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1:01

you create a stress on the body maybe a little bit of damage

1:03

right the body heels the damage

1:06

and then what it does is it tries to adapt so

1:08

that the same insult no longer

1:10

creates damage so the question is what

1:12

does it take to get my body to adapt welcome

1:15

to the school of greatness

1:18

my name is louis how is a former pro athlete

1:20

turn why style entrepreneur in

1:22

each week we bring you and inspiring person

1:25

or message to help you discover

1:27

how to unlock your inner

1:29

greatness thanks for spending some time with

1:31

me today

1:31

now let the class begin you

1:36

can cross your fingers and all your job during a data

1:38

center migration you can knock

1:40

on wood plug a doesn't four leaf clovers or look

1:42

to your lucky stars for a successful office expansion

1:46

you could hold your breath shut your eyes and say all

1:48

the little wishes to help avoid cyber attacks

1:50

the none of that truly helps you

1:53

because next level moments need the

1:55

next level network with the security

1:57

reliability and expertise to take your

1:59

business for

2:00

AT&T Business, the network

2:02

you can rely on.

2:10

Welcome to this special Masterclass.

2:12

We brought some of the top experts in the world

2:15

to help you unlock the power

2:17

of your life through this specific theme

2:19

today. It's going to be powerful, so

2:22

let's go ahead and dive in.

2:27

How do we build like this, I don't

2:30

know, furnace burning machine

2:32

inside of us? Is that a consistent

2:35

weight training and nutrition

2:38

practice? Is it weight training five

2:40

days a week? Is it,

2:42

you know, it's not doing to fatigue

2:45

or failure. It's more like 70% weight training. What

2:47

is that machine look like? So

2:50

the muscle building process is an adaptation

2:53

process. So to use

2:55

another example, it would be like,

2:57

okay, so like going out in the sun and

2:59

then your skin darkening to adapt

3:02

to the UV rays. So it's very similar to what's happening

3:04

when your body builds muscle. You go to the gym, you

3:06

create a stress on the body, maybe a little

3:09

bit of damage, right? The body heals

3:11

the damage and then what it does is it tries to

3:13

adapt so that the same insult

3:16

no longer creates damage. So this is how you get stronger

3:19

incrementally over time. This is how this

3:21

is why you can work out harder over time

3:24

because your body slowly adapts. So the

3:26

question is, what does it take to

3:28

get my body to adapt a little more

3:30

than you're doing now? That's it. So

3:33

if you're doing nothing right now, literally 10

3:37

body weight squats, five pushups,

3:40

and maybe a couple band rows is enough

3:43

to get the body to start the adaptation

3:45

process. And again, you want to do the right dose,

3:47

meaning

3:48

doing more than is appropriate will

3:51

only get your body to prioritize healing over the adaptation.

3:53

Your body can't adapt

3:55

because it's only trying to heal this

3:57

damage that you caused. So

3:59

the appropriate amount... is literally a little

4:01

more than you're doing now. So for the average person

4:03

watching this with strength training,

4:06

if they did 30 minutes of strain training

4:08

once a week, they would get strength gains.

4:11

And then when that felt easy, they could do an

4:13

hour of strain training once a week. And then

4:15

when that got easy, they could do a little harder. They

4:17

could add a little more load, and then eventually it could add

4:19

an extra day.

4:20

And there's a lot you could do with two days a week

4:23

with strength training. There's a lot of room

4:25

to go when it comes to load, exercises,

4:28

intensity. There's so much room to go

4:30

with two days a week that the average

4:32

person, I can get them to

4:34

what they want realistically, which is two days a week.

4:36

Now, more than that, then we're talking

4:38

about, well, I want my biceps to bulge, or

4:41

I want my glutes to sit real high,

4:43

or I want more definition in my delts to really

4:46

pop out. Now we're looking at

4:48

more days a week. But two to three days a week,

4:50

I mean, you can get really, really far. I mean, the old

4:53

time strength athletes in

4:56

the 1930s and 40s, they worked out full body three days a week. And

4:59

those guys, people like Steve Reeves, they had phenomenal physiques,

5:02

just working out three. So you can go real far, and

5:04

you don't want to look at the extreme

5:08

fitness fanatics as, well, that's what I need

5:10

to do. That's not what you need to do. That's not what you

5:12

need to do. Strength training is the core, it's

5:14

the key, is what it sounds like. It is. Is

5:17

that a burn body fat if you're doing strength training with legs and

5:19

chest? You don't have to do abs

5:21

all day long? No, that's

5:23

a good question, right? You're

5:26

kind of alluding to maybe spot reduction, right? So

5:28

I want to burn body fat from an area, so I'll train that area.

5:31

It doesn't work that way, but what you do do is you

5:33

develop and sculpt and

5:35

strengthen the muscles underneath. It's

5:38

important to train the whole body. The best

5:40

exercise is to choose,

5:43

first off, you want to choose the ones with the most bang

5:45

for your buck, right? So if I'm only going to spend 45 minutes

5:47

exercising, I want to do the exercises

5:49

that have the most carry over and have the

5:51

biggest impact. Essentially, you want to do compound

5:54

lifts or big gross motor movements.

5:57

So rather than doing like a curl,

6:00

which is a very simple, you know, single

6:02

joint exercise, I would do a row,

6:05

which also involves the biceps, but now I'm working the back

6:07

and the whole upper body. Pull up, right? Oh

6:10

yeah, that's right. And dips and

6:12

squats and deadlifts. Those exercises

6:15

do the work of like five exercises

6:17

combined. So

6:19

you want to do those big gross motor movements

6:21

because they give you the most bang for your buck. And for

6:23

the average person, and I talk about this

6:25

in my book, go to the gym and pick,

6:28

you know, three or four gross

6:30

motor movements and just practice them. So today

6:32

I'm going to go squat, press, and

6:34

row. I'll do three sets of each.

6:36

I'll rest for a minute and a half in between, and

6:38

then I'll leave. That's it. That's

6:40

it. Three sets of each, what, 80%? Yeah, you want

6:42

to train, again, more than you're used

6:44

to,

6:45

not beyond that. You want to feel good at the end of

6:47

your workout. It's okay to feel a little

6:49

sore the day after, but if you're sore to the touch or you're

6:51

sore for two days, you went too hard. Really?

6:54

Mm-hmm. So you shouldn't feel too sore. Soreness

6:56

is a terrible indicator of... You push

6:58

too hard. It's actually a good indicator

7:00

that you do too much.

7:02

It's not an indicator of, wow, I had

7:04

a great workout. Really? Yeah, yeah. In

7:06

fact, high-level strength

7:08

athletes, they rarely get sore. They'll

7:11

get sore, maybe if they change something up, but

7:13

they really get sore.

7:14

You want a little bit of soreness is okay. So when

7:17

I first became a trainer,

7:19

I would ask my clients, how'd you feel after

7:21

your workout? Oh, I was so sore, and I'd be so proud. Yeah, I got a real

7:23

sore. Later,

7:25

when I really figured this out, I'd say, how did you feel after your

7:27

workout? Oh, I got so sore. I'd say, okay, we went

7:29

too hard. Let's scale it back. Really? Yeah,

7:32

and what you'll get through, and trust me, try this out.

7:34

When you approach it this way, you're gonna see

7:36

more consistent results.

7:38

Otherwise, what ends up happening is you end up

7:40

getting stuck on this hamster wheel of

7:43

breakdown and recovery. So I hammer my

7:45

body, break it down. My body heals.

7:48

Oh, I'm back to my workout. Break it down.

7:50

My body heal. And you just end up in the same place

7:53

all the time. Breakdown recovery, breakdown recovery. What

7:55

you want is a little breakdown recovery

7:59

adaptation.

8:00

break down, little bit of recovery, adaptation.

8:03

So you wanna end up better than you were before.

8:06

And you will see consistent strength

8:08

gains and consistent progress, especially

8:11

within the first year or two of exercise, if

8:13

you approach it this way. After a couple years of exercise,

8:15

it gets a little more challenging. But those first couple years,

8:17

you should see some pretty consistent gains. Has

8:19

anything evolved or changed for you in the last four

8:22

years, you know, as you continue

8:24

to get older, you

8:26

have kids, you have family, all these different things,

8:29

you're running a business, you know, all this stuff.

8:31

Or do you keep the lifestyle and the diet

8:34

or the nutrition and the training

8:36

pretty much the same from

8:39

four years ago? No, it has to change. It has

8:41

to. The key

8:43

with exercise and nutrition is understanding

8:46

that it's this very powerful, valuable

8:49

tool, it's multifaceted, that

8:52

can improve the quality of your life regardless

8:55

of the context of your life in that moment.

8:58

So my workouts and my nutrition

9:00

look different

9:01

when I'm not getting good sleep because I have

9:03

an infant at home, or when,

9:05

you know, something stressful's happening in

9:08

my business,

9:09

or I have lots of energy and I feel great, I'm getting good

9:11

sleep, now it changes.

9:13

Or hey, I'm gonna come

9:15

be on Lewis Howes' show, I want my

9:17

mental acuity to be really good, I'm gonna

9:19

be sharp, my diet will change and my workouts

9:22

will change around that as well.

9:23

Or I'm going on vacation, or, so

9:26

I mold it and change it all

9:29

the time. And really the idea is, can

9:32

I improve the quality of my life right now? And

9:34

so that's what I ask myself when I go work out.

9:37

How do I feel right now? What's gonna make me feel better? You

9:39

know, what's going on in my life, what's gonna improve that?

9:42

I can't, if I apply

9:44

the same intensity, same training all the time as

9:47

my life changes,

9:48

that means I'm either gonna underdo it or overdo it, hurt

9:51

myself or not get anything out of my workouts.

9:53

It's like, I'm never, it's gonna be very hard to do

9:55

the right amount. So you have to change it and mold

9:58

it

9:59

as things change. in your life. So sometimes

10:01

that means you're going after

10:03

it and you're having these great intense workouts

10:05

and you're seeing these new gains in strength or whatever and

10:08

sometimes that means I'm gonna just relieve

10:10

some stress right now. Sure. And I'm gonna feel better. Yeah.

10:13

I think it was about 10 years ago and I remember hearing

10:15

the stat that

10:17

a third of Americans were obese. Yeah. I think

10:19

it was 10 years ago and now I just heard recently

10:21

I think it's either 40% or 50% in

10:24

that range of Americans are obese.

10:26

I'm not sure if that's what you've heard or... We're

10:29

almost there. We're almost half. Almost at 50% right? Mm-hmm.

10:32

What do you see happening over the next five to ten

10:35

years in kind of our society

10:37

in our world to look out for

10:40

in terms of the health, nutrition

10:42

and fitness space and

10:45

how can we start shifting the

10:47

obesity you know epidemic?

10:50

We need to we need

10:52

to change the conversation. This has been my motivation

10:55

since starting my podcast

10:57

and my channel. The motivation

11:00

has been to shift the

11:02

direction, the conversation, the fitness space so

11:04

that it becomes truly effective. We

11:08

need to move from the mechanistic

11:11

aspects of diet and exercise. Now those

11:13

are important to understand so I want to be clear.

11:16

It's good to know

11:17

proteins, fats and carbs. It's good to

11:19

know calories. It's good to know

11:21

workouts and how they affect my body and

11:24

what works for me but that's not the

11:26

main conversation.

11:27

The main conversation is

11:29

how can I develop a relationship with exercise

11:31

and nutrition that lasts forever?

11:33

What are the behaviors that lead to success

11:36

within that? How can I move

11:38

through the four stages of learning so I can make this

11:40

an

11:41

unconscious action

11:44

to where it becomes like breathing

11:46

which it can be. I know people

11:48

sometimes balk at that and think oh that's not that's

11:51

not possible. Yes it is. It's totally possible. You

11:53

just have to move from where

11:55

a lot of people are right now which is unconscious

11:57

incompetence to becoming unconsciously

12:00

incompetent to becoming consciously competent, which

12:03

is okay. I got to pay attention to

12:05

eventually becoming unconsciously competent

12:07

where

12:08

now this is kind of what

12:10

I do and it's a process in

12:13

the health and fitness space is doing the

12:15

world a disservice if

12:17

It doesn't communicate to people in this

12:19

way if we keep staying on this whole Its

12:23

carbs its fats its sugars. It's

12:25

this diet food. It's a super food. This

12:27

is the new workout This is the new fad if we keep doing

12:29

that we're gonna end up worse and worse and worse We're

12:32

not gonna solve anything if we talk to

12:34

people and say hey, here's the deal. Let's understand

12:37

Let's understand the true value of food

12:40

So that we can start to develop a relationship with food

12:42

where you enjoy eating in a way That

12:44

care that where you're taking care of yourself. What does

12:46

that look like? Well

12:48

Most people understand food value

12:51

from a very narrow perspective

12:53

What is going to give me the most hedonistic

12:55

value? What tastes the best you

12:58

know, you've got to you know lunch with your friends.

13:00

Hey, what do you guys want to have for lunch?

13:03

Oh, I know I'm Chinese or Mexican or

13:05

let's get the tie in or whatever The value

13:07

of that we've placed on food is around that. Mmm. We

13:10

don't understand all the other values

13:12

So you got to start with let's start to pay attention

13:15

To all the values of food.

13:17

How does this food affect me emotionally?

13:20

How does it affect my digestion my

13:22

skin? How

13:23

does this affect my hair? Yeah When

13:25

do I crave certain foods? Is it when I'm stressed?

13:29

Is it when I'm anxious?

13:30

Do I eat differently when I'm

13:32

in a restaurant versus when I'm

13:34

with friends versus when I'm on my own? You

13:37

have to kind of bring awareness first

13:39

then

13:40

Start to point out the positives

13:42

and the negatives. Hey that thing that I like eating

13:44

so much. It's the tastes so good That's

13:46

the thing that keeps giving me heartburn

13:49

pay attention to that or You

13:51

know that one dish that I don't

13:54

like the taste so much my god when I eat that though I feel so

13:56

good. My digestion is really good. Pay

13:58

attention to that and here's what happens over

14:01

time you start to develop a relationship

14:03

with food where the value of food now is much more

14:05

complete. Then what happens is you actually

14:07

start to

14:09

crave or want foods that actually

14:11

benefit you in the truest sense. You

14:13

start to develop balance, right? So,

14:16

hey my digestion's off. I know, you know what? I want

14:18

these particular foods because they make me feel really good. Or, my

14:21

energy's low. I know these foods are gonna make me feel

14:23

real good. Or, hey I'm

14:24

going out with my friends.

14:26

We're gonna have a good time and drink some beers. Let me get

14:28

that food that has that hedonistic value so we can

14:30

all connect, have some fun, and have some laughs. Because

14:33

that's a value too. But you

14:35

have to have this, by the way, the food industry knows this. So

14:37

this is not, I'm not like, you know,

14:40

discovering anything here. I'm just communicating what they've

14:42

known for a long time. This is how they sell their products.

14:44

They sell you food with excitement and,

14:47

you know, beer commercials and they show you the girls and

14:49

the beach and, you know, eat this. Look,

14:51

we crave popcorn when we go to the movies. They've already

14:54

created that association. We

14:56

probably

14:56

already have foods that we have emotional

14:59

connections to

15:00

because of maybe something in childhood

15:02

or because it reminds us of somebody that,

15:04

you know. So you can do this with yourself.

15:06

You just have to

15:08

become aware around it. You also have

15:10

to interrupt impulsive behaviors

15:13

around food

15:14

to bring that awareness. So a

15:17

good example would be, like, for me,

15:19

there's definitely certain foods that I can become very impulsive

15:22

around. So like potato chips for me is the worst. Yeah,

15:24

I know. That and pizza. Oh, that pizza's

15:26

another one, right? So

15:28

what I'll do is I won't have potato chips

15:30

in my house.

15:31

Right. But I don't say I can't have them. If I want

15:33

them, I'll drive a mile to the grocery store and

15:35

I'll get them. Right. It's more resistance to get there.

15:38

I have a barrier. Yes. The barrier

15:40

is, you

15:41

know, getting my shoes on, getting in the car, drive

15:43

the grocery store.

15:45

And you know, usually I'm like, I don't really want it that

15:47

much. Right, right, right. So you can do that with yourself

15:50

and create those barriers and create that awareness and

15:52

then identify what is making

15:54

me feel the way that I feel when

15:56

I crave these particular foods.

15:59

And this is, again,

15:59

This is a bit of a process. But once you identify

16:02

these types of things,

16:04

you stop using food as a drug. And

16:07

you start, again, you start valuing food for

16:09

its total value.

16:11

Because when you talk to people, I love talking to

16:14

people

16:15

who've done this for decades, people in

16:17

their 70s who really, they just live a good,

16:19

healthy lifestyle. Ask

16:21

them, do you enjoy eating

16:23

healthy? Oh, I love it. Do

16:25

you really love it? Or do you just do it because you like the results? No,

16:27

no, I enjoy eating healthy.

16:29

What they've done is they've built that relation. So

16:31

it's totally possible. You just have

16:34

to. Yeah.

16:35

And this is what the industry needs to start

16:37

to communicate. We need to start to talk to people

16:40

in this way, versus the

16:42

cut your carbs out, or only eat these

16:44

foods, or eat this specific diet.

16:47

This is going to solve it for you. Not going to work, but you're

16:49

not solving

16:50

the root issue.

16:53

If someone is above 60 or 70 right now, and

16:57

they're listening to this, and they've been, maybe

16:59

they haven't been well with their diet, or they're

17:01

working out at all. They're just kind of like

17:04

living in little obese, and

17:06

have some minor health challenges. What

17:09

can they be doing right now, if they're over 60, to

17:14

try to live a better, healthier, longer life? I love

17:16

it. Well, let's pretend they're not over 60, but we'll

17:18

go there. Let's pretend they're 35

17:21

or 40, and they're slightly obese,

17:24

and they have a couple number of health problems.

17:28

Because we're all in this together. What

17:31

are we going to tell this person? Here's what I'm going

17:33

to tell them. I'm going to say, OK, the first thing that

17:35

we need to focus on is metabolic correction. And

17:38

we're going to do that by optimizing your protein.

17:40

So you are a, what are

17:43

they? They're probably not eating a ton,

17:46

or maybe they're eating a lot of carbohydrates. I'm

17:49

going to say, well,

17:50

the first thing we're going to do is I'm going to say, we

17:53

are going to, ideally,

17:55

and again, they might not do this one gram per

17:57

pound ideal body weight,

17:59

person is 150 pounds,

18:02

it would be 150 grams of protein, that

18:04

is high, right? That is on the higher end, so

18:06

this guy might be like, I don't want to do that. I'm going to say,

18:09

you know what? That's fine. Here's what we're going to do.

18:11

We're going to focus on metabolic correction.

18:13

So I'm going to start you at three meals a day.

18:15

I don't care when

18:18

your first meal is, but that

18:20

first meal after you are coming out

18:22

of a fast is the most important.

18:25

And you are going to optimize that for dietary protein.

18:29

And the reason it's the most important is because they

18:31

are catabolic, they are fasting.

18:34

At that moment, if we

18:36

get that threshold, that nutrition,

18:39

that protein threshold right, you will

18:41

stimulate their muscle. So

18:43

what should be eating the first meal of the day? So that could be,

18:45

I would want them to hit 40 to 50 grams of

18:48

protein. And that could be

18:50

a whey protein shake, which you could probably get a little

18:52

bit less. It could be a beef

18:54

patty. It could be eggs. It

18:57

could be chicken and eggs. It

18:59

could be whatever. Okay. 40,

19:02

50 grams of protein in your first meal. Just get that right.

19:04

Just if any of the, if the listener would

19:06

do that for me. No matter how big your, how much

19:08

you weigh. No matter how big or that's

19:10

right.

19:11

40 to 50 grams. If you're 150 pounds

19:14

or 250 pounds, just try to get in that range. Yeah. I mean, listen,

19:16

could it be between 30 and 50? Yes. Okay.

19:19

Gotcha. 30 and 50 would be great if you

19:21

are older. You

19:22

know, if you are that 60 plus, you

19:25

know, the muscle goes through a

19:27

normal physiological change called anabolic

19:29

resistance. You want to

19:32

push their protein a little bit higher.

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Booking.com, Booking.y. If

22:01

you are younger like you, you could probably

22:03

get away with 30 to 40 grams of protein.

22:06

Okay. Do you want to... does

22:09

it matter if you work out first in the morning

22:11

or fast for five hours in the

22:13

morning? It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter.

22:16

Just your first meal when you eat after you wake up, whether it's right away

22:18

or 10 hours later, have

22:19

protein. Right. That first

22:21

meal should be optimized for protein. Okay. And I would argue

22:23

that if that meal is not around training,

22:26

our target carbohydrate load

22:28

and if they're not training would be 40 grams

22:31

or less, that first meal. So you keep the

22:33

carbohydrates lower that first meal. The

22:36

reason is, is it ends up being about a one-to-one

22:38

ratio of,

22:39

you know, if

22:41

they want to... Hard to say

22:43

more or less. It would be less, right? Because

22:45

anything really above the 50 grams

22:48

of carbohydrates creates a more robust

22:50

insulin response.

22:51

Yeah. And you

22:53

don't want that for your first meal. You want that first meal to be very

22:55

smooth and stable. Okay. And

22:57

not only that, and Heather Lieti, who I'd mentioned

22:59

earlier, has done some very interesting FMRI

23:02

research that, you know, one of

23:04

the things that protein does is it's very satiating.

23:08

And I always tell patients

23:10

not to worry about their strengths, but

23:13

to plan for their weaknesses. And

23:16

when you augment willpower by

23:18

leveraging dietary protein, you

23:20

plan for it. You're much less likely

23:23

to overeat. Right. So

23:25

you nail that 40 grams of protein first,

23:28

maybe a little bit lower carbs and

23:30

some fat.

23:31

Then that next meal is maybe four or five

23:33

hours later. Right. So you stimulate

23:35

muscle. You now have robustly stimulated

23:38

muscle. That next meal will

23:40

be another... Again, depending

23:43

on what you need, I like to target around 30 grams

23:45

at a minimum.

23:47

Protein. Yeah. Okay.

23:50

The data, you know, it's interesting. So a lot

23:52

of the literature doesn't actually support much

23:54

discussion on that lunch meal. It's really

23:57

that first meal. And then, but

23:59

again, if we're...

23:59

We're talking about maintaining healthy skeletal

24:02

muscle. We're also talking

24:04

about maintaining blood sugar. Compliance

24:07

is really important. Protein

24:09

is very hard to store protein as fat.

24:12

There's a high thermic

24:14

effect of food, meaning it takes more energy

24:17

to utilize it. And part of the reason

24:19

I believe is because it stimulates muscle. So

24:23

it takes anywhere from 20%

24:26

of the food that you eat to actually,

24:28

it takes 20% of that energy. So

24:31

if you're eating 100 calories of protein,

24:34

there is some contribution to

24:36

that. Then that last

24:38

meal of the day, I would say I would make

24:40

that more robust. Again, that 40 to 50 grams.

24:44

And any listener

24:46

could do this. The younger you are,

24:48

you can, muscle is typically

24:50

healthier. You can get away with a little bit less.

24:53

The older you are,

24:56

the more protein you need at once to

24:59

overcome anabolic resistance.

25:02

Skeletal muscle is fascinating in case you

25:04

were wondering what I really thought about. It's

25:07

actually a nutrient sensor. It senses

25:09

our nutrients. And it senses

25:11

leucine. And

25:13

that leucine, which is that branch,

25:15

which is that amino acid. And

25:18

that's really how we need to think about protein

25:20

is we really need to understand that protein

25:23

requirement as we age is really about

25:25

a meal threshold. 24-hour

25:28

protein is very important.

25:30

Secondarily, having

25:32

protein in discrete meals is incredibly

25:35

valuable. Because if you

25:37

don't, you won't stimulate your tissue. And

25:39

as you age, that tissue becomes

25:42

more marbled with fat.

25:44

It becomes more challenging.

25:47

The other thing is resistance exercise is

25:49

another way to stimulate tissue. And this is

25:51

where you get with a great trainer. I

25:54

typically recommend between three

25:56

and four sessions of resistance exercise.

25:59

week, but again, having

26:02

someone evaluate you as

26:04

it relates to training. And then another thing

26:07

that's overlooked is mitochondria. And

26:09

that's really the cardiovascular aspect.

26:12

And the current recommendation is 150 minutes

26:15

of moderate to vigorous activity now. And

26:17

I think as, you know, again, we're very

26:19

split. People really into resistance, training,

26:23

or they're really into cardio. But

26:25

when we think about longevity, we must address

26:27

both. Is cardio, when

26:30

I think of cardio, I think more about people trying to lose weight.

26:33

That's not a great strategy. Is it helping you build muscle

26:35

when you are just running and riding a bike?

26:37

I mean, not really. I

26:40

mean, muscle to grow requires

26:43

metabolic stress, requires mechanical

26:46

tension. Exactly. Metabolic

26:48

stress, ribosomal biogenesis, protein

26:51

and calories. Then

26:53

why do people focus so much on cardio? Is it for

26:55

heart health? Is it for other benefits? Yes.

26:58

I believe that, number one, it's very easy to do. You

27:01

don't have to have advanced knowledge

27:03

of training protocol. Machines, equipment. And

27:05

that's hard. That's hard for people. There is

27:08

that

27:08

barrier to entry. Cardiovascular, a lot of the literature,

27:11

a lot of the data

27:12

has always been done on cardio.

27:14

Again, because it's easy. You first

27:16

use rodent models, then you transition

27:18

to humans. But cardiovascular

27:21

activity is very valuable

27:23

as it relates to mitochondria function, as

27:25

it relates to energy. And there's a natural

27:27

decline as we age. Again, aging

27:30

doesn't get easier. But being able

27:32

to be strong and

27:34

capable and optimizing

27:36

for dietary protein will

27:39

be the ultimate in longevity.

27:40

And there's so much confusion

27:43

about the narrative that my fear

27:46

is when you

27:48

address it in your later life, you're

27:51

missing this huge opportunity midlife. Alzheimer's,

27:54

cardiovascular disease, they don't develop

27:57

later in life. They start in your 30s.

28:00

When I was looking at that participant's

28:02

brain,

28:03

when I was looking, we'll just call her Sarah, when I was looking at

28:05

Sarah's brain, it didn't

28:08

start then, it started

28:10

in her 30s. From nutrition

28:13

or from? Yes, from access,

28:15

from being overweight, had

28:18

she built muscle, it would have been a metabolic

28:20

buffer.

28:21

When you look at diseases

28:23

of aging, it's not the aging.

28:26

These diseases, like Alzheimer's, these

28:28

start in your 30s. Sarcopenia,

28:31

which is the big one, where sarcopenia

28:33

is loss of muscle mass and function,

28:35

which is we see people get much smaller,

28:38

that doesn't start then. It

28:41

starts much earlier. So

28:44

if you eat the way that you did in your 20s, you

28:47

have no chance of protecting your muscle. The

28:50

changes will be subtle until

28:53

one day they're not. Mm-hmm.

28:56

You just start shrinking and getting weaker. You

28:58

have increase in adipose tissue. You

29:01

now fall into the general

29:04

category of one of the millions

29:06

that are overweight, have

29:08

high blood sugar, insulin resistance,

29:12

you name it.

29:14

And it's something that happens over

29:16

time.

29:17

And if we continue the conversation that

29:20

is very distracted

29:22

about, we'll take this and we'll take

29:24

this and we'll do that, as opposed

29:26

to do the foundational things that

29:28

we have direct control over,

29:31

which is train hard, optimize

29:35

and prioritize for a protein-forward

29:37

plan, you do

29:39

those fundamental things, everything

29:42

else is gravy. That's it. So if

29:44

you focus on protein and you're trained

29:46

consistently, you should be

29:48

able to protect your muscle. And

29:51

it sounds like eliminate a lot of the health

29:53

problems or risks that could come your way. This

29:55

is the ultimate in

29:56

a muscle-centric approach.

30:02

What was the things you saw when you went to these blue

30:04

zones that they did that

30:06

maybe you weren't even thinking

30:08

they would do? Like what were the surprising

30:11

things they did? Or the unsurprising things?

30:13

Yeah, I mean, one of the few things I saw that were

30:15

kind of striking to me, it

30:17

made sense, but one was that

30:20

in Icarina, which was one of the Greek blue zones,

30:22

they eat so much wild food.

30:24

So they had wild greens, summer greens, winter greens,

30:27

they had wild mushrooms, they had wild sage tea, they

30:29

had wild fish, they had so much wild food in their

30:31

diet. We know that wild

30:33

foods are much more nutrient dense. Why?

30:36

Because they're stressed.

30:38

And stressed plants make

30:40

more protective compounds. Those protective

30:42

compounds are called phytochemicals. They

30:45

give the color and the richness and the flavor. What

30:48

people don't understand is the more flavorful a food

30:50

is naturally, the

30:52

more phytochemicals it has. Interesting.

30:55

So you go to a garden at the end of August and pick a cherry tomato

30:57

that's ripened in the hot sun that explodes

31:00

in your mouth like the most incredible flavor.

31:02

But if you go to a store bought tomato and you cut it, it's

31:04

like cardboard and tasteless. What's

31:07

the difference? It's the phytochemicals. So

31:09

flavor always follows the phytochemical

31:11

richness of a food. So not the

31:14

stuff you put on it or sauces or salt or fat

31:16

or sugar to make it taste better, which food industry

31:18

does, but just the natural flavor. So

31:21

the more flavorful a food

31:22

is, the better it is. So

31:24

they eat a lot of wild food and it's so flavorful. The

31:27

other thing that was interesting was that shepherds had

31:30

this culture of going

31:33

and knowing exactly which plants to feed their

31:35

animals at which time of year to graze

31:38

them. So with shepherd them, they'd eat all these wild plants.

31:40

But they know if this herb was coming in at this

31:42

time of year, they'd go eat this herb. And if this plant

31:44

was coming in at this time of year, they'd go eat that thing. I'm like, why are you

31:47

doing this? Because we know because the meat and

31:49

the milk tastes better when

31:50

we... Wow. And

31:53

so they were not doing it because it was

31:56

better for them or because it was for longevity or

31:58

because... Tastes better. So

32:01

it turns out that we know now that

32:03

phytochemicals are not just

32:06

in plants. And phyto

32:08

means plant. They're not just in plants.

32:10

They're also in animals. So

32:13

the work of Fred Provenza and

32:15

Stephen Van Beleut from Duke have

32:18

clearly shown that when animals

32:20

are eating a wide array of wild plants

32:23

or a wide array of, you know, planted grasses and flowers

32:25

and different things, they

32:28

will seek out medicine

32:30

in the food. So they will literally go and eat major,

32:33

like, you know, calorie crops, let's say, but then they'll

32:35

go and sample from, like, a hundred different plants

32:38

to get their medicines.

32:39

And so these wild animals,

32:42

these wild plants are being eaten and

32:44

the phytochemicals are accumulating in the

32:46

meat and the milk of these animals. So

32:49

studies have shown, for example, that

32:51

you can have as high levels of the catechins and green

32:54

tea

32:55

in goat milk. From goats eating

32:57

certain wild plants. Really? Yeah. So it's

32:59

my point. And there may be ways that even these get transmuted.

33:02

So eating regenerally raised meat. I

33:04

went to a restaurant here in L.A. last night called

33:06

Mattu, where they have regenerally raised

33:08

meat.

33:10

Was it amazing? It was amazing. Now, it wasn't as, like,

33:12

fatty and kind of like marble-like,

33:14

corn-fed meat. But it was delicious

33:17

and it was tasty and yummy and amazing. What

33:19

was this place called?

33:20

Mattu. M-A-T-U. I'll have to check it out. Really

33:23

good. From Beverly Hills. And it's...you

33:25

love it. Yeah. So good. And,

33:27

you know, you can eat

33:30

that and know you're eating from an animal that's

33:32

been well taken care of, that's living out in its natural

33:34

habitat, that's regenerating the environment, that's

33:37

storing the ecosystems, increasing biodiversity,

33:39

conserving water in the soils, that's

33:41

reducing climate change, that's producing more

33:44

nutrient-dense food, rich in phytochemicals

33:46

and good fats and more antioxidants and more

33:48

minerals and just pretty much everything. It sounds incredible.

33:50

So that was sort of a...I think

33:53

a key part of their longevity was they lived

33:55

on this stuff. You know, they used to wear shepherds and

33:58

goats and sheep with their livelihood.

34:00

What was about their relationships?

34:03

Yeah. How did that play in? Did they have certain

34:05

types of relationships with family members?

34:08

They have intimate relationships? Were they married for long

34:10

periods of time? Did they have 10 wives? What

34:13

was the whole process? One couple I

34:15

saw had a collective

34:17

age of 210. That's crazy.

34:21

So I don't know. I think

34:24

being married is definitely a key

34:26

to longevity for men.

34:27

For women, not always. Depends on if

34:29

they're happy or not. Oh, man. So

34:32

I think having a happy, healthy relationship

34:34

is such a key part of longevity.

34:37

And they were very much

34:39

in the realm of community. And it wasn't

34:41

just like this isolated relationship. They were embedded

34:44

in a context of a community that was

34:46

totally supportive, that celebrated together, that played

34:48

together, that worked together, that harvested

34:51

together, that shared sheep together, that made

34:54

cheese together. They were just doing stuff

34:56

together as part of the way of life. And

35:00

they would just stop and talk and hang

35:02

out and chill. Nobody

35:05

was starting a company. Nobody

35:09

was getting ahead and social media for

35:11

likes and followers. They

35:13

were just living

35:14

life. They weren't striving or trying

35:16

to get anywhere. They were just being. Interesting.

35:19

And so the culture was all about the

35:22

power of these incredible moments where

35:25

you share with people you love and care about and celebrate

35:27

life and enjoy life and talk. We

35:30

were driving out of this one town in Sardinia that

35:32

had these two guys that were really great and they were local

35:34

Sardinians.

35:35

And this car stops in front

35:38

of us and blocks us. And this old

35:40

guy gets out and he walks over to this stone

35:42

wall and he waves us to come over and

35:45

I'm like, what's going on here? And he

35:47

just waved us over. He wanted to talk. He saw us in

35:49

the car. He's like,

35:50

he just wanted to talk. So we sat in the stone wall

35:52

for like an hour or so and chit chatted about

35:54

life and about his life. He was karma. He

35:57

was 85 years

35:59

old and.

35:59

We were a vibrant, fit guy. And

36:02

he started telling us about his life and how there was a mudslide

36:04

that destroyed the village he grew up in, which they

36:06

moved the town a little bit higher on the mountain. But

36:09

he still had his farm on that old area.

36:11

He's all family land. He took us down, he had like

36:13

six sheep, and he had a pig, and he had some chickens,

36:16

and he had orchards, and he had a whole garden

36:18

where he grew eggplants and peppers and tomatoes

36:20

and zucchini and herbs and spices. It

36:23

was amazing. He literally took care of his entire

36:25

property by himself at 85 years old.

36:27

I mean, I wouldn't think I could do it. And

36:30

then I'm chasing this guy up this hill after

36:32

his sheep, and I'm like, wow, I can't keep up with this guy.

36:35

He's 85 years old.

36:37

And so he was super vibrant, mentally

36:40

sharp. He lived

36:42

with his family, and

36:44

they just had this incredibly deep culture. There wasn't nursing

36:46

homes. I met old woman Julia,

36:48

who was 103 months. You

36:51

know, like I said, I'm 105 and three quarters. She's

36:54

like, I'm 103 months. And she was like, didn't

36:57

have kids, and lived with her

36:59

niece and nephew, who loved her and took care of her. I mean,

37:01

she was still working. She was still working making

37:03

all this stuff, her weddings, all the little tablecloths

37:06

and doilies and embroidery stuff. I

37:08

don't know how to do that, she was making all this

37:10

stuff, and she was so bright,

37:13

and still was walking around every day

37:15

and taking her walks and hanging out with everybody and her friends.

37:17

And it was really amazing to see this culture

37:20

where people were not ostracized

37:22

or excluded, but

37:23

they were included in life. And it doesn't

37:26

sound like they're hustling for something. They're

37:28

working hard to maintain their life, like

37:31

their home, their farm, their land, whatever

37:33

they have, maybe their small business, but they're not hustling

37:36

for something greater, is that right? Yeah,

37:38

no. Why

37:40

can you live long and still

37:42

hustle? Hustle or

37:44

just want more? Want to build

37:46

something greater in your life? I think you can. I

37:48

think it's really about

37:50

what happens on the inside because one

37:52

of the biggest things that regulates

37:54

your epigenome is your mind. So

37:57

your biggest pharmacy in your body is between...

38:00

It's the most powerful pharmacy in the world. And

38:04

you can activate it for good or bad.

38:06

So when we are having thoughts that are

38:08

stressful

38:09

thoughts,

38:12

when we're in toxic relationships, when

38:14

we're worried or anxious, when we

38:17

aren't in harmony with ourselves,

38:20

it activates all these really

38:23

nasty pathways that drive inflammation

38:25

and harm your mitochondria industry. I mean, your microbiome

38:28

is listening in on your thoughts. It's eavesdropping.

38:31

So those bugs don't like it when you are

38:33

not happy. Really? Yeah.

38:36

What is the process of that from an idea, a thought into

38:38

the mitochondria?

38:39

How does that transfer into a healthy

38:43

information, into a physical manifestation

38:46

versus unhealthy information,

38:48

data and a thought into physical,

38:50

unhealthy? So what's the biochemistry

38:53

of it? Well, for example, if

38:55

you're stressed, you're producing cortisol

38:57

and adrenaline and all these other hormones

39:00

and proteins that then will trigger

39:02

a whole cascade of downstream effects that activate

39:05

transcription factors, that transcription

39:08

factors that turn on genes that cause

39:10

inflammation and all these other problems. So

39:12

you're basically creating inflammatory

39:15

thoughts or creating inflammation in your body, literally.

39:18

Isn't that crazy? And you have receptors

39:20

on your immune cells, for example, for

39:23

neurotransmitters. So if

39:25

you're stressed, your immune

39:27

system is eavesdropping on your thoughts. That's

39:30

why if you're stressed, you are more likely to have an

39:32

infection or get sick or have other

39:34

bad health consequences. Why do you think it is that our body is

39:37

built this way that a thought can either make

39:39

us feel and physically

39:41

transform into joy and

39:44

health, more feel sick and

39:46

then become sick? Why do

39:48

you think our body... Why, from an evolutionary point of view,

39:50

how do we... Why do you think that is? Isn't that crazy?

39:52

It's a crazy thought, right? You think something, it's not actually...it's in

39:54

your mind,

39:56

right? Where it...and it's like...and then it transfers

39:58

into your body. Well, I think I think

40:00

I don't know Lewis but I think you know We

40:03

have have a built-in stress response system,

40:05

which we need it Like if we're getting chased

40:07

by a saber-toothed tiger

40:09

Well, you know We didn't get on the move right

40:11

and we need to like run jack up our cortisol

40:14

and pump our blood sugar up and get our blood

40:16

pressure up and in our heart rate up and Flood

40:18

our body with glucose and you know, just all

40:20

this stuff that needs to love Yeah, it's like,

40:22

you know the story like how someone's you know These

40:25

are kid under a car and can lift up a car like

40:27

why can that happen? Right because we have the system

40:29

built in to deal with acute stress.

40:32

That's a good thing the problem

40:34

is we have a Society in a

40:36

life that drives chronic unmitigated

40:39

unrelenting stress

40:40

So unless you are very clear

40:42

about how to discharge that stress because

40:45

we can't avoid it, right? But how do you discharge

40:47

it? How do you not react and how do you

40:49

have a different perception of relationship and what's happening

40:51

to you? Yeah, it's all about perception, right? So

40:54

I always say stresses the perception of

40:56

a real or imagined threat to your body.

40:58

So it could be a real threat to your body Like

41:00

a tiger chasing you or it could be an imagined threat

41:03

to your ego Like you think your wife's cheating on you, but she's

41:05

not and you get the same physiology or

41:08

you can have the same input Let's say James

41:10

Bond and I put a gun to your head

41:12

versus Woody Allen Give me a very different

41:14

set of responses, right same input

41:17

very different response So that's the beauty of

41:19

our minds is we have the power over our thoughts.

41:22

You remember Victor Frankl who wrote

41:24

Man's Search for Meaning. He said between stimulus

41:26

and response There's a pause

41:29

and in that pause lies a choice and

41:31

in that choice lies our freedom For

41:34

those of you don't know about Victor Frankl He

41:36

was an Auschwitz and he was a psychiatrist in

41:38

Auschwitz and he chose not to

41:40

let

41:41

Even the most horrific thing that's almost

41:44

ever happened to human beings Affect

41:46

his own well-being and happiness

41:49

in her life. Yeah, that just blows my mind,

41:51

right? So when you think oh my life this

41:53

and that we always have a choice, you know

41:56

And and whether you have stuff or don't have stuff.

41:58

It's all about our perceptions

41:59

So mindset and your thoughts

42:02

are a key part of longevity and

42:04

health and having meaning and purpose That was the other

42:06

thing in these cultures. They had so much meaning and

42:08

purpose like like Carmine had

42:10

such purpose He had to go and take care of his sheep

42:12

and he had to feed his family And he he wanted

42:14

to support the other members of the community by giving them

42:16

food and he fed his animals the extra And so he he

42:18

was had a meaningful life and he also had

42:21

a very active mind was reading books and learning

42:23

all the time So, you know that that extends

42:25

your life after seven years Wow

42:28

Having meaning and purpose because

42:31

you hear the story sometimes of like, you

42:33

know someone in their older years Their

42:36

husband or their wife dies and then within

42:39

six months or a year later. They they die

42:41

or a week later Yeah, a week later, right? You hear

42:43

that story off all the time

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43:56

Is that because their meaning

43:59

has lost or just? more they have a broken heart

44:01

and they don't know how to...both. I mean there actually

44:04

is a phenomena of a broken heart.

44:06

I had a patient with this one so had this incredible wife

44:08

they were deeply in love they were married for decades

44:11

and decades she got breast cancer and died and

44:13

he was relatively healthy and all of a sudden he went

44:15

into heart failure. Come on.

44:17

Like boom. And it's in the medical literature

44:19

it's literally a broken heart and it

44:21

causes actual clinical

44:24

heart failure where your heart muscle can't

44:26

pump the blood around. That's

44:28

from...what is that from? Is that

44:30

from thinking and then feeling

44:32

the heart you know the pain in your

44:35

heart? Yeah it's the physiological

44:37

phenomena that happen

44:39

when you have a stress response the flood of all these stress

44:41

molecules in your body that damages the

44:43

heart.

44:47

Let's say that you were able to give a

44:49

five-step process for someone who's 30

44:53

pounds of belly fat or

44:55

around there. 20 to 30 pounds of body fat and

44:58

they were like you know what from once in my life I

45:01

want to get like at least a flat stomach. Yeah

45:03

maybe it's not gonna be super defined and under 8% body fat

45:05

but 12% body fat roughly 10% and I could get

45:12

close. Sure.

45:14

Everything we talked about from sleep

45:16

to emotional stress to nutrition to

45:18

we haven't talked about calories in calories out or

45:21

lifting and things like that yet but from other things we

45:23

talked about

45:24

if you had to give a five you

45:26

know bullet point process of

45:28

like this would be the foundational steps to

45:31

get you started on losing that 30 pounds

45:33

of belly fat what would you say? Yeah

45:35

I'd say and I've talked about this before step

45:38

one

45:39

very clear and defined breaks

45:42

between meals whether

45:44

you are snacking or not what

45:46

I mean by that is rather than

45:48

grazing throughout the day and constantly

45:51

keeping insulin levels high

45:53

I find it much people have

45:55

much more success by having very clear defined

45:58

gaps so I don't if you're

46:00

fasting or not, but eat breakfast and have a

46:02

very clear and defined break until lunch.

46:04

Have a very clear and defined break until dinner. Allow

46:07

yourself the ability for insulin levels to come back down,

46:10

glucagon levels to come up, so that you're

46:12

actually getting into a fat burning process

46:14

between these meals. Every time

46:17

you're consuming something, you're kind of stopping

46:19

that process for a little bit.

46:21

Even if your calories are, yes,

46:24

that comes into equation, but you need to

46:26

have these peaks and valleys. A little break between

46:28

consumption. Now, can you

46:30

consume water, teas, coffees,

46:34

anything else? For sure. Anything zero calorie. I

46:36

think people will naturally eat

46:40

less doing that too, but

46:43

I do think that we have to take little bits from

46:45

the calories equation and little bits from carb insulin

46:47

model and meld them together instead of having these two camps

46:49

that are largely opposed. That's where I say,

46:52

hey, this seems like an equal, delicate, thoughtful

46:55

acknowledgement of both sides. You're probably going

46:57

to eat less by having these clear defined meals, but you're also

46:59

taking into account letting insulin levels come

47:01

back down nice and low and you're not keeping them chronically

47:04

elevated, which you know is not good either. So

47:06

that's usually rule number one. Okay. Step

47:08

one. Step number two is

47:11

very similar, but I say,

47:12

have a minimum, like 12

47:15

hour break between your last meal

47:17

of the day and your first meal of the day. 12 hour

47:20

fasting minimum. It's not really a fast, right?

47:22

It's no even don't eat after eat. Exactly. I

47:24

feel like there's a reason

47:26

why

47:27

you get your blood work done after a 12 hour fast,

47:30

right? Things tend to come back down to homeostasis.

47:33

Give yourself a chance to get

47:35

back down to this balance. There's a

47:37

multitude of different reasons why it's beneficial. Insulin

47:40

levels getting lower, insulin sensitivity

47:42

getting much better. So the food that you do eat with breakfast

47:44

is going to be much more

47:46

able to be taken up and utilized, which

47:48

leads into step three, a breakfast

47:51

like a king, lunch like a prince,

47:54

dinner like a popper, right? So you're kind of tapering as the day goes

47:56

on. So larger meals in the morning,

47:58

if you're not fast.

47:59

which we'll talk about here later. If

48:02

you're not fasting, having a larger meal

48:04

in the morning is generally going

48:07

to be better. If you look at the research, it's

48:09

very, very clear that people that have a larger

48:11

breakfast end up eating smaller

48:13

lunches and smaller dinners naturally. Because

48:16

they feel satiated, right?

48:19

That doesn't mean that you go eat a box of Froot

48:21

Loops or Cheerios for breakfast. With

48:24

that, I'll dovetail into a slightly different

48:26

piece that coincides with that. There was a BMC

48:29

medical genomics study that's probably one of my favorite studies

48:32

that demonstrated that you can have higher

48:34

fat content in the morning

48:36

because you end up starting the day with

48:39

more insulin-sensitive muscles and less

48:41

insulin-sensitive fat cells. What that means

48:43

is you have less likelihood of storing

48:46

fat as fat in the morning,

48:48

and that way you start your

48:50

day with higher fat, higher calorically

48:53

dense meals. So maybe steak and eggs, something

48:55

like that, without a bunch of hyper-palatable

48:58

carbs, right? Something

48:59

that's calorically dense. And then as the day

49:01

goes on, taper calories. Carbohydrates

49:05

are lower calorie than fats, even

49:07

though they do spike your glucose and spike your insulin.

49:10

It's okay to have those at night if you're

49:12

not overdoing it. So a lot of times what I will

49:14

do is I will have a higher fat breakfast. I will

49:16

have something like steak and eggs for breakfast, or

49:18

usually like steak and ground beef. I'm

49:21

a big fan of that Joe's scramble kind of thing that you do, right?

49:24

With a little bit of goat cheese, a little bit of feta, maybe some

49:26

like a mox, make it very Mediterranean. And

49:28

that's pretty high fat, so it's calorically

49:31

dense, right? It ends up being like 800 calories,

49:33

right?

49:34

Then as the day goes on, like a slightly smaller

49:36

lunch, and if I am having carbohydrates,

49:38

they're usually allocated to the evening time. That

49:40

doesn't mean I'm having cakes and pies. It means maybe I'll have

49:42

some lentils. Maybe I'll have something

49:44

Mediterranean, right?

49:46

Then that's going to naturally be lower calorie

49:49

because there's not as many fats in it. I'm

49:52

largely Mediterranean, I'm mostly

49:55

Italian. So it's like I look back at that and my grandmother

49:57

was always kind of saying she always had these light dinners, these light

49:59

dinners.

49:59

little teeny dinners. That's why. It's

50:02

just like when you look at a lot of the Mediterranean cultures and

50:04

with the exception of when they're having big feasts

50:06

and stuff for special events, like a lot of times they are

50:09

having really small dinners and they're like

50:11

shutting it down right after dinner. It's like maybe

50:13

they'll have a little bit of coffee or whatever it

50:16

is they're having and then go right to sleep. Which

50:19

then you go into step four is your

50:21

diet should optimize your sleep.

50:23

That's something that we kind of talked about

50:25

in the beginning, but the best way that you can optimize your

50:28

sleep without really

50:30

digging super deep into what

50:33

is stressing you out and causing this sort of internal

50:35

battles that might be keeping you up.

50:37

Cutting your food out a few hours before bed

50:40

is usually very, very powerful for people. And

50:43

that, again, it nicely coincides with everything I'm

50:45

talking about. If you're having those

50:47

12-hour breaks between dinner and

50:50

breakfast,

50:51

well, then the earlier you eat your dinner

50:53

and cut it down, shut it down,

50:55

the earlier you can eat breakfast the next day. If

50:57

you stop eating dinner at 6 p.m., you're done

51:00

eating, then by 6 a.m., you're good to eat again. And

51:02

chances are you're not going to roll out of bed at 5.59 and

51:05

immediately go eat at 6. You're probably going

51:07

to naturally end up fasting longer and

51:09

you don't have to be a quote unquote intermittent faster. You're

51:11

naturally kind of getting into that category.

51:14

Okay. And number five. And number

51:16

five, and this is something that you

51:19

pull the throttle on or hit the throttle on occasionally.

51:23

You want to temporarily, like when it's

51:25

time to really pull that lever,

51:27

temporarily reduce fats and then bring

51:29

them back up. Right? So that's sort

51:31

of my lever, right? If I'm following all four of these lifestyle

51:33

principles and things are working

51:36

but not working as fast as I want, what

51:38

I will temporarily do is reduce fats

51:40

out of the diet, even if I'm low carb. Okay.

51:43

This just sounds crazy, right? But then bring them back

51:45

in once weight has started to come off.

51:48

People forget that even if you're doing, and I'm largely

51:50

a low carb guy, so I catch

51:53

heat for saying this sometimes, but fats

51:55

are still calorically dense. So

51:57

it's the easiest lever to pull from

51:59

a food. volume standpoint to dramatically

52:02

reduce calories really quick

52:04

and then be able to bring them back because what you don't want to

52:06

do is you don't want to have

52:08

just this point where you're chronically

52:11

restricting calories forever and ever and ever. And

52:13

then the moment that you do come back up, your body's like,

52:15

oh shoot, put the weight back on. Yeah,

52:18

it's not fun. I actually think, and there's recent research

52:20

to back this up, that keeping calories

52:22

moderately high and then having aggressive

52:25

short-term drops

52:26

like reducing fats and bringing calories low for

52:28

a couple of days and then back up can actually

52:30

be very, very effective, which is probably why

52:33

fasting works so well for a lot of people that

52:35

just do it at random. Yeah. Like

52:38

they'll just be like, I'm eating six days per week normal and then

52:40

I do a 24 hour fast once per week. It's great because you're

52:42

never letting your body get accustomed to this decline

52:45

in calories. You're just like status

52:47

quo, status quo, whoa, what's going on? Then

52:49

back up to normal. Who do you recommend fasting

52:51

for and who do you not recommend it for?

52:54

I don't think there's many people that

52:57

shouldn't do fasting to a certain degree, right? But

52:59

there's a large degree of different kinds of fasting.

53:01

There's 24 hour fasting, there's 16 hours. Exactly.

53:04

And like a 16 hour fast, if you want to put the label on

53:06

it, you can call yourself intermittent fasting,

53:08

but there's a lot of people out there that are probably intermittent fasting

53:11

that don't know they're intermittent fasting, right? So 16

53:13

hours is pretty, I think the benefits

53:15

start at 16 hours. So someone

53:18

doing a 16 eight fasting,

53:19

that usually works. But the reason that that's

53:22

working is for two simple reasons. The caloric

53:24

restriction and insulin being lower. Nothing

53:27

magical is happening with a 16 hour fast,

53:29

but when you start creeping over that 16 hour mark

53:31

is when the benefits start to kick in. So I

53:33

personally, I fast usually three

53:36

days per week with a 20 or 21 hour fast. So

53:38

I'm still eating two meals and I just do

53:40

it three days per week, so it's kind of intermittent.

53:43

I can't think of a lot of people that wouldn't

53:45

have success doing that because

53:47

almost everyone that even thinks they wouldn't

53:50

be able to do it,

53:51

they might get hungry the first couple of times and then after

53:53

that it's a cakewalk. It's not

53:56

now people that have serious hypoglycemia

53:58

issues, they should probably be.

53:59

conscious of it. That being said, and full

54:02

disclaimer, I'm not a doctor, I'm not a dietician,

54:05

but even people that are dealing with hypoglycemia,

54:07

a lot of times getting their bodies adjusted

54:10

to periods of time without food is

54:12

actually a good thing because it teaches their body to

54:14

be able to utilize alternative fuel sources

54:17

so they're not reliant on this undulation and glucose.

54:21

There are certain people that

54:22

if you're very, very, very, very

54:24

active, then yeah, it might not work for you.

54:27

Everyone that's working crazy manual

54:29

labor construction. I'm sure

54:31

there's different situations, clinical

54:34

conditions that people shouldn't fast. And

54:37

those, yeah, defer to your doctor. But as far as general

54:39

people,

54:40

I can't really think of anyone that wouldn't get some

54:42

benefit out of it. I hope you enjoyed today's

54:44

episode and it inspired you on your

54:47

journey towards greatness. Make sure to check

54:49

out the show notes in the description for a full

54:51

rundown of today's episode with all

54:54

the important links. And if you want weekly

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55:21

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55:24

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55:26

you matter. And now it's time

55:29

to go out there and do something

55:31

great.