That boisterous nutrition and fitness person, in your face about their beliefs – at 18 and 19 that used to be me. A wrecking ball of creatine and chest day, i.e. the Facebook Profile pic above from 2006 exemplifies this. I guess I am still pretty loud on social media, but even then I specifically try to present facts and information in an unbiased but entertaining manner. Yet, 10 years later when you meet me I am usually very quiet especially in the beginning. I live in the country and spend 2-3 of my work days exclusively with clients and alone with my thoughts and studies. I love to watch, to critically observe and listen to the wind chimes on our porch. Words mean very little to me especially in the world of nutrition and training. I care about actions, about what someone actually does. Daniel Martinez a very well regarded strength coach from San Antonio came up to observe TAE because he wanted to see what we were really about. Was it just fluff, a facade we write about or do we really believe and live these principles to the core. I have talked with trainers who never shut up about coaching philosophies, this, that, and the other and then I watch them coach - they are on their phone 87% of the time and then yelling into a stop watch the other five to ten minutes of a session. Talk is cheap.
Coach Martinez, Coach Davis, and I had a great lunch after he had observed. I was plowing through white rice, chicken, and vegetables as it was about 1-2 hours after some heinousness on the TAE programming and I remember him looking at my plate. I could see the judgement in his eyes or maybe it was my judgment of myself for eating rice, but none of those thoughts mattered because I knew I was doing the right thing, I needed clean carbs, protein, and fat and I needed it NOW. On hard training days if I don’t eat over 4000 calories and at least 200-300 grams of carbs, I will waste away, or just survive the stimulus instead of adapting positively. I could have stopped the conversation like I did this post to explain the situation, but that would be about me and my insecurities. It was not the time nor the place. Over the years I have become convinced that most male athletes who have a lot of muscle on board can’t thrive on sweet potatoes, kale, salmon, and coconut oil. What tends to happen is that they will eat extremely “clean” for 3 days, a week, a month and then the bender of brownies arrives. Sugar, Naps, Sugar. We have to lose our attachment to purity and do what works. Insulin blunts the cortisol response post training and is the most anabolic hormone in the human body. We need to use it and respect it, not try to smash it as low as possible so we can live to see interstellar space travel because if we combine that philosophy with high intensity training 5 to 10 years down the road we might not even be able to stand at attention.
Back when I was young and dumb I used to think I had this right, this power, this responsibility to change people. I thought I knew what was best for them and I was going to shove it down their throats and they were going to like it. You see these ten serving of vegetables and lateral lunges - open up! Now I my demeanor is completely the opposite, almost apathetic to a fault. I’ve heard so much talk and seen so much bullshit that I just present the facts, any recommendations I may have and then I let them run with it and answer any questions that may come up.
“I can’t convince people, they must convince themselves, and the more I push, the more I may inflame opposition.”
-Gretchen Rubin
If they ask me to monitor, I monitor, but I always ask, why are you doing this? Are you doing it for me? Are you doing this for myfitnesspal? Or are you are doing this for you and is monitoring going to be helpful long-term? For some it is. For some, it is a mangled car crash of judgment and failure. Many things including but not limited to: monitoring, a coach, or a meeting with a great functional medicine practitioner can give you a spark but you have to find that something that lights your fire and causes you to build a roaring furnace of immovable healthy habits that change your life forever and put you at constant odds with your relatives, your peers, and the culture all around you. Sorry but weight watchers frozen meals neither identify nor fix any of those aspects of your life.
In the beginning, it is hard to change especially for those of us who don’t live alone in an organic food Co-Op. We have families, friends, and significant others that aren’t used to these new cumbersome granola habits. Wait - we aren’t eating spaghetti and garlic bread on Wednesday nights anymore and we get salmon and asparagus WTF Mom!!! Meatloaf!
Yes, there will be opposition, yet think about what could conspire over time as your sticktoitiveness, wells sticks.
If you never eat sugar or cupcakes and then one day you are at a party, thinking of indulging, and someone asks, “Hey Samantha would you like this red velvet one on top?” But before you can reach out your hand and say, “well I guess I could…” your daughter interjects,”Oh my mom doesn’t eat cupcakes.”
Fire extinguished, no way Samantha is mashing her teeth into that gluten death trap and going against the moral code that her daughter trusts she will uphold.
Actions.
They may not be easy, but they are all that really matters.
The other aspect I find to be really motivating and helpful is money. Hold on, now this dude is going to reach into my pocket. Nope. I’m out. But money has incredible power. It signals commitment and may be the only reasons $120 dollar an hour LifeTime trainers get any results. Soooo ummm, I broke my savings to pay for this sub-par training atmosphere, but I better damn well do it or my money will be lost forever into protein shake abyss. If we pay for something most of us are much more likely to do it. We attach value to things that have a cost and generally the higher the cost the higher the value. On the other hand if something is free, or really cheap like a Planet Fitness membership it is not valuable and therefore likely doesn’t produce results. You got it for nothing or for 0.001 percent of your monthly income. This is why Davis and I rarely do complete pro-bono work anymore. We become attached and really really want to help clients and this gets us into trouble, but it is also the foundation of our business, yet when we give it away people tend to not value our product or services and in the end everyone loses. So if you really want to change, put your money where your mouth is. Spend more than 10% of your income on your food. Spend money on clothing, cooking utensils, gadgets, and other items that solidify your habits. Find a quality fitness professional who can teach you how to move well forever. Invest in your health by seeing a functional medicine doc who likely doesn’t take insurance. I can absolutely promise you won’t regret a dime that you spend and who knows you may just build a granola horde of nonjudgmental cupcake squashers.
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