Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2726: Fitness Rules Change After 40 ! Try These "Must Do's"

Episode Date: November 12, 2025

In this episode of Quah (Q & A), Sal, Adam & Justin coach four Pump Heads via Zoom. Mind Pump Fit Tip: Fitness MUST-DO'S if you're over 40. (2:59) Tamping down inflammation with fatty acids. (25:01) Fun Facts with Dahlia. (28:43) Halloween fun with Mind Pump. (30:00) The skill of public speaking. (37:16) Serious about sprinting. (42:38) Data on daylight savings time, and Adam's electricity usage experiment. (44:56) Selective brainwashing to reduce prison sentences? (51:14) Mind Pump Trainer's favorite partner. (55:11) Want to work for Mind Pump? (56:10) #ListenerCoaching call #1 – Advice on tracking macros and finding maintenance calories. (59:02) #ListenerCoaching call #2 – Using the gym to cope with/avoid emotions you haven't dealt with. (1:12:37) #ListenerCoaching call #3 – How do I effectively plan workouts and select movements that go beyond just providing a "good workout" — and truly help clients see real, lasting results? Also, how do you build confidence in yourself as a trainer when you're still working through your own body image and food struggles? (1:22:51) Related Links/Products Mentioned Ask a question to Mind Pump, live! Visit https://www.mplivecaller.com  Visit Fatty15 for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! ** You can get an additional 15% off their 90-day subscription Starter Kit with code MINDPUMP ** Visit Crisp Power for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! ** Code MINDPUMP10 for 10% OFF. Give your snack game a serious upgrade. Crisp Power Protein Pretzels deliver super crunchy and delicious snacks that are up to 28g of protein, low carb, zero sugar and high in fiber! ** BLACK FRIDAY SALE: 60% off ALL Programs, Guides, and MODs **Code BLACKFRIDAY at checkout** Mind Pump Store Mind Pump #1225: The 5 Must-Dos For Fitness Over 40 Mind Pump #2645: Muscle Building & Fat Loss Shortcuts for the Over 40 Crowd With Stan Efferding Mind Pump #2709: Diet Smarter, Not Harder: Mind Pump's Top Hacks Mind Pump #2385: Five Reasons Why You Should Hire a Trainer Mind Pump Concierge Coaching DIETARY INTAKE OF ODD-CHAIN FATTY ACID REDUCES INFLAMMATION AND ENHANCES GUT INTEGRITY IN IBD MOUSE MODEL Does new 'Cognify' tech allow prisoners to complete years of social rehabilitation in minutes? Mind Pump Jobs Unlock sharper focus and support long-term brain health with Ketone-IQ—clean brain fuel for deep work, mental clarity, and sustained energy with no crash. Get 30% off your subscription, plus a free gift with your second shipment at https://ketone.com/MINDPUMP Mind Pump #1830: Five Steps to Determine Your ideal Caloric Intake Muscle Mommy Movement Mind Pump #2612: How One Man Lost Over 300 Pounds Without Any Cardio Trainer Bonus Series Episode 1: The Successful Trainer Mindset Sal Di Stefano's Journey in Faith & Fitness – Mind Pump TV Elite Trainer Academy – Podcast Mind Pump Podcast – YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources People Mentioned Kyle P (@mindpumpkyle) Instagram Jamie Selzler (@jselzler) Instagram Mind Pump Fitness Coaching (@mindpumppersonaltraining) Instagram  

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Definitely hard. A lot of people have struggle with it. But when you're over 40, it gets a little bit harder. What's the deal? What do you got to do? We're going to talk about the must do is. Look, if you're over 40, you want to get fit, healthy, build muscle, build strength, get lean. We're going to help you out right now.

All of us here on the show are over 40. So we have some experience. Let's do it. We're all over the hill. We are. Do you really believe it gets harder? I think it gets different. That's a better way to play.

I think it gets different. I like that better. Yeah. I like different. Which makes it harder in the sense that, you know, a lot of the information that's out there gets communicated to people or from people who I don't think have a lot of experience like this. So as personal trainers, if you train for, you know, five years or more, majority of your clients are going to fall in this age range. And you start to figure this out, right? So if you're a young trainer, you probably are going to go through what I went through.

early days, which is I had these preconceived notions. And then I started training a lot of people over this age group, which, you know, different challenges. They're different stage of life. And I had to kind of piece things together. So you learn it that way. And then also as you age yourself and life changes, there are some considerations. That's all that you need to take into account. I think like your behaviors are just more cemented at this point. Like you've been running like the same playbook for a really long time and what's worked for you. But, you know, might not be working at the rate it was working in the very beginning. So I think it's a bit like parenting.

I think parenting in your 20s versus parenting in your 40s. I feel like the things in your 20s that you have to your advantages, you don't need as much sleep. You can run around like crazy, get away with a bunch of stuff. Maybe I don't have the perfect diet, all those things like that. But what comes with 40 is a ton of wisdom, right? So I might not be able to run around with my son like I probably could have when I was 20 years old, but I'm a lot wiser at 40 than I was at 20.

I think fitness is kind of similar to like you, By 40 years old, most people, especially if you have made any attempt to make good choices around eating or exercise and learn some things about yourself and about their body and about being healthy, I think the wisdom trumps the physical capabilities of the youth. So I think that physically you can make the case, right, for why it's harder. Yeah. I think let's start there, right? Let's start there. Because there are some, there are definitely generally speaking, so it's not true for everybody, but generally speaking, there are some physical, I don't know, for lack of better term,

challenges that you'll encounter more often as you get into your 40s than you would have in your 20s and maybe 30s. And at the top of that is mobility, right? So you can have mobility issues in your 20s, but you're typically more likely to have those issues in your 40s for a number of reasons, primarily because by the time you're 40, if you've been inactive for the last 20 years, mobility just gets worse. So if you've spent the last, you know, five, 10, 15 or more years just going to work.

Yeah. And sitting at a desk. It's the fixed positions. Yes. You're going to have some mobility issues that are more challenging versus somebody's 25. Even if you were active, let's be honest, because you're going to do repetitive things in your job. True.

So, I mean, I would consider you a very active person your whole life, but you would also probably admit you have mobility stuff, right? So even if you were an active person, you still tend to get these mobility issues creep up on you at 40 just due to repetitive movements. That's right. That's right. And in potential injuries that accrue. Right, right. I would like to start with this because what you'll hear on our podcast and what you'll hear from smart fitness coaches and trainers are the benefits of certain exercises, right?

So when you have just a lot of exercises, it's probably a thousand or more exercise that exist in strength training. but they're not all equal. Some are more valuable than others. In particular, some are more valuable when it comes to what you could label as bang for your buck. Like you want to build muscle, burn body fat, you want to get good results. There are exercises that are worth 100 points, and then there are exercises that are worth one point. That's not saying some exercises are worthless and others. Exercises applied properly for the right reason are very valuable.

But generally speaking, like if you want to go to the gym and spend 30 minutes working out, you want to pick the exercises that are going to give you the most bang for your buck, the ones that are going to produce the best results that are going to give you the most muscle and strength and fat loss and mobility and health, right? And among those exercises, generally speaking, are what are known as gross motor movement, compound lifts. These are lifts that involve more of the body, typically two or more joints. So a single joint exercise would be like a curl.

A compound lift would be like a row. to give you an example. So compound lifts. And then if you kind of narrow it down, there are some exercises in that category that are just phenomenal. They just give you great results. And chief among them is a squat.

A squat and squat variations, barbell squat in particular, is phenomenal. Now, the challenge with the barbell squat is if you're listening to this and you're 42 and you haven't been squatting properly for a while, you're not going to be able to get under a bar and do a proper barbell squat.

The odds are very low. You're not going to have the mobility, the control, the stability. It's not going to be, it's not going to look good. It's not going to feel good. Your risk of injury is really high because you don't have the ability to do it properly.

And so you have to kind of work your way toward being able to do this amazing exercise. And so what I'd like to do is provide a alternative to a traditional barbell squat that is almost as good. That is a lot easier to perform from a skill perspective. And that's a box squat.

A box squat, a barbell box squat is a great alternative to a barbell squat, traditional barbell squat. And that's essentially, it's the same thing as a barbell squat. The only difference is you got the bar on your back and you slowly sit down on a bench, pause, and then stand back up versus there's no bench underneath you and you go up and down. It's a great substitute exercise. Well, I would say that's probably where a majority of my clients spent their time when we first. I can't recall too many clients. You just barbell squatted around the way. That I barbell back squatted, like, right out the gates.

Very, very rare. I almost always started with box squats or a lunge or a step-up was probably the three go-to movements that I would start most people with. Now, what I'd always convey to them that I think is important to the listener is that the barbell back, a deep barbell back squat is the goal. Yes. And so, of course, you're 42. You've either never done it. It's been a long time. So you're not going to hit the goal right out of the gate.

We're not going to get there maybe right away. But we're going to do some other alternative movements right now. While we work on your mobility with the end goal of, I want to get to be able to get you strong in a deep barbell back squat. Some of my clients were with me for years and we never even got there. That doesn't mean it was a failure because we progressed in a lot of other areas and saw tremendous success. And they saw all kinds of great results in the pursuit of trying to get there.

And I think a mistake that, people in their 40s tend to do when they, you know, they hear that they can't barbill back squad or their low back bothers them or their doctor told them. They never do it. Yeah, never do it. They just throw it to the side and be like, oh, that's for when I was young. I'll never do that again. And it's like, no, that's a terrible attitude towards it.

The goal should be to get to that play. Yeah, well, with each one of these types of exercises, there's risk or reward and there's ways to kind of modify it. So for that instance, like that stretch reflex, like, that's right. It just adds a ton more risk and force that you have to account for. So to mitigate that and then be able to focus on, you know, focus on, you know, those different components of that, the eccentric part and then now just the concentric part to come back up

and to organize that, you're still putting a lot of work in the direction of doing a full squat. So same thing with the deadlift and like a trap bar. Yeah, I was just going to go there, Justin. Deadlifts is right up there. If it's not as good as a barbell squat in terms of bang for your buck, it's definitely second. It's a phenomenal exercise. I mean, you're picking something off the ground. Strength, it'll bulletproof your back if you do it right.

It'll give you a really strong, stable back. It works the hamstrings of the glutes from an aesthetic perspective. It gives you great visual results. But a barbell deadlift, it's a high-skill exercise. Again, like to your point, Adam, you work your way up to it. to be able to do it, but right out the gates, you're probably not going to be able to do it properly with good technique and good form.

But an easy variation is a trap bar deadlift. Most people can grab a trap bar with appropriate weight and do a deadlift variation with good technique. I also would say that I got more of my clients to deadlift than squat. So maybe you didn't have great squad mechanics, but through the trap bar or Romanians

to eventually full deadlifts, That's an easier, I think, pathway than a barbell back squat. There's a little bit more complexity to the barbell back squat and a little more difficult. So deadlifts became a far more popular exercise with my clients, just as far as the pathway there was easier. And I would argue that it's as good or more valuable because you work the entire posterior chain. And since most of the issues that you're dealing with clients are anteriorly driven, right? So they have the rounded shoulders, the forward head, a lot of this dominance in their front because we do everything in front of us.

So strengthening the backside directly opposes all those postural deviations. So I found that being one of the most valuable, if not the most valuable exercise. This is why I always like to make the argument about the dead left being. I know we talk about the squat being king. And maybe that has a lot to do with the complete organization of the muscles and the core stability. And the requirement of a deadlift is why you could probably. put it at King, but it's a very close second as that deadlift for all of its benefits and also its ability to get even a beginner lifter there too. Totally. And then, you know, overhead presses I would

place as very important. Which is a squad of the upper body. Yes. And it's also a skill people tend to lose. I remember as an early trainer having clients hire me in their mid-40s and they were unable to fully extend their arms above their head. Like they'd get them up there and they have to kind of arch back and have this kind of. And so an overhead press is a great exercise, but if you can't perform it without feeling tension in your low back, without not being able to straighten your arms out, a great variation alternative is a hold.

It's literally get a weight that you can straighten your arm out over your head, brace your core, and hold, and just hold it there for 20 to 30 seconds, isometric overhead press. And that leads to being able to do an overhead press properly. And it was one of my go-to movements for people like this. I literally put them in a position, have them brace their core, extend their arms up, hold their position nicely, hold it for 20 to 30 seconds.

That was the extra. Just bringing back familiarity, I think a lot of times, like when your body isn't exposed to load overhead, for instance, you just lose the ability to immediately understand and organize in a way where you're going to be able to stabilize that and know how to keep that from, you know, crushing you. So your body just wants to compensate immediately with that and like, you know, use other means to to compensate and get it up where, you know, to be able to just hold that there. It's the base for, okay, I have load overhead now. How's my body going to be able to hold that and stabilize it? If you figure that out, you know, pressing it to that point becomes a lot more easy. I'm trying to draw back to my clients and determine whether the overhead press was the first thing to go or squire. wots, meaning I think even like younger clients, I found lost the ability to bring their arms.

Interesting. Yeah, yeah. Well, when you think about it, you still got to squat on the toilet, up off the ground. Out of, like, there's not a lot of things. Like fully extending. Yeah, where you need to fully extend your- Most of you're out in front. Yeah, exactly.

Out in front. I mean, maybe you have to put some cups away in the covers that are like here. But here, I mean, you're probably. more likely to lose that earlier than lose this even the full range of motions. Well, what's just for people listening right now, these are fundamental, you know, parts of human movement. So your body's supposed to move this way. Once you start to lose this, these capability, because you don't do them. So much dysfunction sets in. Okay. So this is where you start to feel pain. Yep. This is where you start to move. Your movement patterns become less efficient.

What does that mean? As you're moving, it takes more work. to get your body to do things. And so you just don't feel as good. Once you correct these, you just feel like, oh, my God, I just, everything just opened up. I feel amazing. So what we're talking about is you practice these. You're going to feel a huge difference in just everyday life,

not just from the strength increases, but now you can do these movements that you're supposed to be able to do. I'm going to move to diet now. Here's a must do. This is important for everybody. But the older you get, the data is showing it's even more important, is to eat a high protein diet, A high protein diet is actually more valuable as you get older than it is when you're younger.

Now, a high protein diet in the context of building muscle, appetite, suppression, helping with fat loss, helping with insulin sensitivity. It's valuable. The data on this is pretty awesome, especially when it comes to muscle building. As you get older, though, the data gets even more interesting. In fact, as you get older, your body is trying to get you to lose muscle. Strength training combats that. so does eating a high protein diet.

Now when I say high protein, here's what I mean. One gram of protein per pound of desired body weight or target body weight. That's a lot more protein than pretty much everybody watching this right now in this age group is eating. But if you hit this on a daily basis, you don't accidentally do that. It's life changing. Okay, so for the audience, just 15 minutes ago, right, before we lit these mics up. On Mondays, we all get lined up from Vicki, who has like her little barbershop inside of our. shop and she just came in right before and said, are you guys on? No, we're not on. She goes,

I have a client that's a huge fan of the show. Can they come in? And he just walked in, introduced himself, been a long time listener. Probably in his mid-50s, if I had a guess. Would you guys guess around? They were in. Probably 40s. Oh, you know, he lived 50s. Yeah, if I had to guess 50, like early 50s, mid-50s, uh, and walked in and was like, man, all I've done is follow maps andabolic and hit my protein intake. And it's been like life changing for me. It's like, that you're three day a week, full body routine, and hit your protein intake is especially as you get older, because I think, to your point, I think that it's just been neglected for so long, the change that happens just from that is, it's crazy.

It's crazy. In the studies on high protein diets and people as they get older, and I'm talking every decade, right, so 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, without strength training, it slows down the muscle loss that occurs. Now, you have to strength train to stop and reverse the muscle loss. So high protein diet by itself isn't going to do it. But by itself, it slows it down dramatically, just to show the power of protein. You combine it with strength training and then watch what happens. And it's, again, it's one gram of protein per pound of body weight. And just to kind of focus on this a little bit, if your target is 150 grams of protein a day, which is, you know,

average body weight for a lot of people. That means 50 grams of protein for breakfast, 50 grams for lunch, 50 grams for dinner. So hard to do. It's not easy. So when I say, you know, hit your protein target, eat a high protein diet. What people sometimes do is they hear this. And then they'll throw in a couple of foods that they know are protein. So I'll have an extra egg.

Or let me eat a little bit more meat at dinner. So, okay, congratulations. You added 10 grams to your protein. Your target's 150. Now you're at 70 instead of 60, right? So actually make this a priority. watch what happens to everything else. Well, just to add on to your point you're making right there,

you know, the average, like, meat serving to hit 50 grand is north of eight ounces. You're talking to eight to 10 ounces just to hit 50. Very few people even do that. And I always like to make the point of if you eat out at all, semi-regularly or regularly, when you order any meat anywhere, unless at the steakhouse, right? I'm talking about your Chipotle's, your sandwich shops. Like the standard serving. is four ounces. You have to double it. Yeah. So you, you, a lot of, that a lot of people don't realize

that the, the amount of what you think is a protein meal is half of probably the serving you need to eat. And you need at least three to, and that's, you're saying 150. Yeah. Like, there's not a lot of 150 pound guys running around. So like, that's my female clients. I've got to hit that number normally. My male clients, we're shooting for 180, you know. And so that goes up another number, another 10. That's a lot. That's a lot of protein. And so just the conscious effort to do that. I mean, and then it also does this beautiful thing because

it takes effort to get to that much protein. You never get to a place where you're like getting so hungry you need to eat. You get leaner doing it. And the Cravens kick in. You eat less. Yes. I mean, it's such a great psychological hack because you're not telling yourself, oh, I can't have this, I can't have

that. All you're saying is go get that. Go get that. And then if I'm still hungry, then I'll enjoy that or I'll do that thing. And it's wild, how difficult it is to get that much protein. And focusing just on that kind of takes care of the appetite control. That's right. And then you don't have to worry about that. And then I think you get the muscle building.

You get the satiety. You get the insulin sensitivity. And again, the data on as you get older, this becomes more important. And this is more mainstream even. This is even just from fitness experts. You're now hearing this from the mainstream to increase protein intake. Lastly, I mean, I'll add this one, and if you guys want to add more, but I think this is really important. And I think this is the group to talk to about.

Nothing is going to help you get to your fitness goals in an effective, sustainable way, like working with a good coach. Okay. Nothing comes close. You can listen to this podcast every single day and we got great information and we've been around for a long time. We're talking about. but we are not going to come close to a good coach. You could go to a gym and follow classes. You can do all the,

it's not, nothing comes close to having your own coach, a good coach, who can help you design a workout, who can walk you through the process, who can guide you through all the times you stumble. Yeah. Through that,

your odds of success explode. Well, we just don't have disposable time anymore. And it's like any chance we can be more efficient and effective, I feel like, you know, at this point, you want to put all your effort into something that's going to move the needle the most.

And so, you know, getting a coach is that's your fast track. That's the way that you're going to get there. Without, you know, when you're younger, it's like you can, you get all this expendable time. You get all this, you know, free time where you can kind of experiment and you can kind of recover. And you can, but, you know, now it's like you got responsibilities. You got all kinds of stuff going on.

Like, let's laser focus this. Well, you also don't. have to waste time unwinding bad behaviors, much like learning a golf swing, right, where you've, you know, you go directly to a coach, learn from the ground up how to do this correctly and watch how much better you progress versus swinging a club for eight years, then going to a coach and having to unwindle. I mean, I find that this was very common as a personal trainer. I tended to be the last line of resort. Like, people had already tried to do it on their own for a decade, finally threw their hands up because they hadn't had success.

Then I get them. And when I get them, it's like, oh, wow. We've got this crazy addiction to cardio. We've yo-yo dieted our whole life. We've got like, we've like been over-training. Like, so you've got all these things that you have to unpack, unwind to get them back to where they should be. Versus, okay, this is an investment in myself. I know I want to be healthy.

There's a lifelong pursuit. And I think the value of like a podcast. like this is hopefully if you've been listening along this when you go to invest in a coach or a trainer you quickly can determine whether they're good if they're good yeah it's like okay uh and then that's really where the value what i think the value is sure some people can listen to the advice that we give and put it together themselves and figure it out and we've obviously seen that case but man if you really you really want to excel you invest in a coach or a trainer to help you with that you use the information that you've learned from here to determine okay this this

this coach knows what they're doing. Well, what's our site, Doug, what's our site if people want, would want a coach to call them? Because I feel like we should give them somewhere to go if they're looking for someone that's good. Yeah, mind pump personal training.com, I believe is the one you go to. And is it, is it for slash help if they'd like somebody to give them a call? Yeah, let me pull that up. Yeah.

I'll see how mad Kyle gets at you. Yeah. We booked 100 calls this week just so you know. Oh, wow. Yeah. We're doing our best. We're doing our best to get trainers. We have really high standards, you guys.

So, you know, a lot of trainers work for us, but we don't hire just anything. Yeah, so it is, forward slash help. So my pump personal training.com forward slash help. Yeah, there you go. Anyway, I got to, so I've done, I've been doing a, it's been now a week and a half of using the fatty 15 C15 fatty acid. And so I've been doing it consistently. Yeah. And I sent you guys a text, I think it was Saturday.

Uh-huh. So left, my left hip, I've had, I got this on and off pain. and so and it's just there and it gets worse if I lift heavy and you know do stupid stuff but it's just kind of there and Justin and I all fair like to commiserate about it yeah we like to complain like old guys right about this whole thing and I'm sure it's connected to ego lifting yeah yeah uh over the last three seconds great segue from today's topic yeah I know total ego lifting yeah we learn the hard way that's another thing so okay what do you listen no more pain so I just okay you text that in the thread I saw you guys texting about that

You think it's just tamping down inflammation? Yes. Okay. So that's what most likely is happening. It works on the inflammatory pathways. You know, fatty acids and your cell membranes play a big role in inflammation. And it regulates. It's not anti-inflammatory.

It's not like I'm taking an insid and stopping the inflammatory process. You don't want to do that. You want inflammation to exist. You need it. But it's modulating it. And it's my, it's weird. Yeah. It's really, it's so weird that I.

messaged you guys. No, it's wild because I was like, maybe I'm getting better sleep. Like, something's a little bit different. Yeah, because, well, that, that, that was always when I'd wake up in the morning is when I would feel it the most. And I would start, like, it would take me a while to almost work through that stiffness. You know what's weird? Is your sleep better, too? A little bit. Me too. Okay, now, this is wild. Remind me, uh, like, I know we get, uh, omegas from, like, fish. Where, where, where. Dairy. So it's dairy. Yes. Okay. Yes. So this is probably, too, why this is because you guys both aren't like big dairy people at all.

Well, Justin is, I guess is cheese, huh? I mean, I, yeah, I cheat. I mean, I think he tries to stay. I try not to go in excess. I can't have dairy. And there's a fatty acid in dairy. I mean, the C-15. People, you could look this up, you guys, in the studies on this is really interesting.

It's, I predict this to be a fatty acid people supplement like fish oils, often as fish oil because of the benefits it has. So, I mean, and it is weird. I have been sleeping better. I don't know what the data says on sleep. So I got to look that up too. So I don't know if it's because my hip doesn't hurt as much. I'm sleeping more or the reduced inflammation now is helping me sleep. That's what I was kind of factor.

I haven't looked that up. But that's weird that you said that because my sleep's better too. Yeah. Really interesting. I mean, how much, like any idea of how much like a dose that you're taking versus like, say, a brick of cheese for Justin? Ooh, good, good question. I should know this.

I don't know this. Yeah. So it's one capsule a day. We're going to have to look this up, Doug. get the total amount of C-15 in there. Yeah, because I'd be interested to see, like, what, like, how much dairy do you have to consume in order to do it? To do it. Unless make a challenge out of this.

Yeah. Yeah, I want to, yeah, let's see what that says. Because it makes a lot of sense, obviously for you, it makes a lot of sense. Yes. And then I'm curious if, you know, even Justin with his cheese consumption, is that still, that's most, I'm guessing it's probably still not hitting the upper limits of what you're getting when you supplement with it. I don't know how much is in there. It's good for liver health and immune response, which is great. I don't know how much is in there.

I mean, we'll stay tuned. Yeah, stay tuned. Next time we talk about it, I'll make sure I bring it up again because I'm curious. Yeah, like how much, how much dairy would you have to eat? No, that is interesting thought. Yeah. Wow, let's see. Can I get it from food?

You can find it, but I think you have to eat a lot of food, a lot of dairy to get the amount that you're going to get in this. But we'll find out. We'll find out. Anyway, speaking of facts, I love it when my kids come up to me. and tell me random things. So my, my three-year-old, she's about to turn three.

She's dropping facts on you now? So we're sitting there. Jesus. Dude, we were sitting there. Your kids are so your kids, we're walking in encyclopedias. Oh, my five-year-old is ridiculous with it. But anyway, it's my daughter, right?

So we're sitting there, and she's feeling cuddly, which is, she'll occasionally do that, and I love it, right? So we're sitting there, and she's like, you know, like, rubbing my face, and I love you. And I'm, you know, I'm kissing her. And she goes, astronauts wore diapers. Did you know that?

I'm like, and, they do, right? So I'm like, they do. There's that famous one with the lady that drove across country, is her ex-husband or whatever. She's like, did you know that? I'm like, uh, yeah, yeah, they do. Like, why do they wear diapers? She's like, they go to the moon.

I'll like, like, duh. Where did you get that from? I don't know what she got it from. What else you to hear that? That's hilarious. That's hilarious. It's so hilarious. It's so wild.

It is wild the things that stick, right? Like they're just, I mean, they're constantly taking in all the surroundings and information and the things that they decide that they're going to go like, oh, I'm going to grab onto that and hang on to that one and repeat that later on. It's the best. It's the absolute best. How was Halloween for them? Oh, yeah. So, oh, well, we had, it was not good. Well, it was good, but we had to divide it. What do you mean? What do you mean? So, uh, you were a gorilla, right? I was. So, which, yeah, I'll tell you story about that. So I bought a gorilla outfit because my son was Godzilla, so he wanted me to be King Kong.

But I got a full gorilla outfit Like masks and everything This is a You scared the crap out of it Total fail For a day Like you knew it You hit it right

For a three year old I thought to myself This is gonna be so funny I'm old babe Get the camera I'm gonna come out In the full gar You back you're surprised

Oh wow I want the video You just had like a furry wig Or something What did I think what happens It's like one of those things Where you let her touch it Feel it see it first

Before you consider Bro I come out And traumatize my daughter Yeah She's not even going to want to go to the zoo now You're going to go to the zoo like, no When I put the costume on for Halloween I couldn't even, she didn't even want to see the mask

So that picture you saw? Yeah My wife turned her around I put it on real fast Shut up Took the picture because if she saw me out with it She would have shut up What an idiot

I can't believe I did that anyway So here's what happens So Thursday, so Halloween's Friday right So Thursday night 3 a.m. My 15 year old comes into our room crying like what's the matter I threw up all over in my bed I'm like, oh, no.

So my 15-year-old got a stomach bug really bad. So she stayed in our room, threw up the rest of night. So Halloween's the next day. She had a fever. And so she's like, please don't let me, I don't want to be alone. Because she was supposed to go to a party, which she ended up not going, obviously. So she's like, I don't want to be alone. So we ended up having to, I did a little bit of trick-or-treating with the little ones,

brought them back, and then Jessica went out and did some with the little ones because I don't want to leave my daughter alone. Of course. So that's how that all went down. It was cool. It was good. It was fun. but, you know, sucks at my girl.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And she's still at that age. We, uh, did you see the, our family was so funny? You guys are all themed out. Yeah, yeah. So everybody. Was he the only kid? The only kid.

So 15 adults. Bro, how much attention does he get at this? I know, dude. I'm like, I was saying like, he's so ruined. He thinks that he probably thinks like this is like so normal. You know what I'm saying? You should have seen like, we like, when we were going through neighborhoods, we were like to talk of the neighborhood because we're the biggest entourage.

Nobody's rolling 15 deep, right? And they're all growing up. adults, fully costumed out too, right? So everybody's decked out, head to toe, and all themed as all Batman villains, right? So we're all the rogue Batman villains and Max's Joker. And, you know, we'd roll up to a house and you'd see this like look on the people's face like, oh my God, so many. And then just one kid walks up with his bag. And then they'd be like, oh, is it just for him? Like, all of you? Like, yeah, all of us. Then you hear people talking as we were walking on the road. And so he had an absolute ass. I mean, what do you do with the camera?

Because do you guys, you guys don't eat at all, obviously. No, no. You know, it's, I mean, I, you know, I don't know if it's my son. I don't know if it was because of the work we put in earlier, early on in his life. But I can literally tell him he could have a bag of candy. And I could say, you get two pieces. Okay. And he'll eat his two pieces.

I'll take the bag. I'll go put it away. He'll forget about it by tomorrow. And that's it. I mean, literally is that, that, that, candy is not, he does not, I love it too, because you guys know,

and I've talked about it, if you listen to this pocket. It doesn't pull at him. It's got a pool on me. Like, Oh, yeah. Candy has got that right now. Yeah, it is. Doug brought a bag of candy.

Yes. Adam took it. Bro, I can't, I don't care how much effort I've put into, like, breaking that, it's there. It is there. It is definitely. And it's, and it's, I know it's, we grew up that way. And so I, it, it warms my heart to see his relationship.

with that. I, in fact, the Katrina will tell you, I buy him the most treats. I love it. I love that I can have a little bit of an ice cream and it can be two licks and then we could toss it. I love that I can just I can introduce him to all this fun stuff and it not be like, and I was

with my friends kids and I was like, man, yeah, Max is just so different. I, he had like a little jar or something and I grabbed and I threw a candy in mouth and his son saw it. His son come run up to like wanting candy and because he saw that I had it

and he had to calm him down and it was such a big ordeal and it was just like and Max is right there you know I can literally go have a piece of candy and tell Max like no you can't have it and he's fine

like so his relationship with ice cream candy all the treats is uh is wild and again I don't know if if it's a combination um of just who he is makeup of Katrina and I

I don't know if it's all the above yeah I mean I like to think that it had a lot to do with the early on you know training the palate. Like, you know, like, my son's, like, favorite thing is a little bit of cocoa whip and fruit. Like, that's like a, that's, he'll go bananas for that and just so excited. Yeah, to have a treat like that. So do you guys all, you guys all go trick or treating all the adults in him? Yes. Oh, so he's the star. Yes. It's all about him. It's 100%

about him. And that's what they all get, they get like that because he gets so excited. That's so great. Yeah, about the characters. And he's like super, you can't come over unless you're, you're dressed. That that's, like, so not all the family gets to come. Like, if you're not themed out, you don't, you don't come over for Halloween day. And so, yeah, he comes, everyone came over. We had pizza before.

And then we went and hit, like, three different neighborhoods up and, let him go around. It's different now. When we were kids, I used to take a pillow sack. And I was probably, by the time I was going off by myself, I was probably 10, 9, 10. And we were gone. Yeah. Like a long time.

We were gone for a long time. Well, yeah, that's kind of what we experienced with Ethan, and kind of he just took off with his friends. And he already had plans to stay. We knew exactly, like, who you staying with, who is with, all this. And then I kind of, I'm coaching from afar, and I'm letting him, you know, have the freedom part. Courtney's having a hard time with us.

Has, like, because, you know, on your phone, you can track and see, like, where they're at. So she's just, I'm like, relax, babe. Like, you're at home just doing our thing. We were supposed to go out and do, like, a monster. ball thing for adults and all this. And, of course, we start making dinner or hanging out or doing our thing. And we're not going anywhere.

Who are we kidding? You know, like, we never get to the house to ourselves like this. I'm not doing a thing, you know. And so we're just like, watch like poltergeist. Yeah. The original? Yeah. Meanwhile, Courtney's like this on our phone the whole time.

She's like, we've got enough fight over this. I'm like, leave them alone. This is my future, bro. I like hearing this. So I know how to handle it because Katrina's the same way, dude. And then everyone was in Morgan Hill. Somebody had run into you guys. But it was great.

He had a great time with his friend. It's like we let him, you know, decide to go there. And I guess somebody had one of those like claw machines. Like you have it like one of the arcades. Like they had a big one that they allowed every kid to do. And then like they pull a stuffed animal thing out and has candy. And it was like, what a rad idea. So he was like, he was like,

going off about that and like he was having such a good time but uh it was funny because you mentioned you know with your like pull towards candy and like like some of that kind of stuff like you know with ever for me it's like the public speaking stuff has always been like that oh dude I really hope he doesn't get this shit for me you know like this fear and he doesn't he completely doesn't but everything else is like so similar in our personality uh and he had this project that he had to do for school where he just he had to interview me uh and like find out like what got me into like my profession like my my interests as a kid and oh fun was this recorded and he recorded yeah wow he recorded it and then like he wrote notes and was going to write it all up for his class but i was like

dude send me the audio because it was just like it's one of those things like later on i was like thinking about it i was like wow that was so cool like he steered the whole thing and he was like super confident in delivery and like we had a great little like mini pod for like 15 minutes. No way. You should have brought him in here. Oh, man. You should have totally done that.

You should. Yeah. You're recorded too? No, it's just audio, but... Still would have been cool. It still would have been cool to experience. You know what I'm saying? That'd been something you kept, you know, way later.

That'd been a cool. It made me feel so good. I was like, oh, wow, I can't believe, you know, because that's just one of the same. It has to be... Okay, that has to be... Obviously, you guys are way ahead of me, right? And we just talked about the sugar thing, so I feel like that.

And I think what you're saying resonates with me. Like, as a death, one of the best feelings has to be when you, you know you've got a bad trait or you know you got something that you don't like, that you don't want to pass, and you work really hard to make sure that that doesn't happen to them and then to see that they're not, you're like, oh, yeah, thank you. You know, I wonder if yours would have been that way, Justin,

because it's a natural fear, right? But I wonder if yours would have been that bad if you never had that experience as a kid. Yeah, I froze. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, that's the good point left the more. It was traumatic. Yeah. It's so hilarious and silly.

thinking about it now, but like as a kid, I was like, that was, Oh, did I tell you, did I tell you what Max's school does? Like that they, like, literally, he's, he was pre-K. He's kindergarten now. But since pre-K, the kids get up in front of the entire school. And now that he's in kindergarten, it's every week there's a kid that has to get up in front of the class every day. Wow.

And so when you're, and they call it the VIP, you're VIP. And when you're VIP, you, and what they do is they're really cool about it because They don't like, it's not a big pressure thing. It's like they give them the flexibility to share something every day. But you're the VIP student that week. And all that week, it's like, it's all about kind of you and your things. And so you have the option to bring something and share it in front of the class. And so, and the teachers will review and let you know as a parent like, hey, this is an area that he's struggling with or does really well with.

And like, this is one of the things that we got in his review about they were just like, he chose to get up every single day. And every single day he had something to share. share. And it's like, but I think it's so cool that the school starts doing that when they're in pre-k kindergarten. I mean, they keep, they keep doing that all the way through. You practice as a kid. Yeah, by the time they're in high school, like get up in front of your class and do, like,

this will be no big deal? When you guys were kids and you did group projects, was there always a role that you ended taking? Yeah, there was always, there was always a kid that you, there was a kid that spoke. I'd wait for a while and then I'm, okay, I'm taking over. Yeah, I was the present. Yeah, I didn't want to do the work. I'd present it.

I didn't want to get it back. You know, you and I are the same. You're like, you guys do it and then just tell me, I'll go through. I'll go present. You know why? Because nobody wants to present. Yeah.

I mean, okay, cool. You know, yeah, yeah. Get it done. I didn't want to do any of the, I didn't want to do any of the rassels. I don't want to do another written work. I was going to do all the work. I would get up there and sell it.

We would have made a great team. Yeah. You and I wouldn't work. You present. No, you know, I'll present. No, that's what I used to do every time. Yeah. But you know what that.

So that stuff for me didn't happen until like, I want to say seventh, eighth grade. Presenting? Yeah. Do you remember presenting before that? Oh, yeah, right out the gates. Oh, you remember early? Yeah, early on.

Oh, I don't. I loved it. Yeah. No, no, I mean like the school? I don't remember. Oh, you mean presenting? Yeah, yeah. That was like seventh, eighth grade.

Yeah, we did. Middle school. I don't remember presenting before that. Not that early. I don't remember that far back, but I remember like fourth grade. Yeah, fourth is. We would do reports and we'd have to talk.

So, okay, fourth grade, I remember reports. I remember we had to come up with an invention, write a report. I remember the castle. but we didn't have to get up in front of the class. Oh, we did. Oh, see, that's good. So we didn't have to do it. I don't remember getting up and doing report. And I actually remember

that in social studies. It's such a good skill because so many people hate it. So if you want to differentiate yourself, practice it. And it's a skill so you can learn it. Well, that's what I love. Again, I mean, you ingrain it in a kid that early. By the time it's like part of their curriculum in high school, it's like, it's not even going to be a big deal. By the way, I looked up to C-15. It's 100 milligrams for a capsule.

You'd have to have 12 cups of whole milk. 12 cups of whole milk to get 100 milan. So that's a thousand calories. Yeah. So either you could have a thousand calories of whole milk. Wow. Or you take one capsule. Well, that makes me eat really good because I have a lot of dairy, but not like that.

Not no 12 milk. No, no, no, no. I'm not putting a gallon of milk. Yeah, so strange that you mention, you know, all the benefits you've been getting from it. Because I haven't even noticed the correlation, but my sleep. has been better. And you've been taking it? I've been taking it.

Interesting. I don't know if you know this, but once a week I've been doing sprints because I had lost my ability to run essentially. I remember I had to go across the street. And I was like running like an old man. I go, this has to stop, right? I love it, Doug. And so I started doing sprints once a week at the park.

Yeah. And my right hip was hurting. And this last week, it wasn't hurting. And I didn't even put two and two together. So that's interesting. Oh, great. Isn't that the same thing that you did that kicked it out for you, too? was running across the street over here?

Yeah, I just haven't practiced. No, I got serious about it because I went across the street to get the mail and I was like jogging like an old man. Literally. Yeah, you had to think about what you were having to love here. That's what I described the other day on the treadmill. I'm like, okay, this is what I got to think about.

But here's the interesting thing after two or three sessions of sprints. I'm only doing like six to eight, 30-second sprints. Yeah. Completely corrected. Were you fast as a kid? I picture you as being a fast kid. No, I wasn't super fast.

Really? No. I wish I was fast, but I wasn't. I wished you were there. Funny of Doug said that. I wished I was fast. I did, I did. I was like, I wish I was just a little faster.

Fast enough to get away from the stable two tigers, really? Yeah. Well, that goes without saying I'm still here. Hey, so I looked up some data on daylight savings time because it's such a... How stupid it is? It's so dumb. It is so dumb. Do you guys know what the data should...

Every year. Okay, you guys know the reasoning for it, right? Why we still do it? It's like with the farm. That was originally what it's for. Yeah. They say it saves energy. So it saves energy because you'll capture more of the daylight,

require you to turn your lights on less than you normally would. And so there's a lot of studies. You want it they show? Probably does nothing. It probably does nothing because then. Inconvenience is. People are using their AC more. Okay, do you guys monitor that, by the way?

But so, I mean, it's funny you bring this up right now because, like, I'm, I got my, my annual correction for my solar. And I still am paying quite a bit of money for electricity. And I'm like, this makes no sense to me. I have solar panels, a lot of them all over my roof. And I'm like, why am I paying so much? And Katrina's like, well, it's because we, I was like, yeah, but we have solar. So we should have plenty. In fact, most of the time, you have so much extra.

energy left over. You have to give it back to the city. So how am I tapping into it? And my pool and all that stuff is heated through gas, so it's not electricity. So it's like, because I know that would run a lot if I was doing that, because I do that quite a bit. So it's not that. And I'm like, there's three of us. There's not

that many loads of laundry. Like, what's going on? And I do run my AC a lot. But I mean, I have solar. So I thought, no big deal. But then Katrina gave me the breakdown. They break it down on your bill. And I do. run both the ACs at peak times a lot. And so you get nailed for that. If you run it,

so I don't know if you guys pay attention to this. It's between 4 and 8 p.m. is like if you don't run stuff during that time, it's like a fraction of what it costs you if you do it at different times. Now, knowing you, you're still going to do it. Well, no, I'm testing right now. What? Yeah, I'm testing. You're going to let it get warmer? I'm testing it right now. You can time it out. Well, as long as, yeah, yeah, so exactly. So how much you think you can save? I don't know. That's what I'm curious. Well, it is November. So, yeah, it's a lot easier right now.

So it's, I mean, I like, my electricity bill is too much for considering I have solar. It's been really annoying. I'm like, I thought I was like part of that, the excitement of having solar was like, oh, I'm going to have no electricity bill. When we lived out in Marina, I had no electricity bill. Well, that's because it's so cool. That you're right. See, I never, I never had to run any AC. I run a little bit of heat, barely any though.

I don't have to very often at all. So, yeah, you're, well, Santa Cruz. That's what's great about. cruise marine area is that you probably don't have that. Like, you know, like, I bet your electricity bill is like, high. Oh, yeah. Well, what do you, what do you run on an average month? Close to thousand? I don't even remember, to be honest with you, but it's a lot.

Equal to door gas, Jessica. You don't even know your electricity bill, though? I forgot. I got to think about it. Do you have a guess? If I had a guess, I guess you probably like 800 bucks. Yeah, I think so. Yeah, that'd be like somebody who just basically runs their ACs. Yeah, we just, yeah. Full, blast. My wife, she just, she just

has to be cool all the time. She's like me like that. So, well, you know what I'm trying to do now because I'm checking to see this four to eight how much they're getting me for it. So early in the morning, I get up and now I'm dropping the temperature of cold. So really cold so that it maintains through that the peak time. And Katrina's like, why is the AC on at 11 a.m? You know what I'm saying?

Yeah, I'm like trying to get it way down so I don't, so I don't run it. My wife does that cracks me up. If she thinks it's too hot or too cold, she thinks if she hits the, hits the, hits the freaking buttons so that the number goes really high, that it heats up faster. It's freezing in here. It's like, I'm like,

honey, just put it to where you want it. The fact that you go up to 90 doesn't make you get hotter any faster. Like jumps up beyond. No, what are you doing? And it's like, up and down.

It's not worse. And I teaser about it. You just said you were just sweating your butt off. Now you're freezing. What's going on? I'm bad. I'm the one who's finicky about the temperature for sure. As long as it.

But so as long as it's cold at night, I'm okay. Like, it doesn't have to be. My grandparents just to crack me up, but when we used to go over there all the time, it was like, how dare you tell me to turn the heater on and you're not wearing a jacket? That was like, like, put a jacket. We still wear jackets in the house.

Yeah, yeah. Because it made no sense to these old world Sicilians that we would pay for warmth when you have jackets and blankets. To them, it just, I remember my grandpa. That's that whole generation. He's like, what are you doing? And then it was hot? It was really hot.

He's like, use a fan. So we would use the house. Use a fan. I mean, I'm that way when it comes. It made no sense to them. I'm not, but I hold back on the heater. I can totally hold back on the heater.

Well, you like it cold. Yeah, yeah. So I can hold back on that. Because I and I feel the same way, I'll throw a hoodie on, you know what I'm saying? So everybody in my house is like hoodie down. Bless your breath. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But if it's hot, though, I do. But, I mean, it's so dumb, though, the solar thing I thought for sure. So I'm like, I don't know. I'm testing right now to see if I can get this down. you guys know how that's how like the solar bill works it's like they don't they don't tell you you get like a correction just let it go and then they then they go after like i think every six months or a year i get it and it's like oh yeah you owe four grand yeah of like this usage that you that you

used over your allotted amount or like that i'm like this is weird there's some conspiracy now that i'm like convinced i'm like and i can't i can't i understand the AC but it's like other than that that's all i i run i've got for i don't know how many 20 something panels I have on my house. I got plenty of panels. Really? Yeah. So how much how are you saving? What do you mean? How much money are you saving with all that solar? I can't imagine because my

bill is still four or six hundred bucks. Oh, okay. I mean, that's, that's like, and the most, I had, the highest AC bills I ever had were like a thousand, twelve hundred. Yeah. That was like some peak, like. We pay a lot here for power, don't we in California? Yeah, we do. Yeah, we bet people are listening right now to the parts of the country and they're like, what do you guys, what do you guys do? What are you guys doing? Nuclear plant under your basement?

Look that up. I'm curious. Where is... We have the most expensive everything. Yeah. My niece, my niece, who lives with us now from Nevada, she lived in Vegas, she looks at our gas and she's like, this is crazy. She's like, this, you know, because she's a, she just became an adult. So, you know, when you become an adult, you start realizing things cost money.

Yeah. But she can't believe how much gas costs here. And she was telling me what it costs over where she's at. Yeah. No, we've been so... Welcome to California. Yeah, you've been so conditioned to that price. Like, you know what they're, like, I didn't even know this, but in Livermore?

Well, you know, there's like, there's places where, well, they have this whole setup for these, like, long lasers, almost like, what's that one place where they're, they do it in Switzerland? Anyways, they have all these lasers that they're, like, organizing together to, like, split atoms. Oh, you're talking about the large hydrant collection? Yeah, but so this one, they're making, like, many suns. Like, they're creating fission. Oh, wow. In Livermore. I was like, I didn't know this was happening in our backyard.

And like, wow, so if they messed up, we're just all going to get sucked in. I mean, he's sons. I'm like, this is happening, like, close by. Speaking of which. You got to share with Sal, what I shared with you about the cognitive thing. If you go to go to prison, you have an option. Oh, yeah. This is scary.

It's almost like minority report or on a level or, um, so they're going to give you the option. Who's they? This is some company that's created this, like, I guess it's like brainwashing software. Yeah, yeah. No, literally. Literally. It's basically, so you can, it's a, they're working with these prisons. You will have an option to do your time, 16 years or whatever.

Or what they do is they implant all the trauma that you put on the person through yourself. So you have empathy for what, for what you did. And like basically. You live through it. And they say that like it feels like years. Yes, three hours, but it feels like years. Yeah. That's not real.

Yeah. Problemish. Oh, that's not ethical. Well, I know. That's not a black mirror. How real is. You choose. You don't care.

Yeah. That doesn't sound ethical. Like, no way is that moral. That's like, what's that? He's not really a superhero. Is it a ghost writer that does that? Really, like makes you feel all the. Oh, is that what he does?

Yeah, dude. Okay, look, I'm going to play. I got to play the pain of your crimes. It's too late, but it's about our generations to come. Your children. your grandchildren, your great-grandchildren. There is a company called Cognify. If you Google it and watch their video, and it's the future of incarceration, that's what it's titled. With this Cognify system, let's say you do a crime, or maybe you act out against the government, or you have a belief system

that is not consistent with the country that you live in, and you are prosecuted for a crime, by their definition. You will then get an opportunity that you, let's just use this for hypothetical, a measly petty theft. You can spend 50 years in prison, or you can, can go through the Cognify process, which in three minutes, they will imprint memory sets. So let's say there was someone who was even harmed by the crime that you did. You will be able to feel the emotions of your victim, the emotions that the family members went through, all of that. You will be forced to have the empathy.

And you will feel like you've been imprisoned for 25 years or whatever it may be, but it's only three minutes. This is black mirror type stuff. Yes, so it's only three minutes. And I'm not joking. You watch it, and it will just blow you away. But remember, they say this is, this is for the goodness of society. Okay. Would you trust your government with your memory sets?

That's a nightmare, dude. That's a nightmare. What is it? What could go wrong? Judge Dred, or, you know, when they put them in these, like, little isolated cells and they put, like, some kind of, like, VR on them, and then they just stow them away. What a nightmare? I know. It's just, it's so dystopian.

Like, it's just weird to see where we're going with the future, like, with all the, like, with all the. I mean, you got to... You know, we got to think, though. Okay. And not us in here because I think that we would be so fearful of that. But somebody who gets incarcerated for 30... That's why it's unethical because you're giving them a choice, sure. But the choice is 20 years in jail or I'm going to torture you through your brain to have you feel...

Like, how is that? What kind of side effects are you going to do? That's the crazy part. It's the side effects of that stuff. It's kind of nightmares you have, like... This is why you need a society needs a strong moral foundation because that's the guiding principle. Without that, science just does what it wants. Look at it. Doug pulled up the killer.

We are the most expensive in the country. Of course. 50% higher than NASA average. 50% higher. 50%? 50%, bro. The average of the nation is 20 cents per kilowatt worth 30 cents per kilowatt. We win.

That, I'm like, come on. That and gas prices, like, dude, what is happening here? I don't know. It's the greedy oil companies, Justin. Oh, that's right. Yeah, there's nothing to do with the politicians. It's like organizing these deals. I mean, screw us.

I want to mention, I think the most popular sponsor we have for our staff is the Chris power because it lasts two seconds. Never. There's none. I'm annoyed by it. Have you had your kids try it? My kids are like, I can't even get it home. Bro, they send a box here.

I've got it home yet. It goes out there. By the time we're done with the podcast, it's gone. All of our trainers destroyed them. Yeah. So it's a handy little snack. People don't know this. These are like,

these are pretzels, but they come in different flavors. Nacho and honey cinnamon or whatever. Fire, bro. It's the best. Fire. Yeah. And they're 25 to 28 grams of protein per bag.

It's awesome. Yeah. And we put them out there. That's the mistake. Next time I'm going to tell Jerry, put them in my car. Yeah. Don't leave them out there.

They crushed them all. They're gone. Anyway. So there, they're very popular. Yeah, no, they're good. They're really good. I wish I could bring some home. I would.

I would totally would. Did you see I had her put on some of my stuff in the fridge? She puts on it, like, for the owners only? I know. I mean, it's a different time for us here. It's like it felt like, it felt overnight, even though it's been a transition the last year and a half, I'd say. Would you say? Yeah.

But we went from a year and a half to having no trainers to having 17. 17. Yeah. Plus all the rest of the. staff. It was a lot more quiet in here when we'd walk in the studio, that's for sure. I mean, I think we all love it. I like it.

It's a better energy. Oh, I love it. Oh, my God. It's a trip when you think about it, though, for years, years, it was just us. Yep. Yep. You know, for a long time, it was just the four of us that came to work every single day. I would have to wear pants.

Yeah. It's a real hassle. Well, it was crazy. I had a thought that is, I had a crazy thought. I was in the bathroom. and I'm like, you know what? We got to keep this bathroom clean because now we have clients. Yes.

When it was just us. I've been saying that for a while now. Is that being you're going to stop pissing that seat? I don't. Is that me your stuff? Lift the lid, people. Lift the lid. Hey, you know that I'm not guilty, though.

You know, it's definitely eliminates me out of that. If you get on the seat, you sit down. I'm like, you have another problem. Something's really wrong. That's going on here. Push it down. But yeah, no, it's great. It's great seeing clients in here every day.

trainers in here every single day. It's amazing. And we're hiring as fast for people who are like wondering because people have been inquiring. We're hiring as fast as we can. But we have, it's really hard to be a trainer here. That's it. Quality control. We don't want, I don't, we want the best of the best.

And that doesn't mean we're hiring people who, uh, have, you know, we've been doing it forever. It's like, no, no, we're hiring based off character. And these people that we have are, these are the best trainers ever work with. They're just incredible. to represent us. Kyle's done a wonderful job. Kyle has done an incredible job.

He runs our fitness department. He's a very, very good job. He's going to be mad at you for pointing to pointing people. Now he's going to be busier. Sorry, Kyle. I literally saw him this morning about, because we went Sunday, the other episode went live where we talked about it. And so I wanted to wait to see what that.

And so there's a hundred phone calls book this week. Wow. Yeah, that's a lot. He's like, yeah, we're slammed right now. So I'm like, okay. I meant to tell you guys before you said something. My bad. Crank it out, Kyle.

That's right. I like keeping the heat on him. We'll see how it goes. Ketone IQ gives you instant ketones. What do you want that for? Well, better cognitive performance. You feel focused without the stimulatory effects of a stimulant, caffeine. If you want the effects of a ketogenic diet,

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Our first caller is Andrea from Ohio. Hi, Andrea. What's happening? Hi, guys. How are you? We're good. How are you? How can we help you?

Good. So I know the normal spiel. Thank you guys for doing everything you guys do. Thank you, Doug, for setting this up. It's a well-oiled machine going into this. I know you guys know this, but everything from health and fitness to sharing parenthood to daily things and struggles, all of it. You know, I'm a long-time list.

since pre-COVID and just thank you for everything you guys talk about. So I will dive into my question. I'll read it here. Basically, I'm reaching out because I'd love to get your advice on tracking macros and finding maintenance calories. My situation, when I do track, I end up eating very differently than I normally would. Between a full-time career, helping my husband run a small business, taking care of two young girls, two and four, it feels impossible yet so important to say consistent, healthy, all those things. I truly have no idea where my maintenance is. Hello, tiny children who steal bites of food every chance I get.

So now that I'm finally done with pregnancies, breastfeeding, all of that, I'd really love to do a controlled bulk. I'd love to build muscle, put back on muscle that I know I've lost since pre-babies, all of that. I feel like I've done a pretty good job getting most of it back, but still would love to build. And then eventually cut to lose the last big. of stubborn body fat from postpartum.

Eating right now is very inconsistent. If I had to guess some days, I'm around 800 calories, other days closer to 2,500. I definitely can go off the rails at times, meaning lots of sweets, things like that. I have a slight tendency to binge restrict, nothing crazy, but definitely get in moments or holidays or patterns where I eat a lot more

than I normally would. Those are rough estimates since the little tracking I've done. It could be way off. I truly don't think I'm under eating by any means. I've had to keep up milk supply for breastfeeding. Basically the last four years through pregnancies and breastfeeding, I just stopped breastfeeding last month. Just a tiny bit more background about me. I am five foot, 120 pounds. I've been lifting for about 10 years plus. I definitely feel like I'm an experienced lifter. I was very lean, strong, yet healthy pre-babies. I've had two 70 pound plus pregnancies.

So it gained a lot of weight, both pregnancies, lost it all fairly easily. Everything was pretty healthy through both pregnancies, nothing crazy, but just was a lot of weight gain there. December of last year, I did do a body fat check. It was at 26%. I was a year postpartum at that point and had been lifting a little bit, but October of last year, really when I started to kind of kick it in Digger again after having kids. I did get hormones checked a few months ago. Everything seemed pretty normal and okay.

But I was still breastfeeding. They suggested to get everything retested about six months after breastfeeding. So I'm 37 right in that age of, you know, going into possibly perimenopause and all of that. I currently and have always prioritized proteins. We have chickens. I eat a lot of eggs. We eat a lot of local meats, things like that. I live out in the country.

So I don't. feel like I struggle with getting enough protein either. Right now, biggest challenge is finding balance. I want to make progress. I want to hit goals. I want to feel confident. I want to be strong, be a good example for my girls, all those things. But I also want to enjoy chocolate chip cookies without having to put every single ingredient in a tracker and see how big they are and weigh them and all those things. So I guess my question is, should I accept that this is just not the season of life to be doing those things with kids and busy and all that? Or is there a, practical way to do this that I could do it slowly, subsanely, without tracking again,

every single thing that I'm kind of putting in my body and having treats on the weekends and things. Good job. You're doing great, by the way. I think you're doing very, very good. But I'm just going to just going to comment on a comment that you made about going through a little bit of a binge restrict cycle, holidays. A binge restrict cycle, what that really looks like is I lose control and then I try to

overcorrect. Most people eat higher calories around holidays or celebrations, and then we'll self-correct a little bit when that's not happening. So that's normal. Binge restrict, it feels more out of control. Okay, and it doesn't sound like that's you. It sounds like you've got a pretty good decent grasp of fitness. You've been working out for a while.

Postpartum, a year postpartum with a little bit of strength training. You're at 26%, which is healthy. And 120 pounds, I hear that correctly. Right now you're probably in the low 20s is where I would guess. So you're like doing great. I don't think tracking is a good idea, mainly because of what you said at the end, which is that you're trying to find balance, you want to enjoy your life, you don't want to have to put everything in a tracker.

You know, a healthy lifestyle shouldn't add more stress. Now, that doesn't mean tracking doesn't have value at times, but if it's, if you're doing something that's making this thing that's supposed to make you healthier, if you're adding stress, if it's a stressful experience, it's not going to make you healthier. In fact, it'll promote a relationship with nutrition that's not going to be great. So, I mean, really, all you would, Andrea, all you need to do is hit your protein targets. That's all I was going to say. And that you're good.

I literally just and allow the chocolate chip cookie to come in and out. If you're strength training, you have a good strength training program and you're consistent with it. And you consistently hit protein. The additional calories from the cookie or thing here or there is not going to be a problem. It's, in fact, it'll only feed into you building. muscle and moving in that direction. So because you said your protein was a bit inconsistent, although you do eat it, I think you'll naturally be in a really, a really nice balanced bulk.

I'll say bulk, but not really. It'll look more like a nice body composition change over time. As you build some muscle, maybe lean out a little bit or maybe just maintain your current leanness just by hitting protein. So here's what you would do to make it not so stressful, right? You're 120 pounds. So what we want is about 40 grams of protein per meal. So just get a rough idea of what 40 grams of protein looks like for breakfast,

lunch, and dinner. That's it. And then just aim for that and eat it first. And then eat the rest until you're satisfied. And you're done. Yep. There's nothing else you got to do. The maps programming is the next thing, which is what are you doing?

What are you following right now as far as your strain training routine? I'm in phase three of Muscle Mommy. I love it. I love the five-by-fives. I feel very strong right now. I feel like I'm getting back to where I was. You're doing good. You know, I love that.

I was doing a program before that. That was like five, six days a week. It was an online program. It just, it was too much. I knew it was too much for me and just didn't fit my schedule. It was more stressful than not and all that. So switching to three days a week, honestly, it was great. I think, I guess, you know, part of, you know, the macro tracking for me, it's like weekends,

everything goes out the window. Like if there's a leftover waffle sitting on the counter and that's what I have time to run and grab and put in my mouth and run out the door, I'm doing that. And I felt like tracking was the answer because it would make me be more consistent. But I think even saying it out loud, it's almost like I need to plan better and meal prep, not necessarily track. That's it. If you literally, if like you give yourself the permission to do those things, so long as I hit my protein intake. That's the caveat that you just say that to your like, I can do those things. just make sure I hit my protein take.

And again, those additional waffle calories, chocolate chip, you're fine. It's going to be fine. You're going to be totally fine, and it'll go right into building muscle if we got good programming, and you're consistent with that protein, I promise. It also sounds like the challenge on the weekends is just convenience, right? Because it sounds like you're rushing.

Yeah, so if you have something there, so, you know, can you have dairy? Yeah, I eat a lot of full fat dairy. Just that's what we give our girls. Okay, nice. So you could buy those like high protein yogurts. Love those. oftentimes are like 25 grams of protein per like a little container because it'll actually be yogurt plus they'll add way in there. Those are really convenient ways of hitting protein.

If you had that, some berries available, maybe granola if you want a little more calories. And you're like, oh my God, I'm on the go. Put a couple of those in there with some berries and there's a 50 grams of protein meal. Or you could prep and have some meals sitting in the fridge ready for you just microwave and eat. Beef jerky is another convenient thing. But here's the other thing, too. You have, how old are your kids? Two and four.

Yeah, you got little kid. I have a two. So that's like the ages of my kids. You got little kids. You got stuff, you're managing in the home. Weekends are family time. You're maintaining good strength. Your body fat percentage of the low 20s, I could tell.

You're doing really well. So really, it's just, honest to God, it's like if you hit the protein, if that's the goal and you try to be consistent with that, what you're looking for is going to start to happen, even faster. even though it's already happening now. It seems to be happening already with your strength gains. You hit the protein targets. It's going to be just next level.

And that's pretty much it. Yeah, I think with everything you got on your plate, adding tracking and I think you just added stress that you don't need. And you're doing such a good job already. Yeah. I've done it a couple times and it just fell off. And that's for the 1,800 calories. And I'm like, this isn't even what I would normally be eating.

So what, you know, what's the point of even doing this? So I mean, I guess as far as bulking, cutting. And if I did want to do a cut at some point or anything like that, would you suggest just not at this point, just kind of keep on this road for a while? I don't think you need to. If you're at 120 pounds, low 20% body fat, seeing yourself get stronger, no, it'll happen.

You know, I know this is always like one of the hardest parts for clients. And we talk about this on the show all the time. Just sometimes you're actually in the perfect spot, but psychologically because you're not seeing major fast movement, you think that you need to do more. But the reality is, no, just keep going. And, you know, and a lot of times with a client like that, that is struggling with that,

I'll make them like take a picture front side back in an outfit or a bikini or something that they're in the same spot. And then we don't even come back until like three months later, you know, and just and then let's, and then say, okay, what happened? Even though you might have felt like you didn't really change much, you look back and you go like, oh, wow, I see that. I can totally see the difference. Andrea, here's the thing, too, you've been doing this for 10 years relatively consistently. You're doing a great job. You're getting to the place now because in the beginning, it's important to have a goal and to kind of point towards. something, but you're getting to the place now where always having a goal is probably

detrimental because what it's going to do is going to make you chase things that aren't really benefiting you. And so the next stage in your fitness, because you've been doing this for a decade, is to do it for the sake of its enjoyment. Am I enjoying my workouts? Am I enjoying my life? Am I eating in a way that improves the quality of my life? Now the reflection of that, here's where I sell it to you, the reflection of that is a fit, healthy body. and not one that is stressful to maintain. Yeah. Otherwise, it becomes an over focus because you're like, okay, what part of my body can

change? Am I lean enough? Am I doing it? And then again, it just takes away from this wonderful relationship you're developing with fitness. And it seems like you're doing a phenomenal job. So that's the only thing I would add. Okay.

Well, thank you. Yeah. I feel like I'm a highly competitive person and chasing a goal is always just kind of on my mind. And like now that again, four years straight of pregnancies, breastfeeding, all the things. I'm like, it's my time now. What can I do now? And I think, you know, I was going to say, you're 120 post-prepregnancy, 70 pounds down.

You won. Yeah, you're doing it. You won. You're saying you're so much stronger. You won. Yeah, just you're good, man. You're good. Okay.

Well, thank you guys. It's a lot of times a mental game more than anything else. Always. Obviously, I trust everything you guys say. So I appreciate that a lot. And thank you guys. You got it. Do you have a program to follow after muscle mommy?

That's a good question. So I don't know if I should just. redo it. I really enjoyed it. I definitely enjoyed muscle mommy. I think I got Maps 15 performance with that when I bought the bundle. I have not tried it yet. I haven't started it yet. So I don't know if you have any other. Run muscle mummy twice and then run that. Yeah, yeah, you can do that. Or let me send you something if you ever want to get real competitive with your workouts. Let me send you power lift if you ever get the itch to just get real strong. Okay. I love that. You got it. All right. Thank you guys so much. Thanks for calling. It's always mental. Yeah. She's all

She just needed a high five. But, yeah. But listen, this is... Sometimes that's it. This is the thing nobody talks about because the big, big, big challenge, like the big challenge is getting people to the point where they're consistent, you know, for five years and then 10 years. But once you do it for a decade or a decade and a half, you start to enter into a phase where always having, like always trying to chase a goal starts to become kind of a detriment,

you know, a detriment. You have to get really creative with your goals. at some point. Well, okay, mobility or let me do it for a little bit of this or that. But at some point, you can't even do that because what, you get older. So at some point, it's just kind of- Just got to enjoy it. You just enjoy it.

I love when we had Jesse on the podcast, right, his 100-plus pound journey. Yes. And his comment that I think is such a great one, which is I'm just a guy who works out four times a week, you know. That's it. That's it. It's not like this crazy goal. It's just like, I'm a girl that works out three times a week always. And I hit my protein take.

That's who I am. You know, that's it. Our next caller is Andrew from Florida. Andrew, what's happening? What's up, man? Welcome back. Hey. Yeah, I can actually see you guys this time, which is great.

Oh, good. Great. So last time you called, just correct me if I'm wrong, you had some questions about MAPS anabolic. It wasn't working for you. We gave you some advice. You went back and applied it, right? Is that what happened?

Yeah. So I originally emailed you all and was like, hey, you know, this, I'm having these issues. I'm getting feeling pretty fatigued at the end. and you guys had suggested some changes to make to it, which I did, and I applied them. And I will say, and I think it was good for me to apply those changes, but I also was made very aware that that wasn't why I was like losing strength towards the end. I mean, it's a bit of a story, but if you want to hear it, I can tell you.

Yeah, I'd love to. So earlier this year, I had gone through a bunch of stuff and basically decided you know like I'm going to throw myself into the gym everything is going to be you know I'm just going to dial it in go every day track macros I mean everything was being religiously tracked and so I'm doing that I run through anabolic I have the issue I email you guys you guys suggest things I start running through the second time about halfway through I get a very real realization through some other life events that I had been using the gym to cope with and avoid emotions I was not dealing with.

And so I think that was like causing my body to be under a lot of stress I wasn't even aware of. For sure. Yeah. That's tough. That's tough. And so yeah, so that very much hit me in the face about halfway through the second run. And I just kept telling myself was like, all right, I'm going to keep doing this. Like I said, I would do it. I'm going to see it through to the end. But some very similar things happened. And I just, I hit a point where I was like, I've been relying on this thing that is very worldly and very self-centered and ego-driven. And it's not, you know, it failed me.

And so I kind of look back at the email. I sent you guys originally and I'm laughing at it a little bit because it's, it didn't come from a place of needing, like, help physically with it. It came from this place of this thing failed me. why did it fail me? Like, I cannot let this fail me because I didn't even know at that point that that was a problem. Yeah, no, that's, you did your best, dude,

and actually you did a good job of coming to something resembling the truth as to kind of what's happening, which is revealed. Fitness is phenomenal for that. It actually is really good, and it sounds like you're pretty self-aware. Do you mind if I ask you a personal question, Andrew? Yeah.

Are you able to share what those, what those issues were that you were using the gym to either numb or run from? Yeah, I can a little bit. So a while back, I had gotten laid off from a job that basically drove me into the ground. It paid well, but it was not a good job. It was just, it just paid well. And then some things happened. I end up separating with my girlfriend of about three years, not because of the job thing specifically.

lots of other reasons we just mutually decided you know things were working out um and so then january comes around it's literally new year's and i was in california at the time actually it's funny uh i get stuck with like bronco pneumonia and um i end up in the hospital back in orlando here for about four days um and i was just like okay you know like i'm gonna i have a lot more free time now and a lot more emotions i'm not dealing with so i'm gonna i'm gonna just throw myself into this and and like I have control over the gym uh you know and and what I eat so I'm gonna I'm gonna do that and I'm gonna just fully can have control over that and take a break and just yeah really really unhealthily went into it heavily there um and and leaned on it uh and it was got not to get

like super religious on you but uh I was leaning on it a lot and God kind of said hey if you are leaning on something that's worldly like it's gonna fail you like I am literally the only thing you can lean on. And so I, he very much made that apparent to me. And that was, that was great. You know, and things have been getting steadily better since then. Great, dude. Yeah. That's great. Let me just encourage you a little bit if that's okay. Is that all right? Yeah. All right. There's nothing wrong. And men, men are a bit different than women generally with something like this. Okay. If you get stuck in self-rumination, okay, I got to deal with this emotion. So you think about it and you think about it. It's actually worse than doing something.

So you actually didn't do something terrible. In fact, it brought you to where you're at right now. So there's nothing necessarily wrong with being like, I got to go out and do something because I'm feeling terrible. Now, of course, what that oftentimes turns into is a little bit of self-punishment. Yeah, or obsession. Or obsession, which is the realization that you came to. So it actually brought you here.

Yes. And so I just want to encourage you because sometimes, we tend to be, and this is what the data shows, by the way. What I'm conveying is actually with the data shows. Sometimes we'll get the advice that, no, no, no, you've got to deal with your feelings and talk about your feelings and think about what you feel. And for men, that actually tends to have a negative outcome. Yeah, we just kind of self-ruminate and get really into this kind of dark place.

So be aware of your feelings and then go out and do something. And I think that's what you're doing, dude. And so what that looks like with exercise, and you did mention God and spiritual ideas. from and go is how do you do it in a way that glorifies him and not you? Right. And so that's kind of what I've been. I got to a point where I was like, I'm not lifting with a routine. And that was out of confusion and like, I just don't have a desire to do this.

But then I came back and was like, okay, like I'm going to, I'm doing this to be healthier. And then just to give you guys like a full picture of it, I would not have. taken this next step had it just been because of what happened this year if I had not been thinking about this for probably about four years now. And I don't use this lightly just because I've never felt like this. But I had been thinking about a long time ago. I was like maybe I'll start, you know, get certified as like a trainer and do those things. And God very much put it on my heart to say like, hey, now is the time. Like I put it back on your heart back then to have you think about it, but now is the time when you're going to do this. And I would not,

normally I'd be skeptical and be like, okay, you know, are you just feeding into the ego sort of thing? But there is that genuine love for just like helping people that I had before this happened that I can lean back on and say, like, no, this is something that he wanted me to do. Wow, this is great. That's got the detection. I'm taking it now. So at the current, like, I got certified, which is great. And now I'm just, you know, running around to different gyms, waiting for one to take a chance on me. And then when they do, I mean, if God has gone before me in that place, like, there's no telling what could happen. That's great, dude. And you're also talking to the right people. You know that, right?

Do you know we train at trainers as well? We have coaching programs for trainers and we have a course and all that stuff. Did you know that? Yeah, I'd seen a little bit of it, yeah. Okay. Can I have somebody call you just to answer questions, maybe give you some advice? If you want to be in our program, we'll put you in. And I guarantee it'll set you up way better than anybody else. I mean, the whole reason why we do what we do is to set trainers up to be successful. So we don't focus heavily, although this is part of what we do, we don't focus heavily on biomechanics, anatomy, and that kind of stuff. We focus on how to make coaches successful and how to be good coaches. Right.

So I'll have somebody reach out to you, and you can just ask them whatever question, we'll give you some free advice. We also hire internally and remote trainers. So if all goes well, that's also, I mean, one of the thing, we hire from our course program though that's just that's one of the stipulation so that's also another caveat to that so definitely we hire based on character more than anything else so so uh i'll have somebody reach out to you but you're yeah you're dude this is great yeah this is really great and helping other people and through fitness is going to help you when it comes to your fitness especially experiencing what

you've experienced absolutely yeah right it's awesome yeah lean not on your own understanding that's don't forget that yeah because what hell do you know nothing that's that's right that's Right. I appreciate you guys even a weird avenue for God to take, but I really appreciate you guys being there. Have you been watching my series on trying to tackle this myself, kind of along the line? I have a little bit, and I get a lot more relationship advice out of that than anything else. Yeah, well, keep watching because I'm tackling the same thing you just discussed. I'm just actually small world. Yes, yeah, well, that's a common one.

So check it out. Well, I have somebody reach out to you, Andrew. I'd love to eat. Awesome. I really appreciate it. You got it, brother. Thanks for going in. Thank you.

That was great. That was unexpected. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. But, I mean, I love the realization that he had. And again, just as for men, sometimes we get, because the therapy world tends to be geared towards what helps women, not to say it don't help men, but when you look at the data, men do really well with having a purpose placed in front of them versus just thinking about

what caused this and how do I feel all the time or whatever. It tends to make, cause men to feel worse. I was going to say that that could have resulted in staying at home, feeling sorry for myself, eating Doritos on the couch all day long and getting unhealthy, you know what I'm saying, along the ways versus pursuing health for the, say, wrong reasons, but then also. But he's pursuing something. Exactly. And he's and he's working towards something which I think brought that realization.

And so what a better place to be at right now than the other one. Our next caller is Alexa from Arizona. Hi, Alexa. What's happening? How can we help you? Hi. Okay, I'll just read my email prompt. I said, hey, team, I'm 23 in my first couple months of being a personal trainer.

I have a background in gymnastics, gymnastics coaching, and group fitness. So I'm new to full-time training and programming, but I'm not new to, like, working with clients. I'm currently finishing up my program postnatal certification, but until then I'm just working with the general population. My two main questions and struggles right now, one of them has to do with programming. So I'm wondering how I can effectively plan workouts and select movements that go beyond just providing a good workout, and they can truly help see real lasting results. So yeah, that's my first question. Yeah. So, and then the second question, you mind if I, if I read that? Because I want to answer both at the same time. Is that okay? Yeah. It has to do more with confidence in being a coach, especially like myself, I'm still, I have my own body image issues and food struggles. And it's hard to feel like I have the legitimacy to be a trainer when I still, you know, look in the mirror sometimes and don't like what I see. So how can I help people?

like what they see when I don't always feel that way about myself. No, that's great. Alexa, you're going to be a great trainer. And here's how I know. You asked the right questions. You really did. So here's what's going to, so here's the challenge that you're going to run into

because your experience is a training athletes. And athletes, uh, they kind of do what you tell them. They've got good body mechanics. Cues are easy. They've got good body awareness. Super discipline. Super discipline.

Jen Pop is not like that. Like you tell you, I remember Justin talking about this as a trainer. Oh, my God. When he became a trainer, he loves telling the story of how he was an athlete. So he was like, I don't understand why I would tell a client to move their hips back and they couldn't. So it's like, it's totally different. Yeah, I've certainly run into them because, dude, there's just a lot of stuff I naturally know as a gymnast.

Yeah. And it's like, oh, I didn't realize I had to tell them to do that. Well, okay, so here's a deal, okay, with workout programming. As long, if you don't hurt them and you train them appropriately, you're going to move in the right direction. So that's generally speaking. Now, workout programming gets much more. granular, the more advanced the client becomes. So if I'm training a competitive powerlifter or a high-level athlete, my programming

matters a lot. With new Gen Pop clients, the main thing is, are we doing good movements? Am I training them appropriately? And I'm not hurting them. Okay, that's the most important thing. In the relationship, you're building with them with working out. That's key. There's nothing, what will make you effective as a coach is whether or not your clients

trust you and want to follow you. Period. End of story. That's it. Period. End of story. So what does that look like? Vulnerability, honesty, consistency, giving them grace. Here's how you know you're doing a good job. If your clients come to you and tell you when they mess up. Because the tendency that can happen with a trainer and a client oftentimes is that the trainer presents themselves, not because of ill will, but just because we think we need to present ourselves. as like these fitness gods, like I know everything, whatever, and I'm like this perfect fitness person, the client can feel embarrassed or ashamed to share their mistakes or they want to impress you.

Sometimes you can build a relationship with a client or they just want to make you happy. And so they don't really share everything, which makes it impossible to coach them properly. So vulnerability, authenticity, consistency, and grace. In other words, the client feels like they can tell you because you're going to give them the grace. Now, that doesn't mean you lie to them.

It just means like, this trainer isn't going to look down on me. They're going to be honest with me and they're going to tell me what I need to do or how I can help you. They're going to try and coach me, but they'll never look down on me. That's it. That's the key right there. That'll make you an excellent trainer. And the fact that you're asking the questions tells me that you're probably going to be that kind of a train. I think, I mean, we have a lot of resources for this.

And, you know, we've talked about our courses, but we're actually going through, you know, bringing groups of trainers to kind of teach them stem to stern. Like, where do you start with this with the first case client coming in? And how do I not overwhelm them? How do I assess them properly so we can add in, like, the basic primers, the ones, the corrective type exercises to focus on? So it's going to move the needle the most. And, you know, we're doing a lot of that. and we're teaching a lot of that currently. So, you know, that's something, too, that you may want to look into that we offer.

Also, look at your body image issues and food struggles as a superpower. This makes you relatable. So lean into that. Don't allow that to feel like it's crippling you or you can't share. You can't. That's what makes a good coach is that ability to relate to their clients. and if you are vulnerable with them and tell them, yeah, man, I currently still am working on these things. It's not easy.

That right there makes that client more open to share with you the same struggles they're having, and they're more likely to come to you and ask questions versus what Sal was saying, where they don't. They hide it from you because they think you're perfect. They think you're perfect and you got everything all together, then they're going to be more insecure about opening up with what they're challenged with, or they're going to shame themselves or beat themselves up because they can't be perfect on the diet or they can't. can't make every workout versus you letting them know even as their coach and trainer that this is a constant work for me. I'm still working on this and sharing that. That's a superpower. So leaning

into it like that's right. Or worse, they're afraid of letting you down or feeling like you look down on them. Like I can't tell my trainer this. They're going to think I'm, you get some trainers that believe that. I see this on social media too. It's like, you lack discipline. It's your, it's like, you talk to a client like that. And they may be motivated in the short term, but at some point, they're going to hide stuff from you or they're bounce. They're going to take off. They're just like, I can't even face this person and you lose clients that way. How long have you been listening to the show, Alexa?

On and off for a couple of years. I started listening before I fully committed to like getting my personal trainer's certificate and then just kind of periodically. So probably for the last two years. How many times have you heard us discuss our challenges, either past or present with body image, food struggles, our relationship to fitness. Have you heard us talk about that on the show? Yeah.

Why do you think we do that? To come off more relatable. Yeah, it's not because we like to share it to the world. It's because we want to help people. And it's like, let's just like, and this is what makes us effective as a podcast is that people don't look at us as a perfect whatever. First of all, nobody is, which is stupid to even pretend. But it's, Adam is 100% percent. Correct. In fact, the next time a client shares with you a challenge they're having with their body image or food struggle or whatever,

that's your opportunity. The best thing you can do is say, oh, yeah, that's tough. You know what? Here's a struggle that I have. And then you coach them after you explain that to them. And watch what happens. It's, it's a super. Adam labeled it perfectly. It is a superpower. And make sure you're getting in all of our trainer forums, following the trainer IG, watching the, you know, we have a podcast dedicated to. trainers now too, right, that Kyle runs. So if you're not watching, oh, yeah, so that's on Elite Trainer Academy. Elite Trainer Academy. So if you're, if you're not following that, that's purely conversations around being a good trainer and building your business as a trainer. So that's all that content is dedicated to. If you want, Alex, I can have someone reach out to you and talk to you about some of what we do to coach and train trainers. And they can just answer questions for you. But if you want to be a part of our, or what we do, our course and all that stuff, it's also how

we hire trainers. So would that, would you be interested? Yeah, absolutely. All right, I'll have somebody reach out to you today. Okay. Awesome. Yeah. Thanks for calling in. Yeah.

You're doing great. You ask the right questions. Great questions. Thank you. You got it. It's scary. Just being a new trainer. It should be.

It should be scary. That's because you care. That's right. It's okay. It's important. We got you. Thank you so much. All right.

Bye. Just to clarify, here's why I said it should be scary. If a new trainer is like, oh, yeah, I got this. Well, that's it. You're not going to be good, dude, at all. You're naive. Yeah, you ain't got nothing, bro. Yeah, yeah.

It's a tough job. And you have people, what you're potentially tapping into is helping someone dramatically change their life for the better. It's a big deal. So you should go in with this like, okay, I need to know more. I want to do a good job. There's a lot on the line because it is. But if you go on with you.

You use that to motivate yourself to get more educated and just more experience. Totally. in, you know, you'll get confident as a result. That's right. 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, check out our discounted RGB Superbundle at Mind Pumpmedia.com. The RGB Superbundle includes MAPS Anabolic, Maps Performance, and Maps Aesthetic, Nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by Sal Adam and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints and over 200 videos, the RGB Superbundle is like having Sal Adam and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction of the price. The RGB Superbundle has a full 30-day money-back guarantee, and you can get it now plus other valuable free resources.

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