Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - "If It Fits Your Macros" Dieting and the Value of Being Able To "Grind"

Episode Date: December 29, 2014

In this podcast I talk about the "If It Fits Your Macros" style of dieting--what it is, how it works, and what I do and don't like about it--as well as why I think being able to be a good "grinder" gives you a huge advantage in life (27:25). ARTICLES RELATED TO THIS PODCAST: How to build muscle and lose fat at the same time: http://www.muscleforlife.com/build-muscle-lose-fat/ High-fat dieting: http://www.muscleforlife.com/clean-eating-and-weight-loss/ How to make a meal plan: http://www.muscleforlife.com/healthy-meal-planning-tips/ The truth about sugar: http://www.muscleforlife.com/sugar-facts/ The Definitive Guide to the "If It Fits Your Macros" Diet: http://www.muscleforlife.com/what-is-if-it-fits-your-macros-and-does-it-work/ My supplement recommendations: http://www.muscleforlife.com/recommendation/supplements/ 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/

Hey, it's Mike, and this podcast is brought to you by my books. Seriously, though, it actually is. I make my living as a writer, so as long as I keep selling books, I can keep writing articles over at Muscle for Life and Legion and recording podcasts and videos like this and all that fun stuff. Now, I have several books, but the place to start is Bigger Leaner Stronger if you're a guy and Thinner Leaner Stronger if you're a girl. Now, these books, they basically teach you everything you need to know about dieting, training, and supplementation to build

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Now, as you probably know, I'm not a fan of the supplement industry. I mean, I've wasted who knows how many thousands of dollars over the years on worthless supplements that really do nothing. And I've always had trouble finding products that I actually thought were worth buying and recommending. And well, basically I had been complaining about this for years and I decided to finally do something about it and start making my own products. And not just any products, but really the exact products that I myself have always wanted. So a few of the things that make my supplements unique are one, they're a hundred percent naturally sweetened and flavored. Two, all ingredients are backed by peer-reviewed scientific research that you can verify for yourself because on our website, we explain why we've chosen each ingredient and we also cite

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about my supplements at www.legionathletics.com. And if you like what you see and you want to buy something, use the coupon code podcast, P O D C A S T, and you'll save 10% on your order. All right. Thanks again for taking the time to listen to my podcast and let's get to the show. Hey, this is Mike Matthews from MuscleForLife.com. And in this podcast, I want to talk about if it fits your macros, the style of dieting, what it is, how it works, what I like about it, what I don't like about it. And I want to talk about what it kind of means to be a grinder and the benefits of this. And I'll explain what I'm even talking about and why I thought about this when I get there. All right, so let's get going. Let's talk about if

it's your macros. If you haven't heard of this, this is a pretty popular style of meth, uh, pretty proper style of dieting these days. Um, and it's called if it fits your macros because macro is short for macronutrient. Uh, the macronutrients are protein, carbohydrates, and fat, uh, at least the ones that we're talking about with uh with when we're talking about if it fits your macros it also the the technical definition includes macro minerals as well but when you are following if it fits your macros you're not really tracking your macro mineral intake you're just tracking protein carbs and fat and this style of dieting it actually goes back a couple decades now,

but it was always known as flexible dieting. So it's not really brand new in terms of the approach to dieting, but the If It Fits Your Macros name for it is kind of caught on, and it's a big internet thing and whatever. And how it works is it's very simple. So let's say you want to lose fat, losing fat requires that you put your body in calorie deficit, which means that, uh, you need to burn more energy than you're feeding your body. You need to maintain what's called a negative energy balance over time. Um, you do that by, uh, you know, you can measure the amount of energy your body's burning in calories. And you, you do that by eating a bit less than that. Anywhere from, uh, I usually use about a 20 to 25% calorie deficit when I am

meaning I'm eating 20 to 25% less energy than that body's burning every day. And that 20, 25%, that differences is, uh, my net fat loss over time. Um, so if it fits your macros, basically what you're doing is you're taking, uh, your, your baseline intake of calories. And if it fits your macros, basically what you're doing is you're taking your baseline intake of calories. And if you were just to hit those calorie numbers every day, you will lose weight. You could eat anything. It doesn't matter. You could eat Twinkies and Doritos and donuts. I don't care what. If you hit those calorie numbers, you will lose weight. So in that sense, a calorie is a calorie. When we were just talking strictly weight loss, seeing pounds come off, you know, looking at a scale, calorie is calorie. But when we're talking body composition, meaning retaining or even

building lean mass and losing just fat, then the calorie is not a calorie. Then macronutrient balance comes into play. Meaning for instance, first thing is a high protein diet is essential if you want to maintain lean mass or even build muscle when you're in a calorie deficit, uh, which you can do. I'll actually link an article down below. Um, and you know, you can, you can read more about that if you're new to weightlifting or new to proper weightlifting, you can, but if you're an experienced weightlifter, I don't need to tell you, you know, that you can you can read more about that. If you're new to weightlifting or new to proper weightlifting, you can, but if you're an experienced weightlifter, I don't need to tell you, you know, that you can't build muscle and lose fat simultaneously. And there are some physiological reasons for that, which we'll talk about in the article below. So when you want to

optimize body composition, now macronutrients matter. So where you get those calories from matters. If you want to, if you want to build muscle or maintain muscle while losing fat. You can't just eat a bunch of, like, for instance, if you were to do what I was saying earlier, eat a bunch of Doritos and donuts and junk food and whatever, basically what you're going to end up doing is your carbohydrate intake. Let's say you did that and you hit your calories, you're losing weight, but the majority of your calories are going to be from carbohydrates and fat, and you're going to be and you're not going to get much from protein. And that is not a good way of going about it. And there are also some other downsides to

eating too much junk food, which I'm going to talk about soon. And they're not related so much to fat loss. So that's the basic premise of If It Fits Your Macros is you find out how many calories are you going to be eating every day to put yourself into a mild calorie deficit. And you turn that into, let's say 40% of those calories are going to come from protein. 40% of those calories come from carbs and 20% from fat. It's a very standard breakdown. It works well. That's what I follow personally, or even a little bit less fat, a little bit more carbs. High fat dieting is very overrated. I'll actually link an article down below on that as well. If you want to read more about that and read my thoughts about that. So you have these macronutrient numbers, right?

I just recently finished a cut and my final macros were, I want to say about 200 protein, 250 carb and 60 fat, give or take. So I have those numbers. 60 fat, give or take. So I have those numbers. Now what you do next is you take those numbers and you turn those into a meal plan or you turn those into, that's what I like to do. And I'll talk a little bit more about that. But basically how you get to those numbers isn't so important. The types of foods you eat to get there isn't important as long as you hit those numbers. So that means what kind of protein do you like? I like meats. I like dairy. I like eggs. I don't mind getting protein from plant sources like beans and rice and stuff like that, although I'm not a huge fan, I guess. I like peas. Peas are pretty protein dense for a vegetable at least.

But the point is you get your protein how you want. Carbs, there are a million different options, obviously, of carbs. I personally prefer to eat nutritious carbs, fibrous carbs, because they help keep me full. And if you start developing micronutrient deficiencies, you're not only going to notice it in the gym, but you're going to have a harder time dieting. And I will talk more about that in a minute. So the point is though, you can eat for your carbs, for instance, you can eat the types of carbs that you like. And hopefully you like some sort of nutritious carbohydrate, but you have a lot of options there. Like you have, you know, potatoes, sweet potatoes, all different types of grains, seeds, legumes, fruit is great. Basically fruits um even you know you can get some some carbs from dairy like from lactose as you know as long as it doesn't bother your stomach so you

have plenty of options again the point is it's not about restricting certain types of carbs not eating this or having to eat only vegetables at certain times or whatever all that doesn't matter it's just hitting your numbers fat Fat, same thing. I prefer to get my fats from meat. I prefer almond butter is very good. I like almond butter. I like to cook with some oil sometimes or cook with some butter. My diet is relatively low fat. It's not so low that it's going to impair my health, but I'm not a fan of the high fat, you know, 30 to 40% of daily calories from fat. And again, you'll see an article down below where I really explain why. So that's if it fits your

macros. And that's why macros matter. And you can now, I mean, you see why this is popular, because people are used to in the world of dieting, we're told so many ridiculous things about, you know, with food restrictions, and can't eat this food. And you know, you can't, you know, with food restrictions and can't eat this food and, you know, you can't, you only can eat these kinds of carbs. Starch and carbs are good. Starch and carbs are bad. Carbs period are good. Carbs are bad. So it's, it does simplify things a lot. It's very easy to plan or track macros. If you're, if you know that your numbers are 150 protein, you know, let's say that depends, would depend on your weight. your weight, if you're a guy or a girl or whatever. Let's just say it's 150 protein, 150 carb, and 40 fat, if those are your numbers. That'd be for a

girl. I'm not of all weights, obviously, but I don't think a guy would ever be small enough to eat that little food. Then you have these simple numbers, and you can either track on the fly, which some people like to do with an app like My fitness pal or something where you can go on their website and set custom macros. Don't follow their preset macros cause they suck. Um, so you set custom goals and then, and then you just kind of log food as you eat it. Um, that's fine. You can do that, but you need to be familiar with the, with the content of food because if you just go and eat something and you don't really know what is in it and then you go look it up and you're like, oh great, there's 40 grams of fat. There's like my entire day's worth of fat in one meal.

Well shit, what do I do now? You need to be familiar with foods. So if you're already familiar with foods, then it's useful. If you have no idea, then you're going to probably have some issues if you try to just wing it on the fly. You're just going to put yourself in positions where it might be 6 p.m. and you have nothing. You have no calories left for the day. So you have to either just cut it off and deal with it or go over. But once you get used to foods, then I kind of do that on the weekends. Even when I was cutting, my weekend calories a little bit lower as my off

days. And I'm familiar enough with foods now and all the different foods that I like to eat that, you know, I just know. I mean, I also like to weigh like for potatoes. OK, it's point two carbs per gram. So I'm weighing my potatoes, but I'm not necessarily weighing every little thing or even looking like I just know now potato that big. Okay. That's about 200 grams or whatever. And, and, and vegetables. Okay. That's about a cup and a half, whatever. So my calories, you know, I'm, I'm probably within a hundred calories, but you can do that. Uh, if you really know your calories or if you really know your, you know, the macros of food. Um, but initially I recommend that you, you create a meal plan, which I'll link, uh, an article, I recommend that you create a meal plan, which I'll link an article to down below,

and how I like to do this. And just follow the meal plan. Eat the same foods every single day. Yeah, does that sound boring? Yeah, it does sound boring. But it actually is not so bad, because you're eating foods that you like. That's the big thing. And you can change it whenever you want. You can also get fancy if you want. Like what I do is I still use meal planning. I don't wing it every day, just one or two days a week where my calories are already, like I'm reducing them a bit when I was cutting. I'm already in a decent deficit. So if my deficit is a 50 calorie or even a 100 calorie deficit, if it has a swing on one or two days a week, it just doesn't affect the overall results.

But I don't recommend trying to wing it every day. I recommend that, you know, still create a week. It just doesn't affect the overall results. But I don't recommend trying to wing it every day. I recommend that, you know, still, still create a plan. And, and what you can do is you can like, let's say you have a certain allotment of calories, enough macros of protein, carbs, and fat for your post-workout meal. Let's say it's a 50 for me, it's about 50 protein, somewhere between 75 and a hundred carb and a little bit of fat. Post-workout fat does nothing, so it doesn't really matter. So with those numbers now, I mean, I have a smoothie every day just because it's delicious. I just never get sick of it. It's simple. It's a frozen banana, a couple cups of rice milk, a couple scoops of protein, cinnamon, and that's it these days, actually.

It's so good. It's just delicious. So that's my post-workout every day. And I look forward to it every day. So one day, if I get sick of it, I'll do something else. But if I wanted to, I could turn that into pancakes, for instance. It doesn't matter. Like, as long as I measured everything out and knew what was going into it, I could just turn that into a pancake meal every day. And eat pancakes every day if I wanted to. I don't know. Depending on... My body does pretty well with whole grain.

With more refined, shitty-type wheat products, it can upset my stomach. I find with whole grain products, it doesn't really bother me. But maybe at some point, I wouldn't have to dial it back. Like with dairy. If I do too much dairy a couple days in a row, my stomach just gets upset. It's just the way it is. But I can do a lot of dairy maybe once a week and be okay. Like, well, I guess I wouldn't necessarily say a lot.

But like these days, my cheat meal is – it's not even so much of a cheat meal because I kind of save up a lot of calories for it. But I eat like a pint of Talenti gelato, which is so good. I go on and off this. Like I beat Talenti to death and then I just move on to something else. But I'm only cheating, like I only really cheat once a week. So beating it to death takes me like four months basically. But so I can eat a pint of ice cream and, and, you know, like a blueberry muffin with it or something and be okay. But if I were to do a pint of ice cream every day, there's a point where my body would just get mad.

Anyways, so you have your macros for meals. You work out, you know, you can work out a few different options if you want. And you could have, let's say it's your dinner. You could have dinner one and it's chicken and this and that and whatever. And dinner two is beef and this and that. And dinner three is like these days I like, for instance, I'll do usually like some sort of dish with meat and vegetables. And for my carbs, I'll switch things up. Sometimes it's potato based. Sometimes it's sweet potato based. Sometimes it's grain. Sometimes it's seed. It just depends what I feel like. Um, and then also sometimes I'll do like a frittata, which I, which I bake in the oven

and, uh, in, in do it with, uh, I put cottage cheese and Parmesan cheese and salsa and wrap it up in a big breakfast burrito. It's delicious. So again, it's just, I have cottage cheese and Parmesan cheese and salsa and wrap it up in a big breakfast burrito. It's delicious. So again, it's just, I have my numbers worked out and you know, it depends what I, I come home and I decide what do I feel like eating and then I make it. So you can do that as well. You don't have to eat literally exact same foods every day. Although I'll do that for, you know, seven, 10 days at a time, just because I'm busy. It's simple. I just need to throw something in the oven and you know, usually get back to work and then I don busy. It's simple. I just need to throw something in the oven and, you know, usually get back to work. And then I don't really want to have, I like one pot cooking a lot, which is actually my next cookbook is going to be one pot just because it's so convenient.

So that's one nice thing about FFitcher macros is it does simplify the whole process. And another nice thing is of course that it does work. I mean, I think I've already made this clear. It is just taking the underlying, the physiology of weight loss and weight gain. So on the flip side, if you want to build muscle, as you probably know, you need to be in a slight calorie surplus over time. That's how you maximize muscle growth. And again, that's just the same game. It's just, you know, get to eat more food. So for me, if I were to bulk right now,

clean bulk, right. I'd probably, I'd probably eat about 3,300 calories on my training days. And in terms of macros, that would be about my, I would probably do about 200 carb and about 50 to 60 fat and all the rest from carbs or sorry, 200, sorry, 200 protein, uh, 50 to 60 grams, 200 grams protein, 56 grams of fat and all the rest from carbs. Um, and that would, that would be great. I mean, I would feel awesome. My training would kick ass, but right now I'm just staying lean. I'm doing some photo shoots and stuff. So my calories are just kind of hovering. I'm just keeping them around 2,600 and, um, one sheet meal a week and you know, it fine for now so anyways it if it's your macros absolutely

works when when though you have the right calculations one of the problems that people run into with if it fits your macros is the calculators that are being used are wrong they're just too high like it's kind of just a known thing I mean I even read a paper on it recently that the Harris-Benedict is a bit high in calculating BMR. And that activity multipliers, especially those that I recommend, I recommend that you work out your BMR using the catchment card all because it takes into account body fat percentage, which does matter quite a bit. It can be the difference of 200 calories one way or another in your BMR,

which is your basal metabolic rate, how much energy your body burns every day just at rest. And then you have activity multipliers though. So if you exercise a certain number of hours per week, then you're multiplying your BMR by a certain amount to reach your total daily expenditure. The problem with like the catchment cartels daily or its activity multipliers, for instance, is they're just too high. You're not going to be able, if you follow those multipliers, the way that they're laid out, unless you, it's not going to work for if you followed those multipliers the way that they're laid out unless you it's not going to work for you unless you have a very very fast metabolism there are people i run into that are able to you know run on like a 1.5 multiplier for tde and but they're just rare most people um have to dial it back and that's just kind of a known thing in the

bodybuilding world and again i actually read some research on it recently so's just kind of a known thing in the bodybuilding world. And again, I actually read some research on it recently. So it is kind of a known thing in the scientific world as well. If you check out my meal planning article that I linked down below, I give some better multipliers that actually work and work with the majority of people. And I'm really kind of speaking now from experience and working with thousands of people. And it's also, like I said, it's kind of a known thing in the bodybuilding world as well that they have to use a bit lower multipliers. So yes, as long as you have your numbers right, then it works.

Then you can eat all kinds of good foods, meet your numbers, and achieve your goals with your body, whether it be gaining weight, building muscle, or losing fat. Of course, another good thing about it is you get to eat foods you like. That also includes, you know, if you want to eat a little dessert every day,

do it. I do. Every day, I eat something that has the dreaded sugar, which I might as well link an article to down below because sugar is not nearly as big of a problem as it's made out to be if you are relatively lean and if you exercise regularly. So, you know, for me, it could be some chocolate, although I kind of cut back on chocolate. It's just too much fat, unfortunately. As much as I like it, it's so fatty and I don't really want to, I have to steal too much from carbs to eat chocolate. So I'd rather get, I don't want to get like half of my daily fat from chocolate. So, you know, it might be, uh, I have like these little ice cream sandwiches that are good or, you know, whatever, mainly a

carb type dessert. Um, so you get to eat foods you like though. And that's a, that's a big, big thing. Meaning that there really are no restrictions unless all you like, if all you like is junk food and fast food, then change your mind. Like start eating nutritious foods and make your body like them basically. Um, and, and another big benefit of it fits your macros. There's this flexible dieting approach is that, uh, it kind of eliminates the anxieties that people have about, you know, can they eat this? Can they not eat this? Did they just screw up their diet because they ate the starchy carb after 4 p.m. or because they took three extra bites of pasta or because blah, blah, blah. It shows you that dieting is

much, much simpler than many mainstream gurus and experts and whatever make it seem. And it really is just a numbers game when we're talking about losing fat or building muscle. Now, talking about some of the things that I don't like about it is that, and this kind of is a segue from this last point, and I've mentioned this earlier, is that a lot of people use it as an excuse to just pound junk food. A guy who works for me, he might have spoken to me, if you ever called in the Legion, Kareem answers the phone and that's Kareem, right? So he's been cutting and he's been losing weight. He's been, he'll do well. And then sometimes on the weekends, he just crushes himself and

gains like three pounds over the weekend and then has to undo it. But overall, I think he's down 25 pounds or so. And so he's doing well in that regard, but he loves just bad food. Like I think a third of his daily calories are from candy bars and, and sometimes other candy as well. Um, and you know, he doesn't eat vegetables. He has like a joke. He hates micros, right? Like any micronutrient, he doesn't want it in his body. Like all he wants is things that taste delicious to him. And, um know, he's 21, so he can get away with it, but that kind of approach catches up with you. My partner in Legion, Jeremy, as another example, he has kind of done the same thing in the past,

where he would get a bit too, you know, if it fits your macros, you junk it, shred it, and so he would, you know, be working in, like, you know, half pints of gelato. We, plenty is our thing. I mean, I just don't eat very much of it. He was eating a lot, but he'd try to eat it every day. And then he'd be trying to, you just try to get to, to, you know, aesthetics with his, with his diet and what he ran into and what Kareem has also run into is one, they get much hungrier. And they always wondered, like, how is cutting so easy for me?

I never get hungry. I always have high energy levels. My body always feels good. My training is always good. A big part of that is because I get the vast majority of my calories from nutrient-dense sources. I get plenty of fiber in my diet. I take plenty of supplements that are proven, not just workout supplements, but health-related things like spirulina, fish oil, vitamin D. I take a good multivitamin.

And these things matter. Especially, it's accumulative over time. I've been doing this for a long time. I've been eating like this for a long time. I've been training properly for a long time. been eating like this for a long time. I've been training, you know, probably for a long time. And it's, I'm kind of at a point where my body is just very resilient and calorie deficit, it isn't that big of a problem. Um, and if I want to go and eat, you know, um, 3000 calories of just sugar or whatever, I can do that. Uh, and it doesn't have that big of a negative effect on my body. But Kareem and Jeremy, because they were just eating too much junk regularly, I guarantee

you they were developing, I mean, Kareem for sure, micronutrient deficiencies. And they started to feel it. Their bodies just didn't feel so good. They would get very, very hungry when they would eat, you know, when, when your lunch consists of like, uh, some rice, some chicken in like two Twix bars or something like that, or, or even, I don't even know if he's doing rice and whatever. Um, it's not going to be nearly as filling as if you would have taken all those calories and broke it up into nutrient dense things that actually fill you that have fiber that have, you know, that have nutritional value. Um, and then performance in the gym really suffers as well. Cream has been

complaining about that, about how strength is going down so much and like your diet sucks, dude. Like, yeah, you're hitting your macros, your diet sucks. Um, and you'll also find that with, with people that compete, you'll often find that of course they know about flexible dieting and they follow flexible dieting but they get the majority of their foods from from nutritious sources and they really get the majority of their macros from nutritious sources nutritious foods and yeah a lot of competitors are they just listen to their coach they really actually don't know anything a lot of coaches don't know they just have all kinds of weird bro science ideas, but there are a lot of competitors

that are very informed and yeah, they know that they could eat, uh, you know, they could eat more junk food if they wanted to, but they really, especially guys that they're getting into, you know, competition shape, they're getting to four or 5% body fat. They need to be holding no water. Like the drugs aside, the diet really starts to matter a lot. So those guys notice it. Um, one of the thing I don't like about a fitzer macros is that people, and I'm speaking from experience here. I email with a lot of people. I talk with a lot of people. They tend to get, uh, well, I wouldn't say they tend to some people just get kind of carried away and they don't really plan or track their macros precisely enough. Like, you know, they'll be eating it a few meals.

Even, I think there's somebody recently, they're eating a Chipotle like two or three times a day, which I don't even know why you'd want to do that. But yeah, like Chipotle has macros for you on their website. But how precise is that really when they're just like, what do you want? All right, slap this, slap that. And yeah, it's going to be in a ballpark.

But if you're off All right, slap this, slap that. And yeah, it's going to be in a ballpark. But, um, if, if you're off by a hundred calories per meal, that's 300 calories extra per day. Uh, that that's quite a bit, actually that that could be half of your deficit gone right there. And then, and then also, um, not just that, but, but just kind of eyeballing, you know what I mean? Like, oh, well, I think that's about four ounces of meat when it's actually seven ounces or it's actually six ounces, or, you know, I think that's, uh, you know, 300 grams of, of sweet potato when, or, or, or rice or, you know, whatever, when, when it's actually 400 and things like that, uh, all those things add up. So if you're going to do it, you need to make sure that you're precise. Once again, that's why I recommend that you create, create a proper meal plan, weigh your food every day, and just do it that way. So then you take the variables out relating to just simple dietary

compliance. Because that's the number one thing that people run into, at least in my experience, of why they're not reaching their goals in terms of losing weight or gaining weight is just dietary compliance. The vast majority of people that don't lose weight as quickly as they want to, or as quickly as they should, or are stalled simply overeat. They either overeat on a regular basis, like they just kind of overeat every day by a little bit, or they just, you know, go nuts on the weekend. And it's funny because people will email me and it kind of just opens with like, I'm plateaued. I don't know what's going on. What do I do? And my standard first reply is what's your diet like? You know, what are your macros like on a daily basis? How often are you cheating and what are you doing? And it

almost all like 50% of the time, at least maybe 60% of the time it's the weekends alone. Like, oh, well during the week I'm good. I stick to my diet. And then the weekends come and I eat like 82 cheeseburgers and drink beer all day. Well, then that, you know what the problem is. Of course, that's like, you can undo an entire week's worth of weight loss in one weekend. Easy. No question. Cause you're only, when you're doing it right, you're only losing one pound, maybe, you know, two pounds max fat a week, you can gain a pound of fat or even two pounds in two days for sure. A pound is easy. Like you just, just go eat 8,000 calories Saturday, 8,000 calories Sunday and make it really high fat. Eat like pizza and cheese, lots of cheesy type things and just as much fat as you can get in you, dietary fat, and you will gain, noticeably,

you will gain one to two pounds of fat over the weekend easy. I don't know what the maximum, it was funny, I was talking with one of my friends about this, I wonder how much fat can your body actually synthesize? I mean, it has to create it, so it has to take everything that you're putting in and change it molecularly to store it. But there's got to be, just like how your body can only build so much muscle in a kind of change it molecularly to, to, to store it. So, but there's gotta be just

like how your body can only build so much muscle in a period of time. It's building, I mean, a pound of muscle, think of that as like a pound of steak that your body's building. Same thing with fat. I don't know what that is, but you can gain a pound of fat or even two pounds in two days for sure. Though the process is very efficient. Um, so yeah, that's where I think the, the, those are kind of like the two problems or if it's your macros, it's not really problems inherent in it. It's just a problems with how people promote it and how people use it. How I use it, flexible dieting, like I said, as I like to make a meal plan, I eat foods that I like. And I work out various meals that, that, that fit my

numbers and I stick to it. And once you get used to it, it just kind of becomes an everyday part of your life. It's not even, I don't feel restricted at all. I think of it more as like a budget, like with money, right? So you only have so much money to spend. How are you going to spend it? You don't complain. Like, yeah, you could wish you had more money to spend, but you only have that much money to spend with food. It's a little bit different because you can eat, you can go eat 8,000 calories

a day. But if you kind of look at it more like a budget, you have a certain amount of calories to spend macros, the, you know, broken down into macros. How do you want to spend them? Once they're spent, they're gone. If you look at it that way, you know, if you're, if you're good with your money, then you can be good with your diet. If you just look at it that way, you know, if you're, if you're good with your money, then you can be good with your diet if you just look at it that way. So yeah, that's about everything with it. If it's your macros again, you'll see some articles down below that you might like to go, to go learn more about how to actually put it into use. Okay. So now let's move to this other thing I want to talk about, which is grinding. Right. And the reason why I thought of this is I've, I've been getting into golf recently. I played a bit when I was younger, never really

got good. I never broke 80. I was kind of an 80s golfer and I didn't play that much. I played for six months, I guess. And I want to get back into it now just because I wanted, I don't know, something other than just lifting weights to do with my body, I guess. And I've always liked golf. And so I've been working for the last couple of months just on swing mechanics. I don't have that much time to give it. Um, but I, but I work it in, I have even a little setup here at the office and just kind of do what, do what I can do and get, get out there on the weekends a little bit. Um, and I've been working a lot of my swing mechanics and people that over at the country club or whatever, they,

you know, just some of these guys are like, Oh, i wish i could grind like that like i don't have the motivation to just go out there and grind right and uh it just kind of got me thinking in that like how in how big of a an advantage you can have by just being able to be a good grinder and how really everyone that i know uh who got really good at anything and not just like got okay, but got to a point where like they're making, that's their profession, that's their career, and they're making a lot of money doing it. Like people, you know, they're good, whether it be a business or it could be, I don't even know, like I think it's salespeople or marketing people or athletes or whatever, is that these people were just really good at grinding. And that concept of grinding, right? It kind of has a good connotation because

there's a negative aspect to it, but also kind of a positive in terms of toughness, because that is really what it is. Like when I'm out there working on my swing, I'm on video, I'm hitting one ball, going back, looking at my, looking at what I did. And it's, it's a matter of working toward the positions, what I need to see and getting a feel for it. I'm not just out there banging balls. And you know what I mean? It is, it's, it, there is a grind to it. It's not that that's particularly thrilling. I'm kind of ambivalent about it when I'm doing it. I'm not, I wouldn't say I'm exhilarated and I'm not angry, or I'm just kind of level-headed. I'm almost, maybe I'm a little bit above, I don't know. I'm kind of ambivalent about it when I'm doing it. I'm not, I wouldn't say I'm exhilarated and I'm not angry or I'm just kind of level-headed. I'm almost, maybe I'm a little bit above, I don't know, I'm somewhere around boredom kind of thing. Maybe I'm somewhere between boredom and,

you know, being just kind of, you know, contented, I guess. Um, and, but I just do what I do. And, uh, and, and it does have that grind kind of feel, you know, when you're learning something, anything in the beginning, you suck at it and you wish you could just go do the, do the, you know, the big picture and be good at it, but you have to just take one little piece and you have to just grind it. You have to just grind and grind and grind until you get that piece. All right, good. Then you add another piece, you know, grind, grind, grind, grind, add another piece, grind, and then grind them all. And you're just kind of just like, you know, grind, grind, grind, grind, add another piece, grind, and then grind them all. And you're just kind of just like, you know, you're building up this thing. And, um, I really, that's a, it's an analogy. I think that applies to, to really anything. You have to be able to push through the struggles in the beginning. You have to push through all the mistakes. I mean,

take golf, all the Tiger Woods was, uh, I mean, he probably still is. I don't know. I don't really actually follow golf that much, but I know that he was renowned, especially back when he was crushing everybody. He was renowned for his grind. He just would be 12 hours a day. That was his schedule. Even when he was winning everything and every day that he was out there, you know, he'd four hours on the range, four hours playing this, that, whatever. And he could, it was just kind of a known, like he could outgrind everybody. And, uh, you know, ironically, a friend of mine that was, was, uh, super good at video games. Like actually we played a couple of games professionally and whatever, same thing. He was just a grinder and he's got an aptitude for it, but there's a similarity there. People that are,

uh, are, I know that are very successful in business, they acquired skills that they're just good at grinding. And by that, they're able, you know, you take somebody that has achieved, made a lot of money or something like that, and out in public, how the public sees them is in this very type of, they must have like a mystique about them. Right. Um, that, that in a lot of cases, people think that that success came a lot easier for that person than it actually did. And in, you know, I've, like I said, I've known a lot of people that have made a lot of money doing a lot of different things. And I know a lot of people that make a lot of money doing a lot of

different things. And one for one in their private lives, these people are grinders. They go through all the same struggles as everybody else. Um, some people do have knacks for things that make it a little bit easier, but for the most part, they're able to just sit down every day and you know, not don't, don't be discouraged because they suck and just grind and grind and grind until finally they're able to just make breakthroughs. And if you've played sports, you've probably experienced that. I played ice hockey growing up. And I remember, it's funny that I remember this. It's just like etched in my memory.

Where for the first year, I was terrible. I mean, I played a lot of roller hockey. But then I went on the ice and, you know, I didn't know how to skate. I didn't, it was completely different. Shooting a ball versus shooting a puck. I didn't know how to skate. It was completely different. Shooting a ball versus shooting a puck.

There was a lot less in common than I was expecting. So it took a year, and I played in the season, and I played camps. I played as much ice hockey as I could living in Florida. So it's not like I could just go out and skate on the lake or something like that. But it took a year of grinding camps. You go to these camps. That's what you do. You grind, you're practicing one little skill. You're practicing your crossovers for an hour straight. You're practicing, you know, one type of shot for an hour straight, grinding. And it took about a year or a year. Yeah, probably about a year, a little bit more

than a year before I was even good enough to like make a difference in a game to even do anything. Right. And I remember the play where I actually, I did something good and, you know, got around some people almost scored. And then I was like, finally, the grinding has paid off. I can do something now. And, and then I got, that was like a first breakthrough and I got progressively better. And it went like that where I'm, you know, where then I would be at that

skill level and I would grind, grind, grind, grind. And then all of a sudden it would be like, I can all of a sudden just do this new thing that made me even better. And in taking up golf again, it's the same thing. You know, in the beginning, everything felt terrible and janky and my swing sucked and I couldn't hit the ball consistently and I couldn't get my hips moving correctly. And I couldn't use all these things and I've been grinding and now it's not perfect, of course, but it's much, much better. And it feels so natural and easy now. I'm like, how, why wasn't, why was this so hard? You know, just a month ago, why was I, why couldn't I just do this with my hips? It's so simple. No, I don't know, but that's how it goes with anything,

whether you're learning, you know, writing or learning something related to work or whatever. In the beginning, you suck. That's just the way it is. And you grind, grind, grind until finally it just comes. And it seems to come in these big, you know, you make these little improvements. Then all of a sudden something clicks. And then you make little improvements. Something clicks. And I don't know, there seems to be something to that. Um, you know, working out,

building a good physique is a, is a kind of a good exercise in grinding because, uh, you know, you have to show up every day. You have to put in the work. You have to only improve your biggest improvement that you're going to see in a day to day. like today you can beat your reps from last week. That's it. Like what did you, you know, you, you bench press 225 for five last week and you did 225 for seven this week. Great. That's an improvement. That's a successful grind session in a sense. Um, but you get no, uh, immediate rewards. It's not like now you get to run to the mirror and see that new muscle growing out of your chest or something. You look the exact same, nothing has changed apparently, but you know, something has changed. And over time you kind of accumulate these small little gains until you've

really done something oppressive. Um, and that's really how I think just things go in many areas of life where you just, you slowly accumulate positive, uh, you slowly are just moving forward, moving forward, moving forward, uh, really with like your, your head kind of down your, your nose is in the grindstone. And then after time you kind of look back and you see, Oh wow, look at how much, look at how far I've progressed. And, uh, you know, and that's, that's really it. It kind of goes back to, uh, the, how much, look at how far I've progressed. And, uh, you know, and that's, that's really it. And it kind of goes back to, uh, the, the 10,000 hour rule, which you've probably heard about. I think Malcolm Gladwell kind of really popularized it. I mean, it's been around for longer than when Gladwell talked about it in his book outliers. But, um, I think that was

like the first real mainstream kind of, uh, uh, you know, spreading of it. Um, and in case you haven't heard of it, it's just a simple, there was some research done that, uh, basically concluded, uh, in looking at people, various skill levels and all different types of fields and endeavors that the, at a, at a master level or a top, top professional level, you're looking at about 10,000 hours or more of deliberate practice. That's what goes into that. Your average teacher, maybe 3000 hours, your average student at a student level where he's still learning, you know, a thousand hours or less. Um, and, and deliberate practice is, uh, basically where you are practicing where to, uh, similar to working out actually like working out what you're actually doing to the body

with progressive overload is it's overreaching. You're forcing your body to do a little bit more than it wants to or that it could do just the week before. It adapts a little bit. You push it a little bit further. It adapts a little bit. And the same idea with practicing, you know, coming back to a sport. You can go out and practice, let's say, I mean, you can take golf again, you know, you can go to the driving range and just hit golf balls over and over and over. That's kind of mindless practice and it doesn't really achieve much. Or you could go out and you could, let's say, play a game where one popular practice game that good players use is they actually play a course in their head. So, you know, let's say, play a game where one popular practice game that good players use is they actually play a course in their head. So, you know, let's say the course that you normally play,

you go out on the range and you visualize that first tee, what would you normally hit? A driver, okay, good. Where would you put it? Okay, good. It needs to be in between those two things, you know, whether it could be two trees or whatever. Okay, how did you hit it? All right, it's over there. What was your drive about? Which you would know. I mean, you have to the back of the range, right? And then now you get your next club and you'd hit your approach shot.

How did that go? And there are different ways to play games like that where you keep score, actually. There are other games where, you know, putting games and things where you're trying to, you gain points for doing certain things and you lose points for games and things where you're trying to, you gain points for doing certain things and you lose points for doing other things. And by practicing like that, it's a challenge. So you're trying to actually beat your scores as opposed to just mindlessly going out there and

just swinging a club for two hours straight, which a lot of people do. And it's that, you know, it's very inefficient. In the two months that I've been kind of taking this up. I've met some of the people over the country club or whatever, and they, they're out there and their swings look just as bad as they did two months ago. And they're hitting the ball just as poorly as they were two months ago. And, you know, the, they're now coming and talking to me cause they see how much I've improved in just two months. And, you know, it's, it's a matter of smart, deliberate practice. Um, all right. So yeah, that's about it. That's all I want to say on grinding is it's just a, it's a skill that if you can, if you can kind of get into that mindset and, and just be patient and be a good grinder, I really think that it can serve you well in every

area of your life. All right. Thanks again. I hope you enjoyed the podcast and I will catch you next time. Hey, it's Mike again. Hope you liked the podcast. If you did go ahead and subscribe. I put out new episodes every week or two where I talk about all kinds of things related to health and fitness and general wellness. Also head over to my website at www.muscleforlife.com where you'll find not only past episodes of the podcast, but you'll also find a bunch of different articles that I've written. I release a new one almost every day. Actually, I release kind of like four to six new articles a week. And you can also find my books and everything else that I'm involved in over at muscleforlife.com. All right. Thanks again. Bye.