Let's Say Hello

[00:00:49.580] – Allan
Hey, Raz, how are things going?

[00:00:52.190] – Rachel
Good. Allan, how are you today?

[00:00:54.220] – Allan
I'm doing well. As this goes live, I'll actually be back in Bocas. We're finishing up our trip right now as we're recording this. But by the time this goes live, in a few weeks, we'll be back in Bocas, trying to run Lula's now as a full bed breakfast. And I'm now becoming the tech guru to run the computer systems and things like that. It's not been easy. So that's been the hardest part. Just figuring out what you've got to do to run a restaurant and getting the rules for Panama

[00:01:27.400] – Allan
is one thing. But then you're like, okay, here's the booking engine. And now we have to find a credit card processor that will work out of Panama. Tammy's trying to start a bank account, but it's like, is almost impossible. The banker traveled to our island from the mainland and met with my wife, and there was all these papers that Tammy needs to fill out or needed to fill out. And so I think Tammy is going to have to take a trip to the mainland and then spend hours with them to just try to get a bank account open so we can take money in and run our credit cards.

[00:02:03.800] – Allan
So a little bit, a little missing pieces as we go about that. So it'd be really busy the first few weeks once we get back, because there's just so much to do.

[00:02:15.080] – Rachel
Yeah, sounds like a lot. It's all those little behind the scenes things that tend to eat up your time. But I hope you've had a good vacation while you've been here in the States.

[00:02:24.880] – Allan
I did. We realized because we went to Mexico first, and then we came to the States that we were just beat. And it sounds weird, but the vacation you're at different kind of tired. So it's almost like a lot of people say I need a vacation from my vacation, but, no, we put over 4000 miles on this car. And we're not even done. So it'll be abouti'm, guessing right now probably closer to 4500 miles that will put on the car total before we turn it back in.

[00:03:00.890] – Allan
And that's just a lot of time. It's a lot of driving. We broke the trips up, and we were able to see everybody we could see it was a really productive trip, but productive in vacation don't typically go together in the same Senate. So I'll probably need some time to kind of decompress when I get back. Vacation from a vacation.

[00:03:24.160] – Rachel
For sure, traveling can be very exhausting, especially all the places you've seen.

[00:03:29.980] – Allan
So how are things up there?

[00:03:32.100] – Rachel
Good. Really great. Our weather is starting to change, and here in Michigan our leaves are starting to change colors. It's just the beginning of our fall season. So it's about to be gorgeous up here. But over the weekend, Mike and I ran a half marathon, and I just want to brag on him a bit because he set a new half marathon PR. And I just want to remind everybody we just turned 50. We're not spring chickens anymore, but he just set a new PR. So this year, he has a new PR for the 5K, the 10K, and the half marathon.

[00:04:05.890] – Rachel
He has just gotten so much faster in the last couple of years, and I'm really proud and excited for him.

[00:04:12.540] – Allan
And he's in that real sweet spot of the 50 to 55 range. So he's the young and running in the group, running some of his best. He's probably winning medals and having some really good races.

[00:04:24.450] – Rachel
I think we have won some metals in our age bracket so far, but he came in 4th in his age division in this half marathon. He needed to shave nine more minutes off his time. And I want to say his time was 1 hour and 42 minutes for the half. And so I think the guy was in the 130s that just beat him off the podium. So there's some fast people in our age brackets. Seriously fast.

[00:04:53.980] – Allan
Maybe they'll age out before he does.

[00:04:56.400] – Rachel
I hope so. Yeah. Fingers crossed. We can catch up.

[00:05:01.920] – Rachel
That's so exciting.

[00:05:02.880] – Allan
All right. Well, when the weather changes, it's time for me to fly south. This year, we did the traveling to see family earlier because in September is the downtime in focus. And so this when we decided to just go ahead and try to shut down, but we actually had monthly renters in there. But this is the thing where it's like, okay, we're going to shut down and we're not going to worry about this. And we'll go. And so we're going to be traveling more during this time in September.

[00:05:31.940] – Allan
And I can just tell you going to Indiana, North Carolina and Miami. It's a much nicer time of the year. Weather wise to be there. It wasn't cold. And in fact, I think I might have put on a sweatshirt once.

[00:05:44.420] – Rachel
Oh, wow. Good.

[00:05:45.410] – Allan
I was able to wear jeans. I don't wear jeans.

[00:05:47.980] – Allan
I wore jeans a couple of times, and I was thinking when I got here I might have to buy more of it now the weather stayed nice the whole time. And so I'm still wearing shorts.

[00:05:58.210] – Rachel
Fantastic.

[00:05:59.830] – Allan
looking forward to kind of getting back to my bocas routine, starting the training for that tough Mudder in August. It's August 27th. If you're interested, you can go to 40PlusFitnesspodcast.com/Chicago and they used to call it a classic, and they made some changes to their website since last time I looked at it. So now it's a 15K. So there's a 15K and some of the children's runs on Saturday and then on Sunday they're doing a 10K and a 5K.

[00:06:30.090] – Allan
And so there are different distances in this. If you don't think you're up to the 15K, which was the classic, I think they're shortening it a little bit because it'll be closer to nine and a half miles, then the ten to twelve that it used to be, but it's still 24 25 obstacles. So it's going to be the full array of those. But if anybody's interested, go to 40PlusFitnesspodcast.com/Chicago as we get closer to the event, if you're telling me you're going to be there, I'm on the 10 to 10 45 run.

[00:07:01.290] – Allan
So if you've signed up and you're in that same run, let me know and we meet up and do some of the course together because it very much is a team style, even if you're not on a team or bring a team, everybody's helping everybody. So you're trying to climb out of a mud pit, everybody's helping you climb out of the mud pit and then you're turning around and helping them get out of the mud pit. So it's a really cool run. It's very, very personal.

[00:07:24.610] – Allan
You need a lot of people and it's tough, tough mudder, but it is a fun run. So if you're interested in doing that, then let me know if you're in the area and I'll know more as they get closer to where they're actually going to host it. It can be anywhere within 2 miles of Chicago. They're going to call it the Chicago Tough mudder, but we'll be in a general area. So if you're in the area, maybe we do something that Saturday night, have a dinner or something.

[00:07:48.790] – Allan
If anybody's in the area, we can figure it out. But again, it's on the 27th of August, the ten to 10:45 run. And if you go to the website, you can sign up for that now. I think they're gonna be well by the time this goes live, Unfortunately, they probably raise their prices a little bit. That's kind of how they run with it is the prices go up. They have early bird and then they kind of raise the prices so you might pay a little bit more than someone else paid.

[00:08:13.740] – Allan
But for what you get in all the fund, it's well worth.

[00:08:17.200] – Rachel
It sounds awesome.

[00:08:18.830] – Allan
Alright, so you want to have a conversation with Dr. Foster?

[00:08:22.880] – Rachel
Sure.

Interview

[00:08:57.920] – Allan
Dr. Foster, welcome to 40+ Fitness.

[00:09:01.000] – Dr. Foster
Thanks, Allan. It's a pleasure to be with you.

[00:09:03.410] – Allan
So today we're here to talk about your book, The Shift: Seven Powerful Mindset Changes for Lasting Weight Loss. And it's one of the things that has really kind of hit me over the last six years of doing this, is that for most of us, any substantive change that we make in our life has to start ahead. We have to fix our mindset first and then the good things happen. It almost never ever is going to work the other way.

[00:09:30.550] – Dr. Foster
That's exactly right. And I think for most people that's a little counterintuitive when most people are starting on a weight or wellness journey, their first thoughts and often their only thoughts are, what do I eat? How do I move and really get pretty granular about that? Is it low carb, high protein, low fat? Is it strength resistance training? Is it hit? There's a lot of stuff going through people's minds and what you eat and how you move is certainly important for your wellness. I think the missing ingredient and the thing that people most underestimate over my 30 years of clinical and research experience is the most important component to a wellness journey is your mindset.

[00:10:16.630] – Dr. Foster
And simply put, your mindset is how you think about the journey. But also importantly about how you think about yourself.

[00:10:25.290] – Allan
Yeah. My path to taking care of myself. I was not healthy. I was not fit doing great my career. That was wonderful. So what I call one for three and overall realized that was probably the worst one that I should have been focusing on. But I didn't like myself quite honestly at that point in my life, I really didn't like myself. And for the next eight years effectively punished myself to try to fix me. And so it wasn't until I came to this realization that the lacking component was compassion and love.

[00:10:59.700] – Allan
And you put that as the first mindset change and kind of really the only way this is ever going to happen is you got to get this done first. Can you talk about self compassion and why it's so important?

[00:11:12.640] – Dr. Foster
Yeah. First, Congratulations on your success. I know about your success, and it's quite impressive. And I really applaud the efforts you're doing to get that message out. That it's how you think about yourself and the journey that makes a difference. And you're right. The book starts, it's about seven different shifts that have science-based, proven techniques to help you with your wellness journey. In fact, any journey in life. But to your point, self compassion is the basis of all of it. If you look at the way most people start a journey of any sort, whether to your point, it's in your professional life or a wellness journey or a weight journey or any self improvement journey, people often view it in a deficit model.

[00:12:00.130] – Dr. Foster
So what do I have to fix? What deficiencies do I have? And that just doesn't really feel that great. Right? If instead you can build from a position of strength, not weaknesses, what strengths do I have that can help me achieve my goals. And that's all predicated on self compassion. And that basically says that I'm worth taking care of that any self improvement project that I undertake, whether it's personal, professional, whatever it is, is based on my own value, as is without any change, I am worth taking care of.

[00:12:41.140] – Dr. Foster
And that's a position of strength, and that generates power for the journey. Alternatively, I hear this a lot have been a clinical health psychologist for over 30 years, working with lots of people elbow to elbow knee to knee in their weight loss journey. I hear often that they start out at a point where weak-willed, I'm undisciplined, I have terrible eating habits, and I often say that's you you're talking about, you need yourself to be successful in this journey. And that's why self compassion is so critical.

[00:13:18.400] – Allan
Yeah. And if you don't have self compassion, I think a lot of these other things we're going to talk about, we're going to end up kind of circling back to that because you can't really see these things or do anything about it. And the next one I wanted to talk about was the unhelpful thinking and the reason this one resonated with me so much was, wow, I used to do that all the time. Wow, I used to do that all the time. Three out of the four I was guilty of practically every day of my life up until maybe even still today.

[00:13:48.520] – Allan
Occasionally I find myself with some of this unhelpful thinking. Can you go over the four categories that you had? The main ones that once we do probably the most because like I said, I saw myself in most of them.

[00:14:00.040] – Dr. Foster
Yeah, I'm sure happy to. The fundamental premise is what we think influences what we do. So if you think about different, this is steeped in 60 years of research and cognitive therapy without getting into all the details. It really is how fundamental, how basic our thought patterns are driving what we feel and what we do. So accepting that science, then there are styles that I've observed over my clinical career that really get in the way of a successful wellness journey is one is all or none. And this is things are great or they're terrible.

[00:14:37.180] – Dr. Foster
I'm on a diet or I'm off a diet. It's a good food or it's a bad food. It's viewing the world and any interaction that you encounter with as all or none. Light bulb thinking, black and white thinking lots of ways to think about that. And the problem with that essentially is that the world is not like that. And the most frequent off ramps to the journey are precipitated by these kind of unhelpful thinking styles. They're thinking styles that make you just say, the heck with it.

[00:15:09.160] – Dr. Foster
One day I've blown it. Really? So anyway, that's the first one, all or none, the other is once makes always. And I hear this frequently. So somebody will have a rough day that in it as they plan. They didn't work out as they plan. In a non wait world, people can say things like, Well, this is the way it always goes. A watch out for this kind of thinking is when you hear yourself saying things like never, always. Those are signals that that's rarely true and that you're taking one event and extrapolating that to believe it will always happen and it will never change.

[00:15:47.740] – Dr. Foster
The third is negative filtering. And again, this happens both in wellness journeys and in work journeys. I'll take the work journey in the first case here, if you get feedback from your supervisor in an annual review or quarterly review that on four criteria, you're knocking out of the park on three. But there's room for development and for opportunity and for growth on a fourth. If you're a negative filter, all you think about is that fourth one and you start to worry about your job. And is it secure?

[00:16:21.420] – Dr. Foster
And it gets you down into this swirl of negative thinking and not seeing the big picture. So it's really trying to make a mountain out of a molehill, but in an overly negative way. And the fourth, which is less common. But I put it in the book because I've seen it frequently. And also it gets across this point that the key to this is not just positive thinking. It's realistic thinking and this style that's not helpful. It's called Don't Worry, Be Happy. And these are people who go through life and again in a variety of different arenas and just say, oh, it'll get better.

[00:16:59.250] – Dr. Foster
Well, how do you think it will get better? I'm not sure it'll get better. Tomorrow will be a better day. And while that initial optimism is helpful and we're not encouraging people to be overly negative, plans work better than platitudes, it's important to say, okay, if tomorrow is going to be a better day, how will it be a different day? How will it be a different day? So those are the styles that I've noticed over my 30 years in the field that can get in the way and in simple tweaks, a technique that we talk a lot in the book about is called a reality check.

[00:17:32.700] – Dr. Foster
So when you have these thoughts, ask yourself, you can do it from a couple of different ways. One is, what would a good friend say to you? And we can talk more about that, because that's also a good self compassion technique. But the other is to act those almost as if you're a lawyer. So what are the facts to support that I have no willpower or here I go again, or I'll never be able to be successful. What are the facts to support that? And that kind of reality check can help do a check on that thinking and help you develop more helpful, more realistically, more realistic thoughts.

[00:18:07.260] – Allan
And the way I like to talk to people about these realistic thoughts a lot of times in the moment, you don't know you're doing this. It's almost invisible to you because it's just second nature is that after something goes wrong, I always find it valuable to first with the self compassion, forgive yourself and then second analyze what happened. You know, you go in and you get stressed on Friday afternoon, and so you leave there you go to the bar, you have a couple of beers to calm down and relax, and then you say, okay, yeah, sure

[00:18:38.730] – Allan
I'll go ahead and get the pizza and then you eat the whole pizza. You go home and you're like, Well, I sort of blew it. I blew the day. I might as well blow the whole weekend. And so that's your all or non thinking after. And so you realize then, okay, what happened? Well, I went there and I probably would have done better to go to the park and go for a walk. So the next time I find myself really stressed out on a Friday evening, I'm gonna go to the park and I'm gonna walk around for a little while instead of going to the bar and having a couple of beers and that's kind of that way you can take that and get to the reality of it is this is not who you are.

[00:19:13.880] – Allan
This is just an action and a point in time. And if you focus on the why it happened and get to the trigger, then you can take and avoid that unhelpful thinking and take it to the next step of saying, okay, what is the plan? What is the better action for me next time this happens? That slip to success model that I like to use with my clients is really just that three steps of reality based thinking. It happened. I can't undo it. I can't uneat the pizza, I can't undrink the beer, but I can do something better next time.

[00:19:47.420] – Dr. Foster
Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more. And I like the way that you think about that. At first you start with self compassion and self forgiveness. This is not a time to beat yourself up, self flagellation does not worth self improvement. It just doesn't. The other thing I liked about what you said, and we use this. One of my favorite phrases, clinically is ask how. Don't ask why, because if you can go retrospectively, as you just did in that example, about stress leads to a couple of beers, leads to ordering pizza.

[00:20:18.250] – Dr. Foster
You can look at each step in what we call behavioral chain and think about Where's the weakest link is that could you have avoided the stress? Could you have managed the stress differently? Could you have had the beers and not had the pizza? There's lots of ways. And then you're in charge of your destiny the next time. And the question is, if it didn't go well, how did it not go well? And how can it be improved in the future? And alternatively, if it did go well, how did it go well, so you can rinse and repeat on that rather than thinking that the stars and the moon were like, no, you made that happen.

[00:20:51.710] – Dr. Foster
So I like so much about the way you think about it in terms of looking back, having self for business and putting yourself in charge of, where could I do it differently the next time?

[00:21:02.720] – Allan
One of the things you did in the book that I really like, because I got the thinking through some of this. It seems like every time someone wants to change themselves, they want to improve their weaknesses. I'm going to eat healthier, so I'm going to lose some weight. I'm going to go to the gym five days a week, even though I hate the gym and I'm not really good at it. Or I'm going to go ahead and do this couch to 5K. Even though I've never really run in my life, we always seem to want to pick the weakest point of us and start working on that thinking that's going to give us the best return on our investment.

[00:21:39.140] – Allan
But the reality is quite opposite that we need to actually double down on our strengths to be successful in this journey. Can you talk a little bit about that?

[00:21:49.990] – Dr. Foster
Sure. Again, it's very common when people embrace a journey or embark on a journey to start thinking about what's wrong. It's sort of like a fix it model. And in some ways again, it's yourself you're talking about and treating yourself with some positive self regard and saying, what do I bring to this experience? What are my strengths just has a different feel to it. Then here's a long laundry list of things that I need to fix. I can think of a patient I worked with an extremely successful entrepreneur, had established a really robust retail experience, had been through the ups and downs of recessions and lots of industry pressures, lots of near bank foreclosures on the business, really high stress and was now on the other side of it and was trying to manage her weight and when she started on the weight journey, she was very quick to judge herself very quick for harsh characterizations of who she was as a person.

[00:23:00.040] – Dr. Foster
I can never follow this through. I'm not persistent. I don't have any discipline. And can we just stop for a second? Let's just talk about what you've done in your career. What are some character strengths that you have that you would think that helped you? And the first thing she said was perseverance is that no matter what was going on in the business, internally, externally, I was able to persevere. And just that little shift of getting her to think I am someone who perseveres changes the narrative, the self narrative, which is ultimately the most important one on how she can persevere through this journey.

[00:23:38.930] – Dr. Foster
And again, I want to be clear when we say character strengths. There's a whole science of positive psychology behind this. This isn't making judgments about this is good and this is bad. This is a weakness. This is a deficit. We all have character strengths. And helping, what we do in the book is help people identify what their character strengths are so they can leverage that. And again, at the end of the day, it's that slight shift in mindset that if I'm starting with something that feels good to me, something I'm good at.

[00:24:10.260] – Dr. Foster
I'm pretty good at this. That gives you a sense of self efficacy, of confidence, that I can leverage a skill set I have rather than going in this forever elusive pursuit of like a Whack Amole game of trying to whack down every weakness I have.

[00:24:26.980] – Allan
Yeah. You had a link to a strength profile quiz that you could do. And I took the time to go out and do that quiz, the VIA Character Strengths profile. And it was interesting because I think a lot of people would think, okay, if you're going to someone loses a lot of weight. They obviously have a lot of self control and all of that. Self regulation was 19th out of the 24. My top five were honesty, bravery, leadership, curiosity and love of learning. And so as I started thinking about, well, how did these strengths play out when I was actually doing what I was doing?

[00:25:04.890] – Allan
And the reality was, yes, self regulation really wasn't what did it for me. It was the liking, a high minded challenge. So I signed up for a tough Mudder and I told people I was going to do it. So I'm an honest person. I'm going to stand up to what I said. I actually signed up with my daughter. I said I'm going to be ready and I'm going to do this race with you. And from there, getting my certifications and things like that to learn what I needed to do, to take care of myself, to train myself.

[00:25:34.640] – Allan
I just look at that and say that right was my little roadmap that was in here in my head, but I didn't realize that that's what I was doing at the time was I was not trying to self regulate myself to healthy eating. I just knew that if I was being honest with myself and what I challenged myself to do, I had to do better. And I did lean on those so much more heavy, heavier heavily. Then I did on the ones that I was much weaker.

[00:26:02.920] – Allan
And I think that made all the difference.

[00:26:05.300] – Dr. Foster
Yeah, it really does. And it's good to put some words to it to actually realize these are inherent strengths that people have and they can leverage them in the process again instead of searching for these weaknesses or deficiencies.

[00:26:17.220] – Allan
And I think you said it in the book, and you just said it earlier to know what your basic strengths are, you can just look back on other things that you've been successful at. And hey, what got me there? That's the same thing that can make you successful in every journey that you take going forward, including losing weight, getting stronger and just getting healthier.

[00:26:35.780] – Dr. Foster
Yeah, I think one of the things because of the significant stigma that's associated with higher body weights in our culture, people often can in a negative way compartmentalized. So they forget about all these strengths they have in non weight and wellness journeys as if they don't exist when it comes to other areas of their life. So sometimes in the patient that I was talking about, it's just a general reminder about I've accomplished a lot in my life, and I've done so with a variety of different strengths.

[00:27:05.960] – Dr. Foster
And how can I use those strengths for other purposes in life? It's not just wellness. It's not just weight. It generalizes to a lot of other things, which is why I think it's so powerful.

[00:27:16.340] – Allan
I'm going to make sure there's a link in the show notes so you can go to 40PlusFitnesspodcast.com/507. And I'll have a link to that quiz so you can find out what your course strengths are. But it also is very valuable because it gives you all 24 of the strength profiles. So you literally can go through there and read it and say, Well, is that more like with me or less like me? So it's a great learning tool. And I encourage folks to go out there and check that out.

[00:27:41.610] – Dr. Foster
Yeah, the work that Via does under the leadership of Neil Myerson is really impressive, and I'm it's available so publicly, and that's why we recommended it in the book.

[00:27:50.900] – Allan
Cool. Dr. Foster, I define wellness as being the healthiest, fittest and happiest you can be. What are three strategies or tactics to get and stay well?

[00:28:02.190] – Dr. Foster
I think if I had to pick three, I would go back to the beginning of our conversation and say, Start with self compassion, and I won't belabor it here because we've already discussed it, but really treating yourself as you would treat a friend as a friend would treat you with this kind positive self regard. It doesn't mean everything's perfect. You're perfect. But you're starting out with an assumption that you're worth taking care of. And any self improvement opportunity you have is because you're worth it not because you're deficient .2 is to set realistic goals.

[00:28:39.450] – Dr. Foster
People often mistakenly think that I've got to set these bold, audacious goals to get success. And while I'm not saying don't shoot for the stars, that's fine. The first step should be a small, reasonable one. And there's great science behind this. Bf Skinner, a famous psychologist, had this concept which has proven out time and time again called successive approximation, which is just fancy psychological jargon for take it one step at a time so that you approximate the goal by breaking it down into smaller steps. There's a story of a member in the book who talked about she had 100 pound weight loss goal, but she broke it down into five pound increments.

[00:29:26.540] – Dr. Foster
More importantly than that, she broke down. What do I need to do to reach those 5 pounds? What specifically behavioral goals rather than weight loss goals really drive the day? So these small, realistic goals give you an opportunity to be successful at each interval. Rather than saying I'm not going to congratulate myself for whatever it is. Running a marathon, why don't I just start with I walked a mile. That's a great way to start. And I think the third thing, which again might be counter intuitive, is to expect setbacks. To realize that the journey is not a straight line.

[00:30:06.700] – Dr. Foster
It has lots of ups and downs, whether it's on the scale, whether it's in your workout intensities, whether it's your work performance, whether it's how you perform as a parent, how you do in the workplace, it's never a straight line. And instead of using Setbacks as an opportunity to take the off ramp, use that as an opportunity for learning much in the way you talked about with the beer and stress beer pizza cycle, how do I go back and learn that and use that as an opportunity?

[00:30:40.330] – Dr. Foster
So self compassion, set small, realistic goals that are achievable and then importantly, expect setbacks. They happen one of the time to one of the people. It can be distressing, but it's also a great way to say, hey, setbacks happen. It's my next move that matters most.

[00:31:03.740] – Allan
Welcome to being human.

[00:31:05.010] – Dr. Foster
Exactly.

[00:31:07.670] – Allan
If someone wanted to learn more about you, Dr. Foster and the book, The Shift: Seven Powerful Mindset changes for Lasting Weight Loss. Where would you like for me to send them?

[00:31:16.700] – Dr. Foster
I go basically anywhere, any retail location where books are sold anywhere online. My bio is there and details about the book are there. I think the thing I would like people to know is that the reason I wrote this book is that after 30 years and after actually learning from the people I work with, I realized that while eating an activity are important, it's mindset that matters, and it matters enormously. And I think one of the things I hope people can get from a book like this is to get some small shifts that can lead to big results.

[00:31:54.470] – Dr. Foster
Because as you said at the outset, Allan, it's really important. If you have to start with mindset, the other things follow, they won't be effortless, but they will be much easier with the right mindset.

[00:32:08.920] – Allan
You can go to 40PlusFitnesspodcast.Com/507 and I'll be sure to have links to the book there. Dr. Foster, thank you so much for being a part of 40+ Fitness.

[00:32:19.080] – Dr. Foster
My pleasure, Allan. Nice to chat with you.

Post Show/Recap

[00:32:25.490] – Allan
Welcome back, Raz.

[00:32:27.580] – Rachel
Hey, Allan, I think Dr. Foster is my new best friend. He and I have a lot in common, but what he said at the very beginning, what we eat and how we move is important. But before all that mindset, my favorite word.

[00:32:42.350] – Allan
Yeah. And we've talked about this and kind of part of this, this whole because every once in a while get into a topic set. And when I was going through the layoffs, my layoff, I started talking about stress. I started looking for books on stress, and it kind of became a big thing big theme for the show for several weeks. And if you've noticed over the last several weeks, we've talked a lot about mindset, I guess on talking about it, I've talked about it. It really is a start of all of it.

[00:33:11.720] – Allan
And if you don't take the time to get your head right, then the first stumble block that you come to, you're going to trip up. And 99% of people hit that first bump in the road and they're out. They just quit because you're like, this is too hard. This isn't happening fast enough. I'm not good at this. It's never worked before. And so we talked about some of that unhelpful thinking. But that's exactly where this all comes from is if you get your mindset right, then you're in that position to recognize when you're using words like always and never or the I screwed up.

[00:33:48.060] – Allan
So I may as well you start recognizing those tendencies to just blow everything off. I'll start back on Monday kind of mindset. And really, that's been a huge stumbling block for most people. Is that going into it without having their head on straight and I'll admit that was me, too. 37 years old. I was very unhappy with myself, and I decided I needed to do something about it. But it took me eight years before I actually really did anything substantive, and it really did come down to that.

[00:34:21.960] – Allan
I didn't have the right mindset. I wasn't committed, and I didn't have self compassion. And so those big elements that were missing then allowed me to get my head right to say, okay, don't have to be perfect yet. I just need to be really good. And the better I do, then the better I can do. And they're just seeing this as a gradual progression up the Hill. And in some cases, it feels like you're walking up a sand Dune and the Sands just shifting under your feet.

[00:34:52.690] – Allan
And you just don't feel like you're really getting anywhere because it seems like you're sliding almost as much as you're stepping. But the reality is you are moving, you are moving up and you just got to keep that pace, be comfortable with it and just keep going and don't let yourself get negatively influenced by just things that are outside your control and having the right mindset does all of that.

[00:35:13.320] – Rachel
Absolutely. And you mentioned and also Dr. Foster mentioned having self compassion. If you're coming from a place of love that you want to do something that's good for yourself, you'll get farther instead of the negative thoughts that I'm overweight. I shouldn't be here at the gym or I shouldn't be seen in public. And I see a lot of that mindset, especially with brand new runners who are running, trying to lose weight. They're embarrassed to be out in the streets, they're embarrassed to be seen. But no, you got to change that shift.

[00:35:45.290] – Rachel
And you're coming from a place of self love. Then you're working on improving your health and you deserve to be anywhere you want to be, no matter how you're feeling about yourself. So yeah, I think the self compassion is also a positive shift that people need to focus on.

[00:36:03.000] – Allan
Yeah. We talked about it a few weeks ago. I forget her name, but about being your own BFF. And is it really does come down to that? The thoughts that you're in your head were things that you would say out loud to your best friend, then they're probably okay thoughts. But if you start having thoughts and you're thinking, I would never say this to my best friend's face. Even if it was true, I wouldn't say it. I wouldn't say it. And so just kind of thinking about this thought that I'm having,

[00:36:31.460] – Allan
Is it fair? And if it's something I wouldn't say to my friend, how would I say it to my friend? I need if I really needed to. So it's the I didn't mean to have the three beers and the pizza. When I went out with friends, I was going to try to be better. And I had the three beers, and then we ordered pizza, and then we ordered more pizza. And then I blew that Friday night. So then it was like a cascade through my whole weekend.

[00:36:58.440] – Allan
Well, yeah, at some point, you tell your friend it's like, well, okay. You know, that's not how you want to do it. So what are some things that you can do next time to keep that from happening? And you see just that way that I went about is more constructive than destructive. He would never tell your friend, oh, my God, you're at that. Hell, why? And look at you blew Saturday and Sunday. You may as well just quit. And you would never, ever say that to your best friend.

[00:37:27.890] – Allan
But we're saying it to ourselves in our heads all the time.

[00:37:30.780] – Rachel
Well, just like you mentioned in that example, you go out for a night, you have all sorts of beers and pizza, you know, think about that for just a minute. You know, you spent time with your friends. You were doing something you enjoy socializing or celebrating something special. Okay. It was not the greatest night. It was not the best choice. But what could you have done? And even Dr. Foster mentioned that as you look back on these little bits of flip Ops, what could you have done better?

[00:37:56.670] – Rachel
I mean, could you have maybe not had so much pizza, or would I do a lot of cases is, I'll have my snack at home just in case I can't find anything on the menu that I would like. And then just socialize that night instead of eat and socialize. So, I mean, you can have your problem solving tips ready for the next time. And he also mentioned, too, that be prepared for slip ups. These things happen. We have holidays. We have nights out with friends. You know, things do go sideways.

[00:38:25.760] – Rachel
So just be prepared, have your bag of tricks.

[00:38:27.950] – Allan
And when you take those detours know why you're doing it, don't just go in and say, oh, I'm going to do this. We were driving here and there was a sign on the side of the road. This is Squatch Museum, and I'm like, oh, okay, you know, but no, I'm having dinner with my friends, and I need to be in the Tampa by this time. I don't have time to visit the Sasquatch Museum this trip. But now I got this little tickler in my head. This is next time you're traveling through Florida, find the Sasquatch Museum because you might want to spend it, but just not letting yourself kind of get pulled off by just every little Wim, every little thing that happens, it just kind of keeps you a little bit more focused on it.

[00:39:13.000] – Allan
And I think that's why I was really impressed with the concept of focusing on strengths rather than weakness. Almost everybody goes at this and says, okay, well, I was sweettooth. I love my desserts. I like beer. I do well during the week, but then I blow my weekends and so they're like, okay, I've got this weakness and I need to fix that weakness. And then that's gonna fix me when the reality of it is maybe you have strength like, you still are physically relatively active.

[00:39:44.460] – Allan
And it's like, okay, I bump up my activity and I would actually enjoy that. Or I know that I have some drinks, like, I want to drink more water. And so I say, okay, well, if I put a plan in place, like, I've got this gallon jug and I carry that jug with me, then I know that I'll drink that water. So it's just knowing that if I have a system, I can get it done. If I have a certain thing that I'm really good at, then I get it done.

[00:40:10.190] – Allan
If I really like cooking, then I do my batch cooking on Sunday, and I've got my meals for the whole rest of the week. So all those things are where there's a strength where you identify a strength in yourself. And then you say, based on my overall strengths, not just physical capacity, mental capacity, but saying, okay, I am better when I'm focused on this. And I did go through that strength thing that he had in there and kind of look to mine and actually self regulation was out of 24.

[00:40:41.100] – Allan
It was like 19 to most people think, oh, Allan's really disciplined, and it's not a function of discipline. It's a function of structure. If I have a structure, then everything just gets easier. So for my training for the tough Mudder, I have literally blocked out every morning, Monday through Friday and part of the morning on Saturday to train. Okay. So I have five hour windows every day, six days of the week to train. And I'll be lifting six days, five days, and basically doing some cardio, six days, and then taking Sunday off.

[00:41:16.670] – Allan
And so that's my structure.

[00:41:18.100] – Rachel
That's awesome.

[00:41:18.890] – Allan
Nothing else is on my calendar. It's just. I'm in the gym at 07:00. I'm lifting. I finished my lifting. The gym doesn't open until 8:30. So the gym is mine. And then I leave the gym and I go and do some cardio. And that might be kayaking. That might be blocking. That might be some running. But basically, each day I've allotted about three and a half hours of cardio, which is about how long the tough mudder will take me. I just know, physically, if I can keep moving for three and a half hours, I can do a tough Mudder.

[00:41:50.750] – Allan
And so that's the plan.

[00:41:52.990] – Rachel
You know, it's interesting to Allan, because your tough Mudder is your a goal for next year. That's your primary focus. And so all that time that you show up for yourself in the gym, you're focused on that as your goal. So you're not focusing on I got to improve my cardio. I got to lift heavier weights, and I got to do all these things. Those are all kind of like what's going to happen as a side effect of your focus on this main goal. And similarly, that's what I think like, too.

[00:42:23.600] – Rachel
And I'm focused on a race. I've got a race that I need to prepare for, and you'll be out there for 3 hours. I'll be out there for a couple hours running. It's not how many hours I'm going to be out there in the head. It's just that I'm out there running. And so the focus is on the fun part of running, the fun part of the tough Mudder. And it's not all on the hard sweat that we need to put out at the gym to get to that point, which makes it to me it makes it exciting and fun.

[00:42:50.420] – Allan
Yeah. I look at it like this. What can I control? And what can I not control? And what I can't control is how much body fat my body decides to shed. What I can control is the level of effort I put in at the gym and the number of days I show up and will I slip up? Yes. Will there be something? One day my body is going to sit there and my knee is not going to feel really good. And so my cardio is going to have to change or my elbows kind of not feel really good.

[00:43:18.920] – Allan
And I'm going to change my lifting program a bit. Yeah. All of that's completely possible and likely actually very highly likely. And so I'm going to go at this and say, what can I control? I can control Monday. Monday, October 4 is my first morning on schedule, and literally I'm up before 07:00 and I'm at the gym. And so if it's 6:45, I'm walking to the gym. I'm already winning.

[00:43:45.540] – Rachel
That's awesome.

[00:43:46.590] – Allan
Now what I can't, like I said, what I don't have control over are some side effects, but there will be side effects. There's gonna be positive side effects of that. I'm going to lose some weight. I'm gonna probably put on a little muscle, get stronger, get some sun because most of my training will be outdoors in the sun, and we don't have an off season. It's not like cold weather like you're gonna be dealing with where you're out there trudging through the snow. None of that's no stuff for me.

[00:44:13.520] – Allan
I might be running through some sand, right?

[00:44:16.150] – Dr. Foster
That's good for you.

[00:44:17.030] – Allan
Yeah. I might be doing sprints in the sand like, yeah, I want to get some cardio in. And really, I could actually get it in a lot faster today. If I just go and do some hit training in the deep Bluff sand. I can do that and just make it a training. But I've done my training for that day. And then if I end up saying, okay, I've had enough, I'm done. Then I'm done. And I can approach it from that perspective of focusing on activity and performance of the activity.

[00:44:47.400] – Allan
And then if I'm having a good lifting day, that's great. If I'm having a bad lifting day, then evaluate what I learn, what can I do and then just keep moving through that because like I said, my strengths are honesty, integrity and just continue to push myself. It's not self regulation. So what I have to do is actually rely on systems and processes to say, okay, I have this goal at this bigger thing in front of me, and I put 1 foot is kind of a runners thing as I put 1 foot in front of the other is like if you lift it up, I'll put it down and just get that foot forward, and then it'll take care of itself.

[00:45:28.580] – Allan
And that's really how these things work. And yes, the tough mudder is there. And It's not a goal in and of itself. It's an opportunity. And it's an obstacle. And I put this big obstacle in front of me that's going to require me to change certain behaviors for that period of time. And that's something that I have now recognized that I kind of need to have. There's something in front of me that I'm moving toward or training for to excite my training to keep me active and going, because I can go in the gym every day.

[00:46:04.210] – Allan
And then it's just a point where you're saying, okay, this is the same workout I did nine months ago. I'm doing it again. I'm about the same strength. Okay.

[00:46:14.920] – Allan
And it's cool. And I feel good about it. But at the end of the day, I'm like, okay, but where am I moving? It's just having something that I feel like I'm moving toward. And for me, that's important for a lot of other people. It might not be it might be watching the scale, but you don't have total control over that. And maybe I don't have total control over whether I'm going to be in good enough shape to complete the tough Mudder myself. I am at this point going to be, I think, eight years, almost eight years older than I was the last time I did it.

[00:46:44.860] – Allan
and so that's not a little bit of time, but I'm going back and I'm going to do it again, and I fully expect that they'll probably be another one in my future. So particularly if I have a good time. But that's what this is all about. But it starts with the mindset as we said. And then it's really just about saying, okay, what's going to keep me engaged? What's going to keep me fired up? What's going to be fun and looking at what I'm doing from that perspective, it's a gift for me to complete

[00:47:15.650] – Allan
A tough Mudder is a gift.

[00:47:17.660] – Rachel
It is.

[00:47:18.830] – Allan
You know, and so that's the gift I want to give this person I love is that feeling of success at the end of a tough mudder.

[00:47:27.380] – Rachel
I love that. That sounds great.

[00:47:29.950] – Allan
Alright. Anything else you want to go over or we'll talk next week?

[00:47:32.910] – Rachel
No, that was great. I got to take that test, though, that Dr. Foster put out there.

[00:47:38.700] – Allan
It was quite interesting. And then after you get through with it, kind of go back and see.

[00:47:43.560] – Allan
Yeah. Now I kind of get that. They weren't all really strengths that I would have initially equated to health and fitness. But if you take a few minutes to sit down, you start realizing that the things that you are successful at are those things where you emphasize those strengths and they just push you faster. They make you do better. And it's really interesting. You do at some point need to address your weaknesses, but they become easier and easier to do when you get the snowball of all those strengths and those successes, those weakness sort of they just take care of themselves.

[00:48:21.990] – Rachel
I think so. I think that having those strengths are knowing what your strengths are your best tools in your toolbox for you to be able to attack your goal with.

[00:48:30.180] – Allan
All right. Well, you'll have to let me know how that goes.

[00:48:32.760] – Rachel
Yeah, will do.

[00:48:33.800] – Allan
All right. Well, I'll talk to you next week.

[00:48:35.670] – Rachel
Take care.

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Another episode you may enjoy

The 7 health and fitness truths I've learned on 40+ Fitness (Your Wellness SYSTEMS)

Less...

Let's Say Hello

[00:00:52.040] – Allan
Hey, Raz. How are things?

[00:00:54.290] – Rachel
Good, Allan. How are you? How are you enjoying your vacation?

[00:00:57.890] – Allan
I'm enjoying it. It's just there's been a lot going on in the world. In our world. Someone poisoned our dog. But, yeah, we've had some criminals on the island. We caught one of them on camera stealing our hammock off our front porch. But it appears, and this is again coming from the police and others, is that there's this group of thieves on the island, and they're trying to soften up houses to come back later and do something more is the theory. So they poisoned a ton of dogs across the island just to make sure they could get in.

[00:01:31.950] – Allan
fortunately, we had people watching the place, and they were able to step in and do some wonderful things. And so Buster has recovered, he's doing okay.

[00:01:40.510] – Rachel
Oh, my gosh.

[00:01:41.170] – Allan
But it was just one of those hit and go moments where we didn't know if he was going to make it. And so our friends came to our rescue. It's just very stressful when you're over 3000 miles away and not in a position to do anything to help your dog. So we're on our way. So we're recording this, we're most of the way through with our holidays. And as this goes live, we'll be finishing up the final days and about to head back to Panama.

[00:02:11.290] – Allan
So I'm kind of like in that mood. Okay, let's just get back and get Lula's open and get that going. And it's made me kind of rethink a lot of stuff in my own life. As I look at what I'm doing and my training and those types of things. So I might be making some changes to the way I do personal training and to how I manage my own life just to make sure that I'm taking care of me and mine first. And then doing what's necessary to help others.

[00:02:45.920] – Rachel
Wow. I'm so sorry to hear about your dog, and I'm so glad he's okay. And you've got the most wonderful neighbors to help out.

[00:02:53.400] – Allan
And they didn't sign up for that. They were just we're going to house it.

[00:02:57.810] – Rachel
Who would have thought?

[00:02:59.170] – Allan
Yeah. And then you got a lot of other stuff. Someone stole someone's pizza. Yeah. So a lot going on back there good and bad, but Buster's fine and looking forward to getting back and see my puppies because I do miss them. And I did have one other thing that I wanted to talk about, as I talked about when you're driving and you have lots of time to think as your driving, I just I was kind of thinking about what I want to do and where I'm at, and I figured what I really needed was a kick in the pants to get myself re energized with what I'm doing personally, not necessarily with the podcast and not necessarily with the training, but just me, my training and everything.

[00:03:43.460] – Allan
So I have signed up for another Tough Mudder classic. This one is going to be August 27, that's in the Chicago area. I've already signed up. I'm in the 10 to 10:45 range of times. So if you're in the area and we got over eleven months to train for this thing now because I think this episode actually goes out around the 27 September, so we literally have eleven months to get ready for this. This is some yeah, it says it's August 27 of 2022. So you got eleven months.

[00:04:16.350] – Allan
If this is something you want to do, I'd love to meet you. Love to hang out with you at the Tough Mudder in Chicago. Again, I'm on the 10 to 10:45 leg. And one of the things I do like about the Tough Mudder is it's a very Comradery kind of run. It's not a competition where we're trying to beat each other. It's where we're helping each other. So if you're struggling with an obstacle, I help you. If I'm struggling with an obstacle, you help me. It's a really good spirit on this run, walk whatever you want to do.

[00:04:45.990] – Allan
But yeah, going into 10:00 time, you'd have plenty of time to finish, give your shot at all the different obstacles. There's 10 miles with 25 obstacles. And over that weekend, they do have some shorter runs. They have a 10K and a 5K. So if you're not feeling like it can get trained up to do the longer one, then at least look at the 5K or the 10K and consider that you could train for that because it's really, in my opinion, you're not just training for running because while there is running, it's not like just constant ten mile run.

[00:05:17.990] – Allan
You do run and you kind of stop and do an obstacle. With 25 obstacles, you're stopping quite a bit. Then you're doing an obstacle. And some of the obstacles are about fear, like you're jumping from a height into water, some of them you're swimming, some of them, you're going through a dark tube and there is the electricity.

[00:05:35.230] – Rachel
Oh, my gosh.

[00:05:37.280] – Allan
But it's a real character builder, and it's a lot of fun. So hopefully, if you guys are interested head on out there I did post in the Facebook group a link that will take you to the active. But if you just go into Toughmudder.com, you can go check out their events. And it's August 27 of 2022. And like I said right now, I'm in the 10 to 10:45 start times, and they just set you up about 500 at a time and send you out.

[00:06:07.660] – Allan
And so a lot of people be running. But you know, if you can sign up around that time, cool. If you can't. And I know there's enough people around, maybe we'll set some kind of meet up that night, have dinner or something. So check it out. And if you're interested, reach out to me and we'll figure something out.

[00:06:22.720] – Rachel
Wow. That sounds so awesome. It's great to have a goal. It's great to have something on the calendar to look forward to and to train for.

[00:06:30.040] – Allan
Yeah, I haven't had that. And I was like, with COVID, with everything else has really not been anything but training for the sake of training. And I'm not going to say it gets dull because I really enjoy lifting and doing some things. But it's just one of those things saying, I need something to put a little spark in there and being ready for that and making sure that I perform well there. It's important to me. So I'll get it done.

[00:06:53.440] – Rachel
Yep. And you picked a doozy. So you'll have your hands full for the next eleven months.

[00:06:57.740] – Allan
Absolutely.

[00:06:58.550] – Rachel
Good for you.

[00:06:59.390] – Allan
All right. You ready to have a conversation? Wait. We didn't ask about you. What are you doing?

[00:07:03.380] – Rachel
Oh, good. Good.

[00:07:05.500] – Rachel
Enjoying the time. Kids are back to school. It's quiet here at the house for a little while, and we just had a bunch of family time. My brother's in from California, so I got to see him and my parents and my in laws. My mother in law just is about to celebrate her 75th birthday. So we had a little to do for her. So it's been great having family time. It's been wonderful.

[00:07:29.360] – Allan
Okay, good.

[00:07:31.310] – Allan
alright. Are you ready to have a conversation with Dr. Davis?

[00:07:34.310] – Rachel
Sure.

Interview

[00:08:07.560] – Allan
Dr. Davis, welcome to 40+ Fitness.

[00:08:10.800] – Dr. Davis
Hello, Allan. Thanks for having me.

[00:08:13.060] – Allan
Now. Your book, Supersize Lies, How Myths About Weight Loss are Keeping Us Fat and the Truth About What Really Works. As I was telling you before, if I were walking through a Barnes & Nobles, I would pick up this book just on that. And then once I got into it really even just the introduction, I was like, hooked. Like, I'm gonna read this. I'm gonna read every single line of this fit book all the way to the end, because I want to know what really works. But I also want to know what myths am I falling for?

[00:08:44.090] – Allan
So I appreciate the opportunity to kind of go through and say, okay, what's going on with what we're hearing? And why is everybody struggling so much with the information that's out there?

[00:08:55.670] – Dr. Davis
Well, thank you for that. And what I've done throughout my career is to really dissect the science behind all kinds of claims related to health. And I think that's so important because there's so much misinformation about so many health issues, certainly that's come to the four more than ever with regard to COVID. But it applies to so many of the things we hear about with regard to our health. So that's something that it's very important to me. I have a background in public health and epidemiology as well as journalism.

[00:09:22.480] – Dr. Davis
So I try to combine those training that I have to really look at the science and help people sort through the claim so they can figure out what's believable and what's not.

[00:09:31.990] – Allan
Because more than anything else, I just there's this tribalism and the Internet is fostering that Facebook is fostering that, Twitter. They're making people into tribes about everything, every single thing we do. It's like, no, you shouldn't do it that way or on those sites absolutely should be doing it that way. And so we have these pulls back and forth. This is the best way. No, this is the best way. They're all potentially a little right, and they're all potentially a little wrong. And I think that's where the problem comes is that we get stuck in our tribe, and it's really, really hard to step out of that.

[00:10:13.740] – Allan
And what I really liked about your book was that you didn't go in saying this is my tribe, and this is the way to do it. It was truly okay, this tribe says this and they're not wrong, but they're not right. This tribe says this and they're not wrong, and they're not right. So where do we meet in the middle? What is the common denominator? What's happening here? And why is this happening? And I want to start that out, only to say is one of the core ones is this concept that if you go in, there's a tribe and we call them the calories in Calories out tribe, CICO.

[00:10:49.660] – Allan
And they believe just heart of hearts. All you have to do is plug in everything you eat and plug in every bit of exercise movement you do, and you do all the formulas and you're going to lose weight. And it's true. Until it's not. Can we talk a little bit about what the problem is with calorie counting and why? Because if it were too true, then we would lose an incremental amount of weight every single day. And we would always lose weight. If we're always eating in a deficit of 500 calories a day, we would always lose a pound a week every week until we weight zero.

[00:11:28.900] – Allan
Unfortunately, that doesn't work. Can you tell us what's going on there?

[00:11:32.540] – Dr. Davis
Right. Well, first of all, I like another way to describe that philosophy is some people call it ELM eat less, exercise more. And I like to say, for many people, Elm Street is a dead end because they try that and they're told that's going to work and it doesn't work and they try it again and again and again, and it continues not to work. So one of the problems with calorie counting is seen, by the way, I'm not saying in my book, nor do I believe that calories don't matter at all.

[00:11:57.120] – Dr. Davis
There are some people that say that, and that's not what I'm saying. Calories do count. But as I say, counting them typically doesn't work. And one reason for that is fairly straightforward. And that is that calorie counting is an imprecise activity. You see those numbers the top of the nutrition label. It's a bold number that this food has 232 calories, and we're led to believe that's a precise number. But in fact, that number is often not accurate. Under law, those numbers people often don't know this, Allan, but under law, those numbers can be up to 20% off.

[00:12:32.660] – Dr. Davis
So often, In many cases, that error is an undercount. So it could be that we're getting actually the number of calories we think we're getting is not accurate. So just for starters, just the whole process of trying to count them accurately is not easy. And then never mind that for most of the foods, we don't have calorie counts, you're not getting most restaurants are not going to have calorie counts on menus. If you eat at someone's house, if you cook your own meal, you're not going to know.

[00:12:56.310] – Dr. Davis
And trying to estimate calories, it's very difficult trying to do so accurately. So that's the problem, for starters, is why calorie counting doesn't work. But there's a bigger problem, and that is that our bodies act in a way more complicated than just a number of calories we consume. There are other factors at work that are involved in weight regulation. One certainly is genetics. We know people. We all know, people that we say they're very lucky. They have great genetics, so to speak, because they can eat whatever they want.

[00:13:24.740] – Dr. Davis
They eat all kinds of foods and they never seem to gain weight. And then somebody else we know will eat very little, and then they gain a lot of weight. And so genetics we know from studies play a very large role in determining how food a given amount of food will affect somebody's weight, and that varies from person to person. We're also learning more and more about the so called microbiome that is the mix of microbes in our guts, and that can determine that can have a large influence in some cases, on how many of the calories we consume that we actually absorb, because it's not necessarily the calories that we consume that matters.

[00:14:00.900] – Dr. Davis
It's how many of those calories our body actually absorbs versus excretes. So that's an important consideration as well. And again, something that science is showing more and more about all the time. And then there's the whole issue of our metabolism. As we cut calories as we lose weight, your metabolism slows down so that it takes fewer calories. We have to eat fewer and fewer calories to continue to lose weight. And often it's sort of a cruel trick of evolution that actually is a gift.

[00:14:35.350] – Dr. Davis
It's there to protect us in case of famine. So essentially, our bodies become more fuel efficient as we lose weight in order to keep us from wasting away. But the problem, of course, today, thankfully, is we don't have to deal with famines in modern society and Western civilization. But if we're trying to lose weight, it's a big problem because our bodies are essentially fighting us. And so that's something else that's sort of lost in this conversation about. Well, it's just a linear process. If you cut calories, then you will keep losing weight. If you cut it down, if you have a certain negative energy balance.

[00:15:07.340] – Dr. Davis
But what that doesn't take into consideration is the way the body essentially fights back. And so all of these things, I think, and there are other factors as well are often lost in this discussion about calories and calories out because it's sort of simplified to this simple math equation. And it's in fact, far more complicated than that.

[00:15:25.780] – Allan
Yeah. And even on the other side of that formula, the burning because I had at any time fitness membership. And I went in there. They had two different types of treadmills, I mean ellipticals. And so if I got on one type of elliptical and worked out really hard for an hour, I would burn 850 calories. But the other elliptical, if I got on it for an hour, working out just as hard it was 750 calories. So I would always go to the 850 calorie elliptical to get a better work out.

[00:15:54.010] – Dr. Davis
Yes.

[00:15:56.180] – Allan
And so their estimates all the way across what our body is burning at any given time. It's an estimate. What in food is an estimate. And restaurants are off on. Even if they tell you what the calories are, they can be off significantly and you buy a can of something and you think, okay, I'm gonna eat this. And you're looking at the label. And if you don't pay enough attention, there's two and two third servings per can, and you're like, okay, well, now I've got to do complicated fraction math to figure out how much I'm eating and how much I'm getting.

[00:16:26.470] – Allan
So it does make it more difficult. But I think one of the core things that you did say in the book that I thought was really important is that tracking can be valuable. It's just when you're trying to get down to this meticulous math of plus and minuses that it's not going to serve you as well.

[00:16:45.360] – Dr. Davis
Yeah, that's absolutely true. There's no question. And the number of studies show this actually tracking what you eat and not only what you eat, but how much you eat when you ate it, whom you ate it with, where you ate it, how you felt when you're eating. All those things are very important. And I can talk more about why that's important in terms of tracking what we eat, what you eat. But what people often get hung up on when they're keeping these food diaries is the number of calories.

[00:17:11.250] – Dr. Davis
And so studies show that people often stop tracking what they're eating because keeping track of their calories are so difficult. They find that it's frustrating to try to deconstruct the foods they eat if they don't have a calorie count to try to take the ingredients and look up the calorie count of each ingredient, and they end up just giving up on the whole thing because they say this is too difficult. So I think that can become a real impediment to a very important activity. And that is tracking your food intake.

[00:17:40.930] – Dr. Davis
And so, as I say in the book, don't worry really as much about tracking your calories. But what you should do if you can is track what you're eating, because what tracking your food intake can do is give you a sense of your eating pattern so that you can go back and use this information to say, I didn't realize that in work I go and pick up a donut a couple of times a day. I didn't realize I was doing that or I didn't realize that when I get stressed, I go through the fast food drive through more often.

[00:18:09.330] – Dr. Davis
And so by doing this, it can help you understand patterns that you may not be aware of and then take action to address those patterns. So that's why I think keeping a food diary is crucial to successful weight management. But people should not let the mandate they often hear to track calories to bog them down.

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[00:20:35.100] – Allan
As we talk about these tribes, I got into early in this episode. One of the things that really comes out is this concept of villains or foods to avoid at all costs, and then the heroes, so these are the super foods that are going to change your life and make you lose weight a lot faster. Can you talk a little bit about villains and heroes and where this lore comes from and why it's really kind of a fiction?

[00:21:01.950] – Dr. Davis
Well, it's part of the overall tendency we have as human beings and certainly in our society to try to look for good guys and bad guys put white hats and black hats on people. And so the same thing certainly has happened with nutrition generally and with weight loss specifically. So that we have weight loss, the history of weight loss over the last 200 years is an effort to finger some kind of culprit and to boil it down to one food or one kind of food that is particularly villainous that if only if we avoid this particular food, then we can weigh less and manage our weight.

[00:21:34.710] – Dr. Davis
And likewise, we see increasingly, and this is driven in part by the food industry because the food industry has a great incentive, of course, to make us think that their food has some kind of magical quality to eat specific foods that they're either going to keep us healthy or help us manage our weight. And we see every day either claims and ads or news reports about some food, whether it's avocados or whether it's beans or whether it's salmon or whatever it is that have some kind of magical properties.

[00:22:05.100] – Dr. Davis
And as I like to say, these are all often foods that are part of a healthful diet and foods that we absolutely can and should eat. But to imbue them with some kind of magical qualities or special properties that are going to allow them in isolation, to make us healthier, to help us lose weight. It is a myth, and that the evidence that's often cited to support this is not compelling. It will be in animals or it'll be in test tubes or will be some kind of intermediate marker that really doesn't measure what we're trying to measure, which in this case is weight loss.

[00:22:37.200] – Dr. Davis
So often we're deceived about the benefits of these foods as well as the danger as it were of specific kinds of foods when it comes to our weight. And so the point here is that instead of fixating on specific foods either as villains or heroes, what we should be doing is looking at the overall quality of our diets. That is to say, what are our overall eating patterns? Are we eating in a healthful way overall and fixate and not to fixate on the specific foods in that diet?

[00:23:07.440] – Dr. Davis
And the advantage of that is that eating in that way and thinking that way about food allows us lots of leeway. We can construct a diet for ourselves with foods that we're going to enjoy and not feel we're being deprived, not feel that we can't ever eat foods that are supposedly bad for us, that we shouldn't eat and allow us to have a diet that can be sustained over time. And in the end, that's what counts, right? That's what matters is a diet that we can eat, that we can enjoy, that we're not going to feel dissatisfied or hungry on, and that we can follow over time.

[00:23:39.910] – Dr. Davis
And whether you're talking about your health or your weight, that's the absolute truth.

[00:23:44.120] – Allan
Yeah. And like I said with villains, it's like, okay, is this food really that bad? And maybe it is if that's all you're eating or you're eating a ton of it, so moderation could be an answer. Occasionally have a bit of ice cream, have a little bit of this. It's okay. And then with heroes, it's like, okay, don't think that grapefruit is this magical fruit that's going to change your life. If you enjoy eating a grapefruit here and there have some grapefruit, you get your vitamin C, and there's some value there.

[00:24:14.130] – Allan
But it's not going to make your waistline go smaller just because you're eating a lot of it.

[00:24:18.680] – Dr. Davis
Right. And I think, as we said, as I keep saying, weight management is an unbelievably, complex phenomenon, and to think that we can boil it down to a specific food, that whether it's carbs every carbs and that'll be the solution or always eat great food, that's the solution. It just defies logic and common sense.

[00:24:37.370] – Allan
So now I want to kind of shift over to it does work, because that's the other half of the big promise from your book, and you boil it down to something I love is just principles. And rather than not a set of rules that says this is what you must do. But here's a set of principles that if you follow these principles, you're going to improve your chances of losing the weight that you want to. Could you go through your weight loss principles?

[00:25:03.720] – Dr. Davis
Right. And that's a crucial point, Allan, because I think too often a lot of diets that people have involved rules, hard and fast rules that say you must do this. You must eat these foods. You must never eat these foods. Only eat these on every other Tuesday, whatever it is, and people get bogged in and rules that they have to follow. And, of course, again, those kinds of diets, maybe people can follow it for a few weeks or a few months. But over time that's not sustainable.

[00:25:28.350] – Dr. Davis
And often these rules are not science based at all. So what I try to do is outline principles that is general ideas about what people should do. And what I like to say is that these are guidelines and things that people can do that they can tailor to their own needs and their own preferences. And that's, again, so important for people to be able to do that, to be able to have something that they can follow over time. So the first principle is that I say, eat a whole food diet, and that doesn't mean going to the store whole foods necessarily.

[00:25:58.060] – Dr. Davis
It means eating a food that's rich in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans, nuts, seeds, lean meats, fish, eggs, dairy. If you eat dairy and trying to minimize so called highly processed foods, things like candy, chips, soda, French fries, hot dogs, things like that. Now, notice I said minimize. I did not say eliminate entirely, because again, a diet that says a food is toxic or poisonous or whatever else you should never touch it. All that tends to do is to make people want that food more, to crave that food more.

[00:26:33.960] – Dr. Davis
But what minimize means is that over time, and it's not saying do this tomorrow if you eat those foods regularly, but over time and try to eat those foods less often so that they eventually become occasional treats and things that you eat in limited portions rather than things you eat every day. And again, this is a process that takes time. But that's going to a whole foods diet, a largely plant based diet in which you can under a plant based diet, you can have any variety of foods, so you don't have to eat specific foods.

[00:27:03.310] – Dr. Davis
If you like salmon, eat salmon. If you don't eat salmon, don't eat it. If you want to eat other fish, fine, whatever whole grains you like, you can incorporate those. But the point is that you can construct a diet of foods you actually enjoy and will eat, and whatever combination of carbs, protein and fats works, various combinations can work under a whole food diet, but that's the way to think of it, rather than thinking of a specific list of foods that you should and should not eat.

[00:27:27.760] – Dr. Davis
So I think that's one principle that I think is really important, something else. And actually, I combine these things are to focus on movement and by that I mean exercise, but also other kinds of ways of moving your body. One of the things I talk about in the book and is that exercise is an overrated way to actually lose weight. And I say that as somebody who's a huge advocate of exercise, I'm an avid exerciser myself. I'm actually my last book is called Fitter Faster. It's all about the benefits of exercise, so I absolutely encourage everybody to exercise.

[00:28:00.580] – Dr. Davis
But you need to exercise for the right reason, and that is to benefit your health and to improve your overall well being. Now, exercise movement can be in part of weight management because it can help prevent weight gain, help you keep off weight that you lost. But you shouldn't look to weight to exercise necessarily as a way to lose weight. And too often people do that. So that's why movement is an important part of weight management. But I think it's important caveat there is we need to have the right expectation when we exercise so that we don't expect it to do something that usually I can't do.

[00:28:37.400] – Dr. Davis
So movement is an important part of an overall weight management strategy for that reason. For the reason, I just said. Also getting enough sleep. That's something that's often overlooked. But a number of studies show that people who get inadequate amounts of sleep are more likely to put on weight, to be obese. And there are a number of theories as to why that's true. But the studies are pretty compelling, and so I think it's all the more reason, in addition to the health benefits of getting enough sleep, as to why in paying attention to our sleep and our sleep, hygiene is very important.

[00:29:07.580] – Dr. Davis
And then Stress. Trying to Control Stress. Again, there are studies that show that people who are under more stress are more likely to eat more. And many of us know this from our own experience that we tend to engage in stress or emotional eating and to eat foods that are not good for us when we're under stress. And also there's studies having to do with the hormone cortisol. The stress releases the hormone cortisol, which make us more likely to put on to store fat, particularly abdominal fat.

[00:29:38.200] – Dr. Davis
So that's why controlling stress through meditation, relaxation, yoga, other methods can be a crucial part of a weight management program. Another element is something you and I talked about earlier and that's tracking what you eat that's so important to do. I think that's crucial. You don't have to do it all the time permanently. But I think certainly at the beginning and during periods where periods you may be struggling to track everything you eat. And again, not just what you ate, but when you ate it with whom you ate, how you felt so that again, you can over time, look at what the patterns are of your eating and make changes if necessary.

[00:30:16.360] – Dr. Davis
Sometimes people don't like to do this because they feel ashamed of how much they are or they lie to themselves. And I think when people do that they're only doing themselves with this service. This should be an exercise in putting everything down to giving yourself as much information as you can. So if you have full information, you can use that information in a way that's going to help you going forward. So I think tracking what you eat is crucial. And again, studies show that to be the case. What I call strategic planning.

[00:30:44.630] – Dr. Davis
And by that, I mean, and planning for the inevitable challenges and setbacks are going to come with weight management. We all know that anybody who's tried this, there are challenges every day to staying on track, and we fall off the wagon for all kinds of reasons because job or family or other emergencies get in the way that prevent us from staying on track. So the point with strategic planning here is to have a strategy in place to help us when those inevitable challenges do occur. One thing I like to talk about are if then statements that we have for ourselves.

[00:31:21.780] – Dr. Davis
So, for example, we know, for example, you have a temptation when you're in line at the checkout on your work to try to get foods. You know, you don't want to eat candy or chips or something you have. If then statements ready. If I am tempted to get candy bars or chips, then I will pull out the snacks I brought with me that are carrot sticks or something else. If I tend to overeat at restaurants and we know that often, they're giant portions and that people tend to eat what's in front of them.

[00:31:55.020] – Dr. Davis
If I tend to do that, then I will get a doggie bag at the beginning of the meal and put half the food and the bag to take home before I eat. So the point is that there are automatic actions that we have ready to go almost like auto technology when we veer out of a Lane, it pulls us back in automatically, so we don't have to think about it. We're ready, we're prepared for these occurrences, and we're ready to act. And likewise, when we kind of fall out of our lanes, we kind of get off track.

[00:32:25.140] – Dr. Davis
We have ways of talking to ourselves to say if I get off track and I won't blame myself, I won't say I'm a failure, I won't give up. I'll say, you know what? I'm just going to start again and keep going. And so what research shows that people that can do that kind of self talk that can have those if in statements, when they do inevitably fall off track, they can get back on track and keep going. And that's so the point is to have this kind of planning in place so that we are ready and prepared for the inevitable challenges that do occur.

[00:32:53.710] – Dr. Davis
And we can keep going. And then finally, I talk about calling the cavalry, sometimes doing all these things ourselves. We need more help. They helped a certain extent, but we need extra help. And so there are certain things we can do to get extra help. And one that I talk about, it's something called intensive behavioral therapy, and what that is basically is listening to help professionals, whether their physicians, nurse practitioners, dietitians, to offer a certain kind of therapy called intensive behavioral therapy that helps us around things such as food planning, exercise, dealing with different kinds of barriers that we may and helping us overcome those barriers.

[00:33:36.030] – Dr. Davis
So basically helping us to manage the process of weight management. And this can occur in person. It can occur online. There's certain commercial programs like NUM and others that incorporate elements of behavioral therapy so that you can get it in various ways. But that can be very helpful to people, sometimes to get help from professionals to help them get on track and stay on track. And then for some people, surgery can be an option for people who have above a certain BMI who qualify. Surgery can be very beneficial, bariatic surgery.

[00:34:07.290] – Dr. Davis
There are various forms of it. It's not for everybody. And certainly people need to carefully weigh the risks and benefits because there are risks involved. But for certain people, it can be very beneficial. It can help them lose a substantial amount of way, keep that weight off and decrease their risk of certain conditions like diabetes. Surgery can be something that's very beneficial for certain people as well. So I think people shouldn't be afraid. I guess the point there is people shouldn't see his weakness, they shouldn't see it as failure or anything else.

[00:34:36.210] – Dr. Davis
If they say, you know what? I'm trying everything I can on my own, but I need some extra help. So I need to call in some professionals to help me take the next step. And that's something people should be ready to do if they find that what they're doing on their own isn't sufficient.

[00:34:49.080] – Allan
Yes, Dr. Davis, I define wellness as being the healthiest fittest and happiest you can be. What are three strategies or tactics to get and stay well?

[00:34:59.380] – Dr. Davis
well, for me, I guess I would say mine aren't necessarily Earth shattering, and they're not necessarily surprising. But for me, at least personally, the three that I would say would be the first would be movement moving your body. As I said, I'm a big advocate of exercise for all kinds of reasons. I like to say that if there were a pill that could do all the things that exercise can do, everything from reducing risk of heart disease and cancer to improving your sex life, we'd all be clamoring for it.

[00:35:26.160] – Dr. Davis
So I think finding a way to move your body regularly, and that can be any number of things, but anything, whether you're walking to hiking, to dancing, to playing pickleball, whatever it might be that you enjoy, that you can sustain that you can keep doing that's really important. It's crucial for our health. And as I say, it's important for our weight, not necessarily to help us lose weight, but to stay at a healthy weight and to prevent weight gain. So movement would be the first thing I would say.

[00:35:53.850] – Dr. Davis
The second thing would be our diet healthy eating. And again, we've talked earlier about what that means. It's not complicated. It's not following a lot of rules. It doesn't mean you have to buy designer foods. It's a fairly straightforward process. It's focusing on your overall eating pattern. And by the way, it's not just what you eat, but it's also enjoying food with other people. I think that's so important that's an important part of healthy eating to me, and often certain diets that are too restrictive. We're involved fasting to me often take away the joy of eating, take away the pleasure of enjoying our food with other people.

[00:36:29.970] – Dr. Davis
So eating healthful foods and enjoying that food with other people would be a second principle that I would say. And the third I mentioned earlier is sleep. I think too often this is overlooked sadly, in our society. It's a badge of honor for people who say I only sleep five or 6 hours a night. I only need a little bit of sleep well, I think that's unfortunate that people say that and make us think that's something admirable, because it's not. For most of us, we need seven to 9 hours of sleep and that we often don't realize the negative effects that two little sleep have on our health and our wellbeing.

[00:37:00.200] – Dr. Davis
And so I think to focus more on sleep hygiene. Putting away the tablet, putting away the iPhone getting to sleep earlier, focusing on good sleep hygiene is crucial, again, not only for our health, but also for weight management. So again, that's something that I think many of us don't focus on enough.

[00:37:17.290] – Allan
Thank you for that. If someone wanted to learn more about you and learn more about your book, SuperSized Lies, where would you like for me to send them?

[00:37:25.160] – Dr. Davis
My website, Healthyskeptic.com. I have on there more about the book. More about Me. I have a number of videos I've created so that's a good place to start.

[00:37:34.020] – Allan
Great.

[00:37:35.000] – Dr. Davis
healthyskeptic.com.

[00:37:36.010] – Allan
You can go to 40plusfitnesspodcast.com/505, and I'll be sure to have a link there in the show, notes.

[00:37:42.930] – Allan
Dr. Davis, thank you. So much for being a part of 40+ Fitness.

[00:37:46.220] – Dr. Davis
It's been a real pleasure, Allan. Thank you so much.

Post Show/Recap

[00:37:52.510] – Allan
Hey, Raz.

[00:37:54.180] – Rachel
Hey, Allan, I just have to say, I love the title of his book, Super Sized Lies and The Myths of Weight Loss and The Truth. That's a pretty heavy title. Perfect.

[00:38:07.120] – Allan
Yeah. The thing I get to is everybody wants something simple. They want a rule of thumb. Just tell me one thing. Just tell me one thing. What can I eat? What can I not? That's the one rule. And people want to give you rules. If I can give you a rule and I can make money doing it, they give you a rule. So a lot of personal trainers will say, Calories in calories out. You got to get in the gym. You got to have a gym membership.

[00:38:34.320] – Allan
You got to get in the gym. We got to work out the three times per week that you're going to train with me. But that's not enough. You got to come in here another three times a week and be doing that cardio that I told you to do and then go low fat and just eat what you want and you'll be fine. And then if you get in there and you're not losing the weight, it's like what you must be eating too much because I'm working you.

[00:38:56.330] – Allan
And you know what? You're working hard than gym. And they're like, I'm working hard in the gym and you're eating too much. It's like, Well, I'm hungry because I'm working in the gym.

[00:39:07.240] – Rachel
Yeah. Calories in Calories out is probably the most common myth that he had highlighted. And it's one I've heard. And I continue to hear to this day.

[00:39:16.360] – Allan
And the problem with it is it's a myth over the long term.

[00:39:23.020] – Rachel
Yeah.

[00:39:23.570] – Allan
It's not a myth myth because it's true.

[00:39:25.910] – Rachel
You're right.

[00:39:26.690] – Allan
It is absolutely true. If you eat more calories than you are burning, you're going to gain weight. The problem is. And if you're eating fewer calories than you burn, you will lose weight. The problem is your body is not a closed system. So when you sit there and eat less, your body's going to sit there and say, you know, something's going on in Rachel's life, and she can't get enough food for us to do the things we want to do. And we want to save the brain.

[00:39:53.930] – Allan
You want to save the liver, we want to save the kidneys. And what can we get rid of? What can we reduce? And it says, oh, well, yeah, we got some of this fat here, but we want to hold on to that, because if she goes long term without food, we're going to be screaming. You're going to be struggling. So let's let go of a little muscle because it's burning more calories. So you're in the gym working and you're not putting on any muscle or anything you might be gaining weight, but it's not muscle.

[00:40:18.460] – Allan
And then it's going to say, Well, let's reduce the size of the spleen and cut out our immune system. Let's do a little bit of work here and cut off some of our reproductive strength because we have no need to bring babies into this world if there's not enough food. And so sometimes you gotta just coax your body to understand, yes, there is enough food, good high quality nutritious food for us to survive and do well and thrive. And then at that point, your body can sit there and say, you know, yeah, we could use some of this body fat when during those periods of time when we don't have enough food.

[00:40:52.630] – Allan
But we know there's plenty of food because she eats.

[00:40:57.210] – Rachel
Right. We always have plenty enough food. We don't often feel the hunger. And we go through each day. We had breakfast at a certain time, lunch at a certain time, afternoon snack, dinner at a certain time, like we got plenty of food to do what we need.

[00:41:11.820] – Allan
And here's the interesting thing is, those meal times, there's actually no magic to them. There's no reason, we eat that way because that's how the work day was scheduled. You ate before you went to work, they gave you a lunch break. You ate a lunch and then ate after you got through with work. And then along the way, just unions and what not stepped in and says we should probably let them take a 15 minutes break. So there was a morning snack and an afternoon snack.

[00:41:39.180] – Allan
And quite literally, the five six meals a day is built around a work day in an office or a factory. It has absolutely nothing to do with your metabolism and how your body was designed. In many cases, you might go the whole morning without having to eat food because you just didn't have enough the day before. And you've got to walk 9 miles to where you can get honey or roots or kill a rabbit or a bear. And that's going to take a little bit of time.

[00:42:07.540] – Allan
And then you do it. You carry it home and you can prepare it and you Cook it and then you eat it. So you might only have one big meal each day, or you might be able to nibble on berries and things along the way. And then you go fishing, you catch some fish and you eat those fish. But it was never meant for us to sit down and eat five meals a day. And the premise behind that was when you're trying to catch calories, you get hungry by having you eat more often, you feel like you're not as hungry all the time.

[00:42:35.470] – Allan
That's all that's about. So those are myths that were built out of people were getting fatter and they knew the scientists and everything looking at it, they're eating more. We eat more than we ever did. History. because food got easier and easier, got more calorie dense and less nutritionally dense. And that, to me, is the real key to all of this. The quality of your food is more important than the amount of food.

[00:43:07.510] – Rachel
Well, I love that Dr. Davis mentioned that he said he suggested that we track what we eat and not get hung up so much on the calories because he don't need to worry about the calories in calories out equation. But to track what we eat, and the real light bulb moment for me was because then you can identify patterns of what you're eating according to certain moments in your life. If you're always stressed, some people like he had mentioned may reach for a donut or a cookie after dinner at night, it becomes a habit.

[00:43:40.200] – Rachel
And if you can kind of monitor the food that you're eating and how much and when and what for.

[00:43:45.900] – Rachel
Then you might be able to get a little insight that you could then use to change or make healthier choices.

[00:43:51.520] – Allan
Because the personal trainer is selling you the calories in calories out model makes sense because that's where they sell training. As a coach, I stepped back and say, okay, why does that not work? If you sit there and I said, if you did the math and said, okay, I'm burning 2500 calories and I'm eating 2000. I should lose 1 lb per week every week for the rest of my life till I'm down to zero.

[00:44:16.450] – Allan
And we all know that doesn't work. We all know that doesn't work. It's never that straight line ever. And so the reality of it is, if you're just selling burning calories as a model, you got to keep selling it. Whereas we know a man or a woman, we get over 40 or 50. Our metabolism seems to just stop and it doesn't stop, stop. But it's kind of one of those kind of sets of the harder we work to get our metabolism up, if you will, the harder it is, and the more we seem to want to eat and that's our body trying to protect itself.

[00:44:53.850] – Allan
So taking a little bit of time to just go about this in a smart way, like you said, the logging and understanding. Okay, when I eat this pizza or hamburger or hot dog or whatever, the next day, my body weight is higher. I look in the mirror and my cheeks and neck are puffy and my skin just doesn't look as good. So I know staying hydrated, eating high quality food, making sure I'm getting an protein for me. Those are keys. If I'm going to keep myself feeling good and energized, then that's when you give your body the right foods and you have enough energy, then it's a little bit easier to just kind of poke out or net nudge your body to say, okay, it's safe to let some of this body fat go, and then it will and then it will stop.

[00:45:50.690] – Allan
You got to let it set. And then you got to start poking at it again. Give it the general nudges. And then your body. In the terms I would just say you have to coax your body to lose weight because it doesn't want to.

[00:46:02.820] – Rachel
Yeah. Well. And also, Dr. Davis mentioned the importance of sleep and stress because when we don't get enough sleep and when we are under higher stress, our body is not functioning in its optimal fashion. And stress not only somehow makes us want to eat more, we choose the foods that we probably shouldn't choose, the candies and the rich home cooked foods. But it's just a habit. And then we have a higher cortisol level as well. And so our body is not wanting to release any of that again in the same way.

[00:46:41.650] – Rachel
So just knowing your sleeping habits and your stress levels, just be aware of what you're doing during that time.

[00:46:48.520] – Allan
Yeah. Because what's happening there is when you're in that stress situation, whether it was sleep and not getting enough sleep or just really in a high stress environment is that that cortisol is basically catabolic. So it's tearing down your muscle mass. It's basically doing a lot of things that are not good. Be great if you were being chased by a bear, you want cortisol, you want all those adrenals. But you don't want that in a general sense, day to day, chronically. And what we're doing with the foods that we're choosing is we are pumping our body now with dopamine.

[00:47:22.480] – Allan
So it creates that environment of a feeling, happy, comfortable. And so those comfort foods, whatever your comfort food is, you're turning to it to get that dopamine to get that reward. And it feels good. So of course, all doesn't feel good. Dopamine does. And so you get into that cycle. Of course, all hit dopamine. Of course, all hit hit dopamine. And that's the cycle, whether it's Donuts, pizza, candies, whatever it is, it's just that cycle. And when you start to recognize it, it's like, Why did I eat those Donuts yesterday?

[00:47:59.700] – Allan
And then you realize, oh, well, my boss yelled at me and I thought I was going to get fired the day before, the kids, for one reason or another were just assholes today. They didn't want to put on their clothes. They didn't want to get ready for school. They didn't want to do anything. And now I'm late for work. And my boss is already mad at me. And so I don't have time to make breakfast. I'll just stop at the Dunkin Donuts and get a coffee, and then you buy two Donuts, and it's like, why did that happen?

[00:48:29.380] – Allan
You see the story. So the logging what you eat and paying attention to how you felt is going to give you those subtle clues to know where those breaks are and then taking the deep breath, avoiding on Donuts drive through when you're in that position because you might just well be able to pull in order your hot black coffee and move about. But if you're in a stress position and you're looking and they got the smell and at the back end of that place at the drive through, they make sure you can smell it.

[00:49:06.940] – Allan
You end up ordering a couple of them. And that's all by design.

[00:49:11.960] – Rachel
I just want to throw in exercise as an alternate way to get your dopamine hit. All of us runners. We are happy runners. We have the runners high, like they talk about, which is essentially dopamine hits. But also, people feel a whole lot better after throwing some weights around in the gym, just a little bit of movement and just makes you feel so empowered and so energized and kind of kicks out a little bit of that stress in a healthier way.

[00:49:39.490] – Allan
And it could be something as simple as going into the stairwell at work, going up and down a flight of stairs for a couple minutes, and you're going to burn off some of that cortisol because you ran from the bear, you burn some energy, so you're going to burn off some of that, and then you're going to relax. And I'm not saying work up a sweat unless you're and you're that upset.

[00:50:02.980] – Rachel
And yeah, you could.

[00:50:05.070] – Allan
But up and down the stairs a little another technique. And my boss would call me. And if you come to my office, that was never, never, ever, ever a good thing.

[00:50:14.610] – Rachel
No, never. No.

[00:50:16.770] – Allan
That come to my office call was just, ugh.

[00:50:20.490] – Rachel
It's just like being called to the principal's office when you're a kid.

[00:50:23.580] – Allan
No, I wasn't afraid of the principal. Called your boss is like, ugh, this more work. This is going to be like who did I upset today? Who didn't I upset today? And then it was like, So what I would do when I go get on the elevator, I would just start doing the box breathing. You know, I'm going up two flights and I could have walked up the stairs.

[00:50:45.470] – Allan
But I said, no, I'm going to delay it because they see me coming off the elevator. That's what they expect. They don't expect me to go up the stairs. So I'll just go up the elevator and the time it takes for the door to close, just start doing some box breathing. 4 seconds and 4 seconds hold 4 seconds out. 4 seconds hold. You do those while the elevator is going up, you get about three or four or five of those in before the elevator doors open again and you walk out and you'll notice your stress level drops a lot just from something as simple as that.

[00:51:15.820] – Allan
So just recognizing the other things that are going on in your life will help you get past a lot of this. If someone says something and it's an absolute, this is an absolute for weight loss, they don't know what they're talking about.

[00:51:32.550] – Rachel
You're right. Good point. Good point. And I also want to point out to how individualized we all are. I say this a lot, too, that we are all different ages, different sizes, different points in our lives. And so there is no one size fits all. And if what you're doing is not working, I think reach out to you, to me, to whoever can help, because sometimes you just need a little bit of expert advice to help you get through your slump or whatever you're dealing with.

[00:52:02.820] – Allan
And the other side of it is if you hire a coach or you're talking to a coach, the coach is not going to make money making you sweat and burn calories. They're going to be paying attention to the other things going on. They're going to ask questions. It's not so much that coaches that we have the answer. It's just we have this objectivity in the conversation. It's like, Well, I can't help. And I'm like, okay, can't help what? Two Donuts every morning. That's what I see.

[00:52:33.690] – Allan
You're eating two doughnuts for breakfast every morning, and then healthy the rest of the day. And I'm like, okay, well, I see pizza in here. I see tacos. I see not that some of those can be healthy, but at the same time, a lot of folks will get into the moment and lose that ability to take a step back. And what a coach gives you is kind of that opportunity to have a sounding board, and then you say it, and then they repeat it back to you out loud.

[00:53:03.580] – Allan
You're like, aahh.

[00:53:05.690] – Rachel
Yeah, it's so helpful sometimes to have another set of eyes looking at you. For sure.

[00:53:13.470] – Allan
Alright, Rachel, anything else before we call it a show?

[00:53:16.950] – Rachel
No. This is great. I hope you enjoy the rest of your trip up here.

[00:53:20.360] – Allan
I will. I will. Thank you.

[00:53:21.870] – Rachel
Take care.

[00:53:22.730] – Allan
You too. Bye.

[00:53:24.290] – Rachel
Bye.

Patreons

The following listeners have sponsored this show by pledging on our Patreon Page:

– Anne Lynch	– Eric More	– Leigh Tanner
– Deb Scarlett	– John Dachauer	– Margaret Bakalian
– Debbie Ralston	– John Somsky	– Melissa Ball
– Eliza Lamb	– Judy Murphy	– Tim Alexander

Thank you!

Another episode you may enjoy

Less...

Let's Say Hello

[00:00:50.250] – Allan
Raz, how are things going?

[00:00:52.660] – Rachel
Good, Allan. How are you today?

[00:00:54.650] – Allan
I'm pretty good. When this episode goes live, I will be on vacation. Well, actually, my vacation we'll be driving north to Indiana, but I'll be back in the States when this episode goes live, and I've had a nice vacation, but right now it's just trying to get everything done, so we can be gone for a month and traveling around and still do what we got to get done. So it's just a lot of moving parts.

[00:01:27.380] – Rachel
Yeah, it's a long time to be living out of a suitcase, but I know you're going to be visiting family and friends pretty much everywhere, so it'll be really rewarding.

[00:01:37.360] – Allan
I was, of course, high travel before and now I don't travel at all, really, especially in the Covid environment, but we'll have a rental car and our bags to go in the rental car. And, yeah, it's a lot of hotel nights, but I'm kind of almost used to that way of going because it's how I lived a large portion of my life. So I'm pretty good about traveling. And actually, that's one of the upcoming episodes we're going to talk about is how to stay healthy and fit while you're traveling.

[00:02:10.930] – Allan
So this is our Hello segment for this episode of episode 502. And what we're going to do because I'm going to be traveling and it'll be a little bit more difficult to get recording done. And I want to actually try to really take a vacation short of just making sure I'm taking care of my clients because all that's going to be happening. We're actually going to be recording our discussion of this episode, episode 503 and episode 504. So we're going to forego the Hellos episode segments for those episodes because it quite literally just be ten minutes from now is like, hey, how are you doing?

[00:02:45.500] – Allan
And we're not that creative, okay? We're just not good. We're not going to pretend it is what it is, but everything going okay for you?

[00:02:54.300] – Rachel
Oh, yeah. Things are great. Got another runcation plans. We've got a weekend coming up. We'll be camping and doing a little race, so getting the most out of the summer as I can get.

[00:03:08.010] – Allan
Good. We're rolling into September, so it's just around the corner. You're going to have some really comfortable running for the next month. And then poof.

[00:03:16.320] – Rachel
Yeah, this is about perfect, because I have one more ultra for the year. I'm running the Kal Haven with some friends. It's 33 1/2 miles, and it's at the end of October. So I think that'll be a lovely day for running. You never know what you're going to get here in Michigan, but it'll be much better than in the middle of the summer. It's been so hot and humid here.

[00:03:36.910] – Allan
Yeah, but wow 33 miles. Good for you.

[00:03:41.120] – Rachel
It'll still be a long day, but it'll be a nice long day.

[00:03:46.970] – Allan
Okay, well, let's go ahead and get into the episode.

[00:03:50.340] – Rachel
Great.

Interview

[00:04:42.120] – Allan
James, welcome to 40+ Fitness.

[00:04:45.200] – James
Hey, thank you so much. So happy to be here with you, especially because I turned 41 last year. So now I'm officially part of the Tribe, which feels pretty cool.

[00:04:54.590] – Allan
Congratulations. You're almost there. So the book is called Know Your True Self: The Formula to Raise Human Consciousness. And when I saw the book and it was brought to my attention, I was like, you know, we don't spend any time doing that. Most of us are so in our world, in the past, in the future that just to sit down and have that honest conversation, even if it's just in your head. It's okay if you talk to yourself, but it was just one of those things saying that is so important for us to do, but we almost dedicate no time to it.

[00:05:43.800] – James
Yeah. It's definitely a big challenge. And just based on how we're learning and receiving information right now, we're in this onslaught of the connected world. And inside of there, you look at all the knowledge that we've amassed over the past. Just let's look at, like, 30 years because it wasn't until the 90s, we even studied the brain. And we know so much right now and there's aggregates of information out there, and sometimes we tend to focus on just one small piece of the puzzle, and it takes us away from the bigger picture of our existence, humanity, everything that we deal with on a daily basis.

[00:06:23.890] – James
So our goal in developing this, and it was a journey I did with my father as he was going through a lot of health issues was really to take core principles and integrate them into a philosophy to help people look inward, because to your point, it's not something we usually do. We're usually just so unconsciously directed in our own world, getting from place to place for moment to moment that we're not really even taking time to reflect on the moments where in, why we're feeling this way.

[00:06:52.830] – James
It's a challenge that we're facing. And one of the challenges where you see this, a large majority of the population that can't cope with the reality that we even created the amount of anxiety and depression, a lot of its in many ways self induced by not taking that time to really look at yourself, which is a huge challenge. It's not easy to do that.

[00:07:15.280] – Allan
I completely agree. And as I was going through the book and I was thinking, I hadn't really thought of things that way. And maybe I had thought of certain things a certain way. And as I started putting together, I'm like, I need to do this more because I'm not good at it yet. And I should be. I'm 55 years old. I should know myself pretty well. But, you know, there's still bits and pieces that I'm like. Okay, I need to do a little work here.

[00:07:42.990] – Allan
And the book is really well laid out because it allows you to go through each piece of that because you've laid it out really cool. And it's a good visual book. There's a lot of white space, and so it's not a heavy, hard psychological read where you're reading a psychology text, but it's in there. It's so interesting. Okay. I've read this book or read something about this in this. I knew a lot of the concepts, but there's one that it kind of evades me because I want to believe it.

[00:08:15.180] – Allan
And then I don't want to believe it because I like having free will. I like thinking I have free will. But and I think we all know the picture of our brain is like a computer. So whatever has been coded in the brain is what's going to come out the other side. And if we want to change that, change the behavior, we have to change our brain first by what we put into it. So we got to change the code. Why is it so hard for us to just decide we're going to do something like break a habit or start a new habit or really, in some cases, just even be in control?

[00:09:00.540] – James
Yeah. And you bring up that control and that choice, and that free will and to an extent, does exist in our lives. And you know, if you just look at the function of us as a human, there's so much that happens that happens on an unconscious level that we're not in control of. And if you just look at everything that's happening with us, right now, we're talking to each other. We're not thinking about, how do I form these words we're not thinking about I need to breathe.

[00:09:29.510] – James
My heart needs to pump. We have all of these energy systems within us that are working in concert at such a meticulous level that's keeping us alive. Just that unconscious energy is incredible. And that's working through something that's divinely inspired this universal consciousness we're all part of. And then also our brain. And our brain is almost like this I like to think of as an antenna, and that antenna has all of these senses connected to it. And whenever we perceive something, whenever we experience something, whenever we engage in self talk, all of that information is coming into our consciousness through the brain.

[00:10:12.930] – James
And there's this interplay between the brain and the mind. The brain is this tangible object, right? Full of neurons and cells in our mind is sort of boundless in turn. Where's your brain? You could point to it. You're like, Where's your mind? Well it's working through my brain. But it's working through everything. So there's a lot of awakening just inside of realizing that. But getting to your question just about why is it hard to break these habits that we have that form? Because the brain relies on routines.

[00:10:48.330] – James
And whenever we give ourselves a thought, whenever we experience something, we start to program deep neuron chains. These neuron chain start to form around these experiences. And, you know, for sometimes good and sometimes those neuron chains start firing up. And, you know, a good example is, I drank really heavily for a long time in my life, and I don't anymore. And it was usually for celebration because I accomplished the time and I wanted to party and I wanted to go out and have fun. I had neuron chains developed in my brain that whenever I accomplished something, they start lighting up, getting excited, time to drink.

[00:11:32.130] – James
And there's a habit formation in there. Now, if you want to break that habit, you need to develop new healthier neuron change new routines when you have a level of achievement. And to do so is hard because even though those neuron chains might fade as you develop new habits, they never go away. They're always there. So you always have to be conscious of the thoughts that you're having, the feeling that you're having, what you're sort of gravitating to doing and every given moment, because it's because of those routines that the brain can even function.

[00:12:08.690] – James
The brain relies on them, even as a biocomputer relies on those in terms of habit formation and to break those chains and create new ones, just an ongoing challenge that we face in so many aspects of our life.

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[00:14:29.320] – Allan
Could you, I mean, because I think if you're listening to this podcast, you care about positive change. You're trying to improve your help, you're trying to improve your fitness, you're trying to do positive change. So if we've got these neuron chains that are kind of driving a behavior that we know is not good for us, we want to put in more neuron chains for positive actions.

[00:14:55.530] – Allan
How do we go about doing that?

[00:14:57.100] – James
Yeah, the biggest whenever it comes to rewiring your brain. I think the most advantageous thing you can do is practice thought observation. And thought observation can be challenging because sometimes we're under the illusion that when we're thinking about something a lot, we really care about it when it's actually when we're creating space between our thoughts, we're finding peace. And you know, that's why meditative practices have become so important. And I think, like 40% of Americans have now at least tried meditation, which is great. But meditation is just one component of thought observation.

[00:15:38.460] – James
It has to be thought observation as you're navigating life. And when you do get an impulse and an impulse for a behavior, the best thing that you can do is not give in to that impulse immediately. Create a delay so that neuron chain might be telling someone that likes to eat fatty foods. Oh, my God. I just really want to order a big meat Lovers pizza right now. And, you know, you can easily go to any food app, any delivery service, and they're ready to fire up all these around chains associated with that.

[00:16:13.770] – James
Next thing you know, you're in the impulse zone. But if you can, when that impulse arises, that you know, as a challenge for you, and it might be just identifying here's one impulse I want to work on right now, one thing at a time, then to identify that thought, identify that that thought is not my true self. That thought has been programmed in my mind by past experiences I've had here is the root of that. Remove yourself from the situation for 10 to 15 minutes, direct your consciousness to another activity.

[00:16:48.030] – James
It could just be reading a book, watching something positive on television, having a conversation with a friend, spouse, loved one. And then after that, 10 to 15 minutes, that neuron change activity will slow down a little bit. And that's a great time to engage in a meditative practice is when you get the impulse, just cool yourself down a little bit. And usually when you do that, that desire doesn't mean you still might not want a pizza, but the level of impact on your mind and you'll be able to control it will definitely be a lot more manageable.

[00:17:27.220] – Allan
So from a practical perspective, I'm hearing that to mean delete the Pizza Hut or Dominoes app off your phone, because that makes it they've removed the barrier. You can literally push button. And the pizza that you always order is on the way, already paid for. The driver knows where you live, it's all there, and they make it really, really easy to do that. So we delete that off of our phone, and at least at that point, it slows us down. And we have an opportunity to fill that impulse, to deal with it, to observe it.

[00:18:01.120] – Allan
And I always think this is really important, because when I'm talking to my clients about their journey, when they're trying to get themselves healthy and fit, is that the warning signs are there the things that trip us up are the same things that tripped us up before. So if we've been struggling with alcohol, we've been struggling with weight and the food choices, and we've tried before and failed. Those failures are not fail because you're still trying. You're still in the game. So they were learning opportunities in your practice of self awareness.

[00:18:37.360] – Allan
But I think for a lot of us, we're not really good at self awareness. And that's what I was kind of leaning towards at the very beginning of this was if I go out and say, okay, I know that meeting my friends at the bar, I'm more than likely going to order an IPA, and that's not going to suit me or serve me for what I'm trying to do right now for my health and fitness. But I also don't want to say no to my friends, but I know that's the thing.

[00:19:07.490] – Allan
And I'm from a self awareness perspective, it's there. But if my friends call me, I do it. And so why is it so difficult for us to practice self awareness and all these red blocks and how we get it done? Because I think to me, this is where the rubber hits the road for anyone looking to do something positive in their lives. You got to get this one done.

[00:19:35.040] – James
Yeah. And let's start with his desire because you bring up desire a lot, because desire is really where a lot of our unhealthy habits come from. And, you know, the reward center of the brain is directly associated with those desires. And in many ways, the promise of the reward is better than the reward itself. So the promise of that pizza, that beer, anything that is sort of one of your over indulgence in the world after you have that, how do you feel? Pretty crappy most of the time.

[00:20:12.690] – James
You're not like, oh, my God, I just had a large pizza, so I'm ready to take on the world. You know, it's the promise of it is so great. And you even see that with, like, tests with rats and the pleasure center of the brain. If they're associated to hitting a lever to get a reward. And with pressing that lever, they get a shock. They will get that reward the first time. Maybe it's a little piece of food complemented by that shock. Now, over time, the piece of food won't be there.

[00:20:46.170] – James
But they'll just keep hitting that lever, and it's hitting the pleasure center of the brain, releasing all of this dopamine. And they're shocking themselves into submission because the promise of that reward is greater than reward itself. So it's really challenging. And if you think about the world we live in because I love the example you brought about just removing the app from your phone. It's right now, it's not the promise of, you know, being out on a Hunt and our primitive nature. And all of a sudden, we track miles and miles and miles, and we come across some fruits.

[00:21:22.040] – James
And this might be the only sugar that we find for months. And now we can just go to the grocery store or an app. And there's whole aisle dedicated to refine aspects of sugar. So, you know, the same instinct that kept us alive for hundreds of millions of years around now, the root cause of our, you know, addiction because of this over indulgence. And, you know, a lot of that just comes back to when you think about yourself. Awareness is making sure that you understand that I'm not these thoughts.

[00:21:55.170] – James
I'm the one that observes these thoughts. And when that impulse arises, I've always learned to practice to ask myself, who am I? Who am I? And just by asking yourself, who am I it's like the thought that ends all thoughts because it puts you in this reflection. It's like, I'm not someone that's defined by this habit. I'm not someone that's defined by this experience. I'm the one that observes this and then has the ability. And that's where that choice comes in because 95% of what we do is happening unconsciously.

[00:22:30.380] – James
And that's just because of all the programming in our brain and all the things we talked about that are happening in your body on an unconscious level. But to keep that 5% of choice that we have is so precious. And if we start letting all of these technologies pull our strings and all of these dopamine triggers because the triggers are everywhere. They're absolutely everywhere. You know, we really have to start to look at everything from a very objective level and just remember to observe every thought that we have objectively as much as we can, especially when it comes to our specific addictions, challenges, goals that we're looking to achieve.

[00:23:10.040] – Allan
As I got into that part of the book, I was like, okay, this is getting really stoic. And actually, then you quoted a stoic. So I'm like, okay, I'm in the right room. I'm here. And one of the things that really attracts me to stoicism to Buddhism is this concept of acceptance. And I know Buddhism and stoicism are two different things, but they carry this commonality in my world view is that we need to look at what's going on around us is not defining us. And if we can take that objective step back, which is not easy.

[00:23:55.180] – Allan
But if we can take that step back and say, okay, I'm going to look at this. And then I'm going to decide how to act based on what I know is right based on some virtues and some truth, then we're in a better place. But that takes acceptance that takes knowing what you can control what you can't control. You have to accept it. You have to accept what's there. It's very powerful. It's very hard. And I think anything in life that's really hard, the payoff is huge.

[00:24:29.470] – Allan
But could you talk about the power of acceptance?

[00:24:32.100] – James
Yeah. The power of acceptance is appreciating reality as it is, as it currently stands. And you brought up understanding what we can and can't control. You know, I can't control that I just turned 40 and my body is now in a state of contracting. I can't control that. I can't control what other people might think of me. I can't control the weather. I can't control the fact that I'm going to die someday. I can't control that there's a pandemic. All I really have to control is how I respond to all of these things that are happening to me in my life and looking for the opportunity and all of these because we seem to as a culture love to thrive on the highs and the lows.

[00:25:17.260] – James
You know, it's like, oh, my gosh like, COVID this is the worst thing that's ever happened to us. And it's like, it's going to end. It's going to end. And it's like, now it's back and we're just a Ping pong ball going up and down, up and down, riding the highs and lows. And when you learn to accept everything that happens to you and like, you really start to go with the flow. I know acceptance has been challenging, even for me to practice. It's not easy all the time.

[00:25:42.620] – Speaker 2
But, you know, when I quit drinking, I thought I'm going to quit drinking. I'm already in great shape. I'm just going to become, like, in super shape. My mental capacities are going to be sharp. And then I quit drinking. I got hit with other really hard health concerns, and I wasn't able to exercise for a while. I felt like my body was deteriorating. Doctors couldn't figure out what was going on. And it took about a year for me to stabilize again and to get back into positive routines.

[00:26:14.650] – Speaker 2
But during that time, I took it. As you know, what's happening to me right now is an important experience. It's helping me learn about more about myself. I've been so much in the outer world, participating in life, going to parties. And now this is a chance for me to discover more about my inner world without those blocks around me. And whatever we're going through is a huge opportunity for growth like even Napoleon Hill and thinking grow rich of something to the effect of, you know, with every seed of adversity comes in equal seed of opportunity, the greater adversity, the greater opportunity.

[00:26:53.590] – James
But our mind and our subconscious is going to focus on not what's right, but what's wrong. To reframe that, isn't like a one time event. You really have to practice reframe everything in life. Like my wife and I have this, I wouldn't call it a game. The state of being where, you know, you just don't complain. You don't complain about anything. And if you catch yourself complaining about something that's out of your control or judging another person or experience, you immediately reframe it to what's beautiful in that experience.

[00:27:28.720] – James
Beautiful about that person, because all we have to control is our response to life experiences. And if we learn to do that, it really takes our well being and stabilizes it. You stop looking at everything. This is going to be the best time in my life. The best trip. It's just everything that just is, you know, is getting you closer to celebrating enlightenment. Celebrating enlightenment is appreciating what is with an open, objective mind and heart.

[00:27:59.080] – Allan
I think to do that, the real thing comes down to one another concept you had in the book was self love. We have this voice. And you think you quoted a statistic 80% of the voice in our head is typically negative, and it's talking a lot. Probably more words than you actually use in your mouth, your heads talking to you a lot more. And if most of that is negative, then you're coding in that negative expression. You're coding in that negative response because you're in it and you're struggling unless you mentioned, like, COVID or something goes on with our health.

[00:28:42.010] – Allan
If we're having those negative voices and they're winning the argument because they're louder and they're speaking more often, we're going to really struggle with a lot of these things. And the only way to really come out the other end, in my opinion, is through self love.

[00:28:58.540] – James
Yes, self love is so crucial and needs to be practiced on so many different paradigm. When it comes to self love and that voice, you know, first, is not identifying with that voice. It's creating space between those thoughts. And when you are accepting, start just appreciating reality as it is. And being grateful for what is that voice becomes a lot quieter. It doesn't mean it won't fire up because it's trying to protect you. And all it's doing is sending messages based on what it believes to be true.

[00:29:32.540] – James
All of the experiences it has. If you're a hardcore Nike fan and you see someone in other type of sports gear and judging, like, how could they like under armor? That's not you. That's your unconscious mind being programmed to believe that, right. That's on a material level. But you know, when it comes to self love and self talk, if you grow up in an environment where you were told you're not going to amount to anything and you're worthless and that was programmed to you from a very young age, that's a formative time your mind.

[00:30:07.240] – James
Whenever you're looking to achieve something, it's going to send that trigger up and that thought impulse is going to come up. So sometimes it's things that happen to us that we judge in the material world, sometimes the things that happen in formative times in their lives and the other times, things as adults, where we start questioning ourselves. I don't know if I can do this, you know, and you start looking at what you want to achieve. It's a health and wellness objective, and you're 300 pounds and your goal is to get 190 and, you know, it's day two and you just feel like nothing's happening.

[00:30:44.630] – James
You know, that negative self talk is just going to start firing up. It's like you're always going to be overweight. You're never going to be able to accomplish this. And that's when reprogramming yourself with positive self talk. I think one of the greatest ways to do that is just to develop, I don't want to call it a mantra, I just like to call it like a mission vision statement, which is a reaffirmation of who I am. It's like just something simple that you can write up in a paragraph.

[00:31:13.370] – James
Recite to yourself every morning, every time you're getting down, and every time before you go to bed and create positive self talk within that, because self talk and self love go hand in hand. And just knowing that we're boundless with our potential, what holds us back is the contents of our minds, which aren't necessarily truth, right? They're not truth of our reality. We have the ability to to shape and mold and do that. And that's the beautiful thing about the brain. We reprogram our brain with our mind.

[00:31:46.940] – James
And our brain has plasticity. So it's not hardwired, it's not fixed. So anytime someone says, this is just the way I am, like, Well, that's the way you're choosing to be. We all have the ability to change if you don't believe it, there's this great book called The Boy that was Raised as a dog. Really sad story about a child that had very horrible upbringing was raised by a mentally ill. I think it was his mother's brother, and he was locked in a cage for early part of his life.

[00:32:22.490] – James
And he was raised like he was a dog. And they ended up doing a lot of work with brain plasticity to rewire his thoughts, emotions and behavior. And, you know, after months of going through therapy, he entered kindergarten. There's hope for all of us. We can all overcome. And that's the beauty about what you're doing and what we're doing is just helping people realize that we're not stuck in this fixed route that we believe to be true. It's going to take a little work to build a ramp to get out of there, but we can all do it.

[00:32:55.200] – Allan
Yeah. And I think for me, one of the big steps because I fall into that trap myself a lot. Unfortunately, I try to get out of it, I always find a trigger to figure out when I'm having negative self talk, it typically comes down to a particular word. If I remember thinking, Always, you always do that or you never do that or you can't. There's just these keywords that I really just pay attention. And I know as soon as that word hits my head, what I'm about to say is a false belief.

[00:33:30.780] – Allan
It's a limiting belief. And so it's hard. I'm not going to say any of this is easy because that's the whole concept of know your true self takes that kind of work. And so I'm always looking. When those words come up, I'm like, okay, I've got to stop myself and kind of rethink how I'm going to phrase this because it really just comes down to taking that objective step back, getting your head straight and saying, okay, what is really going on here and stepping into it now one of the ways that I think most of us know if we're going to be successful at getting something positive happening in our lives because we've got to set goals.

[00:34:14.820] – Allan
And I worked in a corporate environment. So we had smart goals. And I've had other folks talking about goals, but your approach was kind of fresh and you're not throwing an acronym at us and saying, here's, process, go do this. But it was just here's the things that make a goal good. Can you kind of talk about goal setting?

[00:34:34.470] – James
Yeah. Because goal setting. The reality is if we want to create change, I think from a top level, we have to make that commitment. We get so caught up in this world into life hacks 30 day challenges, 90 day challenges. If we're looking at something as a challenge, we're not going to achieve any type of long term results. But I like to look at goals holistically. And obviously physical goals are very important to us. Also to even now, social goals, how we're interacting with people who are interacting with and aside from just social as getting together with your friends, maybe over an IPA, then there's also family goals, people that are really in your immediate inner circle.

[00:35:23.400] – James
It might be parents or siblings, and there is sort of your physical, your social and your family goals. But then we all have financial goals, right? That's another paradigm of this. Then we have our career goals and our career goals are usually tied to our financial goals. Then we have our sort of hobbies or talent development. I like to call it. What are the things that we're looking to do that supplements this way? Other passion points that we're looking to engage in because our talents shift and evolve over time.

[00:36:02.040] – James
So how are we nurturing new ones as we age and get older, especially as we enter the second half of our life? It's critically important. And then, you know, on the other side of that physical goal, now you see spiritual goals. So whatever our spiritual goals, is it, you know, spiritual group I belong to? Is it meditation? Is it looking inward more? So you look at that paradigm and what I like to do with some of my clients, I say, okay, let's look at this whole spectrum of goals and start to give yourself a rating in these categories.

[00:36:37.100] – James
Am I proficient? Am I Like a 100% or am I really, really lacking? And just focus on a couple of the categories you're looking to improve and set goals within those categories and try to create balance within that chart that you're firing all those cylinders, because that brings you into almost a holistic well being approach, because I know what fitness stuff, because sometimes fitness goals, since it is an outer expression, can really take over. And sometimes fitness goals need to be tempered by spiritual goals because we're so ready to show off our buffness to the world that we forget that it's our inner world that also matters as well.

[00:37:20.150] – James
Then if we're so much going out so socially all the time, it's like, hey, I've lost touch with how important it is just to make sure I'm talking with my family. And if it's a career goal, I love this career, but I'm going to take the gas off that a little bit. I'm going to focus on this other piece of talent development I have, because this might bring me into a new financial level if I want to change career path down the road. So it's nice just to look at yourself from that total well being.

[00:37:48.160] – Allan
Yeah. The concept that you brought up was very similar to a thing called life audit. And basically you have the criteria that you're going to measure your life by how you're doing today. And I would say when I first started my journey, very successful in my career. I was doing really, really well, far exceeding what I had set as targets for what I wanted to be, what I wanted to do. But my personal life and my physical well being, they're crap. Like zeros, you know, like zero. And I was like, until I get balanced across these, I'm not going to be who I need to be.

[00:38:31.060] – Allan
And it meant ending toxic relationships. It meant changing behaviors. And it was a very tough eight years of fighting my way through that change. And it really just came down to me realizing that I was all in on one thing. And while I was exceptional at it, the rest of me was not whole. And until I did something from a more holistic view of my life, I wasn't going to be who I deserve to be. So I do think this is a really important part of the book, because it gives us that opportunity to really focus where we want to put our energies because we have a limited energy back, and we're all focused in one direction.

[00:39:19.290] – Allan
Then we might have success there, but we're going to be lacking.

[00:39:23.580] – James
Yeah. And I love what you said there about it took eight years, because sometimes I think we're under the false belief that we're going to fix everything so quickly and we expect everything to happen so quickly, just the commitment it takes to making that change and the commitment it takes to getting into well being, just making sure that you're focusing on just being a little bit better today than you were yesterday and not getting discouraged if there's a setback and just really appreciating that growth opportunity, because if you look at everything else in nature, you know, nature grows through extreme periods of insular growth, cocoons, rebirth.

[00:40:04.420] – James
And we're an expression of nature ourselves. And sometimes I think we forget that we're releasing energetic layers, finding new energetic currents and to find those currents and to move into those new current is a lot of work. And there's going to be a lot of regrowth along the way. And you're going to be questioning yourself. I know I was in a similar situation. I was in the advertising space for years. I loved my job. I was crushing it, but I just didn't feel right. It wasn't giving me the sense of fulfillment other than the business win other than crushing that at work again, even making the transition to do this, it's a challenge and I think we all just have to make sure that and realize that, you know, we all have the ability to grow.

[00:40:55.440] – James
We all have the ability to develop ourselves and you just got to put in the work.

[00:41:00.940] – Allan
And James, I define wellness as being the healthiest fittest and happiest you can be. What are three strategies or tactics to get and stay well?

[00:41:11.590] – James
Great question. I think the first one is just appreciate the moment. Whatever that moment is, find the opportunity in it and appreciating that moment, making sure that we're expressing gratitude. You know, when we express gratitude for something great that's happening in our lives, it prolongs that level of contentment for an extended period of time. Even replaying past memories that we've had that are good can bring moments of gratitude to us. Then when things are going bad, if you're ever suffering, you're sick, you're in the hospital. You had a setback, finds gratitude in that moment and it will decrease the length of that suffering that you're having.

[00:41:54.940] – James
Gratitude is a a wonderful tool to help fluctuate and equalize our contentment in life, 1st. 2nd is limit your time on social media. It's like the biggest one. I've been preaching it for years and social media is a brilliant innovation. I don't like to speak poorly about it, but we can't rely on governments or institutions to tell us how much we can use it. We need licenses to drive cars, but we don't need licenses to use social media. But social media can really drastically affect our health.

[00:42:33.240] – James
Emotionally, you start comparing yourself to others, start complaining about what you have. It leads to jealousy. So when you do see something on social media, that's a trigger. Just remember to be grateful for what that person is experiencing. Don't compare yourself to anyone else. You are the experience you're your own being, you're on your own journey. Appreciate there. And I think finally is just actively engage in thought observation. And the more you start to observe your thoughts, the more natural it comes. I mean, I've written know your true self.

[00:43:11.230] – James
I'm still on this journey just like everybody else. You know, we're always on the journey and thought observation becomes easier as you do it when you're just navigating life. But you know, if you have five minutes of downtime, you're waiting for something, just pause and just reflect on what are the thoughts that I've entered my head today so far, where are the thoughts coming from? Like, why am I identifying with these thoughts? And the more you start engaging in that thought observation on a regular basis, the more all of those negative thoughts that surface become a lot quieter and you're going to find a lot more peace just in the space that exists between thoughts and finding that space, which is just such a blissful experience.

[00:43:58.750] – Allan
James, thank you for sharing that. I really appreciate you and the time you spent with us today. If someone wanted to learn more about you and the book, Know Your True Self, where would you like for me to send them?

[00:44:10.280] – James
Yeah. Please go to PTNL.com. PTNL is the name of the company. It's the abbreviation for potential. You can also find me at James Petrossi on LinkedIn. I'm pretty sure I'm the only James Petrossi. If you go to go to PTNL.com, there's also a True self assessment quiz, so feel free. It's free just to take an assessment to see how connected you are with your true self.

[00:44:36.060] – Allan
Great. James, thank you so much for being a part of 40+ Fitness.

[00:44:40.240] – James
Hey, thanks so much. I'm glad I'm 40.

[00:44:42.140] – Allan
So I have some people under 40, we're all-inclusive here.

[00:44:47.980] – James
Cool.

Post Show/Recap

Post show with Rach

[00:44:55.000] – Allan
Welcome back, Raz.

[00:44:57.080] – Rachel
hey, Allan. That was a really interesting discussion you had, and there's a couple of phrases that stood out to me. But first of all, James' book know Your True Self. Wow. That's a really deep thought that I don't give credit to too often. I don't take the time to really think of what my true self is all about.

[00:45:20.660] – Allan
There's a meme that goes around Facebook a lot in the health and fitness field, and who is causing me to not be able to lose weight or not to get fit? And it's Fred Jones from Scooby Doo cartoon. And he's pulling the mask off of whoever's the villain for this show. And it's him. He's looking at himself. And so many times when we're on a health and fitness journey, or we're trying to get something done. And even in any aspect of our lives, we often find ourselves falling into the same trap over and over again, even though we tell ourselves, Well, I'm not going to do that.

[00:45:59.440] – Allan
We do it.

[00:46:02.640] – Rachel
Yeah. It's just like those Scooby Doo cartoons. It is kind of a repetition of our own sabotage.

[00:46:10.540] – Allan
And so the process that he goes through in the book is really good because it really shows you how you're wired. It shows you why you're wired that way. And then he gives you a lot of great information on how you can start to reverse that trend. And the very first part of it is that point where you realize, okay, I'm doing this because I'm wired to do this. So I have to look for what's happening before it happened. So sometimes that's a post mortem. It's like, why did I eat a whole box of cookies?

[00:46:47.320] – Allan
And you're mad at yourself for doing it. But you sat there and watched your TV show on Netflix, and you ended up eating a whole box of cookies or a whole sleeve of Girl Scout cookies or whatever it is, and you're not happy about it. But here's the thing. If you take some time to do that post mortem, you're going to find, okay, why was I eating? Well, I was bored. Okay, so if it's the feeling of boredom that has you doing these things, then you just want to do that pause.

[00:47:18.820] – Allan
The next time you feel bored, you're clicking around on your phone and your Facebooking and you're watching a Netflix movie and your minds everywhere else. That's probably a dangerous time. And so recognizing where you are right then it's like, oh, I need to get myself a glass of water. I need to go for a walk. I need to do something to distance myself from the action that I'm very likely to do. So for a lot of people, I'll tell them, just don't have cookies in the house.

[00:47:51.080] – Allan
Now, that's sometimes easier said than done. If you've got kids and they're going to have cookies in the house or all these things that you shouldn't eat, that's going to be there. But if at all possible, if that wasn't there and you literally had to get into a car and drive to the supermarket or a convenience store to buy the thing that you wanted to buy, that gives you time, that gives you that gap, that gives you that space. So just kind of having that awareness that there is a trigger to just about everything we do.

[00:48:17.230] – Allan
We are wired like a computer. The program is in there. So once the command comes over, it's going to be executed the same way every time. Unless we do something to rewire the computer.

[00:48:30.700] – Rachel
Well, that was the fascinating thing about what he mentioned was taking the term thought observation to really take a minute to think about what you're feeling. But then he went on to say, to delay your reaction time and kind of a light bulb went off in my head like, okay, I'm craving chocolate, or I'm craving cookies like you mentioned. Think about that thought for a moment. Why are you craving that? What can you do instead? And take a pause. You mentioned in a couple of different ways just to remove yourself from that situation, he suggested for 15 minutes and then make a decision after that.

[00:49:10.220] – Rachel
Do you still want that cookie after 15 minutes or have you moved on? You don't really crave it anymore. And like you've mentioned in the past, having something to do instead, I go for that walk or have that glass of water or something. But we don't often take that minute to really put words and identify the impulse and then figure out what our reactions should really be like. That was kind of a big light bulb moment for me.

[00:49:37.220] – Allan
The way I kind of heard it said in the past was okay, if you're hungry, hunger doesn't go away. If it's an urge, it can't. So you can outweight and urge. So if you have an urge to eat and then say, you've already kind of had your third meal for the day and you're like, okay, I've already sent in my fitness pal. I'm done for the day logging my food and then you feel hungry and you want to go in there and start snacking and you have to ask yourself, is this really hunger or is this something else?

[00:50:14.370] – Allan
And typically, again, if you can distance yourself from the time that could be go for a walk, water, just do something different for a while. If you're still hungry after 20 minutes, 30 minutes, then it was hunger. But if it was just an urge, a lot of times, those just go away. You were in a stressful moment, you were bored, something was going on. And maybe you saw something on Facebook and got triggered. And so now that was your trigger. So if you start sensing those things are happening, the more you can get in front of it, the better.

[00:50:51.550] – Allan
Because post mortems great. You learn from your slip. That's awesome. But you have to act on it. And so the more you can get in front of it are like, why am I walking into the kitchen at 10:00 at night, right? I don't belong in this room after 10:00. All the dishes are done, the floors are clean. This room is off limits for at least the next half hour.

[00:51:13.910] – Rachel
I love it.

[00:51:15.590] – Allan
So you have to question why you're doing what you're doing and you got to get in front of it. And when you do that, then you have an opportunity to get over all the stuff that you're doing. And it's really it's hard. It's hard to take off the gloves and be real with yourself sometimes. But if you love yourself, then you want to know yourself. It's just any relationship that you have that's truly based on love. You want to take the time to get to know that person so you can treat them well all the time.

[00:51:47.600] – Rachel
I'm glad you mentioned that, too, because he mentioned having self love, and he pointed out that over 80% of our voice is negative and that negative voice talks a lot and it talks loudly. And it's really striking to me that it's 80% of our thoughts are so negative towards ourselves, and I think that people we all need to really work hard to turn that around and focus on the more positive things about ourselves.

[00:52:15.920] – Allan
I would say that 80% is probably an average. I know people that their self talk has to be 100% bad, just the way they treat themselves, the way they go through things, the way they talk about themselves, to me, to other people like, you don't like yourself right now. And I didn't either. When I was sitting on the beach and I called myself the fat bastard, and I didn't have self love at that point in my life. I didn't like who I had become, and that was a real wake up call.

[00:52:48.100] – Allan
Unfortunately, it took me eight years to do anything really good about it and get it all kind of in a better place. But that was a real true first recognition that I was not on the path I was meant to be on. And so once you get that going and then you start finding ways to treat yourself better, you start removing toxic things from your life. Toxic relationships, toxic foods, toxic everything. Once you start doing that, you can start the ball rolling in the right direction.

[00:53:19.740] – Rachel
For sure. It breaks my heart. It really just breaks my heart when people think so poorly of themselves, because I think people are amazing. I think all of us has some important thing to do in society, for our friends, for our families.

[00:53:35.740] – Rachel
I think that we need to recognize all the amazing things that we do in. I think I was pregnant with my first child and weighed over 200 lbs during that pregnancy, which is at least 75 lbs more than I should have been weighing at that time in a pregnancy. And when I was done, my baby was born and she was healthy. You know, of course, I was incredibly overweight, but I wasn't comfortable and I wasn't happy with my health at that moment. But I was so proud to be a mom.

[00:54:09.590] – Rachel
That was my first child. She made me a mom. And my mind was occupied on being the best mom I could be. And so I guess it didn't really overshadow my weight situation. I just knew that was something I needed to deal with, and it wasn't easy to lose all that weight, certainly, or to get to where I am even today at 50. But I just wish people could really recognize that even when you're not feeling your absolute best, there is something wonderful about you.

[00:54:38.500] – Allan
Yeah, I know it's hard because there's when you're looking at yourself and thinking about what you don't like about yourself, it just has this big emphasis. It's very easy for you to say, and I don't like that. I don't like that. I wish this was bigger. I wish I was taller. And you can think all those things and feel all those things. A lot of people want a full head of hair. I just gave up on that notion and so you can keep knit picking yourself to death.

[00:55:09.620] – Allan
So it's really a function of saying, okay, I know I bring value to the world. I know I can bring more value to the world. The actions that I'm taking don't define who I am when I can change those actions.

[00:55:24.640] – Rachel
Sure.

[00:55:25.400] – Allan
So taking the time to clean out those old bad habits, rewrite your programming, start doing little bitty things, setting goals and getting something done positive and then just having a gratitude practice where you sit down at times you just think I'm the luckiest human being on Earth.

[00:55:47.180] – Rachel
Absolutely.

[00:55:48.390] – Allan
I've got so many great people in my life. I can't even tell you how thankful I am for everything that's happened to me and happened for me, good and bad. It's just those are life experiences that I carry with me and I've had some wonderful ones.

[00:56:04.080] – Allan
And I think anyone that would sit down and start a gratitude practice would begin to recognize that. That they have these relationships, that they have these experiences and they have this opportunity to have so many more.

[00:56:18.070] – Rachel
Yeah. Absolutely. Our past good, bad and ugly has made us who we are today and we can benefit so much from all of those life experiences and everything that we've learned on the good days just as well as the bad days.

[00:56:34.160] – Allan
Alright. Well, Rachel, I guess with this, we'll call this show a wrap.

[00:56:38.300] – Rachel
Sounds great. Have a good vacation.

[00:56:40.320] – Allan
Thank you.

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Let's Say Hello

[00:02:26.580] – Allan
Hey Raz, how are things?

[00:02:28.940] – Rachel
Good, Allan. How are you today?

[00:02:31.220] – Allan
I'm doing all right. We got a lot of rain this weekend, so I wasn't really able to get out and do as much as I wanted to, but I'm getting there.

[00:02:39.470] – Rachel
Good.

[00:02:40.360] – Allan
It is a very rainy time and then I'm getting prepared for my vacation. So I think this episode goes out, I will actually be on that vacation. Really, really close to getting on a plane for that vacation on my way, for sure. So I am going to take a week off and the only work I'm going to do during that week is going to relate to taking care of my clients, existing clients. I've kind of let that roll down a little bit. And so if you're listening to this right now, I'm not taking new clients, and I won't be taking new clients for a little while.

[00:03:17.560] – Allan
But I will be starting back up with the training in October. So look for something coming out in a few weeks. Probably once I get back or get my feet under me. When we're traveling around the US, I'll start putting together when I actually want to come back to work.

[00:03:34.560] – Rachel
Isn't that a nice feeling?

[00:03:36.840] – Allan
And then when Tammy and I get back in October, I'm going to be launching this. I'm also probably, I'm thinking I might start seeing if there's some interest on personal training in person, some small group stuff, maybe in focus here. And then, of course, Tammy is doing the bed and breakfast, so she'll be opening up the bed and breakfast, and I'll be doing these things. So October will be a really busy month for both of us. But I'm going to down shift and really down shift for the first week.

[00:04:11.140] – Allan
I'm just turn the car off, throw the keys away.

[00:04:14.880] – Rachel
That sounds wonderful. You got to do that every now and then. That sounds great.

[00:04:20.220] – Allan
Well, and we missed it. You know, it's like we had scheduled the trip to take the vacation, and then it got canceled. We did go last fall to see family, so we do need to go back. But it was like one of those things, we had the vacation plan. It's like, this really doesn't seem to make sense right now. And then we moved it. And the airline I booked with was a bad airline because they wouldn't even refund the money. They're like, no, you canceled it. Every airline on Earth is giving you a credit.

[00:04:47.980] – Allan
At least give me a credit. And they're like, no, if you're not on the plane, I'm like, Is the plane even flying? Anyway, so this whole other story. But anyway, it was just one of those things where this is timeshare. And every year I build up a week. And one of those it's not a lose it or use it, use it or lose it thing. But it's just one of those where I now have two weeks to use in one year. And I don't know that I'm going to go back twice, so I just need to make sure I use this week and push and see if they'll let me roll my weeks out.

[00:05:19.160] – Allan
We'll see. So this is just a good time for us to go back, get some sun, maybe have a few cocktails, play some volleyball. And this place I'm going is where my whole story started for my health and fitness journey as I was there. And I was really unhappy with my life and my things, and I need to change. And so going back there is going to be kind of interesting again, because it's just that all that stuff is there, the feelings, the emotions and where I come and where I was and how much things have changed over that time, because this is episode 501.

[00:06:00.460] – Allan
So if you'd ask me back, then, do you know at some point in your life, you're gonna do a podcast? Well, actually, podcast didn't exist then, but it's a very different lifestyle than I thought I would have at this point in my life.

[00:06:14.030] – Rachel
Well, Allan, that sounds like a great time to reflect on how far you come. I think it'll be really incredibly rewarding for you to have that time back there.

[00:06:23.560] – Allan
And place some volleyball. And then when I get back, get back, hopefully have some energy then that travels through the Southeast. I'm going to stop everywhere these serve oysters because it's been over a year, almost a year as I've had any oysters. So I'm going to eat all the foods I can't get down here and do it with reckless regard because I'm off, and I'm going to take that break as a detour. And then when I get back, get busy with my businesses and get busy with myself and make the right changes and get back on that highway.

[00:07:01.630] – Allan
And right now, I'm just kind of thinking about what I want to do next. What's the next challenge? What's that next fun thing for me?

[00:07:09.380] – Rachel
Neat. That sounds like a great way to start your vacation. I hope you have the world of fun.

[00:07:14.180] – Allan
How are things going for you?

[00:07:15.990] – Rachel
Good. You know, I was in Hell the other day. Mike and I did a race in Hell, Michigan. The race is called the Run Through Hell. It's been on my wish list for years, and I've just never been able to be in the right place at the right time to participate in this race. So it was a five miler in hell, and it was so it was just a load of fun. We both did really well. Mike got second place in his age group, and I got third place in my age group at that race.

[00:07:49.190] – Rachel
So we ran well in Hell and had a fun time doing it, and we made it through. We're back home now.

[00:07:57.590] – Allan
Well, you know what Winston Churchill said?

[00:08:00.380] – Rachel
What was that?

[00:08:01.020] – Allan
If you find yourself in hell, keep going.

[00:08:03.380] – Rachel
Oh, that's what we did.

[00:08:07.700] – Rachel
Yeah. Perfect.

[00:08:10.110] – Allan
Okay. Well, you ready to have a conversation with Chuck?

[00:08:13.050] – Rachel
Sure.

Interview

[00:09:02.350] – Allan
Hey, Chuck. Welcome to 40+ Fitness.

[00:09:05.380] – Chuck
Hey, Allan. Great to be here. Thank you.

[00:09:45.280] – Allan
So your book, Customize Yourself: Nutrition- And What I learned From 110-Year-Old mother, obviously as a health and fitness guy, I'm intrigued. Someone's on this Earth for 110 years. They're obviously doing something right. And if your mother is 110 years old, that tells me you're right in my sweet spot demographic of probably being in your 40s, 50s, 60s, maybe even older. Yeah, but no, that's cool because you're in terrific health. Your mother is in good health. I think since I wrote the book, I guess she's 111, maybe 112 now.

[00:09:56.520] – Chuck
She will be 111 in August. I may have to change the title of the book, but the book just came out, so she's only 110. So the oldest person in New Jersey now.

[00:10:45.590] – Allan
Okay. Yeah. I was reading some statistics that said they fully expect by the year 2030 for someone to have lived 120 plus years. I know there's one or two I've heard of, but they're fully expecting 100 years old to be something within the realm of possibility for a large number of people. And I actually saw another statistic that said by 2060, they expect there to be over half a million Centurions in the United States. So we are getting older, particularly as a baby Boomer generation is coming through because we had a lot more information about health and welfare and taking care of ourselves.

[00:11:20.690] – Allan
So people are living longer with better medicine, better science, better just to sometimes doing the right thing. But there's a large percentage of us that are not. Obesity and overweight. We're talking astronomical numbers, and that's getting bigger, too, which is kind of frightening. Your book, though, goes through a kind of a process of saying, okay, if I want to reinvent myself, my path is not everybody else's path. I get to choose my own path ergo the title Customize Yourself.

[00:12:05.880] – Chuck
Yes, absolutely. If you look at I actually have a customized yourself fitness book coming out next year, which I've already written the first draft. If you look at why people fail with diets, why people fail with fitness, and you're a trainer, you see it all the time. It's because they are told to stop doing what you're doing with diets. Stop eating what you're eating. You know, you've gained weight. You're eating not a great diet. Stop that. Now eat this. It's such a shock to not only to the system, physically and psychologically, you know, consciously, like, well, maybe I don't love all this food, but unconsciously and subconsciously, there's all sorts of alarm bells going off that you're not even hearing yet because it's such a radical change.

[00:12:34.090] – Chuck
And I think that's the same thing with fitness. You probably will lose a student if they just get scared after one or two sessions because my knees hurt, and I'm afraid to tell this guy that my knees hurt. So if you don't think to say, how do your knees feel when you're on that leg machine, they won't say my knees hurt. So really, it's so critical in the beginning with these changes, or if you're a couch potato just to get up and walk down the street just to walk one block if you're not used to it.

[00:13:05.750] – Chuck
I mean, you and I work out seven days a week. A 1 hour workout for us is probably nothing. For me, I do it every day. I need it. I need it psychologically as much as physically. But to get people, you have to do it gradually. That's why I say to customize yourself approach. And I found that when I was reading and looking for things to educate myself with, everything I found was like either a radical approach or a horrible approach. There was no gradually do this one step at a time thing.

[00:13:37.340] – Chuck
And I think you'll find that you're your best students, your most loyal students are the ones that you break in slowly. I've watched for over 30 years. I'm going to be 69 years old this week. I've been in gyms for 40 years. I have watched in gyms in Los Angeles, New Jersey, Florida. You know, I was a total gym rat until the pandemic hit. I've watched trainers work with first time clients, and what they do usually is the same thing with each first time client, which is absolutely wrong because they're not all the same.

[00:13:59.790] – Chuck
And they literally scare their clients away because they don't say, hey, you're scaring me away, but you can see it in their eyes. Like, I'm not comfortable doing this. And it's like, how do you get comfortable? You have to customize. And so I have this very simple approach that I've been using for myself for 50 years. So I went to look for that approach in books, and I couldn't find it. So that's why I wrote the book.

[00:14:36.190] – Allan
Yeah. I think you see it a lot in the fitness industry. You see it a lot in nutrition, too, but it's just not as visible because someone will come on a website and say, okay, or on Facebook. And they'll say I'm going to change my entire diet, and I'm going to go carnivore, and I want to lose. I know all these guys I see all these success stories of people that went carnivore. And so they're asking, well, is ketchup carnivore? And everybody on the group is like, no. I think what happens is people get excited and they want to do something extreme for themselves, and they want to do it all.

[00:14:56.560] – Allan
And they want to do it all now. And so they kind of run at this with an all or none approach. And there's some of us, like myself, I'm wired for all or none. I'm the kind of guy where I put my head down and just do it. So if I decide that I'm going to do a certain thing, I just do it because that's how I'm wired.

[00:15:26.360] – Allan
Now, I know like you said, a lot of my clients aren't some of them are, but a lot of them are not. So what you're providing with this book and the subsequent books that are going to come out in this area is that this is for the person that wants to have a structure to moderation. So it's not an if for this and get away from that or thing. It's all okay, look at something, make a decision about it intrinsically, and then start walking yourself away from it.

[00:16:00.070] – Chuck
And, you know, I think it's also if you want to be an Olympic athlete, I would say use my approach and take five years to become an Olympic athlete. You're not going to become an Olympic athlete in four weeks. And I think it works for an absolute couch potato. And I think it works for somebody who is a regular into their nutrition or into their fitness and has gone halfway down the road to take the additional steps. Like, I hope it works for them, too. But you're right.

[00:16:29.450] – Chuck
I think if you're going to dive into something, maybe it's an age thing. Maybe I Dove into things when I was younger. I don't know, but I like that I'm skeptical about everything. So I like that gradual approach. I want to feel good with this. I don't want to do anything I'm not going to stick to. I mean, I do 1 minute of yoga a day. Now, I know I should do 1 hour a day, but because of my weight lifting, running, swimming and biking, I can't do 1 hour of yoga a day and still get my work done.

[00:16:38.000] – Chuck
So there will come a day when I do one hour but I want to do it right. That's me. But I still do 1 minute. So I know how good it is.

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[00:16:57.500] – Allan
But that's what I like about your book, because it just kind of has a different feel to it than most of the stuff that's out there, because it goes through and tells you all this bad stuff. Don't eat this stuff. Don't do that stuff. Don't do this. Do this and eat this. And for someone who's coming at it, it's a lot.

[00:16:59.270] – Chuck
You're not going to stick to it.

[00:17:30.980] – Chuck
I quote a few studies in the book and just in general. And I want to compliment you, too, because I've read some of the transcripts of your podcast, and you do a tremendous job getting your point across without using too many numbers. Like earlier in our discussion, you mentioned obesity. I would have immediately jumped on and said the CDC said the obesity rate was 42% in America in 2018, and the New England Journal of Medicine just came out with a study in January saying it's going to be over 50% in 29 out of the 50 States in America.

[00:17:56.450] – Chuck
And you would I had to put a bag over my head to stop. I just would have kept going with statistics. I love the way you get your point across without doing that, because I think some people blur when you do that, I get excited. I'm like you jumping into something new. I want all the numbers. I want all the details. I want to read all the studies, but I think most people are like, stop. You're killing me here. I'm not going to process all this stuff, but I love that you do that in your podcast.

[00:18:00.650] – Chuck
I think that's a great strength. And I forgot what I was going to say because I had to tell you that.

[00:18:33.010] – Allan
Well, I appreciate that. And it is part of saying, okay, each of us has our own individual path. Each of us okay. Do I need to lose some body fat? Do I need to get a little stronger? Could I use more stamina to keep up with my grandkids? We know that for ourselves. And one of the approach you take here, I love the phrase that you use to basically more harm than good foods. And I think most of us know those foods, the foods that are not serving our body.

[00:19:05.420] – Allan
But the thought of going like cold Turkey and you mentioned ice cream, a particular ice cream, and all of that, you would not want to live your life without that ice cream, at least occasionally. And so you've listed some what you call them more harm than good foods, and you actually have a little table. And so there's a kind of where you make a commitment to just making a reduction. I want to go through some of them that you have in there, because I think these are really important.

[00:19:10.130] – Allan
And I think most people will see these as their top not with more harm than good thing.

[00:19:13.400] – Chuck
I got to tell you one more compliment. Before you do this.

[00:19:37.070] – Chuck
You use a great word and I noticed this in your other podcast. The word commitment. That is so much better than saying you need discipline. You need motivation, which are wonderful things. But commitment is such a great word. I just want to thank you for stressing that because we all have commitments to certain things. That's something we all have in common, you know. And I love that. Sorry to interrupt, but go ahead.

[00:19:37.700] – Allan
That's fine. Can you kind of talk through just a little bit quickly the process of the more harm than good foods, the table and how you make a decision on what you're going to do and how you track it? And then, of course, the very end my favorite part is the party.

[00:20:31.540] – Chuck
Yes. I found this simple way of doing this and I discovered it by reading. I went to the Barnes and Noble in Monmouth County, New Jersey, this giant store. I went through the health food. I'd say about 500 books in the health related sections looking for a better way to do this. And I read or skimmed 100 books and the best 100 books, It took me 20 visits, and I couldn't find something as simple as this. It's so simple. A lot of people get turned off when their dietitian or their advisor says, you got to make a list.

[00:20:56.890] – Chuck
You got to weigh your food. You got no, no, it's much simpler. Your list is just foods that, you know, do more harm than good. You can list ten foods. You can list three foods. You can list one food. If you're having ice cream four times a week and you know that's too much, most people would say, look, stop eating ice cream. That would be the best thing you could do. All that animal fat that's not serving your well, it's winding up on your gut. Sugar and fat too much.

[00:21:27.470] – Chuck
Okay, but people won't do that. It's too hard to do. So what you do is you just say, okay, I'm eating ice cream on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday. I'm going to skip Friday. That's it just one day. And if I get to a Friday and I'm craving ice cream, I know I can have it on Saturday, and I will have it on Saturday. So there's no loss there. So what you do is you just say that one day, one day of ice cream, then on your calendar, whether it's on your wall, on your iphone, on your wrist, wherever your calendar is six months from that date, You write 25% less ice cream. And you do two things when you get to that date, it's really easy.

[00:21:49.280] – Chuck
After the first week, you're not going to miss one day of ice cream. You're going to enjoy those three days even more. But if you stopped eating ice cream, you'd probably be miserable. I know I would. So you get six months down the road. You get to the calendar. It says 25% less ice cream. You do two things. One, you celebrate. It really is something wonderful. That's all you do.

[00:22:13.430] – Chuck
You do nothing else. You don't reduce your bagels, pizza, bacon or French fries. If you just reduce your ice cream by 25%, you really have accomplished a lot. It really will be good for you. And you should celebrate. The second thing you do is you ask yourself a question. Now, I'm going to put this down on my calendar again in six months. 25% less ice cream because I'm going to celebrate again. But I have an option here. It's only an option. You don't have to do it.

[00:22:45.170] – Chuck
Just think about it. I might put down 50% less ice cream. I might cut out one more day of ice cream. I might only have it two days a week. But you don't have to do that. And if your list has more than one item more harm than good. If you have French fries and Donuts on there, you can say or bacon or whatever rolls or I was killing myself with rolls. I had to reduce my roll intake, but I did it slowly, and it worked a few weeks from now after you used to having ice cream, do it again, you can have another party six months after that.

[00:23:06.880] – Chuck
You can be having parties all over the place celebrating your success. And you should. And then you decide whether to reduce it or not. And you'll see this mught work with your fitness clients. You can do that with exercise, too. You can do that with running. You can do that with distance. You can do it with time. You can do it with swimming. You can do it with biking. You can do it with weights on a machine that same flow. Like, I'm just going to do this a little bit, see how it works.

[00:23:32.590] – Chuck
And if nothing hurts a certain amount of time from now, I'll go on to the next level. And that's how you become an Olympic athlete. Or you just stay at that one level. If you've only reduced one harmful food by 25% and you took my book and used it to wrap fish or in your bird cage, it would be great. I'd be happy. I feel like I succeeded. And it's that simple. I couldn't find that anywhere. That's why I put it in the book.

[00:23:39.010] – Allan
Now the first food that you go after in your more harm than good foods is French fries.

[00:23:39.300] – Chuck
Oh, I love free.

[00:23:45.730] – Allan
Let's talk a little bit about why French fries might be first on the list.

[00:24:12.950] – Chuck
I can tell you stories about French fries. I'll try to keep it short because we don't have hours and hours, but when I was a kid, I love French fries. In the winter I had a scheme to get them three or four times a week. In the summer, I could get them five or six times a week because my parents couldn't keep an eye on me. I even went so far as to dip my French fries in ice cream. That's how much I like French fries. And as I got older, I realized that fried foods were really not good for you.

[00:24:45.770] – Chuck
Unconsciously, without knowing I was doing the customize yourself approach, I reduced my intake of French fries. Another thing in just one anecdote here. I spent ten years as a lifeguard on Point Pleasant Beach, New Jersey, and somehow people would always come up to us for advice. I don't know why 18 19,20 year old kids, adults who would ask us what to do with their lives, but I guess they had nothing better to do in the summer. And we also used to track these teenage girls who were always under 18 and they were too young, but they would fall all over us, and they would want advice, too.

[00:25:21.890] – Chuck
The one line we came up with, which seemed to stick, and I don't know who said it was an anonymous lifeguard was, this was our advice to these girls, stay away from French fries and married guys. That was the best thing we could come up with. That line stuck for some reason. And I find the thing with French fries, if that's your thing, if you're eating French fries four times a week and you just cut out the French fries one day when you get to that six month celebration, think of that's 26 weeks later, that's 26 orders of French fries that you didn't eat.

[00:25:51.400] – Chuck
Think of that mountain of 24 pile that giant hunk of French fries that's not on your gut, that's not on your butt, that's not on your thighs. It's there on the floor because you didn't need it. And you really can celebrate. And then six months later, you'll have another mountain of 26 orders of French fries or you'll have 72 because you went to 50%, which is optional. But I think French fries is a perfect example. I actually cut out all fried food within a few years without any work, without any effort.

[00:26:05.980] – Chuck
But if you tell somebody who's living on fried foods, just stop eating fried foods. I mean, it's good advice, but it won't work. It's just too much of a shock. They won't do it. But let me tell you, the gradual approach works. I've done it, and it's absolutely simple. Anyone can do it.

[00:26:41.600] – Allan
Yeah. Because what ends up happening in this situation is okay. I tell myself, no fried foods whatsoever. And then I go to a family reunion or I go to a football game or I go to something, and invariably I smell it. I see it, I want it. I eat it and then eat more of it. And then the next day I'm back at a fast food restaurant eating more fries, and I'm frying food at home. Healthier, right? Having worked in fast food, I tell you, if you're frying at home, it's probably a healthier, because if you don't want to even look in those Friers at the fast food.

[00:27:11.780] – Chuck
If you fry, this at home, if you really want to prove something, eat a baked potato with dinner and weigh yourself. The next night, eat fried potatoes and weigh yourself. You'll probably notice that you've gained a half a pound or a pound, just the difference of eating a baked potato and eating a fried potato in one day. I think, again, just as a demonstration. I did that once, and I did it twice, and I proved it a couple of times. It really does happen. That extra grease just lays there.

[00:27:13.070] – Chuck
It doesn't go away so fast.

[00:27:41.360] – Allan
Now, one of the other foods that I want to talk to, and that's when we talked about a few times on the podcast. But I really want to send this home. Is that for a lot of people that are against meat eating and particularly for ethical reasons, but they're, I think, more focused on the factory meat. And you consider factory meat one of those more harm than good foods. Can you talk about factory meat and why we should be avoiding it?

[00:28:10.600] – Chuck
Absolutely. Factory meat. Now, I decided to stop eating me 30 years ago, and I talk about in the book how as a kid I craved me. I had to have it twice a day. I couldn't live without it. Once a day was not enough. And somehow I figured it out step by step by step. That all the problems, heart disease, cholesterol, and now all the environmental factors involved. And then I stopped eating meat a long time ago. But what we know about factory meat now, factory meat is toxic.

[00:28:41.580] – Chuck
I mean, if you're going to eat meat, I'm not going to talk to you out of eating meat. What I'm going to say is stick to grass-fed organic meat and in reasonable portions and you'll be fine. But if you're going to eat meat, really avoid factory meat because there are so many, if you look at pre COVID-19, there are several epidemics that have broken out that have come out of meat packing facilities because they're just full of virus and blood and guts and they're really unsafe and unhealthy.

[00:29:27.620] – Chuck
Also, millions of acres of in Central America, South America are just being wiped out for cattle grazing. The methane gas coming out of cow butts and mouths is about 15% of the CO2 problem for climate, and you can go on and on it takes to make 1 pound of beef. Now I learned as a freshman in College to make 1 pound of beef. It took 8 pounds of grain. And I thought, wow, I was also taught in my ecology class that you could feed the world. You could wipe out hunger easily if people ate less meat because it's 8 pounds of grain for 1 pound of beef.

[00:30:00.630] – Chuck
What I didn't know then. It also takes 2000 gallons of water, one gallon of gasoline and all sorts of other resources to make that 1 pound of beef. So at the rate we're going, we will literally kill humanity with beef production in I don't know how many years, but at the rate we're going a couple of decades or 50 or something like that, we really have to cut down to save the planet. Besides saving your heart, your arteries and a few other things. So there's just so many reasons why factory meat, I'm forgetting half of them.

[00:30:13.530] – Chuck
I go through it in the book. I mean, there's just so many reasons why factory meat is so bad, but I'm not completely anti meat. If you're a meat eater, just do it the right way. That's all I'm saying.

[00:30:48.520] – Allan
Yeah, the struggle I have because if I'm going to get meat, I want to get it from a local vendor, local farmer, grass fed grass finished that's what I want. Most of what I eat is that way. The issue I really have with factory meat is that these are not well cared for animals. They're crowded, they're put into little places, and they're fed grains, which is not their natural food. They're fattened up. And if they get sick because they are going to get sick, they don't even wait for them to get sick.

[00:31:17.410] – Allan
They're shot up with antibiotics. They're shooting them with steroids to make the bigger. And just like some of our vegetables, they've bred these animals to basically outgrow their frame to be bigger, heavier fatter than they were ever intended to be as happy animals. So that's just for me, it's the toxicity of the antibiotics and steroids and just unhealthy animals.

[00:31:36.170] – Allan
There's no way I feel that that's giving me the nourishment I need. And what I found is, if I go ahead and pay up for a steak and get a grass fed, grass finished steak, what I am paying, like maybe two to three times more than I would pay for the regular steak and same for hamburger. But what I found is I eat it about two thirds or half less. And so, you know, not to throw a lot of statistics at you there, but you could do the math and basically see, it doesn't really cost you much more to buy a higher quality product.

[00:32:06.930] – Allan
If you can get the nourishment you need by eating less. And so that's how I approach it is I don't eat as much beef or chicken as I used to because I don't need the large portions because I get the nutrition I need from the smaller portions. Therefore, it doesn't cost me any more to eat the way I eat.

[00:32:44.310] – Chuck
I would emphasize what you just said about, do I want to consume these hormones? Do I want to consume these antibiotics? Do I want to consume these steroids? When I eat that factory meat, I'm consuming all that. What is that going to do to me? How long am I going to live consuming all those steroids and antibiotics and hormones? I mean, what's that going to do to my health? The business about what it costs? I would say when you look at what you spend on sugar or liquor or going out to eat, even if you go out to eat a lot, even if you spend a lot of money there.

[00:33:12.420] – Chuck
Now, compare that to what you spend on your mortgage, insurance, car, clothing, children's education. Food is really not that big an expense. If you wind up spending 20% or even 50% more eating healthy, Organics, whatever the benefits far outweigh. And plus, if you're even a couple of pounds thinner, you're gonna spend 50 or $100,000 less on medical bills and the rest of your life. I mean, you really come out way ahead of the game financially. If you just take a few basic steps.

[00:33:15.780] – Allan
It's way better than investing in the stock market, for sure.

[00:33:18.430] – Chuck
Even that. Food is better.

[00:33:25.290] – Allan
Okay. You mentioned it. So let's jump into that. Let's talk about why sugar is one of those more harm than good foods.

[00:33:56.710] – Chuck
Yes. Sugar is just, you know, sort of as a Lark. As I was writing the first draft of the book, I started writing about comparing sugar to cocaine, and I thought, well, I'll just do this for fun. And then I realized I started looking at the pharmacology of sugar and the pharmacology of cocaine and the business of sugar and the business of cocaine. And it became a couple of short chapters in the book because it's amazing when you compare sugar to cocaine, how much they have in common. And the biggest difference, I'll just give you the bottom line.

[00:34:26.890] – Chuck
The biggest difference between sugar and cocaine is sugar is cheap and legal, and cocaine is expensive and illegal, and you really, really should cut down on your sugar. That's the reason why you're overweight. That's the reason why you're buying these expensive food products instead of food. And again, make that distinction. Always try to buy food, not food products. We could talk about labels for a while. If something doesn't have a label, you're better off with it, then you don't have to read the label. But I read a thing today.

[00:35:09.190] – Chuck
I went to USC and I was reading this USC science article, and it said that American diet is made up of 16% sugar. I didn't even know that. I thought it was much lower than that. The average American their diet is 16% sugar. It's really easy to cut that in half, and it will make such a drastic change in your life. You'll be thinner, you'll be more vital, your brain will work better. Everything. If you have cancer, it won't explode as fast. I mean, there's so many reasons to cut down on your sugar, and it's really not that hard to cut it in half, but certainly 16%.

[00:35:09.800] – Chuck
I was shocked when I read that.

[00:35:11.320] – Chuck
I just found that out today.

[00:35:36.400] – Allan
With my clients, when I start working with them and I have them chart their nutrition and we start that conversation. Many of them are just shocked with how much sugar they actually eat because they don't feel like they're eating a lot of sweets. They feel like they're just eating what they've always eaten, regular food. But unfortunately, the food companies, they love making us eat more. They love keeping us addictive.

[00:35:43.290] – Chuck
They make money off it. The more sugar, the more they sell. The people buy the sweet stuff. I put more sugar and they buy the sweeter stuff.

[00:35:51.310] – Allan
Right. And so the best way for someone to know how much sugars in their food, if it's in a box, bag, can or jar, is to read the label.

[00:35:51.750] – Chuck
Absolutely.

[00:36:01.490] – Allan
So talk to us a little bit about reading labels, what we should be looking for, and how now we're getting good stuff versus stuff we don't necessarily want to eat.

[00:36:24.380] – Chuck
Absolutely. I found out the problem with reading labels when I happen to mention to a few people, well just read the label, and people I know with College degrees, we're yelling in my face, how dare you tell me to read a label? I'm a busy person. I don't have time to read labels. Well, you don't have to go in the store and read every label in the store. Just read one label. Each time you go in, pick up something you're going to buy. Just read that label, and I'll make it even easier for you.

[00:36:51.190] – Chuck
Don't read the whole label, don't read anything on the label, but the ingredients. Don't read the endorsements. Don't read how good you'll feel. Don't read how long they've been in business. Just that one little square or rectangle that's white with black printing in it that says ingredients. Just look at that. They'll take you 20 seconds. You will be shocked how much sugars and everything you're buying, and you can easily there's something probably right next to it that as they have the sugar that you'll be just as happy with.

[00:37:21.660] – Chuck
And the most shocking example is this giant supermarket that I go to that should remain nameless because I'm hoping to work with them from the inside. They have built up this huge natural food section, the likes of which few supermarkets, except they're really expensive, like Wegmans they have it. But they have this huge section and they have, like, a whole aisle of box cereals and package cereals. And I started reading the labels on those. I could not find a single item in there that had less than 6% sugar, and most had 8 or 10 percent sugar.

[00:37:48.680] – Chuck
And this is in the Health Food Isle. Cheerios and corn flakes and the other side of the supermarket have less sugar than these so called natural foods. I mean, it's just shocking how much even the natural food industry is packing their stuff with sugar. And they may call it cane sugar. They may call it Brown sugar. They may pull it maltodextrin. There's 1000 names for sugar, and I got 50 of them in the book. I mean, they're just a fructose that you look for corn syrup.

[00:38:07.250] – Chuck
Okay. You know, that's bad. But even the fructose that's in fruit, it's sugar. I mean, you add all that up, it adds to your sugar. It's just shocking how much there is. So if you're a little bit aware of it, you can cut way down on it with very little effort. You can find substitutes that you like that you're happy with, and it really will change your life. I mean, it's such a huge, huge thing.

[00:38:28.010] – Allan
Just swapping one or two things can drop the sugar dramatically. But the only way, you know that is to look at the label and see, because we've lost that capacity to taste a lot of this sugar because we're eating so much of it. And then as a result, it doesn't taste sweet, but there's quite a bit in there.

[00:38:33.680] – Chuck
And you know what? When you cut down on sugar, you'll be amazed other food start tasting better because you can taste them. Your taste buds adjust.

[00:39:10.000] – Allan
Which leads me to my next item on the agenda, vegetables and fish. The two of my favorites. I try to have fish two or three times a week. I have vegetables every single day. They make up most of my dinner plate, and I eat low carb. So a lot of people think, okay, we're all just meat eaters and we don't actually eat healthy foods. It's not true. You can eat healthy any way of eating you want to eat. But I would say that most of us are not getting enough vegetables and fish.

[00:39:49.940] – Chuck
Absolutely. I mean, I hate to admit it, but I hate fish five or six times a week. And the reason I say I hate to admit it because there's a lot of issues with plastic in the ocean now. And I'm working on projects to, you know, help out a little bit. Just do whatever I can. But if you eat organic fish or small fish, I eat sardines once a week, not because I like them, but because they are small fish and the bigger fish, I really try to avoid tuna, although there's a couple of tuna companies that only sell small Tunas, which have less Mercury and chromium and everything else and aluminum and zinc and everything.

[00:40:29.860] – Chuck
If you can eat smaller fish, that's better. Vegetables. Everybody can find vegetables that they love. If you don't love certain vegetables, if certain vegetables don't love you. I mean, I know, for instance, for myself, I have problems digesting cruciferous vegetables, so I found the ones that don't bother me so much. Kale is a phenomenal cruciferous vegetable, but don't eat too much of it. It's like anything else. Don't overdo it. But you really if you play around, if you experiment, if you customize, you can find a mostly plant based diet that you're happier with, then you're mostly not plant based diet pretty easily, and you don't have to go vegan.

[00:41:01.630] – Chuck
You don't have to go all the way, but you can just go a little bit of the way. You're absolutely, you'll feel better. You'll be better. Everything will function better. Everything in your body, down to the molecules will work better because those nutrients are what you really need to function well and be healthy and live a long time. I credit vegetables to my success. I'm going to be 69 years old this week I work out with the Manasquan Beach Lifeguards. They're one of the best lifeguard cruise on the Atlantic Ocean.

[00:41:31.740] – Chuck
These guys are great athletes. They're mostly in their 20s. I can pass the Lifeguard test. I can swim and run fast enough to be a lifeguard. Every summer. They offer me a job there, and I'm thrilled to be offered the job. But most of the people I know my age can't do that. They're overweight. They're stuck on the couch, and a lot of it has to do with they're burdened with sugar. They're burdened with not enough nutrients because they're not eating enough vegetables. It's amazing how good vegetables are for you.

[00:41:36.680] – Chuck
I got them on the cover of my book. There's Vegetables. Can I show the book? Is that okay?

[00:41:36.890] – Allan
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:42:05.170] – Chuck
My two favorites here are bananas and carrots. So if you're stuck on a tropical island or in Panama like you are, you got plenty of bananas. If you're stuck somewhere else, you'll find the carrots. Those are my two favorites. But any vegetable that you like, you can absolutely make your life better with and they'll fill you up. It's better filling yourself up with bananas and carrots than it is filling yourself up with bread and French fries. And I can attest that because I've done it both ways.

[00:42:26.500] – Allan
Yeah, I agree. And it's not again, to customize yourself approach here is not a you must do this or you must do that. It's really a okay, you know the foods that are not serving you and you mentioned one that everybody else would be able of course, you want to eat more of this blueberries. You struggle with blueberries.

[00:43:04.710] – Chuck
Right. So I found blackberries. Now I have been hearing, I think all the news and marketing on blueberries. A lot of that is created by the people who sell and market blueberries, who have convinced you that blueberries is the magic food or super food. A lot of things are called superfood walnuts. Superfood, another superfood. I have an issue with. Walnuts make me vomit most people, and it's a great superfood. Blueberries don't agree with me. But then I found blackberries. Blackberries agree with me just fine. So if there's a great super food that people say, oh, you got to eat this.

[00:43:29.370] – Chuck
Like I just told you to eat bananas and carrots. If those don't agree that those don't work, try something else. You'll find that's why I say the whole customized thing. You'll find stuff that you like. I mean, I gave up on blueberries after trying many times, and then I discovered blackberries by accident. I was at somebody's house, so there was a BlackBerry there, and I said, oh, that works. Now I buy blackberries every week, but I buy organic blackberries. The thing with berries is they really, the pesticides.

[00:43:30.030] – Chuck
Stick to the berries. So I know it's a dollar or two more, but really, if you're going to spend anything on organic food, do it for the berries, the strawberries, the raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, whatever Berry you're into, find one or two you like. And I really urge especially organic there, because the pesticide problem is great with that. But it's the same thing. I've gotten way into nuts and seeds, and as a kid and a young adult, I hardly ever had nuts and seeds. I didn't realize how much I even like them, how good they are for you.

[00:43:59.820] – Chuck
And again, find the nuts and seeds that work for you. Walnuts didn't work for me. So I go to cashews. I go to Pistachios. I go to almonds. I mean, again, customized, find out. Try different things. You'll find stuff that you love. It works like magic.

[00:44:16.440] – Allan
I was very fortunate my mother would fill our Christmas stocking with nuts so that she didn't have to give us as much candy. But I fell in love with Brazil nuts as a kid. And so I'm very much a rabid nut eater.

[00:44:32.960] – Chuck
Selenium, don't go overboard.

[00:44:35.430] – Allan
But I know, but I love them. And so, yeah, I don't go overboard on them. But I do have them from time to time.

[00:44:42.000] – Chuck
And I eat one a week. That's how much selenium. But I could eat ten a day. I mean, they're great.

[00:44:47.940] – Allan
They are great. They are great. So, Chuck, I define wellness as being the healthiest, fittest and happiest you can be. What are three strategies or tactics to get and stay well?

[00:45:00.080] – Chuck
Well, you know what? I know you're going to ask me that. So I wrote down a few things. One is what we talked about. It's slow and steady wins the game. It's the gradual approach we really went over that most of these things I know you love to jump into things. I don't want to dissuade you of that. But I have just observed in the gym in life with food, with weight issues, with weight control, that if you take this gradual approach, that's the one I advocate.

[00:45:32.110] – Chuck
And the way I would describe it is think evolution, not revolution. I think that you're going to evolve. A revolution is sexy and dramatic, but you can also get shot between the eyes and it's over like that. But evolution, it really is why we are still here on this planet. So that's what I urge. The other thing I've noticed is I call the book Customize yourself. But I could also call it customized for yourself, because I have run into a lot of people, especially older women in their 40s and 50s, who are having weight issues.

[00:46:08.980] – Chuck
They sort of know that as you get older, your metabolism slows down and you gain weight. And that is the fact. I mean, you really have to. It doesn't take much. You can exercise ten extra minutes a day and not gain that pound a year that you don't even notice as you're getting older past the age of 30. But what I've noticed is a big problem is they'll go home to their mother or their grandmother or their spouse or their group of friends or their roommate or whoever with a different way of eating, and they're like, oh, no, don't do that.

[00:46:39.210] – Chuck
My grandmother taught me how to make this bread or taught me how to make this stew or whatever. It's wrong if you change the way you eat, because our family has proven this is the right way. And there's a lot of people who are like, oh, God, I'll feel guilty if I don't eat my mother's home cooked baked bread or whatever it is. You really have to get over that. You don't have to proselytize. You don't have to tell your mother she can't eat a bread, but you really have to think about it for yourself.

[00:47:06.600] – Chuck
And that's something. I've noticed it. And be grateful for it because you have something that is will help you to get older and be healthy and not just be vital and not deteriorate like everybody else. So I proselytize. You proselytize world how to. But to everybody else, I just don't let somebody lay a guilt trip on you. Like, oh, don't do that because the family doesn't do that or something like that. And the third thing I would say is don't rely on food to make you happy.

[00:47:37.340] – Chuck
A lot of people are literally ingrained with, it's very simple. Everybody's heard this before. Don't live to eat. People live to eat, don't live to eat, eat to live. First time I heard that, it's just a light bulb on off over my head. Well, that's really easy. I can do that. And I find most people live to eat. And if you eat to live a better thing and find other things to be happy. So I'll give you one more thing, and this is a guaranteed way to make be happy.

[00:48:07.870] – Chuck
That's another thing I want to compliment you on,you make a point in wellness that happiness is an important component of that. I have never heard a trainer say that. I have never heard, you know, even nutritionist say that. I think it's so important that you include that in what you teach to your students and what you tell your listeners. Because people do want happiness. It's one of the things that we have in our Constitution, happiness. So I will give you a sure fire way to be happy.

[00:48:36.980] – Chuck
And again, no trainer ever told me this. I guarantee this will make you happy every day. Play with a dog. If you don't have a dog, find a dog, play with your neighbor's dog. Go to a dog park or get a dog. I'm telling you, five minutes playing with a dog. Two minutes playing with a dog a day will make you happy. I just guarantee it. And you can find simple things like that. It is really that simple. Don't make it complicated. Make it simple. So play with a dog is my last one.

[00:49:04.290] – Allan
Yeah. One of my favorite quotes is I aspire to be the guy my dog thinks I am.

[00:49:09.300] – Chuck
Oh, yeah? Or just watch a dog. Look how happy the dog. I watch dogs and I go, Why can't I be that happy? Why can't I jump in the air and do a back flip and roll around on my back and run up to another dog and nip their ear. You can't do that with people because you'll get in trouble, but yeah, I wish I could do that.

[00:49:29.840] – Allan
Chuck, if someone wanted to learn more about you or learn more about your book Customize Yourself Nutrition. Where would you like for me to send them?

[00:49:38.080] – Chuck
You can go to either Amazon. Amazon is where you can buy the book. Just look up Customize Yourself: Nutrition. Or you can go to my website, which is Customizeyourself.org. Very simple. Customizeyourself.org. Either way, you know, you can find your way to me and I'll be happy to be your friend and I hope I can help a little bit.

[00:50:00.470] – Allan
Thank you. You can go to 40PlusFitnesspodcast.com/501 and I'll be sure to have the links there. Chuck, thank you so much for being a part of 40+Fitness.

[00:50:11.240] – Chuck
Allan, thank you so much. Anytime. I had a blast, I will do this with you anytime. I am at your service.

[00:50:17.220] – Allan
Okay, well, you got the nutrition book coming out next year, so we'll be in touch.

[00:50:21.680] – Chuck
Okay. Great. Thanks a lot.

Post Show/Recap

Post show wit

[00:50:29.670] – Allan
Welcome back, Raz.

[00:50:32.210] – Rachel
Allan, oh, my gosh. We have a lot to talk about here. But before we talk about customizing ourselves, which is just brilliant, I got to go back to what you guys said at the beginning about having a half a million Centurions by the year 2060. How is that even going to be possible?

[00:50:52.300] – Allan
It's really just a function of numbers. Okay? It's not that there's going to necessarily be a larger percentage of Centurions than there are today. Just means there's going to be a lot more people. So our population is unless something tragic happens, our population will continue to grow. We're approaching 8 billion people now. By that time, my guess is we'll probably be somewhere in the 9 billion, maybe closer to ten somewhere in that range. So you just added over 20% more people. When you have those more people, then of course, the percentage of whoever's going to make it to 100 goes up.

[00:51:34.160] – Allan
And then the other thing is there's an expectation that technology will extend our life expectancy, some. At one point, our life expectancy was below 45. And then within 100 years, we now have it up to, I think for women is something like 78.8. For men, it's hovering somewhere or just high 77 point something. So you look at it, the average person in general is going to live until they're late 70s. And then you have these statistics is a Bell curve of people that are going to live one standard deviation longer.

[00:52:10.870] – Allan
That's a few years, and two standard deviations and three all the way out. And then those outliers that they live to 100 is just like on the other side of that average of the kids that die at birth. And so the average is really just a function of math to say, okay, if we can keep more kids from dying and making it even to age one, then that shifts the average. But when you start looking at the outliers, it's really if you have more people and the even the number of outliers goes up.

[00:52:42.150] – Allan
So it sounds like a big number, but you can take it and round it. I kind of look at it from a percentage of people 50 million relative to, say, 10 million, 10 billion. You still see it's a very small fraction of people. It's effectively a rounding error, if you will. It sounds terrible, but what it speaks to is when people know there's the potential to live longer because they're fixing the medical care, they're making us live longer. The question isn't, will I make it to 100?

[00:53:19.070] – Allan
It's like, how much am I going to like being 100 in the last ten years of my life? What are those going to be like? So I want to be able to wipe my butt at 105 comment is really me acknowledging that there is a potential for me to live that long. And if I'm going to be here that long, what do I want my life to be like?

[00:53:44.500] – Rachel
That's a good point. I had mentioned to you earlier that I had great grandparents that live until 103 and 104, when they both passed within about a month of each other. And they are like my example of what potential I have to have a long and healthy life because they didn't leave their home. They lived in their home until they were 97 years old, and then they went into assisted living. And I recall my great grandfather used a cane, but I don't recall either of them requiring a wheelchair to get around until maybe later.

[00:54:24.810] – Rachel
But they were both very healthy people until, obviously, until they decided to get some assisted living. I think they were just tired of the upkeep of their farm property at that point. And God bless them, they deserve to relax a little at that point. But, yeah, I've always had that example in my life, and my grandparents did live into their 80s and 90s. So I do have some not quite Centurions, but close. And they all lived very long and very healthy lives. And I think Besides the genetics, their lifestyle kind of rubbed off on me.

[00:55:01.960] – Rachel
So that's probably why I'm as healthy as I am.

[00:55:05.040] – Allan
Yeah. And that's one of the core is that genetics is sort of the blueprint, if you will, for what's possible with your body. If you have the right genetics, then you can be an elite athlete, if you do the training. It doesn't mean you're an elite athlete just because you have the genetics of an elite athlete. So you have to do something to make those genetics matter. And so I like to think of it in terms of the blueprint, and you can decide if you're going to build your house out of steel and wood or whether you're going to build your house out of fluff.

[00:55:41.580] – Allan
And so if we're building our house the right way and we're using good materials, those materials will serve us over those years. The house I'm in right now, I mean in Lula's. This house was originally built over 80 years ago. Now it's been rebuilt over and rebuilt over and everything else. But we tore up the floors here in this particular room, we could see where they had literally just set wood on dirt. And you just don't do that. If you want that house to stand for a long, long time, that's how you do a barn.

[00:56:15.910] – Allan
People build barns, and sometimes they do that. Sometimes they put footings, but a lot of times they'll just let the wood sit on the dirt. And that barn is not going to last more than 20 years. And then it's going to be gone. So the fact that this thing was still standing was huge, and we didn't realize that they started tearing out the wall, and some of the structure was gone. As a result, we saw the house starting to shift. You couldn't open the doors in here.

[00:56:39.740] – Allan
And so when the contractor showed up that day, I'm like, we got to do something, because when you can't open a door, it's an indication that something bad is happening. And so the main contractor got in here. Yeah. We got to shore up these walls to day.

[00:56:54.580] – Rachel
Oh, my gosh.

[00:56:55.780] – Allan
All over. And that's the whole point. Is the structures there, blueprints there, if you're using quality materials and doing things right, so you're feeding your body the right foods, you're building your body the right way, then you have the capacity to last a lot longer. And for the quality of that lasting to be there. So if this wall had fallen and part of Lula's would have fallen, whole thing wouldn't because a large percentage of it is concrete. But we would have this caved inside the house, and it's kind of the same thing.

[00:57:30.060] – Allan
It's like if you're not taking care of yourself and you have a stroke or a heart attack, you have to have bypass surgery or stents put in all of those things, they're basically making it harder. They're slowing you down or if you fall and break a hip, it's that concept of the healthier you are before you go into something, the better off you're going to be. And so that's where the concept of centers. And the reason I want to bring it, because his mother is now 111.

[00:58:00.490] – Rachel
Oh, my gosh.

[00:58:04.600] – Allan
I'm gonna listen to her.

[00:58:05.010] – Rachel
Oh, yeah.

[00:58:06.640] – Allan
And Chuck has a fitness book coming out. And as soon as his fitness book is out, I'm going to have him back on to talk about that because, yes, I'm absolutely going to listen to people who are living that, you know, we had on Barbara and Margaret a couple of weeks ago who are going into their 70s. And I'm like, yeah, I'm going to listen to them because they're there where I'm going to be. There's an opportunity for us to look into the future and see things we can change now.

[00:58:37.270] – Allan
So we're not dealing with that in the future because we're not going to have a time machine and be able to come back and fix ourselves now. They're not going to come back and sit, say to our 40 year old selves or 50 year old self, please exercise more. Please don't eat that crap.

[00:58:54.460] – Rachel
Yeah, I'm sure as I sit here as a 50 year old, I look back in my youthful days and I think, well, maybe I should not have celebrated with McDonald's after a half marathon because I did, but I don't anymore. But you know what Chuck mentioned or his whole theory about customizing, I think, is so brilliant, because we want the right diet. We want the right exercise regimen. But it's not one thing. There's so many options of diets to follow or different type of exercise modalities to follow.

[00:59:32.600] – Rachel
And you can't just assume that you can put A and B and get to C. You just need to customize it to see whatever suits you.

[00:59:42.600] – Allan
Yeah, we're all different. Chuck is really good. And we talked about this on the episode of Moderation, where he will set a goal for himself to cut back on one of his more harm than good foods and say, instead of eating pizza four days per week, I'm going to only eat it three times a week, and that's 25% decrease in the amount of pizza that he's ordering and eating. He can do that. Me, I would be thinking about that pizza the whole time. I don't do Moderation well.

[01:00:20.950] – Allan
And knowing myself that way, it's like, if I tell myself I can't have pizza, then I'm going to be like, okay, right now, I mean, I live close enough to a pizza place, but my thing was pizza, and that was the thing I want to get rid of. And I lived across the street from my favorite pizza restaurant, and I knew that I could order it. And I love it. It's called Chow here on the island. So if you're ever coming to Bocas Del Toro, make sure you go to Chow.

[01:00:44.160] – Allan
Yes, it's the best pizza on the island and wonderful owners too. But that said, they're open, I think, four days a week. And so they're open Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Those are open days right now. And so I said, I'm going to have their pizza every single day and that I can. I'm going to order a pizza every single day. And then I say, okay, well, I'm eating pizza four days a week. I'm like, I'm going to skip one of those days. And so I just decided I'm gonna skip Thursday.

[01:01:13.770] – Allan
I'm going to be thinking about that pizza all day on Thursday. And then what's going to end up happening is I'm probably going to order two pizzas on Friday. That's just my mindset. I was like, oh, I love this pizza. And I'll have some for breakfast, and I'll have some for lunch. Whereas I normally wouldn't have done that. I would have ordered my one pizza, I would have eaten about half of it. And then, yes, for breakfast the next day, I would have eaten the rest of it.

[01:01:35.720] – Allan
But that was just my approach, if I were eating pizza every day. And so it's good that Chow is a good probably about good, let's say 3 miles from 3 and a half, 4 miles from here. So not some place I walk to every day to have pizza. But I only say because everybody is different and the foods that your body is going to naturally love is a little different. But what we do know and you know, is that there are those more harm than good foods.

[01:02:09.050] – Allan
They're the processed meats. They're the fast food. They're the sugar, the french fries. And so find your poison. Find the things that you're eating that you know are not serving you, and then just do a little less of them. And I'm pretty sure when we get to his fitness book, I'm assuming it's going to be a very similar message of just try to do a little more.

[01:02:33.080] – Rachel
I love it.

[01:02:33.860] – Allan
If you're not doing anything now, just try to walk for 15 minutes in the evenings.

[01:02:41.580] – Rachel
I love that idea, because, like you said, if you just take it, well, like he said, slow and steady wins the race. If you just try a few things, like change an unhealthy breakfast. If you have cereal, which you know is laden with sugar and junk, change cereal to maybe oatmeal or to maybe eggs, just take one meal and change it. Or take one afternoon snack and change it to a fruit or a vegetable snack that you wouldn't normally eat. If you just do little things, all accumulates to big results.

[01:03:14.070] – Allan
When I'm talking to a client about we're talking about their food, and there's a food that kind of fits that same category of more harm than good, I usually talk to them in terms of three things, because there's three things you can do. If there's a food which you know is doing you harm, okay, you can eliminate it. So I'm not a moderation person. So for me, that's the clear path for me is just eliminate it, Okay. For a lot of people, that's not something they can do.

[01:03:43.520] – Allan
So we want to reduce it. So that's Chuck method. Where Chuck saying, okay, if you want French fries, and you usually eat them five days per week. Can you cut one of them out? And at least that's a 20% reduction over what you are doing. And you can do that then that's great. So that's reduction. And then the third way is replacement. Okay. And so a lot of folks that will get into keto will use cauliflower as a way to avoid eating potatoes. So they'll make mashed cauliflower.

[01:04:19.090] – Allan
They'll also use cauliflower for the crust of pizza. So they're doing away with a lot of the carbs that would come in their pizza. So using cauliflower, they've effectively reduced or replaced what they were doing before. So it's a replacement. So the three ways are eliminate, reduce or replace.

[01:04:40.140] – Rachel
I love it. Great tips.

[01:04:42.730] – Allan
And a lot of people do that with soda. So they drink regular soda, coke, soft drink, whatever you want to call it.

[01:04:48.760] – Rachel
We call it pop.

[01:04:50.340] – Allan
I think I got all of them. I'll just call them soft drinks for the sake of clarity. Let's say you're used to drinking a soft drink. Maybe it's even just one per day. You have your one soft drink per day and you look at it and it's 39 grams of sugar like, wow, you know, actually, that's a lot. A little twelve ounce can. And you say I'll just replace that with a diet soft drink. That is better, but it's not optimal.

[01:05:22.010] – Allan
And you know that, you know, this is a more harm than good food. His second stage of the customized process is then after you've accomplished that, you've shifted from the regular soft drink to the diet soft drink. The next stage for him would be to look at that again and say, can I make another foray into this? Can I cut back on those? So maybe that's a volume thing rather than just an exchange thing. But finding the way that you can reduce your exposure to something that's doing you harm, it's going to be good.

[01:05:58.720] – Rachel
I love that. He said eat to live and not live to eat. And if you can think of the foods that you choose in terms of how they benefit your overall health and fitness, it sometimes a little easier to get rid of some things. I know that for me, bread doesn't serve me. It doesn't give me any energy. It doesn't give me any building blocks of protein. It's just to me, it's a useless item for me in my diet. So it's easy for me to slip that off.

[01:06:31.080] – Rachel
But I also focus instead I focused on protein because I need that for all of the weight lifting and running that I do, I need to make sure my muscles are healthy and are rebuilding when I push them too much. So it's just different attitude towards what you choose.

[01:06:47.820] – Allan
Well, again, I'll just go back to the concept of there is a genetic blueprint for you, and then you're making decisions about how that blueprint is used. And so the food that you're putting in your mouth are building blocks and they're going to determine how healthy your muscles are, how healthy your bones are, how healthy your ligaments and tendons are, how healthy your brain is. And so if you're not putting the right building materials in there, you are building your body out of fluff.

[01:07:22.900] – Rachel
True, true.

[01:07:24.600] – Allan
And too much of that means that you're going to be building weakness into your frame. Now, you might lift weights and you might run. You might be this tremendous athlete. But if you're still eating Taco Bell and other crap and rebuilding your body with those and every cell in your body dies and is replaced by something else, another cell of the same meat and model. But it's made with what was available at the time. Now you can recycle some of the amino acids and things from that.

[01:07:57.600] – Allan
Some fats from the cells. But in a general sense, we have to keep eating those building materials to replace those cells. And if you're not getting adequate protein, you're not getting adequate nutrition. Calcium, magnesium, all of it. That healthy fats. If you're not getting those things, then now you're building the cell membranes, the cells themselves out of bad stuff. And that's like Lula's wall that was built on the dirt, wood on dirt and it rotted through. And as soon as we took away just some of the support, we could see the damage.

[01:08:35.580] – Allan
And so just any little thing happening to your health and fitness, you're going to be impacted a lot worse than if you had done less harm.

[01:08:45.270] – Rachel
Just one last thing I want to point out real quick is that where you get those nutrients, like the calcium and magnesium and proteins and stuff can totally vary from person to person. And you don't need to be a vegan or vegetarian or paleo or keto or any other named diet. And like Chuck had mentioned, he can't digest cruciferous vegetables or he does not like walnuts. They don't agree with him.

[01:09:11.520] – Allan
or Blueberries.

[01:09:13.283] – Rachel
or Blueberries.

[01:09:14.030] – Allan
Blueberries.

[01:09:15.040] – Rachel
Truth be told, my mom is actually allergic to blueberries. So no matter how much of a super food it is, she can't eat them. But that's exactly my point is that if you choose not to eat meat, fine. Then find those important building blocks in the vegetables and nuts that you choose to eat instead. Or if your body can't digest kale and cruciferous vegetables, then maybe a more meat based diet is appropriate for you. But there's such a diet war out there, and that's what I want to get across is that, like Chuck said, you have to customize it to what your body needs and don't get hung up on one diet or another.

[01:09:55.420] – Rachel
Just choose the right foods that your body needs.

[01:09:58.740] – Allan
Absolutely. Alright. Well, Rachel, with that, I guess we'll go ahead and call it a show and I'll talk to you next week.

[01:10:05.450] – Rachel
Alright, take care, Allan.

[01:10:07.030] – Allan
You too.

[01:10:07.750] – Rachel
Thanks.

Patreons

The following listeners have sponsored this show by pledging on our Patreon Page:

– Anne Lynch	– Eric More	– Leigh Tanner
– Deb Scarlett	– John Dachauer	– Margaret Bakalian
– Debbie Ralston	– John Somsky	– Melissa Ball
– Eliza Lamb	– Judy Murphy	– Tim Alexander

Thank you!

Another episode you may enjoy

How to solve the energy paradox with Dr. Steven Gundry

Less...

Let's Say Hello

[00:04:03.840] – Allan
Hey Raz, how are you doing?

[00:04:05.640] – Rachel
Good. How are you today, Allan?

[00:04:07.440] – Allan
I'm doing OK and I'm feeling pretty good. It's been really, really busy. Trying to get a lot of things done.

[00:04:13.680] – Allan
We're planning a trip back to the states and so looking all that travel and getting all organized and just stuff that's going on, it's like, OK, I got to get all this stuff done and get it done before, you know, this date. Sure, everything's organized and ready because, you know, there's still a lot of moving parts in my life that aren't fully within my control.

[00:04:34.320] – Rachel
Right? Oh, yeah. It's a big trip for you guys coming from down there all the way up here.

[00:04:39.750] – Allan
it is. We're going to fly up and then drive the circuit that includes Pensacola, north northwest Indiana, North Carolina and Miami. And I think there's even a stop in New Orleans in there. Yeah, round trip. I just measured it out. You know, you go and Google Maps and you plot it all out. It's 3500 miles driving.

[00:05:06.000] – Rachel
Oh my.

[00:05:07.290] – Allan
There we're going to do in a little over three weeks.

[00:05:10.290] – Rachel
Oh my goodness. Look at you. Well, it's a good thing you have the time. Maybe you could spread it out a little.

[00:05:16.110] – Allan
I might listen to a podcast.

[00:05:19.620] – Rachel
That would be one of my favorite things to do, that's for sure.

[00:05:23.590] – Allan
How are things up there?

[00:05:24.880] – Rachel
Good, enjoying the summer. Got a couple of camp outs planned this month and watching the Olympics. The Olympics have been fun to watch the last two weeks. So, yeah, just enjoying a relaxing time.

[00:05:37.760] – Allan
Yeah, I was sitting there last night. It was so funny because I had signed up for a sling account to try to watch some football. And I thought, OK, you know, I watch the football games on Sling and none of the games that were on that I wanted to watch, you know, and I didn't turn it off. So it kept billing me and I would say, OK, I got to remember to cancel this and I wouldn't do it.

[00:06:00.760] – Allan
And then that's another fifty dollars. So finally, I sat there before this billing cycle, right after this billing cycle because I saw the bill hit, I'm like, that's it. I'm cancelling. But they told me I had one month left. So I'm like, OK, I better get on there and see if there's any movies or shows that I want to watch. And so I got on last night and got the women's volleyball was playing Italy and that's one of my favorite sports, volleyball.

[00:06:25.060] – Allan
So I decided to go ahead and watch them.

[00:06:27.370] – Allan
And fortunately they did take out Italy. But I think this is just a qualifier around. So it's just identifying who's going to be the group that's going to play later on. And I think there's going to be four teams that move on and Italy will still be in that four, along with Russia and the United States, and I forget who the other one is. But right now, they're just working on how the seating of all that's going to work.

[00:06:51.340] – Allan
OK, so, yeah, it's good stuff.

[00:06:53.860] – Rachel
It is. It's fun to watch these athletes in the prime, you know, just doing what they do best. It's been really fun to watch.

[00:07:01.000] – Allan
Some of them are scary good.

[00:07:02.800] – Rachel
Oh, my goodness. They are. World records are dropping everywhere. It's pretty amazing.

[00:07:07.960] – Allan
And then you have Karch Kiraly.

[00:07:10.240] – Allan
For those who don't know who that is. He was a pretty famous volleyball player in his day, playing, playing indoor in college. And then he went outdoors and started playing pro and went to the Olympics a few times.

[00:07:24.310] – Allan
And but he's their coach. I was kind of like, this guy's still out there.

[00:07:27.910] – Allan
You know, he's still in the game, which was really cool.

[00:07:30.640] – Rachel
That's fantastic. It's amazing to see a lot of the coaches are former athletes, in one way, shape or form. And it's incredible to see them still enjoying getting the most out of their sport. It's really fun to watch.

[00:07:43.060] – Allan
All right. Are you ready to have a very fun conversation with Barbara and Margaret?

[00:07:48.620] – Rachel
Sure.

Interview

[00:08:07.450] – Allan
Barbara. Margaret, welcome to the 40 Plus Fitness.

[00:08:10.780] – Barbara
Thank you for having us.

[00:08:12.160] – Margaret
Yes, thank you.

[00:08:13.870] – Allan
The title of your book. And it's kind of one of the things we're talking about before we got on here is like, did you entertain? And absolutely. And just even the title of the book was entertaining, Not Dead Yet. And then the subtitle is Rebooting Your Life After 50. And the concept of that just really hit home for me. I mean, I'm fifty-five years old. I did go through covid this year. It wasn't nearly as bad as it has been for a lot of people, but it was just one of those moments, one of those phrases where you kind of get a little smile on your face and then you realize, well, I'm not.

[00:08:47.140] – Allan
So what's next? And I was really excited to get an opportunity to read your book and then have you on the show so we could have some really good conversations.

[00:08:56.860] – Barbara
Good. Thank you.

[00:08:58.240] – Allan
All right, now. You start out the book, probably the way that I wish a lot of books started out with something just completely actionable, I'm a very actionable cut type of person. I love tips. I love things I can learn from other people. And I can say in the last two years, almost two years now, if you break it down, we've had a lot of reasons to not be optimistic.

[00:09:23.530] – Allan
We've had a lot of reasons to be pessimistic and to look to the future and think, oh, my God, where where is this country going? Where is this world going? What's going to happen next with all of the things that are going on? It's almost like they piled on a little more than they should have, if you will. But in the book, you share some tips for maintaining optimism. And I loved every single one of them.

[00:09:49.540] – Allan
There were at least, I think, a dozen of them. But could you go through some of your favorites and talk about them?

[00:09:55.300] – Barbara
OK, I'll start. And this is Barbara. I think sometimes when we would get down, whether when we were hitting that a big milestone birthday or we are sick or there was another ache or pain as we were aging, it was almost like we talk daily as friends. And also because of our work, it was almost like, stop it. We're so lucky in so many ways. And I think that's one of our biggest things as we need it to remind ourselves of ways things, whether it's people, activities, things that we could be grateful for.

[00:10:31.090] – Barbara
We both had roofs over our head during covid and other times we had food on our table, sometimes too much. We had TV we could watch. We had work that we were very blessed having. We had health care. So we try to do that. And it's Meg's idea to wake up and think about one thing that we like about ourselves, because sometimes we'll say, oh, we don't like our hair today or we don't like our body or whatever it was, again, almost stop it.

[00:11:00.370] – Barbara
There are a lot of good things and we try to reinforce that in each other. Our grown children and other people. We also both like people, we like to socialize. And we're optimistic that we're lucky to have people. We're lucky to have family members. We're lucky to have friends to reach out to for help, to laugh. Laughter is big in both of our lives. So those are a few of the things that I think about being grateful for.

[00:11:31.660] – Margaret
OK, I, I think one of the things we talk about one of our points is to stop worrying about the small stuff, focus again on, hate the cliche, but the glass half full and be appreciative of again, what we have a roof over our head, too many carbs on the table and all the good things. It's more like zeroing in on our assets rather than our deficits, sort of like, you know, taking stock of what we have and appreciating it and then realizing that what goes down will come up.

[00:12:14.620] – Margaret
If one day is tough, the next day is bound to be better. And that's something I learned. It took me many years to learn that. Other ways to stay optimistic, be healthy, exercise, sleep. Learn something new and feel good about it every time I learn something that's related to technology, I feel so fabulous and like I really conquered, such as learning how to work and plug in these earphones. It took some checking on Google and YouTube.

[00:12:52.200] – Margaret
So there are many ways to feel good about yourself and be happy when you wake up in the morning, have a new routine stretch, start new habits, try different things. There's no one grading you. You're not in school anymore. Take some risk.

[00:13:08.010] – Barbara
I think one other thing is that both of us either we're born with it or become through different challenges. We're both resilient. We both faced in our last book, suddenly single after 50, we both experienced the loss of a spouse. Mine was through a divorce. Meg's was through death. And we managed some time from that generation that married very young. We managed to navigate singlehood and build new lives. And we've done that with other parts of our lives, with new friendships.

[00:13:43.230] – Barbara
So that's something we're grateful for, that we have that inner, whatever it is that pushes us forward.

[00:13:52.050] – Allan
Yeah, you touched on a lot of great points, and one of the things you talked about was to be thankful and I think that's probably one of the hardest things to do unless you really take the time to build a gratitude practice. I mean, so many times we sit down and it's just so easy to to look at something and say, well, why did that happen to me, you know, versus well, you know, think about all the good things that happened to me over the course of the last 10, 15, 20 years, you know, meeting my wife, having our family, some of the wonderful trips we took, just kind of looking back at the experiences that I've been able to have, you know, each and every day, it's sometimes it's really hard to slow yourself down and kind of have that conversation.

[00:14:39.400] – Allan
So how, I mean, obviously, as we as we go through and we age, there's life changes and things like that, kids move out of the house, parents move back in the house, kids move back in the house, all the different things that go on. How do you ladies take the time or when you find yourself slipping off that optimism path, what are some things that you do to kind of get yourself back into besides the.

[00:15:06.480] – Allan
I love the upraise, you know, stop it. I don't know if you what I'm pretty sure you watch Bob Newhart back in the day. And yes, I'm old enough to know who Bob Newhart is. But my favorite clip from him and you can actually watch it on YouTube is Stop It. And he's a therapist and a woman comes in there and says she's got this problem and his answer is, stop it. You know, just like that.

[00:15:29.960] – Allan
And she's like, I don't like this therapy. And then he said to stop it, you know? And so but it was just it's hilarious. This hilarious clip. If you go through it, obviously some people have some issues and some mental health things that are going on. But if you're just someone who just occasionally finds yourself being a little negative on things, what are some tips to get us back on that path?

[00:15:52.390] – Barbara
Well, I think, again, having a network of people you can talk to, I mean, you can have your own things like I like to take a walk in my village once or twice a day. I like to garden. I paint when I have the time, but I feel so blessed to have a friendship with Meg. We talk in our book about, oh, there's a book called Friendship, which is just wonderful. And they talk about a big friendship.

[00:16:17.500] – Barbara
We don't just grab our selves as best friend. Meg has a really close friend from childhood. I have other friends, but we have a very honest, authentic friendship where we know we can talk. We know we can be brutally honest about what's going on. We know it's not going to go anywhere. We know how to make each other laugh. You know, even some of that laughter where you're almost peeing in your pants. Laughter. We've had a good time working together.

[00:16:44.320] – Barbara
So I say to people, find a person you like. You don't need a huge network. You need a few people who make you feel good about yourself. I think that's so incredibly important. We're blessed with we have good kids. Do they annoy us? Of course they do at times, but then we laugh about that. So I think that I think that's made a huge difference in our lives. And we've seen, we also have friends and acquaintances who are very negative and not and that's hard sometimes for us to be around.

[00:17:19.360] – Barbara
We know we have to be empathetic and sympathetic, but so we try to do our best with that by sharing. I think that's a big thing.

[00:17:28.670] – Margaret
I was going to say Barbara and I both like to process out loud, hence, you know, I wake up and I'm in a terrible mood and the first thing I do is I pick up the phone and I call. Said, you're not gonna believe what my son said to me today or vice versa, what my daughter asked me to do. And we process it and we talk about it. And then in our heads probably saying to ourselves, stop it.

[00:17:56.870] – Margaret
Or Barbara will say, Meg, what? I talk to you these days. I hear a lot of ugh ughs and you know what's going on and laying it out there with someone you trust is so important. And oftentimes what I'll do is I will get extremely busy. I start thinking of story ideas or I love to play opera. It puts me in a good mood when I play classical music. I have all these little coping skills. And I think you do, too, Barbara.

[00:18:30.710] – Barbara
I do one thing that I greatly admire about Meg, and we share this. I think it's very important to help stroke each other people not send your kid every kid home with a trophy kind of thing or every friend. But Meg does a lot of volunteer work. Its course covid put a damper on that, but she was tutoring children in reading and now she's doing on Zoom, If I'm correct. I've done a lot of work, not of late, but with my college and think getting out of ourselves and thinking about other people, we think that's really, really essential.

[00:19:10.370] – Margaret
Good point.

[00:19:11.210] – Barbara
To again, to be thankful and know that we're incredibly lucky not every single day and not with every single thing. But other people are so much worse. So much. Yeah. And we need to help them. We need to do something about it.

[00:19:26.810] – Margaret
Now, what Barbara saying is really important, I think, and I've told this to friends who are going through a depression or a hard time, do something to get outside yourself. It is so soothing and so nourishing and important. Makes you feel great. The right hormones are released.

[00:19:46.820] – Barbara
We also, we both participated in Zoom's with childhood or high school or different friends from Meg did with her friends from St. Louis. Now that she's in New York, that's been a lot of fun to play. You know, I mean, we've all had zoom pretty good times and maybe some one of my Zoom groups, I think is sort of starting to shut down. But that's been a lot of fun. We've had celebrations online. We've attended Shrivels online of just that constant connecting, knowing there are other people out there.

[00:20:21.830] – Allan
Yeah.

Sponsor
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[00:22:35.590] – Allan
You got into that, and I think that's really kind of important. I've seen with my parents, my grandparents and others, as we age, relationships change, obviously. relationships with your children change. Your relationship with your spouse may change.

[00:22:53.770] – Allan
Obviously, your relationship with your parents will change over time. Why is relationship and intimacy so important? And how do we maintain the right relationships and the right level of intimacy in our life as we go through those kind of changes?

[00:23:11.090] – Barbara
I think you have to take almost a constant temperature check. But I'm not talking about daily. But if someone, a friend isn't making you happy, is critical finding fault with you all the time? I'm not talking about people should speak up and be honest and authentic if you hurt their feelings or whatever. But at times not every friendship has to last forever or doesn't have to be in your life on a daily basis or weekly basis. And I think you need to do that.

[00:23:42.910] – Barbara
I think you need, I think our generation has been so eager to be friends with our children more so than our parents generation, that sometimes maybe we haven't parented even our grown children, as we should. Telling them, I don't appreciate if you speak to me that well or can you understand that I don't understand this technology the first time you try to explain it to me, it takes me a bit longer or I'm directionally challenged.

[00:24:16.360] – Barbara
I need help in getting to your new destination. So I think we need to do that with each of our parents. I'll speak for myself with my mother as she aged, and I was very much a caregiver for her and with her a lot of the time. I took on that usual role of becoming the adult and it was very uncomfortable initially, but I knew someone had to do it. So I did it and it didn't. I wasn't always good at it.

[00:24:48.910] – Barbara
And I would sometimes say to Meg, I think I'm really not doing the right thing or the right job. And I'm annoyed with her. I have incredible guilt about that when she would repeat the same thing ten times.

[00:25:02.860] – Margaret
Relationships are as critical as to our lives as oxygen is to keeping us alive. Statistics have shown or studies have shown that loneliness can be the death knell. Having good social interactions can make you live longer. And I've had friends. I talked to someone the other day, lives in Portland. She had moved there from St. Louis who said, I'm new in town. I don't know anyone. I can't make friends at age seventy five. It's impossible. And Barbara and I would have said to her, that's not true.

[00:25:42.370] – Margaret
And read our book and you'll find out how to make these friendships. There are many different kinds of friendships that we address. There are the big friendships like Barbara and I have. There are acquaintances. There are close friends from childhood where you share a history. But again, good chemicals are released in the brain. When you have those close friendships, when you sit down and you can really hang out with these people and be yourself. And how do you find friends?

[00:26:14.830] – Margaret
We list tons of ways you can make and find new friends by joining things, you know, by taking classes and going to an art gallery or standing in the grocery line. Did you meet someone in a grocery line once, Barbara?

[00:26:31.390] – Barbara
I talked to people. I mean, when I was dating during my marathon dating after my divorce, I would look at men's hands to see if they were married or not, see if there was a ring. Not that every man wears a wedding band. And I would look in the cart as a single serve stuffers, frozen spinach or whatever. And I'm sure I talk to people.

[00:26:55.090] – Margaret
Well, you and I talk to everybody we do. I've met since I moved to New York City. I have met more people just sitting on a subway, on a bus, standing next to them on the street corner and working on projects, doing a project did one for the homeless. I tutor kids. Barbara mentioned that. I've met great women who are also tutors, we're part of a team sometimes. But all of that is so important to feeling good.

[00:27:23.710] – Margaret
And a lot of women would say, well, you know, I don't know how to meet a man at this age or a woman at this age. What do we do? How do you meet these people? Barbara, you're the online dating queen, so you talk about that.

[00:27:40.390] – Barbara
I went on a lot of dating sites when I was first divorced. Some people don't. And ironically, after all the dating I did, then I was fixed up with someone who's I call him my beau.

[00:27:53.860] – Barbara
But also I was going to say that it takes time to build a really close friendship. So I would say the new people I've met since I moved to my village, for the most part, I have some good friends where I live, but they're not of the same depth of some of my former friends. So I think you have to accept the fact that not every friend is going to be your bestie.

[00:28:17.410] – Margaret
But how would you define a really good friend?

[00:28:21.130] – Barbara
I would define a good friend as someone who calls you, not just text you and says how are you? That sometimes picks up the phone, wants to see you in person when it's acceptable. Who shares about themselves. Both of us like people where they're sharing, where it's not just us doing will be revealing or whatever. So you know, that I think about a really good friend would be someone, if I move from here, that I would want to keep up with, not just who's been in my life right now on a temporary basis.

[00:28:52.960] – Margaret
But we've also talked about good friends.

[00:28:55.450] – Margaret
They bring you chicken soup. They even feed the chicken soup. If you can get that little spoon in your mouth, they drive you to the colonoscopy is you know, they cook for you. They would drive and pick up your mail or pick up your kids at school.

[00:29:13.360] – Barbara
You pick up or they go and they pick up a friend for you and bring them on the line from kindergarten. It was a baby shower the other day from my older daughter and this friend of mine when she knew she was coming, she said, I'll go pick up Meg so you don't have to come into the city. A wonderful friend is that? And that's one thing about us. We like sharing our friends.

[00:29:38.020] – Margaret
Yes, we do.

[00:29:38.590] – Barbara
Not everybody does.

[00:29:40.450] – Margaret
They also help us celebrate big events in our lives. You know, they're the ones we want with us. And, you know, I have a big birthday coming up. And, you know, they're there when we need them.

[00:29:55.140] – Allan
Yeah, we moved to an island called Bocas del Toro. Islands called is the Colon, but it's a part of the Bocas del Toro archipelago. And it's one of the cool things about the people on this island is it's like that village you were talking about. It's like we all know each other. We all hang out together if we need something you quite literally just post it on Facebook and say, hey, any of my friends, are you going to the states?

[00:30:20.520] – Allan
I need to mail a letter. So a friend has to sit and paperwork for Social Security to mail a letter from here to the United States would cost you about 40 to 50 bucks. versus the getting someone on an airplane to carry a letter. You're building it for what? Postage, what, 40, 55, 60 cents now in the United States? So you put postage on an envelope and they carry it to you.

[00:30:41.670] – Allan
They'll do that. If you need something like your something in the United States that you can't get here, it's like, hey, would you mind carrying this in the suitcase? It's not big. Sure, we'll do it. So there's these just these little things that we all do for each other to make our lives on the island better. And yes, it's great. Those relationships mean a lot to me. And so it's yet you have that from out from a structure.

[00:31:03.330] – Allan
And I had Vivian King on a few episodes back and she had a stroke when she was at a benefit and a lot of her friends were there. And if not for her friends, she would not have gotten care as quickly as she did, and she may not have gotten to full recovery. So having those relationships, having all of that in your life is important. Yes, from a practical perspective, yes. From a fun perspective. And then.

[00:31:28.560] – Allan
Absolutely, Margaret, as you said, from a an emotional perspective with the chemicals and everything that comes on from having those close relationships in the time together, something that as a kid, you know, if you started thinking about, well, my parents certainly aren't intimate right now. They're not doing things like that because they're not enjoying themselves. Well, exactly where they were and they still are. And so it's kind of that thing to look forward to is to sit there and say, OK, you can you can think it's not happening or not going to happen, but it's going to happen if you want it to.

[00:32:02.350] – Allan
Obviously, you can you can decide that that ship sailed and just decide it's not going to happen anymore. But for the most part, that's still an important part of your life as you get older. And so making sure that you have the fitness and have the health and to be able to do the things you want to do, because if you're already considering the blue pill guys, you need to talk to your cardiologist because it's probably not what you think it is.

[00:32:25.830] – Allan
It's probably something else. And it's worth looking at your health first and then the blue pill if all else fails. But beyond that, and not necessarily from an intimacy perspective with someone else, how do you continue to find passion in your life as you go through things? Because things that were important to you when you were in your 20s are no longer important to you when you're in your 30s and on and on and on. So as we get older, how do we continue to keep passion in our lives?

[00:32:54.510] – Barbara
Well, I when I move to my new location, I bought a house. It was the first house that I bought on my own as a single female, which is one of the largest groups of home buyers in the country. And this became a passion. And sometimes it's a nightmare because I'm in an older home and I was determined to make it into the house, into the home, a place where my family could come. My friends came. At one point I thought I was renting it in as my friends or wanted to come see where I lived.

[00:33:33.300] – Barbara
I became a gardener, a farmer. I stopped doing that after about eight years because of all the animals eating my vegetables. I hated a lot when I was younger and in college, I went back to that to a weekly class. When I have the time. I love to cook and entertain. The entertaining went out the window during covid but two daughters who are good bakers and they were making holidays so I looked to how they were making bagels.

[00:34:02.130] – Barbara
So I made a bagel. Meg would be cooking. We got a little competitive about some of our cooking, who made the better this or that or inspired each other. So just being curious about different things, we found different passions. I took up pilates when I came here. I'd only done it a little bit. I don't know if that's a passion, but TV became a passion during covid. I mean, literally, I was watching every night. I love is it Frankie and Grace or Grace and Frankie?

[00:34:35.430] – Barbara
And you know, right now, Line of Duty is a British detective that I'm obsessed with. So it's always trying knowing that there's something else to do and to see.

[00:34:48.120] – Margaret
Well, I have a new life in New York City, I moved here twenty two months ago and I am walking everywhere, in St. Louis., you drove everywhere. And this is a passion. I love the walking. I love the energy in the city. One of my passions is working with kids. I immediately started tutoring in East Harlem. I love music. I and my son works for a classical music organization. And I immediately started going to concerts there to fulfill that part of my life that I love.

[00:35:22.380] – Margaret
But there are so many things you can do. People say to us, well, I don't know if I have any passions, how do I find my passion? And we talk about we give a pretty extensive list in the book, ways to tap into that, you know, make a list of all the books you want to read, even the ones you read in high school that you want to re-read. I mean, Barbara, how many times have you read Great Expectations?

[00:35:45.450] – Barbara
About to read it again.

[00:35:46.920] – Margaret
Yeah, OK. You know, trace your roots if you're interested in your ancestry, anybody can do that. Hey, I love the piano. I always want to learn to play it. My mother didn't give me lessons as a kid. Take it up now. You don't like it quit. You shouldn't do anything that makes you feel terrible or stressed. And again, you're not in school. Nobody's grading you on what you're doing. Ramp up your cooking chops.

[00:36:13.110] – Margaret
Start experimenting in the kitchen. Everyone likes to eat. Maybe you have retired and you're not sure what to do with yourself. Set up a consulting business, perhaps you're PR professional, and this is something you can do. There are so many options out there. You can get ideas from where can you get ideas from books, TV stores, newspapers.

[00:36:36.690] – Barbara
I think you need to take sort of a read on yourself what you like. Meg has always said, I hate exercise, but she started pilates during the pandemic for it was for physical therapy. Is that correct?

[00:36:53.250] – Margaret
Well, it started in physical therapy. She allowed me to try those machine things and I was complaining the whole time, but I actually didn't mind it. Somebody asked me how I liked Pilates. I said, the best I can say is I don't hate it. So, yeah, unfortunately, the pandemic put the kibosh on that, but I'll do it again.

[00:37:12.330] – Barbara
Listening to what our friends are doing, what we read in the newspapers, see on TV, just being open and knowing nothing.

[00:37:21.210] – Barbara
I think one of our big lessons now that we is living more in the moment and knowing that everything doesn't have to be forever, we try this class or that class or it doesn't have to be forever. And we get to explore a lot of these ideas. We're very lucky. In the weekly blog, we write life lessons at 50 plus. We sort of like we take it. It's a cliche, but I use it. Nora Ephron, who said, you know, everything is copy of, which is, I think, what her mother told her, which is very true.

[00:37:54.270] – Barbara
We go through something and then we test it out. I have my list of the 15 places I'd like to go before I am dead.

[00:38:03.430] – Margaret
Also, another thing we talk about, this is a great time, if you think about it, because it is perfectly OK to really do nothing. If you want to sit around and listen to NPR in the mornings or your podcast or, you know, put on a daytime soap or just sit on a bench and look around and enjoy the people and the fresh air and the birds that fly by, mostly pigeons in New York City. Why not? Nobody is telling you. You don't have a boss telling you what to do anymore.

[00:38:33.090] – Margaret
You are your own boss now, hopefully, unless you're still working and a lot of us aren't working for someone else or doing what we want, it's a great opportunity.

[00:38:46.650] – Barbara
Very bossy kids who tell you what you should be doing.

[00:38:49.260] – Margaret
Well, our bossy kids. Right, right. They love to tell us what to do.

[00:38:53.310] – Allan
Well, if you're listening to my podcast, you don't need to be sitting down. You can walk and listen to a podcast. So put the podcast on. Put your headphones in. But be careful. Make sure you're watching out for traffic. But yes, go for a walk.

[00:39:05.130] – Margaret
Absolutely.

[00:39:06.540] – Allan
Ladies, you had a topic in your book, the concept in your book that I just I love. It's going to probably be my mantra, one of my mantras going forward for sure. And it is your inner cake baked. And I love that from the perspective of we you know, I talk to my sixteen year old daughter and I told her, I said, by the time you are twenty four, you're not going to recognize yourself relative to who you were.

[00:39:35.940] – Allan
Sixteen and then she was twenty four. And I said by the time you're thirty you're not going to recognize who you were at twenty four as being you. You're just, you're always evolving and maybe those steps take a little bit more than six years later in our lives. I'm not sure I think I do change enough in six years that I look back and say, who was that guy? But, you know, we have this opportunity today to write the next chapter of our book, to write the last chapters of our book.

[00:40:05.670] – Allan
And we can make that change today. And is your inner cake baked? We keep baking the cake until it is. And once we decide the cake is done, we pull it out of the oven and we are who we are. It sets and then that's the cake. Good or bad, burnt or not, that's our cake. And so can you talk just a little bit about that concept from your perspective of inner cake baked?

[00:40:30.900] – Barbara
Well, I thought that after we wrote our last book that the cake was baked. This is the way life was going to be. And I found in town that we were both surprised that different challenges arose a lot. With regard to health. I'm not trying, but fortunately not serious illness, but things that needed to be corrected. So I'm evolving, trying to take better care of myself that because I think I took it for granted that I would always be healthy.

[00:41:01.920] – Barbara
And now I've had some problems. And, you know, I'm not always healthy. I think also aware I'm a little bit more aware, especially of late, of what kind of people I like to be around. So I'm not rushing into some friendships and letting things maybe take a little bit longer before the values. I grew up in a house which was semi religious. I mean, there was a regular temple going but I really didn't feel I knew enough about my religion, something that I wanted to become more observant, but I wanted to know more and become a little bit more spiritual.

[00:41:43.050] – Barbara
So I took two and a half year program on my religion fairly recently and made some actually very good friends. So that's one way I have evolved that I care much more about that than I ever thought I would. It really matters to me.

[00:42:02.700] – Margaret
In my case, losing my husband to cancer meant my whole life changed. And in doing so, I used to have friends who lost a child or a spouse or a parent. And I felt sympathy, of course, but I really didn't understand what they were going through. And I have really changed in how I view loss and my compassion quotient. It is so very different having been there, done that. Our recipes can change. And that's the good news.

[00:42:38.100] – Margaret
We don't have to keep the same recipe. I think we quote in our book, and I actually wrote this down, Daniel Levitin, who wrote successful aging quotes, Lewis Goldberg, who I think is considered the father of scientific concepts of personality. And he says you can improve yourself at any stage and personality traits. They are very pliable and influenced by certain situations. And as we get smarter about certain things, relate to our kids differently, learn how to handle different situations.

[00:43:18.140] – Margaret
I think one of the benefits of aging is we don't stress out about certain things anymore. Would you say, Barbara, we're much more relaxed and if we have a toxic friendship, who needs it? We don't have to continue that friendship where for some reason in the past we thought we did.

[00:43:37.550] – Barbara
May I interrupt?

[00:43:38.780] – Margaret
Yes.

[00:43:44.150] – Barbara
We always interrupt each other.

[00:43:44.150] – Allan
Barbara, you're being very polite by asking if you can.

[00:43:48.390] – Barbara
Yeah, Meg gave me strict instructions not to. No one going to interrupt each other like we can finish each other's sentences. I think we've both become better. And Meg I think maybe was better at this than me. And I've learned from her. We've become better listeners.

[00:44:05.240] – Margaret
Yes. Good point.

[00:44:06.770] – Barbara
And we hold off jumping in. You tell me you have an ailment.

[00:44:11.130] – Barbara
I'm not going to right away tell me what to do or which doctor I'm going to listen to you and then maybe suggest something. Meg said something shortly after her husband died. I said something. Well, I know how you feel. I didn't say exactly like that, thank goodness. But I said it close and she stopped me and she said, no, you don't know how I feel. And she was absolutely one hundred percent right. So I think listening is the way we've evolved.

[00:44:42.500] – Margaret
I think listening is the most important thing you can offer anybody right now. It's the only way we're going to mend some of these crazy differences we have with people and in all areas of our lives and society. And that is a skill we have honed and not just because we interview a lot of people and we report and so forth. This is more listening in our interpersonal relationships and it has really helped us grow closer to friends and family members.

[00:45:15.080] – Barbara
We also try not to make as many assumptions. We're very good because we're writers. We write scripts in our head. In our head, we write them in emails. So-and-so didn't call me back, so they must hate me now or this happened or that happened. We're trying to stop it. I don't think it's something that's going to it doesn't happen easily. Let me say.

[00:45:38.630] – Margaret
OK, Bob Newhart.

[00:45:42.890] – Allan
Yeah. Two years went out, I love that. So Margaret, I define wellness as being the healthiest, fittest and happiest you can be. What are three strategies or tactics to get and stay well?

[00:45:54.620] – Margaret
Well, OK, first of all, being mentally fit, you know, as Barbara said, take your temperature, metaphorically speaking, if you're having a really tough time, find a therapist. There are so many different kinds out there and there's no stigma attached to doing so. Barbara and I joke that it's the people who don't get therapy who are the really screwed up ones. And I'm using a good word there. The other thing. I think stay healthy physically, eat well, sleep, get enough sleep.

[00:46:33.400] – Margaret
I'm on an eating well kit now because of reflux problem and I joke with Barbara, I'm literally eating like a bird. And that doesn't mean small portions. It means I'm eating seeds and nuts and it's ridiculous diet. But I want to be healthy. I don't want to live the rest of my life with stomach issues and get a good support system. If you have a good support system, that is a really wonderful thing, which we've alluded to a bunch of times.

[00:47:02.290] – Margaret
Those are my three things.

[00:47:03.520] – Allan
Great. Thank you, Barbara. I'll ask you the same question.

[00:47:07.630] – Barbara
I agree with Meg. I think being active physically, as I said, I take a lot of walks in my village because I love seeing the houses and seeing the gardens and seeing people out. So I've done that. It's been on more streets in this tiny little place I live. I work out with a trainer, especially trying to work on balance. I fell five years ago because of ice and snow. But as we age, our balance is less good.

[00:47:41.290] – Barbara
I saw my mother fall, have major accident. Giving of yourself, I think, is a way which we've talked about already, is really picking up on clues from people when they're a little sad or big sad or reaching. I have a good friend in St. Louis who's a widow, and I, I really try to when after her husband died, I was calling her almost daily, but it was I call her at least once a week or sometimes more.

[00:48:12.855] – Barbara
If I don't hear from her, I call her again because I want her to know that I'm there. I'm not physically there, and I'll give her the time. And then I think both of us also where it is, we're in a new stage where we're learning to take better care of ourselves emotionally in the sense that it's OK if we buy that pair of shoes. It's OK if we spend a little more money on ourselves or in Meg's case, she used to buy the better chocolate.

[00:48:45.900] – Barbara
I think it's important to indulge ourselves a little bit because we don't know.

[00:48:51.250] – Margaret
How much time we have left, right?

[00:48:53.470] – Allan
Yes, always buy the better chocolate.

[00:48:55.780] – Margaret
Absolutely. I can't eat chocolate on this crazy diet and it's I'm like going nuts.

[00:49:01.900] – Allan
OK, let's get that stomach squared away so you can get back to eating some good.

[00:49:06.310] – Margaret
Will you send me some good chocolate from Panama? So they have it there?

[00:49:09.760] – Barbara
Ask her about the brands and she'll tell you.

[00:49:12.700] – Margaret
Oh yeah I am the expert.

[00:49:15.550] – Allan
Awesome. Well ladies, thank you so much. If someone wanted to learn more about the book, Not Dead Yet or learn more about you and your blog, where would you like for me to send them?

[00:49:26.080] – Margaret
Well, to our website, www.Lifelessonsat50plus.Com. The book is on Amazon. It's on our publisher's website, Broman and Littlefield. It's in libraries. It'll be in all the libraries soon and in independent bookstores. Where else?

[00:49:48.830] – Barbara
Yes, in my town they have another bookstore. These small bookstores are important.

[00:49:56.710] – Margaret
In St. Louis. Left Bank Books in St. Louis. Hopefully.

[00:50:01.750] – Barbara
And our blog comes out. If you sign up, it will land in your email every Friday morning about 7:00 a.m. and we think it's a great way to start the weekend a little early with your cup of coffee or whatever. And some of them are funny, some of them are heartfelt. It's a mix. We have some guest bloggers sometimes come on and talk about an important topic and a lot of variety.

[00:50:30.830] – Margaret
Our blog is a good habit to begin.

[00:50:33.820] – Allan
The book was awesome. I appreciate having both of you on the show. Barbara, Margaret, thank you for being a part of 40 plus fitness.

[00:50:41.060] – Margaret
Thank you. It's great meeting you.

[00:50:43.090] – Barbara
And we may be coming down to visit you.

[00:50:45.220] – Allan
Good, good.

[00:50:46.090] – Margaret
That would be fun. When the weather's freezing here.

[00:50:48.900] – Allan
It's never freezing here.

[00:50:51.670] – Margaret
So jealous. Thank you.

Post Show/Recap

[00:50:58.400] – Allan
Welcome back, Raz.

[00:50:59.880] – Rachel
Hey, Allan. My goodness, what a fun discussion, but their book title says it all, Not Dead Yet.

[00:51:06.890] – Allan
Yeah, you know, we're going to talk a little bit about how the podcast is made and how I pick guests next week. But that was kind of one of those things. I was scanning through upcoming books on Amazon. And then you see that title in you're like.

[00:51:22.850] – Allan
I can't not have these people on. I got up. I hope they say yes, because that's going to be a fun conversation. And it was.

[00:51:30.770] – Rachel
It sounded like. Yeah. You know, nice ladies.

[00:51:35.150] – Allan
If if if you're in good health, generally good health when you get older, life doesn't get a ton harder.

[00:51:43.310] – Allan
And I think that's one of the things they kind of show, is that they were in reasonably good shape. They take care of themselves.

[00:51:49.430] – Allan
They do what's necessary. You know, they're not going to be out there winning any Olympic medals or anything. But, you know, they're having fun and they've got good relationships in their life. And they're not looking at this as if it's over.

[00:52:03.470] – Allan
You know, the concept of is your inner cake baked is really important because I think so many people think that, well, what I've done where I am, I'm locked in. And I was fifty two years old and I get laid off from a job and I'm like, I'm never going to get back to that income again, you know, it's just not going to happen. I'm not going to I'm not going to be able to invest my effort and energy to get there.

[00:52:30.440] – Allan
And I didn't want to.

[00:52:31.280] – Allan
So I literally used that as the pivot to become, you know, what I'm doing today with the podcast and the training and all of that.

[00:52:38.330] – Allan
And, you know, so just recognizing that you can teach a dog old tricks, can do different things. And if you're not bringing joy in, then, yeah, you're not going to be who you want to be when you're older.

[00:52:54.740] – Rachel
Good point. You know, having just turned 50 myself, I can tell you that I am not the same person today than the person I was when I was 40 or even the person I was when I was 30. You know, so much of my life has changed. Priorities have changed. And I get that pivot that you just had in your life around the same period too. You know, I don't want that old life that I used to have when I was much younger.

[00:53:19.250] – Rachel
And there's a lot available. There's a lot open to me right now, a lot of opportunities right in front of me. And it's I think sometimes we get stuck in that mindset about age. Like, I know fifty sounds old, but it certainly doesn't feel old. And in even sixty I'm looking at sixty think, and that doesn't sound a whole lot older than what I'm doing right now. So, you know, there's just because we hit a certain milestone age doesn't mean life is done or it's stopped or it's over.

[00:53:48.260] – Rachel
You know, there's a lot available to us.

[00:53:50.720] – Allan
Well, sixty is twenty percent more.

[00:53:56.040] – Allan
It's a bigger number.

[00:53:56.960] – Rachel
Yeah, sure.

[00:53:58.610] – Allan
But no, I mean, you know, I think it's one. Yes. Fifteen years ago when life expectancy was in the sixties, sixty mattered. Life expectancy for most people now is well into their seventies other than last year was the first time life expectancy went down since World War Two. And so we do have to kind of look at that and say, OK, what does all this mean? But in a general sense, if you're healthy, if you're taking care of yourself, your fifties can be as good as your forties or 60s can be as good as your forties.

[00:54:34.140] – Allan
Your seventies can be as good as your forties. It's just going to be that you have different priorities. And so maybe you're not pushing yourself to do ultramarathons when you're in your 70s, but you're still going to be a runner. I believe. You're still be doing things that you love. And that's really what this book was all about, is making sure that you have the relationships where you are living a full life. It might be redefined.

[00:55:03.500] – Allan
You might have some health issues that are outside of your scope of control.

[00:55:07.790] – Allan
But if you do, you still have opportunities to introduce gratitude and joy into your life every single day.

[00:55:14.630] – Allan
And if you don't, you're missing the opportunity because you only have so many revolutions around the sun before it is over.

[00:55:22.250] – Allan
And you need to take advantage of every single day you have and live it to the fullest that you possibly can.

[00:55:28.430] – Rachel
That sounds great. And those ladies, Barbara and Margaret, they sound like the best of friends and enjoying time together and with their other friend groups. That sounds like they're really taking advantage of this time.

[00:55:39.800] – Allan
Yeah, they are doing something kind of interesting. They basically it's like they bought a big house as a collective group of ladies and they're all moved in together. And so it's basically a group of women. They all know each other. They know that they're friendly and that they can get along in closed quarters. But they bought it in such a way now that they know that their independence is sort of much assured much longer than if they were living independently.

[00:56:07.750] – Allan
So they're going to be able to have people around them that they know and care about and have those relationships in those conversations every single day without having to go into a home or lose some independence because they just weren't able to do it on their own.

[00:56:25.540] – Allan
Yeah, so just realized sometimes you think outside the box, sometimes you do other things, but your training, your nutrition, your sleep, your stress management and the relationships that you're building and keeping and maintaining and maybe getting rid of some that you need to get rid of, you know, build, build the life that you deserve. Spend the time to make that investment in yourself of time, effort, money, whatever it is to make sure that you're building the life that you need because no one else is going to do it for you.

[00:56:54.940] – Rachel
That's true. Yeah. The best years are right ahead of us, I think.

[00:56:59.230] – Allan
Yeah.

[00:56:59.650] – Allan
Now the best episode is right in front of us. Next week we're going to have Episode five hundred and that's going to be kind of a special episode. You know, I'm going to give a lot of behind the scenes stuff. They're still going to be a lesson. So please come back and listen to it. It's not going to be all about me talking about what Allan did over the last six years. It's going to be a lot of that.

[00:57:21.250] – Allan
Yes. But it's also there's a lesson there's a very important lesson because you don't interview 311 people or books that authors three hundred eleven interviews and learn a few things.

[00:57:33.190] – Allan
And there were things that I thought I knew when I started this journey with this podcast six years ago. And a lot of it was wrong. And now I know things a little bit better. I've learned what works. And so I'm going to share what I call the wellness system.

[00:57:51.610] – Allan
And like I said over and over on this podcast, I love acronyms and lists, but this is going to be an acronym system. So join us next week and we will talk about the seven necessary things in the wellness system.

[00:58:05.650] – Rachel
That sounds great. Can't wait.

[00:58:07.300] – Allan
I'll talk to you next week, then.

[00:58:08.830] – Rachel
Take care.

Patreons

The following listeners have sponsored this show by pledging on our Patreon Page:

– Anne Lynch	– Eric More	– Leigh Tanner
– Deb Scarlett	– John Dachauer	– Margaret Bakalian
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Thank you!

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Let's Say Hello

[00:04:07.770] – Allan
Hey Raz, how are you doing?

[00:04:09.480] – Rachel
Good, Allan, how are you today?

[00:04:11.760] – Allan
I'm doing all right. Tammy has scheduled her like an open house party for Lula's on this Tuesday night, as we're recording this. So our Tuesday afternoon from like three to six. So we're going to have a bunch of people coming over the house. So she's got Lula's ready to go. And now it's just making sure that we get the health department check and then, you know, figure out how we're going to take credit cards and set up our online booking.

[00:04:37.630] – Allan
So now it's more that backoffice stuff she's got the front of house ready.

[00:04:43.620] – Rachel
Wow. How exciting. That'll be fun.

[00:04:46.330] – Allan
Yeah. Yeah. So she's had some monthly guests, you know, longer term guests come in and that's giving her some feedback on, you know, this and that. And so we picked up on a few things and found things. You know, it's like if you don't go up there, you don't know, things don't work. And so when they said, you know, the microwave works but it doesn't warm the food. And I was like, OK, well, I would classify that is not working, but basically saying if the light comes on and it twirls around, but it's not heating it up.

[00:05:16.650] – Allan
So we have a new microwave and the blender had to be redone or cleaned, and so, yeah, little tweaks and things like that we had to do up there to just get that a little nicer. And we learned it by having guests, so it was better to do that when we had the longer term guests going, so she'll be ready. We're going to take a trip back to the states in September. And then when we come back, it's like all boy, let's get these guests in here and let's open up.

[00:05:47.340] – Allan
So we'll open up in October as we get everything done. The health check and the credit cards and all of that.

[00:05:55.350] – Rachel
Sweet. That sounds awesome. How very exciting.

[00:05:58.260] – Allan
Yeah, it is.

[00:05:59.400] – Rachel
Good.

[00:06:00.000] – Allan
How are things up there?

[00:06:01.410] – Rachel
Good, good. I am exhausted today. Mike and I ran a half marathon yesterday and it was incredibly hot and even more humid and it was all hills. It was probably the trifecta of things that are just my nemesis. So I'm just chilling out today, recovering and resting and hydrating back up again. So I'm exhausted but totally satisfied. It was a wonderful, miserable day.

[00:06:30.550] – Allan
Well, do you feel like maybe you haven't completely gotten your bounce back since you did the Ultra? Because it's only been a few weeks since you did that. And like I said, I took off running every marathon I did. I pretty much didn't do any major training or any major running for about a month after. I go on walks, maybe a little jog here and there, but nothing nothing like trying to throw in a half marathon.

[00:06:55.140] – Rachel
Right. And that's kind of been the case, you know, since the 50 miler. I took a couple of days off of no running at all and then just a couple of miles here and there. So I've kind of ramped up slowly again. I did a ten miler, I think, a week or two ago, I think it was. And then this would be my first 13 miler after the 50. And so, yeah, I'm pretty sure that I'm probably still rebounding from that.

[00:07:23.070] – Rachel
And but I hadn't had any formal training. I just will go run when I feel good enough to go run, which is a lot because I run a lot, but I keep my miles short, easy. I just don't go out with any specific goal just to let the run come to me. So this was actually my first real big race since the 50 and long race, I guess since the 50 and for sure. But also I think we had probably think it was about in the eighties and the humidity was it's thick.

[00:07:54.750] – Rachel
It was like fog. It was like breathing fog. So it was just a miserable day. And then to add Hills on to that, it just made it all the more challenging. So, yeah, a little bit of both, I think tough, tough conditions, but also rebounding from the fifty.

[00:08:10.890] – Rachel
But yeah, still great.

[00:08:13.020] – Allan
Hydrate. Hydrate.

[00:08:14.160] – Rachel
Yes, yeah. I am just drinking tons of water and electrolytes as well. Just keeping it going.

[00:08:20.520] – Allan
Yeah. All right. So you want to get into the episode with Dr. Rossi.

[00:08:25.530] – Rachel
Yes, this will be great.

Interview

Text – https://amzn.to/3f7ytKu

[00:08:50.310] – Allan
Dr. Rossy, welcome to 40+ Fitness.

[00:08:53.220] – Dr. Rossy
Thanks, Allan. Thanks for having me.

[00:08:55.380] – Allan
Now I have a Facebook Group for the podcast, and it's a really awesome group. And occasionally I will reach out and just message someone that's new to the group or someone that's been around for a while. And I'll say, hey, what's something that you want us to talk about? What's something you want me to cover? And the topic of emotional eating, binge eating came up. And so I was really happy to see your book called Savor Every Bite: Mindful Ways to Eat, Love Your Body and Live with Joy.

[00:09:26.790] – Allan
And so I'm just really excited to be able to have this conversation with you, because I think this is a topic that doesn't get talked about enough. Most of the books that are out there for health and fitness are eat less, move more. You know, here's a diet. Try this one. Try that one. Try this one. Try that one. And it doesn't really get to the real crux of what's going on is this is not about our food choices.

[00:09:52.980] – Allan
This is not about any of that. This is in our head. This is a mindset thing. And it is something that isn't won over by reading a book or trying a diet.

[00:10:05.390] – Dr. Rossy
Right, I agree with that, I'm definitely not trying a diet. Well, we know that 80 to 90 percent of diets fail. OK, that's a big number, right? It might work in the short term, sure, but in the long term, you're not going to get the kind of changes that you want. You're not going to stay with a diet because it's not really going to fit into your lifestyle. It's not going to be sustainable long term.

[00:10:32.700] – Dr. Rossy
And so I teach mindful eating. Mindful eating, it teaches you how to listen to your own internal signals about when to eat, why you're eating, how much to eat, when to stop. And we've really lost touch with those internal signals by putting all of our focus outside and hoping somebody else will give you the answer. We'll tell you what to do. We'll give you the magic pill, you know, and it isn't out there, right?

[00:11:03.300] – Dr. Rossy
I mean, the diet industry is making billions of dollars on people that keep looking outside of themselves for a way of coming into balance with their bodies in a way that's both nurturing and pleasurable and healthful and, you know, and creates well-being for you. It's all really inside you if you learn how to pay attention in a particular way, which is in the present without judgment and constantly just coming back to what's going on right now, that's a skill.

[00:11:41.580] – Dr. Rossy
That's mindfulness. That's a skill that can be learned. And it's really helpful to have somebody teach you that. It's you can't read a book and go, oh, yeah, I'm going to practice that now. I've been practicing for many, many, many years. And I practice it every day because it's not something you just say, well, I've done that. Now I go on to the next thing. It's a part of your life. Mindfulness becomes a part of your life, a way of living, a way of being so that you're constantly being aware of, for instance, what you mentioned, the emotions that are arising.

[00:12:14.790] – Dr. Rossy
So when I teach people mindful eating, I don't just teach them how to pick up a fork and take a bite of food and put it in their mouth and taste it. But I really approach the whole person who shows up at the dinner table. The whole person that shows up at the dinner table has emotions like being overwhelmed, stressed, bored, happy, sad, angry, you name it. I mean, we all have these emotions because we're human.

[00:12:41.940] – Dr. Rossy
And oftentimes people that come to my classes say that they engage in a lot of emotional eating. And those emotions then can lead to binge eating. Right. And more serious issues that people can have around food in their bodies. So why are we reaching for food when we're sad?

[00:13:02.460] – Allan
Well, that's one of the interesting things, because I spend a lot of time talking to experts like yourself. And some of the experts will talk about, you know, what our ancestors would have eaten or how they would have lived their lives. And so we know they wouldn't have had couches and chairs and wouldn't be watching Netflix. We know that if they wanted to go for binge eating, it's not the binge eating we're doing today. We have over time gotten to a point where we celebrate food, we celebrate with food So, pretty much name a holiday that you celebrate and there's going to be a food that's almost immediately hit your head.

[00:13:42.660] – Dr. Rossy
And that's fine. Right. So it's great to celebrate with food. I love to celebrate with food. I love to celebrate holidays with food. The thing is, it's like people see these times as a time to binge. Here's a deal. I celebrate with food every day. I don't have to wait to a holiday to celebrate with food. I celebrate. I just celebrated lunch, right? I made some guacamole. I had some blue corn chips.

[00:14:11.580] – Dr. Rossy
I had some fresh tomatoes from somebody's garden. That's a friend of mine. And I sat down and savored like it was a holiday because, hey, every meal that we have can be a pleasurable experience. And if we know we can have the food that we want whenever we want it, we don't have to have it all now. What we live in is a culture that is taught us to deprive ourselves. You know, it's that binge depravation cycle, our diet depravations, binge diet cycle that we get in so that if you're given permission to eat because it's a holiday, boy, I better just eat it all now because I'm not going to be able to do it afterwards.

[00:14:57.180] – Dr. Rossy
And so we've developed this really unhealthy relationship both with ourselves, our bodies and with holidays. You know, it's really a shame. It's like, well, first of all, why wait till a holiday to have some great food? But second, why then ruin the holiday with this overeating and binge eating and then feeling bad about it, when you can just simply enjoy it, you might eat a little bit more at a holiday. I might do that, but it's OK because during the rest of the year I'm not doing that.

[00:15:26.700] – Dr. Rossy
And I'm not waiting until the holiday to enjoy and celebrate with food. I mean, it's it's a way that we get together and have community and we've lost the real kind of essence of that activity by making it too much about food and not about the experience altogether, the connection with friends and the sharing of meals and sharing of love. It's become it's gotten a little distorted.

[00:15:54.150] – Allan
Yeah. I guess the challenge and this comes up all the time, particularly with sugar, but with other foods as well, is that. It's very similar to other addictions, like alcohol or drugs or things like that, because we're eating our feelings where there's an emotional response and then there's a food and then there's a guilt response, food. But we have to eat. It's not like I could say, OK, you know, I'm never going to drink another beer in my life.

[00:16:25.010] – Allan
And I could, you know, get into a program, figure that out, get through the mindset of it, get through all of that and just abstain for the rest of my life. But, yeah, there's a vending machine probably within 100 meters of you, almost every moment of your of your day. Whether It's your pantry, your freezer or at work a break room or just walking around any public building the opportunities for you to have access to foods that you really know are not serving you.

[00:16:57.340] – Allan
And but should they call to you because they're generating this desire based on how they've been set up to taste and crunch and salt and sweet and and so they've figured out what we need and so it becomes almost addictive.

[00:17:13.780] – Dr. Rossy
Yeah, so food is everywhere, without a doubt, food is everywhere. Everywhere you turn. So one of the things that we've discovered in mindful eating is that when people engage in mindfulness and increase their ability to be present without judgment and with kindness and compassion, that their preferences change for food because they're finally tasting their food, right. I have people who I talk about the basics of mindful eating in my book, which is a way of kind of bringing mindfulness to the table.

[00:17:47.110] – Dr. Rossy
And a part of that is really tasting, you know, really tasting and slowing down and savoring your food. And when you do that, you will begin to notice things about your food that you hadn't noticed before, because most of us are multitasking when we're eating. We're no tasting. We're not really even savor. Savoring requires two things. One, that you're present for it. And two, that you're actually experiencing it and noticing the pleasant sensations, a lot of food.

[00:18:17.200] – Dr. Rossy
So people come back to my class after one week of practicing. And I have people tell me I don't even like what I eat. Nothing. I think people say I don't like anything I eat. I just hadn't noticed before. I know when I first started into mindfulness, I was a big Diet Coke drinker. Loved my Diet Coke. Well, I used to do a lot of things right. I've done the drugs and I've done all of that stuff.

[00:18:40.540] – Dr. Rossy
And as I've grown in my path of mindfulness, the last thing to go kind of was the Diet Coke, because I didn't want to give up Diet Coke. I wasn't trying to give up Diet Coke, but I was on a long meditation retreat. I was about seven days, nine days. I was in silence doing meditation and walking and eating. There was no Diet Coke there, so I didn't have it for nine days. As soon as I got out of the retreat, I tasted it for the first time and I couldn't believe it.

[00:19:13.480] – Dr. Rossy
I thought, that's really bad. That doesn't even taste good. Why am I drinking this? And so I haven't really wanted it since, but I had not been able to taste it. And so our taste buds really do get accommodated to a lot of chemicals, a lot of preservatives, a lot of sugar. And when you. But while I was away from it for just nine days and I came back and I was astounded at how my taste buds began to wake up and to really go, well, that doesn't even seem good.

[00:19:48.670] – Dr. Rossy
Or maybe it takes a few extra weeks for some people. But undoubtedly by week seven or eight, I have a ten week class and people come back and go, I thought, I like this and I'm kind of grieving that I don't like it anymore because it has been such a friend. But they discover new ways of eating. So mindfulness helps us to really taste, to really be present. Mindfulness also helps us how to be with difficult emotions.

[00:20:19.420] – Dr. Rossy
So I think the number one thing mindfulness does for us is teaches us how to be with difficult emotions without needing to turn to food, alcohol, shopping over or doing whatever it is you overdo it. I just named my favorite, you know. I mean, but but you don't have to do that. Mindfulness gives you an alternative and it teaches you how to be with emotions without doing anything. It's like emotions don't need to be fixed. Who knew? Right.

[00:20:53.800] – Dr. Rossy
Emotions are actually there to tell you something, to teach you something as part of the human experience of being alive. So when you lose somebody, you grieve. That's important. You need to feel that. When you get hurt by somebody, you need to feel that. You need to explore that. You need to like, let that move through your body and your heart and your mind and accept it and acknowledge it. And then it passes through. We've not been taught.

[00:21:24.490] – Dr. Rossy
You know, I like to quote I like to quote Doctor Mister Rogers from Mister Rogers neighborhood, which may date me or many others, but Mr. Rogers had this great show on television for kids teaching them how to deal with everyday circumstances. I think when President Kennedy got shot, he talked about death with them, with kids. You know, I like how to process what was going on in the world. And we don't do that very often.

[00:21:53.740] – Dr. Rossy
We try to protect people. We protect children. And so they grow into adults that have not learned how to process their emotions or be resilient with their emotions. And then they turn to other things or to help make them feel better. That might temporarily work, but then in the long term, creates a problem all of its own. Emotions are mentionable, they're manageable and they're natural and mindfulness, it take some work, right, it's not like it's going to just be easy, but it does work.

[00:22:24.970] – Dr. Rossy
If you practice it and you learn to go, OK, this is what wants to be here right now. This is anger. This is sadness. And you label it. Most people don't know how to label their emotions. And we know from research that when you can label your emotion accurately and really just stop. It just takes a second to stop and go, well, what am I feeling right now? You know, instead of reaching for the Snickers bar, what am I feeling right now?

[00:22:52.000] – Dr. Rossy
I'm feeling disappointed. Ah, I'm feeling frustrated. And automatically, if you get the emotion right, you'll begin to feel a little bit of relief because somebody heard you. It's why we go to therapy. Right? I'm now a psychologist. You know, people come to therapy because they want somebody to hear how they feel and we can do that for ourselves.

[00:23:16.310] – Allan
Now, I want to back up just a little bit, we will get back into the emotions and feelings, because I do feel that you got to get to, if you're going to solve a problem, you've got to get to the root. And so we will get there. But back to the mindful eating and, you know, being friends with food, I think what mindful eating does for me or did for me was it gave me the opportunity to pick better friends to be around.

[00:23:40.190] – Allan
And then you have the acronym and I'm coming from a corporate background for years, so I just love acronyms. I've fallen in love with acronyms and lists, but you put those in a book and you've got me. And so you have this acronym called BASIX, which is basically an approach for how we can do mindful eating. Can you quickly walk us through what BASICS stands for?

[00:24:04.550] – Dr. Rossy
Yeah, absolutely. So basically we start with a B, so B stands for Breathe and Belly Check. It's important to do both. So let's take a deep breath right now. Maybe even take two. So when you take a deep breath, you're activating your parasympathetic nervous system. OK, there's two parts to your nervous system, sympathetic, parasympathetic. Sympathetic nervous system is your fight or flight response. It's what's happening when you're stressed. And there's a lot of stress haters out there.

[00:24:42.340] – Dr. Rossy
Right. So you want to breathe. You want to activate your parasympathetic nervous system, which is your rest and digest response. So if you're eating with when you're stressed, your body's not even prepared to take in food, your stomach isn't really activated. It's shut down so that you can fight or flee. Right. And so you want to take a few deep breaths. When you do that, you begin to relax. The body begins to kick in the stomach and the processes that will be needed to digest food and then belly check.

[00:25:16.930] – Dr. Rossy
Are you hungry? Are you physically hungry? If you're hungry, what is it that you'd like to eat? What would satisfy you right now? Take a moment to kind of think about that. If you're not physically hungry, explore what's going on. Because if you're not physically hungry, food is probably not the answer. So there's something else, maybe you're stressed, maybe you're bored, maybe you're wanting to take a break or whatever. And this habit is to reach for food. If you're not physically hungry,

[00:25:46.990] – Dr. Rossy
Think about what's happening and how better you can approach what's happening with something besides food, OK, on a general basis, I mean, there's going to be times we eat when we're not physically hungry. That's OK. It's not a rule. But in general, the body wants to be fed when it's hungry, not so much when it's not hungry. And then pick what you want, pick what you think is going to satisfy your taste. But allow yourself to have whatever it is that you want in the moment and then assess it.

[00:26:15.910] – Dr. Rossy
A stands for assess your food. What does it look like? What does it smell like? Where did it come from? Is it really highly processed or is it less processed? Not to be judgmental because when there's no good or bad food, but we want to be aware, we want to be conscious of what we're putting into our bodies. So we're making a conscious choice about what that is. Does it look appealing? Does it look like, oh, yum, I want that. Or, oh, yuck. I'm so sick of that. Assess your food

[00:26:44.680] – Dr. Rossy
and then S stands for Slow Down. In my many years of teaching mindful eating, I ask this all the time and about three fourths, three quarters of us eat too fast, which means that you've eaten, you're finished with the meal you're going on to the next day and you've not even registered hunger. You don't remember what you had to eat twenty minutes from from the time that you ate.

[00:27:08.620] – Dr. Rossy
And so you really want to slow down and savor. You want to put your fork down in between bites. You want to chew thoroughly, which is another one of the basics. You really want to take your time, because when you do, the body can begin to register fullness. If you eat too fast, your body doesn't have time to register that it's getting full. And that's the signal to stop eating. Not when the plate is clean, but when there's no more food anywhere in the environment. But when your body has had enough it will tell you it takes about twenty minutes to register that.

[00:27:43.390] – Dr. Rossy
And then I stands for investigate your hunger throughout the meal. So particularly halfway through I ask people to stop. Because sometimes we can start slow and then start speeding up and I'm like OK, stop halfway through, check in with your belly and see are you still hungry? How hungry are you, how satisfied are you with this food? And just do kind of a brief check in to notice what's happening as you're eating and really paying attention and being guided by those satiety signals as when to stop eating.

[00:28:17.860] – Dr. Rossy
And then C stands for chew food thoroughly. I love this one. Chewing is one of the most important things that we do when we eat. And a lot of us just take a couple of bites, gulp it down. Right. And so taking your time and chewing each bite until it's broken down will keep you from having a stomach ache. Number one, because your stomach doesn't have deep. Right? So when you chew thoroughly, your stomach is not going to have to work as hard.

[00:28:45.310] – Dr. Rossy
And I've heard of people really overcoming digestion issues just with this part of the basics. And also when you're chewing food thoroughly, you're sending signals to the brain that you're eating and that you're going to become start feeling full soon. It's great for your teeth health. It's also great and this is, I think my most important point on chewing is that when we chew thoroughly, the food is being partnered with the saliva in the mouth. It's being taken into the body as nutrition.

[00:29:19.210] – Dr. Rossy
Right. And guess what? When the body's been nutritionally fed it. Tells you it's had enough, so that's why when we eat more highly processed foods, the body isn't getting as much nutrition some of the time. And so it's not feeling like it's been fed. And that's why we want more food. If you can eat a whole meal and if you haven't eaten a meal that has any nutrition in it because there's some food that's pretty empty, then the body is probably going to tell you, I'm sorry, I'm still hungry.

[00:29:51.080] – Dr. Rossy
I don't care how much food you put into my my belly, I don't feel like I've been fed in the way that I need to be fed. And so you can begin to feel that. I feel that at family reunions because I eat pretty good. You know, I love to go. I love good food. I love whole food. I love the food that makes me feel good. Right. Which is less processed. It's just how my body reacts to food.

[00:30:18.320] – Dr. Rossy
And when I go to like a family reunion where the food might not be as up to my standards, I can eat a whole plate of food and I'm still hungry. And I notice that I'm hungry. But I'm like, when you ate a whole plate of food, I'm like, I know, but I'm still hungry. So, you know, it's something good to start paying attention to. And the more that you chew, even I get particularly if your food is more processed, make sure you chew it, make sure you chew it thoroughly so you get every little bit out of it that you can so that the body is getting the nourishment and nutrition that it needs.

[00:30:53.750] – Dr. Rossy
And then the last one is my favorite, it's savor. Savor every bite. Savor, you know, savor savor. I love food, I love to eat food and I love. So savoring is a big part of the eating process. I think it's a time that we can have every day, three times a day at least, where we can have a pleasurable experience and enjoy it and see that as an important part of our lives.

[00:31:19.250] – Allan
Absolutely, and the reason I like a lot of those is, is just as you said, the digestive process actually starts before you even put the food in your mouth. So you're talking about the assessing and just sitting there for a moment and knowing what your body needs and then sitting down, looking at it, smelling it. You're you're already digesting that food. You're teaching your body that, OK, we need to start firing off some different enzymes. Some hormones need to get to work.

[00:31:47.240] – Allan
We've got some food coming in. And then just like you said, the chewing and slowing down gives your body the time to react to what you're doing. You get the full nutrition out of that food. And you're absolutely right. When you're getting proper nutrition, you by nature eat less. It's just a magical formula. Our body was built to do it once the nutrition it wants. And if it's not getting it, it will send hunger signals.

[00:32:14.000] – Allan
It will keep you going. And the other side of it is if you're not getting the nutrition you want, then your health is impaired. And if your health is impaired, then your brain is impaired. And if your brain is impaired, then dealing with emotions and feelings and stress and all, becomes that much harder.

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[00:34:44.050] – Allan
You have another acronym and it's not yours, but you borrowed it for this book and it's called RAIN.

[00:34:52.780] – Dr. Rossy
Yes.

[00:34:53.440] – Allan
And so RAIN is a tool that we can use to kind of get an idea between the difference between emotions and feelings and understand what we're doing in our actions. Can you talk a little bit about emotions and feelings and then walk us through the rain process?

[00:35:11.320] – Dr. Rossy
Yeah, so in my book, I talk about the difference between emotions and feelings, so feelings from the Buddhist perspective. Well, OK, so I don't know which aspect of emotions and feelings you wanted me to cover, but and we use those words interchangeably, right? So we were talking about feelings and the Buddhist perspective. And I bring this into my classes a lot, is that things are experienced as pleasant, unpleasant or neutral. Right. And so Buddhism breaks it down into those three categories.

[00:35:48.790] – Dr. Rossy
And it teaches us a lot about how we react to experience, because if something's pleasant, we want more of it. If something's unpleasant, we want less of it. And if it's neutral, we tend to fall asleep. Right. And so we can become aware of those patterns. Those are natural, normal patterns, but we don't have to act out on them all the time. Just because something's pleasant doesn't mean that we need to keep, I need more and more and more and more and more, because in that more is going to turn out to be something unpleasant because we've overdone it.

[00:36:19.330] – Dr. Rossy
Right. So what we want to do is just when something is pleasant, we want to enjoy it and let it go. When something is unpleasant, we want to experience it and let it go and when something's neutral. Actually, I think it's important to pay attention to neutral because I kind of see that as contentment. Right. I find a lot of contentment when I'm not being pushed and pulled by pleasant, unpleasant, pleasant, unpleasant or pushed and pulled constantly in this culture with things that are screaming at us to pay attention to them.

[00:36:48.010] – Dr. Rossy
It's like, oh, here I am. The shiny little thing over here, are the vending machine or whatever it is? Come come get me. You know, and we can know that the brain is is wired that way to do that. And with mindfulness we can step back and not be engaged in that constant being pushed and pulled by unpleasant and pleasant all the time, oK. Emotions are natural. Naturally occurring experiences are feelings that come up as a result of experiences.

[00:37:22.450] – Dr. Rossy
Right. So I have emotions that range from sad, mad, glad, angry, happy, confused. I encourage people to become very familiar with lists of emotions so that you become more familiar with what they are, because we don't have a most people don't have a very big vocabulary. We ask them how they are and they're going, fine. Like, well, OK, that's not a feeling. But there are just a lot of feelings that we can begin to explore through the practice of writing.

[00:37:53.740] – Dr. Rossy
In particular, we can explore the ones that are most difficult. Right. So rain is a meditation, but it can also be used just without being in meditation. You can work through the different steps of rain and learn a lot about the emotions that you're experiencing and getting some distance from them. So the R of RAIN stands for recognize. So you want to be able to label the emotion that you're having. Like I said earlier, when you label it, if you can label it, if you can name it and label it, you can tame it.

[00:38:32.090] – Dr. Rossy
OK, and research shows that there's all kinds of processes that go on in the brain that when you accurately label an emotion, there is the amygdala is dampened. The amygdala is the part of the brain that is reacting to emotions. And so you kind of dampen that down. So you're not as reactive. You get a little relief automatically from labeling it. A stands for accept and allow. We don't resist it. We put the welcome mat out for it.

[00:39:03.190] – Dr. Rossy
Oh, sadness. I know that sounds kind of crazy, but, you know, like you invited it and let it come in. Let yourself feel it. Let yourself acknowledge it and say the sadness is here right now, OK? This is what sadness feels like or whatever emotion it is. Allowing instead of resisting what you resist persists. What you allow fades away, and so allowing is also a really important part of the process and one that we're not very skilled at, as a whole.

[00:39:32.410] – Dr. Rossy
And then I stands for investigate. How does the sadness feel in my body? Can you just bring your attention to your body and notice. Well, I'm feeling a little sluggish, a little tired, I don't have much energy and they're all slumped over. And then what thoughts are going through your mind? What stories and beliefs are you telling yourself about the sadness? Because that's what's going to keep the story going. Oh, I have no friends. I'm never going to have any friends.

[00:40:00.460] – Dr. Rossy
You know, my life is never going to go the way I want it to be. Whatever the story is, notice the story and then begin to not buy into it as truth, because thoughts are not facts, they're just thoughts. And you can begin to ask yourself what else is true? Right. Is there some other way of looking at this? How is this impacting me to believe this particular thing? And there's parts of it that may be true.

[00:40:30.910] – Dr. Rossy
Parts of it that may not be true. Begin to kind of just investigate it and tease it apart a little bit instead of just letting it be this thing that has you gripped by, you know, in the clutches. And then once you've investigated fully, then you can move into N which is not identify and nurture. So we don't want to identify with the emotions as who we are. I am not sadness. There is sadness passing through. Right.

[00:40:57.350] – Dr. Rossy
If I can see sadness as something that's just moving through my experience, I'm not always sad. You know, sadness comes and goes. There's moments, I'm happy. Moments I'm sad. And in fact, there can be moments of happiness in the midst of sadness. It's like it's not don't allow it to become this big thing that completely encompasses you and put you into a box and then stepping back from it. You can even see the story as a movie going across the screen.

[00:41:24.730] – Dr. Rossy
I kind of like that analogy, right? It's like, so here's the story. You're watching it like a movie and I can be a witness to it and let it pass through and feel it and let it go and then bring kindness to myself. Right. Because ouch, sadness hurts. Right. And it's not to say that these things aren't going to have an impact because they do. But we can bring kindness to ourselves. I always bring my hands to my heart when I'm talking about this, because it's just this beautiful way of telling your body that you're listening, bringing your hands to your heart and saying, wow, I'm sorry.

[00:41:59.980] – Dr. Rossy
That's really difficult. It's sadness hurt. And what can I do to best take care of you right now? Do you need to go take a hot bath, light a candle, call a friend, journal, meditate, go on a walk, go into nature, take a bike ride, whatever? There's so many things that you could do after you've gone through that whole process to then engage in self care. In mindfulness practice, there's kind of two parts to right effort.

[00:42:31.870] – Dr. Rossy
And the first part is to recognize when something difficult has arisen. Right. And so we acknowledge it, but we don't want to like just like sit in it forever. We then want to cultivate what's skillfull. We want to cultivate what's going to bring joy into our life. We want to cultivate the other things that can balance the sadness, that can balance the difficulties and take care of us when the difficulties arise.

[00:42:57.340] – Allan
Yeah. You know, as I was reading through that section of the book and one of the cool things that you had in the book is at the end of each chapter is the savoring practices that help you kind of put some of this in motion. And I'll tell you, this is not something that's one and done. You're not going to say, OK, I've got this little tool now and now all my problems are going to go away and there's not going to be any more Haagen-Dazs nights for me.

[00:43:19.540] – Allan
That's not how this is going to work. This is going to take some training, some time to make this kind of a natural a more natural approach to what you do. But I would say one of your areas that you got into, I am a little bit more skilled at. And that's movement. Can you talk about how movement can help us with some of the issues we have with emotional eating and bored eating?

[00:43:43.480] – Dr. Rossy
And I love movement. In particular, I love yoga. So I do talk about yoga in the book, but any kind of movement. Right. So everybody can find a kind of movement that feels delicious to them. I would say move your body in ways that feel delicious, because if you hate it, you're probably not going to do it right. So really find some way of moving your body that doesn't injure you. Right. That's not going to injure you and that you can enjoy.

[00:44:15.550] – Dr. Rossy
And maybe there's ways to increase the enjoyment by doing it with friends are you know, there's lots of things that you can do to increase your enjoyment of movement, but it's so important your body wants to move, like if you check in with your body right now, I can guarantee you there's probably some stress. So right now, I would love to reach my arms up over my head and I will OK and take a deep breath. I feel so good.

[00:44:40.680] – Dr. Rossy
And then bring them back down again and just roll my shoulders back. Right. So I'm listening to my body. And I think if you listen to your body and learn how to respond to it, you'll notice that it's like, hey, it wants to get up and move. It wants to go outside and garden or it wants to go on a bike ride. And that try out a lot of things because the body does want to move and you will feel happier and healthy and you'll be healthier if you learn the ways to move your body that's going to be supportive.

[00:45:13.500] – Allan
Yeah, for me, it's always been lifting weights and what I found was, OK, so let's say I'm sitting in the office and my boss calls me and he tells me something I'm really not happy about. And so I'm like, OK, now I'm really stressed out. And so my afternoon workouts coming out and I already had something programed. I'm like, OK, I'm going to be doing these medium weights at a higher rep count. That's what I've been doing for the last six weeks and that's my program.

[00:45:37.860] – Allan
And I'm like, screw it. I'm going to four reps and I'm throwing a whole bunch of weights on that sled. And I'm going to do leg presses that are really heavy because that I knew at the moment that's what that was going to help me get rid of that frustration, anger, stress, all the different things that were running through me. And it would it would just the idea that, OK, I have control of my domain, I have control of this weight.

[00:46:04.860] – Allan
I have so much to be happy about is that I'm strong and I'm healthy. And nothing he says takes that away from me.

[00:46:13.800] – Dr. Rossy
Yes.

[00:46:14.790] – Allan
And so, yeah, movement for me is is really the best stress reducer you can have. And, you know, runners, runners will love because they get out, they get out in a way and they're in their own little world. Running lifters are kind of the same way. I completely turn off. I'm not someone who's going to listen to music while I'm working out. I'm not someone who's going to be having a conversation with someone. When I had a trainer, he knew, OK, we'll have a little conversation before the workout.

[00:46:42.480] – Allan
We'll have a little conversation after the workout. But during the workout, Allan let's just lift it. And then as my total head, even during my rest breaks, all I want to know is how much weight to put on the bar for the next set. And that's it. And so that was my, if you will, moving meditation. And it involves lifting weights. Others will enjoy walking in nature. Others will involve running and maybe running in nature.

[00:47:09.780] – Allan
Others yourself, yoga, Pilates, any movement practice that you enjoy that you know is benefiting you physically. Well, it's also giving you kind of this release,

[00:47:21.670] – Dr. Rossy
yeah, and I like the idea that you do pay attention to your body, because I believe that any time that we bring our attention to our body through movement and become embodied, we're getting out of our heads and we're moving into our body. We live way too much up in our head.

[00:47:38.620] – Dr. Rossy
And so anything to get out of your head, it's a dangerous place up there. OK, we want to move down into the body and just experience the sensations of the body and the breath as you move, as you lift, as you run, as you do whatever and research shows that, If you're doing other things while you move, you don't get as much benefit from it.

[00:48:01.790] – Allan
Yes, I completely agree. I'm all unfocussed, you know what, you made a very, very important statement there. Our head is a dangerous place and it's a true statement. But what is really important about that is the reason it's such a dangerous place is because we really haven't embraced being our own best friend.

[00:48:26.090] – Dr. Rossy
This is true.

[00:48:26.990] – Allan
And you said in the book that you were doing something, said something, and then your husband turned around and says you're not treating yourself like you're a friend.

[00:48:35.060] – Dr. Rossy
Well, he said, don't treat my best friend like that. What he said. And it really stopped me in my tracks because I thought if I'm his best friend, why am I not my best friend? Right. I am going to be with me 24/7 every second of my life until I die. Do I want to be with somebody who's my enemy? Do I want to be with somebody who is bad mouthing me all the time and telling me I'm not good enough and telling me I made all these mistakes and you know, you're not this and you're not bad and you know, oh, my gosh, I can't believe whatever. It's like,

[00:49:11.540] – Dr. Rossy
That's not the kind of friend I want. So it really I mean, not that I hadn't worked on this in the past already, but that particular statement from him was very eye opening. And I really make a concerted effort to be kind to myself, to forgive myself of my foibles and whatever. I am perfect in my imperfection. Right. And I'm standing by that.

[00:49:38.400] – Allan
You know, I think the thing is, is, you know, if you sit down, you really think about these really close friends. And I was interviewing someone. She's going to be on the show coming up soon. And she called it they called it being big friends, not necessarily best friends forever, that kind of thing. But just you had this friend that you share everything with. And that's got to be you, too.

[00:49:58.820] – Allan
But the core of it is this. If you thought about just a really good friend and more than likely, if you've been friends with them for a while, at some point or another, they said something. They did something that upset you. And you're still friends. And you don't sit there every day and say, well, I remember that time they did this and they always do that and they never do this. And they all those words, the words we really shouldn't use, never, always, can't, won't.

[00:50:26.660] – Allan
those things when you break it down, if you just took a moment, well, OK, this is my best friend because. He listens to me. He's my best friend because I know if I'm in trouble, I can always rely on them to look after my best interests and the best interests of my family. And so you look at those characteristics of what you love about your best friends. And then you turn to yourself and you look in the mirror and say, OK, I know you'll always have my best interests at hand.

[00:50:56.440] – Allan
I know you'll always take care of my family. I know you're always going to be there for me and you're always going to listen to me. You don't have a choice. If I want to talk to you, you're going to listen. But if we started using the right words, the way that we would talk to our friends. And those in your movies you talked about, if they were directed by our best friend, they wouldn't go as bad as they might seem to go.

[00:51:22.880] – Allan
So I just really liked the concept of taking that step back and saying, is this how I would treat a friend?

[00:51:30.310] – Dr. Rossy
Right. And when we treat ourselves well, when we have a positive relationship with ourselves, we do other things to take care of ourselves. So who wants to take care of their enemy? You know, it's like if you're treating yourself bad, it's like healthy behavior doesn't come from that. Behavior that's self care. And kindness comes from a kind relationship.

[00:51:56.070] – Allan
Yes, and I think one of the ways you kind of get there is having that honest conversation with yourself and say, OK, what are the words I'm using? What is my inner dialog? How often is it positive? How often is it negative? In some cases, I think that that rain model that you talked about earlier would be a great OK, why did I just call myself an asshole? Why did I do that? You know, why did I do that?

[00:52:22.530] – Allan
And then you say, OK, well, what was the situation? And you recognize it, you allow it and say, OK, well, OK, yeah, I made a mistake. And then you forgive yourself. And then you're in a position to move forward and nurture the relationship and say, OK, I'm not always this way, I don't always do that, I just need to do it less and I need to be kind to myself.

[00:52:43.370] – Allan
And that's what I've learned. And so, again, the emotional part of it and the feelings part of it is hard. But I think being your best friend first is actually a really good way to kind of put that into practice on a day to day basis.

[00:52:58.510] – Dr. Rossy
Absolutely.

[00:53:00.720] – Allan
I define wellness as being the healthiest, fittest and happiest you can be. What are three strategies or tactics to get and stay well?

[00:53:08.940] – Dr. Rossy
Well, so the first thing that I thought about when you posed that question is to connect with your values and a set intentions based on those values. Right. A lot of times we don't stop to consider what we value in life because we're so busy taking care of our to do list, you know, the next urgent thing has to be taken care of. So I'm not thinking about what's really important and what's really important to most people. I would say health is, physical

[00:53:40.740] – Dr. Rossy
Health is probably way up there. I mean, because if you don't have your physical health, you're not going to have anything else. Right. You're not going to be able to do much of anything else like physical health. So I'm going to use that as an example. Probably everybody has physical health in the top five, right? You have family, meaningful career, whatever. Get in touch with that. But let's take physical health, for instance.

[00:54:02.610] – Dr. Rossy
And then you set intentions based on that value that are non-negotiable. Right. So, for instance, doing something physically active every day is a value of mine because I value health. And that's an intention that I've set. I don't have to even think about it. I'm not waiting for my head, my mind to tell me, oh, go put on your walking shoes and go for a walk. I have a schedule in my day. I make it happen.

[00:54:32.130] – Dr. Rossy
Same thing with meditation. My body doesn't want to get out of bed in the morning, but I get my feet on the ground and I get to my meditation cushion and I and I do my meditation because I set the intention and intention, then begins to fuel me to doing the things that I decided I want to do. But you have to decide that ahead of time, because if you wait, you're going to be too tired, you're going to be too busy, you're going to be too whatever.

[00:55:02.220] – Dr. Rossy
And the mind is not exactly our friend when it comes to these kinds of activities. It's going to tell you everything about why you shouldn't. But if you set the intention, you're more likely to get it done. I believe strongly in intentions. OK, so that would be number one. And they can be whatever you want them to be. I think number two would be about movement. I do think physical activity is one of the best things that we can do for our bodies and finding something that on many different levels, it helps to you're not just your physical body, but your emotions and your thoughts.

[00:55:37.350] – Dr. Rossy
Everything is benefited through physical activity. So find what feels delicious and do it. And then lastly, I would really encourage people to relate to food as nourishment and pleasure, but not a fix. I'm going to repeat that, so relate to food as nourishment and pleasure, not a fix. Many of us have thought, I'm going to fix myself somehow with food. I'm going to fix with this diet. I'm going to fix with this food. And it's going to do this for me or that for me.

[00:56:15.320] – Dr. Rossy
And all these superfoods are going to do that. I mean, OK, that's all fine and dandy, but let's relate to it as simple nourishment and pleasure. Food is this amazing substance that we get to enjoy. But we've turned it into a chore. We've turned it into an enemy. Right. And we're very confused about it because of all of these ways that we're using it. Right. So instead of looking outside of yourself, look inside of yourself and listen to your body and what it tells you about what it wants to eat and in general eat in a way that both nourishes your body and you can enjoy and savor.

[00:56:53.480] – Allan
Thank you, Dr. Rossy. If someone would learn more about you, learn more about your book called Savor Every Bite or about the classes that you spoke about earlier, where would you like for me to send them?

[00:57:06.470] – Dr. Rossy
You can go to my Web site at lynnrossy.com and everything is there. I've got meditations. I've got yoga practices that are all free. My Eat For Life classes starting in September and there's still room in the class. So there's information on my website that tells you all about how to register. And I have varying levels of cost, depending on what your how, what your means are in terms of what you can pay for the class. And the book is on there and the book can be found wherever books are sold.

[00:57:40.910] – Allan
Great.

[00:57:41.810] – Allan
Thank you. Well, thank you, Dr. Rossy, for being a part of 40+ Fitness.

[00:57:46.130] – Dr. Rossy
Well, it's been a pleasure to be here and I highly recommend being fit over 40.

[00:57:52.180] – Allan
That's the way to be over 40.

[00:57:53.360] – Dr. Rossy
It is. That's right. Thanks, Allan.

Post Show/Recap

[00:58:01.110] – Allan
Welcome back, Raz.

[00:58:02.570] – Rachel
Hey, Allan, what a fascinating interview. You know, I guess I don't really take the time to realize how much emotion is tied into the way we eat, what we eat, when we eat. There's a lot more to it than I think even most people would think.

[00:58:18.660] – Allan
Yeah. You know, over the years, I've had clients all the way across the spectrum, some that just really didn't like food, to be honest, didn't find foods appealing to texture, a certain taste. And as a result, they had kind of put themselves in a very small nutrient box of just a few foods that they would eat. And just getting them to try new foods was like pulling teeth, you know, but they needed that.

[00:58:45.600] – Allan
They needed the nutrition because they wanted to, you know, get a little bit stronger. They wanted to put on some muscle mass and they just weren't getting the proper nutrition to make that happen. And then I've had other clients that, you know, yeah, they're very emotional eaters, you know, get home in the afternoon and they're in the kitchen opening mail and anything that's within grabbing distance, cookies, cakes, whatever, they're eating. And even though they know they're going to have dinner and another couple hours, you know, they're just bored eating stress, eating all the above.

[00:59:19.560] – Allan
And so, yeah, I've seen it across the board. But, you know, we've tied food to celebrations and we've tied food to being a solution to emotional stress and boredom and anger and sadness and frustration. And so, yeah, I was glad I was able to find Dr. Rossy and talk about her book because, you know, she has the savoring practices in there. And if you're in any way feel like you're emotionally affected and the food kind of one of those bridge things, you know, then it's something worth looking at.

[00:59:58.690] – Rachel
Oh, yeah. You know, you discussed in there a couple of different analogies or acronyms, one of them being the rain acronym about recognizing your emotion and accepting that emotion. And I thought that was really fascinating because, you know, we don't really label the emotion in the way that we could determine how to deal with it. You know, we like the standard cliche, we grab a pint of ice cream after a hard day of work or break up with a significant other or something like that.

[01:00:35.640] – Rachel
But we don't really think, you know, why do we do that? Why do we feel the sadness and suddenly the urge to have ice cream or something to soothe that?

[01:00:46.350] – Allan
Well, one doing the rain protocol is not a walk in the park. It's hard. It is really hard to take the time to have that kind of self-awareness to really to be that objective. So sometimes you might need a little help to do that process. But, yeah, I mean, I've had guests on, you know, in many cases have lost a lot of weight, had gone and done a lot of things like I forgot Rosie, I think was her name.

[01:01:15.810] – Allan
I had Rosie on. And she, you know, she said she was an emotional eater. She was really upset about food, but it made her feel comfortable. And so it was just an escape while she was eating the food, loved her. And, you know, basically where she put her head and she was so embarrassed about so many things and so emotionally tied to food that she was hiding food and she would eat her lunch in the stall in the girls bathroom because she didn't want anyone else to see her eating.

[01:01:50.190] – Allan
And so a lot of people do have these deeper, deeper problems. And that's something that a counselor would be appropriate for. You know, as a coach, I can explain to folks, you know, hey, let's try eating this way. That's try eating that way and see how you do. But most of the time, you know, I don't have any one that I would say I've never had anyone that I would say, OK, you're disordered eater, you know, so no anorexics, no bulimics, nothing like that.

[01:02:20.190] – Allan
But yeah, I very much binge eaters, bored eaters, sad eaters, stress eaters, in a sense, I was one of the stress eater. And then I found yeah. I, you know, when I was traveling and under a lot of stress, my meal choices at dinner were not as good as they probably should have been, you know, and that but that was just a function of, you know, I'm in a hotel, I'm in a bar, I'm in another town.

[01:02:49.020] – Allan
And so, you know, it's nothing just to sit there and say, OK, I want to go up to the bar or a beer, drink the beer, order some food. But my food choices would not have been what I would have eaten if i'd really sat down and thought about what I really need, what my body really needs and giving it the food that would serve it versus, you know, just what looked good because I was in that emotional state.

[01:03:13.510] – Rachel
Sure. Well, that brings up the next point. You guys discussed, mindfulness and asking those questions or thinking about what that meal does that meal really serve? Does it really answer that craving or does it serve you in that moment? You know, some people find it easier to follow a diet, you know, if you want to be vegan. Those are easy rules to follow. Well, essentially. But on the other hand, if you can't follow a certain guideline or a way of eating, then being mindful about what you're choosing to eat might be a better alternative.

[01:03:49.510] – Allan
Yeah, but I would preface it's not it's not really a way of eating because you can screw up any way of eating. You can be a vegan and eat tons of sugar and tons of crap. And you're a vegan and you're overweight or obese as a vegan. So I wouldn't necessarily just classify any way of eating as good or bad because there's still basically the understanding of nutrition and what it's doing for you.

[01:04:21.910] – Allan
You know, nutrition is building blocks for your body. Nutrition is energy for your body and just those two things primarily. Now there should also be enjoyment and that's what Dr. Rossy is really big on, is take the time to actually enjoy your food and taste it, taste every bite, make sure you're tasting everybody and you'll typically eat less because you'll feel full in time and you'll recognize that. And so that's one of her big things. One of the first rules she had out there was to slow down. Just to slow down.

[01:04:53.360] – Allan
But unfortunately, what happens, is people don't really you don't really think that out and you don't plan, so you end up in a situation. So it's like I didn't plan on this happening. And sometimes it's true. I mean, I have a client who got called in for work, for travel, and he wasn't planning on it. And it was an additional two, three days of travel that he wasn't planning on and he didn't have the food with them.

[01:05:23.330] – Allan
He would normally have carried snacks and things like that with him, and he found himself pulled out of his element. There's additional stress on that because it was he was now out of routine and then there was just the not being prepared. And so that's going to happen. But, when you can be prepared, that's really when you want to put it together. So I'm a huge, huge fan of meal planning. And while we didn't talk about that, specifically Dr. Rossy, a meal planning is kind of a way for you to make sure you have healthy meals available to you and meal planning can go all the way to snacks, breakfasts, all of it.

[01:06:03.450] – Allan
When I'm really, really strict on what I'm eating and I want to cut more weight like I was doing when I wanted to do the Tough Mudder, I literally logged all of my food in the morning. I called it pre logging. so I would get on my fitness pal. I'd say, OK, breakfast is three eggs and some ham and that was my breakfast. And I'm like, OK, what is that? I know what that is.

[01:06:23.370] – Allan
And I say, OK, lunch and taking the salad with some tuna. This balsamic vinaigrette I just made and you know, that's my lunch. What is that? And then I would look at what my dinners were. And if it was if I'd done the pre cooking on the weekend, I would have stuff in the freezer. I could pull that out. And what I'd find is sometimes I could actually even have two portions because my macros and my calories and where I was.

[01:06:46.650] – Allan
So as long as I don't go crazy and eat all the nuts I have in my office, then I can actually have two dinners. And sometimes that would be the case, but I would see it all in front of me before I started. Now, does that mean something wouldn't come up and my boss say, I need you to stay late or, you know, friend called and say, hey, I'm really going through a tough time.

[01:07:07.920] – Allan
Can we meet for drinks after work? Of course that stuff can happen, but it doesn't happen nearly as often as you would think. And so if I just had my days planned out, it was really easy for me to just stay the course. And then the other side of it is when you're going to go to a restaurant and you know you're going to go to a restaurant. The menu is online. Almost every single restaurant has their menu online, go online, find their menu and pick out what you're going to eat before you get there, because later in the day, when you're more tired, you're more fatigued, potentially more stress, and you're around other people.

[01:07:46.920] – Allan
Maybe it's easy to sit down and say and then they start calling out specials and it's like, I'll have the special calzones and, you know, all that. Whereas before you knew you were going to have the ribeye, hold the potato and just bring me extra sauteed vegetables and I have a side salad with that. And so lots different kind of vegetables, lots of greens and everything else and meat and it's all wholefood. And I can tell them, you know, if you put anything on the steak, what is it?

[01:08:19.800] – Allan
You know, I want to know what's on it. And then I say, just don't do that. Just cook a steak, you know? And then, you know, to me, it's going to taste great. If you just cook it to medium rare, it's going to taste great and I'm going to love it. So, you know, but if I don't plan that before I get to the restaurant and you get there and they start calling out the specials and someone orders this and someone else, that looks good.

[01:08:44.970] – Allan
That sounds good. Now suddenly you're emotional and making a decision versus rational when you were sitting there looking at the menu right after you eat your lunch and you weren't hungry, OK, I'm not hungry. I just ate my lunch. I feel great. And I look at the menu and I'm like, oh, I think I'm going to have the steak and vegetables tonight.

[01:09:04.530] – Rachel
Yeah, I love that whole idea of planning. I think the best part about it for me would be that you you've made all your decisions for the day, so you're not caught unaware or by surprised by the specials, like you said. But also then you have you can devote your entire attention to the guests, to whoever you're sharing that meal with and not have to worry about what you're eating or how you just ruined your day's calories or something else.

[01:09:32.120] – Rachel
There's a lot of comfort in that thought.

[01:09:34.470] – Allan
And then just know your kryptonite. You know, there's something there that, you know, there's going to be you know, they walk out and then what they've got the little they bring out. I don't know if they do this anymore because of covid, but they'll do it again. I'm sure, they used to bring out carts or tray with all the mock desserts on it, you know. Yeah, you're looking at it and, you know, it's like, wow, that triple fudge chocolate lava cake thing looks.

[01:09:57.050] – Allan
Really, really good. Yeah, you can say no to it because, you know, that's emotional and you know that and you've already looked at what your macro plan was for the day, and if you're more mindful about your food, you're getting more satisfaction out of the food and less need for the junk. You know, because at that point, you know, you're not hungry. And, you know, I had someone else on and I wish I could remember his name, but the basic gist was this is we have hunger and we have urges.

[01:10:32.870] – Allan
Now, hunger doesn't go away. It just gets worse. Urges go away. So if you can keep yourself busy. Urges go away, so if you find yourself hungry for Girl Scout cookies and you know there's a pack in the freezer, you know, those thin mints, then it's like, hmm, I know I don't need to eat those cookies. I think I'm going to go for a short walk.

[01:10:57.130] – Allan
Yeah, yeah. It's perfect to have a plan B. You know, just walk down to the mailbox or go round the block or something and come back or get out your craft project. I like to knit in the wintertime. So, you know, if you have a plan B, if you've got an urge, there's got to be something else around the house you could do or at work or whatever. That's a great idea.

[01:11:19.750] – Allan
And then just looking for those other triggers, the things that happen, you know, like one of my clients, she would get the mail when she came in and she'd go into the kitchen to open the mail. And it was just the everything's around her. And I said, OK, well, if they have cookies and cakes, just tell them why you're on this plan, because most of the time, the people in your household are your why.

[01:11:42.130] – Allan
So you tell them, I want to be here for my grandchildren. I want to be here for you. I don't want to be diabetic and have my foot cut off and you have to push me around in a wheelchair when we go places. I want to be there for you. So I need to do this for me, but I'm doing it for you as much. And so I need you to put the cookies in the cupboard. You know, one cupboard that your cupboard put your stuff in there and, you know, whatever you've got to do, you know, put a little note on there with your why so, you know, in your vision, your commitment.

[01:12:17.340] – Allan
So you walk up that cabinet, and you're looking at that cabinet door and there's your why. Picture of your kids and your husband or whatever, sitting right there on the door. You're less likely to open that door because your wife is staring right at you.

[01:12:33.650] – Rachel
I love that. Yeah, that's nice to have that reminder about how important it is to be as healthy as you can be for your loved ones and for your own future.

[01:12:44.870] – Allan
And then, as I said earlier, if this is something deeper, if this is depression, if this is bulimia or anorexia or something worse, if there's something really going on and these binges are truly out of your control, get professional help. Oh, you know, a lot of people don't think food addiction is a big problem because we're supposed to eat. And and unfortunately, you can have problems with food just as much so with any other thing that can be abused.

[01:13:15.200] – Allan
And this is your health. And if you keep pushing yourself down the line, all the metabolic diseases are going to come your way sooner or later. And if you don't get the coping skills to deal with what you're going through, you're really going to struggle all the time. There's no diet that's going to get you out of this. There's no exercise that's going to get you out of this. There's probably not even a personal trainer, coach, even like myself, that can get you out of this if you're truly having emotional difficulties.

[01:13:45.710] – Allan
Talk to a counselor. I actually saw the other day where there's a therapist you can actually call in therapy now. You don't have to go to a therapist office. They will actually do teleservices.

[01:13:58.340] – Rachel
Wonderful. So wonderful.

[01:14:00.520] – Allan
Help is out there and it's available to you. So if you feel like you're in that type of situation, reach out.

[01:14:06.860] – Rachel
Oh, absolutely. Great advice.

[01:14:09.680] – Allan
All right, Raz. Well, I guess that's a wrap for this week. I'll talk to you next week.

[01:14:13.760] – Rachel
All right. Take care.

Patreons

The following listeners have sponsored this show by pledging on our Patreon Page:

– Anne Lynch	– Eric More	– Leigh Tanner
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Thank you!

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Let's Say Hello

[00:04:08.520] – Allan
Hey, Raz, how are things going?

[00:04:10.600] – Rachel
Good, Allan. How are you today?

[00:04:12.960] – Allan
I'm doing well. I had kind of run out of gas and so I was in a little bit of a panic mode. So I threw out, you know, reached out to four different guests just to see if I could get them on the show. And they all four said yes. I mean, the three of them scheduled for this week. I was like sitting there Thursday night and I get the last one to book and I'm like, they all booked in the same week.

[00:04:38.130] – Allan
So I have a Monday, I have a Tuesday and have a Thursday interview and I have some books to read.

[00:04:43.560] – Rachel
I was going to say, you got a lot to read.

[00:04:46.740] – Allan
They were good books. I'm looking forward to talking to all of them. And as you're listening to this, this is episode 497. And so I've now booked up the plan all the way through the end of August. And so I did that interview and will be doing the other interviews. So we're going be booked up through there. We're going to have our 500th episode coming up. So that's coming up. That'll be a solo show to discuss what we're doing here on the show and celebrate and talk about some of the things we learned this year that are different, maybe things I've learned in the past.

[00:05:20.820] – Allan
But, you know, five hundred is a big accomplishment. But we've got some really cool guests coming, talking about some topics. Obviously, a couple of weeks ago, we had someone talking about stroke and that was requested by a listener. I have another episode coming up that was requested. Someone was talking about binge eating. So we have a binge eating episode coming up soon. And so, you know, and then there's others that just they want something easier.

[00:05:48.100] – Allan
And so I've got a guy that, you know, kind of talks about how to manage moderation and do it, you know, do it the right way for yourself, customize yourself. So it's got some really good episodes coming up. So I'm pretty excited about that. And I've kind of launched this new thing on the Facebook group that you may have noticed if you're in the Facebook group. But every Tuesday night now I'm coming on and doing a Facebook live to answer any questions that anyone has, particularly about the episode that we did that week.

[00:06:18.870] – Allan
So if you're listening to this on Monday or Tuesday during the day, if you can go the Facebook group at 40PlusFitnesspodcast.com/group, get into the Facebook group and I do a live there. I'll answer any questions you have about this episode with Dr. Bubbs. So you know, anything that comes up and you want to know about, about the interview, something he said, something you thought about, a question that came up.

[00:06:44.940] – Allan
I'll do my best to answer on that live. So go to 40PlusFitnesspodcost.com/group and join the 40+ Fitness Podcast Group. And I'll be there live every Tuesday. We do a lot of cool things, challenges. You know, I post a lot of what I think are important things for us to consider in our health and fitness journey. So a lot of value I think there. Come join the group. It's not overwhelming there. You'll be with over sixteen hundred other people that love the show and want to get healthy and fit and we're all over forty, so it's a really cool place to hang out.

[00:07:20.130] – Rachel
Absolutely. And that sounds fun.

[00:07:22.590] – Allan
So what's been going on up there?

[00:07:24.420] – Rachel
Oh, we're doing good through the magic of podcasting. This will be a little bit later. But Mike and I celebrate our birthdays this week and we both turned fifty. So we're getting ready for that big celebration.

[00:07:37.470] – Allan
Congratulations.

[00:07:38.430] – Rachel
Yeah, I'm pretty excited.

[00:07:40.290] – Allan
Well, we need to share this. I think we've said this before, but from a birthday perspective and if I recall, Mike's older by one day.

[00:07:49.050] – Rachel
He is. Yeah.

[00:07:50.160] – Allan
And then your birthday's the very next day.

[00:07:52.350] – Rachel
It is.

[00:07:53.160] – Allan
And you're both the same age. Both turning 50. And so my wife would probably be able to answer this question for me. But when you're both the same astrological sign and the same Chinese sign, how does that work?

[00:08:11.070] – Rachel
We seem to make it work. I think we're a lot the same in many respects and a lot different in many other respects. We have enough yin yang, I think, to make it work. We've actually been married twenty-six years now, so we somehow made that work. Yeah, yeah.

[00:08:27.840] – Allan
But it's over half your life.

[00:08:29.760] – Rachel
It is. It is. Yeah. We both, cancer is known for being stubborn and that's my astrological sign is cancer and, and we're known for being stubborn and we both can be in very different ways.

[00:08:42.960] – Allan
he's in health and safety. So that's kind of a good feel to be in if you're saying

[00:08:46.980] – Rachel
it is. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:08:50.580] – Allan
All right. So you ready to get into our conversation with Doctor Bubbs?

[00:08:53.720] – Rachel
Yep. This will be great.

Interview

[00:09:26.920] – Allan
Dr. Bubbs. Welcome back to 40+ Fitness.

[00:09:30.020] – Dr. Bubbs
Allan, I appreciate you having me on. Always good to be back.

[00:09:32.970] – Allan
Yeah. Now, the last time I had you on, we were talking about your book Peak, and it's really where you had done a deep dive into just performance in general. What are the best athletes in the world doing? What does science tell us about why they're so good and why they're getting better? And then you wrote the book that I wanted you to write. I didn't tell you I wanted you to write it, but you wrote it.

[00:09:55.840] – Allan
And it's called Peak 40: The New Science of Midlife Health for a Leaner, Stronger Body and a Sharper Mind. That's a big promise.

[00:10:05.560] – Dr. Bubbs
That is a big promise in there.

[00:10:07.750] – Allan
But you delivered.

[00:10:09.130] – Dr. Bubbs
Well, I appreciate that. It's a funny thing when you're trying to write books. I mean, this one actually came out of the impetus was the book was really working in performance. The coaches and the performance staff were all, you know, like myself in their early 40s or beyond and leading busy lives. It was like, look, I need just the Coles Notes or the that's what we use and saying, you know, the abbreviated version of what I need to do.

[00:10:33.310] – Dr. Bubbs
Right. What are the big rocks? And so and that resonated with me as well with working in the general population. You know, people are so busy in their day to day lives that it's tough to have a big, long list of things to do. And so the goal here was to provide, you know, some of these big rocks, like we say, of how we get to the major things that we can really, you know, try to keep the ball in the fairway, so to speak.

[00:10:56.530] – Dr. Bubbs
You know, we use a golfing metaphor here. Let's keep it somewhere where we can play the next shot. And then all of a sudden people realize, like I'm sure you see in your practice, like all of a sudden we can make some pretty darn good progress if we just start layering in some of these real fundamentals.

[00:11:10.870] – Allan
Yeah. And we call him Cliff Notes in the United States. It's just not just the story. You call them Coles Notes. We call them Cliff Notes. But before I get in, I didn't really talked about this, but I was going back and preparing for this. And I just like this. I can't leave this moment without actually saying this is you talked about kind and wicked as learning environments. And I and it just resonated with me.

[00:11:35.380] – Allan
So I just want to share this and we can go into it a little bit if you want to. But a kind learning environment is basically where things just fall in line. You have immediate feedback, you do something, you see the result. Your golf metaphor is perfect because that's what you talked about. You hit a golf ball. If you hit it well, it went far. It went. We're supposed to go and you're happy with that golf shot.

[00:12:01.080] – Dr. Bubbs
It doesn't feel fine, does it, Allan? like it doesn't feel easier, but it does actually. The result immediately tells you if you know a golf swing, you know exactly what you did wrong in terms of swing playing and everything else. But it is obviously a difficult sport.

[00:12:13.930] – Allan
and so kind doesn't necessarily mean the answer you're getting, the feedback you're getting. It just means you do get that feedback. Whereas we're learning environments are where you have to just stick with it and it takes so much more planning and patience. And when we're over 40 and we're looking at trying to improve our health, you know, we go into the gym and we do a workout, we eat well for a week and we don't really get immediate feedback.

[00:12:45.550] – Allan
It's sometimes we don't get feedback or sometimes we even get negative feedback is not the feedback we wanted. Well, crap, I eat salad all week and I gained weight. I guess salads make me fat.

[00:12:56.800] – Dr. Bubbs
Exactly.

[00:12:58.870] – Allan
You know, so I just I wanted to tell you that because I think as we go into this, that was just really something I took out of the book that was not unexpected because it is the message. The message is if you don't have planning, which this book gives you the tools, which that's why it's so great of a book and the patience to execute on the things that you'll learn that Dr. Bubbs has written about. This is a great book to give you some huge fundamentals, those big rocks that you were talking about to really move the needle.

[00:13:31.330] – Dr. Bubbs
Well, it's interesting that you hit on a couple of things that I mean, one of them is the human aspect of this whole story, which is the fact that regardless if you're the most rational scientist, doctor, lawyer or whomever, the human part of us, even knowing your business in your work life or your finances, you'd never think you're going to, you know, you return on investment it's going to be 100 to one in a month. When we talk about weight loss, all of a sudden, you know, rationality goes out the window and we're wondering why in 30 days we haven't lost 30 pounds.

[00:13:59.290] – Dr. Bubbs
And of course, that's the message, you know, rapid transformation so much the message that we get. But compounding things is this idea of like a wicked learning environment. And it's interesting because years ago I actually lived in the south of France teaching English and the method they used, you'd have to speak to the French people only in English. You never translated anything. Of course, they couldn't speak English, and so they found it incredibly difficult to start with.

[00:14:26.450] – Dr. Bubbs
And it's interesting because research in this area compared this is what this program was built on compared to the classic, you know, you learn Spanish, you learn French and you memorize a bunch of words. And when the researchers then asked those students how they felt that they were doing, they all felt like they were learning really well. Now, the other group in the study was doing like I had done in France, which is they were in a full immersion.

[00:14:48.740] – Dr. Bubbs
So they no one could speak to them in their mother tongue. They had to just grind through it. And when you when the researchers asked them how they were doing, they said they were doing horribly. You know, I'm not learning anything. And of course, six months later, they do this sort of immersion test. And, of course, the people who scored 90 percent on their test because they memorized all the words, once you actually put them in an environment where they had to speak French or Spanish, they were awful.

[00:15:12.650] – Dr. Bubbs
Right, because they hadn't actually practiced it, whereas the ones who thought they were awful the whole time by being in this complete immersion could actually do it well. And so that idea of linear progression is what we're talking about here. We're so used to making progress in steps that to go to muddle through weeks and months and feel like you're not making progress, even though you are, because you're laying down the right foundations for how you eat the right habits, the right training.

[00:15:37.130] – Dr. Bubbs
And it does take some time. That's one of the hardest things. I mean, it's and ironically, it circles back to Pete because this is one of the reasons why elite athletes and Olympians are so great, because they find a way to get through. You know, it's not because they're doing some fancy new workout or they've got a special supplement. It's because they can get through all these day after day, week after week of this training. And they accept the fact that this trajectory is going to be, you know, slow.

[00:16:03.290] – Dr. Bubbs
Right. If you get one percent stronger, if you're an Olympic athlete, that's tremendous work in a year. Right. So it's up. But I think when people when we present that more to clients and we let them know that we've traveled down this road and this is the expectation and we're going to get you to where you want to go. And the best part, of course, is if you use that method to get there once you arrive, it's not a free fall back to where you started from.

[00:16:26.090] – Dr. Bubbs
Once you know, you make a mistake or you go off the rails a little bit.

[00:16:31.190] – Allan
Yeah. And so I just thought that was a really important concept because so many people expect that immediate I did this, therefore that like this, if that, you know, it's so but it doesn't happen that way. And so that was really cool. Now another thing you got into the book, which again is you got into it. I was like, whoa, that's a little deep because and I knew this empirically because, you know, when we look at the standard, so something says, OK, you should, your BMI should be this and your blood pressure should be this and your height should be this.

[00:17:08.060] – Allan
And, you know, we go through all those things and what we what you come to find out when you actually get down below it is that all of these things are really sort of averages for a general person, you know? And so, you know, I don't think any of us are average across the board. We're exceptional in some places and we're not so good in others. So as you look at fasting blood glucose level, I was like, this is interesting because what you which use some of the studies you touched on, one of them was in diabetes care and another was in scientific reports, and one of them was nineteen ninety nine, the others in twenty seventeen.

[00:17:44.520] – Allan
So this is research that's been ongoing is that even though you're in the reference range, as they call it, you might not be optimized, you might not have really a good chance that might actually be better from a longevity perspective, from a health perspective to be a little bit more optimized. And you talked about how the current range for blood glucose level might not be good enough. And we might actually want to start not just being high normal, but really pushing ourselves down.

[00:18:15.890] – Dr. Bubbs
Yeah. Again, it's that idea, like in our work life, if we're getting feedback, if the project isn't to that a standard that we want, we don't accept that it's a B and just say, oh, it's good enough. We investigate. We say, how can we make this a top class or A level? And so the challenge in medicine is that so many people are unwell. So for a GP who's sitting there all day long saying twenty or twenty four patients, two thirds of the population are overweight or obese.

[00:18:42.620] – Dr. Bubbs
And so they're seeing blood sugar levels in the nines, tens and elevens. And so when somebody walks in and they're fasting, glucose is five point eight or five point nine, for the day that's you know, that's actually pretty good. And so oftentimes they won't get a recommendation or the doctor won't tell them anything. And that's you know, I don't necessarily blame the doc for that. But it is this idea that we've got to start. You know, if you're the individual listening to this and obviously listen to yourself, they've probably got none of this already of just being able to compare yourself to yourself every year, because the first you know, the first post to the goal to meet is that you're in the normal range, that's the first place you want to get to.

[00:19:21.470] – Dr. Bubbs
But after you're in there, this idea that just because you're within the normal range, you're still doing well is a problem because I've had, as I'm sure you've had, you know, the client comes in, they're 20 pounds overweight, their waist is 40 inches around the belly or more. And they say to you that their doctor told them they're in perfect health and you can see their lives and say, wait a minute, you know, I got this is a bit of a stretch here because perfect is a little.

[00:19:46.720] – Dr. Bubbs
And so what we see in the evidence is the idea that if you're at this high, normal range, you're still at a much greater risk for cardiovascular events. And so the idea around midlife health is that, you know, in midlife works, really busy in the home life, really busy, and you might be caring for young kids or older parents or even both. And so, you know, we are more at risk for various conditions and low mood and other things are part of that, which actually ties in quite tightly to the story around blood sugars.

[00:20:14.950] – Dr. Bubbs
And so really, it's more conversation to have an opportunity really for. I do talk to tell clients, say, hey, look, you're doing well, but at five point eight, we can still see a significant difference if we could get that fasting glucose down towards five, you know, definitely less than five point four. And so it's a conversation to say, what are you doing on the nutrition front? What are you doing in the exercise front?

[00:20:35.380] – Dr. Bubbs
What does that sleep or stress look like? What lever can we move there to be able to get some more wins, you know, to be able to nudge things in the right direction? Because, again, the nice part is you don't have to make a dramatic change. You just need to make a few small changes. And, again, you know, repeat them over time. But to circle back, I think the biggest problem, as we see some of you are so sick that those others kind of fly under the radar.

[00:21:00.010] – Dr. Bubbs
And, you know, I'm sure you hear they get frustrated, too, because they're still not losing that 20 pounds and they still feel like their energy is low or they're not sleeping as well or the libido is not where it wants to be. And that's a part of this whole story.

[00:21:12.550] – Allan
Yeah. And then again, in the end, when we're talking about performance, it's performing for your life. So if you can make that better then this is an approach. And again, the connection to the longevity was really something that kind of floored me. It's like, oh, so I can actually be in the normal range. My doctors happy. He's got a big smile. He spent his seven minutes with me and said, oh, your labs turned out great.

[00:21:36.250] – Allan
I'll talk to you next time. Oh, by the way, you need to lose some weight. And then he walks out the door and

[00:21:42.700] – Dr. Bubbs
wait a minute, what am I? Am I great? I'm going to lose some weight? And this is where like an American unit to be less than ninety four is kind of what we aim for or in international units, 5.0 millimoles per liter. But that's a good fasting glucose is a really good marker or your HA1C is another one, you know, that's your HP1C that's your three month average for blood glucose and again less than five point four, five to five point four is what we're after.

[00:22:08.530] – Dr. Bubbs
And so those just act as a way to tell us, like, do you have the right diet for you, regardless if it's low carb or low fat or everything else in between? That starts to tell us, like, wait a minute, if you're still at five point seven or five point eight or your fasting glucose is at one hundred and five or 110, you know, you're not all the way home yet. We've got to continue this.

[00:22:29.320] – Dr. Bubbs
We've got to, you know, like detective work, start to unpack things a little bit more and figure out where those those gaps are.

[00:22:36.160] – Allan
Yeah. Now, I was very fortunate in my kind of fitness journey and health journey was that I fell into a lot of things. I got a little lucky is the best way I can say it. The things when I found the things that worked and one of the things that really worked well for me was fasted exercise.

[00:22:55.060] – Dr. Bubbs
Cool.

[00:22:55.480] – Allan
And it was just one of those things to me saying, you know, if I get up in the morning and what was it was twofold.

[00:23:00.130] – Allan
One, if I got up in the morning and did my exercise, it was going to get done that day. You know, it's kind of like. The general says that makes you make your bed because you have a small win. For me, it was like if I just get some exercise in in the morning. And so a lot of my programs that I would put together would just say, let's let's even if it's just going for a walk, a 30 minute walk, when you first get up in the morning, you know, hydrate, go the bathroom and then just take your dog for a walk or go for a nice little walk.

[00:23:29.440] – Allan
And I said it's literally going to help you lose weight faster. And the funny thing is, is there's still a lot of people that will argue and say, no, it's calories, a calorie. You're not going to lose fat or anything. But I just don't empirically. And it's anecdotal from my perspective, until you actually, again, pointed to a study because your book is extremely science based. And it basically was it was in the Journal of Nutrition in 2019.

[00:23:55.930] – Allan
That is basically if you're exercising before breakfast, you're giving yourself a competitive advantage for weight loss.

[00:24:03.880] – Dr. Bubbs
I mean, it's a fascinating topic, everything around breakfast and timing of exercise. And there's a group out at the University of Bath and it's called the Bath Breakfast Project. So the group of researchers that are investigating everything around breakfast in terms of the types of breakfast we eat and whether we exercise before or after. And the really cool thing here is that if for someone who is overweight or trying to lose weight. When you do exercise in the fasted state, it's amazing that our body, it needs fuel, right?

[00:24:31.510] – Dr. Bubbs
And of course, we have fuel on our bodies. So even if you're 10 percent body fat, so you're lean, you've got almost a six pack, you still have thirty thousand calories of energy on your body, which means you could run like seven or eight marathons with nothing. So you imagine someone who's 20 percent or 30 percent. We've got all this energy, right. So it's your point, you wake up in the morning, you might not feel like you have the energy, but the cool thing, if you do resistance training on the one hand.

[00:24:59.450] – Dr. Bubbs
The fat within your muscles, which is called intramuscular fat, you actually start improving your ability, your body does the ability to use that fat as a fuel source for your muscle. Now, it gets really interesting here because insulin is the blood sugar hormone. And if you're more prediabetic or diabetic or overweight with a lot of central adiposity, so belly fat, then you have really high insulin levels. And that's not a good thing for longevity. Some of the original research, Dr.

[00:25:26.300] – Dr. Bubbs
Gerald Evan Stanford Medical School back in two thousand show that that's a you know, that's a big risk factor for cardiovascular disease, cancers, dementia. And so, when you train in the morning, you do resistance training, you use more intramuscular fat, and that's really correlated with really lowering this insulin in, you know, your chronic levels of insulin. And so it's a great way to, you know, you're basically moving your body in a state where there's not a lot in the fuel tank coming from the food you're eating.

[00:25:58.370] – Dr. Bubbs
So your body has to use what's in the reserves. So your body fat starts to really kick things up. And it's amazing how that is a powerful signal. And it happens also on the aerobics side. So, you know, it's a little bit different in terms of the pathway. But when you haven't eaten anything and you go off and I love your point there, but like even walking, because what people struggle with is especially if they've exercised in the past.

[00:26:22.520] – Dr. Bubbs
And then I tell them, hey, look, just get up and go for a walk. And if there a type A personality, they think you're giving them like the lower version of things and they're all I don't want to do that. That's not you know, that's not intense enough. And they don't realize that the goal is actually just to train yourself to get up and do something. It's almost like, I don't care what you do.

[00:26:40.020] – Dr. Bubbs
I just want you to get used to waking up at six or six thirty or whatever it is and do something, because that's actually the hardest part right? The getting out of bed part. And I'm sure you've seen this. You get somebody walking and then by the end of the week, without even telling them they might start jogging a little bit or by the end of two weeks, they're running in the morning. But had you suggested that right off the bat, they would have gone, oh man, the first morning they wake up and it sort of feels too intense, then we've got some cool studies to show that right.

[00:27:08.370] – Dr. Bubbs
You ask someone to go down and give you 30 pushups and, you know, something like 30 percent of the group wants to do it. You ask someone to go down and give you one push up. Almost one hundred percent of the group wants to do it. And at the end of the day, both groups are actually quite similar to the amount of pushups they can do. So it's this idea like if you can just get the person down on the floor ready to do one, once they're down there, they're going to show you what they got.

[00:27:34.830] – Dr. Bubbs
And it's the same with that morning movement piece. And so, just what you said, I think the fact that life is busy in midlife is like if we can carve this out in the morning, is great. I know people's schedules are different. So for some people, could even be after dinner, you know, rather than, you know, we all fall prey to like the Netflix and Red Wine or whatever might be a bottle of beer.

[00:27:55.410] – Dr. Bubbs
But like, if we can do some movement after dinner, if that's the only time you can get it in. And that's a pretty good time, too. And that way you get into that natural rhythm and you can start making some progress.

[00:28:06.690] – Allan
Yeah. And I've actually seen a study that said if you do some movement after you eat, it actually helps with blood sugar regulation. So, again, there's no bad time to exercise. It's just when you can get it in and which you enjoy doing and just the consistency of doing it.

[00:28:23.160] – Dr. Bubbs
100 percent. I mean, that's one of the things where, you know, we're in an Olympic year this year. And back to that morning analogy like, olympic athletes don't wake up in the morning doing cartwheels like it's five thirty in the morning and they're jumping out of bed with a big smile on their face right there. They don't know. They don't want to get out of bed and trained a lot of mornings. But the big difference, and this is part of the notion that we talk about in the Book of Building Habits is that the rest of us wake up in the morning.

[00:28:47.900] – Dr. Bubbs
When the alarm goes off. We still ask that question, like, should I get up? Should I not get up? And do I really want to go for a run? Whereas the people in this example, the you know, the athletes, the Olympic athletes, there's not a question anymore. The alarm goes off that that alarm triggers the action. They roll themselves out of bed and they just get on with it. And you'll often hear people say, well, I could never do that.

[00:29:10.640] – Dr. Bubbs
And then I say to them, what? What's the first thing you do when you sit in your car? We put your seatbelt on, right? Well, you're not thinking about that anymore. You're not motivated or inspired or you start even disciplined. You just literally the environment of sitting in that chair triggers this automatic reaction. And it's interesting how we can you know, everybody does that and so we can start to use that to implement. You know, that's ultimately what we want to do in nutrition and exercise.

[00:29:35.030] – Dr. Bubbs
We don't want you to make decisions all day long. We want to start as best we can integrating some of these things that are just what you do rather than having to think so much about it.

[00:29:42.800] – Allan
Yeah, and with an athlete, the way you're talking to competitive athletes and Olympians is, you know, first they start off with a commitment. They're going to do this and then it becomes a habit. And, you know, it's the whole point of in a way I like to say it is if your spouse needed you to pick them up at the airport at five o'clock in the morning. Guess where you are at five o'clock in the morning? You don't roll out and say, I really don't want to do this and hit your snooze alarm and ignore their text and then the letter from your divorce attorney.

[00:30:13.670] – Dr. Bubbs
exactly.

[00:30:14.870] – Allan
You know, so no, you show up where you're supposed to be. And so it's just kind of getting that thing, that ball rolling. And to know that doing this physical activity first thing in the morning before your breakfast is actually doing you more good than just doing it really kind of needs to be a huge incentive to say, yeah, get up, do something, start something. That work, even if it doesn't feel intense, is really kind of changing you and getting you better and helping you with your performance as just being a good human and a healthy parent, a healthy grandparent and all of that.

[00:30:48.230] – Dr. Bubbs
100 percent.

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[00:33:02.560] – Allan
One of the things you got into in the book is you got into protein, and this is a topic I think I read about or talk about nearly every single day, you know, because, you know, if I'm talking to a vegan or vegetarian, then the topic will always come up is where do you get your protein?

[00:33:22.120] – Allan
And I tell people it's like it's in all of that. You just have to mix and match. And then someone who is like animal protein and like, that's great protein. If you want to eat animals, that's great, too. I loved your approach coming in, basically just saying to both, you know.

[00:33:39.430] – Dr. Bubbs
Yeah. I mean, it's I mean, in the book we basically set like a minimum level and people say, well, more it. Sure. But again, the idea with the book is that if we use a golf analogy, like if you play a par three with Tiger Woods and even if you're a 10 handicap, if Tiger hits a really good shot and you hit a really good shot, you're probably not too different in terms of where the ball is.

[00:34:01.550] – Dr. Bubbs
But the difference is if Tiger hits his worst shot he's got, he's still on the green, whereas if an amateur hits the worst shot, the 20 hours in the bush and they're, you know, they've lost their ball.

[00:34:11.730] – Allan
And so we heard a splash. We just heard a splash.

[00:34:14.080] – Dr. Bubbs
That's so it was like. And so this idea that we've got to start like, you know, the worst day that we have is just going to be better, right. Rather than always focusing on trying to be people want to be great, but then it's hard to maintain it. And then all of a sudden they fall off the wagon. And so, you know, the minimum the idea for this minimum of one point two grams of protein per kilogram body weight per day, which if you divide, you know, for Canadian or American, you take your body weight in pounds and divide that by two point two.

[00:34:42.820] – Dr. Bubbs
You know, this is a number that some of the best protein researchers like Stu Phillips of McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada, and The US leads back in the U.K., in their research, have found that as we age, if we can maintain this amount of protein, minimum amount in the 50s, 60s, 70s, it really helps to fight off sarcopenia, which is the loss of muscle associated with aging. And that's actually a huge problem when we talk about longevity and wellness.

[00:35:08.320] – Dr. Bubbs
Like once you start losing muscle mass, you know, a lot of bad things start to happen after that. And so, again, it's about setting up this rhythm that if you can just start to hit this as part of your daily rhythm every day and you just know that you're getting this one point two grams per kilo, you can actually stop thinking about protein a little bit. I mean, there's scenarios where you might want more, etc., but you can then, you know, focus on other areas like carbs or fats or whatever else.

[00:35:32.890] – Dr. Bubbs
But that's a really big one, because as much as people think they're eating a lot of protein and, you know, you mentioned, you know, plant based or vegan, they'll often say, well, I've heard that before, I'm fine. But I'm sure you've seen once you actually go through and calculate things, even for meat eaters, you're saying, well, wait a minute, you know, we're barely at the RDA, which is zero point eight.

[00:35:54.730] – Dr. Bubbs
And and we're wondering why, you know, we're leaving a lot of gains out here if we're not at least getting to one point two. And even there we see in the research, if you climb up to the one point six, you're still going to get some significant benefits. So, you know, it's a great place to start to build out your diet is like, where is the protein on my plate? And then from there figuring out, you know, the rest.

[00:36:15.200] – Allan
Yeah, you do center on protein as kind of the starting point of deciding which you're going to eat. And, you know, yes, I have a client. I meet a client, I start talking and we start looking at their nutrition. And it's like they're eating 60 grams, maybe 65 grams of protein in a day. And I'm like, oh, no, no, no, you're about to start lifting weights with me. I need you to bump that up considerably.

[00:36:40.630] – Allan
And then there's this fear. They're like, well, won't that harm my kidneys? Can I eat too much protein? And you kind of dove into that, you know, that people might not be able to eat too much protein, can you talk a little bit about is there a protein limit?

[00:36:56.190] – Dr. Bubbs
I mean, that's one of the biggest hangovers that still lingers in medical schools, is this idea that if we eat too much, protein is bad for our kidneys. And this really stems from if someone has type two diabetic and is having renal failure typically is the issue where we do need to be mindful of the amount of protein because the kidneys struggle to cope with it. And of course, it's almost like lost in translation. That's then got the notion of, well, if anybody consumes X amount of protein or too much protein, they're going to have issues with their kidneys.

[00:37:23.130] – Dr. Bubbs
I mean, we have studies now that for the course of one entire year, individuals consumed three point zero grams per kilogram, which is almost triple what we suggest here. And there's still no adverse effects on kidney function. And so I think one of the things, you know, this obviously is safe for the kidneys, and that's what all the protein experts will tell you. And we see more and more doctors now realizing this. And the evidence is really clear.

[00:37:45.480] – Dr. Bubbs
I mean, it's not even you know, it's very, very clear. But in addition to this, the thing that I talk about in the book, as well as this idea that vegetables are great for you, eat lots of those, but when you increase your protein intake, you also dramatically increase your micronutrients data. So you bring on board more vitamins and minerals, which we often just associate with plants and the vegetables that we're eating, but animal proteins and plant proteins as well.

[00:38:12.360] – Dr. Bubbs
But I think animal proteins often get left out on this is they're tremendously nutrient dense. And so, you know, making sure you get those in is, in effect, acting like a multivitamin. You know, you're getting you know, you're one a day or all the key vitamins and minerals that you're after.

[00:38:28.710] – Allan
Now, one of the other concepts before we get off of protein that I thought was really important that I say this all the time. It's about the quality. So when we talk about the quality of protein, what does that actually mean and how do we how do we achieve that?

[00:38:47.570] – Dr. Bubbs
Yeah, I mean, I think this is interesting when we start to look at populations around the world and we could probably even expand this to just the overall diet quality like the quality of the entire diet, because the conversation, one of the reasons why we tend to fear animal protein is because if we increase saturated fat in the diet, we can increase LDL cholesterol, which is quote unquote, the bad cholesterol. And that plays an important role in the progression of atherosclerosis, which is the narrowing of the arteries, which predisposes you more to heart attacks and strokes.

[00:39:19.160] – Dr. Bubbs
And so, heck, that's not good. We don't want that right? Now, there's a lot of nuance in this whole story because, you know, first off, we often hear steak, eggs, dairy, watch out they're high saturated fat foods. They certainly do contain some. But, you know, almonds contain double two and a half times as many saturated fats as 100 grams serving of steak. And you don't hear people saying, well, listen, almonds are going to cause you problems or dark chocolate or whatnot.

[00:39:48.710] – Dr. Bubbs
And so, you know, the foods that are richest in saturated fat are things like pizza, grain based desserts, sausages, hamburgers, all these processed meats and processed foods. And so, you know, that's the first place that we look at. But it gets even more interesting when you look at the countries around the world, because there are certain countries that have removed this upper limit, which in America we still have this upper limit that says, you should only consume 10 percent of your total caloric intake from saturated fats.

[00:40:17.660] – Dr. Bubbs
If you go above that, it can be a problem. Now, it gets interesting because you go to Spain and by 20, 40, the Spanish will be the longest living people on the planet and they eat more than 10 percent saturated fat and think, OK, maybe that's a one off, we go to France. Same thing, one of the longest living countries in the world. They also consume more than 10 percent. And this is the notion where diet quality matters, like if your saturated fats coming from real food, from steak and eggs and these types of things, and you're eating a lot of vegetables and whole foods, it looks as though that's not as big an adverse impact.

[00:40:54.230] – Dr. Bubbs
Right. You're not going to have this adverse cardiovascular effect because we see, you know, in places like Spain and France, thirty two or thirty eight deaths per 100000 from heart attack, whereas in the United States we see almost 80. Right. So more than double. And this is the idea where if you're saturated fats are coming from all those ultra processed foods. Right. Like the take out pizza, the quick hamburger or the sausage, and you're overweight.

[00:41:20.690] – Dr. Bubbs
This creates the perfect storm for all these bad issues to happen. And so, you know, if you're someone listening in and you don't like to eat meat or you don't want to eat meat, we don't tell you this to force it upon you. But I think too often I see people who are overweight who are avoiding these foods because they think it's, quote unquote, bad for them. But an effect of that is we don't achieve the protein intake and the foods that they choose to eat actually have a lot more calories in them.

[00:41:45.920] – Dr. Bubbs
And now if we're not losing weight, then we're not going to be improving blood sugars. We're not going to be lowering inflammation. And this is where we get into a real problem, because now we're you know, we're really stuck in that risk is not going to go down.

[00:41:58.150] – Allan
Now, I see that too as someone to sit there and say, well, you know, I don't want to eat that much meat and I want to get my protein. So I buy this vegan protein shake at this certain place. And I go to that place and look up the nutrition information and say, OK, well, it's got, you know, thirty nine grams of carbs, I mean, sugar. And I'm like, so that's like drinking a so-called soft drink.

[00:42:20.650] – Allan
I mean, quite literally drinking a soft drink. And you might be getting 20 grams of protein out of that. But, you know, it's not just protein and it's processed stuff and it's a lot of sugar. And so, yeah, I think it's too easy to get roped into this. The simple is the way and it's just, you know, go ahead and avoid these, you know, set these simple rules, avoid saturated fat, avoid animal products, avoid that.

[00:42:46.930] – Allan
And you can get yourself roped into a just kind of making mistakes only because you're listening and trying to fit it in and and also because you like that particular flavor of shake.

[00:42:59.320] – Dr. Bubbs
Well, and the other thing, too. Yeah. I mean, if you're a plant based or vegan and oftentimes I see people have problems, I'm like, I don't see them eating any lentils. I don't see them eating any tempe and eating all these processed, you know, meat substitutes and say, wait a minute, you can't if you're plant based and you're still eating a processed food diet, that's still not good. And it might even be worse than an animal based processed food diet.

[00:43:22.900] – Dr. Bubbs
And it's like we've got to get back to your point here, like eating real food. You want 20 grams or 30 grams of plant based protein. Well, let's have some lentils. Let's have some tempe or whatnot or a shake that has less sugar than the one you mentioned, because otherwise, yeah, you're still causing a lot of the same problems just with a different type of strategy.

[00:43:43.630] – Allan
Yeah. Now, one area you got into the book that I think is far overlooked in the health and wellness space is because we're like, OK, well, here's your nutrition, here's your fitness. Go lose some weight, get stronger and you're good. And many people will sit there and kind of put this concept of when I get to a particular weight, I'm going to be happy. Yeah. Now,

[00:44:09.070] – Dr. Bubbs
when I win an Olympic medal, I'll be happy.

[00:44:12.820] – Allan
I'll be happy.

[00:44:13.960] – Allan
Right. And that day may or may not ever come, but you get to that weight and it's not there. And so you talk about awe and happiness and they're related in my opinion. Awe gives you happiness. Awe is the moments that you're happiest because you're just looking at the world in a way that's just it's opening you up to just what, what's possible. Why should we commit to all Awe.

[00:44:42.080] – Dr. Bubbs
I mean this is sort of the underpinning of the whole book with this idea that. Well, first off, Mindset's. You know, the six inches between our ears is the reason why we succeed or don't succeed. And so with that as the backdrop and again, this is regardless if it's you or I or someone working a nine to five is trying to achieve their goals or even an Olympian, it's still you know, that mindset that we bring is really what's going to make us or break us.

[00:45:07.420] – Dr. Bubbs
And the really, you know, at first kind of depressing thing in midlife is how I open the book with this U shaped happiness curve, which Professor David Blanchflower, Dartmouth University goes around the world than the one hundred and thirty five countries. They measure all these indices of happiness and realize that it doesn't matter if you're in America, South America, Europe, Asia by midlife and are between 41 to 48. Effectively, we have this dip, our lowest point of the happiness index, which on the surface sounds a little bit like, oh geez, really?

[00:45:38.440] – Dr. Bubbs
That sounds like a long time, seven years, but really more than likely reflects the fact that we're just at our busiest. We got all these demands on our time, we're sleeping less, etc.. Now, why is that important to this whole conversation? Well, if we don't if we know that, let's say if you don't sleep sufficiently, if you don't get that at least seven hours a night, it's more difficult to disengage from negative thoughts. Tonight,

[00:46:02.170] – Dr. Bubbs
You wake up in the morning. I think we'll forget that. I'm not getting up to run because, you know, we can make up an excuse, right. It gets harder now to build the habits that we need. And so this is one of the major roadblocks we see with clients in midlife is that, you know, the mindset is such that we're sort of stuck in this bit of a rut, if you will, or we've tried to achieve those weight loss goals, health goals so many times that as soon as something goes wrong or as soon as we get to a roadblock, you know, it's like a loop that plays back in our minds and we start self sabotaging and thinking it's not going to work out.

[00:46:37.810] – Dr. Bubbs
And so, you know, this connection to awe, really, how do we rather than this progression of if I achieve the promotion, if I achieve the weight loss goal, if I achieve my dream of the Olympics, then I get to happiness. The cool thing, again, from a performance standpoint, is in elite sport, they're flipping that whole model to say how do we create happiness in this person to allow them to express their potential? Because even if you achieve your weight loss goal, guess what happens tomorrow morning?

[00:47:08.800] – Dr. Bubbs
You still need to wake up and do something, you still need to eat something, you still need to train a certain way, like there's you know, the world keeps moving. And so how do we build that mindset? How do we start to reshape, you know, how we think and how we feel, you know, whether it's optimism, self talk, all these types of things? And this is where we circle back to this conversation are awe because I think with the backdrop of the latest pandemic, we've seen how people's moods have been impacted.

[00:47:37.060] – Dr. Bubbs
And so what's the easiest way to impact, you know, mood and happiness? And when we look, you know, there's two components to happiness. One of them is life satisfaction, which is effectively, you know, how satisfied are you with your life? And that actually does trend really closely with your income. So you tend to be more satisfied with your life if you have higher earning power. But the other part of happiness is the subjective part.

[00:48:02.750] – Dr. Bubbs
Which means, are you happy in your life? And that actually has no correlation with income. It might. In fact, when you get to a high enough bracket, it actually impacts negatively. And so the crazy part about awe, which is awe is basically just walking out into nature, you know, forests, seeing mountains and ocean, even pictures of it. Awe is even listening to, like a song that really resonates for you or a speech that makes you feel a certain way and that actually triggers both aspects.

[00:48:32.340] – Dr. Bubbs
It's a positive emotion. It triggers both aspects of happiness. And so, you know, some really cool research by Dr. Amy Gordon at Cal Berkeley and even our day to day lives, if you can actually in a week, find a couple of things that are, that allow you to experience that, so if you can scroll through your Instagram rather than comparing yourself to somebody, look through some landscapes or listen to some music, it actually has this really beneficial effect for, you know, emotions and positive emotions, which, you know, by itself isn't going to move the needle.

[00:49:07.740] – Dr. Bubbs
But it allows you then to take that step towards saying, I'm going to do a little bit more, you know, positive self talk exercise or I'm going to train myself a bit more to be optimistic. Because the funny part is these are actually like these are trainable skills. We often think of them as just traits like that's a positive person. I'm a skeptical person. But one of the analogies I like metaphors that's really great is this idea. Like, you don't show up to the championship game and expect to score 40 points if you've never practiced.

[00:49:38.370] – Dr. Bubbs
And how many of us really practice our mindset skills. Right. And until recently, it's really flown under the radar. And so I think for some of us in midlife, it feels kind of weird to sort of circle back to that. But, you know, one of the ways in which I outline is and which I've seen it, the experts that I work with and in sport right now is this notion of going back to your values. So if I need you to develop a new habit.

[00:50:04.090] – Dr. Bubbs
It helps a little bit if you want to hit a certain number on the scale, but it really helps if your values or the fact that you want to take care of your you know, you want to spend quality time with your kids and have enough energy for them, but you're 30 pounds overweight. And if you don't do it, it's going to adversely impact that relationship and your ability. Now, all of a sudden, we've got this you know, you can really see that the North Star there is that value.

[00:50:26.000] – Dr. Bubbs
And if you're staying up late watching, you know, crappy TV and snacking on things, it just becomes more obvious. And so that's been one thing over time that's really struck out for me in my practices, you know, limiting the amount of things that get people to do, being more just like here's the one or two things you want to do and allowing them the space to see that, you know, hey, this is your goal.

[00:50:48.530] – Dr. Bubbs
You want to be more energetic, to thrive in your business or at home. Well, these are the things that you're doing. Do you think those are in alignment? And when you can let people start and they make those connections quite quickly and all of a sudden it's amazing how almost like snapping your fingers, people who struggled to do a behavior for weeks or months can all of a sudden really jump on board.

[00:51:10.100] – Allan
Dr. Bubbs. I define wellness as being the healthiest, fittest and happiest you can be. What are three strategies or tactics to get and stay well?

[00:51:20.420] – Dr. Bubbs
that's a great question. I mean. The way again, this whole idea of being busy in the madness and hectics of midlife is coming back to simple rules that we can remember. When we're busy and when we fall off the wagon and we fall out, you know, we go off path, it's easy to remember these heuristics, right? These simple rules to come back to us. What I would like to tell people is, if you can start your morning well, in the book we call Master your morning.

[00:51:45.610] – Dr. Bubbs
If you can end your day well or not, let things go off the rails with all the late night eating because we know that's where, you know, more than 40 percent of all the calories we consume now come after six o'clock. So if you can start your day well, end your day well and eat enough protein through the day. Three simple things. You'd be amazed at how much progress you can make as the middle of the day actually doesn't matter nearly as much as those other points.

[00:52:07.360] – Dr. Bubbs
And so that would be kind of the quick tips I would give someone that they can go off with and say, hey, eat the right breakfast, try not to snacks in the mid-morning, don't succumb to the late night snacking and get that protein in. And you'd be pretty, pretty amazed at the progress you can make.

[00:52:24.050] – Allan
Awesome. So, Dr. Bubbs, if someone wanted to learn more about you about the book, and I believe you have a seminar, a peak 40 think coming up this fall, where would you like for me to send them?

[00:52:39.380] – Dr. Bubbs
100 percent. Yeah, I appreciate it. You can go to drbubbs.com/peak40 and you'll you know, you'll see some info there. We have a nutrition coaching we do every three times a year. The next one's in the fall, 2021. And so you can check out some information there. We got a peak 40 podcast as well, or a short form podcast, again, sort of 20 minutes an episode to give people some clips on this and how they can start to implement some of these things.

[00:53:04.430] – Dr. Bubbs
And again, you know, after 20 years of doing this and working on both ends of the spectrum with kind of elite Olympic athletes and the general population, it's really been, you know, a fun journey. But trying to figure out how we can help people, you know, make the most progress by doing that minimum effective dose is really the, you know, the impetus for the book.

[00:53:24.230] – Allan
Dr. Bubbs, thank you so much for being a part of 40+ Fitness.

[00:53:28.160] – Dr. Bubbs
Allan, I appreciate it, man. It's been great to be on. And thanks for having me.

Post Show/Recap

[00:53:36.360] – Allan
Hey Raz, welcome back.

[00:53:38.160] – Rachel
Hey, Allan, wow, that was really neat of Dr. Bubbs to come back with a new book and they both of his books sound really interesting. I like the idea of peaking, but especially after 40.

[00:53:50.240] – Allan
Well, yeah. And I think that was kind of one of the things the first book was just it was intense because it was written for pretty much for professional athletes. And it was, you know, in their field, they need to peak at a certain time. So I'm not sure the show we're coming up on the Olympics soon. I think, you know, people won't be attending again because of the problems with covid.

[00:54:13.980] – Allan
But all these athletes over the course, the last several months have been doing what they needed to do to qualify for the Olympics, which is typically done every four years for most of these athletes. So they are doing world championships and other things. But for most of them, they don't care about that. They just want to make this one race. They want to do this one thing. And to do that, they spend all their time trying to peak to try to be at the best performance they possibly can at a given point in time.

[00:54:46.230] – Allan
So one, they make it into the Olympics and then two when they're competing in the Olympics against the best people in the world, that they're doing their best. So even if they don't win, you're seeing the best that that athlete can bring to the field. And the science that Dr. Bubbs talked about in his first book, Peak was everything we know about how that happens and how you can train for peak performance. I thought it was important to have him on here because we are training to be peak grandparents and peak this, you know.

[00:55:22.500] – Allan
So if you're planning a hike and you're going to do the Grand Canyon with your nieces and nephews or your children or whatever grandchildren you want to be, peak health, you want to be peak performance, you know, you want to be able to lift your own kayak. You want to be able to do your own, you know, your own marching and you don't want to have to sit stuff out. So peaking and being in the performance state I thought was really important.

[00:55:44.790] – Allan
And then he comes back with peak forty and I'm like, well, this is perfect. I didn't have anything to do with that. But like, this is perfect. And so. Yeah. And so basically this book is taking a lot of the basic science and things that were in peak and is applying it to the rest of us. So he was talking to that, that one percent of people out there with the first book and I, I tried to take that information and apply it for us and then he's gone and actually done it and even better.

[00:56:15.720] – Allan
So it's a really cool book, particularly if you consider yourself generally athletic, but doesn't have to be because there's still a lot in there for everybody. But if you're if you're an athlete, you see yourself as an athlete, there's a lot in there to help you just be as good as you can be. So if you're trying to get a PR on a five K or a half marathon boom, you're going to have some a lot of information in there to help you do that.

[00:56:42.660] – Allan
Or if you just want to be an awesome grandma when it comes to family vacation or the grandkids are hanging out with you. It's also that kind of book too.

[00:56:51.960] – Rachel
When you started the interview off with the big rocks, the major things, the big things that we can do to make a change in our lives. And that also resonated with me, too, because we're bombarded by data all around us. There's articles and podcasts and news clippings and and news headlines that we see on the news.

[00:57:11.100] – Rachel
And all this stuff is around us and we can easily get lost in the weeds. But I like bringing the focus back to the big rocks. What are the major things that we can do to move the needle on our own personal health and fitness?

[00:57:22.720] – Allan
Yeah, well, I brought this up in my book as well, the Wellness Roadmap was that we do have to focus on the big rocks. And I actually talked about kind of where that concept came from, its big rocks, little rocks and sand. And you're trying to get them all in the bucket and they all fit in the bucket. If you put the big rocks in there first, if you put the sand in there first, you won't get all the big rocks and little rocks in there.

[00:57:46.020] – Allan
And if you put the little rocks in there, you're still not going to get everything in there. So you've got to put the big rocks in first and then you put the little rocks and then you shake the hell out of the jar. And then you put the sand in and shake the jar and you eventually can get all of that into that jar. It doesn't look like it when you first start, but you can. And the concept is, if you focus on the big rocks first, you're going to make up a lot of ground faster.

[00:58:11.340] – Allan
And it and it works and it works in almost every aspect of your life. We get buried when we start focusing on the sand. So the question is, what supplement should I take? You know, I hear about this protein window after my weight training, do I have to have protein within an hour or is my training wasted? We hear all these things and it keeps coming out every day, you know, eat pomegranate, it's a superfood.

[00:58:41.440] – Allan
Those are all those things are good. But they're the sand. They're just sand in your progress of how far you want to go. So focusing on the big rocks means that you're putting your priority. You're putting your time, which is at a premium for us today. You're putting that on the most important thing. So, you know, you'll hear the statement, you can't outwork a diet.

[00:59:07.470] – Allan
people still try.

[00:59:08.870] – Allan
Yeah, well, you know, I'm doing an hour a day on the treadmill and I'm like, well, if you spent that hour food prepping. You know, cutting up some vegetables, pre cooking the meat and fish that you want to eat for the week and putting those meals together and putting them in the freezer that hour would do so much more for you than the hour you spent on the treadmill. Now, the hour on the treadmill might be important from a mental health perspective because many of us get a lot of mental benefit from the exercise.

[00:59:41.280] – Allan
So my big rock might not entirely be your big rock, but I will say I'm certain for 90, 95 percent of us nutrition, eating whole food is our big rock. If you're not eating mostly whole food, meaning it's not coming from a can, box, jar or bag, and I see those different every time I see them. But if it's not coming from one of those four things, then you're eating Whole Foods. It's plant.

[01:00:13.200] – Allan
Yeah, animal. And the less processed the better. If you're eating mostly whole food and as high quality as you can eat. That's most of our big rocks.

[01:00:24.780] – Rachel
That is a good one. That's a great one.

[01:00:27.300] – Allan
And then the next big rock. The next big rock is moving. Exactly. You need to be moving. Your body was designed to move. In fact, it needs to move to stay alive. You know, the toxins that are in your body, they're cleared from your cells and they go into your lymph system. Now, your lymph system doesn't have any pumps. Your heart is a pump for blood. Your lungs and the diaphragm work as a pump system to basically move oxygen in and take carbon dioxide out.

[01:01:00.480] – Allan
And that's working like a pumping action. But we don't have a way to remove our toxins with any pumping action, the way that works is through skeletal muscle. Skeletal muscle is the muscle that moves our body around. So if we're not moving, we're not clearing toxins. And they're sitting there and you might have heard some terms like, OK, well, I hope the cancer doesn't get into the lymph nodes because then it spreads.

[01:01:26.970] – Allan
And that's true. So movement is a way for your body to stay detoxify. It's a way for your body to stay cleaner. So we need to move as a function of our day to day life that makes us healthier and helps us avoid a lot of problems. And so those are the two big rocks that I would say if you're not doing those two things and it doesn't matter how much protein you eat, it doesn't matter how many hours you sleep, it doesn't matter anything else.

[01:01:58.110] – Allan
Doesn't matter if you're not doing those two things.

[01:02:01.080] – Rachel
Yeah, I have to agree with you on that. One food and movement are so critical. And he also mentioned the happiness and awe and mindset at the end. That's my other favorite word, mindset.

[01:02:16.080] – Allan
I was so happy to see the word, Awe. Because no one in the health and fitness field, to my knowledge, and I've read hundreds, thousands of books and articles, no one really talks much about that. You know, I talk about happiness, but awe takes it to a whole nother level. Awe is about the experience of life. And I think a lot of us missed that because we're too busy being busy.

[01:02:45.610] – Rachel
Oh, gosh. Yeah.

[01:02:48.380] – Allan
So I was really glad he brought that up, because I do think that happiness and awe are kind of a missed piece of a life well lived. So you can be super fit. And you can eat the best foods. But if you're not enjoying yourself and you're not having those moments of bliss of awe, then why live a year longer? You know, why? I mean, so the why that we go through the commitment is typically about

[01:03:22.930] – Allan
Those moments, you know, when I talk to clients and I say, OK, why do you want to do this? Why why do you want to lose 30 pounds? why? And it's the well, you know, I'll feel better. I'll be happier. And that's not the way it works. You will probably feel better. That's true. But it's so you can do what? And those moments should be, awe, you know, time with a granddaughter, time of the grandson.

[01:03:55.760] – Allan
Hiking Grand Canyon, going and seeing the Great Wall of China, the Galapagos, you know, having the health and wellness to do that stuff, because I can tell you, when you're standing on the sea cliffs of the Galapagos and you're watching the albatross fly and the sea wall is just like the sea just hitting these cliffs and spring up in the air. Those are moments that no one can take from me.

[01:04:24.230] – Rachel
I love it.

[01:04:25.280] – Allan
And so when someone tells me, you know, I'm too busy. I'm too busy to eat well. I'm too busy to work out those big rocks and then the fact that smaller, big rocks of sleep and stress reduction, I'm too busy to meditate, I'm too busy to do yoga. I'm too busy. When someone tells me they're too busy, that's one of the saddest things that I can hear, and it bothers me that that excuse bothers me more than any other excuse out there.

[01:04:58.400] – Rachel
Yeah, it's so important to make your own health a priority and then to work your life around that. And I'm a morning runner and a lot of the people in some local run clubs are morning runners. Some of us are evening runners. And I see the most beautiful sunrise and sunset pictures from other people's runs that are just breathtaking. And to have that moment of that beautiful splendor of the first light or the last light, it's beautiful.

[01:05:29.620] – Rachel
Who doesn't love a sunrise or sunset? And to just appreciate that moment or to see the wildlife we've got dear right now are dropping fawn. So we see a lot of fawns on our runs as well. And to see a deer and a fawn is such a special thing. And it's why I get out and run so often. And I just it just makes me so happy in that moment and it's such a special time. And I wish other people could appreciate that as well by getting up early and doing their thing.

[01:05:59.740] – Allan
And it's not that you have to go for a run to do those things. Sometimes it's as simple as getting in your car, driving down to a local park and going for a walk. And it's funny because I have a guest that's coming up and I don't want to blow the whole thing, but he just you talked about just petting and playing with a dog and some things like that. And I'm like, there's so many moments that you can take.

[01:06:26.710] – Allan
To put more happiness into your life, and so I'd kind of like to leave this with a challenge and the challenge would be write down three things that you really, really, really enjoy doing that just really make you happy. Write down three things and then commit to within the next month to do all three of those things. And it can be to sit with your loved one and watch a sunset. It can be to go back and watch a movie that I really, really enjoyed.

[01:07:06.010] – Allan
it can be to take up something that I did before that was athletic and just do it slower pace. If you need to pick up a tennis racket and a golf hit the ball against the wall.

[01:07:20.890] – Allan
You know, you don't have to be all of that. But if you enjoyed playing tennis, it's not that you have to give it up. You go do it. And so within the next month. Take those three things and just make a point to do them, and if you can do them easily like Sunset's. Other than when it's cloudy, those happen almost every day, lots of opportunity, whereas, you know, if it's I want to go to the beach again, maybe that's a little bit out of touch, out of reach for this month.

[01:07:54.100] – Allan
But think about the things that really kind of bring you joy, that make you happy and just spend a little bit more time doing that. And then, of course, if you're focusing on the big rocks, you have more energy, you have more fitness, and you'll be able to do more. And so, like I said, it just it bugs me when people say they're too busy. And I'm like, you know, really, if you care about your wellness, then they're listening to this point in the podcast.

[01:08:25.360] – Allan
So I think you care. You got to make the investment. You got to make the investment of time because big rocks take time. Big rocks take time because one, you're not going to get that immediate satisfaction of, oh, I had a salad for dinner, I should weight 10 pounds less tomorrow. Not how it works or I got on the treadmill today and I ran a mile. It's like, OK, you wake up the next morning and you hurt like heck because you haven't been running at all.

[01:08:56.200] – Allan
That's not how big rocks work. You've got to move them slowly. You've got to do the gentle nudges and then you've got to be patient and wait for those things, those good things to happen. And so the peak performance that you see in an elite athlete, the Olympics, are four years away for some of these kids. They started training when they were in diapers, learning a skill and then honing it and working it, working it, and hours and hours and hours and hours, thousands and thousands of hours of training.

[01:09:23.050] – Allan
Yeah. Just for the chance to be one of those athletes. And then they perform, and so the investment that they're making is huge over time. And it's that slow, they get there, they get there, and then if everything peaks, everything's right. They have that awesome moment. And what but I think that Dr. Bubbs is saying in this book is awesome moments are all around you. You don't have to wait for the Olympics to come.

[01:09:58.120] – Allan
You can have an awesome moment today. You just have to go out and do it. You have to know you want it and you have to do it. You have to make the investment of time, effort, money, put the time and you put the money and you put the effort in and you make special things happen in your life. And that makes your life better. It makes it more full. And so, you know, most of us are opportunity to go to the Olympics is over.

[01:10:24.520] – Allan
Our boat has sailed. And we're not going to be there. I'm not going to be in the NFL. You're not going to be NBA or WNBA. That stuff's not going to happen for us. But that doesn't mean we don't have things that we can aspire to, things that we can win, things that make us happy.

[01:10:41.770] – Rachel
Yeah, we can do great things. Allan, I mentioned earlier, I'm about to turn 50 and a couple of weeks ago I ran fifty miles.

[01:10:50.200] – Rachel
That's got to be one of the biggest accomplishments in my life. And I'm about 50. So there's still plenty of time to do great things, whatever they are. Well, just if you could start,

[01:11:01.060] – Allan
it might be the biggest so far.

[01:11:02.890] – Rachel
So far. That is true.

[01:11:05.410] – Allan
because you haven't been a grandma yet, you know. So there's. Yeah. And pushed that off a few years. OK, but since your kids are just not quite there yet. Yeah butthe whole point being is, Yes, that there's so much in front of us. And that's again why I love that word, awe. Is because if you start seeking out those things that do that for you, your life is going to be so much fuller.

[01:11:35.410] – Allan
And most of the time we get on here and we're talking about nutrition and we're talking about fitness and we're into the stuff that sometimes it's easy to forget. It's not always about putting more in. So I'm working that full time job, I'm doing this, and then I'm trying to exercise and I'm trying to cook and I'm trying to take care of my kids and and do all those things together. The reality is sometimes it's just taking a break and doing less and just doing something that you enjoy that just brings you that feeling.

[01:12:09.670] – Rachel
That's just it is finding that happiness and that joy and awe. Like Dr. Bubbs had said, it's important.

[01:12:17.950] – Allan
Yes, it is. All right. So, Rachel, I guess we'll talk next week then.

[01:12:22.930] – Rachel
Sounds great. Take care.

[01:12:24.850] – Allan
You, too.

[01:12:25.730] – Rachel
Thanks.

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