Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - How Legion Coaching Helped Laura Lose 8.5 Pounds and 6.5% Body Fat in Just 90 Days

Episode Date: May 22, 2019

In this episode I interview Laura, who recently completed my 90-day coaching service and dropped 8.5 pounds and 6.5% body fat, while getting stronger on all of her key lifts, and at 49 years old! She���s a perfect example of how it’s never too late to get into great shape. Regardless of your current age, condition, and history, you can lose fat, gain muscle, and get healthy, you can enjoy the process, and you can stay fit for the rest of your life. Full stop. You may not be able to get as jacked as you were or could’ve been when you were younger, but how much does that really matter? Especially if you love the way you look and feel? That’s what this episode is all about. Now, as with everything, nothing ever goes exactly as planned, and learning to adjust and adapt to conditions is an important part of the fitness game, which is something Laura experienced firsthand. She ran into a number of roadblocks along the way that most of us can relate to, including issues with balancing work with her workouts, getting her meal planning just right, and dealing with hunger and cravings, dietary temptations, peer pressure, and more, and in our chat, Laura shares what has helped her navigate these barriers skillfully and prevent them from getting in her way. So, if you like hearing motivational stories about how people have changed their bodies and lives, and if you want to pick up a few tips that may help you in your personal journey, this episode is for you. 4:09 - What did you look like before and after our coaching program? 5:16 - How long were you traveling for? 8:02 - What type of traveling did you do? 8:47 - Why did you go on a plant-based diet? 11:19 - What benefits did you have from a no-dairy diet? 13:46 - What did you learn from taking things away from your diet? 14:58 - How long were you on our coaching program and what were the results? 15:28 - What were you doing for workouts? 16:18 - What changes did you experience after you increased your protein? 23:52 - What obstacles did you have to overcome? 27:23 - What are your current goals and what’s next for you? 33:26 - Do you feel any physiological difference with training in your 40s compared to yours 20s? 33:48 - What did you do to fix your tight hips? 34:57 - Are you able to do squats comfortably now? 36:38 - How did you go from a client to a coach for our coaching program? 41:32 - What is your advice for people considering our coaching program? Want to get my best advice on how to gain muscle and strength and lose fat faster? Sign up for my free newsletter! Click here: https://www.muscleforlife.com/signup/

Hello, this is the Muscle for Life podcast. I am Mike Matthews and welcome, welcome. In this episode, I interview Laura, who recently completed my 90-day coaching service and in those 90 days dropped about eight and a half pounds of fat and about 6.5% of her body fat percentage, 5% of her body fat percentage, absolute, not relative, while also getting stronger on all of her key lifts. And she did it at 49 years old. Now that is significant because I often hear from people in their forties, fifties and beyond who think that it is too late. They are not in good shape now. And they think that they have missed the opportunity. The window has closed and they are doomed to being fat, weak, and unhealthy for the rest of their lives. And that is simply not true. It is never too late to get into great

shape regardless of your current age, regardless of whatever condition you're in right now, regardless of your training experience or lack thereof, you absolutely can lose fat. You can gain muscle. You can get healthy. You can enjoy the process and you can stay fit for the rest of your life. It can become a lifestyle, full stop. Now, you may not be able to get as jacked as you were or could have been when you were younger, but does that really matter? Especially if you love the way that you look and feel right now. And that's what this episode is really about. Now, as with everything, nothing ever goes exactly as planned and learning to adjust and adapt to conditions is an important part of the fitness game, especially the long-term

fitness game. And that's something that Laura experienced firsthand along the way. She ran into a number of roadblocks that most of us can relate to, including issues with balancing work and her workouts, getting her meal planning right and dealing with hunger and cravings, dietary temptations, peer pressure, and more. And in our little chat, she shares what helped her navigate these barriers skillfully and prevent them from derailing her. So if you like to hear motivational stories about how other people have changed their bodies and lives for the better, And if you want to pick up a few tips along the way that might help you in your journey, this episode's for you.

This is where I would normally plug a sponsor to pay the bills, but I'm not big on promoting stuff that I don't personally use and believe in. So instead, I'm just going to quickly tell you about something of mine, specifically my one-on-one coaching service. So the long story short here is this is the personal coaching service that I wish I had when I started in the gym many years ago. Every diet and training program that we create for clients is 100% custom. We provide daily workout logs and do weekly accountability calls our clients get

priority email service and discounts on supplements and the list goes on and on furthermore my team and i have also worked with hundreds of people of all ages circumstances and needs and goals so no matter how tricky you might think your situation is, I promise you we can figure out how to get you results. If I have piqued your interest and you want to learn more, then head on over to www.muscleforlife.com forward slash coaching and schedule your free consultation call now. I'll tell you there's usually a wait list and new slots fill up very quickly. So if you're interested at all, don't wait. Go schedule your call now. Alrighty, that is enough shameless plugging for now, at least.

Let's get to the show. Hey, Laura. Thanks for taking the time to talk with me on my podcast. Yeah, thanks for having me. Yeah. So as these types of interviews generally go, the idea here is I would just like to hear your story. I'd like to hear, probably just start maybe with a snapshot of before and after. So before you found me, where were you at in terms of your body and your health? And then fast

forwarding now to where you're at today, just to get something to grab attention. And then let's rewind to where you were at before you found me and what was working, what was not working, what were you struggling with? And then we can kind of just move forward to where you are today and how things have changed. Okay. I teach group fitness classes. I have for about 20 years and I'm a slim person. So it was always difficult for me to maintain or build any kind of muscle. But I think part of it was that

I was doing a lot of cardio. About a year ago, a year and a half ago, my husband and my son and I, we all decided to go and sell our house and travel. And I wasn't able to work out the way I was used to. I wasn't able to eat the way I was used to. And I ended up gaining 15 pounds. So when we came back, I couldn't go back to what I was doing. How long were you traveling for? About a year.

That's not too bad for a year of good eating. That's not too bad. And year of good eating. That's not too bad. And a lot of sitting, which I was not used to. I was always a very active person. So when we came back, I tried to do what I would normally do, which is just work out a lot. It came down a little bit, but it was the heaviest I've ever been. And I was at a loss for what to do. What I would normally do wasn't working. I had been following you since 2012. I read Bigger, Leaner, Stronger. I always, always had the mind that workouts that were geared toward women was not going to help me. I tended to follow things that were meant for men because I figured that I was going to have a hard time gaining muscle. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I guess the thinner in thinner, leaner, stronger is not for you. You

know, I actually, I remember debating with myself back when I was trying to decide on the title. The reason why I wrote the book for women is a lot of women were reading bigger, leaner, stronger, but then reaching out to me saying, Hey, can I do this? This sounds like something like, you know, at least all the diet stuff sounds like it's something I could do the workouts. I don't know if I want to train my upper body that much. What should I do? And so that's why I created the book for women. But at the time I was debating, should it be fitter, leaner, stronger or thinner, leaner, stronger. And I'm not sure, I don't know if I chose correctly. I think there are arguments to be made. I mean, it was a tough decision.

So, you know, the thinner would turn off maybe somebody like you or a woman who is already fit, let's say. I mean, it sounds like you're already fit, but even maybe a bit more of like a woman who is into training her muscles already, but wants to take it to the next level. But there are a lot of women out there who want to lose weight and that's like top of mind. So, I think that's why I chose it where I was like, I feel like it's not the best title, honestly, for it's not the ultimate goal. Whereas bigger, leaner, stronger for guys, like every guy can never in their minds, never get big enough, never get lean enough, never get strong enough. And so it's the perfect title. Whereas with women, of course, there's a point where with thin, it's really just an optimal body fat percentage. Anyways,

I'm kind of rambling, but it just made me think of that where I'm like, should I went with fitter? That would have been the smarter one. Fitter, leaner, stronger probably would have been a good catch-all. You would have gotten both camps. I know. It's true. It's true. I think I made a mistake. Oh, well. Well, I mean, thinner, leaner, stronger is going to appeal to a lot of women. So, I mean, I deal with women every day. I mean, most of the people in my classes are women and they are afraid of building muscle. So I think thinner, leaner, stronger is probably a good title for them.

Yeah. Yeah, that's true. That's true. Although fit now is kind of like, oh, fit is the new skinny, you know. Yes. Which I agree with. But anyway. All right.

So you're traveling for a bit. Do you travel around the U.S.? What did you do? Yeah, we had we bought an Airstream trailer and we lived in the Airstream and worked remotely. I would personal train over FaceTime. But I mean, even though we were hiking, it just wasn't the kind of workouts that I was used to doing. It wasn't enough.

Yeah. And you were already used to eating a certain amount of food. So you're kind of just naturally going to maintain that calorie intake, even if your expenditure goes down. Yeah. And I mean, I've always eaten pretty healthy, although I do have a sweet tooth, but I didn't cut my calories back with less activity. And I think that's what got to me.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So a year goes by, you're 15 pounds heavier and you're just trying to work out harder and it's not working. Yes. And I went plant-based. For the purpose of trying to lose the weight or health or both? No, just health. Well, I do these little things and it's kind of a quirk of mine that I like to do challenges where I'm going to try this for a month and just see if

I can do it. Like silly things, like I'm going to drive my car in the summer without an AC for a month and see how I do. That's how my cold shower routine started. I wrote about that where I was like, in the end, especially after doing some research on it, I was like, all right, there's really no health benefit to this. It's not going to boost my immune system or make my skin or hair prettier or anything, but it does wake me up. And so I just kind of stuck with it. I bet. Yeah. So you understand that sometimes you just want to have a little personal challenge just to see if you can do something. I cut out caffeine just recently, even though I wasn't having much. That's my, I'm going to see if it impacts my sleep at all,

even though I was having my normal day was three shots of espresso at 9am and that's it. So, and I was like, eh. No espresso? Yeah. Now, well, now actually I'm just doing, I just like a cappuccino. That's all I really like. I like cappuccino, dry. It's like a little bit of milk, more foam, and I like it strong coffee. So now I'm just doing decaf because I actually don't care about the caffeine. I don't even feel it to be honest, because I'm not very, I have a fast metabolizer of not just caffeine, but also it would include any sort of toxin like alcohol and so forth. So I could have a couple hundred milligrams of caffeine and I'll feel a little bit for like an hour and then it's gone. So it's not, I don't really get

much of a buzz from the espresso. I just like how it tastes. So I'm like, eh, if I'm just going for the taste, I'll just get rid of the caffeine because who cares? Yeah. I'm like that too. I love the taste of coffee. I don't really care about the caffeine. Yeah, I understand. So it's all right. So you start the vegan challenge basically. Yes. Well, my husband was vegan for many, many years and he was always trying to convince me. So I did go vegetarian for a while, but I was still doing dairy and eggs and all of that. And he just kept trying to convince me that I should do it. And I was like, you know what, I'll do it for a month and I'll see how I feel. So I decided to go totally plant-based. And to be honest, when I gave up the dairy, I didn't realize I was having an issue with

dairy until I gave up dairy. And I never felt bad. But it was instantly like after like two days of no dairy, I didn't have like the stomach bloating anymore. So I decided, okay, maybe I'll just keep doing this. So I just gave it up. And it's been a year in August that I haven't had any animal products. Are there any other notable benefits that you've noticed? I actually feel better. It was a challenge at first because I didn't know how to structure my meals. Yeah. Yeah. I've written about that.

Yeah. You have to pay closer attention to what you're eating. And there's also, I'm sure you know, I'm sure you've educated yourself on, you want to watch out for a couple of micronutrient deficiencies, but if you just account for those things, it's perfectly workable. So yeah, exactly. So when I decided to do a diet coaching, Matt, he actually told me you had a coach that specializes with vegan and vegetarian clients. And I was like, that's perfect. He said he, she knows how to structure meals and she knows how vegans and vegetarians like to eat. And I was like, that's great.

What's funny is I had bought meal plans in the past. This was before you even had the coaching. And there was lots of protein shakes, a lot of protein shakes. A lot of rice protein, peepers. Yes. So working with Rachel, she was awesome. She immediately asked me how I like to eat, what I like to eat. And if I had an issue or I wanted to change something, she did it for me

immediately. The accountability was big for me because I had never actually, I know I'm not going to win any sympathy here, but I had never had to diet before in my life. Yeah. Yeah. No, I, I understand that actually. My wife is similar. She's always been small, petite. So whenever she wants to lose a little bit of weight, which is purely random, like she, her body, she doesn't, she doesn't need to from it from more than anything than just the way, you know, we're all, we're all our, yeah. Well, we're all our worst critics where I'll, she'll me, look the exact same as like, you know, maybe a month ago to me, but then she's like, no, I'm going to lose three pounds. But because she's never really had to diet before, it's actually tricky for her to, because she's so used to just

eating the foods that she likes and they're just nutritious foods and the portions. And so, you know, I, I understand that, um, not firsthand, but at least directly secondhand. Yeah. I mean, it was a, it was an interesting experience to go through it. Part of me was like, I should do this also for, to understand what the people in my classes and my personal training clients go through when I suggest to them to make dietary changes. Cause I had never had to worry about it before. And I definitely got a different perspective than what I expected to get. And how did that play out? Well, I realized that when you take something away, like she did give me chocolate because I love dark chocolate,

but I didn't realize that I would graze on things all day long without even, yeah. And it's like, every time I walk by, I'm like, oh, I'm going to have an M&M. Oh, I'm going to have this. And being very aware of everything that I was eating. I was like, wow, I was really eating a lot of sweets. Yeah. And it's easy. Even if it's not sweets, it's easy to rack up calories when you snack. And that's one of the, it's like a simple tip for people who want to lose weight without necessarily going all in on meal planning or tracking or calorie counting is one of the tips is to eliminate snacks, limit yourself to two or three bigger meals per day. And it really helps with calories, especially when people are eating nutritious foods like nuts. For example, if they snack on nuts, a lot of people don't realize how calorie dense nuts are seeds. Oh yeah. The trail mix all the way.

Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Dried, dried fruits. Yeah. Dried fruit, nuts, nut butters, things like that. It all adds up very quickly. Yeah. How did that turn out then? So, and how long were you working with Rachel for? And then what were the results? I did three months with Rachel. And I went from, right before I started, I think I was a hundred and, I got up to 148 pounds right before I started. I think it was 145 and I got down to 127. Wow, that's great. Maybe 126 and a half.

Yeah. I mean, I hadn't been that slim since I was in my late 20s. So it surpassed my expectations. That's awesome. And what were you doing for workouts? I mean, I love weight training, but I started making more time for weight training instead of just focusing on,

oh, I'm gonna get my workout in my classes. Because I have a home gym, so I just decided I'm gonna use my home gym. And I made sure I have a home gym, so I just decided I'm going to use my home gym. And I made sure I did weights Monday through Friday, if I could, cause I was working multiple jobs and all over the place, but adding in the weight training and upping my protein, that's another thing I'm sure, you know, being plant-based, it's a little bit more tricky to get all the protein in. Yeah. I was going to ask that. What did you do for your protein? Well, I used the Thrive protein. I did things like tofu, tempeh, lentils, quinoa. I just had

to plan it a little more carefully. Yep. But yeah, I mean, once I upped my protein, that made a huge difference. What kind of difference did it make? How did you notice? What were the changes? Well, my body started looking different. I started looking more defined. I think I was doing too high a carb because when you're told that you do a lot of endurance stuff, then you're like, you need to eat more carbs. And I think I was doing too much carbohydrate, not enough protein, which I see in women a lot. They don't do enough protein. Yep. And I was in women a lot. They don't do enough protein. Yep. And I was doing the same thing.

Yeah. And I've heard from many women who experienced the same thing where they didn't change anything other than just eating more protein. And they were surprised at how much tighter their muscles felt and how much, because I've heard from women who were actually doing a lot of things right. They were training their muscles. They were doing a bit of extra exercise as well and eating nutritious foods, but their protein intake was way too low. They just didn't realize it. And then correcting that quickly improved muscle tone, muscle definition, strength in the gym, of course, muscle gain, although you're not going to necessarily notice that in just a month. And it's not surprising if you understand the role that protein plays, but they were pretty surprised that that simple of a change could make that big of a visual difference and a big of a difference in how their muscles felt to

them, you know? Yeah. Well, you had mentioned one time that you told a guy at the gym just to watch your calories and get your protein in and not worry about the carbs and fat. I told one of the ladies in class that because I, you know, I was told, I told, they were asking me what I was doing because I was looking different. And I said, just do this. And I told her that I said, just keep your calories under this and just hit your protein goal. And it was after about three or four weeks, cause she was already slim. The other women were asking her what she was doing because her arms look more defined or legs look more defined and all she did was up her protein. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's, of course it's, again, it's not surprising when you understand a bit

more of what protein is comprised of and what your body does with it. But it is one of those very easy kind of magic bullet quick fixes for many women who are into working out. I'd say the vast majority that I've come across both online and offline are not eating enough protein. And yeah, that's the simplest tip to give is if they're not eating somewhere around a gram of protein per pound of body weight per day, assuming that their body weight is in a normal range, it could be a bit less. It doesn't have to be necessarily that. I could be like 0.8 grams to one gram per pound per day. If they just do that and watch their calories, they're going to be surprised with their workouts.

Well, it definitely helped me. And learning how to do flexible dieting, I know it's kind of cliche, but it did change my life as far as eating is concerned. When did you learn about that through me or through the coaching plans, and then after a while, I was like, I'm going to see if I can just follow these macros and these calories and then try to eat some things on my own. And I started tracking everything myself. And just I was tracking everything in an app, and just trying to keep my calories a certain place and my macros. And I was like, wow, this is it's empowering, really, because then you're like, I don't have to just eat this every day. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And that's really what, what I want people to walk away from the coaching, whether it's the diet coaching or the all in transformation coaching is it's, it's also about teaching

people to be self-sufficient. And that's of course, on the dietary side of things, one of the big lessons is you don't need, if you just understand these principles, these basic principles, you don't need us to continue making meal plans for you or tweaking meal plans. We'll happily do it if you want us to, but that's within a few months. That's, of course, everybody who goes through the program knows what to do going forward. And many people do continue because they just like the accountability. They like their coach. They just like the service. But as I say in the sales letter that I wrote, I do intend for people to fire us after 90 days, basically say, okay, great. Now I know everything

that I need to know and I can just do it myself. It actually helped me a lot because then I saw that I can eat the chocolate that I want as long as I account for it in my macros and calories. So I didn't have to feel like I had to deprive myself, which I think that a lot of women think that when they start a diet, that they're going to have to restrict things or take things out that they enjoy eating. And that's the only way that they're going to be able to lose weight. But then that restriction causes some kind of emotional... I mean, I had it at first. I was like, I can't just eat whatever I want.

It was emotionally, it was harder than I expected it to be because I never had to think about it before. Yeah. And the psychological effect of being able to eat what you like, even though you know you have to regulate how much, you can't just eat. eat what you like, even though you know you have to regulate how much, you can't just eat. If you're a 150-pound woman and you wanted to eat an entire bar of chocolate every day and still lose weight, you could do that, but you're going to have a tough time. You're going to be very hungry. You're not going to be able to eat very much else other than

whatever that would be, probably 800 to 1,000 calories of chocolate plus maybe another couple hundred calories, right? So, it's not very feasible But if you had a, let's say a hundred calories or 150 calories of chocolate per day, now that's very workable. And I don't know about you, but what I've found is I also like dark chocolate. I eat a little bit every day, usually a, I don't know, square or two or something. I like chocolate in particular because it doesn't take much for me to be satisfied for whatever reason, as far as like I can eat 100 calories of chocolate and be satisfied. But just eating a small amount of something that is whatever it is that you like, it makes a big difference than not eating it at all. It makes, I think, a bigger difference than people realize going into it where if they normally, let's say they would eat quite a bit more of something

sugary and tasty. And now when they're cutting, they're eating quite a bit less. But the fact that they do get to eat it every day makes things a lot easier than they think going into it. You know what I mean? They think, oh, it's just a hundred calories of chocolate. I don't think that's going to be satisfying. But then women in particular, I found many women are surprised at how nice it is just to be able to have a little bit of something every day. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. I mean, because I mean, I like peanut butter, but as soon as I saw that my fat was a certain

amount, I started like just dreaming of peanut butter. I don't know why, but then I found a way to get just a little bit of peanut butter into my plan. And then that was enough to satisfy me. And it kind of like the dreams went away. It was, it was a really strange thing. That's funny. Hey, quickly, before we carry on, if you are liking my podcast, would you please help spread the word about it? Because no amount of marketing or advertising gimmicks can match the power of word of mouth. So if you are enjoying this episode and you think of someone

else who might enjoy it as well, please do tell them about it. It really helps me. And if you are going to post about it on social media, definitely tag me so I can say thank you. You can find me on Instagram at Muscle for Life Fitness, Twitter at Muscle for Life, and Facebook at Muscle for Life Fitness. Were there any challenges, any obstacles that you ran into along the way that you had to overcome? Yeah, like going out to eat, like date, you know, my husband is very supportive, but he'd go just have a cheat meal. And I'm the kind of person that I'm all or nothing, a cheat meal. And then I just want it all the time. So I was like, I'd rather not do the cheat meal and just, you know, have a few extra carbs that day or something, but not have a dessert

because then I just want the dessert every day. And so what did you do then? So basically, I would just have a few extra carbs that day just to feel better, you know, like the refeed. It did make me feel better. And then I would kind of reward myself every two weeks or every three weeks instead of once a week and get something small and really savor it. Yeah, yeah. That's a good strategy. Was there anything else that you had to shift gears to overcome? I think the planning.

At first, I really had to think about it, especially when I started to transition away from following a meal plan and actually doing flexible dieting on my own. At first, I was like, wow, you really have to think about everything. But tracking everything every day, I kind of got used to what I was going to eat because I found that I eat the same breakfast every day. I change out of dinner. That's the funny thing that's very common where people sort of start- You just get used to eating the same food. Exactly. Where you kind of come full circle, right? So a lot of people that first, let's say they read one of my books or come across an article or podcast or video or something where I'm talking about meal planning and they go, okay. And my pitch for meal planning is that you get to eat

the foods that you like, but if you just do this and it's like, yeah, it's a little bit annoying. You got to open up Excel and poke around on the internet. And then you have to weigh your foods, at least for the first little bit. So you get an idea of portion sizes, but it guarantees results. It absolutely guarantees results, or at least it takes out the biggest stumbling block. It takes out the biggest variable that causes people to fail in their dieting. And then, so they do that for a bit and they go, okay, fine. And then it works and like, oh shit. So that's exciting. And then they just stick with that for a while to get to their goal. And then, and then they're like, okay, well now they come to the same point where

it's like, I could, I don't need to eat exactly this. I mean, I understand now the numbers. I'll just start plugging and playing and then eventually come back to where they're basically back onto a meal plan because they go, you know. It's just easier. Yeah, I don't need all this variety in my diet. I mean, I eat, I mean, I speak for myself. It takes so long for me to finally hit that point of like food fatigue where I just don't want to eat my dinner anymore. And I think I'm actually kind of there. I've

been having this chicken and vegetable stir fry for, it probably is like seven months now. Wow. Basically, I don't know, five, six days a week for that's my dinner. And I'm finally coming to the end of it. I'm like, all right. You're a machine. I don't really look forward to this anymore. I think, I think it's time to get a new recipe basically. And I, that's, I think I'm maybe an outlier in that regard, but still where people will find I can, you know, Hey, I can eat kind of the same stuff every day for weeks on end and be totally satisfied. And I don't even want to change anything. And so it's kind of coming back to like, eh, it's on a, on a, on a, maybe a loose meal plan, you know?

Yeah. And if I did get tired of eating like Brussels sprouts, I would have, you know, like asparagus, you know, just something with a slightly different flavor, but it's still a vegetable. And I mean, that was enough to keep me motivated to keep doing it. That's great. And where are. And what are your goals now? Like, what are you doing now? And what's next for you? Right now, I'm maintaining. I was going to do a little bit of a cut, but I think I'm just going to maintain for a little

while. I'm enjoying eating more food, that's for sure. Yeah. And I do allow myself to have a cheat meal once a week that it's not a big deal now because I'm in maintenance. So I don't feel like, Oh, I really need a cheat meal. I do savor. It has taught me to slow down and really savor the things that I, the treats that I have. And that's a good tip for just eating in general. Actually eating quickly is fine. If you just have a portion of food and that's all you're going to be eating period. And if you want to just slam it down, okay, fine. But one, if you

more slowly, you're going to enjoy it more, but then you're also going to be fuller sooner. So, cause it takes a bit of time. You drink some water also with the food that you eat, you'll probably get, be more satisfied and feel fuller. And those are just good tips. And especially with sweets to eat them slow, enjoy them when you're maintaining because you're not necessarily weighing out every meal, you have an idea of how much you're eating, but you could also fairly easily overeat if you're not really paying attention, you know? Oh, for sure. It got me in the habit of weighing myself because before I didn't really weigh myself, weighing myself every day. I mean, I was always afraid to weigh myself every day because I would see the women in my

classes and they'd be like, I gained a pound a day. Oh, I lost a pound a day. And they would live and die by that number. And I'm like, I don't want to be like that. But realizing that there's going to be fluctuations, like I would go out to eat, even if I got something healthy at a restaurant and then I'd weigh myself and I'm like, wow, went up two and a half pounds. And I knew it wasn't fat. So it kind of really taught me that there's going to be fluctuations up and down. And that's just normal. And it's helped me educate the women in my classes, too. Because, you know, we'll joke about it. Like we I had a cookie yesterday, my weight went up a pound, you know, just things like that. I'm like, you know, it's not fat,. Right. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's, that's a lesson.

That's like one of the first lessons that many women that they need to learn just because so many women have been indoctrinated to live and die by the scale and have been trained to think that if their weight ever goes up, that's bad. And you always want it to be going down and they should be sad when it goes up and happy when it goes down, period. And of course, that's not true. And of course, there are multiple reasons why weight can go up and down in addition to fat gain and fat loss. And especially when you're talking about, yeah, having a little bit of extra carbs one day. Well, yeah, don't be surprised if you weigh an extra pound or two the next day, but it's not because of fat. It's because of additional water retention, for example,

and glycogen in your muscles and stuff. And especially in this new third edition of Thinner Leaner Stronger, which I'm just in the process of releasing, I make even more of a point on this that weight is good and weight is important and it makes sense to pay attention to your weight, but don't make that the only metric and don't make that. It's not even the most important metric, I think, for women, especially women who are starting out with resistance training, because of course that adds weight. It adds any muscle that they gain is going to weigh something and the muscle that they already have is going to hold more water and more glycogen, which

for anyone listening doesn't know, it's just a form of carbohydrate. So that means weight's going to go up. And so what often happens, and I hear from these women is they'll be doing my program for usually like four to six weeks and they'll email me because they're kind of confused that their weight hasn't really changed, but their pants are fitting better and they're looking better in the mirror. And there's not sure like, is that a, they're happy with that, but is it a bad sign that weight hasn't changed yet? It hasn't gone down yet. And of course the answer is no, you can expect that weight gain in

the beginning from the resistance training, which was then offset by the fat loss. So their weight maybe didn't change yet, which depending on where they're starting, it will change eventually, but it's just a good lesson for women to learn. Yeah, exactly. And same thing with the weight training, because I hear it a lot that I don't want to do heavier weights and we're talking, I say, grab a heavy weight and they grab a five instead of a three. They're like, this is my heavy weight for lat rows, you know, something like that. So we're doing like a thousand reps here, right? Yeah, exactly. Like, you know, how many reps you're going to have to do to fatigue that muscle, but I'll hear like, oh, I tend to build too easily, which I'm like, that's you not burning

off the body fat as fast as you're putting on the muscle. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, sure. There are, of course, our genetic outliers in both men and women, but even women who tend to gain muscle and strength faster than most, still a slow process because your average woman, if she does everything right, can gain, let's say, Your average woman, if she does everything right, can gain, let's say, 10 to 15 pounds of muscle in her first year of weightlifting, whereas with men, it's about double that. Yeah, and they seem to think that they're just going to wake up. Jacked. Yeah, I wish.

But I'm like, it's a very gradual process. And then when you get to where you want to be, you just, you can maintain that. You're not going to wake up a Hulk. Yeah, exactly. And then even when you're maintaining, then you have the flexibility to, to overeat for a few days if you want to, if you have a good reason to, and then you can undereat for a few days and just kind of be right back to where you were. So it's nice. It's enjoyable.

It is. Yeah. It's definitely an empowering thing. You don't feel like you're at the mercy of, I don't know, your hormones or something. Cause I hear that a lot too, you know, it's my hormones or I'm just older, you know, cause I'll be 49 this year and, you know, I have one more year in my forties and I'll tell younger women all the time. I'm like, I'm almost 50 and you know, you're never too old to start weight training, it's going to make a huge difference in your physique. Very true. Have

you noticed any major differences, major physiological differences between now and let's say your 20s? And as far as as far as fitness goes, like other new challenges? Yes. I mean, like, I have to give myself more recovery, definitely mobility. I struggled a little bit for a while when I was on the program with doing squats because I had really tight hips. Okay. What did you do to fix that? I would do some yoga mobility routine. Nice. Pigeon pose, foam rolling. Although I don't know how much foam rolling helped me, but it felt good. Yeah. Yeah. It probably doesn't do that much. The yoga though. I mean, I've been doing the

same thing now for, I've been shit. It's probably been a year at least about 10 minutes a day. So I do pigeon pose. I do, let's see, frog pose. I don't know the name of anyways. I run through a routine. I actually put an article up at most for life, just showing people, hey, here are the things that I do for lower body and our body, because I also had tight hips, I had also, my external rotation on my right side was not very good. And my left side, it was better. And then my internal rotation was reversed. So on my right side, it was good on my left side, it was not so good. So that just made for uncomfortable squatting. It made for uncomfortable deadlifting. But it took a while to get things balanced.

But now I would say the internal rotation is still slightly an issue on my left, but it's definitely gotten better. And the external rotation has gotten a lot better. Are you able to squat now comfortably? Yes. I'm still not doing a heavy weight because I also have a hamstring issue. I had a hamstring injury like 10 years ago and I didn't go see anyone about it. I see. So there's probably some scar tissue there. I'm better than I was because I think

the yoga made a big difference. I went to see someone and after a while when I couldn't, I would bend over to touch my toes and I couldn't even reach my knee. Oh, wow. Yeah. So I was like, okay, I need to go see somebody. So when I went to see him, he actually gave me some stretches, dude. I'm like, this looks like yoga. So I just started doing yoga. Yeah. That's, I mean, I just started doing yoga because I was like, I'm just tighter now. That's the thing I noticed as I was getting older, more tightness just in my hips and also on the right side of my upper body. And so I started doing yoga and I would do like one, maybe two, one hour class a week.

And that wasn't enough to really move the needle. So I was just like, eh, I did enough where I had gone through a bunch of poses and I just took the poses that seemed to feel not necessarily good because in some cases, I wouldn't say it's painful, but it was uncomfortable because if you lack mobility and you're trying to force slowly, but really you're trying to ease your body and force it into a better, just getting into those positions. It's not comfortable, but it's not painful. It's just uncomfortable. So I just took the ones where I was like, yeah, I think these are the ones I need to do. And it actually worked fairly well. I mean, you could apply that to pretty much anything. Anything that's challenging to you, that means you need to do more of it. Yeah. That's applicable to many areas of life. That's for sure. So that's your experience as a coaching client. And then now you're on the team.

So how did that come about? Well, after I went through the program, I was like telling everybody about it. I was telling the women in my classes, I was telling my training clients, I was talking about it online. And then you mentioned that you were looking for coaches. So I was like, And then you mentioned that you were looking for coaches. So I was like, you know, what's it going to hurt? I'm just going to try. And so I sent in my application and Matt contacted me and he said that it really helped that I had gone through the program because I had a perspective from the other side and I knew what clients would be going through. And it's really awesome because whenever I'm working with the clients and they'll have a day where they ate a little too much and their weight went up on the scale. And I'm like, I've been where you are. I know what it feels like. Don't beat yourself up. It's one day and just get right back to it. And I think that helps a lot because before I wasn't, I could sympathize with them, but I couldn't empathize with them. Yeah. No, I totally understand. I've joked sometimes that I feel like in some ways I'm not the best role model because there

are some things that for whatever reason, I've just never had problems with. I mean, I've had my problems, but there are just certain things, not necessarily. I mean, there's some fitness things like diets, for example. I've never really had any issues cutting. In some cases, maybe it wasn't like all that enjoyable. And I was like, Oh, I wish I could eat more food, but you know, that's about the extent of it. And then, and then in other areas where people ask me questions on, Hey, how do I overcome this obstacle? And I feel bad sometimes. Cause I was like, I don't, I feel like I don't have any great advice. I mean, I could parrot some stuff that I've read and I'm happy to do that, but I wish I could say like, I totally know what you're going through

and here's what got me through it because that tends to be the most valuable advice that you can get and give. Yeah. I mean, the emotional aspect of, of dieting, I think I didn't realize how much there was to it. There's a lot of emotional issues. I mean, it's like, I find this more with women, but I work more with women. Men may go through it as well, but it's like you have a slip up and you just want to beat yourself up about it. Like I'm a failure and I should just give this up. It's not for me. And it's just a bump in the road. You just have to keep going. But it helps to have that person tell you, look, it happens to all of us, or at least some of us. And you just get right back into it. And

it's not a big deal. Totally. Yeah. Maybe I haven't dealt with much of that type of thing, because I'd always go to that. Like if I happen to eat a bit too much on a, let's say a cheat meal, it was like, oh yeah, that's a little bit over the top. My instinctual response was more along the lines of, well, let's look in the bigger picture. How much does it really matter? You know what I mean? So, you know, I've been in a deficit, let's say a 4,000 calorie deficit so far. And maybe I erased a little bit of that. Okay, big deal.

What does it really matter? But I totally understand where if you don't have that information, well, I mean, I guess I can relate to that. I can relate to that in that there was a guy who introduced me to flexible dieting many, many years ago, powerlifter guy. And he didn't tell me how it worked. He just said, hey, so eat. I think he had me on like,

I don't know, 2,000, maybe 2,200 calories a day or something. I wanted to get lean. And he's like, here it is, protein, carbs, and fat. I don't care what you eat. Just meet those numbers. And I was like, what? I can eat literally anything? I mean, not that I was into eating junk food, but I was like, what about complex carbs, simple carbs? What about sugar? What about different types of fat, saturated fat? And he's like, I don't care about any of that. Just hit these numbers and let's see what happens. And so I remember I had a cheat meal. I went and ate sushi. I remember texting him after like, so I just ate three spicy tuna rolls and emoji and like some edamame. Is that okay? Or did I overdo that? And then he'd be like, just don't worry about it, dude. It doesn't matter. So I do understand where if you

don't have all the information, then that's where the emotions can easily take over because we all tend to catastrophize when we don't have information or missing information for whatever reason. Our brains want to often fill in with the worst case scenario. So I can empathize with that for sure. Well, and it helps if you have that long-term vision. If you're just caught up in the day-to-day in the present moment and any little issue or problem that comes up and you, yeah, it becomes very dramatic, but you have to look at it as this is a journey and you're going to have little bumps in the road and you just get right back on the path and keep going.

Yeah, exactly. No, I agree. Well, I think that's, I mean, those are all the questions that I had for you. Is there anything that you wanted to, anything that's like still top of mind that you wanted to, you wanted to talk about? If anyone is out there wondering if this is the coaching service is for them, I really do think you should consider it. Even when you have knowledge and you know what to do, sometimes just having that accountability,

having to report to somebody every day and having somebody give you a little pep talk when you're down on yourself. That is probably the number one thing that got me through when there were days that I'm like, I don't want to do this anymore. Just having that coach tell you, this is just one day, we're going to take another step and another day and another day. And by the end of the three months, you're like, wow, you realize how much you're capable. Yeah. Yeah. And Laura's saying that not just as a coach, but also as a former client. Exactly. Yeah, no, it's pretty cool to see. I mean, I love seeing, I do every four to six weeks or so

an email. And so I get to go through the success stories and it's just cool. It's cool to see because at this point we've worked with hundreds and hundreds of people of all ages and circumstances. And in some cases it's been pretty. And it can be people who are very busy, who are traveling a lot. And so, you know, they come into it thinking like, this is probably not, my time is so limited and I'm all over the place. We probably can't do it and we figure it out. And in other cases, there's age where you have people that think it's just too late, my hormones or my metabolism, and then can show them just within a couple months, major results. But then that's also, it's not just the results. It's what does that say for the future? And then it shows them like, oh, wow, if this is

what I can do in three months, imagine what I can do in three years. And that's cool because that's really what it's about. That's what I try to promote is longevity and lifestyle, not just quick results. Quick results is great. It's motivating. But really, I want to teach people something that will serve them for the rest of their lives, something that they will be able to enjoy for the rest of their lives as opposed to crash diets or really grueling, 30 day crazy exercise challenges that sure can deliver some results, but are not sustainable. And then can even almost like it's like a, like a negative halo effect can then make people reluctant to want to even try something else because of how terrible that, uh, that previous thing was, you know? Yeah. I've seen that in, uh, when I've talked to clients, they'll give me this long list of things that they've tried and they got results and then they went back to what they were doing and they gained all the weight back. Totally. And this is definitely

something sustainable. Not only does it teach you how to eat for the rest of your life and still enjoy what you're eating, but it also empowers you in other aspects of your life. You're like, if I can do this, then I can do pretty much anything. Yeah. Yeah. Did you experience some of that? Yeah. Yeah, for sure. I mean, there were times when it was difficult and I wanted to give up, but because I just, there are days where you're just like, I just don't want to do this. I just want to eat chips on the couch and watch TV. But then I had to remind myself what my long term goal was. And after going through it, and I feel so much better, not only about the way how I look at how

I feel, I just feel better. And I have the skills now to manage how I eat for the rest of my life. I mean, I don't have the metabolism I had in my 20s, I could pretty much eat anything and never have to worry about it. It wasn't until I hit about 45. I'm like, wow, I don't have the metabolism I had in my 20s. I could pretty much eat anything and never have to worry about it. It wasn't until I hit about 45. I'm like, wow, I really have to watch what I eat now. But now I can eat foods that I enjoy eating and still maintain my weight. Yep. Yep.

And a lot of that metabolic change can be explained by just reduced activity levels. For most people, they were more active when they were younger. And muscle loss too. Yeah. Yeah. Muscle loss can be a factor. It depends. In your case, you've been training your muscles. It's probably not much of a factor now because unless you were noticeably more muscular in your twenties than you are now, then sure, it would be a factor. But there's something called non-exercise activity thermogenesis NEAT. And this is just spontaneous activity that we engage in without really realizing it. It could be something as simple as fidgeting or something as, I would say, inconsequential

maybe as fidgeting or something as consequential as pacing around a lot, like walking around a lot, maybe when you want to think. Or it could be also something that's kind of in between exercise and needs, like, you know, taking the stairs instead of taking the elevator. And in a lot of people that tends to be quite that neat factor tends to be a lot higher when they're younger than when they get older, especially with, you know, most of us sit at a desk to work. And so that alone can be the difference of if you spend a fair amount of time walking around, whatever it is that you were doing versus sitting, that can be a difference of if you

stretch that over the course of a day, it can be a difference of hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of calories actually. Oh yeah, definitely. It adds up. Totally. Well, awesome. Laura, I really appreciate you taking the time. I love your story. Yeah. Thank you for doing what you're doing. Happy to have you on the team as a coach and look forward to seeing what you can do for other people. Yeah. Thanks so much for having me. And if you dear listener want to learn more about my coaching service and how we might be able to help you reach your health and fitness goals faster, just head over to muscleforlife.com slash coaching, muscleforlife.com slash coaching, and you can learn all about it and schedule a free consultation call where my director of coaching,

Matthew, will get on the phone with you and talk about where you've been, where you want to go, and how we might be able to help you get there faster and more enjoyably, which counts for something again, muscle for life.com slash coaching. Check it out. Hey there, it is Mike again. I hope you enjoyed this episode and found it interesting and helpful. And if you did, and don't mind doing me a favor and want to help me make this the most popular health and fitness podcast on the internet, then please leave a quick review of it on iTunes or wherever you're listening from. This not only convinces people that they should check the show out, it also

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