Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2724: Fix Your Gut, Fix Your Body - The Benefits of Probiotics

Episode Date: November 8, 2025

Mind Pump Fit Tip: 10 amazing and weird ways probiotics benefit you. (2:14) Silicon Valley espionage. (18:45) Uncomfortable experiences training clients. (28:37) Iron sharpens iron. (33:51) Prioritizing your relationship above your kids, and the importance of establishing family values/foundations. (40:28) Fostering good bacteria growth with the Green Juice from Organifi. (50:41) Must-haves when building your house. (52:33) #ListenerLive question #1 – No matter what I do, I cannot gain muscle or weight. Please help. (1:00:57) #ListenerLive question #2 – I'm looking for advice on what program to do after completing Anabolic Advanced? (1:10:28) #ListenerLive question #3 – My current life routine only allows me to go to the gym 1 day per week, and maybe some weeks I will be able to squeeze in a second until March. Is there a program that you would recommend I follow during this time span? (1:18:48) #ListenerLive question #4 – I'm having a hard time gauging my results from Muscle Mommy. I was wondering if that is just how the program is written, as most women fear "getting bulky," or if my additional activity is hindering my progress? (1:33:00) Related Links/Products Mentioned Ask a question to Mind Pump, live! Email: [e-mail] Visit Seed for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Promo code 25MINDPUMP at checkout for 25% off your first month's supply of Seed's DS-01® Daily Synbiotic** Visit Organifi for the exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Promo code MINDPUMP at checkout for 20% off** November Black Friday Deals (Nov. 1-15th): Sitewide 60% off. That includes every single MAPS program, bundle, MOD, and guide. Enter the raffle now to win HUGE prizes: Bundles give you 10 entries, MAPS program gives you 3 entries, MODs or guides give you 1 entry. For programs go HERE. Enter the code BLACKFRIDAY at checkout.  Mind Pump Store Probiotic consumption relieved human stress and anxiety symptoms possibly via modulating the neuroactive potential of the gut microbiota Probiotics for Eczema: A Science-Backed Guide for Skin Health How Probiotics Can Help You Lose Weight and Belly Fat How Silicon Valley Became a Den of Spies - POLITICO Sal Di Stefano's Journey in Faith & Fitness – Mind Pump TV Mind Pump #1665: How Gyms Survived Shutdowns With Jason Khalipa Mind Pump #2290: Becoming a Better Man With Jason Khalipa Mind Pump #2225: How to be a Great Parent & Raise Successful Children With Adam Lane Smith 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 Mind Pump #2684: Do ONLY These 8 Lifts to Achieve an Amazing Body Muscle Mommy Movement Mind Pump Podcast – YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources People Mentioned Peter Attia, M.D. (@peterattiamd) Instagram Jason Khalipa (@jasonkhalipa) Instagram Corinne Schmiedhauser (@mindpumpcorinne) Instagram  

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head on over to Mindpumpstor.com. That's it. Enjoy the rest of the show. Of all of the supplements you can take, it's looking like probiotics are the most beneficial across the board. And yeah, I'm not talking about digestion. Everybody knows that. probiotics help with digestion.

But there are many ways probiotics affect the body in a positive ways, many of them you're probably not aware of. We're going to talk about those 10 amazing and weird ways probiotics benefit your body. Let's go. Is this going to be as good as creatine? The muscle building studies coming out are fascinating and interesting. I don't know where that's on your list. I know it's on your list.

It's not on this list because we've talked about it before. But I'm glad you said that, Adam. the data on, you can look this up, everybody. Hit pause, look it up. The data on probiotics and force production, recovery, and hypertrophy are kind of wild. It's a supplement that actually builds muscle. I wouldn't say it's as effective as great team for building muscle. It's not.

But it's more effective than anything else, which is kind of wild as well. I mean, you could probably make the case, though, in certain circumstances. It could be, though, right? Like if you have like debilitating issues with your with your gut and then the probiotic helps solve that. I mean, I would think that would. Sure. It's just, it's just weird to me that a pro biot, I would have never, how do you ask me this 10 years ago? I would have speculated.

Oh, maybe. No, there's a direct muscle building effect. So it's super not to derail you from your story here. But I'm curious because last time you brought it up, I actually wanted Doug to check. And I didn't ask him. So I'd like him to look up. curious about the market just is how have we seen

the probiotic market just explode like is it uh was it you know a multi-million dollar industry just you know a decade ago and now it's you know tens of millions or hundreds of like where is it at like I'm so curious I think it's an hundred idea I would say it's a it's a hundred

yes it's 90.56 billion in 2025 is that worldwide or US global global and projected to reach 226 billion by 2030. That's serious growth. Where was it 20 years ago?

Oh, it was nothing. Yeah. Where would, yeah, that's, that's some serious growth. That's crazy. Yeah. It makes sense, you guys, because it works. Here's a thing, though. If you take a good probiotic, you notice,

there's a lot of things that are probiotics that you might not. What you got for me? 34 billion in 2015. So it's gone up substantially. Almost tripled. Yeah. I mean, I guess it kind of points. not a lot of people eat or consume a lot of fermented foods,

because obviously that would cover it. It also points to that we'd rather take a pill than actually fix our diet too. Well, you guys, listen, of course. You guys, I hate to say it. It's easier. I hate to say it, but it may be necessary. So, yes, we don't eat a lot of fermented foods.

We also eat a high fiber diet, and there's fiber in certain types of fiber feeds. Sure. Beneficial bacteria. So that definitely plays a role. But there's also. So so many things that are environmental that disrupt the microbiome of the gut from glyphosates in foods. Even organic foods sometimes have glyphosates through cross-contamination.

Antibiotic use. You know, antibiotic or antimicrobial soaps and toothpaste. Just environmental things that have just totally disrupted our microbiome. it's probably essential to take a probiotic these days. And remember, a lot of your microbiome, because it's influenced by your environment quite a bit, but a lot of it you get from your mom. Okay.

And so if you're a C-section, baby, that's reduced. If you don't breastfeed, that's reduced. Now that girl grows up to have her own kids. And so what you're seeing is this generational decline in the quality of the microbiome of the gut. And a lot of people are connecting this to autoimmune issues. Yeah, I hadn't even thought of antibiotics and glyphosates because they're so prevalent in the environment. And it just finds its way in all of your like water and in all the foods that we eat, everything.

Another random question since you brought up breastfeeding. When did baby formula really take off? Like at what point did we? Because at this point, I would guess that there is a greater percentage of people that use. It's reversing a little bit. Oh, it is reversing. Yeah. Yeah, but so where was it set?

Like in the 70s, I would imagine almost everybody is breastfeeding at that time. And then. You know, it's working. You went here, so we'll blame it on you, Adam. Yeah, yeah, okay. It strongly correlates with the, you know, you could loosely labels a feminist movement. So as women went into the workforce and as this is also part of it, everybody so don't get pissed off of me but this is you lots of books that were very popular during

these decades that uh labeled breastfeeding as oppressive and burdensome and how modern science uh was freeing and so there were decades there so there were decades there so it's like you're gonna wake up in the middle night, you're gonna do this and that. It's, you know, formula is just as good. Just going that direction. So there were, like, the 80s and 90s, it was like, it was, you were kind of weird if you were like, no, I'm gonna breastfeed, especially when you're in a medical. Yeah, it'd be interesting to see what the numbers were like, because I imagine most of our

parents probably grew up being breastfed and very few people didn't. And then I do know that it became widely popular. Yep. And it'd be interesting to see how much it's rebound. They're gone back the other direction too. It looks kind of like a bell curve or whatever. But yeah, so because of our environment, the way we live, probiotics are probably necessary.

Muscle building, endurance, stamina, recovery, all of those things are positively affected from probiotics. Supplementation. What does that say there, Doug? So it has gone up. So from 2004, it was 73%. And then I went up to 84% in 2021. However, after six, up to six months in 2004, it was 11.3% in 2022.

It was 27.9%. Of what? What's the 11 and 22? Breastfeeding? Yeah, breastfeeding. Okay. Okay. From 2004 to 2022?

Yes. Okay. Yeah. And then I would imagine it was the opposite from like, say, 1980 to 2000. There was a growth. Yeah. Yeah. Huge growth.

Yeah. All right. So let's talk about some of the other ways that, um, probiotics seem to benefit you. Here's one. Reduces cortisol in stressed individuals. This was a more recent study. Now, is that just because you, if your digestive system is thrown off and you have trouble

breaking down food, then you're going to have this low level. Way more complex in that. Okay. Way more complex than that. You have the gut brain axis. You have GABA being produced by oftentimes. is heavily influenced, like other neurotransmitters from the gut. You have the HPA axis, you know, just the hypothalamus, the pituitary, the adrenals,

how they communicate with each other. Probiotics seem to balance those out. So, by the way, this cortisol lowering doesn't happen in people who don't have, you know, stressed levels of cortisol. In other words, it's not a cortisol lowering drug. It creates this balancing effect. So somebody who's under a lot of stress who has these inverted cortisol levels and has all these issues with it, which what it'll feel like is in the morning I feel like I get hit by a car. It takes me a couple cups of coffee to get moving.

At night, I'm tired but wired. And then I can't sleep or I get broken sleep. Probotics. Probotics, easy way to kind of help with that, which is pretty cool. That was a more recent one. Another one improves anxiety and depression. So this is pretty significant. it's actually a significant

anti-anxiety anti-depression intervention especially when you compare it to other over-the-counter interventions. Of course, not as good as exercise in just eating healthy.

But if you're like, yeah, I got some anxiety, can I take a supplement? Probotics. That's a good one. Abuse immune function. That one's a little bit more well-known.

But we see lower rates of viral infection, bacterial infection, better inflammatory pathways from supplementing. Again, this is from people supplementing with probiotics, lowers blood pressure. So they find it to lower blood pressure. Reduces LDL cholesterol. Here's a cool one. Enhances skin health, reduces acne and eczema from taking oral probiotics.

So I imagine all these that you're listing off that there are studies to support that they've controlled all things equal. This is the only thing they've changed. is out of this probiotic and all those markers are showing improvements. So lifestyle tests are difficult because there's so many things to control. Probiotics, easy. They take groups of people

who aren't taking probiotics. We're going to give you this one that contains, and we're going to give you a placebo. And then let's see what happens. So it's like it's an easier type of study to conduct. So it's not like a survey. You know, how many tomatoes do you eat

or do you eat healthy? Yeah, I feel like those are terrible. No, it's like here, here's your 30-day supply of this thing. not going to tell you what it is. Right, right. Half of you have got a placebo.

Half of you get a probiotic. And the researchers don't even know who gets what. So it's double blind. Yeah. And then they come back and report back and see what's going on. But acne and eczema. Yeah. You see a benefit from probiotics.

Just keeps pointing to like how many things are affected by your gut bacteria. And like healthy gut bacteria obviously is going to make a massive difference in so many directions. It's so funny to hear that about like acne because when we were kids, like if you asked a dermatologist, like, does my diet impact this at all? They would mention it. They would scoff at you. I wonder if they still say that.

Well, I know they did not just 10 years ago or less when I was still seen a dermatologist for my psoriasis. And they said, no, it doesn't affect it. Yeah, oh yeah, no, that's not. That doesn't matter. It's like, really? Feels like it should. Yeah, I feel like I have an effect.

Yeah. You know what's funny about that? Not to go off topic, but what wouldn't a better diet effect? Well, can you name anything that it wouldn't, like any issue that someone has would eating healthier with your body affect it? Yeah. Always. All things.

Yeah, like what wouldn't it, you know? I'm trying to think right now. I think it all gets, it's weird that a doctor would say that. Yeah. Because I think that would be like the, you know why? It's because they're not trained in it. Who was it? Dr. Peter Atia was just on 60.

minutes. I saw that. Yeah, I saw that. And she, and she's like, you know, I don't remember what the question was. She asked, how many people think what you do is like hocus pocus. Yes. And which is crazy because literally what Dr. Etia is doing, he's a real physician. He's a, I believe Harvard. No, is it Stanford? Stanford trained. That's where you guys are education. And all he's doing is like fitness and nutrition protocols in addition to the traditional medical protocols. And she mentioned hocus pocus. Why is that? So weird. It's not like he's doing weird stuff. You know, he's not biohacking stuff. Yeah, no, it's like, no, I'm testing their grip strength. I'm testing their VO2 max. Yeah, yeah.

We're doing exercise protocol. Pretty fundamental things. Hook is so weird. And then she asked him that and he said, how much training do you think? He goes, I went to Stanford. You know, train doctor. How much training do you think I got an exercise? Zero.

Zero. Yeah. How much train do I think I got nutrition? Almost zero. Yeah. He's like, so that's why other doctors don't. They don't have the training here. Yeah.

So they don't, what does that say there, Adam? I mean, Doug, sorry. Yeah, it seems like dermatologists are now suggesting dietary changes. Yeah, see? So it's coming. Yeah. Relatively new, though, because like I said, it wasn't that long ago when I seen a dermatologist. I think actually that was kind of like the tipping point from it.

It was like at that point, I'm pretty fully aware. You know, I was kind of more just asking like, hey, is there anything I could do? It was like, I knew the answer. It was more like, let's see where you're at here. Yeah, let's see how they respond. And I'm like, and when they were, it was like, oh, yeah, no, that doesn't really matter. Well, you guys know, they still use this. You know one of the big medications for really bad acne is?

Accutane. Doug, how does acutin? Look up acutin. If I'm not mistaken, it is a very powerful antibiotic, or am I tripping? Can you look that up in how it works and what? Because I know that acutane has got some really wild side effects. What does it say? Yeah, it's retinoid derived from vitamin A.

Okay. So is it antimicrobial? Or is it just, yeah, there to go. Limits bacteria. A pill. Yeah. And it's got some pretty, it's a very powerful drug. But anyway, so helps with acne, helps with eczema.

It supports weight loss and fat reduction. Here's what's cool about this. There are no supplements to help with that. There's pretty much no supplement you'll give someone, and then you'll see a statistical significant reduction in fat loss without lifestyle changes. This one there is. These people lost, not a ton, but they didn't.

change anything else. They lost about two pounds of body fat and about one and about one point eight centimeters around their waist, which in the realm of supplements for fat loss is pretty amazing. Yeah. Because supplements pretty much do nothing when it comes to fat loss. So I thought that was pretty cool. Improves sleep quality. Reduces allergy symptoms and supports oral health like gingeritis and gum disease. So crazy. Yeah. What it does. The athletic performance benefits for me I think are a great selling point because I know of all the things. I never put those together. Yeah.

And I know of all the things I talk about that I just said, our audience is very. That's the most. Yeah. That's the one. Now I'm interested. Done. Let me use this one.

Oh, it makes me healthy too cool. The fact, though, that it's a $90 billion industry, the amount of bootzy probiotics that are out there. I mean, there's got to be, I mean, there's just got to be. is taking it back on you guys. That would be my biggest concern as a consumer. I feel like a lot of these things that get a lot of popularity,

the studies start popping out. I think of the red light therapy in the last decade, same thing. Like, you know, and then here come all the charlatans. And so buyer beware. I mean, I think one of the biggest mistakes people make when they hear stuff like this and they go out is they go find the thing and they search. the cheapest version of whatever that thing is, and that's what they purchase,

thinking that they're getting what they read about or heard about? Listen, go with seed. If you're hearing this right now, you go with seed. There is, when you're looking at quality supplements, there's always a difference in every market of supplements because the supplement industry is just notoriously terrible. So consumer reports will test protein powders. The recent one came out.

You know, I don't remember it was like seven out of ten of them had high levels of heavy metals, or they'll test other supplements like, oh, you know, eight out of ten, had nothing in the pill or had barely it, whatever. But when it comes to probiotics, and I know this, just a gut health was a big issue for me for decades. You have seed over here and then you have everybody else way over here. It's like it's a universe of a difference in terms of the science, the application, the delivery, the bacteria is alive at room temperature, it's stable. it gets delivered to where it needs to. They test the,

they have a simulated digestive track to see what's happening. There is, there's no other probotic that comes close. So yeah, I would just go with seed. That's the one.

Anyway, I got an article I want to talk to you guys about. Have you guys been seeing this like going viral right now? About these reports. I'll pull this one up on. Like the international spy network that's been, that's infiltrated. Silicon Valley for a while.

Our feeds are all so different. Well, I'm surprised you didn't get this one. Okay, from me. Justin would get that one, maybe. No, I'm surprised you didn't either because you know what this is? What? What would be if you're Russia or China? Okay.

And you're like, I want to steal. Corporate espionage. You're like, I want to steal secrets from these tech billionaire nerds. Okay. Where do I go? How would I get? What's the best way? Yeah, every time.

Honey pot them with what, though? What are they, what do you get in? Well, no. you don't know what that term is. Yeah, honey pots are where you tracked them. You tracked them. Yeah, but it's specific for spying is women. Women.

Oh. Oh, I thought honey potting someone just means in general you basically entrap them with a. In the spy world, a honey pot is. It's always a girl? Pretty much. I mean, you're not going to, guys aren't very effective at honeypotting. Yeah. I mean, oh, I.

You might have a demographic. I just always, I always thought honey potting was not specific to like you're using a woman to attract that, that it was more like, You're basically entrapping people using something that would entice them. No. But I didn't know that it was specific to... In the spy world, it's you send attractive women. Oh, yeah. Over to...

For sure, that's a way to get all... Oh, yeah. Get all these guys that got no attention in high school and college at all. Yeah, yeah. And then they're billionaires. Yeah. And then suddenly, you know, they're getting all this attention. So how's that...

So, wait, tell me this, this is interesting to me now. So what's... I knew you. I do. That's why I was... Yeah. This is interesting. So how's it unfolding?

So what's... Oh, I've heard about these tech bro murders. Like, that's a whole, like, class of, uh, of incidences around here, too. And one of them was in Santa Cruz. And this guy was like, you know, this billionaire who, he had like a boat, like in the harbor and everything. And they caught him dead. This, this prostitute, like, was basically there doing heroin with him. Oh, my God.

And then, like, left in, uh, apparently he was having a seizure or something died. So these aren't, these aren't prostitutes. They're not sex workers. These are spies. They send highly educated women who are very attractive. Which is that's what we'll work on. Who don't even have an accent sometimes. Remember, this is like, this is funded by the state.

This is like Russia's funding it. China's funding it. Yeah. They send them over and they play a long game. So they go over there. And these articles are crazy because there was just, they've got a couple of them now that are like spilling the secrets to us and saying like, well, here's what we do. They'll come over there and they have a whole strategy.

So, so they're like. like in legit relationships with these guys? Married. Yeah. They'll go as far as to get married and have kids. Wow. And then the guy totally trust them. Of course.

And they get all kinds of secrets from them that they send over to these other countries. It's like a super long game. So crazy. Dark. Yeah. Dark. Right? So here's the...

Pray off somebody like that for that long. So here's the script. And you have kids with them? Here's the script. You first appear in their life. Committed. Listen, she... So this girl goes in here and she spills like this time.

Mother Russia, huh? Yeah. So first you appear in their life seven times before making contact. So you want to be around them about seven times so they kind of notice you a bunch of times. Then she says is when they finally meet you, their brain already trusts you. Then she says it starts with love bombing. Messages, compliments, selfies, bikini photos. Then you typically, not always, but oftentimes you paint this story that you got a sad backstory.

My parents were killed or I'm a student or I'm broke. Now billionaire nerd guys like, I'll save you. I'll take care of you. You know what I mean? And it's, and then they also use another technique where they fake mutual connections. So they'll start following friends or they'll make friendships with your friends. And it's all totally fabricated.

Then once trust is established, the psychological manipulation escalates. They'll make you doubt yourself. Things like your boss doesn't appreciate you. Your colleagues use you. Then we understand each other. We're in this together. They'll create stress. You know, crazy.

I'm reading all this stuff and I'm like, and they're well trained. Like they know how to do it. Now, I imagine that's a better strategy than literally infiltrating like that and then trying to just steal from them. Stealing their ideas will be probably harder to prove and get them. Like, right? Like, obviously she, if she's in the point where I'm having kids, she's got bank account access.

She's probably got access to money. But doing that, we'd get you caught up versus I'm just. buying and giving. Well, part of it is that. Yeah, the information. Part of it is sabotage. So here's this company and they're competitive. And I'm just going to stress them out.

I'm going to make his home life like this terrible. The power of a woman right there. There was a, there was a, many empires have fallen. There was a famous case of a congressman. Maybe you can find out, Doug, where it was found out that his girlfriend was a Chinese spy. Uh-huh. And he was a congressman. Yeah.

And so then what she'll do, she'll influence your voting. or get, you know, more insider information or whatever. And I'm, like, listening to this, I'm like, there's no defense. Like I said, you got a bunch of dudes. First of all, you just get a bunch of dudes. Let's just start there. This is the oldest hustle that's existing.

You just get a bunch of dudes, okay? You don't even have to say anything else. And you get an attractive woman who seems intelligent, who's like, needs help or whatever. Like, already he's weak, especially if he's single. And that's what she's saying. Typically, they'll target single guys. Yeah.

But if he's also a total dork, and he never had that kind of attention. Oh, my God. And then he's probably justifying. He's like, well, yeah, she's with me because I'm successful. Yeah. And I'm helping her.

And so that's why this is. Meanwhile, your friends are like, what is what? What's going on here? It's like a movie waiting to happen right there. I mean, did they, did they unveil anybody that's in the middle?

They have people who are giving like information now who are like, you know. Imagine being that guy, you know, and you find, You don't, you find out. Oh, I know, right? You have kids with them. Look at this.

Look at this. Christina Fang, known as Fang Fang Fang. She was a Chinese spot. Fang Fang. Who formed relationships with upcoming U.S. politicians. Okay, look at this picture. Yeah. Deadly Fang.

You didn't score that girl. No, dude. Come on, look at that guy. You're not that funny. You're not that charming, bro. I mean, he looks jolly. Yeah, dude. I mean, as I'm listening to this, I'm like,

this is the most brilliant thing. Like, there's no, like, what's the defense? Yeah. I mean, it's weird because, like, even I was training quite high profile type Silicon Valley executives and whatnot. And you sit there and you're like, okay, I have to take this call. And it's like, you try not to listen. But like, I'm sitting there listening to really crazy important information, you know,

that they're discussing. Is that how you made so much money or something? Yeah, I definitely used it to my advantage. I didn't, but, I mean, it's like Steve Jobs or, like, it's on the phone. You're just like, whoa, it's crazy. But, you know, that trust, you could establish that trust pretty effectively and then get far. Well, that's a woman like that. Well, that's, I mean, imagine you're this guy and it hasn't came out yet and then somebody knocks on your door to tell you.

Like, that's, I mean, how many. Imagine you've got like a six-year relationship. Yeah, how many dudes would deny it? No, she's not. She's not. No, she's not. I trust her. Yeah, yeah.

No, she's not. I love her. Yeah, yeah. We love each other. Yeah. Devastating. Yeah. You imagine how crushed.

Oh. How crushed you would be. Maybe, maybe. Is that the worst? Like, that has to be worse than even, like. Imagine if you had kids with her. It's got to be worse than even having her step out on the marriage, right? So worse than, like, finding out.

She was working on you. She was working on you. Yeah. I think, okay, put yourself in that position right now. Because the whole thing's a lie. You have to, one of the other happens to you. You don't have a choice. Either she, she, she, like, right now, like, like, we found out.

That's right. That's right. Our wives, okay, right now. You either find out she's cheating on you, has another man and maybe even family, okay? With someone else? Or this whole time she's been working you and she's a spy. Which one's worse? Yeah. The spy. Yeah.

For sure. Spy. Definitely. That would be, that would be, because then, because here's the thing. Here's what your head would rationalize for the cheating part. Yeah, but it was good at the beginning. Or she still kind of could have loved me. This happened.

Yeah. That was a rough time. But she did love me? Where did it go wrong? Where spy is like, she never loved me. She never loved me. This was all fake.

Yeah. Devastating. Yeah, that's way worse. Devastating. Way, way, way worse. And, you know, I think about the thing, again, imagine if this was one of you guys are, uh, or me, right? Like, you would probably, I could imagine my head being like, well, she was a spy,

but I know she loved me now. Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You'd be in denial. You 100% would be, if she did that good of a job where you had kids and you've been together for six years. That would turn a, even somebody telling you. That would turn me celibate.

I'd be like, never, nothing from the rest of my life. I'm going to China and retaliating. Imagine the trauma you have that. You never trust me after that. Nobody. That's what I'm saying. I didn't be celibate forever. Oh, that'd be bad.

I'm like, I'm going to start working for Huawei. Yeah. What is Wal-in? Honey pot somebody. You're so easy to fight. You wouldn't fit in. You're a spy in China. No, I don't think that's working for him.

Yeah. I'll be a spy. I'm not obvious It seems Let's not be at the airport You can't come in here dude Yeah Anyway

I thought that was I thought that was a quick That's crazy man I told you guys a story And I don't mind saying this now Because if she hears And just screw you It's just terrible

It was one of the worst experience I had I had this I had this woman Who hired me to train her And she was in her I want to say mid-20s And her

I didn't know much about her her at the time fiance they were about to get married she came in to hire me i trained her once and she's like hey can you train me at my house and i said yeah she's like you know i'd like you to train me in in my soon-to-be husband so i was like yeah okay no problem so we set up this package they buy all this training and i drove up for the first time to this house and it was the i'd never seen a house like this in my life it was i think it was 17000 square foot house wow okay so i I drive up to it. And, you know, I don't know if you guys ever had a client like this where you have no idea and you start driving this neighborhood.

You're like, okay. What's happening here? Okay. So I pull up to this ridiculous. Like, I've never seen a house like this. And still, this day, I've never seen a house like this. I go up to it and I ring the doorbell and they, you know, they buzz me in. I walk in and I get lost.

It's such a big house. I get lost. So I have to call them. I finally get to the room where we're working out. Yeah. And she was like a 25 year old stereotypical blonde, you know, like, you know, like, you know, pretty blonde girl, whatever. He was, if you could imagine what a,

what a, like a tech nerd would look like, if I were to tell you. Yeah, yeah. Like, classic. Glasses, skinny, super awkward dude. Yeah, really distrava. Yeah, and he was, he was probably 40, so there's already a huge age gap.

Yeah. And the whole workout, guys, she demeaned him so terribly. Yeah. The whole workout. And I've never, I don't think I've ever told the story on the podcast. I refunded them.

because I couldn't handle it. Like she was like, you're so weak. I can't believe you can't do that. Like, horrible. That's so awkward. And I remember the whole time I'm thinking in my head, like, like, bro, I know why you're with her. Yeah. But this is not cool.

Yeah, but isn't that the highest? Okay, so the men, the men, what's that called? Okay. Where they pay for women to demean them and like. I don't think it was a kink. I think he was just. You say that, but that it's that, it's that. No, I could tell.

That type of guy that is the most likely to high power executive. Everyone tells you, oh, he wasn't like that. No, bro. It's like billions with. No, I could tell. I could tell she was making these comments to him and he was just get crushed. So I told you that. So I had, I trained three different clients that and I didn't even know this was a thing where we were on.

Chips and changed those. That were, that were mail, yeah, mail order brides. And then same thing. Same exact thing. It was always like this kind of tech nerd guy. And he was like in his late 40s, early 50s, and she was like in her mid-20s. At least he knows what he's there.

Barely spoke any English at all. And like the first time I was like totally lost. I was like, this is such an interesting relationship. And then by the second and the third one, I realized like, oh, this is kind of a thing over here. Wow.

Like I had no idea that was, I didn't even know there was a thing until I started asking questions. And someone's like, oh, yeah, that was probably a male or a bride, looked it up. I'm like, oh, my God, that's totally what that was.

But it was, I remember feeling so sad because the whole hour I trained him, she would make these, little comments that were so, and he would get so crushed and so sad. And you could tell she's just making him feel like garbage the whole time, but I was so uncomfortable. Yeah, dude, in front of, you know what I mean?

And she'd make a comment about me, like that would make him feel bad. Why don't you have arms like Sal? You know, maybe you're right. Maybe afterwards. I'm telling you, dude. I'm telling you, that's a little pink weights. I mean, I don't even know how we make Doug Google search this, but I know that that's like, that's like a, that's like a popular.

you have kink for, and it tends to be that guy. The guy that has a lot of power, a lot of money, a lot of success, used to being told, yes, and so they want someone to be like that. Like, there's a, there's a, there's a, there's a, there's a genre of, of guys that literally just take abuse virtually. They don't even get, they don't even see the, like, they give women money to like, I forget what it's called. Well, there's a name for it where they like, well, the ones are basically punk them and make them these women. Humiliate them. Yeah, they humiliate them, they punk them, and they make them give them money. Give me a thousand dollar.

You didn't give me a doubt. And then like the guys, okay. But this was his fiancé, though. You know what I mean? It wasn't like he was paying. Like, he's going to be married to this girl. Well, that's just it. So that's even better than paying for it for some random strategy.

You marry it. So you get it every day. I mean, that's your thing, right? That's your thing. Well, whatever. Yeah. I was uncomfortable.

And I remember. I mean, when it's that way. And I made up some excuse. Like, I can't drive over here. It's not going to work. And I refunded them. Yeah. I mean, you got to think if it was.

Like, treat him separately. If it was not normal and he was really that uncomfortable, he probably wouldn't have even wanted you come back. You chose not to come back. Yeah, but I don't know. That was my perception. Maybe you're right. How old are you at that time? 20, what?

It was, I was probably, that's a good question. I was probably in my mid-20s. Oh, mid? Yeah, so I've been already training for a while. I mean, who knows? I could be wrong. I don't care. Either way, I was uncomfortable as hell.

I'm not coming here anymore. What you said is true, even worse. Yeah, I made the right decision. Dude, weird. Whatever the point of this? Yeah, no matter what, that'd be weird. Oh, it's crazy. Anyway, I got to, you know, I got to tell you about, so, you know, my series has been going on.

And I did an episode with Jason Kalipa. So everybody probably knows who he is, but I'll say, you know, if you don't, he's like a cross-fit. It's good. Yeah, like, you know, he won early on as a young kid, super. And he's just also this really good guy. We've had him on the show a couple times. and each time I've talked with him, you know, you just meet someone. There's just, you know, genuine. He's a very genuine, nice guy.

And I had him in my series. And it was a great, it was such a great time working out with him, talking about faith, hearing his journey. And just, and so that's up right now. And I'm getting all these great comments from people. But it was just, it's really great. Just want to shout out to him, man. just running into people in the fitness space who are that influential who are also that humble and authentic is rare.

Yeah. Is rare. Did he talk about his men's group in the morning and how big it is now? You know, how many people we were trying to figure out the other day? I didn't ask him how many people, but it's getting huge. What's cool, too, is why we were talking. He's like, you know, for the last, for the prior year, he had worked with a team that was helping him build his social media presence.

Yeah. And he goes, and I fired them because, it was a lot of like, you know, stuff that works on social media, poking fun at people and gimmicky stuff. He's like, I don't like it, dude. He goes, he goes, personally, he goes, if I know what the mission and the purpose is and I feel good about it, then the business will follow.

And if it doesn't so be it, he goes, I don't, it didn't feel right to just poke at people and try to talk about integrity. Does he still have all his gyms? He had 31 locations. I don't know. You know, the very first, because we got on the show twice. and the first time I asked him about the clubs and I was just really interested in the business side

of everything that he did. And I know he had like 31 gyms all over the world too. They're not just like, I think, I know he's like worldwide. But I remember how him talking about how difficult. I mean, the amount of revenue he was generating with, and the fact that he had to have 31 gyms to generate that. That was a lot of work, a lot of stress.

I'm curious of where he's at in his life now he's still managing that. I know his one over here does really well. Yeah. Very popular. Yeah.

But he's got a loyal following. Again, because he's a good guy. It's crazy though. So, I mean, I look at the opposite way because it's successful.

But someone of his much, as famous as he is, as good as he is, smart, all the, all the, he has all the right attributes, qualities to run the success.

Still, it's not a lot of money for the amount of work and effort. Like people just have no idea He's very purpose for driven. Yeah. He is very purpose driven. It has a lot of integrity.

And every time I hang out with him, it just keeps confirming. You know, he put together, if I'm not mistaken, a charity after his daughter went through. Oh, yeah, yeah. They do a big dinner every year. Yeah. Yeah. You know? Really cool.

So he's just a, and the men's thing that he does in the morning is free. So you have a top level celebrity crossfit, you know, guy. who takes, I don't know how many men show up now 100, you know, at least 50 in the morning. And he doesn't, and he wakes up early. He brings the equipment. He packs up his truck. He brings it over there.

And he charges nothing. A lot of respect for that. A lot of discipline just to do that, you know what I'm saying? Just to get up and to do that. Three kids or two? I think he has two. Yeah, I know he's two or three. I can't remember.

I can't remember. You know, it's also funny, too, is every time I'm hanging out with a top level athlete in any sport, just my, you know, my fitness brain, I know you guys are like this. You just notice the genetic,

like where they are. The advantages with, yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, you can just see like, oh yeah, this guy,

you know, he is a chimp. I told him that too. So you're like, it's such a chimp. Yeah, he's got his big old, you know,

hands and just like, he's like a total classic mesomorph. You know, heavily muscled. You're around him. Justin, I know you're around a lot of gymnastic parents like is there have you guys had any situations recently with all the parents that you've

been around him have you picked up uh dad tips or any dad hacks anything that you picked up from another parent then you went oh that's like getting their kids to just period like anything in general like you know the last time you've seen something that somebody else did and you're like oh that's cool or i like that like i like i want to implement something like that um just like a stadium chair I was like, oh, that's cool. Not like that, bro. Not like that. That's brilliant.

Yeah, I was like, wow, I got to get one of those. You were sitting a bench for four hours? I know, my back was hurting. I was like, you really figured this out, guy. What kind of snacks you got? Not what I was thinking. Stadium chair and snacks. No, I just, I'm always kidding.

I mean, we just had Sean Stevenson in the store, in the shop. Yeah. And I was telling you, asking him a question in there. I wanted to hear about his experience with his kids. And I'm always looking for that, especially parents, like people that I can relate to as far as like, you know, the business, the success that he's had while also raising kids and everything like that. So can you remember the last thing or has there been anything? Not really. It's more like, because everybody has their own dynamic.

It's like unique to them. And like a lot of times it's, they do a lot. They're obsessive over multiple sports and traveling. And like, so a lot of the parents that I tend to hang out with are kind of like, I mean, they're very into what their kids doing, but then they're like gone. They're going to go take them to soccer. Now they're going to go take them to this traveling team and this one.

And like, I'm trying to, I'm trying to figure out how to kind of keep them focused on the one thing. And then, you know, we have a good. conversations about like their training and, you know, what they're doing nutrition-wise and all that kind of stuff. And they ask me a lot of questions about that. I mean, that's a good point, though, too. Okay, so I guess I can go to reframe this even differently. Yeah, I'm trying to think, like, life advice I don't really get from that. No, not even that.

So, like, maybe that's, like, because what you said, like, you learn from that, just you're doing the, like, I'm doing the opposite. Because I can, I, I could make cases for that, too, where I see, like, where I see, apparently, what not to do? You know what I'm saying? Like, can you remember the last thing that you've seen or that made you go, like, oh, I need, I need to pay attention to that because I don't want that. You know what's crazy on the data on some of that involvement?

Is they, so you guys know the whole like, you've heard this before, right? I see the stream that really puts on the family. So you guys have heard this, right? Like, when you're married, a mistake people often make is they place their children above themselves. Yeah. Or above each other. Yeah. So what you find in the data is when husband and wife prioritize each other above the kids, the kids have a better outcome.

Everybody has a better outcome. which is counterintuitive because when you have kids you love them so much and I can see in some ways you'll love them even more than your spouse in some ways because they're innocent, their kids, all that stuff, where it's like, no, no, kids come first. Kids come first. And when you look at the data, if you place your kids first, then actually they suffer as a result.

Do you know why I think that's so hard? I think that a lot of people are in tough marriages or relationships and then they have the kid and because the kid is so much to focus on it distracts them from the root root issues and then and then the relationship seems to get better because maybe the fighting isn't as bad or they're not they're not because they're busy

because they're busy and then they're both probably good people and they want to have a good kid and so they're both kind of attacking that and so they think that the kid is like helped the marriage but really all it really did was like put that to the side. Divorce Spike when kid moves out. So when the kid, and I bet you that's almost always

that's the relationship where that happens. It's like they never really addressed the problems in the relationship before the kids. The kids just created this great distraction. And because they both cared about being good parents so bad,

they just said, oh, we'll forget about our marriage and we'll just focus on this thing. I think that's a valid theory. I've seen data on this. So of course, we gotta go, you know, let's look at data. And if you have a not good relationship, adding kids to it typically makes it worse.

But here's what the data also shows that a good relationship can often get strained when a child is involved. And it's typically, well, let me ask you guys, who is the one that typically is challenged the most with placing the child above the marriage? Husband or wife, mom or dad. It's typically mom. And this is where that this is what the data shows. mom suddenly becomes a mom. Now my kids are everything. Yeah.

Husband is down here. Yeah. And so then husband becomes resentful towards mom. Doesn't know how to verbalize it because meanwhile, well, she's taking care of the kids. Right. But and then you feel selfish because you're like, well, you know, okay, well, she's with the kids. Sitting in the back seat. And this causes big problem.

And it's typically mom. And what makes it so challenging is if you tell a mom this, good luck. Yeah. Good luck saying, hey, you put your kids above your husband. She's like, well, yeah, it's my kids. You know, of course. They need more, you know, this, that and the other. So that's what the data shows.

I mean, a lot of the female clients that I trained, they were aware of that. Because I remember that being something that I would communicate when I get a mom that I was about to train. And it always hit home when I talk about, you know, your whole life, you probably put all these other people above yourself. And it's time to take care of yourself. Most of them were pretty aware of that. I'd have to say that in our house, it's, it's different. I wouldn't, uh, Katrina was like, I remember a part of what I think I was, you guys do a good job prioritizing each other.

Yeah, she, well, she was very adamant about that from day one. Like she was just like, makes time. Make sure that you guys. Yeah, she was always that, uh, it's us first, you know, it's us, it's us versus him versus like it's, it's him and then us. It's, it's us, you know. And so since day one, she's always, you know, prioritized, um, our related. And she's been good about that even before,

like, because I'd say our, you know, our work was our baby before, before having a son. And like, she's, I've always deferred that power and control of her like, hey, when, when you feel like we're not connecting enough or doing enough, like, you don't have to talk to me about it. You literally just plant, you just say, you're not, you're not going anywhere. We're going here on, and I'll always concede because I trust you to see that better than me, you know, and let me do what I do really well, which is bury myself and, you're not. of the thing for us and then and then you pull me up for error when you think that's awesome

do that. Yeah, Corny's always been good about that too. It's just like I think sometimes because we divide and conquering, we're like, we look at it so much that we're a team and that there's times too where it's like we have two kids. And so one has this event over here. And then, you know, one has this here and like how can we, you know, be most effective with this. And so sometimes we'll get into this like enough of these events happen where we're separate.

and we're separate, and then it becomes a bit of strain. And we don't realize that that's adding up. And so, like, to get on top of that and really prioritize the dating again, I think that's something where it slips, but we acknowledge it. I, I literally, once a week. We have to prioritize it. It sounds so silly, but it makes a huge difference. It's, you know, for us, I think it's easy.

But I've, I've often said this to Katrina, when I think about you guys with multiple kids, because I think about, like, one of the things that makes it really easy is that like at all times Katrina's mom is available for us to do that. But I don't know if I handed her a six-year-old and a newborn by herself. Or if you didn't have family like that. Yeah. Like so then it would be really, really tough.

Like we've always talked about it. It's like, man, we're really blessed that we've got family. We've got her mom. We've got. But it's like, but if we had two, it would throw a curveball in it because it's not like, I can't see her mom taking a newborn and max would be a lot. That's a lot for her mom, especially in an all day. like we can just take off for a day or two.

And so that would change this up a lot. And so I think that would, and then it only gets more as they get older and do sports in different directions. And it gets super complex. It's like, okay, when I have family nearby, well, okay, get a nanny. I can't afford a nanny.

Well, what do I do now? And so what some people will do is you'll have families doing life together and they'll work with each other. So, hey, you know, Wednesday nights, we'll take your kids. Thursday nights we'll take your kids. But it has to be a part of it. That's been a half. I guess if I want to go back to your original question about like with other parents, I started to be more open about offering that. Like we can take your kids of practice. We can, you know, provide whatever. Like they can stay at the hotel with us, you know, when we travel here. Like we offer it first as opposed to like, you know, just kind of. And they tend to give it back.

Yeah. And it's reciprocated. And it's been very helpful. Especially not we have to travel more with like the school. It's like 45. five minutes and, you know, it's been a pain. The scheduling has been a pain. Yeah. That helped. I wish, I mean, Sal, this isn't for you because you saw this, I think, better. Maybe you may, and I'm curious, Justin, if you, what you, you were like, like, I wish somebody would have communicated to me.

I probably would have been less of a pain in the ass to be with in my 20s and 30s. If someone would have really communicated the, the value of family with rage to get, it seems obvious, but it really, it really wasn't that. Yeah, give yourself some crap, though, bro. You didn't have the grass. I know, but like, I wish so, but I wish someone would have hammered that home to me because then I probably would have, I would have had way more patience, even when I didn't have a kid of the value of that, where I was such a little brat, like, of just like, I don't want

to do this. Like, this is, oh, like the, like, I really, me with the family. Yeah, yeah. Why are we, again? You were just there three days ago. Like, you know what I'm saying? Like, again, like, yeah, I don't want to go. Like, I was, I was such a little brat about that, but because I didn't.

I didn't until having my son, I didn't see that. And then I'm like, okay, I can't be alone of the only person who didn't realize how important and how valuable. And then just the power of that, the power of the family dynamic and community of having a grandmother and aunts and uncles that all have a relationship with him, not just for him and the value of what it's raised. But then to how this conversation started, just how important it is that we stay. Yeah, and I got to add something to this because you also are have become this, you particularly, or specifically, flexible with the fact that he's with people that may not completely mirror all of your exact, you know, like, you know, grandma's going to buy him a toy, give him some candy or, you know, maybe he'll watch more TV, whatever, because that could also be a problem. You could also be, no, we're not going over there because then it's not going to be exactly what I love. I find my, I resist. I've heard you talk about.

about that. Yeah, yeah. I resist that a little bit and I have to, and I know I have to, it's easier now that he's at six, because I feel like I've built a foundation. Sure. It was harder when he was like two, three, four when I felt like I was laying that foundation. I feel like, but I've heard you over the years, I've heard you go through this process. Yeah, it's been a process. It's been a process. And I'm sure a lot of other parents struggle with this when you, when you're, when you're trying to lay this, this, this new, these new set of values or foundations or beliefs or nutritional habits or movement habits or non-television habits with your child.

And if they're integrated into a family that doesn't value any of those things very much, it can be really challenging. But what I love is that if, you know, it was a little bit of a push and pull for the first, you know, five, six years. Once you establish that, it's actually really easy. It's so cool. Like it's so cool to hear stories of them. telling me like hey we asked him if you want to go to McDonald's he's like no I don't eat that or I

don't want that it's just like ha ha ha ha you know make the kid happy yeah no I love I mean I love it I love that they they can offer or try those things and they realize that he doesn't even care that's my son does it have red dye yeah yeah yeah no it's I absolutely love that he can that he's like but it wasn't like that so but I get you for sure speaking of integration whatever I I have now, I've told you this last couple times. So green juice now has made it into my regular daily repertoire. We have it here in the studio. I've been using it pretty daily.

And it's interesting. Every time I use it consistently, I'm always like, why did I stop? And the first, it's a nice feel good product. Yeah. And we talked earlier about- Just need reminders. Yeah. Yeah.

And we talked earlier about probiotics. What goes along with that is creating an environment that fosters good bacteria growth. And the, you know, the organified green juice is one of the things that'll do that. It'll feed good bacteria. Would you pay a premium for it to be in a ready to drink? I'd drink it. Yes, but I wonder if they'd have to add things to prevent it from, you know, degrading or something like that. There's complications with keeping things in liquid form versus it being, you know, freeze dried or in a dried powder in terms of shelf life.

Oh, I wonder if that would be. Yeah. Because I don't know any company that has a ready to drink green juice. There are, but they have like a shelf life typically. and it's not this, it's not, yeah, yeah. Because I know I would. Because it's real food. I would pay a premium for that.

Yeah, they're perishable, usually like. I know it, I know it would ramp the cost of extremely high, though. I mean, I think the average person would be like, forget that. Give me the power. But they're so convenient. You get the little packets. Yeah. I know, but look at, even look at, I mean, look at your elements, you guys all drink.

Like, now that we have the ready to drinks? I know. When was that time you mixed a packet? I'm a sucker. Oh, we do it at home all time. Oh, do you guys? Oh, I still, I rarely. Now that they have the ready to drinks.

I mean, the only way you'll get me using the packets now is if my ready to drinks are gone. If I actually dip through all of them and it's like, oh, damn, I'm out. Now I got to use the packet. Because I love the fact. No, I use the, I use the little organify packets, the little single serving. Yeah, yeah. I mean, those are. To a bottle of water and you're saying.

Yeah. I don't. Yeah, the bottle of water makes it. I typically don't have one of those bottles with me. That's why. I think that's why I'm bringing that up is like, I'm always like, look, you know, ever since we moved to the new house. One of the, like, there's a couple things that I did.

And I know, Justin, you're in the middle of still building yours. I can't stress to you these little details of making sure as you are building your thing from ground up. You have the, like having a purified water on tap. Oh, yeah. One of my biggest pet peeves was filling up water jugs or water bottles all over my house all time. Oh, my God. I just. That's one of the first things in the morning.

And so Courtney's done a really good job of like, like, we don't have any plastic bottle. Like, I'm the worst. Like, I'll go buy a plastic water bottle. because I'm just like convenience first. But so I'm there like helping her get the kids ready for school and filling up their water ball. And it's like they don't fit like in there perfectly. So you can't just leave it in there.

You know, like I want one that's like big enough so you can have like a big. Yes. So it's easy to put in there. But yeah, such a pain, dude. You have reverse osmosis? Yes. Do you remineralize? Does it add minerals to it out?

I have the one that Doug has. So I don't know if that was. Yeah. No, you have to add that to your. So you could buy trace minerals and add a couple drops to like a couple gallons of water and get it in there. That's what I do. Yeah. Otherwise, it's just water. Yeah.

So is that necessary if I'm still doing things like element and green juice? Probably not. Yeah, as I was going to say, I didn't think it was that big of a deal if I was doing if I was doing stuff like that. Obviously, that was the only thing I drank, but I drink, I always get an element or a green juice in a day. But I mean, the little things like that, I'll tell you, like, I think about all these little corky. That would be a hack for me for sure. And it's not crazy. It wasn't crazy expensive.

It was just a matter of planning it. Like, hey, this sink is going to be dedicated. to the water purifier. Well, it's that and it's the charging station, like specifically. I have that all mapped out because it's just like the kids' devices and things for school and all these things. And like, dude, I need it organized and I need it all in one place. Plus, then I could be like put it in the charging station and then it's dedicated to that.

So the rest of like the house, it's like there's no electronics anywhere else. I'm passing almost a year, right, of being in this place. And if you were to ask me to list these things, it would be all these. these corky, dorky, dimmers. I have dimmers on every light switch in the entire house. That's a big deal. Which is like, it's such a little thing. Yeah, but it's such a dumb little thing that like, they don't build the house like that

unless you say something. Like you're like, I want every light switch in here to have a dimmer. Every single light switch in the entire house has a dimmer to it. The stupid, you know, reverse osmosis water thing. I've got the, the cubed, like, slushy ice, which was like such a big deal. The little, the little tight, yeah, like that's a huge deal. You know what I'm saying? It's like, these are the things that I go like,

This was the best investment ever. You know what? To the light dimmer thing. If you don't put the right light bulbs in your lights with that, if one of them is wrong, you'll get this weird, sometimes flickering thing going on, which I have to figure out now in my house. Because it happens in my house. It's like one of these lights is, the light bulbs is doing this. I learned from our truckie place because of all the light bulbs switching me.

I did. That was the other thing I did. When I bought, it was like I stocked up on like backup plan. I have a backup storage for every bulb in the place. so that if that happens. This is the most dad conversation. I know. No,

the only thing more of that is like talking about barbecue or directions. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Or new shoes that you don't need to lace. What kind of in acids are you taking? Well, I just think, because I know Justin's in the thick of this right now.

And I literally, we just roll, I can't believe it's been a year. We just rolled past a year at our place. And, you know, I mean, I love all of it.

And it's awesome. It's beautiful, blessed all the things. But it's like, when I actually think of the things that like, those little things. Yeah, that give me the,

most joy. They're not things that cost the most amount of money. It's just thinking through that, like, I value that a lot. And like your charging station's a great example of that. Like making sure you have something like that, you're like, oh, this is such a, well, it's just the, yeah, I think the, the, the, the, everything has to have a place. And that, that's my mentality, like, going into a new place. Like, I want organization and like, cohesion. And, you know, limb taking shoes off. It's like, you put it right here, right? Because it's like, this pile that I'm constantly like, God bless my wife. She is so. God.

She's gifted. You don't care about none of that stuff. Well, I care about it, but I suck at it. I'm just not good. That's good for it. I want somebody else to do it for me. I'm so blessed. The clutter kills me.

So my wife is so gifted in how she designs and organizes the house so that it's both aesthetic and it's also practical. And she makes things look so like I would be the worst. Oh my God. My house would be bare walls. there'd be just chairs and tables and nothing. Yeah, I'm a little neurotic with that. Are you?

Yeah, you'll see. It's very design, like, heavy. I don't have an eye for that at all. I don't think I do either. But I value it and appreciate it, you know what I'm saying? Well, I know you and Jessica and you would share picture. She likes to send you stuff. Yeah, I'm an idiot.

So, Adam, do you like this? Yeah, she's like, okay, see. It's good. You were reminding me. You just reminded me of something about, like, little quirky things. my grandmother used to have toilet seats that were cushioned. Yeah. Do you remember those?

I had a grandmother that had those. I love those. Because they stay warm. Do they make those anymore? Cushy tush. Probably. Oh, they have to. They have to be somebody who...

I'm going to buy some. Okay, but you know what thing I never understood was the carpet around it. Why would you ever do that? I have carpet around the toilet every time you fly. That's still a thing. That's still a thing where you have the carpet right there. Because of your feet. You want them to be warm or whatever.

Yeah. No, cushion toilet seats. You know what I didn't do? I didn't do in the house because I actually didn't do a lot of, I would have if I redid bathroom floors and toilets. I didn't redo those.

When I do, I will do heated floors and a heated toilet seat. Because that, I get up and pee and go to the bathroom and I sit all in the middle of it. And there's nothing like,

we're winters here now. There's nothing like cold, cold ass cheeks on a seat at two o'clock in the morning. I can't believe you. You're like the most confident man I remember. I know. That just loves to talk about how he sits down to pee. respect.

Just like, oh, there you go. There's your cushion seat. Whoa, whoa, there's a $91 seat. What does that one do? Yeah, I don't know how it's a gel seat. Oh, you know what?

Super comfy on your, ooh. You know what I think is what seems kind of weird about them, Sal is the cleaning, the cleaning of it. You'd have to have a material that really wipes good clean. It's vinyl. It's vinyl. Yeah, just spray it down with some lysol. And you're good.

But they stay warmer. That's what's nice about those. You need a Japanese. toilet seat. A Japanese toilet. The crazy ones that have like a new button. They have heated seats. They have bidet.

They have air drying, all that. They're almost too much. Yeah. I've seen some. Hold on. You air dry your butthole after you, you, you, you, you, well, yeah, if you have a Japanese toilet, they'll do the whole thing. Yeah.

It has like a blower on her and everything. Yeah, yeah. You want to, you want to dry. You've seen those before. I have, but I've never air. They sit there. Nice little brown eye whispers. I mean, there's times.

There's times where it would be like, it would be nice to. to have that, but that's like, you got time. You know those dad moments where you go to the bathroom and you're like going to the bathroom to get peace? And so you're planning on like a 30 minute restroom break? Like that's where a toilet like that's awesome. You know what I'm saying? I've been banned from the long toilet visits.

Can't do it anymore. It was such a huge fight. Oh, I did so bad. It's your safe space, dude. Yeah, but it's just you. You submitted, huh? You gave up. I stuck my ground on that.

She makes good point. This is, this is a steak. I staked in the government. You want a she. I'll field you a shit and shit. You're not taking this away from me. You can't have a lot of areas. You can't take this for me.

This is my time. This is my only time. I need to get away. She made good points. All right, fine. You know why? You abused it. You faked it too many times.

It's not even that. It's just you're there. So it's just like, you know, nobody's around. Where is he? Yeah. And he just don't realize I slope. You got to be a little elusive, a little mysterious. That's all.

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With that link, you'll get a free sample pack of their most popular drink mixed flavors with any purchase. Back to the show. Our first caller is Jerry from New York. Jerry, what's up, ma'am? How you doing? What's going on, guys? It's happening. Good.

How's it going? How can we help you? here we are so um guys sent the email in a few more uh lap out a bunch of golf listen i can't put weight on no matter what i do i've done every freaking split you can imagine i eat like a house but i also move a lot super active i do like 18 000 steps a day yep you know i play ball i play basketball once or twice a week oh that too huh um what's that you do that too on top of all i do well that's a lot on top of that um but i'm in construction i'm in the construction i'm in the construction the city so you know I'm lifting sheetrock all day you know metal studs it's just it's just a ton of

stuff that I do but no matter what I do I right now focus on on compound movements you know two or three times a week about 45 minutes in and out decent rest periods you know a minute and a half to three minutes figure I eat 3,500 calories a day I don't I can't get results no matter what I do you're not getting stronger either Jerry I wouldn't say that I can I would definitely say I'm definitely stronger than I've ever been ever you're Even in my 20s, I'm stronger now in my mid-40s than I was now. Good, good. Strength is going to lead to size eventually.

So at that point, then it becomes a calorie gain. There's a couple things you could do. You could stop the basketball, but if it sounds like you enjoy it. So, yeah, I won't tell you to do that. The other thing you could do is do less in the gym. I wouldn't do more than two days a week. Three days a week is probably too much. And then I would really consistently, consistently,

every single day, eat 35 plus 100 calories. Because what's probably happening, and I'd love your feedback on this or your opinion, is you're probably some days eating 35, some days eating three or 25, sometimes eating four. So it might not be averaging as many calories as you think. That typically is what happens with people.

So I would always go 35 minimum up to 4,000, lift two days a week. And if you keep getting stronger, the muscle will come on your body. You're literally describing, I mean, I wasn't in construction, but I was carrying weights around all day as a personal trainer, eight to 10 hours a day. So like you, I was burning, or I was making 15, 20,000 steps every day. Then I was training three to four times a week. And then I was playing basketball at least two times a week.

And same boat just couldn't. And I mean, I think I was eating like 4,000 calories. And I just felt like I couldn't gain it all. A couple strategies that a bit controversial that I'll share that work for me. I just, I had to find places to sneak in calories. And so this was a time where I started drinking like the fully loaded sugar rock stars like pre-basketball. I know that's terrible health advice. But I mean, I had to find ways that I could sneak in an extra 400 calories.

And I tried to make sure I did it when I was doing activity like that. Because when you're playing ball, I'm sure you could play for a good hour. two hours plus at high intensity like that. I mean, that's super aerobic. And that tells your body it's tough to build muscle while you're doing something. And so the one thing that will help it is it ensure that you're not still going to have a hard time, but we'll help it is making sure you slam some liquid calories right before and right afterwards.

Now, in a perfect world, you do something healthy. You blend a shake and you have some fruit. And that would be the ideal advice. But I know how, you know, I don't know what it looked like for you. but playing basketball it was sometimes last minute. I'm in the gym, like, oh, the right guys are playing.

I'm like, I just grab my sneakers and I go right in and then I'm playing. Like, a lot of times the only option I had was, oh, in the refrigerator they had a, you know, rock star. I just grab real quick and I would pound it. So some, that a lot of times will help you sneak those calories in when you need it most right before you play.

And just to add to that, you know, if you have sugar before you're very active, it does, and this is controversial, but this is just what the data shows, it largely negates what we would consider the negative effects of that sugar intake. So the insulin spike and all that, like if you have, even if it was juice,

which is the same thing, people are almost the same thing. Because you're so active right afterwards, you don't get a lot of the negative effects that you might get from a large intake of sugar. The other thing you could do, Jerry, is if you could have dairy, are you okay with dairy?

Yeah, that doesn't bother me that much. Oh, bro. If you had, if you took a, if you had a, if you had a, of whole milk every day, you know, with your meals. You drink a glass of whole milk with every meal. That's an easy 400 extra calories plus protein in that. And that's real easy.

That's a real easy way to add extra calories. And it doesn't feel like you're eating a ton more food. I mean, the common thing you're hearing from us right now is like sneaking in these liquid calories, which is kind of the opposite of what we normally tell people. But when you're in this situation, yeah, when you're in this situation, and you already feel like you eat a lot of food, it's tough to just eat more food. You're already stuffed. And so find in places that you can slide in the extra to 400 calorie drinks. Like even if it's like after a meal, slamming that milk down or right before you work out or right before you go play

ball, slamming that sugar drink. Like those things will, because it is, it's purely a calorie thing. You just, if you ate, let's just say, you know, for argument's sake, 5,000 calories every single day. You'd gain weight. You just would. But it's like you move so much and you're active. you play ball. You're just at a place where it's really tough to stay consistently. And then the other thing I would also say, we didn't ask you, but it's so, so paramount that you hit protein consistently. So I don't know if you do, if you're good about that or not, but that's.

Yeah, I'm up. I'm around 185. I'm around 180 to 190 in, uh, grams of protein per pound of body weight. Consistently. If you do that consistently and then just sneaking those calories in, you'll be good. That's the secret to this. Yep.

And you, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, suggest that you suggest just do the compound movements, the five compound movements. That's it. Yeah, you're actually. I had back surgery, so I try to be careful. So I do the trap, I do the trap ball overhead. I'll do some sort of row, not consistently like a bent over row, but whether machine row.

And then I'll do goblet swats because it's either my back or heel elevated. And then I do some sort of, uh, but in this one. I don't know. You do, and I think you're good. You're, yeah. Did you see our, did you hear our, our great eight episode? We put eight exercise on there. Yeah.

And there's a couple you could modify, uh, like, barbell squat if that bothers you can modify that especially if there's a belt squat if you go to a gym with a belt squat that's great for people with back issues but yeah so the one way the one that's the machine right it's got belt hooked up to it that's right it's a really really good replacement you can load it a lot and it doesn't put

that stress on that low back so it's a it's a great option so are Bulgarians split squats too so there's a lot of other things you can do like that that's a but I actually when you said what you were doing lifting wise I don't think you're far off from an ideal workout like you're only training three times a week. I think Sal's right, maybe scale a little bit back, but you're only in there 45 minutes. You're doing the big lift. You're doing the good

lifts. I don't think it's your workout. I think it's purely calories. It's just getting in enough calories consistently. And not putting too much body fat on with that, right? Well, yeah, if you go crazy with it, you'll put on a ton of body fat. But right, honestly, I think, let's just say for, you know, the conversation, you were averaging 3,500 calories a day. That was your actual average every day. You went up to 4,000. You're not going to gain body. fat. You'll just build muscle. Okay. You know, 500 extra calories a day.

He's not going to make your fat. Right. All right. That's perfect. Yep. Yeah, you got it, man. Yeah. Keep us posted, Jared. I'm curious, I'm curious how this goes for you. I know how challenges can be trying to eat like this. Oh, I definitely will. I'm going to, I'll give you some progress updates. I appreciate it. Yeah.

You got it, my friend. All right, bro. Get back to work. Thanks. Thanks. Thanks, guys. Bye-bye. Yeah. Oh, sorry. Could he be more New York? Yeah.

While we're talking, he's looking around. Who's looking at him? What are you looking at over there? Very shifty. Yeah. No, listen, it's a uncommon question from a middle-aged man. You don't often hear that. This is usually teenage boys go through this.

Yeah. But I've worked with the occasional blue-collar worker. And the amount of activity that they do is insane. And if you pair that with two days of basketball a week? I know. And when you're playing pickup ball, you're playing for hour and a half, two hours easily every time. And high intensity.

So you're burning, man. I remember as a kid, you know, 16-year-old kid who works out and is fit, and in the summers I'd work with my dad. And I would be toasted by the end of the day. It's just what I just wasn't used to it. And these, you know, 50-year-old men would smoke me because for 20 years, what they've been doing, you know?

So it's very, you're just active. All work, work, work, work all day long. It's a tremendous amount of calories. Yeah, I'm going to add one more thing if he listens to this. That's a bit also another controversial piece of advice for someone who's asking a question like this. He's at 13 to 15% body fat. Sometimes what I'll do, I will go in a little cut first.

Because he's already struggling to hit calories. And then I'd say if that's really hard right now, why don't we do this? Let's just keep your diet tight. Stay hit the protein intake. Allow yourself to lean out even more and get down to like 7, 8% body fat and then go the other direction. And sometimes just going in that deficit for a while like that creates that appetite. We're like, oh, my God, I'm so hungry. You know, the challenge with that is he may notice fatigue at work and all that stuff.

But honestly, he also might have been. recomping. If he's getting stronger with what he was doing, just moving slow. He's just not seeing the scale go on. You know, it's great gradual. Our next caller is Luke from Tennessee. Hey, what's up, man? How you doing? How you guys doing?

A pleasure to be here. I love the show and thanks for taking my call today. You got it. You got a professional setup there. What you do? I'm in sales. It's kind of work from home type gig. I'm kind of in the field and out on the road a lot.

Nice. But yeah. Well, thank you. So, yeah, just to kind of get into it, I could just go through my email real quick. You know, basically I've been lifting off and on since high school. I'm 43 years old now. You know, pretty usual throughout my life, kind of yo-yoed up and down and wait a little bit. But over the past year, I really buckled down and solidified more fitness as a habit.

And it's really helped. I started doing MAPS, Santa Baltic Advanced. I did that. I just finished that actually about a week and a half ago. and I was kind of looking where to go next. So I reached out to one of your reps, and they recommended Maps 15 advanced. I was a little bit curious about that,

just going from the amount of volume and Maps Anabolic going to Maps 15, and if that's going to be something that's going to, I don't know, if I can modify it, or because my goal right now is to get up to 190 pounds, and I'm at 183 right now. So, I don't know, should I modify it? or should I just stick with the plan and go with it as is,

or is there a different program that you would recommend? Well, let's get to the bottom of why they probably went that way to you. Tell me a little bit about lifestyle, like what your work. I mean, sounds like you do work at home sitting at a desk. So what else are you got going on? Kids, what do you got anything else? What do you got? Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah, I got kids. I actually coached their 10 youth softball team. And we just started basketball. So I'm coaching basketball this year, too. So our softball season just ended yesterday. So a little bit more time on my hand in the evenings. But yeah. How's your sleep?

But sleep's good. Typically around seven, seven and a half hours a night. Awesome. And then you did, now, you did MAPS Anabolic Advanced. Okay, so that's the one where you train a failure on one week, the next week, higher volume. Right. So, well, so this is the one starts out with the strength phase. Yep.

We're just really low reps, high, high weight. And then it goes kind of intermediate. No, so that's... Raises up to wreck. That's the traditional MAPS enabolic. So you did the three-day-a-week version of it is what you're saying. Three-day-a-week, yes. Got it, got it.

And then the last phase was like 30 seconds of rest in between sets. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was kind of a grind. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And how did you progress through that? Great. The first two phases, I was progressing awesome. You know, I was reversed dieting at the same time.

I'm up to about 4,300 calories, 4,400 calories right now a day, and I'm maintaining 183 pounds. But throughout those first two phases, that was really, is really gaining a lot of strength, a lot of muscle. And things are going great. Like I said, that third phase was kind of a grind. But got through it. And of course, I had to lighten the weight up a little bit. Of course, yeah.

Just to make sure that I can get through. Well, you guys is a higher rep count too. Of course, of course. So here's what I think you should do. And here's what I think's going to happen. I think if you follow Maps 15, the free weight version, which we would say the advanced version, I think what's going to happen at 4,300 calories,

moving out of phase three from Maps and a ball at three. days a week is you're going to see your strength go up quite a bit. If you see your strength go up by the second week, you're on the right program. If you don't get stronger, then we can add some volume. But I don't think that's going to happen. I think you're going to go into it and you're just going to get stronger and stronger and you're probably going to gain weight, especially at 4,300 calories. Sounds like you have a faster metabolism. Yeah. So guys with the faster metabolism tend to do better with a lower volume type of program. It seems counterintuitive, but it's probably why they led you that direction is if you're

eating 4,300 calories and you're not really gaining weight, they're probably trying to reduce your volume and see if you can just actually build from a lesser volume program. And I think it's a great idea. I think it's a great strategy. I think you're going to see strength gains right away. It'll feel like you're not doing a lot, but you'd be blown away how little you have to do to stay on. I mean, I don't know if you've heard us.

I remember when we first created that program, and I think it was the first one to go through it. I remember telling the guys, like, this is wild. This feels like so little amount of volume for me, but I'm building. I'm gaining. It's, uh, it's surprising. What's your natural body type?

Would you say tall and lean, a lot of relent lean, but let's say skinny? Yeah. Tall and lean. Like, I'm 6.1, you know, 183 pounds. Uh, now, of course, this time last year, I was about 230 pounds.

So I grinded my way down to where I am right now. Okay. You know, so I'm just trying to build back up, but do it in the right way. I want to maintain my 10 to 12% body fat that I've gotten to, but I still want to get up to about that 190 pound one. Man, you've done a killer job. If you came from 230, you're eating 4,300 calories. You're down to 10. I mean, you've done a hell of a job.

Yeah, yeah. You did a good job. Yeah, I think what I'll predict that with Mass 15 barbell version, you're going to see some really consistent strength gains. And then from there, you could go back to Maps Anabolic. or you could try symmetry or even MAPS 15 performance would be another program. But if you see the strength gains coming, you're going in the right direction. That's the best signal. That's like, okay, I'm going in the right direction and I'm going to start building muscle.

I wouldn't, I wouldn't be surprised if you gained three to four pounds of lean body mass by the end of that program. Wow. Okay. And keeping the calories the same too. That's the nice part about where going to MAPS 15 is you probably don't need to increase like that. Now, if I saw you after two weeks and you feel good, you feel strong, but you're not gaining any weight, I would bump your calories. So if we, if we like hit week two and you're like, okay, I feel good. I'm feeling stronger, but the scales kind of still hovering around 183, then we have room to still try and bump if you can.

But I know 4,300 calories is a lot. That's good problem to have, though. Yeah, it is a lot. And I was kind of curious about that. And that was kind of the second part of my question, which you guys kind of answered already. Like, is there a limit to how far you can reverse? diet like that? No, I mean, there is,

when you start having adverse effects from it. Yeah. You start, you know, stool is off or you just, you feel bloated, all the time, like you don't feel good. Yeah, interrupt your sleep. But if you feel good, yeah, there's no limit. I mean, if you, as long as you keep feeling good and better on your way up. I generally have never seen anybody a guy, unless they were like a competitive bodybuilder,

you know, get up to north of 5,000 calories and stay lean, generally speaking. and those individual variants out there. But you're reaching that top, you know, kind of tier. So I bet, like I said, I think if you keep it there, you're going to see some nice lean body mask gains. Awesome. Great. Yeah. Well, I really appreciate it, guys.

Yeah, I love to hear back from you, too. You're on such a cool path right now. You know, let's have you back on. How's that sound? Let's have you back on in a few months. I want to see how you did with 15. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

All right, brother. See you then. Yep. Take it easy, man. Thank you. Y'all too. Bye. Yeah.

Would you have, okay, so... 230 down to 183 and 10%. That's awesome. If his calories were low... We say he's 4,300. 43. Yeah. So 43 at 10 to 12% body fat.

6-1-183 pounds, I think you said. Awesome place to do. Lower volume is the name of the game. Yep. Someone like that. Yeah, so I don't know who he talked to on our team, but that's good advice. Yeah, it's good advice.

Yep. I mean, and here, we've talked at nauseam already about how little volume it takes to even maintain. So he's not going to lose. That's for damage. No, no, no. Like what he won't do is go backwards, which is always the fear when you're that guy, right? You've been doing all this volume.

You've been trained this much. You've got to this point. You're like, wait a second. They're telling me to do less work. It's so easy to add to. Right. The other thing, too, is he said, and this feels like this feels like this feels like for me, MAPS Anabolic being a kind of foundational program.

But phase three, he's like, I grinded my way through that. Yeah. So it's going to be a nice break on his body and allow his body to, you know, pack on some muscle. It's funny, too. I was literally reading an article today with Kevin Lerroney. Remember him from the night? 90s. And he said he never could really get away with really high reps because his metabolism was so fast. He couldn't build the muscle that he needed as a pro bodybuilder. Of course,

we're talking about a pro bodybuilder here because he was such a fast metabolism. Our next caller is Andrew from Canada. What's up, Andrew? I recognize you, man. How are you doing? Make sure I can talk here. Holy shit. How can we help you, man? I'll do like everyone else and read my email because I don't know what else I'm supposed to do. Oh, hi, mind pump crew. I need help solving my problem. I'm turning 36 this year, 5-7, hover around 200 currently. I've historically worked out improperly since high school, never longer than three to six months at a time. I have consistently played a sport, whether it be soccer, basketball, ice hockey, racket sports. Also skateboarded, bike, rollerbladed, BMX, skate park kind of stuff, which obviously beat the hell out of my legs. February 1st of 24 I blew my Achilles playing basketball

this was a huge blow to my life on many levels mental battle being the hardest one to come back from still bugs me every day fast forward to today I've been working out consistently since about May of 2024

that's when I was cleared by my physiotherapist to start resistance training in order to get myself back to normal or some sort of normal. Basically, we set a goal that I wanted to be able to return to playing basketball as soon as possible. So this led me to training my legs three days a week for about five to six months. From listening to you guys, I know I definitely was over training.

I would incorporate upper body stuff eventually here and there, but my main goal was getting my legs as strong as possible so that I could get back to playing basketball. I eventually added agility and mobility training in order to get back in game shape, just basically to get back. At some point, my physiotherapist, who's also a friend, found a protocol for Achilles ruptures from an NCAA school. 24, I passed that with flying colors. So by November of 2024, we set a protocol in place for me to return to basketball.

and with a minutes progression per quarter type thing so that I didn't go overboard because I have a tendency of doing that. I played my first full game in January 2025 and haven't slowed down since. Sorry, guys, I'm sweating like a page right now. I'm figuring where it was here. Followed a couple different workouts using past knowledge and also an app called Coachify AI.

Results varied listening to you guys. I was sold on Maps Anabolic, so there was a bundle with that in the six-pack abs, so I bought that. Eventually did Maps Anabolic recently finished Phase 3 and perplexed at my results. I also purchased Maps Prime around that time and used that every day. I spent about eight weeks prior starting the Anabolic Program in the pre-phase in order to really dial in on some techniques and to get comfortable with a bunch of the lifts. So going through the phases, phase one, I got stronger and basically every lift, I started squatting around 135. By the end of phase one, I was hitting 225 comfortably. Bench went from 95 to 170.

And deadlift went up similarly to the squat, maybe a bit more, a bit less. Other lifts went up. I never really, I don't remember what happened with those exactly. Then I went through phase two and three and often questioned whether I was, selecting the right weights and using the right intensity. I found myself eventually becoming extremely fatigued most days and have random unexpected aches and pains in either muscles, joints, or both. Adding to that predominantly my hands.

Throughout this process, I visited with my family doctor, got blood work done on two separate occasions, February and June of 2025. and I do have those results if you guys want to know specifically testosterone is where my brain keeps going based on your podcast. My weight changed from 190 to 200 pounds in that process, but I don't feel leaner. I know I gain strength because my lifts went up, but I feel like I regress rapidly after making gains early on.

I followed the anabolic program two days a week because that's what my life fits and eventually couldn't even muster up enough energy to go more than once a week near the end. Some days, even stretching and mobility work feels like it's too much. Going back to my doctor, she thinks that I'm doing everything correctly and I just need to proceed as I've been doing, whereas listening to your podcast every day makes me wonder what I'm missing. Am I being inpatient? Where did I go wrong? Yeah, good. Blood work came back okay, by the way? So I'll pull that up real quick.

The only one that I wrote down to mention is the testosterone. So the range they tested was 8.4 to 29 nanomoles per liter. February, it was at 9.4, really low. And then June, I went up to 12.7. Okay, so it's going up. Okay. So it was just too much. That's classic signs of, so when you, maps anabolic,

phase one is the lowest volume of all of the phases. Even though it's heavy, the reps are low and you don't hit the same areas each time you work out. In other words, like one day might be bench. The next time would be overhead press. When you get to phase two, you start doing full body each time. Phase three, the volume really ramps up. So I would, Maps 15 would probably be the program that would have you continuously progress. I was thinking Mass 15 performance just because it's basketball.

Oh, Mass 15 performance would be great. Yeah. That would probably be the ideal amount of volume with your lifestyle and how your body is responding. That's why you saw good progress in phase one. Yeah, bro, you're doing pretty good overall. I mean, this is also part of, you know, the process, too. I mean, you've made a lot of really good strides in the right direction. I mean, to recover from Achilles alone is, I know what that's like.

That's a pain in the ass. And then to get where you're at weight-wise to see strength go up and all of your lifts. You had a little bit of a setback, but I think to Sal's point, just classic over just a little bit too much volume for where you're currently at, especially if you're coupling that with men's basketball, like what's a typical week for you playing ball? When I'm not on the road working like I am right now, I usually work out Tuesday mornings and then men's basketball is Thursday night.

Okay. And then what do you mean on the, on the, on the, when you're traveling for work, what does that look like? And how often? So it's typically one week per month. I'm out on the road, staying in a hotel, eating at restaurants. When I'm on the road, I typically do find a gym to play basketball once and work out once if I'm able to to stay consistent with my routine. That is, of course, during figure skating season for my daughter.

When figure skating season is done, then I can get to the gym twice a weekend. So play basketball. Okay. And you, and how does sleep normally for you? I'm a father of five ranging from 17 years old down to 14 months. So sleep is broken. Well, there's the answer. That's another full-time job, dog.

That's more than a full-time job. Five kids. God bless you, by the way. With a blessing. That's amazing. Yeah, Mass 15 performance and Mass. 15 are the programs you need to live in. That's your workout, bro.

Especially with broken sleep, all those kids. You work a full-time job. One week you're gone. on adding just a bunch of strength training. It's just not your body's not going to respond well to it. That's why phase one works so well for you. By the way, in phase one, to go from 135 to 225 in what was that, your squat. Yeah.

That's a dramatic increase in volume by itself. Even though the sets were the same, you went up 90 pounds in a single lift. Your bench press went from 95 to 170. That's almost double. You almost doubled your strength. Yeah. So if you go Mass 15 performance and Mass 15 and you just go back and forth between those two, you're probably going to see nice, consistent progress.

And I don't think you need to add anything else until your life changes dramatically, which you got a 15-month-old kid. It's not going to be like that for the four years. And don't make the mistake when you start feeling better to try and do more. No, no, no. Feeling good is a good sign. Yeah, stay in that. Stay in that place and hover around that.

I think that's where you need to be. But a mistake I make is all of a sudden they start feeling good. like, oh, yeah, and they start ramping it up and start doing more. It's like, no, just. I'm glad I asked, too. You said, you know, as soon as you told me had five kids and all that stuff, it's like, oh, yeah. Yeah, that confirms it. Yeah, that confirms it.

So with Maps 15, how do I make that work if I'm going one day a week? You're only, okay, so you're only able to go to the gym one day a week. I could go more, but I don't want to sacrifice family time, so I choose not to. Gotcha. Right. Do any, any, would you, because what it looks like is about a 15 to 20 minute workout with a barbell. Do you have access? Do you have any equipment at home?

I mean, he could choose to do one day of mass performance. Just pick, pick to work at one, one, and that's all it done. That's another way to do it. Yeah. That'd be another way to do it. Or use the suspension trainer in Mass 15, the original. And then you'd use a suspension trainer on the days you're not in the gym. And then one day you go to the gym and use a barbell would be the other way to do it.

I have no equipment at home right now. I'm working my way back to getting some. I sold it all to my brother a few years ago. I mean, that's not a bad, okay, if you, if, if I'm trying to be home around my family kids, that's primary, like the focus here. So that's the reason why I'm only going to the gym one or two days a week. Then Sal's idea of, you know, $80 map suspension, like suspension is super cheap. You buy one time you're set and you can literally do the whole program from home. That's right.

So you're right there. And you do it, do 15, it's 15 minute increments. So you literally sneak away for 15 minutes, you know, strap. And then the one day you go to the gym, you could do the barbell. version. And that's the original mass 15 is what I would do then. All right, guys, I lost you for about 15 seconds there. No problem. What you would do is you would use the suspension trainers on the day you're home. And the one day you go to the gym, you would do the barbell workout. But each time is about 15 to 20 minutes. Or literally never go to the gym except for to play ball. That's right. You could also do

every workout with a suspension trainer. Yeah. Okay. I do like going to the gym, sorry to interrupt you. Because I like the, we'll say the camaraderie, you're seeing the same people all the time, just using equipment. Would you prefer to do an hour workout once a week instead? That's what I do right now. Okay. So you would like to keep it that way? It's working.

Let's do this then. Let's give you maps performance instead. We're going to switch it out. And you're going to pick, you got me there? I'm not sure what you said after I said it's working. No words. I'll give you maps performance. Okay.

Stay out of the last phase. You're going to go to just the first few phases. don't do the last phase and do one foundational workout once a week. The next week, do the next foundational workout. The next week, do the next foundational workout. And that's what you're going to do. Okay. And when life kind of goes outside of figure skating season, then I can kind of follow the program.

It's going to be a while, bro. It's going to be a while. I think that'll be ideal for you for a long time, dude. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I mean, I tell you what, reach back out to us in, you know, in a year of doing that. Like, you should stay there for quite some time. That's right.

And if you find a, honestly, if you find a little more time, then do the mobility days at home. So like stick to one day of the foundational lifting at the gym, since that's what's working really well for you. And those, that's a good program for playing sports and everything you got going on. And then if you feel ambitious, you have good,

you could literally do a lot of the mobility work right there at your house. So you could just, so the mobility stuff, you can add that throughout the week and that'll help you. Okay. Yep. That's amazing. We'll send that to you,

we'll send that over to you. I appreciate that greatly and I appreciate your time. Of course. Andrew, are you already, I can't, I know you and I have talked before online. Are we talking in Facebook or on Instagram? Where do I know I talk to you at?

I sent a question in a while ago on Instagram. Okay. So we'll put you in the private forum too. So we have access to you and you can just reach out to us. I think we lost them. I did put it on the show. That's the extent though. All right.

We're going to put you in the forum too, brother. Oh, I'm back. I can hear you guys. Yeah. We'll put you in the forum. That's amazing. You got it, man. All right.

Thanks for calling in. Thank you. I really appreciate the, perspective you guys give on being a father. Yeah. No, that's God bless you, man. Yeah, yeah. Five kids, 36 years old, you're doing good things.

You're the man. Appreciate it. All right, Andrew. Take it easy. Take care of guys. That's great. Yeah, as soon as he said, I have five kids. On top of, like, he's looking at labor.

Top is at top of his job. Yeah, yeah. I mean, 36 with five kids, you know, that's. Yeah. So his kids are like, pop, pop, pop, pop, up, all the way up. That's a lot, dude. Parents need to understand.

Well, I think parents get it. But I think what happens when you're parent is you do all this stuff with all your kids. And then you look at a workout and you judge it based off of what somebody without kids and not that responsibility should be able to do. So you're like, two days a week, that's not too much. It is when you live your life for your family. Yeah. Which is the right, that's what you do when you have, when you have a family is you live your life for your family. And it takes a lot. Takes a lot of energy. It's a lot of stress. And you just, you can't keep throwing stress at yourself. I mean, personally, what I heard from him, I would, I like your

suspension trainer idea. I just. I do suspension at home all day. And then if for the camaraderie, I go play basketball once in a week. I mean, that's my... You just stick there. Yeah, yeah. That's my meeting up with the guys

and getting my little break from the home. But then the rest of the time, I'm going to do map suspension at home. I think that's good, too. Our next caller is Myra from Montana. Myra, welcome back. How you doing, Myra? What's happening?

Hi, thanks, gentlemen. Thanks for having me back. Yeah. How you doing? Give us an update. What's going on? Yeah, so I called in with my traumatized butt. And to give you a butt.

I upped my calories a little bit and I ran muscle mommy, which was super fun, not going to lie. I guess my question is, while I was able to see improvement in my strengths, I don't felt like I built muscle the same way. So it didn't look like I gained anything, even though my strength was progressing. So my question is, is that just how the program was written? because I know generally women don't want to look bulky, or is it more of a reaction of all of the other activity that I'm doing right now? So how much strength did you gain? Let's start there.

Give me an idea, like with a lift that you started at and then where you ended up. My squat went up about 10 pounds. Deadlift went up 15 and bench went up 10. Okay. So we saw some good strength gains. Yeah. And the strongest correlate, in other words, the strongest evidence or predictor of muscle growth is strength. There is no stronger predictor. So if you're getting stronger consistently, then you are going to build muscle.

And it's likely you did build some muscle. Now, the strength gains weren't so large that I'm like, oh, yeah, you probably gained pounds of muscle. But you're moving in the right direction. And the program, all of our programs, although there are avatars we design them for, they're all strength training. So they're all designed to build muscle in one way, shape or another, including muscle mommy. Now, what about your nutrition? Did you increase your calories through that period of time?

Yeah. So I went up about 100 right at the start, and then I just stayed there for the whole program. You got to increase your calories. Yeah. Yeah. Sounds like you were doing all the right things. ideally we probably would have increased calories about 100 calories every week or every other week throughout the program. I would have liked.

Yeah, it would have been nice to have seen you 500 calories higher by the end of the program at least. Oh, okay. Yeah. I just bumped it up in the beginning and kept it there. Where did you stay at? What calories? In between 2,200. Oh, yeah.

Get you up to 23, 24, 2,500 calories and we'll see some muscle game. Yeah, yeah. So what this tells me, Myra, is that the programming was perfect. The limiting factor was the calories. Calories. Yep. In fact, I would have, I bet you're...

I'd love to see it run it again with the calories. That's right. I bet you strength gains would have probably been either at least two to three times higher than what you saw with more food. Okay. Yeah. I'm like every other person and concerned about the fat gain with that big of a jump. Is there a way to just increase slowly versus 100?

week or is that just rip off the band-a-and-a-go? You can, Myra, but let's put, I want to put this in a perspective for you. If you increase by 100 calories, right, another 100 calories, and let's pretend it did all go to body fat, it would literally take you at that rate, it would take you almost, what, three weeks before you could even put on a half a pound to a pound of body fat, imagining that it did. But if you're lifting a good program and you're getting stronger and you're getting stronger, it's going to get partitioned to building muscle.

I wouldn't be surprised if you even got a little leaner with such a slow reverse. Yes. In fact, I would bump you right out to 300 calories. Right out the gates, two to 300 calories. Yes. Yes. Okay. Yeah, you can.

My concern with that is when I started the reverse diet about a year ago, I was going really slow. And after about six months, I had already put on seven pounds. Well, you look lean. Yeah. So do you know what your body fat presented? is that? I don't.

I had it tested probably two years ago and it was at 14, but that was way before I was lifting a lot. I wouldn't be surprised just by looking at your arms and shoulders that you're probably 20, maybe even lower. And right around 20, 21, 22 percent is a good body fat percentage to build muscle. It's also lean. So I would not be. If you were my client and I was able to coach you throughout the whole process, I would jump you up faster.

But I'll let you keep it conservative so you can stay comfortable. But if you were my client, I'd have you go 400 calories right now. I mean, Meyer, I'd love to see you in our muscle mommy group just because that's one of the most common things that people are going through in that group. Yeah, is trying to reverse diet. So I'd say 80% of the women in that group are in a similar situation as you is trying to reverse diet and build muscle. And so if you're open to going on it, there's a seven-day free trial. You can go in there and just check it out. I mean, you're also, you're also.

coaching too every week. I'm also reading your question right now. And you're also a group fitness instructor. So three days a week, you're leading a class. Correct. Your calories are really low. We got to eat a lot more. Yeah, I think you should go up 300 calories.

If you're doing the three classes a week plus muscle mommy, plus you're already lean, you saw some strength gains. That tells me the programming's working. The extra calories are going to go to muscle. They're going to go all to muscle. You'll see some great gains. Okay. Yeah.

Here's the other question I have for you. Are you feeling the glutes any more than you were before? Yes. Yes. That's awesome. Yes, I know, right? Score. I think it was mostly just like really pushing the weight on the thruster.

I'm up to like 300 pounds now and in that district. Oh, come on, man. Where did you start with the thruster? What was your weight out when you used? Yeah, what was the weight you were using before? Probably 210. Oh, yeah. 90 pound increase. That's phenomenal.

Meyer, you're doing good. We feed you a couple hundred more calories at least, and you're going to see that. Yeah. But, you know, if that, the psychological part, I know how difficult that can be, that's the reason why I'm recommending the group. It's just so you have other women that are doing it too. We can all talk and share. You've got the coaching, checking in with you every week just for that reason.

Not because I think you're doing anything wrong, but just because I know the psychological part is challenging when you're asking someone to increase calories like that. And just having the community and the trainers supporting you through that process, I think you're going to crush. That's right. Yeah, I looked into the group

and I didn't match any of the avatars. I'm like the overtrainer. No, no, no, no. That was just literally, that was a marketing tool for us to get people in and try it out. Don't even, don't even. It's group coaching for women

who want to build muscle. Yes. You're going to love it. Get in, just get in the group. Just go straight to Musclemommiemovit.com. And then just go straight in and do the trial. and then we'll see you in there. Say hi and start coming in there and talking with people and you'll see.

You're going to get a lot. And show up to the calls if you can. If you can't show up, then watch the recordings when we have them so that you can continue to hear the advice and go through it. But I think you're going to crush it. Now, Myra, the other thing, too, if I recall, do you overall feel disconnection in the lower body pelvic area in general? Yes.

Okay. And I had recommended acupuncture. And I see your question up there that you don't want to lay in a table with your but out. That's not how acupuncture works. Oh, true. Okay. Yeah, that's how that works. So what you would say to the acupuncturist is, you know, from here to here, I just feel less connection. And I'm not sure why. And they'll might ask you some questions. It might be related to past issues, trauma, whatever. And then the way that the acupuncture works is not necessarily the needles go where you need up,

where you think you need them. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. A lot of times it'll be like in your shoulder. It's like the weirdest thing ever. It's a trip. It's a trip to do it when you're like, wait a second. It's over here. And I'm feeling like, just trust me.

Watch. And they do it. And if you feel an emotional release during it, then you know you're moving in the right direction. Okay. Cool. Yeah. And that doesn't sound so intimidating. No, no.

I've never had my butt out. Yeah. Meyer, get in the group. Get in the group. The group is number one. It's going to be perfect for where you're at. Now, you did a great job already in the program. The program is right for you.

We just need to bump the cat. I know how I'll challenge. And I'm telling you right now, you're going to have moments during that time where you're like, oh, God, this is too much. This doesn't feel right. And just having the trainer kind of talk to you off that ledge saying, no, you're kicking ass. You're doing great. I wouldn't be surprised if you got your calories up to 27, 2,800 calories are at a point. Yep.

And you're just going to be strong and have muscle. And lots of glutes. Awesome. That's great. So you would recommend just running muscle mommy again. I was thinking of symmetry. No, run muscle mommy. You could do symmetry, but I like muscle mommy for you.

The fact that it worked that good with that low of calories, I want to see what it looks like with 300 more calories. Just keep it going. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Cool. All right, Meyer.

Well, thank you so much for your health, guys. You got it. Good. See you again. Yeah, we'll be checking up on you. Okay. Sounds great. All right.

Bye-bye. Bye. Yeah, when I looked at her question, so, you know, for the listeners, we also, they'll also write a question in. And sometimes we don't get all the information when we're talking to them. And as I'm looking up, I'm like, oh, you're doing, you're leading three group exercise classes a week. Yeah, it's a lot of extra activity.

And you're only eating 20-something hundred calories, what she said, 21. And I'm looking at her, and you can tell from her upper body, she's probably still in the teens with body fat percentage. So a calorie bump was it. And the fact that she got stronger

was just the programming. The programming is what did it. She just didn't feed herself enough. Yeah. Once she increased her calories. No, she can connect and everything where she wants to. Just for people listening right now,

if I was working with her, and I knew I could be there with her to coach her. I would have her bump 400. Oh, yeah. And I'd be like, watch what happens. And then I'd have to talk her off the ledge, you know, 15 different times. Yeah, yeah, because she's going to feel fuller than she's felt. And then she's going to hold a little bit more water and then think that's body fat. And so that's why I want her in the program is just, just for that, just because she's going to have that moment. That's right. And I know, I know Alyssa or Corinne will be like, honey, you're doing perfect to just watch what happens. And then once she gets over that and then starts to see what she's wanting, it'll change.

And like you said, a lot of glutes. There it is. 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 health and energy, and maximize your overall performance,

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