November 19, 2025 • 44 mins
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--
We compare traditional calorie and macro tracking with a pattern-based approach that uses eating behaviors, biofeedback, and trends to drive fat loss and muscle gain over 40.
What if cutting-edge AI nutrition and physique coaching could analyze your eating patterns, correlate them with your body's response, and provide a high level of awareness without logging every meal?
Learn how Fitness Lab is the #1 (and only) app that can spot correlations across sleep, stress, meals, and training to give precise daily coaching, especially for midlife adults dealing with issues like hormones and recovery.
This approach requires less mental energy so you don’t fall off track, while teaching you how to "level up" your system to get and maintain results for life.
Episode Resources
- Download Fitness Lab AI-powered coaching, 20% off through Black Friday: http://witsandweights.com/app
Timestamps
0:00 - Why tracking calories and macros works (to a point) for fat loss and muscle building
6:45 - Pattern-based nutrition coaching explained
9:50 - The 5 metrics that replace calorie counting for body composition
13:46 - How to track eating behaviors, meal patterns, and biofeedback
18:56 - Building nutritional literacy whether or not you're logging food
22:31 - 4 foundations required for pattern analysis success over 40
25:41 - Protein awareness without counting every gram
29:36 - Daily consistency and minimum viable tracking habits
33:56 - Using feedback vs. hitting calorie targets
37:06 - When to use calorie tracking vs. pattern analysis (or both)
40:41 - How AI makes pattern-based coaching seamless and effortless
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Philip Pape (00:01):
For decades, the gold standard for fat loss and
muscle gain has been trackingcalories and macros.
The research is clear, itworks.
But what if AI coaching couldanalyze your eating patterns,
correlate them with your body'sresponse, and provide similar
awareness and control withoutlogging every meal?
Today I'm breaking down howAI-powered pattern analysis
(00:23):
actually works, why it can bejust as effective as detailed
tracking, and what you need tomake either approach successful
for building muscle and losingfat over 40.
Welcome to Wits and Weights,the show that helps you build a
(00:46):
strong, healthy physique usingevidence, engineering, and
efficiency.
I'm your host, certifiednutrition coach Philip Pape, and
today we're going to examinetwo very different approaches to
the same goal and why one mightbe far more sustainable than
you think, especially since it'skind of a brand new approach.
You probably know I'm a bigadvocate of tracking calories
(01:08):
and macros.
I use MacroFactor myself.
I recommend it to clients andall of you regularly.
The research is absolutelyclear that tracking food intake
works really well for fat lossand muscle gain, for changing
your physique, for gaining someawareness and control over your
food intake and your choices.
(01:28):
And when you track properly,when you weigh your food, when
you log consistently, whenyou're honest about what goes in
and that you track everything,you do get very valuable data.
You know exactly what you'reeating.
You know how much protein, youcan make precise adjustments,
you can troubleshoot theplateaus that might occur along
the way because you have realdata.
(01:48):
And it's been very helpful forme as a coach as well, because I
can see your data and quicklydo an analysis on what might be
happening.
And for lots of people, thisbecomes a simple daily habit.
It's almost automatic.
You, as soon as you prepareyour food, you pull out the food
scale, you weigh it, you log itin your app, right?
Or maybe you use the photo thephoto AI, or maybe you look it
(02:11):
up or use a barcode, whatever.
It takes two minutes.
And most people, their screentime for the day is like three
to five minutes.
Not a lot.
That's not the concern at all.
And so after a few weeks,you've got this routine, it's
not a big deal, and you start toget really good, helpful data.
And so the power of tracking isthe awareness.
I've talked about this a lot.
I'm sticking to that.
(02:31):
That is so, so important.
Because when you have to logsomething, anything, right?
Whether that's your bankaccount, that you may you bought
something at the grocery store,that's awareness.
You bought something online,that's awareness.
And then you become consciousof your choices.
Same thing with the food.
You become conscious ofchoices.
They don't become mindlessanymore, they become mindful.
(02:53):
You see patterns that youwouldn't notice otherwise.
You discover that the healthysalad that you've been eating
has 600 calories of justdressing and nuts, right?
And that's healthy in quotes,right?
You know, we don't use thosethose labels here.
You realize your portions atdinner are 40% larger than you
thought.
You realize that on theweekends you consume three times
(03:15):
as much as you thought becauseyou're going out to restaurants,
drinking alcohol, and all ofthat.
And that's the awareness thatdrives behavior change.
Not because hitting yourcalorie target creates fat loss,
but because seeing your intakehelps you make the decisions to
do that.
And the feedback loop is thenimmediate.
And by the way, we have toclose that feedback loop.
(03:36):
If you're only logging the foodand not doing anything with the
data, well, then it's an openloop.
It's not a closed feedback loopat all, anyway.
That's a different issue.
I'm assuming you are closingthat loop.
So if you eat 2,200 calories aday for a week and your weight
goes up, then you know whathappened, right?
You know that you're eatingprobably more than your body
(04:00):
burns.
If you eat 1800 calories, yourweight trend goes down.
Well, that confirms you're in adeficit, right?
And for people who likestructure, who enjoy data, who
want clear targets to hit, raiseyour hand.
I'm raising mine.
Tracking is fantastic.
It removes guesswork, it buildsconfidence, it works.
That is the premise of today'sepisode.
(04:20):
So if tracking works this well,why would anyone do something
else?
Well, that's the question thatI used to ask.
I said, well, if trackingmacros and calories work so
well, why would you do somethingelse?
Isn't it the best tool for thejob?
I always say macro factor islike the best tool for the job
in the app space, right?
And honestly, for a long time,I thought that tracking in this
(04:41):
exact way was the only seriousapproach for anyone who wanted
results because you're gonnafail without it, right?
But then I started noticingsomething with certain clients
who weren't necessarily trackingthe same way.
I started talking to folks likeDr.
Eric Helms and other physiquecompetitors who have a very
(05:01):
healthy mind state and at thesame time have started to
transition themselves and someclients away from that type of
tracking.
Okay.
And I notice the words I'musing.
We are not gonna eliminatetracking.
If you want to not track atall, have at it.
That's called intuitive eating.
That's called flying by theseat of your pants, that's
called winging it.
I think you're not gonna besuccessful if you do that.
You have to track something,okay?
(05:23):
It's the way that we track thatcould change.
I remember having guests on theshow who very successful
coaches with their clients whodidn't use calorie macro
tracking.
Everything from nutrientapproaches like Sarah
Ballantine, right?
She starts with nutrients toChristina McClerkin was on, and
she talked about tracking otherelements of what you eat other
(05:46):
than calories and macros, butyou're still tracking something.
And I've had several otherguests that I've talked to and
other coaches that have similarsystems.
They're just different, butthey still track.
Now, I always, I always kind ofsaid, okay, that's great, you
do you.
And I'm just gonna stick towhat I think is simple, which is
calories and macros.
But there's there's anotherphenomenon that occurs when
(06:07):
you're tracking, depending onhow you're tracking.
Okay, and I'm not talking aboutdisorders, I'm not talking
about OCD, I'm not talking aboutobsessiveness, none of that.
Okay.
Outside the scope of today, weknow that the research says that
if you didn't have an issuealready before, tracking only
helps.
It only helps you get theresults and maintaining results.
What I do find is that the typeof tracking, right, when
(06:27):
there's a lot of data involved,for example, and you have to
track a lot of things, evensmart, motivated, consistent
people would do this eightweeks, 12 weeks, maybe 16, and
start to get results.
But then a lot of times theyfall off and they stop logging.
And it's not because theyfailed to get the results, it's
not because they lackeddiscipline.
(06:47):
But a lot of times people say,Look, I've got the awareness.
I've built the skill, I'vebuilt the intuition.
I don't need to do thisanymore, do I?
And you've developed someinstincts.
That is true.
You know what your portionslook like.
You can feel when you're in adeficit or maintenance.
You internalize a lot of thepatterns.
A lot of these things do becomeroutine.
(07:08):
Like if you're eating the sameway, you just keep doing that
and you can maintain yourweight.
But they then went one of twopaths.
And again, I'm talking topeople that stopped tracking in
the original way they weretracking, which is a decent
amount of the population herethat I'm referring to.
They either stopped trackingaltogether and then started to
deviate and basically fall offtheir habits because they had no
(07:31):
other system in place toreinforce what they were doing
or to measure or to track.
You had others, however, whosimply supplanted one style of
tracking with another, maybe alooser form of tracking, but
still awareness, still some sortof documentation or journaling
or a light set of numbers, someway that they continue to track.
(07:53):
Do you feel me?
Do you feel what I'm saying?
Okay.
And even when you talk to guyslike Derek, Dr.
Eric Helms, where people gettransition away from tracking,
they're still trackingsomething, or they still have an
awareness of, say, certaintargets.
Like I'm trying to get acertain amount of protein in a
certain number of meals.
And even if it's in their head,it's still a target and it's
still a number, and there'sstill an element of tracking to
(08:13):
it, right?
So, so what does all this mean?
Well, uh, maybe the goal isn'tpermanently tracking in one way.
Maybe the goal is developingthe awareness and the decision
making that skills that trackingteaches, and then be able to
maintain results with somelighter version of tracking or a
(08:36):
different version of trackingif you so choose.
And once I realized that, Isaid, huh, let me explore other
ways people can continue totrack that are maybe a little
bit less time consuming or lessstressful.
I shouldn't say time consumingbecause tracking calories and
macros isn't time consuming, butit does create some weird
scenarios like when you go onvacation or when you're eating
(08:57):
out or when your wife makesdinner for you and she sees you
pulling out your phone everytime to track the food.
It can get a little bit, it cancreate a little bit of
interesting friction or stressin other ways.
Does that make sense?
Do you guys feel me on that?
All right.
And that's what led me toexplore what I call
pattern-based coaching, not as areplacement for tracking, but
as a different path to the samedestination.
(09:18):
Now, we're gonna get into whatpattern-based coaching is.
And I will tell you that if aperson has to do this, either
yourself or a coach doing it foryou, it takes quite a bit of
learning and training to do itthis way up front.
And then once you do it, itit's I'll say a lot more
(09:40):
natural, intuitive approach thatstill involves a form of
analysis and tracking.
All right, fit stick with mehere because this is all gonna
make sense by the time we get tothe end of the episode.
So, what is pattern-basedcoaching or tracking?
Well, instead of tracking thenumbers via a database of food,
you're tracking the eatingbehaviors that lead to your
(10:04):
trends, your patterns, what youchoose to eat, and ultimately
then the nutrients, the macrosand the micros that go into your
body that affect your bodycomposition results.
So, in other words, you're kindof flipping it backward.
Instead of starting fromtargets and trying to fit into
those targets, you're startingfrom what really is the root
cause of your behaviors thatlead to whether you hit those
(10:27):
targets.
Now you could say, well, whydon't you do both?
Yeah, you can absolutely doboth.
In fact, a lot of my coachingwith clients is filling in the
gap of the pattern side.
That's the point of where how Iwas able to kind of figure all
this out over the years, is thatmany of my clients are using
macrofactor, tracking calories,macros, but then I'm coming from
the other end, one-two punch,and trying to figure out these
trends and patterns with themand solve the issue from that
(10:49):
direction.
The calories and macros arejust kind of telling them the
end of the chain for a given dayor a given week or given month
of their choices, but it doesn'ttell them how to solve those
choices or you know, thosebehaviors.
So, in now, so what if yousaid, what if I just take out
those training wheels?
Or what if I just take out thetracking of calories and macros
(11:10):
all together?
How would you use thissuccessfully?
Where it doesn't become wingingit intuitive eating.
The key insight is this yourbody composition outcomes are
determined by your lifestyle andyour patterns.
They're not determined bywhether you strictly hit
calories and macros.
And I say it that way becauseyou might say, wait, wait a
minute, energy balance andgetting enough protein, that's
(11:32):
that's really all you need,right?
In reality, if you hit yourmacros, but you do it in a way
where you're hungry, you'reeating calorie-dense foods or a
lot of processed foods, let'ssay, the meal timing doesn't
work for you, you're trainingfasted and it doesn't feel good,
you don't have enough sleep, etcetera, et cetera, then you're
not gonna get your bodycomposition.
Strictly hitting the caloriesand macros isn't gonna be
(11:53):
enough, is my point.
So I want you to think about adifferent way.
(12:24):
If your body weight trend ismoving down over several weeks,
then you know you're in acalorie deficit and what you're
doing is working.
You actually don't have to knowyour expenditure or your intake
to know you're in a caloriedeficit.
Let me repeat that.
You don't have to know yourexpenditure or your intake to
know you're in a calorie deficitretroactively.
(12:47):
In other words, in hindsight.
So if you go three weeks andyou've lost a pound a week, then
you've averaged a 500 caloriedeficit a day, even if you
didn't know what your intakewas.
Now you might say, okay, that'sgreat, but I still need to know
what to eat to get there.
Stick with me.
If your waste measurement isshrinking and your strength is
going up, that is also datathat's telling you you're doing
(13:10):
something right.
If you're feeling fairlysatisfied from your food and
you're not gaining weight,versus if you're always feeling
hungry and you're not gainingweight, that's your body telling
you something that you need toknow.
And so interestingly, those arestill things being tracked.
And I like to track thosethings anyway, but I'm tying
them into this thought that youmay not have to track calories
(13:33):
and macros.
So stick with me here.
When I talk about a pattern, Idon't, I'm not just talking
about food.
All right, let's break it down.
I'm gonna break it down intofive things.
All right.
The first thing is bodycomposition trends.
If you're tracking your dailyweight and then smooth that into
a trend line, something likeMacro Factor does that.
My new app is gonna do that.
It's a very simple thing.
It's just math, all right?
(13:55):
And that filters out your dailyfluctuations from water, from
food volume, from glycogen, frominflammation.
This trend is real data, right?
It tells you if you're in adeficit, surplus, or maintenance
all by itself, believe it ornot.
Okay, all by itself.
In fact, macro factor uses thatto say, am I in a def, are you
in a deficit or surplus?
Therefore, this is what yourexpenditure is, therefore, this
(14:18):
is how you need to change yourcalories.
But you know what?
If macrofactor didn't tell youwhat your expenditure was, it
can still tell you whether yourcalories should go up or down by
a certain amount because ofwhether you're in a surplus or
deficit versus your goal.
That's really powerful.
I hope you guys understand whatI'm saying.
Okay, these are differentvariables that play together.
(14:41):
If you know you're in a deficitand the deficit's not as big as
you'd like, then you knowyou're not eating in as big a
deficit relative to yourexpenditure as you want, even if
you don't know yourexpenditure.
That's pretty cool.
Okay, stick with me.
The second thing, eatingbehaviors.
Now, this is super powerful.
It's not, it's not what youeat, but how and why you ate it.
(15:03):
Were you physically hungrybefore the meal?
Or was it an emotional hunger,or were you not hungry?
How satisfied did you feelafter?
How confident were you in yourfood choices?
These capture your relationshipwith food.
And you know what?
I've been, I'll say admittedly,inadequate in dealing with
(15:24):
these aspects in my coaching sofar.
Apologies to all my clients outthere.
I I know maybe I'm being hardon myself because I know physic
university has lots of coach, uhlots of modules in the
different courses aboutemotional eating and different
exercises and all that.
I get it.
But I feel like from a trackingperspective, I could do better.
(15:45):
And going forward, I'm goingto.
In fact, that's where this isall leading to.
This is all gonna make sense.
Number three, meal compositionpatterns.
Okay.
Is there protein at most meals?
What does the composition ofyour plate look like?
I think that's reallyimportant.
Now, I didn't used to think itwas as important because I
thought calories and macros.
But no, are you eating mostlywhole foods with some
(16:06):
flexibility for processed foodsin there?
Are each me, is each mealfairly balanced, right?
They don't all have to be, butin general, how different are
your weekends from yourweekdays, your training days
from your off days, et cetera?
Those patterns tell ussomething as well.
You notice what I'm doing,guys.
I'm actually giving you a morecomplex, in a good way, complex
(16:27):
as in nuanced or completepicture of things to track than
just calories and macros thatcan lead to the same outcome and
maybe even more efficiently.
Whoa, mind blowing.
I know it's my it is mindblowing in my opinion, in my
mind.
I hope it is in yours.
Okay.
Number four of the thingsyou're tracking that are not
calories and macros arebiofeedback signals.
(16:49):
So we talk about this a lot onthe show: sleep quality, energy
levels, hunger, cravings,digestion, recovery from
training, stress.
These tell you if your approachis sustainable for you right
now in your life.
Okay, not only is itsustainable, but like the cause
and effect of different aspectsof what's going on, right?
Like if your deficit is not aslow as we thought it would be,
(17:13):
but you're feeling hungry, whichimplies you're not eating that
much, and you have low sleep.
Oh, now we could put thattogether into a pattern that
says you're not getting enoughsleep.
That's suppressing yourmetabolism.
Therefore, you feel hungry andyou have cravings while you're
also not getting the deficit youwant.
What do we need to address?
Probably need to eat a littlemore while we fix our sleep and
(17:33):
our stress.
Boom, right?
And again, you didn't even haveto know calories and macros.
And in fact, the calories andmacros could be
counterproductive because it canmake you frustrated thinking,
I'm in a deficit.
Why am I not losing weight?
Okay.
And the fifth metric here is ofcourse, your strength
progression.
Are you getting stronger?
Can you do more?
How's your recovery with yourstrength?
(17:54):
Because that's an indicatorthat you're fueling properly and
building muscle.
And of course, it's going tochange depending on the phase
you're in, if you're in fat lossmaintenance or building.
So these are all connected inyour patterns.
Now, most people think theyneed to track calories to
develop nutritional awareness.
But when you think of tracking,even in something like Macro
(18:15):
Factor, it does teach you someskills.
It teaches you how to use afood scale, how to log, how to
think of food in terms ofquantities.
So there's definitely thatpiece of it.
And I'm not saying we would wewould exclude that altogether.
There's still an awareness ofquantity and calorie density and
portion size that correlateswith calories that is important.
(18:38):
And pattern-based coaching ortracking teaches you the actual
underlying skills.
For example, you learn toidentify physical hunger versus
emotional eating.
You discover which meals keepyou satisfied for many hours,
all through that what used to bean energy crash versus the ones
that leave you in that energycrash searching for snacks, like
(19:01):
a nomad.
Where are the chips?
You notice that your weekendeating patterns are dramatically
different from weekdays.
And this is actually prettycommon, that exact scenario, but
it might be different for you.
It might have to do with yourcycle or when you work or when
the kids are over or when youhave to take care, you know, go
to holiday events or familyevents.
(19:21):
And then you can address thosespecific behaviors.
You see that you're great ateating protein at dinner, but
it's barely present at breakfastand lunch.
And now you have a clear areato improve.
Now, I'm not saying caloriemacro tracking doesn't give you
some of these things.
Of course, it does, because youcan visually see, oh, I'm not
getting enough protein atbreakfast.
But you do have to go in andlook at that data.
And I do find a lot of peopleusing these apps, like even
(19:43):
macrofactor, they don't go lookat that part of the data.
They're only looking, they'rekind of myopic and thinking only
in terms of, you know, am Ilosing weight or not?
Do I need to go up and down incalories or macros?
They're not looking at thepatterns.
The patterns are there.
So again, this is where I thinkit's not one or the other
necessarily.
And so all of these things helpyou recognize that, for
(20:04):
example, you make poor foodchoices when you're stressed,
but not when you're hungry.
Hmm, interesting.
That's what creates sustainablechange, right?
We know it's not willpower.
We know it's not restriction.
We know it's not low carb orfasting.
We know that betterself-awareness and
decision-making frameworks sothat you can get micro wins that
(20:25):
are under your control thatactually move the ball forward
for you is what makes youconsistent and ultimately
successful.
Now, pattern-based scooching,I'm gonna say it's not easier or
harder than tracking withcalories and macros.
It's just different.
And sometimes you do both,sometimes you do a little of one
or a little of the other.
It depends.
(20:45):
You have to be consistent withfeedback no matter what you're
doing, measuring and gettingfeedback.
Right?
If you only log the data anddon't look at it, or you log
data sporadically and look atit, but it's sporadic, you're
not gonna get enough to seethose patterns.
You also need basic nutritionliteracy.
That's probably one reason youlisten to the show.
(21:05):
You're you crave informationand knowledge, you're curious,
you're skeptical, and you don'tnecessarily need a degree in
nutrition science.
I mean, you don't, but ifyou've listened to the show for
any length of time, you knowthere's a lot.
There's a lot to learn.
What you do need to know isabout how much protein do you
need?
What does a serving of proteinlook like?
Right?
So when you go to a restaurant,you kind of know how much
(21:26):
protein there is.
You understand that the scalefluctuates every day, and that
doesn't really matter.
What matters is the trend overtime.
It's trusting the process.
It's understanding that yourbody's response, the weight
trend, the measurements, yourstrength gains, your energy
levels, your biofeedback, yourhunger signals, all of that
becomes your most importantguide, not targets, because
(21:47):
targets are just reflectingafter the fact what's going on
with all these other thingsanyway.
And of course, you needpatience.
Pattern-based coaching revealsissues over time.
You know, it's not going toreveal something tomorrow.
It's going to take time,several weeks, probably, not
just several days, but itdoesn't take years.
And then when those patternsare revealed, you can then fix
(22:08):
the root cause rather than justtrying to, let's say,
arbitrarily hit a calorie targetby white knuckling it even
further, by doing what you'realready doing, which may not be
optimal, even further.
Now, quick break here becauseif you're listening to this and
thinking, all right, I want thiskind of intelligent coaching
(22:29):
that adapts to everything I'mdoing, just like Philip's
talking about with thepattern-based analysis.
I just launched my new app.
It's called Fitness Lab.
It came out yesterday.
And it's an AI coaching appbuilt specifically for adults
over 40 who want to do all thesethings.
They want to improve theirphysique and their health and
longevity.
They want to build muscle andlose fat.
Using this kind of integrativeintelligence pattern-based whole
(22:55):
body approach is what I'm goingto say.
It's all of you.
It's your hormones, it'severything.
You get daily coachingbriefings that are personalized
to your progress and to yourstruggles, that are based on how
you've been logging things.
Meal photo analysis that spotsbehaviors using AI vision,
exactly like we're talking abouttoday, as well as adaptive
strength training that respondsto your biofeedback, an AI chat
(23:19):
coach that you can ask questionsanytime that's trained on all
of my podcasts, my entirecoaching philosophy, and then
your specific data.
All of that is in my app.
It's called Fitness Lab.
Download it atwitsandweights.com slash app
right now through Black Friday.
You get 20% off.
So take advantage of the deal.
It's, in my opinion, superaffordable for the kind of app
(23:42):
that you're going to get.
A premium, never seen before,game-changing type app that
impresses me every day as Icontinue to use and test it
myself.
My mind is blown, and I thinkyours will be too.
Go to witwaits.com slash app.
It's called Fitness Lab.
And I want to now segue intohow to make this pattern-based
approach work.
Now, Fitness Lab will do it foryou, but I do want to explain
(24:04):
how it works underneath.
Because if you did want to doit on your own or wanted to
design your own system, or ifyou're a coach listening to
this, you're like, well, I don'twant to push people to Philips
app, but I want to try this withmy clients.
I'm all for teaching you guyshow to do that.
All right.
You have to have certainfoundations in place.
Not because I say so, butbecause this is what determines
success or failure.
So the first foundation is bodycomposition literacy.
(24:28):
You can't coach yourselfeffectively if you don't
understand how body compositionworks.
You need to know that the scaleis not the best indicator,
right?
It fluctuates a lot, but it'shelpful over time for sure for
fat gain and fat loss and musclegain and muscle loss.
You need to know that muscletissue is denser than fat.
So you can get leaner while thescale doesn't go down, right?
(24:50):
You can get even leaner whenthe scale goes up.
That progressive overload andprogressing in your training is
the critical signal of stimulusfor muscle building alongside
your weight and yourmeasurements.
If you think that clean eatingcreates fat loss, if you believe
the scale is the only metricthat matters, then you're
already not going to besuccessful when it comes to the
(25:12):
patterns, because that is arestrictive, temporary mindset
that is not sustainable and doesnot correlate well with body
composition.
So you just need to understandthe basics of energy balance,
protein's role in fat loss andmuscle gain, and why all of
these data points together arean important metric.
Okay.
Foundation two is proteinawareness, right?
(25:36):
This is where I say this onpodcasts all the time.
If you can just have protein inevery meal, that is gonna be
80% of the equation right therefor what people are missing.
Now, I've heard some peoplesay, I increase my protein, but
then I gain more weight.
I said, I said, well, then it'snot just protein that's a
concern for you, obviously.
You're just overconsuming ingeneral.
Most people, I'm gonna say,when they meaningfully increase
(25:57):
protein, it displaces otherthings.
It makes them fuller and theyactually eat less in general and
fewer calories overall.
But that's not always true,right?
This is why we have tounderstand our patterns and
what's happening to our body.
Now, you don't, do you have toknow exactly how much you're
eating?
No, but you need to knowapproximately so that you get in
the range that we want to bein, which is 0.701 grams per
pound of body weight, right?
(26:18):
And maybe a little more ifyou're in a deficit, a little
bit less if you're not, a littlebit more if you're older, et
cetera.
And so then we say, well, whatabout palm size or palm size
serving methodology?
Now, I used to kind of frown onthat.
I know that was like the PMI.
Am I saying it?
Not PMI, what's it called?
Precision nutrition.
I'm thinking of projectmanagement, the precision
(26:39):
nutrition approach.
And I think there's merit inunderstanding visually how much
something is.
Not necessarily palm, but apalm is something we all have
with us at all times.
So it could be helpful.
Like a palm size serving achicken breast is like 25, 30
grams of protein.
But you could also equate thatto say 100 out 100 grams on a
scale.
(26:59):
Or, you know, if you had a cupof Greek Greek yogurt and you
know it's like 20 grams, likeunderstanding, you know, an egg
is six grams of protein.
It's a helpful, those arehelpful proxies to have in your
head so that when you're out andabout or you're eating on the
go, you're eating in arestaurant, you're on vacation,
then you know how much proteinyou're getting.
And so you could either getthere from calorie counting and
tracking and learning that way,and or you could just be
(27:21):
intentional about how muchprotein you have in each meal
and do it that way.
There's multiple ways to roam,multiple roads to roam, right?
And so this is part ofnutritional literacy.
And I think there's a lot morethat goes beyond protein, of
course.
But I think it starts there.
If I had to pick one otherarea, it would be fiber, having
enough fiber.
But then we get into the morecomp now.
We're gonna get into the morecomplicated aspects of protein,
(27:42):
fiber, having having a vegetableand having some sort of carb on
your plate is a generally goodrubric for how to eat throughout
the day.
And then you can scale thequantities up and down.
And that's where patternanalysis is super helpful.
Of course, if you're bingingthe ice cream late at night, or
if you're overeating alcoholnaps in the weekend on the in a
restaurant, those are also otherdata points you're gonna have
(28:04):
to have, right?
It's not just, okay, all mymeals are balanced, I'm good.
It's I'm a human being and I'mgonna make mistakes or I'm gonna
do things that I didn'tnecessarily want to do, and I
need to know what those patternsare.
So that's the secondfoundation.
Foundation three, and there'sfour by the way, that I'm
talking about today.
Foundation three is closingthat loop and getting consistent
feedback.
Now, by consistent, I mean I domean at a micro level, which
(28:27):
usually means daily, somethingevery day.
Not everything every day, butsome things every day, and not
the same things every day, if Ididn't confuse you enough
already.
And it's being consistent.
You're gonna you're gonna missdays, I get it.
I always strive to have to doat least one thing a day on my
list of things that I'mtracking, if not, you know, the
goal is to get all of them done,but if you can get some of them
(28:49):
done, right, better thannothing, and that's what
consistency is.
And some of us have minimums,some of us have super minimums,
right?
There's a whole philosophybehind this, but there are
certain things that if you coulddo them every day and turn them
into habits, and by habit, byhabit I mean automatic.
Now, lifting weights isn'tnecessarily something that can
be a habit, but getting up at 5a.m.
(29:12):
on training days can be ahabit.
Packing your gym bag at nightcan be a habit.
Going to the gym and doing allthe process of that itself is
like a massive skill, uh set ofskills and habits, if that makes
sense.
So you really need to break itdown to what are you doing every
day.
I would say weighing yourselfevery day is important.
(29:33):
I would say having sometracking or awareness of your
meals every day, and not, andthis is where I'm gonna differ
from what I've talked about inthe past.
If you have enough of the righttechnology and analysis or a
coach and you could get feedbackon your meal patterns on a
daily basis, even withouttracking all your calories and
macros, you could actually getmore than enough data to make
(29:53):
the choices that get you whereyou need to be.
I know this is controversial,guys.
It sounds sacrilegious.
It doesn't mean we throw thebaby out with the bathwater.
I still think tracking malariesand calories and macros is a
fantastic tool.
And these can be complementary.
In fact, if you use all thesetools together, you probably get
the best of it all.
But if we subscribe to the 8020 rule, the Pareto principle,
(30:14):
find the the things that are theleast stress and time and
friction that still gets you 80or 90% of the results.
And each of these things you doevery day should take like a
minute, two minutes, threeminutes max.
All right, again, working out.
Takes 90 minutes for some ofus.
That is not the habit.
The habit is all the microwinsand habits that lead to us doing
(30:34):
that thing because that's partof our identity.
Identity is a whole othertopic.
I should do another anotherepisode on because it's also
embedded in my app of creatingyour future identity and really
having the app push you torealize that.
All right.
So you need some sort ofminimum viable data on a daily
basis.
There's a lot more than what Ijust said.
Some things are on a weeklybasis, like body measurements,
(30:54):
for example, photos, stuff likethat.
If you disappear for weeks andthen try to catch up, you're not
going to find a pattern.
That's not how it works, right?
Consistency is basically thetrade-off for the price that you
pay for wanting to besuccessful.
And it's a price that I'mwilling to pay.
And I hope you are as well.
All right.
The final foundation here istrusting in outcome data.
(31:16):
What do I mean?
This is the hardest one forsome people.
So with calorie tracking, youhave a target.
Okay, I'm trying to hit 1800calories, and that's gonna be my
win for the day.
Now, and of course, I hopeyou're having flexibility around
that.
Okay, 16 to 1600 to 2000calories or 1700 to 19, you
know, you have a range that isstill a win for you.
(31:36):
And you get that immediatefeedback.
With pattern-based approachesthat I'm talking about, you
simply have other wins thatyou're using instead of hitting
specific calories for the day.
And those wins are all all haveto do with those specific
decisions that put your platetogether.
The things that would allow youto hit those calories anyway,
but now you're doing it in a waythat also satisfies the other
things we talked about: satisfaction, balance, (31:57):
undefined
biofeedback.
And then as your body respondsand you're collecting your data,
like your weight train, yourmeasurements, et cetera, you're
gonna know what to change.
It's really the same thing thatinforms whether your calories
change.
So you are still getting dailywins.
And rather than trying to hit atarget in a way that is not
(32:19):
best for your routine and yourbehavior, you're actually trying
to hit those behaviors andthose micro wins throughout the
day that ultimately lead toconsuming the calories, macros,
micros that you want.
I hope that makes sense.
Right?
You're focusing on behaviorpatterns and letting your body's
feedback guide you.
And so you're still trackingquite a bit of things.
And this is a very powerfulapproach.
(32:40):
So let me be clear about whenwhich approach makes the most
sense.
I think detailed calorie macrotracking is really good when
you're working with a coach,especially, so that they have
data, but also when you're in avery specific, precise phase,
you know, fat loss phase, amuscle building phase, but a
more aggressive one, I wouldsay.
(33:01):
Because I'm I've found thatless aggressive phases, you
almost don't need it as long asyou are being consistent with
and kind of boring with yourfood choices.
Now, if you're not boring, thenyou need to spend time becoming
a little bit more boring, ifthat makes sense anyway, before
you try to go into fat lossphase.
That's the whole pre-fat lossthing we've talked about many
times.
If you've hit a plateau and youneed some more data to
(33:22):
troubleshoot what's going on,you don't have enough data.
If you generally enjoy trackingcalories and macros, it doesn't
create stress or disorderedeating.
If you have a history whereless structured approaches lead
to overeating, under eating, orfalling off track so easily.
I'm a huge fan of calorie andmacro tracking.
So notice that that's a lot ofscenarios that we deal with.
When does pattern-basedcoaching help?
(33:43):
Well, you want a reallycentered approach in your
behaviors that's sustainable tothe point where you don't even
need to know the calories andmacros to know that you've hit
your calories and macros, ifthat even makes sense.
For some of you, it's becauseof the style of tracking.
You're very busy, you can't ordon't want to weigh and log what
(34:03):
you eat.
Maybe you don't have controlall the time of prepping your
food.
Maybe you've tried detailedcalorie tracking and macro
tracking before, and it's aproblem for you individually,
which could be the case.
Maybe it's create stress,anxiety, and unhealthy
relationship with food,whatever.
Even though I've I've tried toconvince people that give macro
factor a try and you probablywon't have those issues.
But I know some people stillhave those issues, even with an
(34:25):
app like that.
Also, pattern-based coaching isgreat if you want to develop
better food instinct, betterdecision-making skills while
you're building your plates anddoing your grocery shopping.
And if you like the thought ofyour behaviors and your body's
body's feedback being theprimary guide to your
adjustments, rather than just,hey, here's my expenditure.
(34:45):
I think pattern-based coachingis pretty cool.
Or here's the third option (34:48):
you combine them, you combine them
strategically.
You use calorie macro trackingalong with pattern-based
coaching.
And you can dial one in or theother more or less, depending on
what's going on.
Or you switch between them.
And that gives you the best ofboth worlds, right?
You're not trapped in apermanent mode of tracking, but
you have the tool available foryou that's best when, say, more
(35:08):
or less precision matters or adifferent style of tracking is
important to you.
So this leads us to a quickdiscussion of AI today and how
it has changed the game andallowed us to do something
that's never been able to bedone before.
It makes pattern-based coachingseamless and almost effortless,
which is almost the opposite ofwhat it's been up to this
(35:30):
point.
Up to this point, pattern-basedcoaching is a really
complicated thing, in myopinion, to get right.
It takes a lot of education, alot of learning, oftentimes
working with a coach.
And I think AI is a gamechanger right now.
A human coach can definitelylook at your food log, they can
spot some patterns, but come on,they can't correlate reams and
reams of data, thousands of datapoints about everything you're
(35:52):
doing all day, every day.
You know, your sleep qualityscores, your step count trend,
your training performance, yourstress levels, all at the same
time every day.
They can do it kind of to acertain level, and it depends on
how much time your coach putsin.
The more, the more time thatthey put in, the more that they
do, the more they're gonna cost.
That's for sure.
And a lot of you, if you'repaying for a cheap coach, you're
gonna get a cheap outcome inthis regard.
(36:14):
Trust me.
I'm an engineering thinkingperson, and I can tell you very
few coaches think that way orget to that level of detail.
They want it to be as easy onthemselves as possible.
I mean, you can't blame them,right?
They're trying to maximize thetime they put in for the revenue
they earn while still helpingyou, but that's the truth of the
matter behind the scenes.
Whereas AI never has to go tosleep, you don't have to feed
it.
It can do all this stuff, itcan calculate data, it can
(36:35):
calculate patterns constantly inreal time.
It can notice that your foodchoices deteriorate on days when
you sleep poorly, that yourprotein intake drops on high
stress days, that your weekendeating patterns are 600 calories
higher than weekdays, but onlywhen you eat it out instead of
cooking at home.
These correlations reveal thedrivers of your behavior.
And those are what you canchange.
(36:56):
That's the first advantage.
The second one is how real-timeand immediate it is.
It's personalized feedbackbased on your data when you want
it at 3 a.m.
if you want.
I hope you're sleeping at thatpoint, but still, it's the point
I'm making.
And it's adaptive to yourpatterns, your biofeedback, your
response, your weight trend,your adherence, your protein
(37:18):
consistency, your weekendpatterns, your step counts, your
sleep quality, on and on and onand on.
And then it can say, here'syour recommendation.
I just calculated everythinggoing on in your life in 30
seconds or less, and I gave youa recommendation.
Your energy tank this week,despite hitting your targets,
maybe your deficit's tooaggressive.
Maybe you need a rest day.
Maybe life stress is the realissue.
The AI can triangulate frommultiple data sources.
(37:41):
So that's what I mean bycoaching intelligence, not just
collecting data and doing alittle cursory kind of
intelligence on top of it.
And then the cool thing is, atleast this is what I'm trying to
do with my app, is helping youdevelop the skills while you do
this process.
While it's helping you figurethis out, you're also learning
about it and yourself so thatyou can then maintain the
results and you're not dependenton either the app or coaching
(38:04):
or anybody else for the rest ofyour life.
You learn to identify whenyou're eating from stress versus
hunger.
You recognize your behavioralpatterns around weekends, social
situations, high stressperiods, right?
Different food choices,training load.
And then after a few months,you've really developed a skill
and could see it for yourself.
And you develop nutritionalcompetence, not just adhering to
(38:26):
someone else's plan that theygave you.
That is the goal.
I want you to buildindependence.
Now, let's be honest, neitherapproach is magic.
Whether you track calories oranalyze patterns, you still need
a calorie deficit to lose fat.
You still need progressiveoverload to build muscle.
You still need adequate proteinand good sleep.
The fundamentals are notchanging.
But what could change is youradherence, your sustainability,
(38:47):
your relationship with your foodand your body.
I've coached people who thrivedwith detailed tracking.
They love data, they found itempowering, they got incredible
results.
I've also coached people who,as good as the tracking tools
are, they still feel like I'mwhite knuckling it.
I'm doing this to make my coachhappy.
I have to do it.
It's this resistance, you know?
And maybe they hit a goal shortterm and then they stop because
(39:10):
they don't like the process.
And then they don't want tocheck in because they haven't
been tracking.
And I say, well, that's whenyou need to check.
And it's this whole thing.
And I'm like, how do I solvethis for people?
Because not everybody is thesame, right?
And the real, the real questionis not then which approach is
more accurate.
It's which approach is it'swhich one can you actually
maintain yourself long enough toget the results you want.
(39:31):
Right.
And if detailed tracking inthis way or that way feels
manageable and you can do itwithout creating stress or food
stress in particular, do it.
Like I can track my caloriesand macros every day, no issues.
But at times I've felt, oh,wouldn't it be nice to not
really have to do it that way?
Right.
And should we really have to dothat for the rest of our lives?
(39:53):
Like that feels a littledependent to me.
And I've definitely questionedthat in my brain, even though I
don't mind doing it and I likedata.
So it's kind of an oddsituation to be in.
So I get it.
I get it.
Now, if tracking of a certaintype makes you miserable, and
and I put it that way becausethere should be a form of
tracking that works for you,right?
You shouldn't just not trackanything at all.
(40:14):
And the tracking may be superlow stress without involving an
app.
It might be involving just afew things in your head.
I don't know, but you're stilltracking and aware.
Anyway, if it's somethingyou're not going to stick with
longer than a few weeks, thenanother approach might be the
answer you need.
And I would say that thispattern-based coaching that I've
developed for the app is a gamechanger in that regard because
(40:35):
I think it's going to open upfor a lot of people a way to do
this that's highly precise andinformative, but feels extremely
low stress.
And I think that's a wonderfulcombination.
There's no moral superiority toany of these approaches.
It's just what works for you inyour life right now with your
psychology.
(40:56):
Now, remember, calorie targets,targets are great, like KPIs,
targets.
But in any world, even in likethe financial world, calorie, a
financial target, it's like anoutcome, right?
Even if it's a daily outcome,it's not going to teach you how
to get to that outcome.
It's not calorie targets aren'tgoing to teach you how to eat.
Like I think we know that.
They tell you what to hit, whatto get to.
(41:18):
They don't show you that, hey,I'm eating out of stress right
now, not hunger.
They don't tell you that yourportions are 30% larger when you
eat with these people over herebecause they stress you out
versus these people over here.
They don't identify that, youknow, you make great choices at
home but struggle inrestaurants.
The targets don't.
Now, the information you tracktrying to hit those targets do.
(41:39):
And that's where I'm sayingthere's a lot of ways to get
there.
I think pattern analysis inthis way makes the invisible
more visible.
And once you see the pattern,once you understand what's
driving your behavior, then youcan fix the behavior.
You know, not by tightening thetarget, right?
Or adding more restriction tohit a target, but address the
behavior at its source.
(41:59):
And we know that is whatcreates long-term success,
better self-awareness, betterdecision-making frameworks,
right?
And then you stop reacting toyour food environment, you start
designing it instead, you stopfighting your hunger signals and
instead respond to them theright way, including your
emotions instead of justreacting.
You get to use those emotions.
You stop depending on someoneelse's rules and you start
(42:21):
trusting your own competence.
And that is that'stransformation, guys.
That is transformation.
So I know some of you listeningare tracking macros.
You use macro factor or anotherapp, it's working great.
Keep doing it, please.
I still use macro factor myselfwhile I'm using my new app.
And I would love to see if Ican get it to a point where I
only need to use one, and thatday might be just a short while
(42:43):
away.
If you're someone who's triedtracking, it didn't stick, or if
you don't like the mentaloverhead, or it's really not
helping you as much as you wantfor some of these other deeper
issues, that's wherepattern-based coaching could be
what you need, right?
Not as a replacement fortracking, it's a different way
to track.
It's a sustainable way and itteaches you skills as well while
you're doing it, which is kindof cool.
(43:04):
And the goal here isn't juststop thinking about nutrition,
right?
It's to think about it moreeffectively, develop awareness,
develop decision-makingframeworks that serve you, that
serve you for the rest of yourlife.
All right.
If this approach resonates withyou, I built Fitness Lab to
deliver exactly this kind ofintelligent coaching.
I'm very proud of it.
I've been using it myself.
(43:25):
It's super exciting.
It's only going to get better,and it'll get better faster the
more people that use it and givefeedback.
There's all the other funfeatures.
I'm not going to go into them,you know, the briefings, the
strength training, the AI coach,all that great stuff.
But it's built specifically forthose of us over 40, primarily,
right?
Who have our challenges and wewant to know what the heck's
(43:47):
going on and what to do aboutit.
We want sustainable fat loss.
We want to build muscle.
We don't want to guess.
Download it atwitsandweights.com slash app
through Black Friday, November28th.
You're going to get 20% off.
That's wits and weights.comslash app.
I'd love to have you in thereand have you see what's possible
when you try somethingdifferent like this.
Witsandweights.com slash appfor fitness lab.
(44:07):
Until next time, keep usingyour wits, lifting those
weights, and remember that thebest nutrition approach is the
one that builds real awarenessand fits your life.
I'm Philip Pape.
This is Wits and Weights, andI'll talk to you next time.
For decades, the gold standard for fat loss and
muscle gain has been trackingcalories and macros.
The research is clear, itworks.
But what if AI coaching couldanalyze your eating patterns,
correlate them with your body'sresponse, and provide similar
awareness and control withoutlogging every meal?
Today I'm breaking down howAI-powered pattern analysis
(00:23):
actually works, why it can bejust as effective as detailed
tracking, and what you need tomake either approach successful
for building muscle and losingfat over 40.
Welcome to Wits and Weights,the show that helps you build a
(00:46):
strong, healthy physique usingevidence, engineering, and
efficiency.
I'm your host, certifiednutrition coach Philip Pape, and
today we're going to examinetwo very different approaches to
the same goal and why one mightbe far more sustainable than
you think, especially since it'skind of a brand new approach.
You probably know I'm a bigadvocate of tracking calories
(01:08):
and macros.
I use MacroFactor myself.
I recommend it to clients andall of you regularly.
The research is absolutelyclear that tracking food intake
works really well for fat lossand muscle gain, for changing
your physique, for gaining someawareness and control over your
food intake and your choices.
(01:28):
And when you track properly,when you weigh your food, when
you log consistently, whenyou're honest about what goes in
and that you track everything,you do get very valuable data.
You know exactly what you'reeating.
You know how much protein, youcan make precise adjustments,
you can troubleshoot theplateaus that might occur along
the way because you have realdata.
(01:48):
And it's been very helpful forme as a coach as well, because I
can see your data and quicklydo an analysis on what might be
happening.
And for lots of people, thisbecomes a simple daily habit.
It's almost automatic.
You, as soon as you prepareyour food, you pull out the food
scale, you weigh it, you log itin your app, right?
Or maybe you use the photo thephoto AI, or maybe you look it
(02:11):
up or use a barcode, whatever.
It takes two minutes.
And most people, their screentime for the day is like three
to five minutes.
Not a lot.
That's not the concern at all.
And so after a few weeks,you've got this routine, it's
not a big deal, and you start toget really good, helpful data.
And so the power of tracking isthe awareness.
I've talked about this a lot.
I'm sticking to that.
(02:31):
That is so, so important.
Because when you have to logsomething, anything, right?
Whether that's your bankaccount, that you may you bought
something at the grocery store,that's awareness.
You bought something online,that's awareness.
And then you become consciousof your choices.
Same thing with the food.
You become conscious ofchoices.
They don't become mindlessanymore, they become mindful.
(02:53):
You see patterns that youwouldn't notice otherwise.
You discover that the healthysalad that you've been eating
has 600 calories of justdressing and nuts, right?
And that's healthy in quotes,right?
You know, we don't use thosethose labels here.
You realize your portions atdinner are 40% larger than you
thought.
You realize that on theweekends you consume three times
(03:15):
as much as you thought becauseyou're going out to restaurants,
drinking alcohol, and all ofthat.
And that's the awareness thatdrives behavior change.
Not because hitting yourcalorie target creates fat loss,
but because seeing your intakehelps you make the decisions to
do that.
And the feedback loop is thenimmediate.
And by the way, we have toclose that feedback loop.
(03:36):
If you're only logging the foodand not doing anything with the
data, well, then it's an openloop.
It's not a closed feedback loopat all, anyway.
That's a different issue.
I'm assuming you are closingthat loop.
So if you eat 2,200 calories aday for a week and your weight
goes up, then you know whathappened, right?
You know that you're eatingprobably more than your body
(04:00):
burns.
If you eat 1800 calories, yourweight trend goes down.
Well, that confirms you're in adeficit, right?
And for people who likestructure, who enjoy data, who
want clear targets to hit, raiseyour hand.
I'm raising mine.
Tracking is fantastic.
It removes guesswork, it buildsconfidence, it works.
That is the premise of today'sepisode.
(04:20):
So if tracking works this well,why would anyone do something
else?
Well, that's the question thatI used to ask.
I said, well, if trackingmacros and calories work so
well, why would you do somethingelse?
Isn't it the best tool for thejob?
I always say macro factor islike the best tool for the job
in the app space, right?
And honestly, for a long time,I thought that tracking in this
(04:41):
exact way was the only seriousapproach for anyone who wanted
results because you're gonnafail without it, right?
But then I started noticingsomething with certain clients
who weren't necessarily trackingthe same way.
I started talking to folks likeDr.
Eric Helms and other physiquecompetitors who have a very
(05:01):
healthy mind state and at thesame time have started to
transition themselves and someclients away from that type of
tracking.
Okay.
And I notice the words I'musing.
We are not gonna eliminatetracking.
If you want to not track atall, have at it.
That's called intuitive eating.
That's called flying by theseat of your pants, that's
called winging it.
I think you're not gonna besuccessful if you do that.
You have to track something,okay?
(05:23):
It's the way that we track thatcould change.
I remember having guests on theshow who very successful
coaches with their clients whodidn't use calorie macro
tracking.
Everything from nutrientapproaches like Sarah
Ballantine, right?
She starts with nutrients toChristina McClerkin was on, and
she talked about tracking otherelements of what you eat other
(05:46):
than calories and macros, butyou're still tracking something.
And I've had several otherguests that I've talked to and
other coaches that have similarsystems.
They're just different, butthey still track.
Now, I always, I always kind ofsaid, okay, that's great, you
do you.
And I'm just gonna stick towhat I think is simple, which is
calories and macros.
But there's there's anotherphenomenon that occurs when
(06:07):
you're tracking, depending onhow you're tracking.
Okay, and I'm not talking aboutdisorders, I'm not talking
about OCD, I'm not talking aboutobsessiveness, none of that.
Okay.
Outside the scope of today, weknow that the research says that
if you didn't have an issuealready before, tracking only
helps.
It only helps you get theresults and maintaining results.
What I do find is that the typeof tracking, right, when
(06:27):
there's a lot of data involved,for example, and you have to
track a lot of things, evensmart, motivated, consistent
people would do this eightweeks, 12 weeks, maybe 16, and
start to get results.
But then a lot of times theyfall off and they stop logging.
And it's not because theyfailed to get the results, it's
not because they lackeddiscipline.
(06:47):
But a lot of times people say,Look, I've got the awareness.
I've built the skill, I'vebuilt the intuition.
I don't need to do thisanymore, do I?
And you've developed someinstincts.
That is true.
You know what your portionslook like.
You can feel when you're in adeficit or maintenance.
You internalize a lot of thepatterns.
A lot of these things do becomeroutine.
(07:08):
Like if you're eating the sameway, you just keep doing that
and you can maintain yourweight.
But they then went one of twopaths.
And again, I'm talking topeople that stopped tracking in
the original way they weretracking, which is a decent
amount of the population herethat I'm referring to.
They either stopped trackingaltogether and then started to
deviate and basically fall offtheir habits because they had no
(07:31):
other system in place toreinforce what they were doing
or to measure or to track.
You had others, however, whosimply supplanted one style of
tracking with another, maybe alooser form of tracking, but
still awareness, still some sortof documentation or journaling
or a light set of numbers, someway that they continue to track.
(07:53):
Do you feel me?
Do you feel what I'm saying?
Okay.
And even when you talk to guyslike Derek, Dr.
Eric Helms, where people gettransition away from tracking,
they're still trackingsomething, or they still have an
awareness of, say, certaintargets.
Like I'm trying to get acertain amount of protein in a
certain number of meals.
And even if it's in their head,it's still a target and it's
still a number, and there'sstill an element of tracking to
(08:13):
it, right?
So, so what does all this mean?
Well, uh, maybe the goal isn'tpermanently tracking in one way.
Maybe the goal is developingthe awareness and the decision
making that skills that trackingteaches, and then be able to
maintain results with somelighter version of tracking or a
(08:36):
different version of trackingif you so choose.
And once I realized that, Isaid, huh, let me explore other
ways people can continue totrack that are maybe a little
bit less time consuming or lessstressful.
I shouldn't say time consumingbecause tracking calories and
macros isn't time consuming, butit does create some weird
scenarios like when you go onvacation or when you're eating
(08:57):
out or when your wife makesdinner for you and she sees you
pulling out your phone everytime to track the food.
It can get a little bit, it cancreate a little bit of
interesting friction or stressin other ways.
Does that make sense?
Do you guys feel me on that?
All right.
And that's what led me toexplore what I call
pattern-based coaching, not as areplacement for tracking, but
as a different path to the samedestination.
(09:18):
Now, we're gonna get into whatpattern-based coaching is.
And I will tell you that if aperson has to do this, either
yourself or a coach doing it foryou, it takes quite a bit of
learning and training to do itthis way up front.
And then once you do it, itit's I'll say a lot more
(09:40):
natural, intuitive approach thatstill involves a form of
analysis and tracking.
All right, fit stick with mehere because this is all gonna
make sense by the time we get tothe end of the episode.
So, what is pattern-basedcoaching or tracking?
Well, instead of tracking thenumbers via a database of food,
you're tracking the eatingbehaviors that lead to your
(10:04):
trends, your patterns, what youchoose to eat, and ultimately
then the nutrients, the macrosand the micros that go into your
body that affect your bodycomposition results.
So, in other words, you're kindof flipping it backward.
Instead of starting fromtargets and trying to fit into
those targets, you're startingfrom what really is the root
cause of your behaviors thatlead to whether you hit those
(10:27):
targets.
Now you could say, well, whydon't you do both?
Yeah, you can absolutely doboth.
In fact, a lot of my coachingwith clients is filling in the
gap of the pattern side.
That's the point of where how Iwas able to kind of figure all
this out over the years, is thatmany of my clients are using
macrofactor, tracking calories,macros, but then I'm coming from
the other end, one-two punch,and trying to figure out these
trends and patterns with themand solve the issue from that
(10:49):
direction.
The calories and macros arejust kind of telling them the
end of the chain for a given dayor a given week or given month
of their choices, but it doesn'ttell them how to solve those
choices or you know, thosebehaviors.
So, in now, so what if yousaid, what if I just take out
those training wheels?
Or what if I just take out thetracking of calories and macros
(11:10):
all together?
How would you use thissuccessfully?
Where it doesn't become wingingit intuitive eating.
The key insight is this yourbody composition outcomes are
determined by your lifestyle andyour patterns.
They're not determined bywhether you strictly hit
calories and macros.
And I say it that way becauseyou might say, wait, wait a
minute, energy balance andgetting enough protein, that's
(11:32):
that's really all you need,right?
In reality, if you hit yourmacros, but you do it in a way
where you're hungry, you'reeating calorie-dense foods or a
lot of processed foods, let'ssay, the meal timing doesn't
work for you, you're trainingfasted and it doesn't feel good,
you don't have enough sleep, etcetera, et cetera, then you're
not gonna get your bodycomposition.
Strictly hitting the caloriesand macros isn't gonna be
(11:53):
enough, is my point.
So I want you to think about adifferent way.
(12:24):
If your body weight trend ismoving down over several weeks,
then you know you're in acalorie deficit and what you're
doing is working.
You actually don't have to knowyour expenditure or your intake
to know you're in a caloriedeficit.
Let me repeat that.
You don't have to know yourexpenditure or your intake to
know you're in a calorie deficitretroactively.
(12:47):
In other words, in hindsight.
So if you go three weeks andyou've lost a pound a week, then
you've averaged a 500 caloriedeficit a day, even if you
didn't know what your intakewas.
Now you might say, okay, that'sgreat, but I still need to know
what to eat to get there.
Stick with me.
If your waste measurement isshrinking and your strength is
going up, that is also datathat's telling you you're doing
(13:10):
something right.
If you're feeling fairlysatisfied from your food and
you're not gaining weight,versus if you're always feeling
hungry and you're not gainingweight, that's your body telling
you something that you need toknow.
And so interestingly, those arestill things being tracked.
And I like to track thosethings anyway, but I'm tying
them into this thought that youmay not have to track calories
(13:33):
and macros.
So stick with me here.
When I talk about a pattern, Idon't, I'm not just talking
about food.
All right, let's break it down.
I'm gonna break it down intofive things.
All right.
The first thing is bodycomposition trends.
If you're tracking your dailyweight and then smooth that into
a trend line, something likeMacro Factor does that.
My new app is gonna do that.
It's a very simple thing.
It's just math, all right?
(13:55):
And that filters out your dailyfluctuations from water, from
food volume, from glycogen, frominflammation.
This trend is real data, right?
It tells you if you're in adeficit, surplus, or maintenance
all by itself, believe it ornot.
Okay, all by itself.
In fact, macro factor uses thatto say, am I in a def, are you
in a deficit or surplus?
Therefore, this is what yourexpenditure is, therefore, this
(14:18):
is how you need to change yourcalories.
But you know what?
If macrofactor didn't tell youwhat your expenditure was, it
can still tell you whether yourcalories should go up or down by
a certain amount because ofwhether you're in a surplus or
deficit versus your goal.
That's really powerful.
I hope you guys understand whatI'm saying.
Okay, these are differentvariables that play together.
(14:41):
If you know you're in a deficitand the deficit's not as big as
you'd like, then you knowyou're not eating in as big a
deficit relative to yourexpenditure as you want, even if
you don't know yourexpenditure.
That's pretty cool.
Okay, stick with me.
The second thing, eatingbehaviors.
Now, this is super powerful.
It's not, it's not what youeat, but how and why you ate it.
(15:03):
Were you physically hungrybefore the meal?
Or was it an emotional hunger,or were you not hungry?
How satisfied did you feelafter?
How confident were you in yourfood choices?
These capture your relationshipwith food.
And you know what?
I've been, I'll say admittedly,inadequate in dealing with
(15:24):
these aspects in my coaching sofar.
Apologies to all my clients outthere.
I I know maybe I'm being hardon myself because I know physic
university has lots of coach, uhlots of modules in the
different courses aboutemotional eating and different
exercises and all that.
I get it.
But I feel like from a trackingperspective, I could do better.
(15:45):
And going forward, I'm goingto.
In fact, that's where this isall leading to.
This is all gonna make sense.
Number three, meal compositionpatterns.
Okay.
Is there protein at most meals?
What does the composition ofyour plate look like?
I think that's reallyimportant.
Now, I didn't used to think itwas as important because I
thought calories and macros.
But no, are you eating mostlywhole foods with some
(16:06):
flexibility for processed foodsin there?
Are each me, is each mealfairly balanced, right?
They don't all have to be, butin general, how different are
your weekends from yourweekdays, your training days
from your off days, et cetera?
Those patterns tell ussomething as well.
You notice what I'm doing,guys.
I'm actually giving you a morecomplex, in a good way, complex
(16:27):
as in nuanced or completepicture of things to track than
just calories and macros thatcan lead to the same outcome and
maybe even more efficiently.
Whoa, mind blowing.
I know it's my it is mindblowing in my opinion, in my
mind.
I hope it is in yours.
Okay.
Number four of the thingsyou're tracking that are not
calories and macros arebiofeedback signals.
(16:49):
So we talk about this a lot onthe show: sleep quality, energy
levels, hunger, cravings,digestion, recovery from
training, stress.
These tell you if your approachis sustainable for you right
now in your life.
Okay, not only is itsustainable, but like the cause
and effect of different aspectsof what's going on, right?
Like if your deficit is not aslow as we thought it would be,
(17:13):
but you're feeling hungry, whichimplies you're not eating that
much, and you have low sleep.
Oh, now we could put thattogether into a pattern that
says you're not getting enoughsleep.
That's suppressing yourmetabolism.
Therefore, you feel hungry andyou have cravings while you're
also not getting the deficit youwant.
What do we need to address?
Probably need to eat a littlemore while we fix our sleep and
(17:33):
our stress.
Boom, right?
And again, you didn't even haveto know calories and macros.
And in fact, the calories andmacros could be
counterproductive because it canmake you frustrated thinking,
I'm in a deficit.
Why am I not losing weight?
Okay.
And the fifth metric here is ofcourse, your strength
progression.
Are you getting stronger?
Can you do more?
How's your recovery with yourstrength?
(17:54):
Because that's an indicatorthat you're fueling properly and
building muscle.
And of course, it's going tochange depending on the phase
you're in, if you're in fat lossmaintenance or building.
So these are all connected inyour patterns.
Now, most people think theyneed to track calories to
develop nutritional awareness.
But when you think of tracking,even in something like Macro
(18:15):
Factor, it does teach you someskills.
It teaches you how to use afood scale, how to log, how to
think of food in terms ofquantities.
So there's definitely thatpiece of it.
And I'm not saying we would wewould exclude that altogether.
There's still an awareness ofquantity and calorie density and
portion size that correlateswith calories that is important.
(18:38):
And pattern-based coaching ortracking teaches you the actual
underlying skills.
For example, you learn toidentify physical hunger versus
emotional eating.
You discover which meals keepyou satisfied for many hours,
all through that what used to bean energy crash versus the ones
that leave you in that energycrash searching for snacks, like
(19:01):
a nomad.
Where are the chips?
You notice that your weekendeating patterns are dramatically
different from weekdays.
And this is actually prettycommon, that exact scenario, but
it might be different for you.
It might have to do with yourcycle or when you work or when
the kids are over or when youhave to take care, you know, go
to holiday events or familyevents.
(19:21):
And then you can address thosespecific behaviors.
You see that you're great ateating protein at dinner, but
it's barely present at breakfastand lunch.
And now you have a clear areato improve.
Now, I'm not saying caloriemacro tracking doesn't give you
some of these things.
Of course, it does, because youcan visually see, oh, I'm not
getting enough protein atbreakfast.
But you do have to go in andlook at that data.
And I do find a lot of peopleusing these apps, like even
(19:43):
macrofactor, they don't go lookat that part of the data.
They're only looking, they'rekind of myopic and thinking only
in terms of, you know, am Ilosing weight or not?
Do I need to go up and down incalories or macros?
They're not looking at thepatterns.
The patterns are there.
So again, this is where I thinkit's not one or the other
necessarily.
And so all of these things helpyou recognize that, for
(20:04):
example, you make poor foodchoices when you're stressed,
but not when you're hungry.
Hmm, interesting.
That's what creates sustainablechange, right?
We know it's not willpower.
We know it's not restriction.
We know it's not low carb orfasting.
We know that betterself-awareness and
decision-making frameworks sothat you can get micro wins that
(20:25):
are under your control thatactually move the ball forward
for you is what makes youconsistent and ultimately
successful.
Now, pattern-based scooching,I'm gonna say it's not easier or
harder than tracking withcalories and macros.
It's just different.
And sometimes you do both,sometimes you do a little of one
or a little of the other.
It depends.
(20:45):
You have to be consistent withfeedback no matter what you're
doing, measuring and gettingfeedback.
Right?
If you only log the data anddon't look at it, or you log
data sporadically and look atit, but it's sporadic, you're
not gonna get enough to seethose patterns.
You also need basic nutritionliteracy.
That's probably one reason youlisten to the show.
(21:05):
You're you crave informationand knowledge, you're curious,
you're skeptical, and you don'tnecessarily need a degree in
nutrition science.
I mean, you don't, but ifyou've listened to the show for
any length of time, you knowthere's a lot.
There's a lot to learn.
What you do need to know isabout how much protein do you
need?
What does a serving of proteinlook like?
Right?
So when you go to a restaurant,you kind of know how much
(21:26):
protein there is.
You understand that the scalefluctuates every day, and that
doesn't really matter.
What matters is the trend overtime.
It's trusting the process.
It's understanding that yourbody's response, the weight
trend, the measurements, yourstrength gains, your energy
levels, your biofeedback, yourhunger signals, all of that
becomes your most importantguide, not targets, because
(21:47):
targets are just reflectingafter the fact what's going on
with all these other thingsanyway.
And of course, you needpatience.
Pattern-based coaching revealsissues over time.
You know, it's not going toreveal something tomorrow.
It's going to take time,several weeks, probably, not
just several days, but itdoesn't take years.
And then when those patternsare revealed, you can then fix
(22:08):
the root cause rather than justtrying to, let's say,
arbitrarily hit a calorie targetby white knuckling it even
further, by doing what you'realready doing, which may not be
optimal, even further.
Now, quick break here becauseif you're listening to this and
thinking, all right, I want thiskind of intelligent coaching
(22:29):
that adapts to everything I'mdoing, just like Philip's
talking about with thepattern-based analysis.
I just launched my new app.
It's called Fitness Lab.
It came out yesterday.
And it's an AI coaching appbuilt specifically for adults
over 40 who want to do all thesethings.
They want to improve theirphysique and their health and
longevity.
They want to build muscle andlose fat.
Using this kind of integrativeintelligence pattern-based whole
(22:55):
body approach is what I'm goingto say.
It's all of you.
It's your hormones, it'severything.
You get daily coachingbriefings that are personalized
to your progress and to yourstruggles, that are based on how
you've been logging things.
Meal photo analysis that spotsbehaviors using AI vision,
exactly like we're talking abouttoday, as well as adaptive
strength training that respondsto your biofeedback, an AI chat
(23:19):
coach that you can ask questionsanytime that's trained on all
of my podcasts, my entirecoaching philosophy, and then
your specific data.
All of that is in my app.
It's called Fitness Lab.
Download it atwitsandweights.com slash app
right now through Black Friday.
You get 20% off.
So take advantage of the deal.
It's, in my opinion, superaffordable for the kind of app
(23:42):
that you're going to get.
A premium, never seen before,game-changing type app that
impresses me every day as Icontinue to use and test it
myself.
My mind is blown, and I thinkyours will be too.
Go to witwaits.com slash app.
It's called Fitness Lab.
And I want to now segue intohow to make this pattern-based
approach work.
Now, Fitness Lab will do it foryou, but I do want to explain
(24:04):
how it works underneath.
Because if you did want to doit on your own or wanted to
design your own system, or ifyou're a coach listening to
this, you're like, well, I don'twant to push people to Philips
app, but I want to try this withmy clients.
I'm all for teaching you guyshow to do that.
All right.
You have to have certainfoundations in place.
Not because I say so, butbecause this is what determines
success or failure.
So the first foundation is bodycomposition literacy.
(24:28):
You can't coach yourselfeffectively if you don't
understand how body compositionworks.
You need to know that the scaleis not the best indicator,
right?
It fluctuates a lot, but it'shelpful over time for sure for
fat gain and fat loss and musclegain and muscle loss.
You need to know that muscletissue is denser than fat.
So you can get leaner while thescale doesn't go down, right?
(24:50):
You can get even leaner whenthe scale goes up.
That progressive overload andprogressing in your training is
the critical signal of stimulusfor muscle building alongside
your weight and yourmeasurements.
If you think that clean eatingcreates fat loss, if you believe
the scale is the only metricthat matters, then you're
already not going to besuccessful when it comes to the
(25:12):
patterns, because that is arestrictive, temporary mindset
that is not sustainable and doesnot correlate well with body
composition.
So you just need to understandthe basics of energy balance,
protein's role in fat loss andmuscle gain, and why all of
these data points together arean important metric.
Okay.
Foundation two is proteinawareness, right?
(25:36):
This is where I say this onpodcasts all the time.
If you can just have protein inevery meal, that is gonna be
80% of the equation right therefor what people are missing.
Now, I've heard some peoplesay, I increase my protein, but
then I gain more weight.
I said, I said, well, then it'snot just protein that's a
concern for you, obviously.
You're just overconsuming ingeneral.
Most people, I'm gonna say,when they meaningfully increase
(25:57):
protein, it displaces otherthings.
It makes them fuller and theyactually eat less in general and
fewer calories overall.
But that's not always true,right?
This is why we have tounderstand our patterns and
what's happening to our body.
Now, you don't, do you have toknow exactly how much you're
eating?
No, but you need to knowapproximately so that you get in
the range that we want to bein, which is 0.701 grams per
pound of body weight, right?
(26:18):
And maybe a little more ifyou're in a deficit, a little
bit less if you're not, a littlebit more if you're older, et
cetera.
And so then we say, well, whatabout palm size or palm size
serving methodology?
Now, I used to kind of frown onthat.
I know that was like the PMI.
Am I saying it?
Not PMI, what's it called?
Precision nutrition.
I'm thinking of projectmanagement, the precision
(26:39):
nutrition approach.
And I think there's merit inunderstanding visually how much
something is.
Not necessarily palm, but apalm is something we all have
with us at all times.
So it could be helpful.
Like a palm size serving achicken breast is like 25, 30
grams of protein.
But you could also equate thatto say 100 out 100 grams on a
scale.
(26:59):
Or, you know, if you had a cupof Greek Greek yogurt and you
know it's like 20 grams, likeunderstanding, you know, an egg
is six grams of protein.
It's a helpful, those arehelpful proxies to have in your
head so that when you're out andabout or you're eating on the
go, you're eating in arestaurant, you're on vacation,
then you know how much proteinyou're getting.
And so you could either getthere from calorie counting and
tracking and learning that way,and or you could just be
(27:21):
intentional about how muchprotein you have in each meal
and do it that way.
There's multiple ways to roam,multiple roads to roam, right?
And so this is part ofnutritional literacy.
And I think there's a lot morethat goes beyond protein, of
course.
But I think it starts there.
If I had to pick one otherarea, it would be fiber, having
enough fiber.
But then we get into the morecomp now.
We're gonna get into the morecomplicated aspects of protein,
(27:42):
fiber, having having a vegetableand having some sort of carb on
your plate is a generally goodrubric for how to eat throughout
the day.
And then you can scale thequantities up and down.
And that's where patternanalysis is super helpful.
Of course, if you're bingingthe ice cream late at night, or
if you're overeating alcoholnaps in the weekend on the in a
restaurant, those are also otherdata points you're gonna have
(28:04):
to have, right?
It's not just, okay, all mymeals are balanced, I'm good.
It's I'm a human being and I'mgonna make mistakes or I'm gonna
do things that I didn'tnecessarily want to do, and I
need to know what those patternsare.
So that's the secondfoundation.
Foundation three, and there'sfour by the way, that I'm
talking about today.
Foundation three is closingthat loop and getting consistent
feedback.
Now, by consistent, I mean I domean at a micro level, which
(28:27):
usually means daily, somethingevery day.
Not everything every day, butsome things every day, and not
the same things every day, if Ididn't confuse you enough
already.
And it's being consistent.
You're gonna you're gonna missdays, I get it.
I always strive to have to doat least one thing a day on my
list of things that I'mtracking, if not, you know, the
goal is to get all of them done,but if you can get some of them
(28:49):
done, right, better thannothing, and that's what
consistency is.
And some of us have minimums,some of us have super minimums,
right?
There's a whole philosophybehind this, but there are
certain things that if you coulddo them every day and turn them
into habits, and by habit, byhabit I mean automatic.
Now, lifting weights isn'tnecessarily something that can
be a habit, but getting up at 5a.m.
(29:12):
on training days can be ahabit.
Packing your gym bag at nightcan be a habit.
Going to the gym and doing allthe process of that itself is
like a massive skill, uh set ofskills and habits, if that makes
sense.
So you really need to break itdown to what are you doing every
day.
I would say weighing yourselfevery day is important.
(29:33):
I would say having sometracking or awareness of your
meals every day, and not, andthis is where I'm gonna differ
from what I've talked about inthe past.
If you have enough of the righttechnology and analysis or a
coach and you could get feedbackon your meal patterns on a
daily basis, even withouttracking all your calories and
macros, you could actually getmore than enough data to make
(29:53):
the choices that get you whereyou need to be.
I know this is controversial,guys.
It sounds sacrilegious.
It doesn't mean we throw thebaby out with the bathwater.
I still think tracking malariesand calories and macros is a
fantastic tool.
And these can be complementary.
In fact, if you use all thesetools together, you probably get
the best of it all.
But if we subscribe to the 8020 rule, the Pareto principle,
(30:14):
find the the things that are theleast stress and time and
friction that still gets you 80or 90% of the results.
And each of these things you doevery day should take like a
minute, two minutes, threeminutes max.
All right, again, working out.
Takes 90 minutes for some ofus.
That is not the habit.
The habit is all the microwinsand habits that lead to us doing
(30:34):
that thing because that's partof our identity.
Identity is a whole othertopic.
I should do another anotherepisode on because it's also
embedded in my app of creatingyour future identity and really
having the app push you torealize that.
All right.
So you need some sort ofminimum viable data on a daily
basis.
There's a lot more than what Ijust said.
Some things are on a weeklybasis, like body measurements,
(30:54):
for example, photos, stuff likethat.
If you disappear for weeks andthen try to catch up, you're not
going to find a pattern.
That's not how it works, right?
Consistency is basically thetrade-off for the price that you
pay for wanting to besuccessful.
And it's a price that I'mwilling to pay.
And I hope you are as well.
All right.
The final foundation here istrusting in outcome data.
(31:16):
What do I mean?
This is the hardest one forsome people.
So with calorie tracking, youhave a target.
Okay, I'm trying to hit 1800calories, and that's gonna be my
win for the day.
Now, and of course, I hopeyou're having flexibility around
that.
Okay, 16 to 1600 to 2000calories or 1700 to 19, you
know, you have a range that isstill a win for you.
(31:36):
And you get that immediatefeedback.
With pattern-based approachesthat I'm talking about, you
simply have other wins thatyou're using instead of hitting
specific calories for the day.
And those wins are all all haveto do with those specific
decisions that put your platetogether.
The things that would allow youto hit those calories anyway,
but now you're doing it in a waythat also satisfies the other
things we talked about: satisfaction, balance, (31:57):
undefined
biofeedback.
And then as your body respondsand you're collecting your data,
like your weight train, yourmeasurements, et cetera, you're
gonna know what to change.
It's really the same thing thatinforms whether your calories
change.
So you are still getting dailywins.
And rather than trying to hit atarget in a way that is not
(32:19):
best for your routine and yourbehavior, you're actually trying
to hit those behaviors andthose micro wins throughout the
day that ultimately lead toconsuming the calories, macros,
micros that you want.
I hope that makes sense.
Right?
You're focusing on behaviorpatterns and letting your body's
feedback guide you.
And so you're still trackingquite a bit of things.
And this is a very powerfulapproach.
(32:40):
So let me be clear about whenwhich approach makes the most
sense.
I think detailed calorie macrotracking is really good when
you're working with a coach,especially, so that they have
data, but also when you're in avery specific, precise phase,
you know, fat loss phase, amuscle building phase, but a
more aggressive one, I wouldsay.
(33:01):
Because I'm I've found thatless aggressive phases, you
almost don't need it as long asyou are being consistent with
and kind of boring with yourfood choices.
Now, if you're not boring, thenyou need to spend time becoming
a little bit more boring, ifthat makes sense anyway, before
you try to go into fat lossphase.
That's the whole pre-fat lossthing we've talked about many
times.
If you've hit a plateau and youneed some more data to
(33:22):
troubleshoot what's going on,you don't have enough data.
If you generally enjoy trackingcalories and macros, it doesn't
create stress or disorderedeating.
If you have a history whereless structured approaches lead
to overeating, under eating, orfalling off track so easily.
I'm a huge fan of calorie andmacro tracking.
So notice that that's a lot ofscenarios that we deal with.
When does pattern-basedcoaching help?
(33:43):
Well, you want a reallycentered approach in your
behaviors that's sustainable tothe point where you don't even
need to know the calories andmacros to know that you've hit
your calories and macros, ifthat even makes sense.
For some of you, it's becauseof the style of tracking.
You're very busy, you can't ordon't want to weigh and log what
(34:03):
you eat.
Maybe you don't have controlall the time of prepping your
food.
Maybe you've tried detailedcalorie tracking and macro
tracking before, and it's aproblem for you individually,
which could be the case.
Maybe it's create stress,anxiety, and unhealthy
relationship with food,whatever.
Even though I've I've tried toconvince people that give macro
factor a try and you probablywon't have those issues.
But I know some people stillhave those issues, even with an
(34:25):
app like that.
Also, pattern-based coaching isgreat if you want to develop
better food instinct, betterdecision-making skills while
you're building your plates anddoing your grocery shopping.
And if you like the thought ofyour behaviors and your body's
body's feedback being theprimary guide to your
adjustments, rather than just,hey, here's my expenditure.
(34:45):
I think pattern-based coachingis pretty cool.
Or here's the third option (34:48):
you combine them, you combine them
strategically.
You use calorie macro trackingalong with pattern-based
coaching.
And you can dial one in or theother more or less, depending on
what's going on.
Or you switch between them.
And that gives you the best ofboth worlds, right?
You're not trapped in apermanent mode of tracking, but
you have the tool available foryou that's best when, say, more
(35:08):
or less precision matters or adifferent style of tracking is
important to you.
So this leads us to a quickdiscussion of AI today and how
it has changed the game andallowed us to do something
that's never been able to bedone before.
It makes pattern-based coachingseamless and almost effortless,
which is almost the opposite ofwhat it's been up to this
(35:30):
point.
Up to this point, pattern-basedcoaching is a really
complicated thing, in myopinion, to get right.
It takes a lot of education, alot of learning, oftentimes
working with a coach.
And I think AI is a gamechanger right now.
A human coach can definitelylook at your food log, they can
spot some patterns, but come on,they can't correlate reams and
reams of data, thousands of datapoints about everything you're
(35:52):
doing all day, every day.
You know, your sleep qualityscores, your step count trend,
your training performance, yourstress levels, all at the same
time every day.
They can do it kind of to acertain level, and it depends on
how much time your coach putsin.
The more, the more time thatthey put in, the more that they
do, the more they're gonna cost.
That's for sure.
And a lot of you, if you'repaying for a cheap coach, you're
gonna get a cheap outcome inthis regard.
(36:14):
Trust me.
I'm an engineering thinkingperson, and I can tell you very
few coaches think that way orget to that level of detail.
They want it to be as easy onthemselves as possible.
I mean, you can't blame them,right?
They're trying to maximize thetime they put in for the revenue
they earn while still helpingyou, but that's the truth of the
matter behind the scenes.
Whereas AI never has to go tosleep, you don't have to feed
it.
It can do all this stuff, itcan calculate data, it can
(36:35):
calculate patterns constantly inreal time.
It can notice that your foodchoices deteriorate on days when
you sleep poorly, that yourprotein intake drops on high
stress days, that your weekendeating patterns are 600 calories
higher than weekdays, but onlywhen you eat it out instead of
cooking at home.
These correlations reveal thedrivers of your behavior.
And those are what you canchange.
(36:56):
That's the first advantage.
The second one is how real-timeand immediate it is.
It's personalized feedbackbased on your data when you want
it at 3 a.m.
if you want.
I hope you're sleeping at thatpoint, but still, it's the point
I'm making.
And it's adaptive to yourpatterns, your biofeedback, your
response, your weight trend,your adherence, your protein
(37:18):
consistency, your weekendpatterns, your step counts, your
sleep quality, on and on and onand on.
And then it can say, here'syour recommendation.
I just calculated everythinggoing on in your life in 30
seconds or less, and I gave youa recommendation.
Your energy tank this week,despite hitting your targets,
maybe your deficit's tooaggressive.
Maybe you need a rest day.
Maybe life stress is the realissue.
The AI can triangulate frommultiple data sources.
(37:41):
So that's what I mean bycoaching intelligence, not just
collecting data and doing alittle cursory kind of
intelligence on top of it.
And then the cool thing is, atleast this is what I'm trying to
do with my app, is helping youdevelop the skills while you do
this process.
While it's helping you figurethis out, you're also learning
about it and yourself so thatyou can then maintain the
results and you're not dependenton either the app or coaching
(38:04):
or anybody else for the rest ofyour life.
You learn to identify whenyou're eating from stress versus
hunger.
You recognize your behavioralpatterns around weekends, social
situations, high stressperiods, right?
Different food choices,training load.
And then after a few months,you've really developed a skill
and could see it for yourself.
And you develop nutritionalcompetence, not just adhering to
(38:26):
someone else's plan that theygave you.
That is the goal.
I want you to buildindependence.
Now, let's be honest, neitherapproach is magic.
Whether you track calories oranalyze patterns, you still need
a calorie deficit to lose fat.
You still need progressiveoverload to build muscle.
You still need adequate proteinand good sleep.
The fundamentals are notchanging.
But what could change is youradherence, your sustainability,
(38:47):
your relationship with your foodand your body.
I've coached people who thrivedwith detailed tracking.
They love data, they found itempowering, they got incredible
results.
I've also coached people who,as good as the tracking tools
are, they still feel like I'mwhite knuckling it.
I'm doing this to make my coachhappy.
I have to do it.
It's this resistance, you know?
And maybe they hit a goal shortterm and then they stop because
(39:10):
they don't like the process.
And then they don't want tocheck in because they haven't
been tracking.
And I say, well, that's whenyou need to check.
And it's this whole thing.
And I'm like, how do I solvethis for people?
Because not everybody is thesame, right?
And the real, the real questionis not then which approach is
more accurate.
It's which approach is it'swhich one can you actually
maintain yourself long enough toget the results you want.
(39:31):
Right.
And if detailed tracking inthis way or that way feels
manageable and you can do itwithout creating stress or food
stress in particular, do it.
Like I can track my caloriesand macros every day, no issues.
But at times I've felt, oh,wouldn't it be nice to not
really have to do it that way?
Right.
And should we really have to dothat for the rest of our lives?
(39:53):
Like that feels a littledependent to me.
And I've definitely questionedthat in my brain, even though I
don't mind doing it and I likedata.
So it's kind of an oddsituation to be in.
So I get it.
I get it.
Now, if tracking of a certaintype makes you miserable, and
and I put it that way becausethere should be a form of
tracking that works for you,right?
You shouldn't just not trackanything at all.
(40:14):
And the tracking may be superlow stress without involving an
app.
It might be involving just afew things in your head.
I don't know, but you're stilltracking and aware.
Anyway, if it's somethingyou're not going to stick with
longer than a few weeks, thenanother approach might be the
answer you need.
And I would say that thispattern-based coaching that I've
developed for the app is a gamechanger in that regard because
(40:35):
I think it's going to open upfor a lot of people a way to do
this that's highly precise andinformative, but feels extremely
low stress.
And I think that's a wonderfulcombination.
There's no moral superiority toany of these approaches.
It's just what works for you inyour life right now with your
psychology.
(40:56):
Now, remember, calorie targets,targets are great, like KPIs,
targets.
But in any world, even in likethe financial world, calorie, a
financial target, it's like anoutcome, right?
Even if it's a daily outcome,it's not going to teach you how
to get to that outcome.
It's not calorie targets aren'tgoing to teach you how to eat.
Like I think we know that.
They tell you what to hit, whatto get to.
(41:18):
They don't show you that, hey,I'm eating out of stress right
now, not hunger.
They don't tell you that yourportions are 30% larger when you
eat with these people over herebecause they stress you out
versus these people over here.
They don't identify that, youknow, you make great choices at
home but struggle inrestaurants.
The targets don't.
Now, the information you tracktrying to hit those targets do.
(41:39):
And that's where I'm sayingthere's a lot of ways to get
there.
I think pattern analysis inthis way makes the invisible
more visible.
And once you see the pattern,once you understand what's
driving your behavior, then youcan fix the behavior.
You know, not by tightening thetarget, right?
Or adding more restriction tohit a target, but address the
behavior at its source.
(41:59):
And we know that is whatcreates long-term success,
better self-awareness, betterdecision-making frameworks,
right?
And then you stop reacting toyour food environment, you start
designing it instead, you stopfighting your hunger signals and
instead respond to them theright way, including your
emotions instead of justreacting.
You get to use those emotions.
You stop depending on someoneelse's rules and you start
(42:21):
trusting your own competence.
And that is that'stransformation, guys.
That is transformation.
So I know some of you listeningare tracking macros.
You use macro factor or anotherapp, it's working great.
Keep doing it, please.
I still use macro factor myselfwhile I'm using my new app.
And I would love to see if Ican get it to a point where I
only need to use one, and thatday might be just a short while
(42:43):
away.
If you're someone who's triedtracking, it didn't stick, or if
you don't like the mentaloverhead, or it's really not
helping you as much as you wantfor some of these other deeper
issues, that's wherepattern-based coaching could be
what you need, right?
Not as a replacement fortracking, it's a different way
to track.
It's a sustainable way and itteaches you skills as well while
you're doing it, which is kindof cool.
(43:04):
And the goal here isn't juststop thinking about nutrition,
right?
It's to think about it moreeffectively, develop awareness,
develop decision-makingframeworks that serve you, that
serve you for the rest of yourlife.
All right.
If this approach resonates withyou, I built Fitness Lab to
deliver exactly this kind ofintelligent coaching.
I'm very proud of it.
I've been using it myself.
(43:25):
It's super exciting.
It's only going to get better,and it'll get better faster the
more people that use it and givefeedback.
There's all the other funfeatures.
I'm not going to go into them,you know, the briefings, the
strength training, the AI coach,all that great stuff.
But it's built specifically forthose of us over 40, primarily,
right?
Who have our challenges and wewant to know what the heck's
(43:47):
going on and what to do aboutit.
We want sustainable fat loss.
We want to build muscle.
We don't want to guess.
Download it atwitsandweights.com slash app
through Black Friday, November28th.
You're going to get 20% off.
That's wits and weights.comslash app.
I'd love to have you in thereand have you see what's possible
when you try somethingdifferent like this.
Witsandweights.com slash appfor fitness lab.
(44:07):
Until next time, keep usingyour wits, lifting those
weights, and remember that thebest nutrition approach is the
one that builds real awarenessand fits your life.
I'm Philip Pape.
This is Wits and Weights, andI'll talk to you next time.
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