So what that would look like is,

let's say you're at work and you're sitting. Sit in a way to where you feel a light passive stretch on an area that you want more flexible. And so you're just sitting there while you're working, while you're, and you're kind of stretching. You don't need to push it to where you can't work, but like, you know, you can sit in a way that stretches your hip or your hamstring

or your calf or a shoulder, and then switch sides. And all day long, find ways to do these really light stretches and movements throughout the entire day. Like sitting on the floor is a good example of something like this. You'll gain flexibility very quickly in comparison to other methods by doing it that way. Okay, so I do some of that already,

especially sitting at work. I try to do a lot of hip and I do have a standing desk, so I try to go up and down, sit to stand, so I'm not constantly sitting at work. I try to do a lot of hip and I do have a standing desk. So I try to like go up and down, sit to stand so I'm not constantly sitting for hours. It's a mildly active job. Like I'm a nurse. So I move around a lot, but yeah. And I've done some of the mobility stuff you've talked about, like with the like T-Rex straps or whatever suspension stuff. But I don't know. I did that for a couple of months, but I don't feel like I moved anywhere. Where do you feel most of your tightness?

I think it is ankles. Okay. Yeah. Okay, before you go to bed for 10 minutes, do some really long static stretches in combat position. Okay. Yeah, I've been doing a combat a few times a week before I warm up.

Every night before you go to bed. Literally. And this is what it looks like. So when you do it as a mobility warmup, it's active. If you do it as a static stretch, this is what it looks like. You get into the position and hold the stretch and breathe and relax. You're gonna go to bed, so you wanna calm everything down.

And literally do five minutes on one foot, five minutes on the other foot. It's a long hold. Valerie, how long did you play volleyball for? Well, I still play, so for 21 years, I started when I was 10. So understand that that doesn't help this, right? The position, and you know your stance that you get ready in, right? It's like you're not even at fully

90 degrees, your hips are back, your chest is forward. So you've gotten really strong and explosive from that. So your body is very comfortable and very strong in that position. And we're trying to reverse a little bit of that work by working in a greater depth, it's gonna take time. And the longer someone's gotten really strong in that shortened range of motion like you have, the more difficult it is. Had you never played volleyball, it would be easier for me to get you to there

than it would be with you have done that your whole life. And so I've got you, so that's part of why it feels like that, you can do it, but just think about the amount of reps that you've put into volleyball. We need to start putting that amount of reps into that ankle mobility. You've got to think about it all the time. I mean, there, you can't, you can't do it too much throughout the day. Every time you can get down in that combat stretch,

get down in that combat stretch, even if it's just for a minute, uh, the frequency of you doing it is going to be the key to you gaining that new found range of motion. But you, I mean, you've played volleyball for a long time in that tight short position and you're strong in it, which makes it even harder. So keep that in mind. Yeah, and in terms of the muscle up,

the biggest limiter is depth in that dip position. So that's something I would chronically work towards in terms of getting strong in the lowest position possible and grinding your way back up through that. And that'll help substantially with, as you're going to switch and lean forward and get more of that chest involved to press your way back.

Can you do pull-ups? No, I can't yet. Last summer, I was close to one pull-up because I started this probably about a year ago when I really wanted to do more of the body weight stuff. But then I had kind of a wrist injury, so I haven't really done handstands for like seven months or something like that. So it's been a little bit limiting and like trying to work on grip strength

and kind of rehab my wrist for a while because it gets better and worse, better and worse. Are you tall? Because you play volleyball, how tall are you? I'm five, seven, but I have legs and arms, like I'm five, 10, so I'm very short upper body and long limbs. That's gonna make it a lot harder for you to do a muscle up. And harder for ankle mobility too.

Those are both, this is the big goals. I mean, it's cool, but yeah, it's gonna take a lot of time. It's great to work up to, so for now, I would get good at pull ups, and you can start with a negative. So get yourself up at the top, and control the descent as a good regression. It's gonna be a hell of accomplishment when you do it just so you know it. That's a good, that's a

really good goal but you definitely shouldn't be discouraged if it's taking a long time and you see other people because you're not built for it and you played a sport that's not helping. So the fact that you did those things and that you're working towards it I think is an awesome goal for you but don't get discouraged because how long it's taking because that's a that is a big goal for for your your body type what you played sports wise for a long time even if you had a ideal body type for that and didn't play that it would be still hard it's still hard you're trying to do one of the harder things for your

body type and what you played for a long time. People that do muscle ups really easy are typically tiny with skinny legs. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. They weigh nothing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what I mean. It's a good goal. It is.

Don't get discouraged. No, don't. Yep. Thank you. All right. Yeah, I appreciate it. Thanks for calling in, Valerie. Bye, Valerie.

Yeah, of course. Have a good day, guys. I like her goals, because they're all performance-based. Yeah. It's all performance-based. And it's gonna stretch her, because that's skill and performance. Those are hard. Oh, yeah. Those are real hard. But I had to ask her, you know, how tall she was and stuff because, you know, especially girls that could do muscle-ups are

typically tiny gymnasts. Yeah. It's not even... You got long arms, you're tall. And they started real young too. So the amount of time and volume volume it took for them to really get strong and stable in a lot of those positions is substantial. You got to be able to do like 10 pull-ups before you do a muscle-up, in my opinion. So start there. Yep. Because otherwise you're not going to get the speed to get them to it. Our next caller is Sadie from Florida.

Hi, Sadie. How you doing, Sadie? Good morning. Oh my gosh, this is so cool. I'm so excited right now. Good to meet you. Us too. How can we help you? Oh my gosh, this is so cool. I'm so excited right now. Good to meet you. Us too.

How can we help you? Yeah. So, um, I was calling in with a question regarding bone density after extreme weight loss, um, so if I can just read the email I sent you. Yeah, do that. Yeah, that's probably best. Sure. Catch us up.

Okay. Perfect. Um, and this is kind of a Yeah, do that. Yeah, that's probably best. Sure, catch us up. Okay, perfect. Um, and this is kind of a lot, so sorry any bands, but I grew up pretty overweight, I'm five seven and my highest weight was around 200 pounds. I used food to comfort me and cope with a lot of trauma I faced at a young age. When I got into high school, I developed a pretty nasty eating disorder. And over the course of a year and a half, I lost about 120 pounds and became severely malnourished and underweight. When I finally reached out for help,

my heart was beating in the 20s, my organs were failing, and I didn't even have enough strength to stand up on my own. I got admitted into the ICU for a month, followed by two months of inpatient treatment to get me more mentally and physically stable. And while I was there, they gave me a grip strength test and they told me I had the grip strength of an elderly woman, but I did not know what that meant until I started listening to you guys.

Anyways, I was so lost when I re-entered the real world. I only knew the extremes, how to lose weight fast and how to gain weight fast. I had no balance or understanding of true health. I was still underweight, under-muscled, and scared to eat when I found you guys. Through listening to your podcasts, I became comfortable eating more and doing some light strength training, but it was mostly isolation exercises via machines.

As my body continues to heal, I'm becoming more concerned about the health of my bones because losing so much weight has definitely taken a toll on them. So I started lifting heavier about six months ago after listening to you guys for about a year and a half at that point. I'm currently strength training 30 minutes, three to four times per week, full body. I rely heavily on the Smith machine for squats, deadlifts and bench press. And I still use a few other machines like glat pulldowns, chest presses and rows. And

after my lifts, I do incline walk for 20 to 30 minutes, just for some low impact cardio. So I was wondering if I'm on the right track as far as You're doing incredible. You're doing really good right now. Yeah. What a great comeback story and your approach is awesome. Sadie, let me, so. That's awesome. You're, can I, I just wanna compliment you.

So you're young, right? You're 21? Yes, sir. The courage you have to come on this podcast and to talk about and be so vulnerable and talk about your challenges and what you're doing? I don't, you're helping a lot of people by talking about this.

I hope you reach some other people that are afraid to do something like this. It's incredible that you've turned this around like that. Great, great, great job. Excellent job. Have you had a bone scan? That means so much. Yeah, no, no, you're doing great.

Have you had a bone scan? Because you said you're concerned with bone health or is it just because you're just like I need to focus on it? It was just because I feel like I need to focus on it. Yeah I haven't had a scan. Okay and it says in your question that you're eating about 2,000 calories a day? Yes and then probably around like 160 to 180 grams of protein. Okay, doing great. And are you tracking or is this a rough estimate?

So I was tracking for a couple of months but then it kind of turned into like a mind game. Yeah. So put it on the back burner but from the eating disorder stuff, I have a pretty good idea of like portions and whatnot. So. Good answer.

I'm making sure I'm eating enough. You're in the right place. You are. And are you working with anybody through all the challenges that led to that? Are you working with therapists or anything like that? Oh yeah, I have a therapist and a psychiatrist that I see pretty regularly.

So they're helping me so much with the mental side of things and then y'all's podcast, like I can't emphasize this enough. I truly believe it saved my life. Like, I don't know if I would be here right now. I didn't. If you guys weren't so encouraging when it comes to women fueling properly and like, the importance of muscle and I don't know, y'all just really transformed my life and it's amazing. So proud of you. You're doing a really good job. Do you work right now or are you in school?

I'm working right now. I had to leave college because of all that stuff, but I work two days a week, so just. Are you in our private forum yet? I'm not, no. I'm gonna have Doug put you in there so you can stay in touch with us. So you got access to us when you have any questions like this and you go, but I tell you what.

You're a big inspiration. You're kicking ass. Do you have any, do you like fitness? Do you ever think about coaching other people? It's funny you say that, Sal. Right now I'm actually taking an ASM's personal trainer. Beautiful, look at you. I knew it.

Something inside me told me that. You would make an excellent, people like you make such good coaches, Sidney. Such a great story. Yeah, we're gonna put you on our trainer forum and also we'll get you in there. And you can talk with our coaches and trainers and our team.

And I think that would be a great career path for someone like you. I think it would be good for you and your health to help other people. But I think it'll also give you a tremendous sense of meaning and purpose. Because it's gonna get all, it's all the challenges you went through

are gonna have a lot of meaning and purpose. Yes, because it made you this incredible coach. It's really gonna make you an incredible coach. If you have a passion for this, I really think it's a good idea. I do, thank you so much. That means a lot to me. Well, you're in the forums now.

Stay close to us, okay? Yeah. Already, I'll be reaching out. Yeah, and keep doing the strength training. Keep bumping your calories. Focus on getting strong. And find some people that you can help yourself. Do it for free.

It's gonna help you too. I think that's the best thing you can do. Yep. Well, Dill, I appreciate you guys. Thank you so much. Awesome. You got it. We'll see you in the forum. Thanks, Sadie.

Yes, sir. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. What a badass story. Yes, dude. Oh, dude. Yes. Love it., bye bye. Bye bye. What a bad ass story. Yes, dude. Oh, dude. Yes, man. Love it, I love it.

I love it, that's so encouraging to hear, especially a kid, 21, she's, you know, she's- Turned it around, man. But I knew it, you know, I heard her talk, I'm like, I bet she's trying to be a trainer. Yeah. And if she's not, I was gonna convince her, because I think that would make it such a great-

Oh, yeah, what a great, and man, to have figured this out on her own, really, I know she credits listening to podcasts, but the fact that she's making all the right choices. You could tell there's a little bit of hesitancy here to tell us that the isolation exercise, but a person like that is great.

I don't care. That's a great introduction to get you going to. She's applying resistance. Yes. And that's gonna help build things back. 100%, and 2000 calories already, like she's in a good place, man, so she's gonna get it all back

So totally what a cool story our next color is Phil from Colorado. Hey Phil, what's up Phil? How you doing guys? Yeah, I'm fangirling real hard right now. So I'm gonna have to just read what I wrote. Hopefully that's okay. Sorry if it's a bit long-winded. No, that's good I wrote, hopefully that's okay. Sorry if it's a bit long winded. No, that's good. Sweet. Um, so I started listening to mind pump in 2019 after the birth of my fifth child. I quickly drank the Kool-Aid, um, and was binge listening to episodes and past

episodes while waiting for new ones to drop. Um, I bought the RGB super bundle and attended the live event in Denver. Uh, I was in the private forum and I ended up purchasing Suspension, Resistance, Anywhere, 15, Prime, Prime Pro. So I'm pretty stacked there. A little bit about me and admittedly super nervous to talk about this in such a public forum as I'm also currently in a job search. Um, but I bought all the programs, listened to all your advice, but I was in a really bad place, both physically and emotionally.

I was struggling with depression and alcohol abuse. As a result, I would start a program and quickly abandon it. My drinking was out of control. And for the second time in 2024, I entered an inpatient treatment program and actually as of today, I entered an inpatient treatment program. And actually as of today, I'm six months sober. All right. Um, after leaving treatment, I started with maps 15, just to get back in the gym.

I'm currently in anabolic phase two, starting with the pre-phase I'm 36. Um, and I'm down to about 210 pounds from my height of 245. And depending on which scale I use in body or my home one, I'm around 25% body fat. I've seen significant improvements in my strength and overall volume each week. So now to my question. I'm currently consuming around 1700 calories, mostly from whole Foods, generally in the 100 grams of protein range. However, I'm really struggling with appetite and wanting to boost those numbers.

I've heard all you guys said about the importance of reverse dieting to achieve my goals for weight loss and strength, but I just am having trouble getting my appetite back. I've tried shakes and bars to boost my calorie intake and protein, but I still have no appetite or hunger. How can I change my body to want to eat and reverse dieting with the goal of still losing about another 25 pounds? Ah, good question. All right, so when appetite's low, there's a few places I'll typically look. So let's start with your current program which which math program are you currently following?

Anabolic phase two just started that are you two or three days a week? Generally two but sometimes I fit a third in there. Okay good stick with two. How's your sleep? Really good since Since getting sober. I'm roughly around seven, seven and a half hours, pretty consistent. Wake up here and there, but fall right back asleep. Okay, good, and stress? Pretty high, five kids will do that. Wow.

Yeah. And between jobs too. So, you know, that's been difficult, and then just everything that comes along with being in recovery. Okay, and do you know what your vitamin D levels are at? Not currently. I was taking a typical vitamin pack from, you know, supplement companies. Yeah.

But now I've since stopped taking that. Okay, I would start taking vitamin D again, making sure you get sunlight during the day, really focus on sleep Maintain where you're at with the strength training and keep eating whole foods and your appetite will start to come back One of the side effects of sobriety for some people is They they're either they overeat or they under eat afterwards for whatever reason. You're only six months sober I think you're doing okay now I can I can tell you to force feed You're only six months sober, I think you're doing okay. Now I can tell you to force feed,

so we can convince you to push, and a little bit of that's okay, but what I don't want you to do is to make that like a thing where you gotta really force feed yourself. I think it's a good idea to add a shake. If you're hitting about 100 grams of protein a day, I think a 40 gram protein shake would be a good idea.

You can add that at the end of the night before you go to bed. There's nothing wrong with that. And then just stay the course. Just be patient, consistent, and as you get stronger, appetite will start to slowly, should start to slowly come back. Yeah, I'm not pushing in this situation either.

It's interesting, I don't know if I've ever met a guy or a friend of mine who was was that had kids, multiple kids, and between jobs that didn't stop eating. It's like, it's weird. It's almost like a thing that we all kind of naturally tend to do. Like, I don't know if it's innate in us or what, but it's like, it's like a common side effect of that type of stress. Like, oh my God, all, and it's because it's just this low level all day, you're probably thinking about it or even subconsciously it's on your mind. And so you tend to lose the appetite. I think once that gets kind of resolved for you, I think maybe that's when if I was your trainer, right?

We were trained. I'd be like, let's just keep doing what we're doing right now. Two times a week. Keep heading the pace when you are hungry. Eat more. But let's let's solve that. Once you feel good, you get in a rhythm again with your job, then we can start talking about trying to push the calories a little bit right now. I just think that pushing too hard might end up reverting back either to alcohol or reverting back to binging or that direction. And I'd be more worried about that than I would be like reverse dieting you an extra 200 calories more a day because even though that's good and you will long term want to do that where you're currently at right now

I would want to make sure you're good before as a your trainer I pushed you that adding good like I said a 40 gram protein shake is fine Now do you mind if I if I ask you some more kind of non fitness questions? Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so Do do you have a group of friends that you hang out with regularly or did that change after you stopped drinking? Um, yeah, I'm pretty insulated as far as Outside friends. I have a huge family. So it's you know family and kids and we all have kids So we all get together pretty regularly Everybody's been super supportive. Okay

Good that helps a lot My closest friends are also my brother-in-law's so it makes it easy Do you guys ever meet up just you and the guys like like once a week without kids without wives? And just talk about how to become better Not as often as I'd like for sure. Busy schedules with all of us. But yeah, I mean it does happen, just not as often as I would like.

So I've been looking a lot into this just personally, for personal reasons. And the data on this is really interesting. Men and women gain a tremendous amount of benefit from meeting weekly with women with women, men with men, and focusing on how to become better at something. So like, okay, how do I become a better dad? How do I become a better husband?

How do I become a better person? Men are notoriously terrible at this. We're so bad at this, especially as men get older, we just don't make friends. We just kind of stay on our lane and do our thing. I think that's a good idea for someone like you right now because you got rid of the alcohol, so you're probably challenged with dealing with things

without having that quick release. If you could find a few guys that you meet with with the purpose of, we're gonna meet once a week or maybe once every other week, be twice a month and the goal is Let's see if we could just focus on becoming better I've been looking into the data at on that and it's it's it's profoundly beneficial So I think that would help you a little bit with this with this journey yours Yeah, I appreciate that. It's certainly difficult

Dealing with the loneliness and the change in environment I think my biggest struggle wasn't necessarily the alcohol but dealing with all of the depression and anxiety emotional stress So more a symptom of a deeper cause there, but yeah, the connections are huge and I agree I mean, I know I feel better when I meet up totally and it's a regular it's got to be a regular thing That's what the data shows. If you need help looking for groups, typically local churches have men's group that meet specifically for this reason.

It's like how do we become better type of deal? And again, I've been looking at the data on this and it is really, really good. So I think that would help you quite a bit. As far as the workouts, two days a week. Just do that, walk every day. I think taking vitamin D is a good idea as far as the workouts two days a week. Just do that walk every day I think taking vitamin D is a good idea and Add the protein shake for now and then let your body slowly improve its appetite

Right, and I appreciate that. Do you mind if I ask a question? I've searched the asmine pump, but I haven't really found anything sure What are your thoughts on IV therapy and? Some of those systems as far as I see them popping up all over the place? Um, is that beneficial? What are the, like, how long does it last? It depends. Yeah. It depends for what, like, uh, what are you looking for specifically? Well, specifically, like to address like vitamin deficiencies, um, said vitamin D stuff like that. Are those boost packs going to last long enough or is it something where it's kind of just a trend? I mean not a bad

idea to do because it might give you some insight that you're deficient and stuff right if you go do one of those like you know B vitamin shots or all the IV or whatever and you afterwards you walk out like oh my god I feel amazing well that might tell you like oh you might be running low on some stuff. I think what would be better would be if you're gonna spend money on that would be to get a nutrient test to see what you're deficient in. Now here's a deal with IV.

There are some things that don't get absorbed well orally and there are other things that get absorbed well perfectly fine orally. So it doesn't make sense to take, to do an IV drip of vitamins you could just take orally that get absorbed well. Now sometimes people have absorption issues, in which case an IV works really well. Like some people have issues absorbing B12.

They have gut issues or whatever, in which case a shot makes a big difference. Most people don't though. Most people are fine. Vitamin D absorbs perfectly fine in capsule form. Glutathione might be a good idea if you're looking for liver support or something like that. Liposomal glutathione's okay, just takes longer to work.

But otherwise, except for specific applications, they tend to be overrated based off of whatever. The biggest key from them is that it giving you insight on that you're probably deficient. Because if you did one of those things and it made you feel amazing. Yeah, you get a B-shot, you're like, whoa, I feel way better. That's a big sign that, oh, you're probably deficient. Because if you did one of those things and it made you feel amazing. You get a B shot, you're like, whoa, I feel way better. That's a big sign that, oh, I'm probably deficient somewhere versus,

oh, this is something I need to do all the time. It's like that. Don't let it do that. Like if you go do it, it's not like, oh, I need to go buy this every so often. No, it's like that means you're deficient somewhere. That's why it felt so amazing right afterwards. Let's dive in. Let's dive into what you're deficient in and then fix that out via probably just a daily pill and you're gonna be fine Perfect. Thanks guys. You got it, man. All right, man. Yeah. Thanks guys. Have a good day. Take it easy. I

You know, it's so Have you ever noticed that like every every guy I've ever met that has a family that has gone through between jobs. Job shifts. You stop eating. Yeah. Like it's almost like it's innate in you, which makes sense, right? Like if you go all the way back thousands of years

when we were hunting and I all of a sudden couldn't find, it's me who's gonna. It's not a priority anymore. I'm gonna ration it for me because I'm like, my kids need to eat, my wife needs to eat, like I need to care for them and it's like, and you just automatically lose weight and you're not eating and that appetite. Short term acute stress suppresses appetite, long term moderate stress increases appetite.

I actually think especially that type of stress. I think there's some sort of correlation with providing for the family and every guy I know that has a family that has been through that Always loses all kinds of weight and I asked him that question about friends because what happens sometimes when you become sober is the friends You hung out with that's how you guys hang out. Yeah, and you don't have that social component anymore So the data on that is like, you know meet with people who are like-minded Regularly, it's really powerful for man. We are terrible at making friends and doing that. It sounds like he's got a pretty good support group though

with his family and stuff like that. But there's a difference between the kids and just the network. I think it's so profound for somebody who doesn't have any of that. Oh, even more so. You take somebody who doesn't have family, doesn't have close friends, never does that, then all of a sudden they start meeting.

It's like boom, it's like an unlock. But you know what happens too sometimes, you get in a pattern. You guys ever notice this where you have close friends never does that then all of a sudden they start meeting it's like boom like this It's like it unlocked But you know what happens to sometimes you get in a pattern you guys ever notice this where you like you have old friends You don't see him for a while you meet up with them again, and you fall back into like well This is how it used to be like this weird. Yeah, so it could be a challenge as well, but he's on the right path Dude, he's on the right path and for people listening you may be thinking on paper Forcing him to eat more would have been the right thing. No, not right now. No, it doesn't work that way. Not right now. If you like listening to Mind Pump come find us on Instagram. Justin is at Mind Pump. Justin, I'm at Mind Pump to Stefano. 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,

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