Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2921: Your FAT LOSS Stalled ! How Do You Fix it?

Episode Date: August 12, 2026

MAPS BOGO SALE Buy Any MAPS Program and Get Another One Free https://www.mapsfitnessproducts.com   Your fat loss was working until it stopped. In this episode, Sal, Adam, and Justin break down what causes fat loss plateaus and four strategies that can help get progress moving again without simply cutting calories or adding more cardio. They explain why a short mini bulk or reverse diet can be one of the most effective ways to break a plateau, when adding or reducing cardio can help, how carb cycling can be used as a tool, and why shifting your focus from fat loss to performance can provide both physical and psychological benefits. The guys also discuss muscle building and fat loss, the relationship between science and real-world coaching experience, red light therapy, the growing importance of community and social connection, big-wave surfing, and more. The episode then moves into live coaching with three callers: Amber from Texas gives an update on her progress, Chase from Arizona gets advice on losing body fat while rebuilding his athleticism, and Ashley from Texas gets guidance on returning to training after pregnancy and an extended period away from exercise.   Legion Supplements https://buylegion.com/mindpump Code "MINDPUMP" for buy one, get one 50% off for new customers, and 20% cash back for returning customers.   Joovv Red Light Therapy https://joovv.com/mindpump Code "Mindpump" to get $50 off your first purchase.   Fatty15 https://fatty15.com/MINDPUMP Get an additional 15% off their 90-day Subscription Starter Kit with code "mindpump".   02:18 - How to Break Through a Fat Loss Plateau 08:05 - Mini Bulks and Reverse Dieting 13:26 - Should You Add or Remove Cardio? 16:42 - Carb Cycling for Fat Loss 19:50 - Focus on Performance Instead of Fat Loss 23:50 - Building Muscle and Its Impact on Fat Loss 30:49 - The Best Intervention for Healthier-Looking Skin 33:55 - Why Gyms Are Becoming More Social 44:29 - The 16-Year-Old Lifeguard Who Saved a Child 01:08:06 - Amber: Progress Update 01:14:10 - Chase: Losing Fat While Building Fitness 01:27:39 - Ashley: Returning to Training Postpartum

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mugs, or training gear over at MindpumpStore.com. I'm talking right now, hit pause, head on over to Mind Pumstore.com. That's it. Enjoy the rest of the show. You've been on a fat loss journey. It was working until it stopped. Today we're going to talk about how to break through fat loss plateaus. We're going to give you some tips on how to get the fat loss started.

Again, don't stay where you're at. That sucks. Let's get it moving. Yeah, let's go. Reminds me of one of the last seminars I did as a fitness manager, stuck in a rut. Really? Yeah, that was the, yeah, that was the, those are the posters you put around the down?

Yeah, yeah, you remember that? You're the little kits that used to get in the poster around? Yes. Did you get it? I like this topic because this is inevitable. Okay, so it's not a matter of if this will happen. This is going to happen. It's when and how hard.

Right. And the typical, so this is what it feels like, right? You do your diet, you're doing your workout. You're consistent enough to see some fat loss. And the fat loss, it seems relatively consistent. So you're noticing the scale or you're noticing the calipers change and go down pretty much week over week. And then it doesn't move. And it doesn't move for a week.

And it doesn't move for two weeks and three weeks. And you realize, wow, I'm in a total plateau. What do I do? Now, the typical answer is we'll cut calories and increase activity even more, which, you know, that can definitely work. But that eventually also leads to a plateau. And when those two things stop working, in other words, when cutting your calories more isn't realistic, and when exercising more isn't realistic,

what do you do? How do I break this plateau? I'm already eating 1500 calories, or I'm already exercising a lot. And if I drop my food even more, there's no way I'll be able to sustain this. Or I'm going to feel terrible. Or I'm going to lose muscle.

Or if I exercise more, I don't think I can do that consistently. And I'm not going to like this. I'm going to hate this. and then I'm just going to rebound. Is there anything I can do, or am I done? Is the fat loss journey done? And the truth is, there are a few things you could do

to get the needle moving again that don't include cutting calories and or dramatically increasing activity. Yeah, it's quite the opposite, actually. That's right. I mean, I think you should talk a little bit about what happens, I feel like in... Why the plateau is there?

Well, not just that, but like what... This was so common as a young trainer and your go-to method is, and I think it's so common still in commercial gyms when you see people training clients that when this comes about, the levers that they always pull is the cut calories, run more. And I think that it's still prevalent. I mean, I just in the gym the other day, and I see a group of people that are getting trained by a trainer that are trying to lose weight, obviously. and the entire hour is like dedicated to just burn and sweat. And I'm going like, man, they would be far more valuable for those people to be focused on strength right now than to be just trying to burn off the calories all the time.

And so I just, I think it's important to communicate how common this still is. That's right. So here's what happens. And this is a very oversimplified, super oversimplified explanation. of the weight loss or fat loss process. So you are burning more energy than you're taking in. Or to say it a different way, you're taking in less energy than you're burning. This causes an imbalance in energy.

Okay. So if I'm taking in 2,000 calories, and this is how we measure energy from food, so I'm taking in 2,000 calories, but I'm burning 3,000 calories with the only possible way I could burn 3,000 calories of energy if I'm taking in 2,000 calories of food, is if I'm grabbing that thousand calories from somewhere, where is it coming from? Body fat, ideally, right?

So that deficit or that imbalance has to be there for consistent weight loss or fat loss to occur. The reason why you plateaued is that balance disappeared. Or that imbalance, I should say, disappeared. There is no more deficit. Even though you're still eating the same amount and moving the same amount,

your body has figured out a way to have them equal. So if you're taking in 50% 1,500 calories consistently a day, and you're working out five days a week doing lots of exercise, and that was working for a while, and now it's stopped. Here's what that literally means. It literally means your body has figured out how to burn what you're taking in. It has figured out how to survive and perform and burn 1,500 calories a day because that's what you're taking in.

And that's what the plateau means. And so there's two ways we can get that imbalance to occur again. there's a few ways. One of them is, oh, I'll just eat less. Cool, got another imbalance. But guess what's going to happen now? We're going to get back to where we were before.

My body figures out how to adapt in that direction. It's called metabolic adaptation, by the way. Second option is I could just move a ton more. Let me just keep moving even more. But believe it or not, your body figures out a way eventually to cause that energy to balance out again. There's a lot of different ways it does this. It can lose muscle.

Muscle burns more calories. It could reduce activity when you're not working out and weight. that you don't even realize. It should actually pull away from in extreme cases. Other functions of the body. You start to feel tired. You start to notice your hair isn't. It looks as good.

Your skin. Your nails. If this happens too aggressively, you can get sick, really burn out. You can lose bone mass. Okay. Now, and that's typically what you're looking at. So what we got to do is figure out,

how can we create this energy and balance to occur again without necessarily have to eat less and exercise more. And I'll give you the first thing you can do. And this is the most effective. Build some muscle. Of all of the ones we're going to talk about, this one right here is the one that works the best. And the most predictably,

it's also the one that's the most challenging and the most scary, unfortunately. And that's to switch gears and stop being in a deficit and go on what we would call a mini bulk or a reverse diet for a short period of time. So this is where you take your calories, whatever you're eating, and eat more, bump them up, in some cases, 500 calories,

in other cases as much as 1,000. And now you're going to try and build for the next week or two or three or four weeks. And then when your body's balanced out there and you've built a little bit, then you can go back on the cut. And this is really the philosophy behind a reverse diet, kind of how it works. Yeah, I look at this a lot like even with lifting weights, there's safeguards. There's ways that the body protects itself from being injured and overextending itself and, you know, in terms of dieting and, you know, like dwindling down to an unhealthy place. Your body has safeguards there and it's trying to preserve energy. And at that point, like, it's trying to keep, you know, what it can.

So you're going to hit this stall because it's a safeguard. This is your body protecting itself. So, you know, to be able to kind of like move past this, we have to like introduce, you know, a new. standard for it. I find one of the greatest challenges with communicating this, at least today, is our own fitness community pushing back on how beneficial adding two to three pounds of muscle is. You know, there's this ongoing conversation and debate around, you know, just how metabolically advantageous adding three to five pounds of muscle is to your body. And, you know, you have and part of the science community, uh, fitness science community is, oh, it's, you know,

it only gives you an extra, you know, 10 to 20 calories at most, uh, a day that you're, the dumbest argument I've heard. And it's crazy because, um, and what, through what mechanism, um, this happens, I'm not sure, but I, it's not a handful. It's hundreds of cases where I've seen clients who have just only added five, five or six pounds of muscle, but are able to eat a thousand more calories a day and not put on body fat. So it doesn't math based off it. Now, we can sit here and theorize the different things that are happening. Oh, that person now is six pounds more muscle.

And so they're, you know, fitter. So they, they're more active throughout the day. And so maybe that accounts for some more of the calories. they now can, they're stronger so they can lift more weight. So there's been natural progressive overload that happens. So maybe more calories are getting expended through there. I'm not sure exactly where it comes from. But I know for sure putting five to 10 pounds of muscle on somebody's body is radically different metabolically for them.

And it doesn't. And I hate when we hear people in our space make the argument that building. We will have the science to support what every good coach has observed for decades. So we will have the science eventually to support it. The problem is the metabolism is so complex. And the way we measure things is just inadequate to kind of capture what's going on. But we do know this. Like here's a fact.

Like your body can burn more or less calories with your current lean body mass. You don't even have to add muscle. It could become more or less efficient. Well, to a lot of different. To me, to me, Sal, that's just another like, another, you know, a hole in that argument for them of like trying to make this argument

that three to five pounds is exactly this, or approximately this many calories. You leverage. When we know that hormones and stress can fluctuate how you, you burn calories in a single day. You leverage insulin sensitivity. You leverage mitochondrial uncoupling.

Your body can become more or less. I've had clients add two pounds of muscle and boost their metabolic rate, 600 calories, from working with me. We reverse diet people all the time. This does work, you guys. And look, here's the, I'll explain it in a way that makes sense. Although I don't, the science is going to be far more complex and what I'm about to say.

But here's a deal. You're in a calorie deficit for too long. Your body doesn't feel safe burning tons of calories. It's going to learn how to burn less calories. A couple weeks of going on a small bulk tells your body, hey, go ahead. Become less efficient with calories. Burn more calories because we're getting food. By the way, bodybuilders have observed this for years.

They would do that this is like an old bodybuilding trick where they plateau on a diet and they'd have like a quote quote cheat day or weekend come back and they'd notice that they were leaner. This is my favorite way to break a fat loss plateau because most fat loss plateaus don't happen when somebody's calories are still high. This is rare. It's not like I took someone from 3,000 calories or 2,500 calories they plateau. This is typically an issue when someone's going down below 2,000 calories. Yeah. that I have to start to do this kind of, you know, this money.

Under 2,000 for a female. I'd say under 2,500 for a male. Yeah, you drop most males below 25. Yeah, you get down to 2,000 for a guy. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, for sure. Here's the next thing. This is going to sound weird.

But your fat loss is stalled, you can either add or take away cardio. Now, this sounds like it's contradicting. What are you talking about? What do you mean add or take away cardio? Well, it depends on the person. You're doing no cardio? You can add a little bit of cardio. You're doing a lot of cardio?

take away some cardio. Yeah. And believe it or not, both will work for fat loss, but let's explain a little bit, okay? The person is doing no cardio whatsoever, adding a little bit of additional cardio, a couple days a week or three days a week, does increase predictably calorie expenditure.

It's very predictable. Obviously, you're moving more, you're going to more calories. Pretty straightforward. But what about the person we're taking cardio away from? How does that help with fat loss? Well, I'll tell you, when I got someone who's doing six days a week of cardio,

and working out a lot and their calories are low. Oftentimes, I take cardio away, and I take away some of that stress from the cardio. They build a little bit of muscle, and I see some fat loss. And I've seen that one time and time again. Nobody wants to do it when I suggest it. Everybody fights me on it. But I give them two or three weeks. And it's like I take it completely away.

But, you know, you're doing six days a week. We're going to go three days a week. That's all we're going to change. Let's see what happens. And sure enough, we'll see a half percent to percent drop. Yeah, sometimes that's what the body needs to recover fully and really adapt to build muscle. That's right. I used to always explain using cardio like nitrogoxide for like the engine. It's such it's it's such a great way to get that extra bit of boost and speed, right? If you're if you

understand how nitric oxide works with an engine you get it's like like a blast of cold air that goes in there and to get horsepower. But you'll blow the engine if you just keep. You just run on it all the time. And so somebody who's running on it all the time taking that away and then building the metabolism is going to be something like through, through building muscle like your point. Someone who never uses it, right? And they save it. And then all of a sudden they hit it, you're going to see a boost from it. But it's short live, just like nitric oxide is. It's not something that you want to keep hitting over, over, over, over like that, because eventually you will hit that same plateau. So why when I used to compete, my goal always for myself and my clients

was how long can I get this person to lean out heading into a show without using any cardio? So I knew at the last couple weeks, if I needed to ramp it up a little bit or show, you know, sharpen up a little bit, I can hit that nitric on that last, that last bit. If we had been doing it, and then you see this all the time with competitors, especially like bikini competitors, they're on like a 16 week prep. And day one, day one, they're doing an hour of Stairmaster already. It's like, dude, you're doing that so early. We get in the final weeks and we don't like Caledini you can't ramp it up because you've already used that up. So I like given that analogy to clients, it's like that, it is a powerful tool, but it's short-lived what you get from it.

Yeah, the person who's not doing cardio right now, is agreeing like, oh yeah, I'll add a little bit. But I guarantee you the person listening right now is doing five, six days a week of cardio. Yeah. Who stalled the fat loss. Oh, no way. They're listening to me, tell them to cut their cardio in half and that'll help them with fat loss, and they're just not believing it. Yeah.

And here's what I got to say to you. They want to fight you got nothing to lose. You already plateaued. Give it a shot. Worst case scenario does nothing. And you can go back to what you were doing before. Next up, this, I don't necessarily have a ton of science to support this. But it's been done for so long.

by stage competitors, and there's so many anecdotes surrounding this. And I have personally experienced this that I do believe this to be a kind of decent. It's not as effective as the mini bulk, but it's a somewhat decent way to break through a fat last plateau. And that's to do carb cycling. So carb cycling looks like this. You do two days of very, very low carbohydrates, and then you do a day where your carbohydrates are high, and you just go back and forth. That's one way to do it. And in my experience, I've gotten myself that final percent, percent half of body fat when I plateaued it, you know, something like five or five and a half percent body fat.

Yeah, I'm not sure if this is attributed more. I mean, I know that most people say it's just the calories that you're manipulating while doing through that. I had a lot of success doing this. I liked it. It also gave me something to look forward to on the, on the high. The psychological piece. Yeah. Yeah.

And we talk a lot about that, you know, being such a big piece to this whole puzzle is, like, like being able, the psychological gain that you're constantly playing. So it's different. Like I think sometimes when you're in this consistent deficit and you're consistently trying to lose body fat and you're eating the same calories every single day is just monotonous. You need an interruption. Yeah.

So it gives you a nice little interruption. I always, too, try to schedule if, you know, this is somebody who's doing this for body composition change. I like to schedule the high carb days around, like the muscle groups that I was really trying to work on, develop, or you're big ones like lay. Big intense workout day. Yeah, when you needed energy like that, I could really power through a, you know, upper body type of workout when I'm low on carbohydrates.

It's not difficult for me. Lower body, I need a lot more fuel and gas. And so I liked that part of it versus just having this kind of consistent, moderate or low calories. And so I always have success with it. I like the psychological piece. I liked feeling, because when you go zero carb or low carb for two days, things flattened out. Your muscles don't feel as pumped. But you do kind of feel, you lose water, so you kind of feel like you look leaner.

Then I do the one day that's high, muscles get a bigger pump. I don't necessarily hold water right out the gates. So for like a short period of time, I kind of look a little leaner in the mirror. And psychologically, that was always very motivating me. But I've done this, and I've maintained the calories. So I've done this where my carbs are low, but my fats are higher. So it's not like my calories drop. Yeah.

But I still find that it's, and I've done this enough time, so it's like, I can get another half to percent body fat off myself. just by doing this and I would I did this the times I've done this is when I'm like really low and it's when things are just really hard to continue moving well I like it too because uh anytime you remove something like that that could be a potential tool for you to really boost your energy and like a useful energy at that time um you know removing it sometimes you get somewhat uh I don't know if it's like adapted or you're just like you're just kind of been doing it for so long you don't notice, you know, that energy boost.

It's good to kind of like reactimate to it. Totally. And then last, this is a, this one, this one's great for a few different reasons. One, it requires you that you feed yourself a little bit differently, which is good, which is kind of similar to number one, right, going to mini bulk. Two, it takes your eyes off of the aesthetic, which I will never downplay the psychological when it comes to body composition change. Because the psychological, of all the things we need to consider,

the psychological is the number one thing. It's the most important thing. I know this is a coach. Like, you get that solved. Everything else is easy. You can do everything else. Don't get that part solved and forget about it. So, and that is to focus on performance.

You've been focused on fat loss for so long, and now you're plateaued. Give yourself five or six weeks of performance goal. I'm just going to get stronger. Or I'm going to improve my stamina. or I'm going to improve my mobility. And then feed yourself accordingly. How do I eat to improve this new performance goal that I have?

And I'm going to do it for five weeks. I'm going to go back to fat loss after five weeks. But for the next five weeks, I'm going to give myself a break, mental break. I'm not going to weigh myself. I'm not going to look in the mirror. All I care about is this performance goal that I'm going to do for the next four to six weeks and eat accordingly. And this is a wonderful plateau buster.

It's one of my favorite plateau busters because it's also a psychological plateau buster. You get out of your head. You get in love with performance. which is going to take you a couple weeks, but then you'll see the gains of performance, you'll start loving it. And then you get back on your fat loss journey and it's fresh.

It feels fresh again. More specifically, I love to pick an exercise. You've either never done or rarely do and focus on that. Right? Same thing as what you're saying, right? You're saying, because someone might be listening right now, and they're like, well, I'm kind of always trying

to get a stronger bench. And I'm always trying to get a stronger deadlift. So I'm never not trying to do that. And that's performance focused. and I'm still at a plateau. I'm not seeing anything. One of the best ways to break through a plateau and also focus on performance

and see positive change in that performance is to choose something you don't normally do. If you don't ever do Bulgarian split squats and you suck at them, like great time to switch over, focus on them, and see how good you get on them. And you'll see this. And I love this,

even when I have somebody who is cutting or trying to lean out because even sometimes in a calorie deficit will actually see strength. which is hard to do. It's very hard to see performance and strength gains when you're trying to lean out many times. And so, but when you're doing a new movement, a lot of times you'll see that performance gain even in sometimes a deficit. And so I love to add in to someone's routine. Just exchange a staple movement that you do with something that you don't do and keep focused on that and getting better on that and watch how that helps. Of all of these steps, because the last one we just mentioned, kind of goes along. with increasing your calories because you're trying to boost performance. Of all of these steps, the one that I was most consistent with with my clients was this one

that we're talking about. When I would have a client, we're doing fat loss, we're doing a good job, it's plateauing, it's frustrating, very frustrating. I would literally have this conversation with my client. They'd come in, it's like, okay, this is week four or five, nothing seems to be moving. We're definitely in a hard plateau. And I say, hey, here's what we're going to do. For the next four weeks, for the next 30 days, we're going to just focus on,

this performance metric. And I would pick, typically it would pick strength because that's an easy one. So I said, we're just going to get you strong, and I want to get you stronger at this one particular lift specifically.

And we're just for the next 30 days, that's all we're going to focus on. After we're done, then we're going to get back on the fat loss journey. And they'd be like, well, I want to keep going. So we already plateaued. If we keep pushing, nothing's going to happen. So let's just have some fun

from the next 30 days. And don't worry, when we get back to fat loss, that's going to start happening again. And my clients would agree. We'd do it. We'd have fun. They'd get into the performance.

then we go back to fat loss and like magic, like magic. Everything started happening again. You know, back to what you were talking about, about building muscle and how it contributes to fat loss. It's so funny, Adam, a study just came out, and I'll pull it up right now, on the effects of muscle building to fat loss. Actually, this is an actual study, and this was June of 2025, and it's a peer-reviewed study.

The title of it is, effects of skeletal muscle hypertrophy on fat mass. and glucose homeostasis in human and animals. It's a narrative review, and there's some systematic literature search. So here's what they found. The analysis reveals that a 1.9 to 3.3% increase in global muscle mass in humans is associated with a 4 to almost 6% lower fat mass. In other words, as muscle mass goes up, fat mass tends to go down. That's right.

This increase of muscle mass was associated with 23%. to 22% less fat mass. So in other words, muscle does contribute to fat loss. And in there, they're showing how it affects glucose, homeostasis. Muscles are, so glucose is obviously the sugar in your blood. Muscles are a storage vessel for sugar and carbohydrates, just like the liver. And as muscles build a little bit, they become more insulin sensitive. They store more of that.

And so you start to leverage the body more towards burning. body fat, less towards storing body fat, more towards performance. And so, and what we're finding, you combine this with other studies where they use strength training is the primary form of exercise for fat loss, even though strength training burns the least amount of calories. It's actually not a great calorie burner, but it's a great fat loss tool. How is that possible? Muscle.

Muscle is very valuable when it comes to fat loss. Yeah, I don't think anybody in the science community would argue, obviously they wouldn't. It's coming directly from a study. going to argue that point or most of the points that are made around the benefits of building muscle and speeding and metabolism up. I just think that they it's a classic example of when you know, we want to be more right. And so when somebody communicates, oh, I had a client who we built five pounds of muscle and they're eating a thousand more calories, they want to come in and be like, that's a bunch of bullshit. That's not true. Every pound of muscle is only this many calories.

and what I and I hate, I hate when this is done because it, the average person that's listening, it's, it's been so difficult to get people off the, this hamster wheel of body composition change by just running and eating less calories and encouraging people to build into the body they want. We've spent most of our career trying to make this case. And when you have someone like that from the science community that comes in and uses studies to support. Just throw a bunch of dirt in the water. You do. You just. You, you, you, you, you, you discourage. For what, too?

Yeah. Yeah. To be more right, bro. Yeah. To be more right. Doesn't help me. You know, to be. You know what, you know what the challenge is with that?

I know, so here's, here's the downfall. It's so funny. It's just totally linked to that conversation. I was texting you guys the other night. This is because people who are really deep in the science, data, data, and literature only use science data and literature as their, their litmus test for truth. everything else is just an opinion. There is no truth unless it's proven by a study.

Okay? I get that. I get why somebody or how somebody could come to that conclusion. But here's the deal. You take a doctor, right? Well-educated doctor. The most, the best doctors in the world, the ones that really do a phenomenal job,

are the doctors that know the science very, very well, who also have lots of experience. Nobody would argue that. I think everybody would agree to that, right? They're the most educated, but also the most experience. You combine the two, and they just have a knowledge that is applicable, understands nuance. They're just that much better. Same for trainers.

You can have a trainer who has got all the courses, certifications, know all the data studies, anatomy, but they're not going to be a great trainer until they also get the experience. Now you combine both, and it's amazing. The challenge was that anecdote and opinions, you know, you would, kind of, it was based off your opinion of the people that you heard or maybe your own opinion. And if I get an anecdote for one person or two people or three people, I mean, it could be anything, right? Is it true? I don't know. Maybe, maybe you just experienced it and you attributed your success to that thing and maybe it was something else. But if you could

compile thousands of anecdotes or millions of anecdotes, now we got something that points us in a particular direction, right? So experience, uh, is that. experiences, well, I've been a doctor for 20 years. I've seen enough patients to know that the study says this, but here's what happens in real life and it's kind of different, right? Well, we actually have an opportunity now to compile anecdotes to start to point in the right direction. You can use AI that way. And that's what I was tripping out over.

I used AI the other night and I asked it, can go on all of the fitness forums, for example, and tell me what does the consensus look like around what works for Fet? loss or what supplements are best for performance. Now take that that data set and compare it to what the studies show and try to find the commonalities. And it's remarkable. It's amazing. So if you just did that.

It narrows it down quite a bit. Listen, you could do that. Go, you could ask AI, go on all the fitness forums for fat loss. And what are people's experiences with reverse dieting? Do their metabolisms actually get faster? I bet what you'll get is the majority of people will be like, who did it right? like, oh yeah, it totally work. It totally worked.

And yet the data and the science is yet to prove it, yet to prove how it works or why it works. So, but anyway, I did that feeling. Were you, were you, I mean, Courtney, Justin's wife was talking when we were sitting by the fire on about her, her experience as a nurse, just like being very educated in the field. Oh, yeah. Yet they would take all these nurses with less education, but that have had two years of experience. Yeah, two years of experience because they did like the intern or whatever like that for two years. And she's like, I mean, I just, I think everybody would rather have that. I mean, I always would, I would always prefer a coach or a trainer who's been, who's been doing this for a long time than, then all the national certs.

Like, I don't give a shit about all that. If you have all the national certs and you've trained for six months or give me the guy or girl who's been training for 10 years, it's like, oh, I'll take the one who's been helping people for 10 years. And what's crazy is that how few studies are repeated. So they'll have a study with a conclusion. then someone else will repeat the study and it'll come to a different conclusion. Like, well, I guess that didn't work. Yeah. I know it's pretty crazy.

Speaking of science and studies and stuff, we'll get questions on like skin stuff. We have a large female audience in Alaska. It's like what actually moves the needle the most for improving the health of your skin or the way it looks or whatever? And there's a few things you can do. But none of them compare besides being healthy. I got to say that, right? Being healthy is the best thing you can do for your skin. But the red light therapy is by far.

Like nothing comes close. That's by far the, so another way to say that is the most by far intervention. Yes. So like nothing beats, nothing beats diet. Yes. Get good sleep. Diet, stress management, exercise. That's right.

Like that's obviously. Nothing touches that. Right. But the thing you could do on top of that. Yeah, the greatest intervention. You get a juve red light panel within a week. Within a week, you notice a difference. Oh, I feel like within a couple of session or.

two of doing it. You can see it. Makes a huge difference. It moves the needle the most out of everything. So for people who wanted to change the appearance of their skin and make it look younger, like you get a red light panel, use that three days a week. Bro. That's going to crush everything else. I remember I think it was Mercola because way back when I was looking at like, because it just sounded like wizardry. It does.

Yeah. And he was like really kind of challenging it and going through. And the studies are so airtight. Yep. And it was just amazing. And they go back decades. All, yeah, way back. Oh, it's, it's so accepted, though. I mean, Doug, did you guys hear Doug talking about Brianna?

He just dropped Brianna off at her new place. Oh, yeah. And they're like college, campus, condos or whatever like that. And inside their gym is red light therapy. Oh, yeah? Wow. They have a room dedicated to red light. Oh, wow.

Yeah. No, it's full. I mean, it's full. Recovery rooms and stuff are getting big in gyms now. Everywhere. It's really, yeah. It's so not uncommon to see. In fact, most all your big name gyms all have it now,

which is so crazy to think that, right? Because the studies go back pretty far. You're talking about McColl and so with that. I mean, he's been talking about it for a long time. Red light studies go back to the 70s. And then I remember when we first met with you, like, I remember you going through the studies, you're like, man, these are studies way back when.

So this has been happening for a long. But man, it didn't take until not that long ago. It didn't take because just 20 years ago, if you wanted like a legit red light panel, like the ones in studies. Yeah, you spend 20 grand. Yeah. So the only way to get red light therapy, you know, 20 years ago, 30, 0, you'd go to an expensive salon that had them.

And then you'd pay, you know, 50 or 100 bucks per session. Yeah. Isn't it kind of typical, though? It's like, you know, the gym industry in itself was so focused on, you know, the workouts and, like, that's the priority. And then all of a sudden we realize, oh, shit, like recovery is really where you get everything from. And so now they're just highlighting all the interventions instead of like the actual way to recover. You know, it's funny because the recovery means don't come. come here.

I'm the gym. Hey, go rest more. Like, wait, we need the, we want them to come. We want you here. Resting.

How do they need cover more here? Exactly. Did you guys see? Here's a hammock and here's a red light. Did you guys see the clip that Doug sent over, um, of, uh,

the experiences and like the, the, the, hospitality? No, I didn't see that. Oh, it was a good clip.

You guys should have watched it. It was a really, he was a really good, it was a really good breakdown. Just, uh, prediction on the surge in hospitality. Yeah.

You're going to see one of the largest booms we've ever seen in hospitality. And as AI becomes more and more prevalent in our regular day, more and more people are wanting to experience in-person-type experiences. Of course. And so, hence, the gym's exploding, wellness exploding right now and going that direction. But you're saying even, like, clubs and lounges and pool party places and what do you see happening even like AVAC and stuff like that? You got to go to places that are. It's just blowing up right now. And what it is, it's like we're using more and more of this technology, which is great.

You know, and everybody's starting to adopt it in business. Well, you have to go out of your way to build community and be social. That's just it. It just doesn't happen as a default of your life anymore. Yes. It used to be that way. It used to be your daily life included social components because you surround people. Well, yeah.

You go your whole, you go weeks without seeing anybody. No, you know, classic example of. of, I mean, as stuff that so many people have just now adopted is like getting Instacart or DoorDash your groceries. I mean, there was a time when like you wanted groceries. You had to go to the grocery store and you had to see other people and say hi and talk to a cashier. And I mean, you could literally not do that ever again. And so and more and more people, I think, have adopted things like that. And you, I think you just take it for granted. You start to stack those things before you don't. I mean, go into the movies.

I mean, see it even in my own son who will pass on going to a new movie release because he knows it'll come out at home and you'd rather watch the convenience of and stream it from home. You know, it's just like, just more and more of these things that. Well, the norm used to be, uh, when you were a kid, there was nothing to do unless you went outside and played with the other kids. That wasn't that long ago. It was a few, you know, a couple decades ago, but you just, this is, I want to hang out with some.

I got to go outside. Um, if you needed something, you would go to your neighbor and ask them, you know, old, hey, can I borrow a cup of sugar? Yeah. You know, type of deal. And then most of society attended some kind of a religious service once a week, which is a big community thing. We worked with each other.

So remote work is very common now in comparison to how uncommon it used to be. It didn't even exist. Yeah. And it's, and then on top of it, we were so entertained when we're alone that it kind of takes away the sting of boredom. And so, yeah, it makes sense to me that now services that organize social interactions are going to explain. I mean, it goes back to the thing I think I've said on this podcast many times when we're debating trends or societal stuff. And it's like we always allow the pendulum to swing one extreme.

And then I feel like the, and I think this is a positive thing, right? Like, this is the thing that I always makes me feel good about humanity is that as bad. is it can be and that we talk about what, things that are going on. We only let it go so far. And then I feel like the trend comes back the other direction. Now it tends to counter swing really hard the other way. And that's kind of just what.

But I feel like that's kind of always what happens. And this is an example of that. Like we, you know, all this AI stuff's going. And then, of course, all the fear mongering around it and like, oh, my God, we're all going to, no one's going to have jobs and everybody's going to be just no one's going to talk to each other. And it's just like, okay. Yeah, maybe for a little bit. maybe all of us will experience a little bit of what that is and then we'll realize like, oh, this doesn't feel good.

I don't like it. Well, I like the direction that gyms are going. I really think it's cool. I think gyms are going in a direction of socialization, connection. So I wonder, you've been saying this. And now after seeing that clip that Doug sent, I have kind of a different take on, like, does it fully explode? Or were gyms just smart enough to be the first to pick up on this trend? of this like hospitality direction and they're benefiting from being on the front end of this wave

and does other businesses like say the Ritz and companies like that and other companies start to realize like, oh, we're missing, we're missing an opportunity right here to be in the mix of this. And then does some of that market share get taken from the gyms? I don't know how they'll take it. I think so. Well, I don't know because gyms are an. in a perfect position to do this.

Like one of the things that, so to be social without actually having an activity to do, it's hard to get people out of the house to do that. Like, hey, go hang out with people. Like, no. Hey, go play pickleball. Okay. Or, hey, go hang out and do this workout class or join this hiking group or then, you know, maybe a reading club.

I don't know. Maybe libraries will come back because of that. But my point is there has to, I don't see people just going out to be around people unless there's something to do. And gyms are, you know, it's like the old country club model, except smaller. It makes me think, too, because I've been watching on HBO. They did a documentary on Burning Man. And, like, it's interesting to see, like, with the potential.

People, like, getting this crazy experience from it. It's really just human connection that's been lost for them. And, like, this, like, bare bones, like, I have to, like, figure out how to interact with people. And, like, the weather is crazy and this is crazy. And then, you know, and, and, you know, And we're appreciating people's gifts and art and stuff that they're bringing here. Obviously, there's drugs, sex, and all that kind of stuff. You know, they didn't really get into that in the documentary, of course, which I was like,

minor detail. I was just, yeah, I was curious to watch it from afar as I've never been. I know, you know. Doug's been there. Doug's been there. Doug's been there. So he could probably chime in, but it looked cool. Yeah, he's got a lifetime membership.

I understand the appeal of it. It being like, you know, people really, like, dedicating like this. this idea of like a piece that people are going to benefit from. And it's like outside themselves. And they're just thinking of other people, really, in a sense. And then I was like, man, I wonder if because of this documentary guarantee is going to blow up even more people are going to go. Yeah, yeah.

You know, because of the way they portrayed it. But then also it's like, you know, in the 60s, there's this big revolution and stuff where people are hanging out and like it's like free love. It's like, I wonder if there's going to be like an underground kind of hippie thing. I think so. I think that's a pretty good speculation. I think what Sal had been calling and noticing about in the gym space for a while now and what we're seeing.

And the reason why we saw them is because the people that probably were the most resistant to being antisocial to are the wellness and fitness people because they're aware of how unhealthy that can be. Everybody else is like cool new technology. Oh, cool it. They're not like if you're not a fitness person, you're not thinking of the unhealthy things of AI. You're not thinking from that perspective. Fitness and health people are understanding that, right? So I think what they did was they caught the front end of a wave, a wave that was going to

happen with or without them. And they're benefiting from that right now. I agree. And I also think gyms are one of the few semi-social places that are just like that on accident. Yeah. Like there's very few gyms. I don't know of any gyms that you could sign up or you're the only guy in there. Well, it's like everybody's there to improve themselves. You want to be around that kind of energy. And it's like it's really hard to find that available until people come up with other places for you to do that. And it kind of happens on accident. Like if you go to a gym and you're consistent, you're probably consistent on the same days and the same times. Right.

So you're probably consistent Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 5 o'clock or whatever. You start to recognize the same people because the people who are also consistent also go at the same time you do. Right. Every time you've got their own. And so what naturally happens, I know this because I ran gyms. What naturally happens is you might go in with zero intention. of building commuter. You're just like, I got it, get in shape.

Yeah. But you go at the same time, same days, every week, and you're very consistent because you're trying to get in shape. Yeah. And you see the same people. And before you know it, you give them a head dog. Unconsciously, you're motivating somebody else, too. That's right.

You talk to them. Next thing you know, you're part of the 5 a.m. crew or whatever. You know, every gym has this. So I think that gym's just naturally, we're doing it on an accident. And they're like, oh, wait, this might actually. Yeah, I think they saw it leaned into it and they, and they're riding the wave.

What I'm curious about, because I'm trying to, I don't know. Yeah, what's going to compete with that? Yeah, well, I mean, there's a lot of things. Right now, gyms are... Well, bars, bars are going down, but I bet those go back up. That's the prediction of this guy is. He says bars are going to back up. Oh, yeah, bars, all those things because people are going to want...

They'll come back. Which, I tell you what, I mean, as somebody who's in an investor would be a smart player right now, because they're probably discounted because of the downturn of drinking. Do you know how big of a piece of English culture? I know this because my wife's family's British. How big of a part of their... I don't know if it's still... this way, probably still is, but how big a part of their culture that pubs are.

Oh, yeah. Where, like, after work, every day, every day you go to the pub and you socialize with your friends and you go home. Well, wasn't it, was it you or wasn't my other buddy who was out, uh, out that way? Don't they do a thing where like, uh, at one or a certain time, they close the pubs, but they keep it going on inside. So it's like if you're partying and there, you're going. Oh, at night.

Yeah. So it'll go all, it'll go all night, but then you can't leave and drive. Certain time, yeah, you can't drive you, they lock you in. Yeah, so it's like at one o'clock, it's like you either stay or go. You know what I'm saying? But if you want to keep going, we're going. But then the door's shut and you got to stay or some ships. To prevent like drunk driving?

I don't know. I thought Justin was the one that told me that. I think so. Yeah, I'm trying to remember. I think it was, might have been Ireland, but yeah. Yeah, I think it's, I don't know. I thought someone else out, oh, that's interesting. I mean, talk about a pub culture or a drinking culture where that's like, it could be a norm.

Interesting. You're staying all night. Let's go. All right. And people actually do it. That's what you touch your way. But I don't know it. So locked the doors.

Yeah, like that. Yes, the traditional pub lock-in is a real invite-only custom. Isn't that interesting? It says, is an after-hours gathering of trusted regular is not a legal practice. Because serving alcohol after official licensing,

licensing hours is generally illegal. Ah, okay. Then bartenders lock the doors to stop new customers from mentoring while allowing the most loyal patrons. Yeah, the patrons to just get smashed and sleep. The real alcoholics. You guys are going to stay there. That's kind of cool, though, right?

Can leave, you know. That's crazy. Yeah, United Kingdom and Ireland, so that's where it's at. Dude, did you guys see the video of the 16-year-old lifeguard? Yeah, I did. Saving. Yeah. Actually, he just gave me anxiety watching it.

Bro. First of all, how old was the kid that he saved? 13. 13, I think. Something like that, 12, 13? Obviously, younger. But he's 16. Yeah.

Dude, he's out there diving. Just weathering it. And the waves were nasty. Well, so the waves. The waves. In Santa Cruz. I don't know. I don't know if there was some kind of storm like elsewhere where we got this crazy swell where it wasn't just like regular like swell coming in with waves.

It was like from multiple directions. So you'd have one crazy underdog, another crashing. And then it would be all at different times. Yeah. And the riptide was insane. I didn't know this was a C-Bright. Yeah. This was in Santa Cruz.

He's a local hero. Am I saying that wrong? Is there a difference between rip-tie and undertow? Is that the same? I think it's the same. I thought undertow was when your nail is. Well, it pulls you. in regardless as it's pulling you into ocean i think you're correcting me on so i didn't know i was like

oh shit is that not what he's not called it i see just i don't know i'm just saying it in a different way and a riptide are different water movements and undertow is a brief downward pull of water under a breaking wave while a riptide or rip current is a strong narrow channel of water moving fast away from shore so they are different okay interesting well there you go let's do i watch the video i think it was a combination of both right i mean i really i heard riptide you're undertow did you Did you know that the kid that he was trying to save had passed out? Yeah, you could tell. I mean, I could tell by he looked unconscious the way he was holding on to him and just diving.

Because the way he was pulling on his arm, the kid was not like getting up and himself. I don't know how many seconds, but he only had a few seconds to even just get up, get air, hold him, and then boom, hits him again multiple times. So he's apparently a water polo player. Oh, and apparently, too, like this, that wasn't even the craziest safe he made. that was kind of filmed a bunch that day. Oh, no way. Yeah, there was a bunch. Courtney and showed me a few articles.

They interviewed him and he was like, yeah, nobody was filming the craziest one. I was like, he basically like recovered and went out and did it again. Oh, my gosh. So, I mean, this kid's a champion. Bro, talk about he risked his own life to save some 10 year. It was a 10 year old. 10 year old kid. He doesn't even know.

10 year old. But yeah, I read an article. I guess he's a water polo player. And I forgot what position he. played. Does it matter? Yeah, there's a position of water polo where you're constantly getting battered. Oh.

And, well, first off. It's like one of the most like physical grueling sports. Have you ever trained a water polo player? Have you guys ever trained one? No. I have. Yeah. Okay.

Water polo players, it's like they have the most brutal practices ever. Yeah. They are out there for hours and hours. Their stamina is ridiculous. Sure. They get the crap. So, I mean, it's. And what goes on underneath the water is crazy, dude, I guess.

Yeah, yeah. The kick in. pinching and you know oh man but he got he got invited to the white house you guys know that oh he did yeah him and his family i guess he's getting on award or something like that pretty cool that's cool that's wild though that he had other saves that weren't yeah yeah how how popular do you think this kid is in high school he's 16 he goes back to school yeah oh my god that that well that brings up too like i've been watching this other like documentary is like the hundred foot seeking the hundred foot wave uh garrett mac mac macnamara i think is how you say his name um

It's interesting to hear the whole origin of like big wave surfing because this wasn't like a thing for a long time until they figured out how to basically like tow them in with a jet ski. Oh. Because it was just like it's so dangerous and like to get out is like insane. And you really have to have like safety measures. And so a lot of this was just like over the past, you know, decade or so has just been developing as like, you know, this brand new sport. And so he's one of like the pioneers of this whole thing. started in Hawaii. Then he came over looking for bigger waves.

Came over. This is where he started to see too around the world. You started to see even like plays like in Ireland. They have huge waves but like you know, it's like freezing water and nobody's out there like you know, oh I love the surf in this weather. You know, they're seeking like these crazy like stormy waves.

But he's the one that found like Nazare. So this guy like... What's Nazareth? This is in what country is at the It's like right next to Spain. Portugal. Portugal. Thank you. I was thinking, I was like I said Peru.

It's not Peru. Portugal. And so there's this one like point where like the lighthouse is gets gets these crazy waves to hit. And I guess like because of this huge valley that that is really deep and then like kind of comes up like perfectly meets at this pinnacle. Like it creates. like these crazy waves that could reach about 100 feet high. That's crazy. And like,

people surf that? So they never did. They just like, fishermen would go out there and there's all these stories of them like dying and like crazy stuff. I mean, falling off of a hundred foot, you're dead, right?

I think isn't 100 feet enough. If you hit water after 100 feet, you're dead. I mean, it's like literally like, um, a high rise building. Yeah.

So look at a picture. Yeah. What are you doing? It, dude, if you watch this, you get like, all the anxiety. It's crazy to watch.

But so he actually had to navigate like when they would get these types of waves to come and form. And like, you know, they went into a lot of the science of like, you know, the oceanography of like how, you know, when this is going to happen. Like what the conditions are going to be all this. And, you know, laid the blueprint. Went out there himself, you know, and almost drown a few times. And then they figured out how to like get spotters outside. and they would like have bullhorns and tell because you know the person that's on jet ski can't find him right away he only gets a few seconds where his head's like popping out and so they like you know direct them and like it was just amazing to see how this all developed to even be able to surf that for one and then they start breaking records there it's uh with like the biggest waves ever was it was it was this an older documentary is it's pretty new it's really good dude and i'm not doing it injustice it's like they go through this because i've watched an older one of it's

I watched an older one, but I don't, this is, this must be like a new record, huh? Yeah, so he's still. Is he called 100 foot wave? He's a psycho. He's still going for it. And he's an older guy. That's, that's my biggest, like, fear. Like, one of my most, my biggest kind of normal natural fears is water and that right there in

particular, being out in the water with crazy. With a crazy wave. Yes. You ever watch videos of, like, ships, massive ships in the ocean, caught storms? Yeah, yeah. And you'll see from the, from where the captain is. and they'll go over a wave.

Like this and just... It's like they fall off a clip. Or you see it like this. They're like they're completely sideways, the wave coming over the top of it. Dude, this is one clip of, of it. And so he had got all confident because he had like mastered like Nazre and all this. He went back to Mavericks. And Mavericks is like huge waves too.

But like, you know, it was like overconfident because he's like, ah, this is no, you know, no big deal. Didn't get towed in. Ended up doing it without getting towed in. So he was a little bit like late on the on the break of it. Yeah. And just, just the crest of it smashed down. And he ended up like skipping, like a skipping rock.

Boom, boom, boom. And like totally obliterated. Wow. He broke all kinds of bones and everything. Oh, God. I was like, oh, my God. It was, it was. What's wild is how, uh,

how people do that? How crazy it looks from our perspective. So have you ever been on like, when you, when you're, like, being under it is so different. Oh, yeah. So like when you're like, it's like, I don't know how many times I have my, like, gone to go like ski something that's like a like a double black diamond or something. And when you're like looking at it from afar, it's like, that's not that bad. And then when you get over the top of it and you look and you go down, whoa. And you're looking down. Oh my God. It's a

so I can't imagine like, like, hair's in the back of my neck. Oh, yeah. It has to probably it has to feel similar to being on like the top of like a crazy high rise building. Yeah, skyscraper. It's pro. What's that called? What's that call? Pro surfing? What's that call that does a. Yeah, it's a big wave surfing. Big wave surfing. Does that have a high death rate? Yeah, I mean, they've had deaths for sure. I don't know what the rate is.

I think the highest is what the squirrel suit people? Well, yeah, that's the highest death rate, right? It is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Remember that documentary were like, like a bunch of old died. Over half hit died. Yeah, it was something crazy. The overall death rate for surfing, including big wave surfing is statistically

extremely low. Yeah. 10 to 20 fatalities globally per year. You know why, though. But they're counting everybody. Well, it's because nobody does it. Nobody does. I know.

Who's going to tempt that? Yeah, there's not a lot of people doing it. I don't know Mavericks is at Half Moon Bay. You didn't know that? No. You've never been up there? No. You've never been up there, dude, when they have a six wall.

Really? Does it just look crazy? Crazy. Yeah. Oh, man. Yeah. You get a real feel for it, at least even from, if you're close and you're watching them come in, like, you're like, I can't believe anybody's out there right now.

This is insane. Oh, that's crazy. Yeah. Adam, I was going to ask you because I heard you off air before we started the show, you were talking about the protein cereal from Legion? What are the macros on that? They're really good. Yeah, they're really good.

A bowl ends up being like close to like 40, I think, I want to say like, well, with the, really? Oh, yeah. I mean, a good, it's like a good size bowl for me. Can you find the macs? I got it right here. Oh, what is it? One serving 170 calories, 17 grams of protein.

So 17 grams of protein. 15 grams of carbs. That's like a half a cup of cereal or quarter or one of quarter cups. Yeah, so that's not even a bowl of cereal. Wow. A bowl of cereal. Wow. And it's got 70.

8 grams of fiber in that serving. So you could do 35 grams of protein. You know what? You did two of those and you would have 16 grams of fiber with the, that is got to, it's got to produce some good satiety, I would imagine. It is good. What Legion did really good is a lot. If you, I don't know how many protein cereals you guys have tried.

I've tried a bunch of them. They get stuck in your teeth. They're really, like the tech, they just, because they're healthy for you, they don't have a lot of the crap in there. And so the texture is tough. They nailed the texture. It doesn't get all. Uh-huh.

Uh-huh. It's like the cereal. What's the protein in? Is it? Is it way? It's got to be way. Most likely. I believe so.

Let me go to check that. It's most likely that. I've tried, so I can't do dairy, right? But I've tried plant-based protein cereals. Gross. I got. They're terrible. Yeah, they are terrible.

I got my digestive enzymes that you had me get. Yeah? You know, it's, so. Does it help you? It did. I mean, I had it. So I had it with that. So I'm having weigh and then vitamin D milk.

And so that would be an example. and a big bowl. That's a lot of dairy free. It's just a lot in one shot. And it never, I could do it. But like, I definitely felt way better at taking those. When I noticed so I didn't know, and now I know why you take so many of them, one pill is per five grams of protein.

Yeah. So you got to take quite a few of them. So I got to get a much bigger bottle than what I got. I just also really, to be honest with you, I just overdue supplements. I don't really count. Well, no, it's, it says on that one's good. It says on the bottle that one pill should be for five grams of protein. for five grams of protein.

So if I have a 50 gram protein meal, that's 10. So you got to take 10 pills. Yeah, I only took six. I'm like, I don't want to overdo it the first time. And who knows what the opposite was. So I was like, let me ease into it. And so I took six with it. And I was like, oh, wow, that was really, that felt really good.

So that's going to be like my new thing is to try and be disciplined to the times that I do have. You know what I did the other night? Because dairy for me is the war of all the things that can bother me. I can get away with gluten a little bit, you know, now, nowadays, now that my gut's a lot better. dairy I just got to stay away from it just it's it's going to hurt me no matter what but what I did the other night because I don't have dairy is I ordered my wife called it salami bread because I ordered a pizza with no cheese and I know that when I send that order can you do that you for sure the guy making it is looking at this going what I feel like the guy

who makes the pizza with no cheese is like the guy when my wife orders a well done steak at a steak house like this the chef is like this is yeah this absolute You know what I'm saying? As he's like, burning this. He's just smashing it in there. The pizza guy's going like, what kind of more? Yeah, the pizza guys are, what kind of moron? No cheese.

I've heard of it all cheese pizza, but no cheese. It's literally a piece of bread with sauce and then it's like salami sausage, all those. It's like, is it okay? How's your salami bread? I'm like, it's not bad. I kind of want to try. I'm curious. I mean, it's still good.

It's not pizza. Yeah. It's not bad. So the gluten actually isn't as like, because if you're going to compare the two in terms of reaction, dairy's worse. Yes. What gluten will do to me is it'll, I'll get inflamed a little bit. If I eat a lot of gluten, I'll hold water. You guys will see it. I'll come in here and you guys, what happened to Sal's face? Yeah, like, but it'll Jordan Peterson. It'll, it'll con, thanks for pointing that up. I appreciate it. I'm so glad we pin that to top. I'm just not like, it's not like,

every time I see that, I'm like, what's going on there, bro? No, it'll slow down my digestion at first. So at first, it seems like it's not bothering me, but I'm slightly slowed down. Yeah. Let's just say that. And then a day or two later, then I have a bad, then I have a bad stomach. And so it takes about a day or two. Dairy, dairy is right out the gates, pretty much. Like, I'll eat it and then pretty much,

I'm not going to have a good time for a little while. Oh, yeah. Oh, wow. Interesting. I got something right now. I'm, uh, dude. So you guys know my, my squirrel issue that I had not that long ago.

So I have this. Where you're going to battle with the squirrels. Yeah. Because they're eating. I lost. I'm not going to battle. I lost. It's already over.

War's over. War's over. got no peaches. Zero. So they are. They got them all. They won. Until next year. So the, we're, we're, we're, we're, battle is lost, but the war is still going.

There you go. Yeah, yeah. I definitely lost this battle. There's lots of deer this year. But I've got a new one on me right now that I have and I, and I, I'm not a hundred percent sure. I, I'm pretty sure it's my neighbor's cats. They've got, they've got three cats at, at, that Rome. And, and, uh, he, he, he or she, I'm not sure, uh, pisses on my car on top of my car. No, they don't. Yes. Of all places.

The same car. The same car. Only one car. Oh, my God, bro. Yeah, only one car mine. The one I'd be most upset. The one I'd be most upset about this. You're so bad right now. Good. The first like, the first three. That's the worst. If you ever piss on anything of Adams, the worst will be his car. What is so weird. You can piss on his clothes. It's on the, it's on the, it's on the back of it. on the top and uh and cat pee smells it is it is the most annoying and it is consistent as hell every every every if i if i don't cover so i cover it most of the time but then i uncover that yes and it's in the

same spot in the back and i thought it was birds i thought it was birds that first started happening i told katrina i was like well so originally the way i backed the way i backed the car up i back it up so that my overhang of the house of the overhang of the house shades the car for for most of the day. So I back it up. So I thought it was a bird that was perching. Sure. And I'm just like,

oh my God, what is it? And it only started happening when I had that car. Didn't happen in any other car. It's only this car. Doesn't like your car. And so I thought, what,

that is so weird. And so it happened three, four times in a row. And I'm like, I'm complaining to Katrina. And I'm like, well, this sucks.

The whole reason why I back. it up so I get that shade. Now I'm having to pull it out so I don't get the shade so I don't get it. But then the piss is still coming. So I'm like, okay, there's no way a bird is still hitting it perfect like that after I've now moved it because I thought it made sense if it was perched and that was... But then I moved it forward five feet

and I'm still getting the piss in the same spot of the car and so it's like it's got to be these cats. Because I've seen the cats paw prints before on like the hood of the cars when they're dusty or what I'm so it's got to be cats. Love when your car is still warm. Mine always tries to get on. I'm like, no.

Oh, maybe that's, well, the engine's the back. Where's the engine? Yeah, that's where the engine's at, but it's mid-engine. But I'm not driving it. Like, it's, I don't drive it as much. It just doesn't like your car, dude. It's only that one. It is only, none of the other ones.

You don't see it on camera? No. I've tried to catch it, but the cats are sneaky enough. They don't set the sensors off. They're ninjas. Wow, so there's no sensor, just pee. Yes. Like it's a demon.

Cat demon. I'm so angry, though. It's so funny. I had some pet piss problems as of late. That's a triple P. Yeah. Triple Pied. That came out.

Pet peece problems. Yeah. And we're speculating too. So my dog Arlo, he, he likes peaches. He likes plums. He likes all this. And I'm always like putting them on leash now because he'll take off and go down to like the junior high and like eat out trash cans and he's like a real problem.

And so I'm always the one that's like consistently put him on the leash and this and that. And Courtney sometimes just like, ah, you know, just like lets him out. I'm like, what are he doing? You know, like he, you know where he's going to go? And sure enough, he goes down and he like, he's just eaten like all these peaches and plums and all stuff comes back. His breast smells like like fermented fruit, you know. Anyways, he's sleeping the other night.

and it was like a really bright, like full moon. Two in the morning gets up just peeing all over, like, you know, next to my side of the bag. In the house? In the house? Oh, my God. He never does that, like, you know, hasn't in a while at least. And just like, there's just this pot. I'm like, oh, no, we were just getting up trying to get towels, clean the whole thing.

You have to take him outside. Bro, that dog, how do you have to hate that dog, bro? He's done so many things to you. Listen. I, yeah. And, shoot. Like,

I don't know what to do. Like, because I can't, like, just get, I'm, like, looking for places that would, like,

take him in, you know? Like, I'm that guy. I'm, like, looking for people. Hey, you want a dog?

He's, like, really sweet. Yeah, like, he's great. But he has a little, like, corks. Little, little corks.

Little problems here and there, but you like some wrestle skunks. He pisses in your house. He said, remember he looked at Justin in the face and crapped in a shoe? Yes. While he was looking at him in the face.

Yeah. Yeah. Right when I was walking, bro. I would have lost that dog camp in a long time ago. I just, I feel like, oh, man. He's my rage training. He's my rage training, you know, so I don't, you know, I actually, like, I'm more prone to, like, ah, and I just hold back with him.

I feel like he gets that out of me, so I'm not like that with my kids. And I've held myself from, like, destroying him, you know. I'm like, ah! But I don't, you know. we were, I worked through it. My, my, my wife thinks that it has something to do with the way I, by, why I am with nature. You know, she's a little more woo-woo than I am, right? So she's like, this, this, this squirrel.

Yeah, the squirrel thing was because I killed the squirrel. Like, we never got that much, like, we would get, we'd lose some peaches. But she's like, once you killed the squirrel, then they all went back and told the rest of them, and now they ate all of our peaches. And so she, and the cats. So back, so if, I don't know if you have. It's like the planet on avatar, like all nature now is. Yeah.

And so. So in my backyard, in my backyard, I have all this, I have white cushioned furniture, which, you know, it's already tough to keep cleans of that. And if I don't put, if you ever come to my house, you ever notice that, and if you guys have ever noticed this when you come in the daytime, if we're not out there with a party, my cushions are all up. I tilt them all up like this. And the reason why I do that is because those stupid cats will sleep on them.

And then I get cat hair all over my, all of my furniture. So I got to do that every night, after we have come up to say, I got put all the things all up. so a cat won't sleep on there else he'll sleep on it. And so anytime that cat's in my backyard, I yell at it, throw a rock at it, do whatever like that,

just shoot out of our backyard. So he knows he's not welcome there. And so Katrina thinks that's why he's pissing on my car now. So that's what it, that's, so I bring on the squirrel, eating all of our peaches. I bring on the cat pissing on my car.

And so I don't know what to believe anymore. Did I ever tell you? This might be a horrible story to share, but I'm going to share it anyway. This is, like, just a disclaimer. This is old school, like, I guess Sicilian justice, I guess you would say. When we were kids, so I was young, we went to Sicily to visit my dad's parents. Now, remember, these are my grandparents.

They're not alive anymore, but they're like old school, poor Sicilians. Okay? So that's just to just everybody picture this, okay? We went to visit them, and we were there for, I think it was like the whole summer. It was like two months or something like that. and there was this dog that the neighbor had, and it was an aggressive dog. So when we were outside playing,

the dog would, you know, bark, bark, bark, and then, like, scare everybody. Well, anyway, my grandfather hated that dog because that dog had tried to bite one of his other grandkids before. And he said, if that dog tries to bite anybody else, I'm going to kill that dog. He remember he telling me that. So anyway, we were out there playing,

and we went inside, my sister was still out there. She started screaming. The dog came out their garage, and bit at her ankle. And then the neighbor comes out, my grandfather comes out, and he was remarkably, I remember as a kid,

I was going to fight. My grandfather's going to come on and fight this guy. He was calm. He was scary calm. He was like, he looked at the guy, and he shook his head, and he kind of like, wow, he didn't even get,

no, no, didn't get, and he had a bad temper. He's like, he didn't get mad or anything. It was weird. The dog died a few days later. Oh, God. Oh, I'm pretty sure.

My grandfather did something. Oh, wow. I'm pretty sure. I remember, you know, because he was so calm. He came inside. dude, he came inside. I remember we're all hanging out.

We're having dinner. This is like three, four days later. And my grandfather's like, my dog's not going to bite anybody. Yeah, exactly. And he says it all. He drops it like that all covered. Oh.

That dog will never bother anybody again. You notice how quiet is it outside? It is outside. Like, what are you talking about? That dog is died. He died. Like, what do you mean he died? I don't know.

Oh, my God. Sleeps with the fishes. Did you kill the dog? Oh, my God. What's going on here, dude? Oh, man. Anyway, I don't know if he did it or not, but let's just say,

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That's fatty-15.com slash mindpump. And on that link, you get yourself hooked up and use the code mind pump at checkout for a discount. Here comes a show. Our first caller is Amber from Texas. Hey, how you doing, Amber? We're back. Hey, guys. I'm doing pretty good, a little nervous.

That's all right. So what's going on? Give us an update. This is what, 30, we talked to you, what, a month ago? Yes, it was. So this is the third update. And since then, I listened to the advice. I'd like to say not have fast at this time.

Adam's so surprised. I'm pretty sure we hung up and I'm like, she's not listening to us. I didn't say that I wasn't going to listen to. No, I said that. I think I said that. What I said in Spanish was, I'm afraid that they're going to,

what is the word in English, scold me again. But I did lower the dose and then I've been off my GLP. I have gained weight. I don't know how much because, again, I'm not weighing myself, but the clothes that were falling off of me, they fit now. So my clothes are fitting better. And I'm getting stronger with my workouts.

I haven't changed my workouts, and it could be the testosterone too, but I've done that. And I do have more energy so much so that I don't know if this is a good or bad thing, but I really love dancing. Like, it's my life and I've been able to have more energy to dance again. So I've been asked to give some more dance classes. So, yeah, I got off of it and I've gained weight. Not happy about it, but I have gained weight. Amber, great job. There's more in your email.

Is it okay if I read a little bit of it? Yeah, please. It says that you're now working with somebody virtually to talk with about the body dysmorphia and all that. Yes, so not too long after our conversation, our follow up, I started seeing different therapists through my work. And actually, I did even mention you guys. I mentioned the podcast. because I was telling her this is why I'm gaining weight before the surgery.

Otherwise, I probably wouldn't have gotten off the GLP. I would have just kind of been going on the same trajectory. And I'm actually meeting with her later today. So, you know, just to talk about why I have these feelings. I mean, my life is a novella, so she has her work cut out for her. But that is one of the things that we're covering. That's awesome. So Amber, great job.

Yep. Really, really good job. And I just, first off, I want to encourage you. And then I'm going to prepare you a little bit. Is that okay? Okay. I want to encourage you because you did a very hard thing. You did a very difficult thing.

You got off the gLP. You're eating more. You're not weighing yourself. And you're talking with somebody about some of these challenges. Now, just to prepare you, it gets really hard about 60 to 90 days in or maybe a little bit after that. So in the beginning, these changes kind of feel good. You're like, I got, okay, I got energy.

Getting started is difficult. You got over that hump. And then what happens is we tend to fool ourselves because we're like, I feel good. I got great energy. This is awesome. And you start to compromise some of the things that you have decided that you're not going to do or do now. And it starts small, but then the compromises become larger and larger. And so I want to just encourage you, it will get more difficult.

You may take a couple steps back. But when you do, just, okay, I'm going to get back on. I'm going to do this again. Give yourself grace. That's what this journey looks like. It doesn't look like a solve. I'm good. It's awesome.

It looks like, okay, things are good. I'm awesome. Uh-oh, this is hard. Uh-oh, this sucks. Let me do a little bit here, a little bit there. But if you get down on yourself and you start to feel shame, that spiral really starts to accelerate. So you just give yourself grace and remind yourself.

And what might help is you say, oh, yeah, Sal told me this would happen. This is expected. It's expected. It's normal. Let's get back on. Yeah, well, I mean, you guys have helped me a lot over the years. I want to say I've been listening for 10, 11 years. And first you help me with like,

not weighing myself. That was a big one because I used to weigh myself. Like when I was in the real thick of it, I want to say after every meal 10 times a day. And then you guys help me focus on getting stronger so much so that I even did a powerlifting competition. I didn't do well, but I did it. And then, you know, with not tracking, that was a big one for me because I've been tracking for over 24 years. So I trust you guys. It's not always easy, but I do appreciate the help that you've given me, even if it's, you know, not something I want to hear, but I appreciate it. You're doing good. It's awesome. And Amber, we were just talking. we saw your name come up and then we remembered when we met you.

How long ago was it? We met you in person. Like nine, 10 years ago. It was when you guys had that live event and Incinitas. It was there. Like eight, nine years ago, right? At least that.

Yeah. And I want to say that at the time I was the first, you offered me a free program cell because I was talking about the nonprofit work that I wanted to do, which I did end up doing. I'm actually a member of Guardians of the Children nonprofit. We're a biker group and we go with kids when they have to testify. on court and stuff like that. And I've been able to do like some group fitness classes for those

kids. And I've been doing a lot of nonprofit work. And, yeah, a lot of the, like the stuff that they want to do fitness-wise, I'm able to help them with that. And a lot of the stuff that you guys have taught me, I've carried into that. Oh, what a good heart you have, Amber. So cool. Yeah, so glad you're one of our listeners. Yep. Thank you. Well, thank you guys. I want you to reach back out if you need anything else, okay? I will. All right. Keep focus on getting strong. You're doing great. Yeah. Let's go. My background is flex, by the way.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. I love it. I love it. Good talking to you, Amber. Thank you. She's great. She's great.

Yeah, she's doing good, man. And she's definitely come a long way. And, you know, the reason why I asked her how long ago we met was it's been a while. So it's not like, it's like she's progressed that entire time, like she said. She's moving along in the right direction. And I hope she listens to this afterwards. afterwards. But, you know, when you get in those tough moments, like, think back how far. That was the Viori launch. That's right. We helped launch that store.

The first physical store. Yeah, yeah. How many years ago is that? Yeah, it's about nine years. And I mean, what's weird is we did that and now look how big there. So I don't know if it was. Some kind of weird effect after me. Might be us. Our next caller is Chase from Arizona. What's up, Chase? What's up, Chase? Hey, Chase. Hey, gentlemen. How are you? Good, man. How can we help you? Good. Thanks for having me on. today. I appreciate it. What you got for us? I'll jump right into it. So I am a 34-year-old father.

I'm six-foot-six sitting anywhere between 300, 310 pounds right now. I played a ton of college athletics, and I am just tired of being an overweight dad. The reason I say that is because it was maybe too deep here, but about a year and a half ago, my oldest daughter got in a dog accident. She got attacked by a dog, and I just remember racing to the hospital with our other daughters. And there was no parking, had to park so far away from the hospital. And I had to carry them all in there. And it was just exhausting. I had to stop a couple times, and it was frustrating to me to try to get into the hospital to see her and help

and had to make stops on the way there, and it was frustrating. Sorry, I guess a little emotional for me. So I decided to make a huge change after that point, listened to your podcast for a long time, tried to really get back into lifting. So for a year and a half, the goal has been just to get put on muscle, and to set a solid foundation. So I've been doing that ever since.

A couple years ago, probably four or five years ago, I did have some success with the keto diet. I lost about 70 pounds doing that, but I hated how I felt and how I looked. I honestly felt like I felt like I looked the exact same, but just weighed less on the scale. I lost a ton of muscle. It just wasn't a good experience. Since then, I've learned tons about health and nutrition, try to be, become better. And again, just try to to keep going from there. So my question for you guys today is I get super confused with all of the information out there in the world with with calories and how

much calories you should be eating. You know, I put my information into a calorie tracker and it's anywhere from 2,200 calories a day to 3,500 calories a day. I'm a bigger dude. So it's difficult to kind of gauge what's correct for me and what's there. So also, protein intake. I mean, I know on the podcast you talked about having the correct amount of macros and protein for your goal weight. So I've tried to been eating 260 to 270 grams of protein per day. Not as consistent in that as I would like to be, but that's my goal for now. Easily every day I'm getting about 7 to 8,000 steps. So that's where I'm at. So I would love to figure out your thoughts on where to start with calories and just the overall, I feel like I am

at the muscle mass that is good. And now I just don't want to start cutting down a little bit from here. Well, Chase, first off, thanks for calling in, man. And, you know, that story you said about, you know, trying to carry your kids into the hospital, man. I feel that. That must have been very difficult. And the reason why I'm bringing you back to that is to help kind of start with the best starting point that I think is going to bring you the most success. Also considering you're an athlete and college. By the way, what sports did you play in college? Football.

Okay. Okay. So I think this will help you a lot, okay, what I'm about to say. Because where the origin of the motivation, I guess for lack of a better term, makes a big difference on success. The motivation that you have, the real core motivation is to improve your fitness. It's not to lose weight. the motivation to be able to do what you need to do as a dad or do what you need to do in life.

Really has nothing to do with your weight. Now, your weight will start to react to your improved fitness. But I think, especially as an ex-athlet, and especially with that moment that you had, which is a very strong memory, I think the goal is to improve your, the goal is to improve your fitness and allow your body weight to go where it goes. Does that make sense? Now, what will probably happen is you'll probably get leaner, right? You'll probably get leaner. You will.

But if you can move and you've got crazy athleticism and fitness at, you know, 290 pounds, 280 pounds, who cares? By the way, your body will reflect it. You'll look more like an athlete. Like you experienced when you did keto, getting smaller doesn't necessarily mean better. You lost muscle. You didn't feel good. Your fitness declined, even though you were lighter.

So the goal needs to be fitness. And the goal with fitness, with diet, is what's going to fuel my endurance, my stamina, and my strength. So if we start from there, you're going to crush. Now, if we start from, I got to lose weight, you're going to run into the problems you had before. Where you start to compromise your fitness, you start to compromise how you feel in pursuit of a scale weight, which can definitely happen. Does that make sense?

Yeah, that makes perfect sense. I totally understand you're saying, before I started getting back into lifting heavily, I was around 318. So naturally, I've just kind of come down a little bit from just lifting and doing, trying to eat better whole foods and things like that. So completely under the matter of saying. Yeah. So we could definitely do the whole tracking thing and all that.

I think, you know, I think 250 grams of protein is plenty. Oh, yeah. For you. I don't think you need to 200 to 250. Yeah. I don't think you need to go higher than 250. and if you get over 220, you're doing good. So I would keep it in that range for a guy your size.

So that would be really the only thing I would say you would track. And then what you do is you eat only whole foods. And you eat when you're hungry. And then you gauge your performance. Your workout is also very important here. Because when we're training for performance and movement and stamina and strength, workout makes a big difference. How many days a week is realistic for you to go to?

the gym. And I mean real, realistic. Like, you can be consistent. Don't give me pie in the sky. No, I shoot for four days a week. Okay. I have a home setup that I, that I enjoy. So it's not too hard to get out of the garage and bust out a workout. All right. Maps performance. Maps performance, that's your program. Maps performance. You'll love it. Aim for 240 or so grams of protein a day. Only eat whole foods. If you're hungry, eat and you're good. And literally that's what it's like, oh my God, I'm hungry. I'm going to go have whole foods. And what's going to happen is your performance, your athleticism will continue to improve with mass performance and your body fat percentage and muscle, your body composition will change over time. And it won't feel like you're

chasing something that you can't get a hold of. The one thing I want to lean into, since you have the competitive athlete side of you that I like to do with my ex-athletes is being competitive with yourself on your consistency around your eating habits. So what it looks like is this. If your main goal is the performance, the health, the strength like Sal is saying, and that's the lens that we look at this through, and it's inevitable,

you're going to have a day that's not good. You're going to have a day that you're busy. You don't get to, and like, so what? So what? The next day you're back on track again. And what I want you to pay attention to is that competitive athlete is, how many days in a row did I get of eating, Whole Foods hitting my protein intake and being consistent.

Oh, it was seven and then I had them, then I messed up. Cool. You're back to zero next day. Your goal is eight. Can you get to eight? And just compete with, now along the way, you're going to have these days. That's, it just happens. What happens to people, though, is they have, they had that one bad day where they ate,

you know, bad or they drank or they missed some protein. And then it's like, it spirals out of control. Oh, F it or they get on the scale. And it shows a number they don't like. And so they totally go off the rails. and then one day turns into a week of bad eating and not consistency. I don't want you to look at it like that. It's not a bad thing.

In fact, when you're chasing performance and strength, sometimes kind of a high calorie day eating out of bounce will fuel tomorrow's workout when you go to the gym. And you're going to feel awesome. So don't look at it in a negative thing. Look at it as like, oh, man, I got to seven days is my new record. I'm shooting for eight. Can I get eight days of perfect eating and hitting my protein and training? And so don't let the one day here and there that you have.

start keeping track of how many days can you string together and compete with yourself on getting better better. And before you know it, you'll wake up and you'll have strong 30, 40 days of perfection and you're going to feel the best you've ever felt. Chase, do you meal prep? I do. So each, I mean, each Sunday I'll throw some things together and put them in some glass tub-aware things and have them throughout the week. So I try to do that. Yeah, good. Meal prepping is going to be key for this.

And then here's the other thing I'll say to look out for. because the weight is always going to be in the back of your mind, you might start to find yourself veer towards under eating, which you'll notice in your performance. So you may be like, okay, I know I'm supposed to eat whole natural foods. But if I skip, no big deal, I need to lose weight anyway. And then you'll see declines of performance. So I'm going to give you a little bit of structure, okay?

I want you to have no less than four meals a day, no matter what. Now, if you're hungrier after that, then eat more of those whole natural meals. But I don't want a guy your size following mass performance. if you eat less than four meal prep meals a day, you're going to be under eating, you'll notice a decline in your performance as well. Notice, Chase, that nobody on this call yet has said anything about

we care where your calories are at. Like it's like the whole... It'll go where it needs to. Exactly. If you focus like what we're talking about, the land where they're supposed to land, you'll have some higher days than lower days, but what you should see is consistency,

consistently getting stronger and feeling better and performance going. And then to Salas point, the body will follow. Yeah, body compages will follow. The aesthetics and the leanness and all, that'll follow. But if you keep focused on the hitting your protein intake,

feeding the body, fueling the body for performance and stringing as many of those days in a row for your performance, the other stuff will follow. That's right. But four meals a day, no less than because you need a lot of fuel, dude.

You're a big dude. And yeah, and like I said, that in the back of your mind may be like, oh, you know, I'll lose weight. It's okay if I skip a meal here, there, and that's going to send you off in the wrong direction. The other thing, too, Chase,

if you want someone to guide you through this, have you thought about working with a coach? Because we have coaches, and there's a few I have in mind that I think will work great with you. Yeah, yeah. I've heard you guys talking about it on the podcast. I mean,

I'd love to sit down and chat with one and see what that looks like. Okay. For sure. Yeah. It's funny. Exactly what you guys are saying is exactly what I go through on a daily basis,

where it's, you know, I'll skip a meal or two, and it's difficult to, it's hard to get past the obsession of, if I don't eat, then I'm going to lose weight or whatever. But you get their mentality of fueling my body and just focusing on being an athlete. No less than four meals a day. Have fun with your workouts.

You've got it in you. You'll get strong. And bro, you'll start to enjoy it. You really have a lot of fun. And your body, I promise your body will look more athletic if you become more athletic. I think working with a coach, I think six months for you would be great. Six to nine months, you would be fire, bro. You would be fire.

give you such a better mentality towards this whole thing for sure and they'd guide you through i'll have somebody call you uh today chase and then you can ask them all the questions or whatever but in the meantime i'm going to send you mass performance if you don't have it um yeah and uh you'll do great dude if you if you kind of remember what we're saying stay there and don't try and do anything crazy you'll get there yeah i'll stick to it all i'll change up the programming a little bit and focus on what you guys have said i don't you got it chase thanks for calling in brother yep thank you guys i appreciate it very much you got it is it Yeah, I think, especially with an ex-athlet,

and getting back into that kind of like, oh, man, it feels good to move. Plus, like, the main, what happened with his kids, you may confuse that with I need to lose weight. And yes, losing weight may be a part of it, but really what you were looking for is ability. Oh, yeah. Exactly.

Fitness. Oh, trust me, there's 350-pound guys that can move faster than me. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So it's like, it's not a weight thing. Yeah. And they're shredded dudes on Instagram that would have had to pause each time because they weren't fit.

That's right. That's right. And then you let that be your guiding light through this whole process. So, you know, the hardest part with athletes is they tend to be all or nothing.

That's right. And that's why I said coach at the end. Yeah. And that's also why I made the point too of like if you're going to use that competitive side of you, use it towards consistency around the diet. String those days.

Yeah. And the fact is we all have bad days. And so, but what happens many times is the all or nothing person lets that bad day turn into it. Now it's nothing. That's right.

And then so hopefully he can, and we'll get with a coach and they'll walk them through all this. Our next caller is Ashley from Texas. Hi, Ashley. Ashley. Yeah, I'm so nervous. I'm excited to talk to you guys. We'll help you.

Yeah. So I rode in. I did just want to say thank you guys. You've really inspired my fitness journey. And I've done a lot since listening to you guys when I discovered you guys like five years ago. So I really appreciate all the information that you've. you guys give. But I wanted to ask a question. So I was, feel like I was in pretty good shape a year ago. I was working out five days a week and felt really strong and good. And then I got pregnant and I got

hyper emphasis gravodarin, which is just like the most extreme morning sickness. Like I was basically on bed rest and didn't do any movement either than like getting up from my bed to the couch for like nine months. And since then, now I'm four months postpartum. And I just don't know what programming I should do to get back into the gym without like hurting myself. I feel like an alien in my own body where everything just doesn't feel right. I'm so weak in everything. just simple movements, just I really struggle with again. And I just feel like I've lost all progress, almost full everything, and I'm starting from zero.

That's so glad you called in. That's a tough position to be in Ashley. I've trained women like you in similar situations. And it's very difficult. It's a really tough. By the way, my wife was pretty close to that for about four months while she was pregnant with my daughter. So tough.

Like, what were you able to eat when, because I know, Because I know with my wife, if I just said a food, she'd throw up. Like, was there anything you could eat? I mean, it was pretty many. I was going and getting like IVs and it would just be random. I don't know, like carrots were something that I could really like handle on TikTok. It was just super random the things that I could. But yeah, like the microwave would go on and I would be like,

and throwing up. And it was horrible. Brutal, brutal. Well, you're, this. This is the way you feel is totally normal. I have the perfect program for you. It's going to be a MAP starter. And just to encourage you, Ashley, is you have muscle memory.

And that's a real thing. So the results will come back faster than you anticipate. The challenge will be not to push too fast too hard. That's the challenge. Map starter, perfect. That's where you need to go. just follow that program right there. And it may feel easy after a few weeks.

Stay with it. Don't do any other program that we have. Don't add anything to it aside from maybe walking. Just follow Map Starter. And at the end of that, you should feel like you can do more traditional, maybe a couple day a week programs. Okay, great. Thanks.

I started anabolic initially. And I was, that I felt like I was hurting myself. Too much at first. You might even run. starter twice based off how you feel so I would have you go through starter and then if you were feeling great I'd say hey let's let's see if we can handle maps anabolic and then I'd want feedback from you on how you feel and if you're

like I'm feeling great we keep going if you're like man this feels still scary I still don't feel like this is all my body like then I'd be like back to starter let's run starter again and so really got to go off of how you feel probably gonna be at least a year before you're even thinking about hitting the gym five days a week. That's a lot of volume for anybody, much less somebody who's postpartum, and went through what you went through. So Map Starter at least once, if you still feel uncertain, run it again. You'll be great. And then slowly dip your toe into anabolic and see how you feel. And the way you would do Maps Anabolic, if you did follow it afterwards, would be to start in pre-phase

and do that for about five weeks before even going into Phase 1. Does that make sense? Yeah, no, definitely. That's so encouraging, even just to hear other people say that it's okay and it's going to take a while. Oh, yeah. To be back to where I was and it's hard to go from feeling so strong and good to feeling like I can't do anything. Ashley, you said a few things. And you've said a few things that have been echoed by so many people that I've worked with, so many women. And the common thing that they say, you actually said it is, I feel like my body's not mine.

super common. So yeah, don't worry. And what Adam said is accurate. Takes between one to two years before moms fully feel like, okay, I'm back. That doesn't mean you won't progress that entire time. You're going to progress that entire time. But it's going to take a little while because you're going to still have a one-year-old. You're going to have all that stuff going on.

And you're going to about one to two years later, you're like, okay, I'm back. I feel good. In which case, then you tend to have another baby. But we'll see. The last time, that was the... She's like, I'm good, I'm good, I'm good. So we'll send you starter. Yep.

That's awesome. Thank you guys. I appreciate it. Thanks, Ashley. Yeah, be patient and be in touch if you need help. Okay, thank you so much. I really appreciate it, you guys. You're awesome.

All right, I should. Bye. Have you ever worked with a woman who had hypermesis? No. Dude. Not to that level. Dude. I've had...

You've got to go to a hospital. I've had clients. that have had like, like through the first trimester, had some really bad, like, morning sickness, but not nine months and IVs. She's just on IVs and they're trying to give her nutrients out of it. It's like you can't eat anything. It's so extreme.

So Jessica was, there was like, there was like a week within that period. The whole period was rough where she was like hyper sensitive to anything. There was like a week there, dude, where I'm like, we're going to have to like, we have to get something inside you. Yeah. Like you can't. just not eat because she would literally just, blah. They couldn't do anything. It was just on the couch.

It was crazy. Hey, look, if you like Mind Pump, you can find us on Instagram. It's 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

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