Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2704: How to Finally Reach Peak Fitness (Listener Live Coaching)

Episode Date: October 11, 2025

In this episode of Quah (Q & A), Sal, Adam & Justin coach four Pump Heads via Zoom. Mind Pump Fit Tip: The Secret to Ultimate Fitness. (1:57) An example of a dysfunctional way of promoting health & fitness. (18:40) Teaching the youngins’ what’s up.  (22:33) The reading level in America. (25:27) Betting on entrepreneurship opportunities in America. (27:37) LMNT’s new flavors. (37:52) Sal’s rebrand. (39:18) Adam’s Joymode pitch. (41:00) Being obsessed with your child’s curiosity. (44:05) Max’s gift of intuition and empathy. (49:20) #ListenerLive question #1 –  Would I see better results sticking with this new approach, where all 3 phases repeat every 9-day cycle for 12 weeks, or is it more effective to dedicate 4 weeks to each phase across the 12-week program? (53:08) #ListenerLive question #2 – I’m having trouble staying asleep, and I’m looking for any advice on what I can do? (1:04:52) #ListenerLive question #3 – I’d like to shift my focus from weight loss to body composition: reverse dieting, building muscle, maybe even doing my first bulk. But with the GLP-1 and HRT, I’m unsure how to approach maintenance calories, whether to taper off the medication, and how to set myself up to build muscle. What would you suggest as my next step? (1:14:27) #ListenerLive question #4 – Are there specific exercises or strategies you recommend to improve balance and maintain an aesthetic look despite this permanent limitation due to my trap injury? (1:24:44) Related Links/Products Mentioned Ask a question to Mind Pump, live! Email: [e-mail] Get a free Sample Pack of LMNT’s most popular drink mix flavors with any purchase! As always, LMNT offers no-questions-asked refunds on all orders. The 8-count LMNT Sample Pack doubles down on our most popular flavors: Citrus Salt, Raspberry Salt, Watermelon Salt, and Orange Salt (2 stick packs of each flavor): Visit DrinkLMNT.com/MindPump Visit Joymode for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! ** Enter MINDPUMP at checkout for 20% off your first order. ** October Special: MAPS GLP-1 50% off! ** Code GLP50 at checkout. ** Mind Pump #2485: How to Make 2025 a Successful Year for Your Fitness Journey Muscle Mommy Movement Do More Than Half of Americans Read Below 6th-Grade Level? Over 10,000 Millionaires Depart from the UK in a Year Amid Changing Financial Landscape Who Would Win? 10 Book Box Set Visit Luminose by Entera for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! ** Promo code MPM at checkout for 10% off their order or 10% off their first month of a subscribe-and-save. ** Mind Pump #1897: Why Phasing Your Workouts Is So Important & How to Properly Switch It Up Mind Pump #2700: Get Back on Track With the 24-Hour Reset HACK Mind Pump Podcast – YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources People Mentioned David Goggins (@davidgoggins) Instagram Mike Matthews (@muscleforlifefitness) Instagram LAUREN FITZ, M.D. (@drlaurenfitz) Instagram  

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind Pump. 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, we coached people on air for their health and fitness. Real people calling in asking us for help. But this was after the intro.

Today's intro is 51 minutes long. now in the intro we talk about fat loss and muscle gain and fitness we also talk about family life and current events it's always a great time by the way if you want to be on an episode like this where you call in we can help you out send us your question send it to live at mind pumpmedia.com this episode is brought to you by some sponsors the first one is element this is an electrolyte drink you can either get the powder or you can get the ready to drinks they have new flavors now like watermelon stuff tastes amazing no sugar no artificial sweeteners go check them out go to drink LMNT.com forward slash mind pump. On that link, you'll get a free sample pack of their most popular drink mixed flavors with any purchase. This episode is also brought you by Joy Mode. They have a pre-sex supplement

that has been shown to actually work. The ingredients are backed by data. And Adam talks about his experience today using Joy Mode. You want to try it out? Go to tryjoymode.com forward slash Mind Pump. Use the code Mind Pump at checkout. Get 20% off.

We also have a sale on Maps, GLP1. This is a workout program designed for people who are using a GLP1 like OZempic or Wagovi, terseptitides, surmaglutide. It's a workout program. There's diet advice. There's lifestyle advice. All designed to maximize fat loss, minimize muscle loss. In fact, you'll probably gain strength and muscle and boost your metabolism following

this program. You can get it for half off. Go to Maps, glp1.com. Use the code, GLP50 for the discount. Back to the show. All right, fitness. There's so many different ways to become fit. You can run, cycle, swim, Pilates, yoga, you can lift weights.

You can do crossfit. Now, of course, they all produce different things in the body. But ultimately, people pursue them to improve their health and fitness. But what's the secret? How can you do something for the rest of your life? How can you create a relationship with fitness where this is just something you always do and you never stop? Because that's really the big challenge. Today, we're going to talk about that.

what is the secret to ultimate fitness let's go yeah it would be it would have it would have it would have something to do with uh learning to measure all the other like uh things outside of the mirror and the scale right like can i use because let's just say like you said you could have all these different modalities that could get you to the same point so it's not this isn't an argument over that's right this is wrong or anything like that it's more so um You know, there's a ton of different ways to skin a cat. And but the real, the thing that's going to make you successful is if the thing that you're measuring at the end is, am I sleeping better? Is my libido better?

Um, am I happier? Um, can I, can I do the things with my kids that I want to, like if, if, but I don't know how to, how you would say that or categorize that. Yeah, that's, I mean, that's really good. That's really good, uh, input. So would you say the secret lives within you? Oh, yeah. I guess you might to make it weird. I think, you know, when we first started, I'll take it back, right?

When we first started the show, we had a couple big goals. One of them was to counter a lot of lies that the fitness industry puts out. And we've been doing that for 10 years. The other thing that we really saw a challenge with was the, just for lack of a better term, the tribalism that exists in fitness. So what you see in fitness is you have these groups. and now all of them are trying to improve their health and fitness, let's say. Maybe they'll say that in reality.

They're not really trying to do that. But ultimately, that's what's happening or that's what they're trying to do. And you have people who use a lot of bodybuilding or powerlifting or CrossFit or Pilates or yoga or running. And then in these camps or these tribes, what they like to do is poke at each other or point to each other and say, well, that's wrong. That's not good. And what I'd like to point to is that every single one of those can be used in a way that is not going to improve your health and fitness. Every single one of those can become dysfunctional. Also, every single one of those methods can be used to improve the things that you said, Adam.

You can run, if that's your favorite thing to do or do Pilates or yoga or lift weights. You can do those things to dramatically improve the quality of your life and develop a relationship with those things to where you want to do it forever. So less than the methods, although I do believe there's parameters of, you know, what works, what doesn't work and, you know, what's considered appropriate. It's the root. Like, what is the root? Intention. Yeah, like if I'm using strength training, but the root is, you know, like mine, let's be

personal, like I'm too skinny. I need to get bigger, you know, my value is in how much muscle I have. It becomes as functional, right? It's not really, I'm no longer doing it to improve the quality of my life. it's actually becoming something completely different. And I think that could be true for any of these different pursuits. So really the secret is in the root of why you're doing things. I think if you change that, then each one of these things can become incredibly valuable.

And then the balance is kind of, you know, baked in. And, you know, again, taking it back, you'll often hear us, you know, promote strength training to people. But that's largely because people will give us a specific goal. Or what we know we're dealing with is, well, this person doesn't have a lot of time to spend at the gym. What's going to give them a big R-O-Y? Strength training just seems to be one of the best tools for that. But ultimately, it's about, you know, and that's just for us. It's considering the individual, which is a lot of times my quorum with most things that we experience in education and politics.

And you name the category, it's group think. You get swept into it. And it's kind of a natural thing. because, you know, people get passionate about when things work and, you know, what's worked well for them. However, you've got to kind of remove yourself back and really assess personally how this is affecting your individual results. And so, you know, that's just something, too, just always kind of be conscious of being swept into the momentum of the group. I would say it's largely dictated by the application, and the application is mostly influenced by the root. Yeah.

because I do think that I do think that somebody potentially will just use CrossFit but insert anything can be used with it being applied appropriately and get said desired outcome even if the root isn't ideal right like so

somebody who really understand maybe someone who listens to this show but still loves CrossFit and so they take those nuggets and they go okay I hear what the guys are saying why it's a slippery slope and why you know the programming needs more of this and so they modify their CrossFit training

and they measure the things but deep down they still want to get jacked. You know, they still want to look jacked and that's their motivator. So I think that you can not have, still not have the most ideal route driver so long as the application is appropriate. But I would, to agree with you,

ultimately, most people's application is applied in relation to their route. Does that make sense? It's my product of it. 100% yeah i'll give you an example of two examples right so if the goal is if we look at the biggest challenge with the average person when it comes to fitness the biggest challenge is consistency period end of story it's like the biggest challenge is people just they're not able to or they find it super challenging to make uh fitness and health a regular part of life and be able to maintain it

forever in other words if you could solve that you've solved everything uh so i'll give you an example what i mean you have person one who does the perfect routine and perfect diet, but doesn't love it, doesn't have a relationship with it where they just love it and want to do it forever. Person B does suboptimal application of these things. So it's not absolutely perfect, but it's not terrible. Of course, it's within the parameters of what's appropriate, but they love it. They find enjoyment. It brings life quality. They have a good relationship with it. Who's going to be more successful throughout their life, right? The person who has, the love for it, who has the good relationship with it.

And so that's really the secret to ultimate fitness. And what's so disheartening for a lot of people, and that's why I get so passionate about this, is people who are getting into fitness, they jump into the space. They're like, okay, I'm ready to do something about my health. And they get in there and they're like, this is bad, that's better, do this, more effective, do that.

And they're like, ah, which one do I do? I'm so confused. I don't know which direction. And this person says that's wrong. And this person says that's bad. And they say that bodybuilders are not functional. and bodybuilders are saying you ain't going to build any muscle

but I like to run it's my favorite thing to do or I like to dance what's wrong with dancing oh it's not it's not the most effective thing but I love it so I think it's a very important

conversation for people and I think it's incredibly important for trainers because if you're a trainer you have there's a lot of goals you have for your clients but the ultimate goal is

can I get this person to want to do this for the rest of the life the most important thing you can foster in that person is a relationship that makes that happen. The problem is quality of life

isn't enough of a motivator to get you out of that beta paradox. That's the problem with that. If you are having what you could consider a relatively good life, but you're just way out of shape, you rarely hear that client go,

you know what? I don't think better when I improve the quality of my life. I should go get healthy and take care of myself. It normally requires something that is like, faltering, a massive insecurity, something to move them out of that paradox. Otherwise,

they stay in that place. Comfort zone. Until the doctor goes, hey, you're going to die if you don't do this. Or someone close to us does. Or you get to this place where you just feel disgust in yourself. Or maybe somebody is teasing you that goes back down to a deep rooted insecurity from childhood of, oh my God, I remember when they called me chubby and someone said that. It's normally something like that that moves us in the direction. of change, but we know that that's not the place you had to stay. So it's tough to hear the advice you're giving without not first doing it the wrong way. Well, people often come to us for the wrong reasons.

Almost always. Most people do. Almost always. Yeah. And even what you said, like this is, by the fact, people will have a heart attack or their doctors like, you're going to die. Yeah, sometimes that's not even a motivator. That doesn't improve consistency oftentimes.

Yeah, you're right. If anything, they start and they'll, like, okay, I'm really motivated and then they go right back. You know, there's people who have heart attacks and their doctors, like, stop smoking and then they stop for a while and they go back. So the root is the most important thing. The relationship with fitness and health is the most important thing. If you could build that properly from the right place, the rest of it takes care of itself.

Now, I'm not saying there are- Correcting something has an end. Yes. Enjoying it and learning to love it, like that's indefinite. Yeah, absolutely. But can we do it without first banging our head or first being frustrated or first, do you think it's possible? Do you think it's possible? There's somebody listening right now who doesn't currently work out and goes, you know what?

I do want to improve my quality and goes to the gym and goes and does it. Do you think that's possible? I think it's possible, but I don't think it's possible that you're going to get on this journey and not fall down 100,000 times along the way. You're going to count for that. You're going to. Like, it's like one of those things that I almost feel like. Like nobody's ever done this right out the gates. Yeah.

It's almost like you, it's inevitable you had to fail. And it's almost inevitable you had to do it for the wrong reason to then learn that lesson, to then do it the right way. That's why we call it a fitness journey. Yeah. It's a total, it is a growth journey. But if you start, if you, if you aim in this direction and you'll fall the whole way, I still fall. And I'm a fitness professional. I've been doing it forever.

I still fall. But if you aim in this direction, every time you fall, you'll try to get back on the path and you'll stumble your way towards what I'm talking about, which is this kind of lifelong consistency. It's so unique. Is there anything else like that? Gosh. Is there anything else that requires most people to be driven by insecurities, life-changing things just to get you moving? And you normally move in the wrong direction first or maybe not the ideal direction, right? Because you're your motivator, your root cause. It's not ideal. Yeah. Maybe you're right.

Good point. Would you say? Perceiving relationships? That might be it. Imagine the guy or the girl keeps dating the wrong people. That's a good. I like that.

Yeah. I like that. And you're like, wait a minute. That's something that we... I'm after the wrong things. No, that's actually a great analogy. You normally missed the mark on that. That was a really...

That's a really good. I didn't ramp water that one. No, yeah. That's a, that's... I think that's a really good example. And I can't think of a better one than that because many people that go pursue relationships think that they're pursuing relationships think that they're pursuing it correctly or for the right reasons and something that you learn when you date a lot of people

is like oh shit this whole time or you get divorced yeah or that right i was looking for the wrong things or uh yeah that's a good that's a good one very and very few people right out the gates their first person they date they they they hit a home run yeah they they they they was motivated by the right factors they knew what they're supposed to do i mean that's that's that's pretty rare if ever um a lot of people could i know there's people out there that married their their first love that would probably make that argument um but i don't know if I would call that more luck than it was like you really knowing what you were supposed to get, right? I think having the right guidance helps a lot.

Like if you work with a good coach that understands this. Going into the right mentality. Yeah, dude. Yeah. Most people don't start with a good coach. Or yeah. So having a good guy, that would be great using Justin's analogy. I wonder if those people that have had that success of, I'm good, they probably had good examples with their parents.

Great examples of parents. They probably had strong faith with good morals, good, you know, pre-wedding. you know, counseling. Good, good, good counseling along the way too, right? Like a good dad or mom that they can lean on and be like, hey, I'm having this challenge with my wife. They're personally healthy in a mentally healthy place, you know, first going into. Interesting. Yeah, but you know, when it comes to fitness, I mean, we've been, look, guys, we've been trying to do this for 10 years. We've been trying to attract people with a message that is way less attractive than the wrong message. This is way harder to sell. I'm telling you,

hey we're going to do this forever and we're going to find a way you got to do it because you really want to care for yourself and be healthy and mrs johnson or whoever's like i want to lose 40 pounds what are you talking about i want to look jacked or i want to be ripped what are you talking about that guy over there told me i can make it happen in 90 days and all i got to do is you know work out with him and take this pill or whatever that's way easier to sell than what we're selling but what i'm trying to say right now is you will fail and i don't mean you're not going to get results you can go do the wrong stuff and get results you won't keep it the fail rate is almost 100% It's not going to happen. In fact, if you're listening to this right now, you've probably already failed many times. In fact, your idea of success is based off of your failures. In other words, how many times have you talked to somebody who says, oh, this diet I did before, men, it worked really well. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Why did it, no, it didn't because it stopped. You stopped. Right. You went back to, the weight came back on. It actually didn't work. Yeah. It totally failed. So it's really, it's about how I do.

It's like, if somebody goes into this and says, I want to find a way to enjoy this. I want to find a way to value this, and I want to feel better in my life and improve my health. And they just use that as their guide. They're far more likely to get there, far more likely to get there and develop a great relationship with this than the person that's like, I'm going to follow this routine that I read is perfect, follow this perfect diet because I'm fat and I want to get, you know, I want to look better. That person's odds of success are almost zero. It's like less than 10% long term. So the secret to all of this is that route. And if you pursue that, and trainers, this is what you got to do for your clients.

If you do this with your clients, well, first off, your business will succeed. You won't have to get clients every single, you know, two or three months because they're going to stay with you. But also, number two, they will have this ability. You'll develop this with them where they can do this for the rest of their life. And then they don't ever have to worry about it again. I mean, it's cool to watch right now because I feel like, we're getting to watch this happen real time for people in a large group setting in the Muscle Mommy movie. Oh, yes. That's what motivated me to talk about this. Yeah. Because there's so many

questions in there that are so individual and unique. Yeah. And yes, there's the right answers for them. But ultimately it's this. Yeah. It's this. Yeah. Can we foster this? Yeah. And I do, I feel like I'm watching that happen real time. It's really cool to see. I mean, the feedback that we've gotten on that community is just unbelievable. Way better than what I anticipated it was going to be. And so it's excited to see and didn't realize how how much maybe our community needed something like that. You know, I thought maybe because we felt like we were so connected with all the other things that we do. Uh, but something about that, that group is just, it's incredible to watch all these ladies moving in, even though different goals all have different challenges,

so that yet moving kind of in the same direction. I think a lot of it has to do with this part is that most of it. Yeah, it's like, because everyone's, is figuring that out. Yeah. I mean, we, we, we, we, we are trainers who run this. And we pop in there occasionally. It's usually, we have our trainers that run this. They know what to do. They know the right answers. They know how to apply nutrition.

They know how to play exercise like you should if you're a good trainer. But this is the coaching part. And the goal is, can we get these women? I don't know how many people we have in there now, but can we keep these women on this path now so that they don't ever want to stop again. This becomes what they do forever. And it's an ongoing thing. By the way, I'll mention the link for anybody wants to join.

It's Musclemommiemovement.com. And it's going to be ongoing. It's ongoing, you know, group coaching. So, you know, a good example of what I'm talking about because dysfunction with health can look, well, see, there's the obvious where it's like obesity, chronic disease or whatever. But then there's a less obvious because you look at the person, you go, whoa, that person looks fit and healthy. But when you dig deeper, you see there's tremendous dysfunction. And I'm going to use a very famous guy as an example of this. I just read an article about David Goggins.

So David Goggins, there's a reason. By the way, I don't know the guy. I'm sure he's a good guy. I'm sure we'd like him. We probably would like him. But we've never had him on the show because he is and communicates the example of dysfunction on the opposite end of the spectrum. So the way he talks about health and fitness is not healthy. It's a dysfunctional way of promoting health and fitness.

And I'll give you an example. So there was this, this is just an example of how you can hate yourself through fitness as well. So I read this article about how he implemented this new routine because all of his organs were shutting down. I'm going to read you what the article said, and you guys can hear it for yourself. So after running over 150 miles a week, competing in countless ultramarathons and breaking world records in pull-ups, which is over $4,000 in 17 hours, his body reached a breaking point. My organs were shutting down. I couldn't sleep. I couldn't even get out of bed.

A specialist told him, you're the tightest person I've ever seen. you've got 50,000 hours of stress trapped in your body. So from that moment on, here's what David Goggins did. He started doing a two-hour stretching routine before bed every night. He added more stuff to his body, which is wild. Yeah. That that's the answer. Yeah.

It's not the answer. No. That's the answer. He thought that was the answer. Yeah, yeah. It's to do a two-hour before bed stretching routine. Yeah. Just to continue to.

It makes sense with his thought process about how. to approach things though you know like that would be you know well stretching is going to help to kind of unwind and help me gain a little bit of resolve with the stress and like get it out but definitely not i mean even the the the level of intensity of application on that's hilarious like two hours a night like i got a plan now i'm going to do two hours of doing this every day yeah i mean this is also the same guy who used to take all the um hate comments and negative stuff they say and puts it in his headphones as he fucking

works out and runs. Like he is he he leveraged that. It's an incredible motivator though. I tell you what. And I think that's why I think that's why he's loved so much is if you've ever tried to flip hate or insecurity on its head and use it as a motivator, it will propel a lot of people forward or in the right direction.

Problem is it's going back to your point with the root cause. It's the wrong, it's the wrong reason to go. The irony is this. And do that and you eventually will break. The irony is this. He'll talk about obese people or people who aren't in shape. And he'll tell them, you're hating your body and not realize he's hating himself with the way he's doing it. So, yes, it's true.

And you might not be trying to do this. But if you're, you know, really obese and you're not active and you're not eating healthy, you are actively through your actions hating your body. But you are also hating your body if you do what he does, which is you go so crazy that you reach breaking points where your organs want to shut down. Is that a recent article? It was a recent article.

I don't know how recent that those events were. Okay. But the article I found was. I've been meaning to check back in. I saw, I mean, I think I brought up on the show a week or two ago when all the events happened with his daughter online. That's caused a lot. Yeah, that made me sad.

Yeah, yeah. It's unfortunate. Yeah. But I hadn't followed up. up to see what the latest news on that is. Anyway, I got to tell you guys, funny. So I just got on the phone this morning. So my parents are in Sicily right now.

So they've been there now for a few weeks. They'll be there for a few more weeks. And this is what both of my parents are from. And my dad, you know, he came here when he was 18 or 19. So they're over there with his family. And they're sending videos and pictures. And it's really cool. It's good to see my dad with his brothers and all that stuff.

And the culture over there. So just so intense. It's so loud and chaotic. It's so great. They'll send me videos of like, it's a dinner and well first off the kitchen is not big because they don't have like

our family doesn't have a lot of money or whatever so it's a small so it's like the entire kitchen is taken up by a long table and they're just all around each other and it's just bright and loud and blah I remember the like the energy that you would feel over there especially if you're driving cars honking

it's just a lot of stuff but anyway I was talking to my dad and my dad's like oh I said oh how's it been over there he's oh pretty good He goes, I went to judo the other day. I'm like, oh, great. So my dad went back to, so his old judo school, he went to go visit. So my dad now is in his 60s, and he's got, you know, arthritis, yeah, from, you know, hard labor since he was nine.

So he's got his back hurt, all stuff. But, of course, he goes to judo. Yeah. And his instructor, you know, gave him a ghee. So he was like, hey, you should train. Yeah. You should train with some of those. So my dad was training with their, the teen and 20-year-old competitors.

Yeah. Of course. So he's going over there, right? And so his, the main instructor there was a guy that came up with my dad. So he knows that my dad has this, like, inhuman strength. And he still does, even though he's all, you know, half broken or whatever. So I guess my mom's on the story. So I guess he tells these kids who are in their 20s.

He says, hey, let, let Dominic, Domenico, grab your ghee and then try and use your gear, your grip breaking techniques. Because in judo, if someone gets a good grip on you, you got to break the grip, otherwise they're going to potentially throw you. So my dad did it, and nobody could get it. Nobody can break his grip, dude.

And these kids are like, what's wrong with you? I can't break. And then the instructor is laughing. He goes, okay, now let him pin you and then see if you can get him off. And he got on top of him, held him. And they're like, nobody was moving.

They're like, how much do you wait? What is going on here? Oh, my God. So my dad's telling his story. I was like, that's his ego. I was going to say, what an excellent day for him, though. Yeah, that's got a thing.

But today, He's, like, hurting? Oh, yeah. He's like, oh, yeah. I want to talk about that? Worth it. Worth it. Oh, yeah.

Totally worth it. He's just so crats me out, dude. Oh, my God. I remember once in jujitsu, he did that, too. Show them youngans. He was in his 50s when he came to jujitsu with me, and I remember there was this high-level competitor who kept trying to break my dad's grip. And, I mean, at one point, he put his foot on my dad's hand and just tore his ghee because his hand wouldn't break the grave.

It's so crazy. You know, speaking of your dad, you brought up a thing one time when you talked about, What reading level? When did he stop school? He only made it to how far? He was nine. So nine, he stopped going to school. I don't know what grade are you at nine?

Fourth grade, third grade. Fourth grade or fourth grade? You want to know a stat that I saw today? What? I was fascinated. Do you know what percentage of Americans have lower than a sixth grade reading level? Oh, that's terrible. I'm afraid it's too high.

I know. I was going to say it's probably hard. I'm going to say 40%. I don't know. That's high. If it's 40%. I know, it's really high, right? It's like 20.

Almost 60%. Oh my gosh. Can you believe that? How do they judge reading level? So what would be considered... We all take tests throughout school and you... Well, I know that, but I mean, what would be considered above sixth grade? Like, what book would be above sixth grade reading level?

I'd like to see what that is. Oh, you could probably Google that and see what books are considered sixth grade reading level. I mean, nonetheless, isn't that alarming? Yeah. More than half the country is less than a sixth grade limit. I had to fact checked it because I didn't believe it. It was actually, he said it was 60%. It was like, when I looked it up, it was 56% that and 20% not even like a second grade.

Like crazy amount. 20%? Yes. Yes. It was wild. Currently. Yes. Right now, yes.

Has it been this bad? Yeah, it was a conversation. It was Ray Dalio and somebody else they were talking. Harry Potter is sixth grade. Okay. So that's about as high as it goes for 60% of people. Wow. You believe that?

I was a hard book to understand when I read it. I couldn't understand it. Did you guys get it? No, we didn't understand it? We never read. Haza! But isn't that fascinating? I mean, that's crazy.

That's crazy. That's crazy. Well, the thing that more than half of those people are influencing how and what we do in this country is a little scary. You know, it's wild to me. I see stats like this all the time, how terribly dumb Americans are. It's like these typical, you know, they, oh, our math level, our reading level. And yet, our entrepreneurs. entrepreneurial production still outperforms everybody.

Destroes everybody. Which I think points to other things. I'm not saying that it's good. You want to know what one that made the number one factors for that is? What? Is the amount of money we have people betting on people. So no other country in the world has as many people that are betting on other people. And that is a huge factor.

So explain that. What do you mean? So in other words, like let's say Australia or another car. And here. equal smart people, or let's say there's the equal, like an Elon Musk here and an Elon Musk there type of person, he is far more likely to get somebody to back him financially and bet on him than in Australia. Sure. And so just purely off of, and that makes, I mean, think about how many failed companies are and how many times you do,

we know, angel investing that doesn't go the way you want to go. Most of them fail. And we can afford, the U.S. can afford to keep doing. doing that until you finally hit that hit that one oh that's interesting yeah and so that's one of the major factors i think that's part of it i think the entrepreneurial spirit uh also uh has been with us for a long time because so many people came to this country still do with this idea that i can i can make this happen i can do this thing i can start a melting pot of ideas and so people come so there's a culture of that well yeah no because i've heard people like i have friends that are

European, Italy. I have some friends in other countries, UK, whatever. And they say that the culture is more like, oh, come on, why are you trying to stand out? Or, you know, just go do this other thing. Whereas over here, it's like encourage to go. Yeah, just blend in, like, yeah, in some of those other countries. Yeah. So that makes a big difference. Well, yeah, it's going to attract even those people. I mean, there's people that fly across the world to go directly to Silicon Valley. Yeah. And then them and eight other dudes live in a house together all why that, like, that doesn't exist really. I mean,

there's probably places that have tried to try to create something similar to that. I think it's a culture. But it is, we are known for that so much that people will literally

leave and move in with an incubator and go live with eight, 10 other dudes that are all on computers just trying their ideas. And then you have a ton of people that are going, I think that kid,

I like this kid. Let's bet on him. And literally being wrong, 90% of the time, betting on these people, but because we have that amount of times that we're betting on those people is so much greater

than anywhere else in the country, it allows for more of those success rates, which only just perpetuates what you're saying causes more of the culture of more people coming. Yeah, it keeps feeding. Yeah, it feeds into itself. I have family members on one part of my family that are really educated.

They live in northern Italy. And when you talk to them about their career choices, you know, they'll go to school, get this education. And then I'll ask them, and there's two reasons for this, right? So I'll say, if you thought about opening up your own office, why would I do that? I get this guarantee if I get this job over here and they give me a little stuff over here. Why would I take a risk like what you said?

The other reason is in many countries, there's a lot of barriers. So it's like difficult to do that. Like you have to get all these licenses and permits and here it's a lot easier. But I think the culture plays a big role because the truth is being an entrepreneur is a lot of it is. There's a lot of sayings around it, right? Like an entrepreneur is willing, is the only person willing to, work 80 hours to avoid working 40 hours. Or it's an entrepreneur, someone who jumps out of a plane and makes a parachute on the

way down. Like, it's, if you just base, you know, off a logic, it's probably more logical to go get a stable job. Well, imagine, too, how much easier it is to, to be that person or take that chance when you move to an area or a house. Yeah, well, that's where everybody's doing it. So it's not, it's not, we're in a room that, you know, this size and we're looking around and there's 20 of us.

And it's like, okay, literally 20% in here. Only two of us might make it. Yeah, I'm all in. I'm doing it. And it's like you would probably never do that unless you had a surrounding like that. You were all by yourself and someone told you the odds of you. Well, that's the workaround too to the regulations because like work hours and all that. You know, they're just all living together constantly working and they're all dedicated to this one idea.

So, yeah, to be able to foster that, you don't find that around the world very often. You know what that points to you. I don't care what your pursuit is. but surround yourself with people who have a similar pursuit and you're far more likely to be successful with that pursuit. Just to confer another stat that I saw too. So Australia leads, or excuse me, UK leads this. Yeah, UK leads this.

16,500 millionaires a year leave there. Oh, yeah. So, and I'm sure they land in places like the U.S. for the reason that you're talking about. We've created that culture of you can become a billionaire and there's a more opportunity. We have a lot of the examples, right? So it started out with the energy side where it's like, okay, we have all, you know,

this oil and ways to, you know, these gajillionaires from that now, you know, technology. And so you have like multiple examples of that. We have a disproportion of people that are trying to make it and that are willing to bet on people that are trying to make it in our country, which allows that to look that way. What is the exact number, 16,500 individuals departing in 2025. Pretty good. Forecast, yeah. You saw that same stat. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. That's the stat. And they're the highest, I believe, right? They're the worst. So I think, I don't know what.

If you, I'll make it, I'll create an analogy that makes more sense, just so people kind of get this. If you run a business, if you have a company, I don't care what the company is, you have this company, and your most talented employees keep leaving, you're doing something wrong. Totally. Like, what are you doing wrong? Yeah. That your best people continue to leave. Now, I'm not saying that millionaires are the best people overall, but I mean in terms of production,

in terms of economic production, they're the best producers. Imagine how hard it is to solve that problem when someone like America is so far ahead of you in that. So back to my point that you've got, you know, so let's say the, just for argument's sake for this, UK has 10 billionaires that are willing, willing to bet on these young entrepreneurs, the U.S. has 1,000 billionaires that are a way to do

it. You live in the UK. You're trying to build this business. Do I stay here and hope I get one of the 10 guys to give me money? Or do I fly over there? So regardless of what policy regulation, all the things are to the point you're making right now, I'm still going to go over there because my odds are greater. It could be, but I wonder what they're tax. I wonder what it costs. Like, Doug, look up how much does the average millionaire in the UK pay in taxes versus the average millionaire in the U.S. These are people that are bleeding right here. I want to see this stat, actually.

Wow, UK is losing a lot. China's gaining, it looks like. Is that what that is? China's at 13 minus 13th. Oh, why do I see two graphs? That's 2023 and 2025. Oh, okay. Okay, I see that.

Wow. Look at that. All these countries lose people. France gains some in 20203, but then lost some. I mean, but what does that highlight? I wonder what policy they changed. And then I'm assuming America's in the plus, right? It's got to be.

It's not all that. We can't see it. I think it dump scrolls down. We can see it. Let me see. Yeah, I'm doing a double search here. I don't see the U.S. It's not on the West.

We're plot. We're positive. The rest of these are all the negative ones. But, God, look how bad U.K. is. So here's what I want to know. In 2023, they lost $3,200. In 2025, they're projected at least $16,500. Policy change.

Something happened. That was a policy change. Oh, you know, 100% that has to be. That's a crazy science. It's got to be that they... Because look at nobody, nowhere else has gotten worse by that. much, right? China got better, which all China has to do is say you can't leave.

Yeah, China got better. Everywhere got better. Anywhere get worse, except for U.K. South Korea. Got a little worse. Oh, South Korea. Numbers are small, but got a little worse. Boy, what, I mean, you're right.

UK had to have done something. They must have done some crazy tax. In 2020, I've been 24, something must have came rolled out. What does it say? There's been a lot going on over there. So, anyway, I'm looking at taxes here in the UK. it seems that the rate is about 45% for those earning over a million pounds. So the average over a million pounds is going to pay almost half of their income in tax.

Yeah, the U.S. is a little more complicated because there's various tax rates. Obviously, our top rate, I believe, is like 38%. Yeah, but we have a lot of tax breaks and incentives. Yeah, so it really depends on how your income is generated. So, for example, capital gains. Why did so many millionaires leave the UK? Exactly. Just Google that because that's just, there's got to be some theories around that to have that alarming. I mean, nowhere else in the world is like that. Here's what's crazy about the mentality, too, is you have the average person's not a millionaire, right?

Average person's like, you should give us more of your stuff. You should. But what you're doing is you're getting rid of the people that are innovating, the people that are moving. The best innovators and the people that are creating wealth and they're going other places. So it doesn't necessarily work out in your favor. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's like, again, it's like having... It's like playing for, like, the Yankees, and just because you're not the highest paid guy and all that, you're complaining, you're wanting the management to actually lower paying everybody evenly.

New tax policies, including the what, scrapping of non... What does I say, Doug? Domiciled tax status, which I have no idea what that means. And then there's anticipated future tax hikes. Oh, so a new political party comes in. It was like, oops, we got to bounce. I mean, that's crazy, though.

That's like a crazy accident. Mass exodus. I mean, compared to anywhere else in the world. I mean, that's why. that's wild that is wild here's another thing too the u.s actually taxes people on their worldwide income um so if you're in a different country the u.s. will still find you and tax you mean if you're a u.s. citizen if you're a u.s. citizen yeah not all countries are that way though so you can actually leave some countries and not have to pay tax yeah but if that's if you keep your

money if you bring your money back over here if you keep it there you don't uh well no in the u.s you're still responsible for tax even if you keep it over there yeah yeah yeah that's why everyone becomes a citizen over somewhere else. Oh, that's why everyone goes and goes to Dubai and now they live in Dubai and that's there become a citizen over there and then they pay to buy type taxes. Speaking of companies and entrepreneurship and all that stuff, element continues to explode. Yes.

And now they have a bunch of new flavors. I'm digging the new pineapple flavor. I haven't tried it because you drink all. It's good. It does, I'm not going to lie, though, does make me want to use some alcohol in it. I want to see what. Oh, gosh. Have you tried it yet, Justin?

I have. Okay. It's tasty. It's tasty. I, I see what you're saying. I see what you're saying. with that. They have smaller cans now, too.

So you can get the smaller, you know, kind of Red Bull-sized cans. Yeah. And then they have pineapple. Which is what? Is it half the dose? Is that what it is? Yeah.

So it's at a thousand, it's 500. Yeah. It's a smaller amount. Yeah. But you said the pineapple is really good. Really good. There's another fly. I didn't try, didn't you try lemonade?

Is it lemonade? Yeah. How was lemonade? It's really good. Yeah. I wonder why they'd have lemonade before. That makes sense. It's really actually one of my favorites.

That would make a lot of sense. Yeah. Well, I bet you when they, I'm sure, especially a company like them, I'm sure they did their due diligence and surveyed and probably launched my favorite. My favorite's still grapefruit, but I haven't tried pineapple yet. Grapefruit's one of my favorites. Yeah, yeah. I like that. It used to be black cherry. And I like, you know what? Black cherry was was for a minute and I got tired of it. Yeah. Yeah, I think the same thing happened to me. Yeah, but I've definitely done way more grapefruit.

I have not got tired of grapefruit. I have not got tired of wine. This is so refreshing. Yeah. Those two, yeah, they have, and black cherry, maybe that's what it is. My cherry had more of a sweeter taste to it. And so after a while, it wasn't as refreshing. Nothing is as refreshing as the grapefruit and the lime to me. All right. So I'm going to do a new vernacular or change. Or I'm going to change what I call my favorite undershirt, which has been historically

called a wife beater. Yeah, what are you going to call it? I call it something different now. I was always resistant before because I hate that. I hate changing words, especially ones I grew up with in the 90s, just because it's offensive. Are you going for a rebrand right? What are you doing?

So here's a deal. Cracker barrel. Don't pull a crackerbell. No. Crackerberry and Jemima. Come on, guy. Here's a deal. Washington Redskins.

Yeah, yeah. Cleveland Indians. Who are you now, dude? Come on, guys. Let's hear it. Let's hear it. Here's what's going on. So I get why some people don't like it.

I like the Caucasians. I don't think it's a good thing to beat people or anything like that. So it's just what it was called when I was a kid. So let's hear it. But I finally heard a replacement that I like. That's why, because all the replacements. McGettstein catch it. Come on.

bro. Stop the racist. It's a rib tank. I mean, see, that sucks. Rib tank. Yeah, I know. But that's... Undershirt, dumb, dumb. Not going to do that. Okay.

Somebody said in the comments of one of my videos in my series are like, why don't you call it a wife pleaser? I'm like, I like that, dude. Leaser. I'm going to call it a wife pleaser from now on. Don't squint your eyes, Doug. It's a great...

It makes it very uncomfortable. Yeah, yeah. Well, you're going to be uncomfortable either way. I'd rather be a wife pleaser. So I'm going to start referring. to my wife pleaser, which I think is also uncomfortable, but I don't mind the discomfort. Yeah, I don't know if I like the rebrand. Yeah, why?

I don't know if I can get behind it. It's honest, for me at least. I know when I'm walking around on it, my wife's pleased. Your thunder tank. Yeah. I like that, too. I like thunder tank. I can give behind that.

Speaking of pleasing people, I'm going to put you on the spot, Doug, because I'm going to bring up an old story. Yeah, he is. I'm going to bring up an old story about your birthday. Remember your birthday when your date? we were all saying nice things about you remember this and i talked about he's quite he's quite the giver no that's not what she said oh what she said something like i remember exactly we were all going around saying nice nice things about doug because doug's a great he's a great

human being great man and uh like really it was great doug was his eyes were watering all of us were emotional uh talking about doug how much we love him and then you know his date stands up it's her turn and she goes yeah doug is such a great lover such a great lover she did say great lover She said he's a great lover. That could have been an ad for Joy Mode right there. You know what I'm saying? That's where I'm going. Doug,

how do you like Joey mode? Do you use it in that way or do you use it pre-workout like I do? Is that the secret sauce or accessory? I've used it a couple times. I mean, it's good. It's great as a pre-workout. I think Justin and I use it more like that. I do use it.

I've actually given it to my brother-in-law. I do use it. I like the energy gives me. Which is awkward to... I use it for what it's supposed to be used for. Oh, is a pre-love? Yes. Yes.

You still do that? I do. I'm not like all the time, but when there's, when there's, like, times when there's, like, times when there's, like, I know it's going to go down that night and I'm, like, waiting for her to get ready up there. And I'm like, do I'm like, yeah, no, I'm down in the kitchen. I'm not on a hot day. I'm down in the kitchen anyways. I know that where the joy mode's at inside my, in my, how much of a difference can you tell? I had to put a, like, a percentage or number on it.

Yeah, like, let's say normally, like inches on it. No, not like that. Come on. Let's say normally. Let's say normally, you throw a wet washcloth on it, hang it off there. She's getting like a bath towel. Like, what's going on there? It's like a beach town.

All right, boy. A little sound difference. Like, no, no. Okay. So, I'm like, yes. Okay, I've, I've messed around with all the, the stuff, the prescription stuff, right? So the Seattle is to Viagra. It's not, it's not quite on that crazy level.

Anybody who's ever experienced that before, that's like, that's like almost uncomfortably. Sure, sure. Weird. Somewhere in the middle of that. Oh, good. Right? From where you normally would be to where that is, it's like, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, It's like leaving the gym with a nice pump.

So I like, I do, I do pre-workout. I'll, I'll give you a little, probably more detail than you probably even want, but I'm going to love this. But not your bicep. When I'm, when I'm on like day three or four in a row, that's when I like to use it. Oh, yeah. Because, I mean, everybody knows. If I've had a day or two. The Jazz tinks a little.

Yeah. If I've had a day, day off or two with my wife, I'm, dude. Yeah, she just, you know what I'm saying? Like, I don't know if it gets better than that. You know what I'm saying? But when it's day three, four in a row, Like, I'm, I mean, we've had, I'm tired. I'm not, I'm not as.

You're reaching for the electrolytes and the Joy Mode. Then it brings me back to what it was like on day one. So that's probably the best way for me to describe it. That's a great. Anybody that can relate to having four or five days in a row, what you feel like versus day one, it brings me back to day one on day five. There you go, Joy Mode. There's a, that's an ad right there.

That's what you look like. Good stuff, dude. Yeah, yeah. Good stuff. Doug loves it. All right. Anyway, I found this new category. Well, I haven't found it.

My son found it. My four-year-old. He's about term five, actually, a couple of months. But anyway, he loves learning about anything, which, by the way, this kid loves coming up to us. He couldn't be more my son sometimes. He loves walking up to my wife and I or anybody and just throwing out facts. Like, just random facts.

And he goes off. And it's just hilarious. And he won't stop. Like, my wife's trying to get him to go to sleep. And he, like, start to doze off. And he looks there. Hey, Mom, did you know? that during the Cretaceous period

like he'll go off on some weird things Does he have his own like Almanac series you bought him? We have books He likes watching documentaries And he doesn't forget Like if he's really into something Or encyclopedia I should say

He doesn't forget So he loves this kind of stuff But we we were reading these books I told you about those books Did you get those for Max? Not yet they haven't got to me Oh they're so good It's the versus books

Like you know polar bear versus grizzly Or whatever like I should have had that best Bro they're so fun That's the interesting stuff I'm with them on that It's so fun right? So we were reading them and my son's like, do they have videos of this in like real

life? So I'm like, oh. So we go on YouTube and I find hunting videos because that's as close as I can get, right? Because you're not going to find a polar bear versus a lion video. Although that'd be cool. Yeah, it would be cool. Whoever's getting or whoever's organizing that's getting in trouble for sure. Yeah, a big trouble, bro. Like we don't have videos of, you know, what they did in the Roman Empire. But anyway, you know, I'm finding videos of like polar bears hunting or polar bears hunting like a walrus or whatever. He loves those videos. He loves, like, predators hunting, you know, prey.

And he gets so mad when the predator fails. So if I find the wrong video, like the polar bear's getting the walrus, but then he escapes. Ah, I wanted the polar bear to catch him. Find another one. Find me one where it's a successful hunt. So I have to type in there. Polar Bear's successful. Oh, my God.

Brutal. He loves it, too. Oh, my gosh. It's so cool to watch them. It's so cool to watch the kids. get, I mean, obviously, this is my first go-around, but to watch him get into things. Like, I mean, Max has been obsessed with storms now for a year now. That is fun.

Yeah, he just is, I mean, there's so many names of storms. I didn't even know that it, like, existed until him. Like, he's so into it. Like, he would call something. I'm like, there's a, there's a fire tornado? Never even heard of a fire tornado before. Yeah. Yeah.

There's, there's all these, these crazy storms. And he's even getting, what we're working on right now is learning what states have, have those. So I'm trying to incorporate a little bit of geography in there So he kind of starts to learn the difference of the states while he's doing it So it's a little bit of a reach for him right now But he's getting to the point When you remember when you realize Well, maybe not you because you moved a little bit

But do you remember when you realize that our storms here are weak sauce Some of the storms you see in other places? Yeah, once I moved to Illinois and they actually had tornadoes I was like, oh no, and lightning storms We just don't really have lightning storms here either Yeah, we have earthquakes though Yeah, we do I remember going to Florida to Disney World

you know, when my older kids were real little and I remember looking up at the sky because everybody started going to the, what's that cafe, animal cafe, so far? What's that one cafe they have that? Rainforest Cafe. Suddenly everybody was going in that direction so I'm like, what's going on?

And they're like, oh, storm's coming. And I look up at the sky and there's a wall of super dark, thick clouds. I've never seen that here in California. And it's moving towards us. And I'm like, is the world in me? What's happening? And it just, and then it passed over.

Well, I remember I'm growing up. in California and then when I was what seventh grade is when we went to Colorado and we lived in Divide Colorado which is like 10,000 elevation and Pikes Peak is in your backyard and the lightning storms I mean I watched them strike

in on the ground in my neighborhood like Lily standing in my garage and everybody's house every house has a lightning rod like every house because it's that common that it's connecting to the ground that you just you have to have a lightning rod on top of your house and I remember

standing in the garage and just watching it and we're used to you hear it first then see it right no no you see it first right and then it's like a delay of like seconds yeah the second yeah the count the seconds yeah where would you see it it's the same time which is is wild because I up into that point I never experienced now I talked about this yet but like the survivors of like a lightning a long time ago you brought that out a long time ago you talked I forgot what you talked about but I know you've you've talked about it before. Just how it looks like the burns after, like, because it goes through it. Yeah, it looks

electricity went through them. Yeah. Like little branches off of it, almost like the Fibonacci kind of weird. Yeah. You know there's some people that have been struck more than once. There's some people have been struck many times. I know there's a couple people that have been struck. What is the, that's crazy.

Yeah, what are you doing that you're getting struck by length? I know. Oh yeah, look at that. Wow. Yeah, see. That looks crazy, Justin. Yeah, because it's almost like you could see the electricity went through their veins. Yes, exactly. I I know. I thought that was so tripping. Like, what a, that's way better than a tattoo. You know, it's way better. You know, you got so many bragging rights with that. That's so tough. Yeah, that's the toughest thing you get. Where'd you get that artwork? Yeah.

I, I actually, Adam, I don't know if you would be okay sharing this, but you shared a story with me yesterday that got me so emotional. You were brought up your son. Oh, my son. And it really highlights. Oh, God. Don't make me cry. What a special kid. Oh, God. Yeah, that's, that's hard to not tell that and not get emotional because of him. Well, first of all, he has. He has. He has. he's special and every fucking dad says his kid's special I know that right yeah but this story

really is yeah he but he's we've always have talked about how he has this weird gift that when we're in the room with the family and we could

I mean you know Katrina's family is huge everyone's heard me talk about all that stuff where there's 20 40 50 people there and as adults you know you know

your family drama and you know your aunt or your cousin who's going through a divorce or had something lost their job or as the adults, you know that. My son doesn't know any of that stuff

because he's not around to hear to that. And it's a trip that I'll know that, like say about a sister-in-law or somebody. And here we are. Show up my son and us and Katrina and I to a party of 20, 30 people. And at one point, he will gravitate over to that person and just love on him. And it's a trip because that it could be someone in the family, he doesn't even know or hasn't even really been around. He just has that gift of empathy. Just so crazy just any, and he loves all. And I don't think they even know that about him, right?

He just, we, Katrina and I know, we talk about all the time. Anyways, it's kind of a known thing between Katrina and I. We don't really talk about it very much or share all the stories like that. It's like one of those things I think as two parents just like, you know, we get, I feel like we get the gift to see it and everybody else can just either believe it or not believe it. Well, I'm talking to my sister who has been really just ill going through it. She's got a lot of stuff going on. She watched him this last weekend.

And we were actually just on the phone. We were talking about something else. And I was, again, talking about, oh, man, it's crazy. Max did this thing. And I'm sharing, like, this intuition that he has. She's like, oh, my God, brother, I forgot to tell you. She was the last night, he spent the night with me. She goes, I had a really rough night.

She goes, three different times. I was woken up from my sleep. And my mind started racing. I got all kinds of anxiety. Just got emotional. and just this heavy stress on me. She goes, every time that happened, she goes, literally, she was, I was just closing my eyes

and trying to calm down. And a couple times I was in tears. And she goes, Max, dead in his sleep, would roll over and put his arm across my chest. And she goes, and then I, she goes, I broke down crying and looked up and thank God for that. And she goes, what was wild about it was not that it happened, but that it happened three separate times through the night.

And each time it was just felt it. Yeah. And so it's like he's crazy. Crazy stories like that. I have so many stories like that of him. What a blessing. And I know that one of the most attractive qualities about Katrina is Katrina has a gift like that. She has this ability. It's why so many people love her. She's so empathetic. I mean, I take so much. I try and learn so much from her to be that, be more of that. And to see it in my son as a child is just, it's a trip to watch. Yeah. A trip to watch happen. Love it. Luminose by Intera has skin care products backed with incredible peptide science. The highest doses of the peptides that work like GHKCU that you'll find anywhere. So they have skincare products. They also have products you can put on your scalp that have been shown to help regrow hair.

This is medical grade stuff. It really does work. If you want the science, go with Luminose by Entera. Go to Entera skincare.com. That's E-N-T-E-R-A skin care. dot com forward slash mpm use the code mpm get 10% off your order back to the show our first caller is josh from virginia how's going josh what's up man hey how are y'all doing good how can we help you um yes so uh this is my first time trying a nine day push pull

legs rotation where i do hypertrophy uh ppl strength ppl then a volume ppl so each nine day block has all three phases built in. In the past, I've always done the more traditional style of the four week blocks. So four weeks hypertrophy, four weeks strength, four weeks volume. I train six days a week with one active recovery day. I'm not doing nine days straight. So my question is what I see better results sticking with this new approach where all three phases repeat every nine days for 12 weeks or is it more effective to dedicate the four weeks to each phase across the 12 week program. That's impossible. My goal is to maximize performance and muscle breaks. I don't know. Yeah, that's impossible to answer, bro. Yeah, this is a, this is a, they're both, either one is

fine. This is a hair splitting, hair splitting question. How long, how long you be consistent? Maybe we could, we could give you something that we think will give you some, some, some noticeable differences. Yeah. So I've been consistently strength training now for about three years. I've lost 60 pounds within the last two, I believe it was. So like I'm seeing plenty of results. So I just try it like trying different techniques and different strategies. And I was just curious if it really made a difference. Well, you're the difference in this is only, you're going from a four week block to a three week block, but everything else is pretty much the same. It sounds like. You know, The only way to know, Josh, with someone like you, because you're in a good place right now,

you're really consistent, you've been seeing great results, and you can play with all these little tweaks and see how your body feels and how you respond. Now, that's given, or that's assuming diet and sleep and everything else is on point, because if those aren't on point, we always go there first. Yeah. And that's also assuming, if you've been really consistent, like you don't miss a workout, and you've been lifting. six days a week for a while. Oftentimes it gives you the best gains

is the back down to like three days a week. Or switch, like this is very similar to what you're used to doing. And so if you create a new stimulus Yeah, do something completely different. Get out of the push, pull legs. Go to a full body. You're going to get more from,

this isn't that novel to what you're used to doing. So if you're looking for which one is going to be better, well, man, we're definitely splitting hairs on how similar these two training programs and blocks are. So if you wanted to get a stimulus that is going to give you more gains than what you're currently doing, I would tell you to go way further away than what you're doing, like something totally different.

And that's more likely to give you more of a stimulus, more results. How do you measure if you're progressing or not? Because you're saying you're getting good progress and gains. What are you looking at? Yeah. So right now, I'm getting back onto a lean bulk right now. so I'm starting to see strength gains again. Before it was just leaning down.

So just how I felt, how my clothes were fitting, how my weekly pictures were looking. But now, like I said, I'm trying to just gain back the muscle mass. So just seeing strength over weeks. You're in a really good place because this is when you can try different things and start to figure out what works best for your body. The one thing I would say that I would ask you to consider is, are you training in different planes of motion? Are you avoiding developing imbalances? Because at this stage, when you're this consistent, you're seeing good progress and your training is getting advanced in the sense that you're starting to tweak things like phasing and stuff like that.

You want to make sure you avoid overuse injuries and, you know, starting to develop, you know, pain because that could really be a roadblock to someone like you. But, I mean, have you tried a full-body three-day-a-week routine within the last three years? No, not full-body, no, sir. You'd be surprised. Yeah. You'd be surprised at how, especially on a bulk at the strength gains and size gains you would see. Well, and it's just far more novel from what you're currently doing. You're not really moving that far away from what you were already doing.

So if you're looking for a novel stimulus. Yeah, that would probably move things in the right direction. How much total volume, give me an idea how much total volume you're doing per body part for a week? So actually the program I'm doing right now is the map split program. So that's a lot of volume. Yeah. Yes, sir. That's a lot of volume.

I think if you did a full body, Monday, Wednesday, Friday, you did a combined, like a total amount of volume per body part around between 14 to 18 sets. So in other words, you would divide that up over the three days. you know, do the compound lifts, you know, a couple isolation movements. So you'd probably see better gains doing something like that because it's so different. So is this how this was, were you following like a different program and then you purchased a maps program that's kind of like with the style that you were already doing or you liked? Is that how this went down? So I've actually had a few programs from y'all. I started, I know this is kind of backwards, but I actually started with the aesthetics program.

Yeah. And then I also have. the anabolic. I think that I got that one in like some package, especially y'all had a while back. But the split one is the one that I've enjoyed the most. Yeah. I mean,

I like lifting like that too. You would really benefit, though, from like performance or if you have, have you done anabolic yet since you've bought it? I have, but I have not done anabolic in a while. Yeah, and you do the three-day-a-week version of that would be good.

Anabolic advance would be another program that you could do, that you could try. Yeah, but, you know, when you're starting to, here's the thing, like, it's, it's hard to know what's going to move the needle the most with someone like you at this point. Generally, it's a, it's the bigger the difference, the bigger potential for the needle to move, okay? But that being said, you're at this great place where have fun with your training and pay attention to how your body responds and then kind of see. And now, here's the rule. A lot of things work. Yeah.

Nothing works forever. Yeah. So that's the thing to consider. You know, you're at year three. Like, this is like when things start to get more challenging to really start to see things moving in the direction you want. So pay attention to like what, how your body responds. Okay. I see now when I do this kind of rep range, I seem to do best with it, but I got to move out of it right around here.

These exercises seem to do best for me. full body produces this feel splits produce this feel mobility man if I don't do mobility every three months like I start to hurt in these areas and so this is where you start to figure things out for yourself and really start to individualize you know what your routine looks like so but you know what you're asking here I mean it could move the needle but I don't know maybe yeah one thing I've noticed with it I and it could just be a mental thing I do feel a little bit fresher doing it the way where I, you know, rotate between the hypertrophy volume and strength every three days. But like I said, that could just be a mental thing. I've only been doing it

this way for about four weeks now. So. Yeah, I mean, split's got so much volume that the thing you want to consider managing the most is recovery. Yeah. Because it's such a high volume program. So if you feel like you're recovering better, then that's probably the right direction. And if you're getting stronger still. So, I mean, if it's, if it's not broken, you know, I wouldn't change anything. But if you want something more novel, which would in turn probably produce more results, then moving away from something that's, like, when I go from program to program, I typically like to go from a program that's not like that program versus doing something

that's similar to that program, just because I'm going to get more stimulus. But you still are early enough in your journey to Sal's point that you could just keep focusing on getting really, strong and if you like that split and it works well for you and as long as you're continuing see results we necessarily don't have to change it yet the most valuable programs for you that are going to give you the widest breadth of experience and knowledge around muscle building if that's the main goal that you have you have split map split which is you're already doing that maps anabolic which is more of a traditional full body style workout symmetry which will help with, you know, imbalances.

You want to throw a performance in once a year. Otherwise, you're going to start hurting yourself. Maps aesthetic. Aesthetic is a different style of bodybuilding style training. And then MAPS and Aabolic Advanced, where you're going to experiment with low volume, high intensity, you know, Arthur Jones style strength training. All of them are going to really teach you something about how your body responds.

All of them are different and will give you that value. And then as you continue going on, you'll really be able to develop kind of this intuitive. feel on what really works for your body as you start to push the envelope. Awesome. Yeah. Once a year, kind of like generic advice we get, because it sounds like the building muscle sculpting your physique is kind of the main focus.

Just once a year, make sure you rotate through either symmetry or performance. As long as you do one of those programs every year one time, that'll give you enough balance, address everything you need to, and then the rest of the time you can toggle between the ones that Sal just pointed out. Like, that'll be, that'll send you on your way real nice. Okay, cool. Great. All right, ma'am. All right.

Thank you. Thanks for calling in, brother. Yes, sir. You have a good one. Thank you. Yeah, this is, it's cool when you get to this place, when you're consistent for years. Then you start to mess around with things. You can play with it.

Yeah, and you have fun. And when it comes to muscle building, you have the low volume, high intensity, you know, train to failure approach. You have the more traditional body building. approach. You have kind of this hybrid of, you know, powerlifting, less exercises, more sets per exercise, maybe full body, maps and a ball type approach. Then you have like the, you know, let's make sure I don't get myself hurt approach, which you got to throw in there. And then you just kind of go in and out and you start to see how your body responds and how long it responds to each style of training. And then you know what to look out for. And it gets real fun. Well, I just want to

address why it's impossible for us to answer that. We, you know, but especially that close of a programming, right? Like they're so similar in nature the way they're structured that it's like giving him a clear answer of which one is better for him is way too hard to say. It's like you have to kind of go through that and determine that yourself. And I think, I think this happens though to all of us is that we tend to kind of keep gravitating towards programs that are similar or that we love doing. And if you're looking to break through a plateau, one of the best ways to break through a plateau. And it doesn't sound like he was at one. So this is, you know, you know, not for him, but anybody else that is at a plateau is to do something that's more novel than what you've been currently doing, not something similar.

And that's probably going to produce the greatest results for you. Our next caller is Jeremy from Michigan. Hey, Jeremy. How are you doing, Jeremy? What's happening? Not much. Good morning, guys. Thanks for having me on.

Appreciate it. How can we help you? So just a little backstory for context. I've been working out into in and out of fitness for the last 20 or. or so years. Usually my outs were related to injuries and things like that. And then, you know, rebounding back. Had a little bit of time off. And back in July, I started a strength protocol. Historically, it's been mostly about functional fitness. And I've got a pretty hefty goal of putting on eight pounds of muscle in the next 12 months. And everything with my protocol has been going

fantastic. I feel good about my workouts. My nutrition is dialed in. But I'm just getting killed on sleep. I've been trying, I mean, literally, anything that I could think of, I've been trying. And if I get 26 minutes of deep sleep, I am high five in the headboard, man. I mean, it's just, it's so rare for me to get a good night's sleep. I have my Apple Ultra, you know, that's my tracking device, if you will. And it's showing that, you know, some nights I'll get seven hours, but I'm maxing out, you know, close to an hour of REM, and it's usually 15, 20 minutes of deep sleep. But it's just starting to wear on me because now here we are, you know, at the end of

September, I've been grinding pretty heavily. Yeah, I'm doing a four-day split right now. I'm doing interval sprints on my fifth day. And yeah, I'm just, I am looking for some advice on what I might do. I don't do caffeine, not a smoker. I'm going to bed early. I mean, I've Googled everything that you can think of, you know, what supplements I might take, that sort of thing.

But I'm just still coming up short, man. I just don't know what more I can do. Jeremy, have you tried to scale back some of the training intensity and volume? That's the only thing I've not tried. So I work out. I get up 5.30 every morning, whether I want to or not. I can't tell you the last time my alarm woke me up. It's just kind of in my DNA, right?

So I get up early, do my workout early and start the day. And I'm in bed typically by 9 o'clock is a later night for me. I start my wind down routine around 8 o'clock, you know, get rid of digital and I stop eating and drinking three hours before bed, drop the thermostat down to 62. This is easy, Jeremy. This is easy. You're over-trained. Yeah.

Classic. Yeah, you back off. Very classic, over-training. So if you wake up in the middle of night, restless, like you're awake, so you've got a restless feeling. And then you're kind of tired but wired. You're overtrained. Copy. So, I mean, what's a realistic way to scale that back without going to zero, right?

No, no. Yeah, you don't want to keep a zero. You can go, if you, look, you can scale it down if you want it to take longer. But if you want it to, if you want this to work faster, take the week off. Don't train for the next week. We did a reset guide that would be perfect for you to follow. So we did, we're, is that under? Yeah, no, we got that.

Yeah, it's a free guide. Mindpumpfrey.com? Yes. Yeah. I'll have Doug send you a link to that. Take a week off when you get back into training, cut the volume in half. You're over training. Two days a week?

Yep. Show a two day a week type of program. And do you have MAPS anabolic yet? I do not. Okay. We'll send you MAPS enabolic. Follow that two days a week. This is very, very classic overtraining symptom.

Yeah. Classic. Yeah, yeah. It feels like this. Go to bed exhausted. Fall asleep hard. Wake up in the middle of night, restless. And it's like hard to go back to sleep.

And I can't go back to sleep. and then I kind of do and I kind of don't. And then I'm up and I'm wired but tired. And context here matters, Jeremy. It's not like you may not feel like you're like the training is so crazy or way overdoing it. It's in the context of you're not getting good sleep. You're getting up early. You're not getting a lot of.

And so therefore it is very much so overtraining. So if you were getting great sleep and rested and all the things, then maybe it would be okay. But I'm going to guess that you scale them back to two, watch and notice a difference. Yeah. I'm going to guess that you're just like putting. your nose down and just going through the workouts and I'm going to make this happen no matter what and I got this goal. Yeah, I mean, that's just me in a nutshell, regardless. So I don't do anything halfway. So maybe to my detriment sometimes. Yeah, yeah. Here's what's going to happen. You're going to take

the week off probably by day four or five or by the end of the week. You're going to sleep. And you're like, okay, here we go. And then when you get back on, cut everything in half. And if you're And you should exercise appropriate amounts of exercise, of course, produces results, strength, muscle, but it makes your sleep better. Yeah. Exercise does not make sleep worse unless it's too much. Yeah. And then that's the classic, classic, like, easy symptom to notice right out the gates. It's that right there.

Especially since you're doing all the other things. Yeah, I knew right away, I was reading your question as you were talking, oh, he's overtrained. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's good to know. So then as I kind of tailor back into this, you know, doing the two-day-a-week, what's the recommendation on how long I maintain that,

or should I never get back to that four-day split? Yeah, listen to your body. Yeah, listen to your body. Because two-day may be the burden. And listen, you would be blown away by what you can do in two days. Especially if you sound like you're doing a lot of the other stuff. Like if your diet's in check, you're putting together a sleep routine, you have all this other stuff that you're managing so well.

and two good days of full body routine, you can build a hell of a physique by just doing that. So if we start to do that, you sleep well. I mean, maybe at one point, if you're like you're missing the extra workout so much, I go, all right, maybe try a third day, see how you feel. Okay. And then slowly.

And then it's like try a third day, stay that way for like three weeks and really determine on how you feel before you even consider. Strength is your indicator through this whole process. And here's the other thing, too. As you get older, less volume is required. required to build muscle. Okay, so I train less now than I ever have, and I get, you know, still good results.

And it's probably going to continue to scale down as a is true for everybody. So, you know, two days a week, full body strength training, even if I had someone's in their 20s, I'm going to give them great results. A 50-year-old guy is perfect. Perfect. You're going to build the most muscle and strength doing that. And the rest of the week, just stay active. That's it.

Jeremy, we did not, one thing we didn't ask about or talk about, just curious, have you done blood panels and seen kind of a hormonal testosterone? Yeah, I have. So back in July when I got started just again because I'm 50, I want to make sure I'm doing things right. So I linked up with the health and wellness kind of concierge company and they did a full, they took six files of blood in a urine test on day one. Okay.

They did a full body scan. Back in July, I was about 12. And a half percent body fat, but that was using a, you know, one of the in touch or whatever those in body scan. So it wasn't like Dexia or anything. thing. They said my muscle mass was great. Grip strength was great. Everything looked pretty dialed in. And I've been pretty consistent with my diet for years. I mean, that's not a new thing for me. I'm kind of ridiculous about it. It's part of my ADHD. I like to weigh my food. I like to

track my macros. So I'm staying as dialed in. But that's just part of my life. So it's not a burden to me like some caution. Jeremy, you're going to see such great results with MAPS Anabolic, too. Just for that. Where was testosterone for you? Are you good? Yeah. So I did start PRT quite a while ago, and it actually wasn't related to fitness. It was just related to absolute fatigue, and I had the sex drive of a three-year-old. So my doctor put me on that. So I'm still a little under the normal range is what he is saying. I can't remember the number guys. I think it was like six or 700. You're good. But, yeah. You do the right amount of volume with training. You're going to blow your mind. Your body's going to respond like crazy. That's exciting. I just don't know what I'm going to do with all this extra time. Jeremy, I'd love to hear back from you because I have a feeling that once you do this recovery week, you go to your two-day-a-week, I think within less than a month's time, you're going to feel and see a major difference already. That would be awesome. Yeah, because I mean, everybody knows that, you know, the muscles made in the bed, you know, and I just feel like I'm killing myself with trying to push out, but I'm not getting the reward of it.

100%. No, it's pretty pretty clear. I'm like I'm also 100% positive. That's what it is. Yep. And that's great advice. I appreciate you guys. Thank you for that.

I am looking forward to giving that a try. Awesome. Yeah. My wife will be happy. I got extra time. Yeah. Circle back. Let us know how it goes, Jeremy.

I will too. God bless you guys. All right. See you. Yeah. That's a classic classic. Yeah. You're just,

you're training hard, everything that sounds. And you just wake up. Yeah. And you're restless. This happened to me. I talked to Mike Matthews about this. What's happening to him.

I mean, everybody, I've talked to so many people. It's one of the first signs. And it literally feels like that. Like, You wake up and you're like, why am I awake? And then you're restless. You're like this is, especially a guy like that who's got this, you know, he's like,

he's got the personality. Yes, he's doing it all already. And it's like what he just needs to do is less. So crazy because I know that sounds so counterintuitive for most people. And maybe his workouts aren't even that crazy. That's what people need to understand it. But it's in the context of what they are. I guarantee that.

Well, he said, just based on how he was describing everything. He said, what kind of mentality has. interval training and I'm grinding to him. Yeah, he's also going hard. Yeah. Our next caller is Lindsay from Florida. Hi, Lindsay. How are you? Hey, how are you? How can we help you?

Good. First of all, I want to say thank you for, you know, take my question and letting me, you know, be on here. This is super, super cool. I'm going to go ahead and read my question so I don't try to ask you like five other ones. I'm a 34-year-old mom of twins that were born in December and a former head coach at Orange Theory Fitness. I've always struggled with weight,

recently I've lost 50 pounds on a GLP1 while also starting HRT. I'm 5'9, 153 pounds, and I'm pretty happy with my weight, but I still have a lot of visceral fat and underdeveloped areas, especially my glutes, which I've never been able to grow, no matter how hard I've tried. I'd like to shift my focus from weight loss to body composition, reverse dieting, building muscle, maybe even do my first bulk. But where I'm kind of caught up is with my GLP1 and HRT and losing weight so quickly, I kind don't know where to start with maintenance calories, tapering off the medication, and how to set

myself up to actually build muscle. What do you guys suggest as my next step? You're still on a full dose of GLP1? I'm titrating down. So they had put me up to five really quickly, which they shouldn't have because I lost like 20 pounds in my first month. So I started working with a hormone doctor versus a primary care and I'm titrating down. So I'm now on three. and I'm working myself down to under a standard starting dose and then probably eventually off pretty quickly. How is the current appetite where you're at now? Good.

I feel like I'm getting the same benefits as I was with a five just without the side effects. I don't really have food noise. My appetite's pretty controlled. So I feel pretty good right now. Are you able to reverse diet? Like you counted calories and are you tracking it all to kind of know where your macros are?

Yeah. Yeah, so I think I'm kind of working myself into a reverse diet now. I was eating at like 1,700 calories on my GLP 1. I was still trying to be mindful of eating enough. So I was trying to work up to like 2,000, maybe 2,100 calories, which is what I started yesterday. Yeah. But I don't know if that's kind of what you guys would suggest.

My maintenance calories are a lot lower now than they were before. Of course. No, I think that's great. And then how's your training? Are you still, you're not still doing orange theory stuff. Are you, are you traditional? No. Okay.

No. I'm strained training five days a week, which I'm curious your thoughts on that because maybe that's a little bit too much. Yeah, for sure. In the context of where you're at, like you're so low calorie, you don't need to be training that much in order to see the results you want. So less would be more in the situation, something like a MAPS antabolic program would probably be more ideal.

Or even like muscle mommy because it has more glute focused in that. You mentioned glutes is a primary focus. So like muscle mommy, it'd probably be a good choice. and then where you're at diet-wise, as far as reversing the calories, is smart. That's probably right where we probably would have put you. Okay. Yeah, because I know you guys answer questions like this all the time. I guess it was just kind of hard for me to figure it out because I've lost this 50 pounds since the end of April.

So I've lost it very quickly and a lot quicker than I wanted to. I tried to come in here being super mindful on the GLP one and weighing myself and stuff. It was just one of those things that I would be at the same weight. forever and then literally one day drop like five pounds and I'd be like oh my god because you know I was trying to lose like a pound a week um but I have lost very very quickly so I know I kind of put myself in a bad spot to reverse diet Lindsay can I ask you some more questions yes okay so you had twins in December yes okay do you want fertility treatment in order to get pregnant so I got pregnant with my twins the first month I was on lettrosol so that was my first medicated

but I hadn't moved to like IUI or IVF or anything, but that was a medicated cycle to get my twins. Okay. And then before that, how long were you trying to get pregnant? A little over a year. So we have three children. We got pregnant very quickly with my three-year-old. And then we dealt with a secondary infertility. And I wasn't my healthiest during that time, which didn't help my cause going into the pregnancy either. And then you had the babies in December. When did you start the GLP 1 and HRT? I started the GLP 1 at the end of April, and I started HRT in July. So four months postpartum, they had you go on, why did they have you start HRT so quickly? So I don't, no one really had me started. It was probably more me, and maybe I did it too quickly.

I know someone who runs like a hormone clinic that I trust and I've known for a long time, and I started working with her in July. I mean, she knew my full background of having the twins and being on a GLP1. I asked her if I was doing too much too soon, and she said that getting on HRT and working with a GLP 1 at the same time could be beneficial. So I went ahead and move forward. Okay. Yeah, because that was really quick postpartum. And a GLP 1, I was really quick to get on a GOP 1 postpartum as well.

And I'm assuming you stopped breastfeeding. So you stopped breastfeeding that went on these things. Yeah, yeah. My babies are formula fed right now. Okay, okay. Yeah, I would take it easy. I mean, you're still, you're not even a year postpartum. And most women, so there's a lot of, I hate social media, because it puts out this just

terrible lie that, you know, four months after you have your babies, you get back to whatever, the baloney, it's bull crap. I've trained a lot of women. I've trained athletes and women who are like really fit. And you're not yourself for like two years. Right. That doesn't mean you'll get back and, you know, you don't start getting in shape and start, but it takes like two years to get back to who you are.

So, you know, HRT, GLP1, I think that, you know, was a little quick. I think it would be good to scale down the GLP 1 so you can reverse diet. I think you're moving in the right direction. More calories, less training. Five days a week is just, it's, you'll do better with MAPS anabolic regardless. And then, you know, go up to 2,100 calories. You're probably not going to see any fat gain. You'll just get stronger.

Right. And then move up another 200 calories. And every few weeks, you could jump up. And I would, you know, you're probably going to end up somewhere around 27-H calories. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. No, I probably jumped the gun a little too quick on this.

GLP one, which is crazy because I'm not even, obviously people care about aesthetics to some degree, right? That wasn't my main concern. It was like, I felt tired and terrible all the time with my three under three. And then I was starting to ache in places I've never ate before. And I started trying to work out and do everything. I've lost weight before twice, like 50 pounds or more. And the things I had done were not working at all.

So I guess I moved pretty quickly to my GLP1 along with labs, like my cholesterol and trigless rides and all of that were high. So I moved towards it, but when I say it out loud that it was four months postpartum, it kind of sounds a little crazy. Was this baby weight that you were losing? Like, what were you at before the, uh, you got pregnant? I was probably closer to like 185. When I was a coached Orange Theory, I hung out around 160. But like I said, during my secondary infertility, I was, I was still working out, but my diet was definitely not that great. So I was a little higher than usual. Um, so I went into my pregnancy a little heavier than I normally take your time is the only advice I'm going to give you yeah yeah because even on HRT if you push too hard

with diet and training and all that stuff especially with uh you know three kids two of them being under you know a year so I know sleep is can you know so it's going to be on and off type of deal like your your body will crash yeah if you if you push so just take it easy and you'll get better results if you take it easy Lindsay did you see the muscle mommy group that we just launched I heard about it because I listen to your guys podcast all the time but I haven't like looked into it. You've got to get in there. I mean, we just had Dr. Lauren on there last week who's all about women's hormones. And the community is not just women following muscle. Mommy, it's just women who want to build muscle. Yeah. So, and it's 100% centered around.

We have two trainers in there that run it. And so you have access to really good trainers and they can help with this whole process of reverse dieting. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah. That's what I need because I've been doing in body scans. And my in body scan says I'm at like a 19.4. 5% body fat, but, like, my stomach does not look like that. Like, my, it's my stomach problem, which is what I'm like, mainly, I know it needs to be a body composition thing at this point. You got to build. You have build muscle.

That's it. That's it. Everything's focused around building muscle right now. For the next year, it's all you should do is build muscle. I wouldn't let you cut for a year. I would just get you strong. But you're doing the right things. Coming down on the GLP1, reverse dieting.

This is, this is the right path. Scale back. We'll send you over maps, enabolic. And we'll send you the link for Muscle Mommy. I think it would be beneficial. And then get in there so I can see. Well, we'll be in there too. So I'll be talking to everybody that's going on in there.

So let's see you in there today if we can. Okay. Yeah, for sure. I really appreciate it. Thank you guys so much. I kind of work so hard to get to this point. And then I'm like, oh, my God, what did I do? No, you're good.

Yeah, you're on the right path now. Yep. Awesome. Thank you so much. All right, Lindsay. Bye. Bye. I'm so surprised that somebody gave her.

A surprise that a doctor would recommend. And HRT and a GLP1, four months post-partum. I actually, I actually thought she's talking with the previous December. Not like this December just passed by. I was like, oh, wow. Very quick. That's just wild. And that's why I asked if she did fertility before because that will affect her hormones.

And I'm like, okay, did they, was she on HRT before? Because I understand continuing it. But no, she went on fertility. You got to wait until things balance out. Four months postpartum, that's. Got some healing. Yeah, what are we doing? Yeah.

Unless there's an emergency situation, I don't know, you know, I'm obviously not a doctor, but to me, that seems very, very quick. No, no. She would need to be, like, dangerously low to make sense to do something like that. And you need to do that situation for sure. So both, both GLP1 and HRT, both fat, too fast in that situation. But, I mean, we got a hold of her now. She's scaling the GLP1 down. She needs to reverse dive, scale back on the volume and training. And I think she's going to rebound nicely. By the way, the link to that group is Musclemommiemovement.com. Thanks, Doug. Our next caller is Jason from Nevada. What's up, Jason? So up, Jason. Hey, guys.

How are you doing? How can we help you? A long-time fan of the show, I love everything you guys do. It's great to meet you finally. Thank you. My name is Jason. I'm 48, about 6 foot 2, weight 185 pounds, and about 19% body fat. I've been strength training for about the past.

years, initially through CrossFit, but now I'm more focused on traditional lifting. I also do some yoga, and I try walking as much as I can. I'm a business owner, a husband, and father to three kids. I have boy, girl, twins that are 11 years old and a nine-year-old daughter, so time's always a challenge for me. But fitness remains a priority. What's unique about my situation is that when I was 17 years old, I had in a large lift note in my neck, neck, and it was surgically removed during that procedure. My spinal accessory nervous was severed, resulting in significant long-term damage to the nerve and leaving my left trapezius muscle essentially useless.

For years, I avoided strength training thinking it wouldn't be effective, but fortunately, when I started lifting in my early 40s with CrossFit, I haven't looked back. I've seen amazing improvements, and I feel stronger and healthier than ever. That said, though, I do have a couple of issues I'd love your insight on. One is regarding the trap injury. So I have, you know, muscle imbalance and issues with my aesthetics. And so the surrounding muscles have to overcompensate. And, you know, so I noticed the asymmetry.

Are there any specific exercises or strategies that you guys would recommend to improve balance and maintain, you know, aesthetics despite this permanent limitation? I did give some pictures of that imbalance. I'm not sure if you guys have access to that. The other question I do have is that I have suffered from chronic sleep problems my entire life. Rarely do I get seven hours of sleep. Typically, I get about six and a half hours a night. Sleep is street for me, though.

Sometimes I'll go four to five hours. I'll go weeks with just four to five hours of sleep. I've explored everything to fix this problem. therapy, sleep hygiene, medication. Currently, I take magnesium, glycine, and melatonin. My big question, though, is with the sleep problem that is chronic for me, it's difficult for me to fix, is how much is my lack of consistent sleep quality limiting my muscle growth? Is it possible still to make meaningful progress even with the compromised sleep?

I appreciate you guys' advice and look forward to hearing what you guys have to say. Okay, so with the sleep stuff, yes, you can make progress. yes, it also hampers things. So it does make it difficult, but it's been a long time. Sounds like you've really tried to figure it out and kind of are having a tough time with figure out what it is exactly. Hormone replacement therapy might be the next place I would look to see if hormone changes can help.

You could also look at a peptide called deep sleep-inducing peptide. Some people have found success with that with increasing the, at least the deep sleep when they go to bed. As far as the trap is concerned, you're with the severed nerve, you don't have connection to those muscles. So there's not much we could do. Yeah. What I would recommend, however, is Stim, and I would use that throughout the day, just

to keep them up. So Stim should at least get that muscle to fire. Have you ever tried Stim on the trap or their sternoclomastoid muscle? Yeah, I have tried it. I have that, forget the name of it, but I do have the device that tries to fire it, but I don't know if it really works, to be honest. Like I've tried it a little bit. Does the muscle fire when you put the patch on and turn it on?

Yeah, I don't, I don't think it does. I think that only the wrong boy does and the other muscles in that area. Okay. So I would, that's the only thing I would say to try is to see if you could get them to fire. Otherwise, what you actually want is typically what we tell people to avoid, which are compensations. But you need compensations because those, there's two muscles in particular that are not working. And so when you're, when you're training your body, try to have good form. One side's going to look a little different than the other.

But in your case, that's okay. We want those compensations so that we avoid too much pain and injury. Because of that, would you keep him more bilateral because he needs him the other side to work with it? Or would you recommend like symmetry for a while? Both. They're both going to be good. Bilateral is going to be good because of the compensations. Unilateral is going to be good because the compensation is going to be there anyway.

So you would train just like anybody. But you're going to have a little bit of a difference on one. side, especially with things like rowing, uh, pressing. You might notice a little bit difference, um, but you want compensations, which you probably already have. It's been a long time, right? When did you have that surgery? I was 17. So 30 years. Yeah, you've got compensations that are already there. Yeah. And so, um, STEM is the only thing that I've ever had, you know, clients that have used that have helped a little bit. Um, but it, uh, it's interesting because sometimes a muscle fire, sometimes it won't. So you could look at more expensive

to the machines that are stronger to see if that'll get the muscle to fire. And you could try using it more consistently to see over time if you start to get that muscle to fire because it's an external signal. It's not coming from you. You don't have any, do you have any pain or any issues because of the imbalance like that? Or is it just more of an aesthetic thing for you? I do hit some pain. It's not constant, but it comes and goes.

I'll get like some shooting pain down like the back, left side of my arm underneath my armpit um i find though that if i if i continue to work out it's always better yeah um and so i notice though if i if i focus like on just like uh front muscles that the pain gets worse so i have do you know deadlifts and bench pressing to kind of keep my balance on both sides of body it seems to help reduce and limit the pain do you get any mid trapezius activation or is it just upper trapezius activation that doesn't happen you know that's the thing is like the upper trap definitely doesn't work. The lower and mid-trap, I might be getting something there, but I can't really tell. It still feels like it's awkward, but like when I look at it visually,

I don't get, sometimes I've seen the injury with people like really bad winging of scapula. Yeah. And my winging isn't super pronounced. So I might have some. A lot of seated row. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you got your, your serratus muscle still works. So that's stabilizing the scapula. Your rhombids are still good. So that's helping to stabilize things. You're probably getting some mid trapezeus activation. The sternoclimastoid muscle is also not working, but you have other muscles there that help support the neck. And you know, your imbalance doesn't look that bad, honestly. I could only really tell what the picture that you sent were your arms dropped. Because he told us to. Yeah. You're looking right at it. Yeah, but it doesn't look that

pronounced. But the standing one, I couldn't tell. If you just said, hey, do you notice anything? I wouldn't, I wouldn't have noticed anything. So, but keep training as normal. I like the two to three days a week that you're currently doing. Have you ran, are you running any of our programs? I did you guys as a, your legacy program, the Annibald. Okay. Maps 15 might be, might be really tried. Maths 15 would be good for you.

Yeah, with the lack of sleep that you had mentioned. I think that would be good. Yeah, you might love. Experiment with the volume of that would be good. Yeah, Matt's 15 might be great for you. Yeah, send that to them. That would be great. You'll have done to do that one.

Scheduling. It's hard for me to fit in long workouts. that's for sure. Oh, yeah, you'll like it then, dude. You'll like it. It's very convenient. But you're doing a good job, Jay. You're doing a good job with what you're doing.

Cool. Appreciate it. Thanks, guys. Yeah, you got it, man. All right, we'll send that over to you. Great. I appreciate it. Thanks.

Thanks so much. You got it. Yeah, when you, I mean, a nervous severed. I just can. I mean, there's nothing you can do. No. I'm like, you can't add mobility drills to reconnect. It's just like one of those.

Well, and it's, you have to face. Yeah. Well, it's South. point, too, this is opposite advice than we normally give, right? We want to try and fix that where you want to reinforce the compensation. You want those compensations when you don't have a muscle. If you didn't have a muscle firing or working and that you can't fix that. It has to take over the function.

The thing, too, is when you have nerve damage, although his was severed, so that's a whole another ball game. But, you know, I've had people who've had some nerve damage, if the closer it is to the injury, the higher the odds are that you could get some function back. The longer, I mean, his was severed at 17. That's 30 years ago. I know. It's gone.

the quicker you get to working on it. Yeah, it's gone the more likely. Now, if he's getting some lower trap activation, though, I mean, I would probably double down on a lot of rowing exercises to develop that at least. And so I think that would just, that would help support scapula and aesthetically help a little bit. Totally. So like seated row, barbell row has become some of my favorite movements if I'm him. Totally.

Look, if you like the show, come find us on Instagram. We'll see you at Mind Pump media. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your body, dramatically improve your health and energy and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Superbundle at Mind Pumpmedia.com. The RGB Superbundle 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 Superbundle is a like having Sal Adam and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction of the price. The RGB Super Bundle has a full 30-day money-back guarantee, and you can get it now, plus other valuable free resources at Mind Pumpmedia.com. If you enjoy this show, please share the love by leaving us a five-star rating and review on iTunes, and by introducing Mind Pump to your friends and family. We thank you for your support, and until next time, this is my friend. Mind Pump.