95% of Diets Fail, Fitness Gurus, and Your Over 40 Muscle Retirement Plan | Bonus - Wits & Weights | Fat Loss, Nutrition, & Strength Training for Lifters

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey Wits and Weeds family, Philip Pape here
dropping another special bonusepisode, and today I am sharing
a replay of my recent appearanceon the With Passion podcast
hosted by Josh Taft.
Now Josh and I had anincredible conversation that
really gets into cutting throughthe noise.
It's something that we give alot of lip service, but we

(00:21):
legitimately talk about thedifference between sources you
can trust and everything else.
We also get into why strengthtraining is absolutely essential
for longevity and how toapproach your health and fitness
journey with a mindset thatallows it to be sustainable and
evidence-based.
We covered everything from thepsychology of goal setting to
why muscle's literally yourretirement plan, and I think

(00:44):
you're going to get tons ofvalue from this discussion,
because Josh is a greatinterviewer and he asked
questions in a way that broughtout some insights that I don't
always get to explore, even onthis show, even after this many
episodes, After you listen.
I would encourage you to checkout Josh's podcast With Passion
wherever you get your podcasts,or click the link in the show
notes.
He's doing some really greatwork with conversations about

(01:07):
personal growth and I thinkyou're going to enjoy his
content, so I'm going to includea link to his show in the show
notes.
All right, here's myconversation with Josh Taft.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
The following conversation is with Philip Pape
.
Philip is the host of the Witsand Weights podcast, and he has
spent years uncovering andsharing some of the most
valuable and importantinformation surrounding your
health and fitness, and so inthis conversation, we covered a
range of topics like what aresome common misconceptions in
the health and fitness industry,what is important to consider

(01:37):
when we're designing a programfor diet and training, and why
strength training is the mostimportant thing for you to do to
ensure your longevity.
I loved this conversation.
It's not often you get to sitdown with someone with such
breadth and depth ofunderstanding of a topic like
Philip, and a lot of what hespoke about has made me rethink

(01:58):
my approach to health andfitness and it's been really,
really valuable and I'm supergrateful for his time.
And so, without further ado, myconversation with Philip.

Speaker 1 (02:07):
So, as part of your mission statement on the Wits
and Weights podcast, youmentioned cutting through the
noise of the with my fitness andnutrition, and it's one of the
biggest pain points and biggestproblems for people today, as

(02:29):
social media expandsexponentially, is that there are
a lot of gurus and know-it-allsand people with MD behind their
name, people, PhD behind theirname, guys like me, you know.
Who do you trust?
Who do you even start to uhlisten to and trust and or give
them your time?
Because, especially a formatlike a podcast right, we have

(02:51):
potentially 30, 45 minutes Inyour case.
You have nice chunky podcasts,episodes, and people are
demanding you're demanding theirtime.
Uh, what do you do with that?
So to me, the noise is not justthe actual volume of content out
there, but the fact that thereare lots of motives for why the

(03:12):
content is out there that leadsto incorrect, false
misinformation, disinformation,unintendedly bad information or
a small sliver of accurateinformation.
And so that was my intent waslike look, I'm an engineer, I
value skepticism, I valuescience and I also have a PhD,
not in this field, but I have aPhD years ago where I learned to

(03:33):
read research papers, and atthat time I realized that it's
easy to be swindled and it'salso easy to follow something
that seems well-meaning and thatquote unquote works for people
and it doesn't actually work foryou.
So long story short, the noiseis all of that and helping you
get some clarity.

Speaker 2 (03:51):
What do you think is the because I wonder about this.
As you mentioned my podcast, Idon't know how much of the
responsibility of me to provideaccurate information is because,
also, you know, in this formatat least it's's a conversation.
I'm well aware that I'm goingto say completely inaccurate
things that do not apply to mostpeople, but they apply to me.
So what do you think theresponsibility if someone's

(04:12):
sharing information may berelated to health and fitness is
?

Speaker 1 (04:17):
you make a great point in that, depending on the
medium and depending on theclaim, right?
Like?
What level of trust are youtrying to assert or match from
somebody who's listening orwatching?
And I suppose it comes down towhether you're asking them to
believe you on something or not,or whether you're just saying
this is my opinion, right, likethat's the fundamental
difference with humans when youtalk and if you watch the news

(04:40):
today, I mean, I'm in the US andof course, things have gotten
very political Even the idea oftruth is in question from all
sides, from from multiple areasof of the, the political,
political sphere, and so, um, Ithink, I think it really comes
down to N equals, one like asthe most trusted sources
yourself first, andexperimenting and testing and

(05:02):
trying things out, we can getinto my systems-based kind of
philosophy of how I approachnutrition and training, but then
I think it expands up from that.
It's like, okay, now you haveyour close confidants, maybe a
trainer, maybe a family member,somebody you work with, who you
talk to as a human, maybeface-to-face, if you're lucky
these days and you kind ofdevelop a rapport and they give

(05:23):
you referrals, don't they?
Or they send you off to readthis book or watch this podcast
and you start to develop thiswhole network of information.
And then, from that, the way Ido it, at least, is I'm
constantly checking againstother sources and starting to
filter out the things that seemto not make sense.
But that's hard, man, josh,that is hard to do.
It's very hard to do.
So there's no easy answer,right?

(05:45):
There's no easy answer.

Speaker 2 (05:46):
Yeah, it's certainly hard to do Like if you've got
someone who is betrayingthemselves as such, like a all
knowing person.
It's kind of hard to be likewait a second, I should check
that myself.
You know, not everyone has thetime for that, so that's why
people rely on people like youonline to do the research for
them and kind of tell them whatit all says and then they can
make their own minds up fromthere.

(06:07):
You mentioned briefly justbefore that you were kind of
finding your way prior to acertain stage and I know that
you said you tried all thesedifferent trendy diets like keto
and intermittent fasting.
What was your experience withthose?

Speaker 1 (06:23):
Be more specific when you say experience, because
there's a lot there.

Speaker 2 (06:28):
Okay.
So, for example, intermittentfasting how did you feel that
impacted you in terms ofachieving your goals, your
energy and your just overalllifestyle at that point?

Speaker 1 (06:38):
Yeah, that's a great example, because any method for
anything could work for a person.
In my opinion, just about anymethod right.
Any specific tool or method canwork, and a method can work for
somebody at one point and notfor another.
Also, it can work for one goaland not another goal.
So what I'm getting at isthere's a lot of nuance behind

(07:01):
it.
Before I answer the exactdirect question, I want to go
back a little bit to how youtell something is trustworthy,
and to me it's.
If somebody is saying thatthere's one true way to do
something, that is where theskepticism radar should go up.
And if somebody says, look, itdepends and there are caveats

(07:23):
and there's assumptions, that isa more nuanced way to
communicate.
And if someone's saying that ona podcast or something else,
it's going to be confident.
Either way, either they'relying to your face confidently
or they're being nuancedconfidently, right.
If they're not confident, wetend to not trust them at all.
That's kind of just how ourminds work.
So, with something likeintermittent fasting, there was

(07:45):
some really good information outthere in the lean gains
community, for example, and allsorts of you know famous people
doing fasting and healthy peopledoing fasting talking about on
social media.
And when you get right down toit, what is fasting?
Fasting is just not eating fora certain amount of time, right?
And then you can say, okay,well, what does that do for you?
Well, it helps you, maybecontrol your meal schedule,

(08:08):
maybe it controls your hungersignals so you eat less during
the time when you're eating.
And maybe and here's where itgets, it gets.
I get skeptical.
It does does all these otherclaims that we've seen start to
be communicated over the years,like cleans out your cells and
improves your hormones, andhelps your mental clarity, and
and and and helps your mentalclarity, and, and, and, and
right.
And so you take all of that andyou say what's the goal?

(08:29):
Well, when I did lean gains,the goal was I was trying to
lose weight.
I didn't even understand fatloss, body composition, building
muscle.
I didn't understand all thatand I was just trying to lose
weight.
And so it was actually a verygood tool at the time because,
guess what, I could eat twomeals from 11 am to 5 pm, feel
satisfied.
My body got adapted to thefasting window, and so to this

(08:49):
day, I tell people it's a tool.
So my experience may bedifferent than yours, but if
you're relying on it for thewrong goal or you're the wrong
person to do it, you only knowby actually trying it out and
gathering the data and closingthat loop and then seeing what
needs to be adjusted actuallytrying it out and gathering the
data and closing that loop andthen seeing what needs to be
adjusted.
But the I guess the asterisk toall of that is making sure it
actually is doing the thing youthink it does.

Speaker 2 (09:10):
Yeah, no, I also tried intermittent fasting for a
while and it and it worked.
It helped me lose weight, but Iwas always skeptical, like I
don't know how much of it isjust the fact that I'm eating
less over a short period of time, because, you know, like
obviously I got used to the kindof hunger part of being between
5 and 11.
Um, I think I did 6 and 11.

(09:33):
I gave myself a little extrahour there, um.
But then, yeah, I see all thesevideos and I think it again goes
back to that truth thing wherethere's so many people posting
about kind of half truths wherethey're like, if you have a bit
of lemon water in the morning,it does this for your cells and
detoxifies all this.
And then you kind of, if youactually dug into the science a
little bit more which, granted,I don't do an awful lot, but

(09:56):
anytime I have where it's kindof like, well, this is a bit of
a half truth, you know it can doyou some good for this reason
and this reason.
But the way they're portrayingit is slightly warped and
shifted and I think that kind ofspeaks to the online space of
fitness and health where youkind of have to make these big
statements to, to get attentionand and to get a following.

(10:17):
So how do you kind of navigatethat space online when you're
talking about health and fitness, knowing that the big
statements in these, you know,life-changing things is how
you're going to get attention,but you're trying to stay true
to the science.

Speaker 1 (10:30):
This is.
This has come up a lot latelyin that you sometimes have to
grab the attention with um, abold claim, a clickbaity
statement.
You know it's marketing.
It's marketing 101 is get theattention, then deliver the
goods and make sure there's nottoo much of a chasm between what
you're saying you're going todeliver and what you actually
deliver.
You talk about intermittentfasting.
I was just looking through mycatalog.
Episode 254 from December 2024is called 10 Intermittent

(10:54):
Fasting Myths that Need to Dieright and it's like kind of
clickbaity.
It gets your attention.
You're like what that, I recallclearly is one of the maybe 20
episodes I've done.
That got tons of YouTubecomments, primarily from people
wanting to defend intermittentfasting because it's like a
trigger.
It's like you're in that tribe,you're in that group and no

(11:15):
offense against people who wantto belong to a group and do
something together.
I totally get that.
It's more of don't just assumesomething's right for everyone
all the time.
Have the nuance behind it.
So I know how to go after thatboogeyman pretty well by now.
Like I had an episode last weekcalled my Escape from Low Carb

(11:36):
Diets, like Keto and Carnivoreand oh man, the hater comments
on YouTube.
I mean it was one of thehighest viewed videos of the
last few months.
Because what happens is YouTubesays people are engaging and
then you get more and more viewsbut, like 90% of it is is kind
of haters.
And then I have to do I engagewith them or not.
And I love engaging with them,not in a not in a super um, you

(11:57):
know aggressive way, but I dowant to defend the point and try
to be nuanced.
So I, I'm okay when someonewants to get the attention using
marketing tactics, as long asthey're delivering authentically
and honestly to what they'reimplying.
That you're, you're, you're,you're giving them, like I, I, I
have an episode coming out as aresult of the comments, called

(12:18):
something like is fiberunnecessary?
The carnivore diet thinks so.
And it's like you know, you'regoing to get people coming in
who are like well, I docarnivore.
It makes me feel great, itsolved all my autoimmune
conditions, I've lost weight, Idon't have any fog anymore and
my gut is fine and you don'tneed fiber.
You don't need fiber oncarnivore and I take exception

(12:38):
to that because I think there's.
If you just stand back and sayI don't care about the diet, I
want to look at the body ofevidence.
What did the meta-analysis sayof studies, of studies on humans
, not just on rats over time andwe see over time, time and
again, that a diverse diet,plants and animals tends to have
the best health outcome, Infact, leaning slightly more

(12:59):
toward more plants and I'm a bigmeat eater, but definitely not
carnivore there's issues whenyou compare saturated fat to
seed oils.
Seed oils win people likebelieve it or not, even though
they're highly vilified on bythe YouTuber in the grocery
store saying look at this bag ofchips, it's got seed oils, it's
going to kill you, Right?
So I don't know if thatanswered your question, but

(13:20):
that's what came to mind.

Speaker 2 (13:21):
Yeah, no, I think that's a good balance.
You've got to get theirattention, but then as long as
the information's good, I thinkthat's where your responsibility
lies.
You mentioned that you kind ofhit 40 and your kind of approach
to your own health and your ownfitness kind of changed.
You built your home gym, youstarted looking into the science

(13:42):
and everything.
I'm curious, what kind of wasyour view of health and fitness
before that point and how didthat change?

Speaker 1 (13:48):
When you said hit 40, I thought of this meme where
this guy falls on his face onthe concrete and it says even
when you fall on your face,you're still moving forward.
Right, so analogy, becausethat's essentially what my life
is and I'm proud of that.
I encourage people toexperience many things, test
many things, try many things andassume.

(14:09):
You don't know if it's going towork until you try it.
Which is relevant to yourquestion, because for my 20s,
all the way through my 30s,that's what I did.
I was always reading booksabout lifting, I was always
going to the gym, trying thingsand trying all sorts of crazy
diets.
I mean going back to Atkins andSlim Fast in college, through

(14:29):
to all the low carb stuff, and Idid a weird diet man for my
wedding.
This was back in 2006.
And all I could remember therewas like 12 foods on a list and
that's all I ate, and I mixedand matched those foods Okay.
Horrible, like sliced deli meatwas one of them.
Like apple was, you know, likesuper crazy.
So people get desperate aboutthis stuff because it's our

(14:51):
health, it's our physique, it'sall those wrapped up in our body
image and our self-worth.
So, from my 20s to my 30s, byhaving gone through all those
and realizing they didn't work,it wasn't until um, the pandemic
, which was when I was 39,turning 40 that year, that I
discovered the muscle andstrength pyramids by Dr Eric

(15:12):
Helms and Andy Morgan andstarting strength, which is a
very, very well-known programand book.
Um, and in fact I justinterviewed the CEO of starting
strength from my show.
I was super stoked about that.
So check that one out when itcomes out.
Um, but uh, I man, yourquestion was like I don't know
what your question was.

Speaker 2 (15:31):
Just so, that was your kind of approach was just
experimenting, trying new things.
Yeah, what, what kind ofoccurred?
So obviously the pandemic cameand everything.
What inspired you to kind oflook into the science and the
background of the health andfitness?
And how has your approachchanged now?

Speaker 1 (15:48):
Yeah, that year, because of the pandemic, I had
to start working out at home.
I had done CrossFit for abouteight years and my trainer at
that gym himself had sort ofmoved away from CrossFit more
toward just traditional strengthand conditioning.
So, lucky me, he wrote for me ahome-based program.
He did it for all his clients,for free, for the pandemic.
Really nice guy, you know,thinking, hey, we're all going

(16:09):
to come back in the gym and talkgood things about him.
Really good businessman, um.
And so I had some dumbbells anduh bands, just hardly anything.
But he said, look, you've gotto focus on strength, you've got
to progress over time andyou've got to uh, see your
numbers go up and you've got toeat and sleep.
So I said, well, this isactually kind of new to me
because I never thought of itthat way.
I always thought conditioning,cardio, um, lots of reps, you

(16:33):
know things like that.
I I didn't have a structuredapproach, so that got me to look
into that, which is why I cameacross.
The books I mentioned, as wellas a whole bunch of podcasts,
got me really into podcasts, um,as a listener, and I had a.
I had probably a hundred in myfeed.
I probably still do.
And that year I said, okay.
Well, if the way to strength asa beginner is to use a barbell

(16:57):
which is kind of the the thing Ihad come across that seemed to
make sense.
I need a gym, a better gym inmy house.
So I hustled to get a rack anda plate, the plates and a bar
and a bench, and then I juststarted doing a novice linear
progression is what they call itright, three days a week squat,
press, deadlift, heavy, youknow, three by five, one by five
, that's it.
And I started eating a lot,drinking a lot of whole milk,

(17:17):
just eating anything, not reallychecking it.
I didn't know how to trackmacros, anything like that.
I just gained a ton of weight,and I'm glad I did, because it
let me see how gaining weightcan massively put on, you know,
strength and size, um, eventhough you gain fat along the
ride.
So that that got the catalystgoing for me.
A year later I figured out Ineeded to cut some weight

(17:38):
because I had gained too muchfat, and that taught me about
flexible dieting, which isactually a term in the industry.
I think Alan Aragon inventedthe term, but it goes back to
probably as early as the 60s,but really in the 90s, they
started studying flexible versusrigid approaches to dieting and
really noticing the differencefor sustaining your results and

(17:59):
adhering to your diet andenjoying your diet.
And I said this is a lot morefun than the 12 food diet that I
did for my wife.

Speaker 2 (18:08):
That must have got so boring so quickly.
That's insane, you know peoplewill do anything.

Speaker 1 (18:13):
Josh, you know this, people will do anything
sometimes.
So when I realized, look, Icould eat animal products, plant
products.
I could eat seeds, nuts, fruitsNothing's off limits.
Carbs aren't off limits,desserts and snacks aren't off
limits.
But I need to have guidelinesand guardrails and structure
around the quantities and aroundthe composition of my meals so
that it served my goals as alifter, and also the energy

(18:35):
balance so I could know to gainor lose weight.
Because you mentionedintermittent fasting.
It's like why does that work?
Because of energy balance, youeat fewer calories and you might
cut out a bunch of processedfoods in the process.
So that's when I got into itand then late 2021 is when I
started my show and eventuallygot into coaching from the show.
So I did it all backward.

Speaker 2 (18:52):
Were there any kind of misconceptions that you now
realize are misconceptions thatyou you may have held in those
years coming up Because you talkabout cutting through the noise
and everything, and I thinkI've personally seen a lot of
content online where I'm like,if that just can't be true, you
know, and it's just kind of acommonly held belief and
everything.
So is there anything where yourealize, huh, I've been thinking

(19:13):
about this all wrong.

Speaker 1 (19:15):
Yes, everything, just about everything.
When it comes to training andnutrition, what, let me ask you,
what's something that comes tomind?
That's like you hear all thetime.

Speaker 2 (19:24):
Um, I think to be, to be honest, my general approach
to to train.
I remember when I startedtraining and I started with the
very basic stuff and I just gotmore and more and more and more
technical as I went on.
I was trying to do all thesedifferent isolation exercises,
achieve certain angles and allthis kind of thing, and you know
, I made progress and everything.
But at some point I kind ofrealized that I don't need to be

(19:47):
doing all this.
As long as I'm working hard inthe gym, I'm eating my protein
and I'm sleeping, I will makeprogress.
And that kind of realizationjust made the whole thing easier
for me, because I was like Idon't need to spend all this
time doing all this research and, you know, timing everything
and making sure that I'm beingoptimal in every single way.

(20:08):
As long as, as long as I'mdoing those three things, then
that kind of that will push meforward and help me make
progress.

Speaker 1 (20:14):
And what was the cat?
What was the um Eureka momentwhere you realize?
So, in other words, did youtest, backing off and finding
that it didn't hurt you?

Speaker 2 (20:24):
did you test backing off and finding that it didn't
hurt you?
Yeah, I went consistently tothe gym doing all these things
and then I just got so sick ofit and bored of it I took time
off.
I went back, did the basicthings again and I was like, oh,
this is great, like I don'thave to think so much and all
I'm doing is just lifting,lifting stuff and putting it
back down again.

Speaker 1 (20:41):
Yeah, I feel like so many people can relate to that,
myself included.
Putting a bit back down againyeah, I feel like so many people
can relate to that, myselfincluded, because I used to
overthink everything as well.
I'm definitely a.
I love data.
I love it now analyzingeverything and whether it's
protein, timing, and now youknow you could just eat your
total protein is is 95% of theequation for the day.
It doesn't matter when or howmuch per meal or everything,

(21:01):
unless you really care aboutoptimizing to that nth degree,
doing too much cardio.
So when I work with clientswhere a lot of women I'll say
two-thirds, are women, butthere's men as well there's
definitely myths around fatburning, for example, that are
misunderstood, like all theactivities to burn fat, or
training, fasted or low-carb, etcetera.

(21:23):
That all has to do withmisunderstanding with energy
systems in the body, and whenyou realize that and you
understand metabolism, yourealize that your body is going
to adapt to what you do with it.
So if you're doing a lot ofcardio, you're going to become a
very efficient cardio machine,which means you're going to burn
a lot fewer calories becauseyour body wants to conserve
energy.
If you're lifting weights, onthe other hand, your body's

(21:44):
going to adapt to grow largersarcomeres in your
musculoskeletal cells right,just to get technical which just
means you'll have more abilityto produce force and have bigger
muscle mass.
So on the one hand, you got tounderstand the basic science to
do the right things.
On the other hand, you don'thave to do that much, like you
said, if you just lift seven or8,000 steps a day at least and

(22:10):
you track your nutrition so thatit's within some reasonable
range of protein and calories.
Yeah, that like covers 80, 90%of it.
Of course there'srecoverability, like sleep and
stress management, where theolder you are or the more
complex your life, the more youmight be, you know your
metabolism might respond tothose things.
If you're a woman, you knowhormones and peri and

(22:31):
postmenopause are also going tohave an impact.
So there's a lot of otherthings like that.
But if you're doing the basics,you're going to mitigate
largely a lot of those concerns.

Speaker 2 (22:39):
Yeah for sure.
I mean yeah when I when I saythat I want a caveat saying I
didn't have any injuries, Idon't have any particular
hormone issues or anything I hadto think about.
So yeah, I'm the kind of boxstandard gym goer that just.

Speaker 1 (22:52):
It's okay.
It's a good place to start, man.
Yeah, I mean, it was great Goodplace to be.

Speaker 2 (22:57):
It was great you did mention about cardio there.
What's your ruling on cardiowhen you're trying to build
muscle or lose fat as well?

Speaker 1 (23:06):
Yeah for sure.
So what's your priority?
What's your goal?
Right?
If your goal is, I want to bestrong, I want to be fit and
have more muscle mass, I wantbetter body composition, lower
stress and better longevity,you're probably going to want to
prioritize strength training.
So then you have to say whatelse can fit into your week that

(23:29):
supports strength training butalso supports your other goals,
like cardiovascular health,right, and I'll say that, like,
strength training alone willmake a massive difference in
your health.
People don't understand that.
It's not about muscle, it'sinsulin sensitivity, it's
nutrient partitioning, it's, youknow, your muscles become a
glucose, a sink for glucose, soyou can eat a lot more food, you
burn more calories.
Musculoskeletal health, bonedensity I mean, there's a huge

(23:49):
list.
You know better.
Hormones like testosterone,growth hormone, estrogen,
progesterone all of it right.
And if that's your goal, thenthink about recoverability
versus the stress.
So the stress is every time youlift weights.
That's a stressor.
Anytime you move your bodyoutside the gym, it's a stressor
to an extent.
Walking is not really astressor.

(24:10):
Running is extremely stressfuland other forms of cardio that
don't involve what's called theeccentric part of the motion,
which is the downward part ofthe motion where you're loading
against gravity.
So, for example, biking doesnot involve eccentric loading
against gravity.
Running does.
Every time you slam the ground,you're absorbing the gravity
right.

(24:30):
So running can cause some microtearing, it causes
recoverability issues whenpeople do too much of it, it
raises cortisol and it tellsyour body you need to adapt for
endurance rather than anabolicstrength, whereas walking
low-grade walking you can walktill the cows come home and it's
great for recovery.
So I like lifting, I likewalking, any other cardio.

(24:52):
You either do it because youenjoy it like a sport.
You know if you're into jujitsuor pickleball, or you know
surfing whatever javelin spiritI don't know.
Or, um, if you want to like, docardio.
I'm a big fan of sprinting.
Now, josh, um, I talked to BradKearns.
He is a uh coauthor with MarkSisson of a book just came out

(25:14):
called born to walk, and theargument there, which is pretty
well supported by now, is that,um, we're not born to run, like
someone claimed.
We are born to walk.
We humans can walk.
I just spoke to a guy thathiked like halfway through
Connecticut and hiked like 50miles in one day.
You know, no big deal.
Good luck trying to run a lotwithout breaking down and

(25:36):
getting injured, which is oftenwhat happens.
So sprinting, though, isanabolic.
It is short, it is a highlocalized stress, acute stressor
, but it's not a chronicstressor and it's very
recoverable.
So I do have a whole sprintingprotocol I use now with clients.
So that's your answer isbasically lifting, walking and a
little sprinting or fun cardio.

Speaker 2 (25:57):
And when you're kind of designing a program or
helping someone out, what kindof things are you considering?
When you're giving them, say, asprinting protocol, or when
you're saying, do this specificexercise or this kind of diet,
what kind of things are youthinking about?

Speaker 1 (26:14):
before we even get to any of that, I want to
understand where the person'scoming from, what their history
is, um, what equipment they have, what their lifestyle looks
like, their job, how many daysper week they have to train,
right, it's like all the thingsthat make you you and that you
know better than me.
So, um, before we, before weget into the weeds, right,
there's beginners, there'sintermediate, there's advanced

(26:35):
trainees.
You know, there's some of my,some of my clients come in,
having lifted for 20 years.
They know how to train, theyneed maybe a little bit of
guidance there, but they want tolose belly, belly fat, right,
they've gained excess fat, um,others, maybe they never lifted
properly in their life and theyneed real basic guidance, they
need form checks, they need abeginner program, et cetera.
So it's very hard to answer thatquestion other than to say, in
generalities, the principles areis it recoverable?

(26:57):
Does it fit within your life?
Does it meet the principles ofof basic strength training and
diet, kind of like we talkedabout earlier?
Um, and then, are you doing itconsistently?
Because, man, josh, that's theyou, even if you have the most
basic program, doing itconsistently is going to give
you massive results, but notdoing any program inconsistently

(27:19):
is not going to give youresults, right, feel me so.
So I don't want to complicateanything.
So, um, that's what it startsfrom.
It's like an intake,understanding the client, their
equipment, blah, blah, blah, andthen, um, putting together a
plan.
Now, the first two months of afitness kind of transformation,
if you will, should not betrying to lose weight or even
gain weight.

(27:39):
It should be trying to findyour true maintenance calories
and your peak level of energyfor where you are right now and
getting all of those habitsdialed in based on habit.
Uh, habit, what am I trying tosay?
Uh, habit principles, likeJames Clear, you know.
Um, and then also dealing withany psychological issues, cause
if you're not ready, you're notready to fat loss.

(28:00):
If you have emotional issueswith food, you know.
Or if you binge, or if youdon't know how to plan, meal
plan, meal prep and all of thosethings, there's a whole bunch
of skills that you have todevelop.

Speaker 2 (28:08):
That's a really important.
I never really thought aboutthat.
Approaching it from apsychological perspective first,
because I mean you know there'sso much of weight loss or gain
isn't really to do with what youdo in the gym, like it's so
much about your diet.
Maybe you could talk on thatjust for a minute, like how, how
much of it is your dietcompared to what you do in the

(28:30):
gym or how many steps you'rewalking.

Speaker 1 (28:32):
I thought you.
So it's funny.
I thought you were going to sayit's so much about your mindset
, but now I see where you'regoing.
Now I see where you're going isthe because, the psychology of
the food side of the equation asit's such a massive sabotaging
your, your fitness, yeah, yeah.
Um, I mean, I guess I'm going tochallenge that a little bit,
just to say that the psychologyis everywhere, like it's

(28:52):
individualized, right, like evenwith the training, um, and it's
all tied together.
So I have a.
I have a client just signed ona couple of weeks ago.
He's extremely shredded, likecoming to me he's very shredded,
did it on his own.
He eats very what's what peoplewould call clean.
Right, he eats very clean.
He also is afraid of gaining anounce of weight.
Okay, and he's, he's, I mean,he's like 6% body fat, all right

(29:16):
.
If you saw a picture of himyou'd say, yeah, you could
probably get him ready for abodybuilding show pretty quickly
.
You know what I mean.
And yet I can tell he has a lotof fear, anxiety, uncertainty
about all of this food andtraining, um, even though he's
done a lot of it what you wouldthink is successfully he feels
it's not sustainable and hefeels like it's like he couldn't

(29:38):
keep living that way.
And you see this a lot.
You see disorders, disorderedeating, you see orthorexia,
which is the obsession withclean eating, you know.
And so with him, my goal hasbeen to take his attention away
from scale weight and towardflexibility.
Right and to me.
That's how I help him get, getto a place where he realizes he

(29:58):
can do things he used to beafraid of and they don't cause
the sky to fall like he has toprove it to himself through
doing it, getting the dataadjusting.
Doing it, getting the dataadjusting.
And he happens to be the typethat needs to ask me 10
questions a day and I'm coolwith it.
I say that a little jokingly,but he to ask me 10 questions a
day and I'm cool with it.
I say that a little jokingly,but he'll send me 10 questions a
day and I, patiently.
You know, the more questions hesends, the longer I wait to
respond.
That's my way of putting inboundaries, but I still.

(30:21):
I love it because he's learninga lot.
He's like, yeah, I want tolearn 10 to 12 things from.
He'll send me things like man,I see the scale weight going up.
Are you sure we're doing theright thing?
Are we at the right calorielevel?
And I'm like all right, let'slook at the logic Scale.
Weight is driven by a number offactors the glycogen in your

(30:43):
muscle and liver, your fluidintake, your body fat change.
You would have to over consumeby 3,500 calories to gain a
pound of fat.
So if, in a week, your scaleweight went up by three pounds,
you either overconsumed.
By what is that?
Over 10,000 calories for theweek, even though we're keeping
you at a very reasonable calorielevel.
It's probably lower than youneed right now, based on his

(31:06):
data.
Or guess what?
It's the creatine.
You're taking the testosteronereplacement.
You just started the fact thatyou're training the right way,
with more recovery.
Instead of going to the gymseven days a week, we're only
doing four days a week.
See to your thing about volume,okay, and you're eating more
carbs than ever before.
Like that was one of his fearsis he wanted to work with me so

(31:26):
that he can learn to eat carbsagain.
So I said, look, all of that isfluid.
It's fluid, it's glycogen, it'sinflammation, it's all the
things from what's going on.
I guarantee you that in a fewweeks we're going to see that
you really burn 3000 calories aday and you've been actually
under eating this whole time andeverything's going to stabilize
and you're going to feel andlook great.
And he already is telling mehow like he's been going to the

(31:47):
gym, having his banana beforehis workout, which he never used
to do and he's like feelingstronger and getting more reps.
You know what I mean.
So yeah, psychology is massiveand diet, training, body image
it's all important.

Speaker 2 (31:59):
I'm glad you brought up that example actually,
because you know, rightfully so,people very much want to
support the one side of thepeople trying to lose weight and
and you know it is really toughand I'm in no way saying it's
not, but as someone who Iwouldn't say I've struggled with
my body image but it's, it'ssomething that takes up a lot of

(32:20):
my mental capacity, is how I'mlooking, and not in an
egotistical way at all, I'm notlooking in the mirror and going,
oh, I could work on my deltoida little bit more and try and
puff that up.
But you know, like I think, assomeone who's been in sports
their whole life and has been tothe gym pretty consistently,
it's sometimes it is there is alot of pressure to look good on

(32:40):
yourself and I'm glad youbrought up the example on that
end where someone who does, bymost people's measure, look good
and and they should feel goodabout themselves and and they
also, um have their owndifficulties when it comes to
body image and diet and whatnot.
Um, on a personal questionactually, does creatine cause I

(33:00):
mean I know it causes more waterretention?
Does that mean that you'regonna weigh more?
Because I weighed myselfyesterday and it was upsetting
because I was like, oh my god,I'm weighing so much, but I've
also just finished my loadingphase of creatine, so I'm
thinking maybe that's part of it100%.

Speaker 1 (33:17):
Probably two to five pounds for most people.
They're going to have a scaleweight bump and that's all fluid
being held in the muscles,glycogen in the muscles.
It's all goodness.
That's the again I was tellingmy client that I'm like this is
all good, you want this If yourespond to it.

(33:37):
You want it Even if you don'trespond to it, which 20% of
people don't.
There are studies now that showcognitive benefits of taking
creatine, especially if you takeexcess to like 15 grams a day
or even 20 grams a day.
I'm pretty sure within a fewyears we're going to see more
and more recommendations foreveryone to take creatine.
But yes, you will gain two tofive pounds.
It will stabilize.
Your body will adapt to thewater.
You might retain a little lesswater.
It might be even a little droponce that happens and then

(33:57):
you're stable.

Speaker 2 (33:59):
Okay, great, that makes me feel better because I
stepped on the scales.
Oh God, where's that come from?
I thought I was losing weight,but, you know, I really
appreciate your approach to it.
I think, especially in thiskind of podcasting world that
we're living in, even not justin relation to health and
fitness, but in so many thingslike productivity and business

(34:21):
growth and everything people areforgetting that they should
just try things, you know, theyshould just experiment with
things.
I think that they're hearingall these people that you know
probably do have a lot ofknowledge and scientific
background and whatnot you havean engineering background and
they're taking it as gospel andforgetting the fact that
something that works for oneperson may not work for the

(34:43):
other person.
And I think my kind of generalapproach to things now, not just
health and fitness is more ismore just, for example, with
money, I'm trying to save moneyand save for the future and not
invest, but invest in myself andthat kind of thing.
And instead of worrying aboutthe finer things and investing

(35:03):
in this stock and this stock andhaving this ratio of savings to
spendings and stuff, I'm justadopting a mentality that it's
like just try and save.
You know, do what you can andjust bear that in mind when
you're making decisions andeverything and I think that kind
of you know applies to healthand fitness as well it's keep
your goal in the back of yourmind when you're making

(35:25):
decisions, saying, okay, if Iwant to lose weight, should I do
this.
Or actually is it better if Ido this and not worrying too
much about the kind of finerdetails, if that makes any sense
.
Sorry, I went on a little bitof a tangent there no, it makes.

Speaker 1 (35:39):
It makes a ton of sense.
It's like the, the paretoprinciple right 20 of the effort
will produce 80 of the results.
You know the golden ratio wehave all these like analogies
for that which is don't try tochange too many variables at
once, don't get caught in the 1%.
Focus on the 80% down here,which for most people is going
to be something like they're nottraining at all and they're not

(36:01):
doing it consistently andhonestly.
I would put that before diet,because I think you kind of
asked that earlier.
I never quite answered it, butI would almost put strength
training consistently beforequote unquote fixing your diet
only because it's an excellentcatalyst for a fitness oriented
lifestyle where the diet thenfollows and supports it.
But anyway, um the the thingwith trying stuff out is then

(36:25):
you run into more psychologicalavatars, right.
So there's the avatar where ofimpatience, and that's very
common.
I'm a perfectionist myself.
I get impatient about certainthings and you are not going to
get a result in one instance oftrying something.
Almost that that's a universalrule, like I mean again, james
Clear and Atomic Habits talkedabout, I think, 21 days to

(36:48):
establish a habit.
You know um the compoundingeffect.
I mean, we do podcasts and Iknow you're getting started and
you're being consistent.
It's going to pay off.
I started four years ago.
My first year, I had like maybe10 episodes downloads an
episode for the first year, youknow and then it started to take
off, like the, you know,exponentially.
And when it comes to tryingthings out, let's say here's an

(37:11):
example Someone reached out tome with a very long message.
She joined my Facebook group.
She says I've been listening toyour podcast and I'm just
struggling and she gave me thisvery long message.
Now, if you know anything aboutmarketing, a long message is a
hot lead right.
Like that's a hot lead.
That's somebody who you know isalready trusting what you're
saying, because they're seekinghelp and you want to help them
but you don't.
You can't like give them alltheir coaching in one day and

(37:32):
nor do you want to.
That can be really dangerousbecause they're going to be all
overwhelmed, like where do I gofrom here?
Um, but she said, look, I triedthis, this and this, cause I
heard you suggested before, butand then it was some excuse
about like I got frustrated so Ideleted the app.
I got frustrated so I stoppedthe next day.
And that immediately goes to myhead of the avatar of the
impatient person.

(37:53):
I'm like, okay, so you kind ofknow what to do, and you even
started, but you just didn'tcontinue, and so that was an
easy thing for me to guide herand say, okay, I think you want
to go back and do that, uh, andand stick with it and get back
to me in three weeks, you know,and if you need guidance, I'm
here for you, et cetera.
So there's the, the impatientavatar, who just doesn't give it
long enough time.

(38:14):
Then there's the person whochanges too much at once, right,
or tries to do too much at oncewhere you're.
I'm going to start a new diet.
I'm going to start training.
I'm going to change my stepcount, I'm going to change when
I go to sleep, I'm going to, youknow, do meditation practice.
And then it all falls awaybecause it's unsustainable,
right?
And I could go on.
There's other.
I'm literally pulling these outof my ass right now.
Josh, I don't have any avatarframework, but these are

(38:37):
legitimate.

Speaker 2 (38:38):
Oh, you tricked me.
I was thinking, oh, this guyknows what he's talking about.

Speaker 1 (38:44):
No, but they are.
They are Because I, because Isee it every day, you know I
talk, I talk to it every day, Ido episodes on it.
Seriously, people just strugglein their own way, whether it's
perfectionism, impatience, whathave you.
But, like you said, just keepit simple.
Pick one thing, spend some timewith it, gather the data and
you got to know what data to getright, what you can't manage,

(39:04):
what you don't measure, etcetera and then feed it back and
say, okay, the data tells methis.
Therefore it worked, or didn'tyou know?

Speaker 2 (39:10):
it's funny you say that I I'm someone who sometimes
falls into that category oftrying to change everything at
once.
I'll wake up one morning andI'll go.
You know what?
This is it.
I'm changing my life, I'm mysleep schedule is being so, I'm
taking ice baths every day, um,and sometimes, you know it, it
does work sometimes.
I just moved to New Zealand and,um, you know, I was in

(39:32):
australia beforehand and my dietand my fitness was kind of
slipping.
And I got here and I was like,okay, fresh start mentally,
physically, I'm gonna, I'm gonnachange a lot and my habits have
been better and my diet hasbeen better.
But I think that's maybebecause I've done it before, so
it's a bit easier to kind offall back into it, um, if that
makes sense.
But it brings up the idea of,you know, like new year's

(39:54):
resolutions, where some randomturn of the world, people decide
that everything's going tochange and they're going to
become a better person, whateverthat means, or they're going to
fix their diet and they'regoing to do all these things and
it's like, okay, well, giveyourself some leeway.
You know, and the way I'vepersonally tried to kind of

(40:16):
rearrange my goals is step bystep and being honest with
myself, you know like, forexample, I wanted to get better
at using my phone.
I for a while I got a littlebit hooked on it.
I wasn't super bad, but I justwanted to get better and
initially I was like maybe Ishould just stop using it.
And then I took I kind of tooka step back and I was like
that's just not realistic, youknow.

(40:36):
So I just made a list of timesI could and couldn't use it,
like can't use it on the toilet.
That was like the the first one, that was the first step to
reducing my phone time, and didthat for like a week.
And then I added another timeand then another time, and that
was how I was able to kind ofget more control over my phone
use.
So how do you help your clientsset goals in a in a kind of

(40:57):
realistic way that they'reactually going to be able to
follow?

Speaker 1 (41:01):
Goals are.
Goals are important, uh, in anumber of ways that come to mind
.
So what you kind of alluded tothere was realistic expectations
.
Right, people will have somethought that they could
accomplish a certain amount in acertain time and then, when
they fail to, that's where thefeedback loop is broken and
you're discouraged, right, andthen you maybe don't want to try
it again.
But you can instead map it outfrom today going forward,

(41:25):
meaning if your goal is to losefat, don't think about losing
all the fat, think aboutoptimize, optimizing the process
for that.
But then that focuses you hereand now, on that process, right?
And is what does the processget you in terms of
psychological wins on a microbasis, on a hourly, week, daily,
weekly, whatever makes sense,which, like going to the gym and

(41:46):
having done your workout, canbe a huge win for people just
doing it Right.
And I might have a client wherethey're just so inconsistent I
said I just want you to go intothe gym, try the workout and
tell me that you went right.
For others it might be no, I'mgoing to actually hit my numbers
and you know there's some moreadvanced goal that they have.
So goals will evolve over timeMost of my clients, when we

(42:11):
start, if on the training side,it's going to be something like
we're going to focus on strengthand just the micro wins in the
gym, they're going to come fastand furious and then we're going
to learn so much from thatprocess and what we have to do
that you're going to be not eventhinking about anything else,
which is great, because that'skind of, as humans, how we like
to be.
We like to feel like we'remaking progress.
Diet gets a little harder,right, because, yes, we can

(42:34):
track our food log, our foodplan prep and so on, but the
change takes time, right, thechange takes longer.
So that's where we have tofocus on the other wins that are
like the non-scale wins in theshort term.
That's what I would tell peopleis like find all the things
that you know will change everyday.
That gives you a check in thebox for you, like, whatever your

(42:55):
level of OCD is around habitstreaking, you know get it down
to that level and then, when youset up, when you've done that
for a few months and now you'reready to go after something more
aggressive, and that's wheresomething like a fat loss goal
or muscle building goal comes inafter maybe six to eight weeks.
Then you go more aggressive.
And this then ties to the thingyou talked about, where New

(43:16):
Year's resolutions people try to.
They want to solve everythingbecause it's the new year.
I love seasons, I love holidays.
I love seasons, I love umholidays.
I love these points in timelike new year's that push you.
I love those.
Actually, you can takeadvantage of them, take
ownership of them.
But then you've got to be superrealistic.
So when it comes to fat loss, Isay not how much you want to
lose, but how fast can you gowhere it still feels sustainable

(43:38):
and it's not that hard?
And you can make tons and tonsof mistakes along the way, like
very conservative, and then dothe math where does that get you
?
That's that's what's.
That's what you're going to do.
Like you want to lose 20 poundsbut in reality you're going to
lose seven over the next fourmonths.
But you're going to do it andyou're going to do it
successfully and at the end ofit you're going to say, wow,
that actually wasn't so hard andI still got to have my ice

(44:00):
cream and pizza on the weekendand I still got to go out to eat
and do all the things I love,whereas every time I did it in
the past, I tried to lose 20pounds and I either crash,
dieted my weight at 20 pounds,suffering and miserable along
the way, binged it all back,wasn't training and I actually
am fatter than I was before interms of body fat percentage, or
um, I had fits and starts alongthe way and I never even lost

(44:23):
anything Right had fits andstarts along the way and I never
even lost anything, right?

Speaker 2 (44:27):
these sound familiar, josh.
Yeah, for sure, I really likeum.
I like again that you mentionedthat some the the idea of
seasons right.
I've been thinking about this alot where people talk about
balance and sustainability, andrightfully so.
If someone's uh, a very extremeend of health and fitness and
they need to move to the middle,perhaps it's going to take a
longer period of time.
So sustainability is important.
But for someone perhaps thathas more specific goals, they

(44:53):
can go through a season whereit's not sustainable.
I remember when I was so I wenttraveling to Mexico.
When I was there, it was aboutthree months I lost so much,
much weight, like you could seethe kind of bones, my cheekbones
, coming through.
And I got home and I was like,okay, I went down to the weight
I was when I was 17 at the timeI was 23, I think, so you know

(45:14):
it's a pretty significant weightloss and I was like, okay, for
these next few months I'm justgonna ham out the protein, like
a ridiculous amount of proteinevery day.
I was hitting the gym, workingreally hard and it was not
sustainable, but for those threemonths I managed to put on 10
kilogram mostly of muscle andget back to a more healthy
weight.
So in my head that was theseason for that, if that makes

(45:36):
sense.
And it wasn't balanced and itwasn't something I'd want to do
for a long period of time, butit got me to where my goal was
and then I was able to kind oftake a step back and and kind of
relax a little bit in the wholeprocess.

Speaker 1 (45:49):
Yeah, what you're saying.
That's genius actually, becausethat's the essence of
periodization, which is a commontechnique in both training and
nutrition, and for most peoplethey don't have to worry about
it.
With training, Don't talk,don't even look at block
periodization or anything likethat until you've just basic
lifting program for like sixmonths to a year.
But with nutrition it makes alot of sense again, which is why

(46:11):
and I don't always communicateit clearly, but it's why I have
this kind of um, pre-diet orpriming, you know, stabilization
phase first, followed by themore aggressive and when I say
aggressive I just mean you'regoing after it.
The aggressiveness depends onyou.
Like you said, how can't, howextreme can you go?
Where you can get through it?
And it feels like you'velearned something and you've,

(46:31):
you've applied skills in a waythat allows you to come out of
it sustainably, because they'reright and wrong way to do the
extreme Right.
Um, because if you make yourbody worse off by crash dieting
and losing a ton of muscle,that's not going to do you any
favors just because you lostscale weight right and then,
coming out of that, it's okay.
How do we maintain our results?
Because that's where 95% ofpeople fail, Like.

(46:53):
That's not a made-up number,it's 95% after five years of
people who lose weight gain itall back.

Speaker 2 (46:58):
Wow, 95.

Speaker 1 (47:00):
Yeah, it's massive.
It's 90 to 95.
So 95 sounds better, but yes,it's 95%.
Speaking of, you know marketingand truth telling, but, um,
yeah, so coming out of it isreally important.
But the coming out of it isoften a function of the part
where you lost the weight andyou didn't do it the right way,
that's, if you do it the rightway, coming out of is actually

(47:21):
quite, quite straightforward.
Um, but it's funny youmentioned extremes, because
right now, like in my groupprogram now, we do challenges
every month.
The current challenge is rapidfat loss, and rapid fat loss is
something like I almost make yousign a contract because there's
so many caveats before someonedoes rapid fat loss.
Rapid fat loss is effectivelytwo weeks with four days in a

(47:41):
very aggressive like half thecalories you need diet, followed
by a refeed where you eat a tonof carbs and come up to your
maintenance.
You do that again, anotherrefeed and then one more time.
So it's 14 days with 12 days ofextremely aggressive dieting
and if you do it right, you'regoing to probably lose between
three and seven pounds of bodyfat in two weeks.

(48:02):
And so people hear that.
If I just said that and Istopped people listening to your
show they're like, oh, let meget.
Let me get that program rightnow.
But there's all these caveats.
You've been liftingconsistently.
You haven't been dieting.
You know how to track your food.
You've been sufficiently eatingenough protein for for a while.
Like, there's all these caveatsbefore you do that.
But aggressiveness can beincorporated at times with the

(48:23):
seasons.
I totally agree.

Speaker 2 (48:29):
Yeah, I think one of the reasons I was able to do it
is because I do have experiencein, you know, like tracking
calories and going to the gymand everything.
I definitely would not recommendthat to someone who was new to
the process, because it wasn'tthat fun.
I mean, in a way it was becauseI got to eat a lot.
But also, mentally, you know,you're're really hyper focused
on this one goal and it's it'snot, as I said, it's not
sustainable, um, but I thinksomething important for people

(48:51):
to know that when they're goingon a diet or when they're
starting, and you don't have to,it's not, it doesn't have to be
forever.
Of course, if you have a goal,you don't want to be part of the
95 90 percent that put theweight back on and everything.
But like, for example, if youare adopting a more aggressive
approach, as you said, itdoesn't have to be forever, but
as long as you have an exit plan.

(49:11):
I knew that when I got to acertain weight well, actually,
it was when I hit a certainweight on the bench that I was
like okay, when I get there I'llkind of taper it off a little
bit, but as long as you have anexit plan and a way to make it
sustainable after a certain timeperiod.

Speaker 1 (49:27):
Um, I think that's really important, you know yeah,
I'm gonna aggressively agreewith that, in that the duration
is inversely proportional to theaggressiveness.
So the more aggressive you aregoing to be, the shorter it has
to be.
And I mean has to be, becausethe human mind is susceptible to
fatigue, emotional fatigue,physiological fatigue too.

(49:52):
I mean we can talk aboutadaptation and all that, but
even if you white knuckle itthrough that, like bodybuilders
do, right, when they're preppingfor a contest season, the
emotional fatigue just keepsclimbing and the more aggressive
you go, the more it's going tobe, and it's tied to your
physiology.
So that's the irony of thewhole thing it's psychological
and it's physiological and itplays off each other, meaning

(50:12):
your body is becoming more andmore resource deprived and is
screaming to eat food and to getback to a better state of
health and homeostasis, and atthe same time, you're mentally
playing all these games to avoideating food and have more fiber
and have more vegetables and doall these tricks for hunger,
and you know, you know what I'msaying.
Like all those things, can yoube more success?

(50:34):
So you're more successful ifyou keep it short, or at least
keep it short and break it upwith breaks.
You know diet breaks.
Take diet breaks for two weeksa month, two months, four months
, whatever.
If you have to lose a hundredpounds, you're probably not
going to do it straight.
You know as one straight shotyou're going to go in two, three
, four phases.
Now if you have some extrasupport whether that's an

(50:56):
accountability, partner training, partner, coach, you know
community, something like that,looking over your shoulder it's
a different game, because nowyour emotional stress can be
shared by someone else is theway I'd put it.
Like I look at my number onejob as a coach is to be a vessel
for your emotional stress.
Honestly, like that's part ofwhat I do, um, and my

(51:16):
personality lends itself to that, because I personally don't
stress out too much, I'm kind ofchill, and so you can freak out
on me and it's fine, I'lllisten.
And that's helpful when youhave a coach, because then it's
like you're going to freak outat some point.
And the other thing, josh, is iflife isn't smooth, sailing,
right, like you're going to haveall sorts of unexpected things

(51:37):
come up, especially when you'reolder or you have a family.
You know, the older you get,the more people have illnesses
and injuries and life stuff thatcomes up and just all sorts of
problems, financial things, youname it your job, your house,
the economy, everything goes andthose are going to interrupt
your life and that's okay.
What's your plan?
To adapt around those and beresilient to those, not try to

(51:59):
white knuckle and be perfect andstick to your plan all the time
.

Speaker 2 (52:02):
Yeah, I was thinking about that while you were
talking.
I've had personal trainers thatI've known help me out with a
few things or write a plan forme at a specific time, but I've
never had it over a long periodof time.
What do you think your role isas a personal trainer?
After the stages of settinggoals and writing a program and
showing them kind of how to doeverything, what do you do after

(52:26):
that point?

Speaker 1 (52:27):
Eventually I want you to fire me, like I'm totally
honest about that, like I'm anutrition coach, just to be a
dick about it.
Like a nutrition coach asopposed to a personal trainer,
that's all.
There's a subtle difference,subtle difference.
But I'm proud of my ability tohelp people with their training
and their form and technique andI will write programs, but

(52:48):
oftentimes I will recommendexisting templates that I have
programs or even third-partyprograms, because I don't think
any of that's as important asdoing the thing and getting it
adjusted for you and havingproper technique and progression
.
So I think the plan is step one.
Plans go out the window by daytwo, meaning the data is going
to become the plan.

(53:08):
The data of you is going tobecome the plan.
So my job as a coach is to say,all right, you're doing all the
things.
I also want you to measure allthe things and I want to see all
of that data as we go.
And I'm going to be availablefor not only reaction meaning
you can reach out as problemscome up but also proact.
You know only reaction meaningyou can reach out as problems
come up, but also proact.
You know proaction.
That's not a word.

(53:28):
Is it being proactive in that,um, let's say, every two weeks
is the cadence.
You know every coach worksdifferently.
I might have a two week uhcheck-in cadence where you're
going to send me your food data,your expenditure, calculation
of your metabolism, like allthis stuff that we collect, your
step count, your biometrics, uhmeasurements, your photos, um,
a whole bunch of things,sometimes hormone panels and
blood work too and I will thenlook at it all, do a screen

(53:55):
share, analyze it and say, okay,here's the two things you need
to work on this week, or threethings, right, not not 20 things
.
Here's one or two or threethings to work on based on
everything I just said, saw.
But I also want to educate you.
I want you to get like anutrition certification level
education by the time we're doneworking together.
If you're open to that, if youdon't care, if you just want me
to tell you what to do which Ihave clients like that as well
Fine, um, I think you'll getmore out of it if you try to

(54:16):
learn why, so that you can fireme and do it yourself.
But hey, if you want to workwith me for three years or
forever, that's fine too.
I'll, I'll, I'll take yourmoney and you'll still be good
better off for it.

Speaker 2 (54:26):
Yeah, that's a yeah.
I guess not everyone wants toknow 10 new things a week, um
right.

Speaker 1 (54:32):
Exactly.

Speaker 2 (54:33):
Um, so you do a lot of your work with, um, I almost
said older people, but I didn'tmean that old, I meant 40 plus,
but I don't want to call callpeople old or anything 40 plus,
but I don't want to call peopleold or anything.
What's the difference whenyou're working with someone who
is older compared to a youngerperson?

Speaker 1 (54:52):
Recoverability is the big one, and that's because of
age, because of how you've livedyour life and also because of
the circumstances of being older.
So what I mean is most peoplehaven't been living a very
healthy lifestyle, let's behonest.
And so it starts to catch upwith you metabolically, you know
, with your, with yourmetabolism, with your hormones,
uh.

(55:12):
But also you've lost somemuscle mass and you've probably
got, you know, other littleniggling issues, maybe with your
joints or something like that.
Depending on the age If we'retalking forties versus seventies
there's, you know, it gets moreexacerbated with age, um, and
that's going to cause, give yousome constraints that you just
have to work around.
The principles are going to bethe same, josh, no matter what
age you are, the principles arethe same.
You know, get stimulus, youadapt, you manage recovery and

(55:36):
energy balance and protein.
I mean, it all is the same.
But you may need more restperiod between your training
sessions.
You may need more food believeit or not, or more carbs.
You know women,peri-postmenopause, tend to need
more carbs, despite the adviceout there of, like low carb
dieting for, you know,postmenopausal women.
That really drives me crazybecause I think a lot of women

(55:58):
are being done a disservice.
So recovery ability is one, thelife circumstances are another.
The older you get, the more youhave obligations, you know.
Your job gets more stressful.
You have more family.
You might be a parent, spouseall of that you know.
Your parents might be facinghealth issues.
You know, I'm seeing that nowin my forties, both of my wife
and my parents with their issues.

(56:19):
Um, and now I can see how thatbecomes.
I hate to say it this way, butit becomes a burden for their
kids, right?
Because now, if you're in yourforties and fifties and you have
parents in your seventies oreighties, you're going to spend
more time helping them out.
That then affects your healthand your life, right?
Um, and and so we?
That's the general sense of it.
I'm trying to think if there'ssomething else the only other

(56:40):
thing I can think of is hormones, right, hormones.
Testosterone drops, you know,for women, estrogen progesterone
starts to drop.
But hormones aren't necessarilythe root cause of all your
issues.
So that's important tounderstand, because that a lot
of gurus sell their programsbased on the fear of, you know,
hormones being the cause ofeverything.

(57:01):
We need to fix your hormones,we need to balance your hormones
, hormone correcting diet, blah,blah, blah.
I'm a big fan of hormonereplacement therapy, don't get
me wrong there.
If you need that, that's great,but a lot of times the the lack
of training and propernutrition is causing many of the
hormone issues.
So it's not, it'sbi-directional.
Is what I'm saying?
So long story short.
Guess what?
If you train, eat your protein,sleep and manage recovery,

(57:31):
you're going to be successfuland you could build muscle and
metabolic health well into your80s and 90s.
I mean, you could be justthriving to the end of your life
, have a great health span.
That's really what we're goingfor.

Speaker 2 (57:37):
Yeah, well, I think there's been a weird shift in
the health and fitness.
I mean.
I haven't been around that longbut, speaking to my dad, for
example, he was and still is avery fit individual, like he did
, I think, 13 ironmans.
He's done a bunch of triathlons.
He's now like representing uh,great britain in like, uh, aqua

(57:58):
bike because his knees ruined,um, but he, his mentality was
just train, train, train, train,train, train until you can't
stop training and then your,your body will adapt.
And I've tried to speak to himabout doing kind of resistance
training and and because hisknees, as I said, he's his
joints are just absolute fromyears and years of running and

(58:19):
cycling and well, I suppose,more the running than the
cycling, um, for someone who isgetting on and they want to work
on their health and theirfitness, why is it so important
that strength or resistancetraining is included in their
routine?
Why isn't it just going outlosing a bit of weight and kind
of just trying to eat healthierand whatnot?

(58:41):
Why is resistance training soimportant?

Speaker 1 (58:43):
Because muscle is your retirement plan.
It's muscle and money, thoseare the two parts of your
retirement plan.
I can't stress enough howstrength and then muscle and
there's a huge corollary betweenthe two will protect you
against just about anything thatills older individuals today,

(59:07):
that we can think of Everymetabolic disease.
You know type 2 diabetes, heartdisease, right, the biggest
killer of heart disease, whichultimately is just a disease of
obesity.
When you step back, you knowone chain in the cause and
effect Joint health, right, achyjoints, fragility from lack of
bone density and lack of musclessupporting those bones.

(59:29):
All of that's going to paydividends and because we know
you can add to your strength andmuscle at any age and the body
will respond hormonally to do so, you will literally avoid the
burden that we talked about onyour kids and on your family and
you'll be able to do far morethan just get off the toilet,
which is honestly an aspirationof many people who can't even do

(59:50):
that Right, which is sad, Imean there's, there's.
I mean, nursing homes are a hugeindustry and that makes me very
sad because I've been in anumber of them over the years
for different people close to meand in my head.
You know you can't help buthave a little judgment now that
I know what I know of if only,right, if only they had been a

(01:00:10):
little more active.
And resistance training, andthat's the thing you're kind of
getting at, is like you can'tjust be active, you can't just
walk.
Every time I hear, well, atleast they're active, at least
they're moving, I'm like, yeah,compared to what?
Like compared to nothing, sure,and sitting in a bed, sure, and
sitting in a bed, but it's likesedentary, active.
And then strength training isway over here on the spectrum in
terms of functional andmetabolic capability for the

(01:00:30):
rest of your life.
So I know I'm not getting intoa lot of like the details on
physiology and science.
We can go there, but you got todo it Like it's essential.

Speaker 2 (01:00:38):
Aside from just you know, your regular strength
training and everything, isthere much you can be doing as a
younger person to kind ofprepare for those changes that
come about in your body when youget older.

Speaker 1 (01:00:49):
I mean just do, just do it.
I mean so okay, are you askingabout longevity in that, like,
if you start young and do this,you don't want to do it in a way
that injures yourself or likecauses issues down the road.
Is that what you're thinking?

Speaker 2 (01:01:05):
Yeah, um, like my dad , he trained his whole life, but
he's still faced with theseissues with his knees and
everything, because he didn't docertain protocols, he didn't
work on his flexibility,strength training, that kind of
thing.

Speaker 1 (01:01:14):
Yeah.
So it's a really good book onthe subject, to be honest,
especially if you're younger,because normally younger people
don't buy this book.
It's called the BarbellPrescription by John Sullivan,
and he talks about the sickaging phenotype, and it's
phenotype just means like anexpression of your genes, based
on your lifestyle.
It's like epigenetics.

(01:01:35):
Right, You've lived this way,therefore you've become this.
And if you want to look intothe future, right, kind of like
in Scrooge, right, what is thatChristmas Carol where you know
the guy says here's your future,right, Exactly, If you want to
get really depressed, read it,because he lays out the biology
of the human body, energysystems and how the decline

(01:01:58):
occurs.
And he calls the book thebarbell Prescription because the
prescription is loading yourspine with training and you know
he uses barbells as a tool.
So do I as like the primary,I'll say, most efficient tool
for the job.
But there's other tools.
There's free weights, there'smachines, there's even body
weight in bands Loading againstgravity, in some way to tell

(01:02:19):
your body hormonally that itneeds to adapt and become
stronger and bigger.
Body hormonally that it needsto adapt and become stronger and
bigger.
If you ever look at a crosssection of a thigh on an MRI,
MRI or X, no MRI, um, for thesame person, from the time
they're 30 to the time they're60, what you'll see is that the,
the diameter tends to stay thesame, but the muscle mass drops

(01:02:40):
massively toward the bone andthe what's filled in is body fat
.
So you see this like completeflip in the ratio.
Or when you're younger, it'slike kind of half and half.
You know, you see all thismuscle tissue and you see the
little bit of fat on the outside.
And then you see a 65 or 70year old and it's like muscle
tissue fat, right, Just tiny bitof muscle.
And that's what happens.
So now imagine what is thatdoing for your, for everything,

(01:03:03):
for your posture, for yourfragility, for your ability to
just move around.
So if you're young, um, now'sthe time to start and you don't
want to beat yourself up withtoo much cardio, Like you said,
too much running or something itdoes.
Now I don't want to scarepeople away from being an
endurance athlete.
If they want to be a Ironman ortriathlete, awesome.
I would actually read Born toWalk, to be honest, the book I
mentioned earlier.

(01:03:23):
I would read that because thatis written by two guys who are
elite endurance athletes whohave taken the lessons away from
that and what the science says,so that you don't beat up your
body and you do train the rightway.
And when you talk about doingless, not more, I've talked to
some endurance athletes who putin, you know tons of miles every
week.
Athletes who put in, you knowtons of miles every week and

(01:03:46):
most of them today that thereally smart ones that are
training the right way forlongevity will have way less
volume than they used to have,like way fewer miles than they
used to have, and they stillremain competitive.
So if that doesn't tell yousomething, then then then
nothing will.

Speaker 2 (01:03:57):
Well, listen, I, I, I've really loved everything
you're coming at me with um,especially your approach to,
just, in general, just tryingthings and being consistent, um,
being understanding ofeverything you've kind of got
going on in your life and, um, Ithink it's really valuable for
people.
One thing I like to ask, justas a kind of round off question,

(01:04:18):
because when I listen topodcasts I I hear so much value
and so much information and Ijust want to retain it all and I
think sometimes I feel a bitpressured and I'm like, oh God,
what did that person say aboutthis thing and this thing and
this thing?
So I like to ask what is onething, if someone is listening
up to this point, one thing thatthey can take away and think
about and really reflect upon?

(01:04:39):
What would you say to them?

Speaker 1 (01:04:43):
There's so many things right.
Um, well, since we endedtalking about muscle, I would
say you know, building muscleand strength training, going to
the gym, this isn't just a thingfor bros, this isn't just to
look good, this isn't just, youknow, for aesthetics.
This is your most underratedorgan for living a long life,

(01:05:04):
for aging better, for stayingindependent, for staying
independent all the things wejust touched on, and yeah,
everything else we talked aboutis great, but all I want you to
do is figure out when you'regoing to the gym, like if you're
not training right now.
Make it as easy as possible.
Forget the new year'sresolution, forget trying to
lose X number of weight pounds,forget trying to have any
particular program, just like,literally pick where you're

(01:05:24):
going and what day you're goingto start this week and build
from there.

Speaker 2 (01:05:29):
Yeah, great Listen.
Thank you very much and, again,I love what you're doing.
I think you're providing somuch value to people.
Um, and yeah, I think I thinkyou're helping a lot of people
and just want to say thanks forthat.
Uh, thank you for coming on aswell.
Um've really enjoyed it and,yeah, I hope to speak to you
soon.

Speaker 1 (01:05:46):
All right, and that was my conversation with Josh
Taft from the With Passionpodcast.
I hope you found as much valuein that as I did having it.
I absolutely love going onother shows and sharing the
knowledge, and Josh himselfreally does have a gift for
asking the kinds of questionsthat get to the heart of what
matters most when it comes tobuilding that sustainable
approach to health, to fitnessfor the long game.

(01:06:10):
If you enjoy the conversation,check out his show with passion.
The link is in the show notes.
And, speaking of not missinggreat content, make sure you hit
that follow button right now,if you haven't already, because
Monday we're dropping episode344, seven fat loss tips from 70
years of research.
It's going to be packed withevidence-based strategies that

(01:06:32):
have stood the test of time.
I guarantee you're going towalk away with real things that
you can implement immediately.
Until then, keep using yourwits, lifting those weights and
remember, as we discussed today,your approach to fitness should
be sustainable, science-basedand focused on the fundamentals
that move the needle.
Talk to you next time here onthe Wits and Weights Podcast.

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