0 (1s):
Coming up on the, get lean, eat, clean podcast,
1 (3s):
Food choices, fix, get your food choices, taken care of like as far as the right foods to eat. And then from there you can say, okay, well now the next thing I'm going to do is I want to simplify my menu a little bit. I want to make my menu to where I'm eating rotating through a list of items that I love that are maybe like about 10. The average person eats about 10 different items in any given period where you got your eggs, your ground beef, your, you know, your typical and, and all that stuff. Doesn't even take any type of macro counting. But as long as you're kind of going through that list, you're going to see that you're going to prevent the risk of overeating and things like that because you just keeping the menu simple.
0 (47s):
Hello, and welcome to the get clean, eat clean podcast. I'm Brian grin, and I'm here to give you actionable tips to get your body back to what it wants to was five, 10, even 15 years ago. Each week. I'll give you an in-depth interview with a health expert from around the world to cut through the fluff and get you long-term sustainable results. This week I interviewed podcast hosts and health coach Danny Vega. We discussed his morning routine, his favorite health rule, along with his daily eating routine. What he learned from extended fasting, the advantage of mindful eating and the importance of mobility. Lastly, we discussed on his one tip to get your body back to what it once was.
0 (1m 30s):
This is my second time around talking with Danny. I hope you really enjoy the interview I did. And thanks so much for listening and enjoy the show. All right. Welcome to the get lean eat clean podcast. My name is Brian grin and I have Danny Vega on second part too. He's a podcast host, coach, father, a lot of other things, and I'm happy to have you on Danny. Thanks for having me
1 (1m 58s):
On brother. You, like I said, I love shooting the breeze and getting on these podcasts to talk about what we, what we do every day and what our passions are. So just love the opportunity.
0 (2m 7s):
Yeah. I appreciate you coming on. This is a part two, and I know we talked to, we were trying to look back. It was maybe almost a year ago. We, we talked what has changed since then? I know we're like getting out of the quarantine. I think things are opening up. How are things going with you and your business and clients and things, things like that. Yeah.
1 (2m 29s):
Well, just like we had spoken about before we started recording, like I am relaunching the podcast to a, a little bit of a different format, so that's the first thing that's happening. So we'll, we'll be going away from this current model that we have now where we're, we're bringing on guests all the time and we just want to interact more with the audience. You know, people, people seem to like that. And, and we like to have opportunities to where, you know, let's say I created this an intake form that people can fill out to apply, to be on the podcast where we can talk about specific issues, whether it's dealing with nutrition or fitness or trying to get your family and your kids on board, traveling, all the things that, that we have kind of mastered in our own lives.
1 (3m 19s):
And we want to impart on people and there's so much that we don't really, we just take it for granted, you know? And so getting these opportunities to talk with people and have others listen in on the conversation, I think is going to be really helpful so that they can just take advantage of what we've learned with. And like I said, we take for granted. The other thing is we are right now, I was just working on that before we got on I'm working on the appendix for the children's book that I told you that we were writing. Oh yeah. So that's, that's pretty much done the, you know, the next steps are, are really just getting it in the right format for the ebook and for the hard copy and getting the illustrations done.
1 (4m 1s):
We got a really cool cover so far. Yeah. And the cool thing is we had a friend of ours, who's a copywriter and he's a great editor. We paid him to run through it one more time. And because we had gone through it so many times, we were still finding grammatical stuff, you know, spelling stuff. And he gave us the idea to make that appendix, which I've been telling people like on interviews. When we talk about the book about how exciting it was to pay homage to people in my life, experiences in my life and all these other issues that go into, even just writing like the names of characters and certain anecdotes in the book, and now I'm actually spelling that I'm spelling them out.
1 (4m 41s):
So like for example, it was really cool. Like we have Dr. Libertas is, you know, he's the mentor, he's the Yoda of the story. And then we have mayor Marelli. Who's kind of like the, the, the, we know early on that, he's the villain. And so when you look at Libertas, which is, you know, derived from the Latin word or it's Libertas is I think that's how you pronounce it, but Liebherr means both book and freedom. So his, his goal is to take Memphis Smith, the main character out of the darkness of ignorance and into the light of knowledge so that he can handle this situation that he's going through.
1 (5m 21s):
And then you have Marelli, which is derived from the Latin word or from the Italian word Morello, which means black. And so he's trying to put not only the main character, but everyone who's in his little plan, bring them into, back into ignorance and put other ideas in their head. So just little things like that, it's been really cool to do. And we're working on a kid's workbook, a parents and kids workbook so that they can, after every chapter, you know, have some cool exercises to, to go over what they learned. Other than that, man, it's just, I'm just putting my head down and working really, really hard. We have a few things that I'm working on. I don't really want to give too many details yet because they were just ideas.
1 (6m 3s):
But I will say that live events are something that I'm really getting into. Now, I'm trying to figure out the logistics of it and the planning and everything. So, because I really want to connect with specifically men for like a weekend event. So we got a few things like that coming up that are just still in the early phases, but it's one of those things that you just put your head down, you work on it a little bit every day and you kind of cross that list off as you go through time. And then like you said, time flies. And before we know it it'll be launched.
0 (6m 38s):
Yeah. You know, I, I find that like, just for productivity, doing stuff, doing a little bit every day and try to do it when you're most productive, like in the morning for me, once it gets to the afternoon, things just fade. I think we like sort of lose. At least for me, I lose. I'm not as productive, I should say. So doing a little bit every day. And I think that goes true with like health and wellness and everything and in nutrition and working out. What is, what is your been like your daily routine now? I know it changes over time. I think last time we talked, you were maybe getting back into martial arts. I'm not sure what you're doing right now, but you're you're are looking Jack right now. You look a little bit bigger than maybe the last.
0 (7m 20s):
Maybe it's just the shirt. No, no people are
1 (7m 23s):
Saying that. I think it's also because it has changed because I am on day 56, I think, of 75 hard. And so I totally agree with you on, you know, getting stuff done as early in the morning as possible. So I'm still waking up early. Like right now I got my alarm at five. I just feel better than, you know, four 30, that extra 30 minutes give it gives me a little bit extra REM. And then I go through my morning routine. And then after my morning routine, I have about one more hour of work that I can get done until 8:00 AM. So 8:00 AM I go in? And I go for my first Lyft because I have to work out today that I got to do that.
1 (8m 4s):
So that
0 (8m 6s):
What's your morning routine. I don't, I know you said. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no. Cause I know we talked about, I always, I talk about this with my guests. I like love it. I think it's just like, it's like my favorite part of the day, the morning routine. What, what, what's your like
1 (8m 21s):
Dude, same thing. Same thing. It really is just like the best part of the day. So first thing I do is I turn on my sauna and my red light that don't, don't really need to turn on the red light, but the sauna needs to warm up for about 10, 15 minutes. Are you doing it for red? Yeah, it's an infrared sauna, which I love it's, it's a Sunlighten so it kind of, it has a pad and it has a dome and it will warm you up really quick. The only thing kind of sticking out is my head. You don't really want to, you know, fry your brain. So my head is the only thing sticking out and, and it does infrared. And then I got also put the red light therapy, which is also infrared. So the red light is good for hair and skin and like, you know, anything that's on the surface for healing and things like that, but it won't penetrate past the skin.
1 (9m 10s):
The infrared will. And so the infrared eye I'm shining that, that infrared on my head for that 20 minutes that I'm in the sauna and that's all the mitochondria and my brain is just energizing my whole brain. I honestly think that was part of how I got through last year where I was losing sleep and it, my habits were getting bad because of the anxiety and everything. It was one of the ways that I kind of hacked myself into some sort of productivity with less sleep. But while I'm in that
0 (9m 39s):
Go, the infrared, how long you in there for,
1 (9m 41s):
So, yeah, it's 20 minutes everyday so that I have the, the infrared and red light set to 20 minutes. So as soon as I get into the sauna, I know I'm done when the, when the light turns off. Okay. So, so that whole time I'm in there. The first thing I'll do is I will open up an app called abide. It's like a prayer and meditation app. So there's something to focus on every day you listen and then you meditate. And there's an always like I do the 10 minutes. And then I always give myself like an extra five minutes of just contemplation as the sounds are playing in my ears. And then what I'll do is I'll open up the Bible app and I'll look at, there's like a daily story with someone who's kind of reading the verse and giving their interpretation of it.
1 (10m 27s):
And then as soon as I'm done with that, I head straight to the shower and I do a cold shower for as long as it stays cold. If I was in Chicago, like you are, I'd be able to take a five minute cold shower, but I can't like down here, the water gets warm after like a minute or two, it kind of stinks. You know, the water warms up. Even if you have it all the way to the coolest part, it's only the winter.
0 (10m 55s):
We can fix that. You should get one of those, you know, I've seen some stuff, there's some companies now that are making these cold, you know, these cold punches that might not be a bad thing to get. If you're having issues with that. There's a few, I can't think of the name, but there's a few companies that are they're, they're, they're specializing in just for, you know, I know Brad Kearns is a big coal plunger and he does that, but so yeah, you should. Yeah. He makes his own like, I guess there's some type of, yeah, yeah.
1 (11m 26s):
I know Mike, I think my friend Mike also Mike muscle does the horse trough also.
0 (11m 30s):
Okay. Yeah. Any anyway, so I like that. So you do, so I put an infrared sauna in, I just moved and I'm trying to figure out the best time to use it. I I've been doing it more towards the evening because I find that actually, if I'm in there for 20, 30 minutes, I'm actually, I mean, it's so relaxing, but I'm like, almost like done, you know, it's like, you get that sweat in, but, but I like how you followed it up with the cold therapy, because that would wake you back.
2 (11m 59s):
Yeah. You know? So that makes sense. I like that.
1 (12m 2s):
Yeah. And like, I've, I've, I'm like you I've, I've thought about that at night. Like the one thing with the nighttime, you know, a lot of the people that I speak to will do like a cold shower at night. And I guess the, the thought process behind that is that you're going to get that you're going to kickstart that lower body temperature, but I it's so hard to tell, you know, because the body always compensates, you know, I always put about, it's almost two hours between my sauna in the morning and the workout because yeah. If I were to train right after that, that'd be brutal. So it's like, I, I I'm out of the sauna by like 6:00 AM and I'm, you know, drinking my coffee, doing my morning reading and then getting my, just going over some Sundays.
1 (12m 52s):
Mt. And I, my wife and I, we, we do our weekly plan and we just kind of go over, okay, what do we got on Monday, Tuesday logistics, things like that. And then daily, I'm going to open up my calendar because sometimes people will book consults. So during those time periods, if I had something tended to be written, I would take that out and move it around if I get a consult. So just that, that 15 minutes of going over the day schedule and then doing that first hour work block before I go to the gym, I feel like I can allow myself to go to the gym that way. And if it were up to me, I would probably ideally train mid day because you know, I'm doing two workouts a day now because of 75 hearts.
1 (13m 39s):
So you got to get the early one in pretty early, because you got to put three hours in between sessions and one of them's gotta be outside. So it's just, it complicates things. But you got to kind of stay on top of your schedule, which I like
0 (13m 52s):
Now explain to me, is it, did you say 75 hard? I'm assuming that's what two workouts a day.
1 (13m 59s):
Yeah. So 75 hard Andy Frisella was one who came up with it, the CEO of a first form, the I've never really taken the supplements, but the guy's really smart. He came out with this in 2019 and it was just a really simple challenge to where, you know, you want to, if you want to transform your mind and get on like the right path, this is a great start because it's basically, you do 10 pages of reading a day and it's nonfiction and it's gotta be, you know, not a, an audio book, obviously then you have to do a gallon of water. You have to do 2 45 minute workouts. One of them has to be outside.
1 (14m 40s):
You have to follow a specific diet, whatever you outlined for yourself, you follow that diet and there's no cheating or alcohol for 75 days. I believe those are the all of re the daily requirements. And you go through that checklist. And if you don't hit one item on the checklist, you got to start back on day one. So that's why we're, we're, we've had times where we've had to walk almost at midnight to get in like a 45 minute workout. Cause we'd been traveling and, you know, lots of things like that, where you have to adjust, but I think it does help you get stronger because you know, those are the typical excuses that we give ourselves and give ourselves a little too much leeway.
1 (15m 20s):
But I am gonna, I am looking forward to a break there's a whole year long process that you can do. Like, let's say you do 75 hard. You can do phase one after. And I think that when you add like a five minute cold shower and there's like little, little habit stacking opportunities throughout each phase, but I think you'd get a break between phases. So I'll play around with that mid day training session because I think it's, it's just perfect. I really do agree that the morning is the most productive time of the day. I do things later in the day and they take probably 50% longer. Yeah.
0 (15m 57s):
Yeah. And you know what? I changed one of my, I used to work out like, I, I was more of a morning workout, but then I realized I wanted to do like, like PR like just producing things for my business in the morning. Cause that's when I was like sharp. And like I've been doing the mid day workouts, like one, two o'clock and then it's and then news yell. I actually, we can talk a little bit about this, but then, you know, so I'm in a fasted state, I've been doing facet workouts. I really liked them. I might have a little pre-workout maybe just a little caffeine or something and then I'll just work out. And then typically after that, I'll, I'll break my fast and you know, that's been a good routine for me. Are you?
0 (16m 38s):
I know you and we'll talk about it. I know you did a longer, fast, but what is your fasting times looking like now?
1 (16m 46s):
Yeah, so like that depends on the day. So I have some days where I have like tomorrow, for example, I'm doing twice a week where I'm training with my buddy, Zach he's, he's a of movement guy and he's at a place called movement therapy. I think it's called movement movement therapy. Okay. And we do all types of stuff with kettlebells, opening up my hips, my spine, my knees, all these things that I've just like really ingrained these, these bad patterns from lifting heavy all these years. And so on a day like that, like tomorrow I'll go to him at 9:00 AM and then I'll have a comeback and I won't eat until 1130.
1 (17m 28s):
And then I'll, I'll probably, I always cut off my food at 8:00 PM because yeah, I wrote, since I was already following the ketogenic diet, I wrote in for myself another rule, which has been my favorite rule, which is cutting off my food at 8:00 PM. So that's something that's been really helpful. Just cutting off my food at eight, because before I would say, well, I know I'm not supposed to do this, but I'm do it anyway. You know, you know, it's kinda like you, you, you, you don't, you don't take it as seriously unless there's some sort of real rule behind it. And so, but today I trained at eight and then at nine 30 I had my breakfast. And so now I won't eat again until like four 30 or so.
1 (18m 11s):
And then I'll take the boys to their jujitsu. I'll do my daily mile, which I'm still doing that. So I got to jog a mile and then the rest of the time I'm walking. So I usually do on those workouts. It's usually like three to four miles in 45 minutes. It's nothing crazy, but it's, it's pretty much every day. And, and, and yeah. Then I come back home and I have my keto brick when we get back in cut food off at 8:00 PM. So it's, it's three meals a day. Either the first meal is going to be around nine 30, 10:00 AM, or I'm going to skip breakfast and have lunch at like 12, have my dinner, like 4 35 and then have my, my keto break at like seven 30 or maybe eight later.
0 (18m 54s):
Nice. Yeah. Yeah. I've been, I've been having those Quito bricks are, there are almost too good. Almost too good, dude. I can't
1 (19m 3s):
Have, I can't not have one. It's hard for me to have nothing.
0 (19m 6s):
I have, you know, I find that I just throw them in from time to time. I mean, chocolate, peanut butter, anything like that?
1 (19m 14s):
Yeah. Yeah. That's what I got a bunch. I love peanut butter though. I AF when I'm finished with these chocolate peanut butter, I'll go back to peanut butter because the peanut butter by itself is awesome. Yeah,
0 (19m 23s):
Yeah, yeah. So, okay. So you're, and I'm the same way. My eating routine depends on like my workouts and what I'm doing during the day, like today might be more of a recovery day. So I might just wait longer for that first meal. And then on other days, if I, if it's a heavier workout, I might just try to consume a little bit more. And that's typically what I try to do on a day to day basis. But I think a great tip, like you mentioned, is, and I talk about it all the time is pick a time at night to cut off eating cause so many bad things can happen. Nothing good happens after, like you said, like probably eight o'clock I'd say is the latest. You probably want to cut it off.
1 (20m 4s):
Yeah, man. Bad sleep. You know? I mean, you just disturbing your, your circadian rhythms. I mean, it's just so much of it and it's, and it's just usually that time, that type of decision at that time of night is, is nearly never about hunger. Right? It's always about some sort of seeking behavior, whether it's to, you know, calm you down or, you know, that wants something that tastes good, you know, it's, it's, it's never like, oh, I want to have, you know, a ribeye at midnight. Nobody really
2 (20m 34s):
Goes for that one. Right. If you're going
0 (20m 36s):
To have something at midnight, it's probably going to be sugar for the most part. Right. And yeah, one of the things that I like to do after I eat, so I don't like keep going or like, you know, you eat and then, cause I think just eating some can lead to even, especially if it's not something that's refined can lead to just more eating and overeating. So I like to go for a walk after I eat.
1 (21m 0s):
That's good. Sometimes we'll do that. I thought you were going to save the one that I like to do, which is brush your teeth. Oh yeah. And you know what? I like that one. Yeah. And just like, all right. Th th this place is closed. The teeth are brushed. I'm not going to put the brush down. There's nothing else I can be. I
0 (21m 16s):
Like that one. Kitchen's close. I brushed my teeth. I can't eat anything else. Yeah. I like that hack. Let's talk a little bit about, I know you did it. I think you did it a few months ago. You did a, you do a 76 hour fast. Oh man. Yeah. That was awesome, dude. Yeah. I, I, you know, and I've done, you know, I fast every day, but you know, intermittent, inter intermittent fasting. I don't extended fast. I've done some, I did a three-day one about a couple months ago, but I'm curious to know how that 76 hour fast went and what you learned, dude.
1 (21m 54s):
It was, it was definitely a big learning experience because I had done two previous, 72 hour fast. And I don't quite remember the first one. I think it was pretty easy to do, but the second one I felt kind of dumb on the third day, which is, which is weird. You know, usually people feel more when you start to see like the, what it does to your adrenals. You know, there is a little bit of a ramp up in, in cortisol and you become a little bit more, you know, sympathetic state it's, which makes sense. Like you have this alert Rouse, sympathetic arousal. Yeah. The alertness for hunting and for, you know, and you smell things more. And, and you're, you're just able to focus on these things.
1 (22m 36s):
But for some reason that second time around it, it wasn't happening for me. And this time around, we had a week before we were just listening to sermons that were talking about fasting and the mindset to go to have going into the fast. And I think that like anything in life, especially anything that's kind of challenging. It's good to have a why. That's not, you know, I want to see how much weight I can lose in a few days, or I'm doing this to look better. Those things will never stick when things get tough. And so for me, and this is an idea that that goes across all belief systems, the idea of, you know, like the Stoics talk about like one is not rich because they have it, all.
1 (23m 23s):
One is rich because they, they lack want, you know, like they don't, they don't have that desire. And the only way that you can really work on things like that is, is to experience that desire and abstain from partaking in whatever it is. And there's nothing better to do that with them food. So that idea was really good to me. And it was also, I was, I was, I forgot what, what, for what reason this was happening. But I was, I was talking to a lot of people at the time with the, with the idea of, of trying to serve others. And so like talking to people about the fast, you know, I was talking to them about why this why is better and why this could help you really do a fast and really just taking a break from your typical, you know, programmed schedule, which a lot of us are.
1 (24m 17s):
I mean, I'm like a robot myself, right. And taking some time to contemplate the things that I think bring us more meaning and more purpose in life and, and reconnecting with the idea that I believe that all of us are here for a purpose. And, you know, we, we want to be looking into what that purpose is because I think that purpose connects us all that purpose allows us to help others more. And anything that can kind of get you outside of your ego and able to serve others better. It, it just, it's just a good thing, you know? So it was a great idea. It was, it was a great experience. And I remembered looking into it.
1 (24m 58s):
I was like, okay. I started my fast a little bit earlier. I think it was like Sunday at like 11 or 12:00 PM or something. And I didn't end it until Friday, whatever it was, 76 hours. And, and I just kind of, I could have probably kept going, but I was like, you know what? I'm not going to fast another day. And this is a new benchmark. Now, if I want to go more now just beat that benchmark. I don't need to blow it away. I got four hours on my last benchmark. Now maybe next time let's try to push it to 84 would be a good one, because that would be an extra half day. So if you started on a, let's say on a Sunday at 12:00 PM, that would be Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.
1 (25m 42s):
Maybe I started on Monday, but
0 (25m 44s):
Either way you right. Monday to Friday, four days. Yeah. And, and it is amazing what you can learn just from abstaining from things, right. Like I think we're just in a society where we can get everything at our fingertips right away. Right. It's true. It's
1 (26m 2s):
True. Everything. Oh, you can have things delivered within the day to get off your car. I know,
0 (26m 7s):
I know. It's like Amazon prime, like you order, there's like someone at your door, like five off, like three hours later, like, like it's crazy. I've done some longer fast. What would you say? The biggest thing you learned and you did it with your wife, right?
1 (26m 24s):
Yeah. That was the other cool thing that we did that together. Like, you know, we were kind of reading the same things and talking about
0 (26m 29s):
The same thing that helps to have something to do it with don't you think?
1 (26m 32s):
Oh yeah, dude. Yeah. Especially in your house, like, it was better for me because I I'm the cook, so I'm still having to cook the kids food, you know, and a lot of time you're cooking your kid's food. You're trying it, you know, seeing how it tastes and then when they're finished and they don't finish it, you know, you just add a little bit more cause you eat that too. And so with this, it was like, right, it's your food? Get this out of my sight. You know, you had someone next to you that was also kind of doing it. I think that makes it much easier for sure.
0 (27m 3s):
Makes a huge difference. And I was just going to say, it is amazing though, when you do start learning about and getting into fasting, that you do get to a certain point where you're like, and like you said, you could have kept going, like where you don't value food as much, I guess, or, and, and you don't, I don't know how to explain it. Right? Like you could just keep going, your body's just fueling itself off the ketones and then you could just keep going, but you're like, oh, maybe I, you know, I should just eat, you know, you're just eating just to eat sort of, you know?
1 (27m 38s):
Yeah. I think we're like, we're, we're so used to being so overfed that it's like, our brain automatically says you got to eat, man. I mean, what's going to happen. So, and then if you just take a second, just be like, well, you know, George Cahill, he was the first person to do this and you want to talk about groundbreaking this guy, I think it was 1957. He, he and his lab at Harvard, the, the prevailing knowledge at the time was that we knew that the brain needed glucose, but we just thought that if the person didn't eat glucose within a certain period of time, that they would eventually die. And this guy was like, well, I'm going to test that.
1 (28m 18s):
And I doubt the ethics review board would, would go for a study like that today, if we were still in that position. But they went for it. They found that not only did the people not died, but within that seven day period, blood sugar only dropped to a certain level and it didn't keep dropping. So there was something there that was keeping it, whether it was insulin or something else. And then they found that also that ketones were increasing. And at the time, you know, they didn't quite know what ketones were. They knew that there was a correlation between ketones and certain bad things. Like for example, you know, ketoacidosis with type one diabetics, but they didn't know that those ketones where were actually a good thing.
1 (28m 58s):
And the funny thing was like, I think the next one of the next studies he did was a 40 day study and his, his whole thought process behind that was that, well, Jesus facet for 40 days, there's plenty of people in the Bible and the old Testament as well, that, that did the 40 day fast. So if they did it back, then people are not going to die. We're just going to do it ourselves too. And they did a 40 day fast, you know? So, so the fasting thing has just been, and, and you're right about the, about, I think again, we have these programmed like responses from our brain to like really we're supposed to eat, something's going to happen. But then as you keep going through that, it's kind of like what Seneca talks about when he does that.
1 (29m 40s):
Seneca was a rich guy. He was a rich, ancient, stored philosopher. And what he would do is he would, he would basically do a day where he was, I don't know if it was a day or a week. I got to go back and read Seneca's letters, but he was, he would fast, he would dress like a popper he would make himself want. And then he would ask himself at the end, every time, like, is this what you feared? Like, it's not that bad. And I think it was good for us to give ourselves that experience, that hardship so that we can know like your fears and your anxieties are nowhere near what they, what you think they are.
0 (30m 14s):
Yeah. Right. It's like those, those hunger cues you get, I think people react so quick to them, but if you just let, let them ride out, eventually they're going to go away and you'll just get used to sort of dealing with that. You're not truly hungry. It's just more, it's just all in your mind. Really. It's psychological.
1 (30m 30s):
Yeah. Whether it's like, sometimes it's, it's like the P the setting that you're in, the people you're with the time, all of a sudden, while it's 12, it must be lunchtime, you know? And it's like all these things that you just that's, that's why mindful eating. I love because mindful eating is one of those things where it's, it's not based on rules. It's not a diet. It's, it's basically really trying to tap into why you think you need to eat right now. And going through that process and being like, owning up to the fact that, you know what, right now I want to eat because I'm stressed and I'm going to, you know, eat because I'm stressed right now. Or, you know what, I don't usually eat this, but this is mom's apple pie. It brings me, you know, memories of, you know, by now, if it were, if that were the case with my mom, I would be like, Hey, you just don't put wheat in the crust.
1 (31m 17s):
Just put something like almond flour or something. But, but it's just, yeah, it's true. It's true. It just won't. But yeah, that's, that's the thing versus like this whole idea of like, you know, I made this decision, I'm a terrible person. You know, you go through the cycles of, of, of endless, like disappointment in yourself and how you can't versus like saying, you know what, this is why I'm doing it. And I, and I admit it overall, you should be with the mindset that food is fuel and that food can't rule you. But a lot of the time, the way people are wired, you know, they're gonna, that's gonna be a battle. In fact, last week, there was interesting, I didn't know the full story.
1 (32m 0s):
I just, a friend of mine was saying that someone said that there's no such thing as food addiction, that it's really just carb addiction. And she took issue with that. And so did a lot of other people. And I, I kind of put my 2 cents in the comments. I was like, you know what, I totally identify with this because I cut carbs. It was five years ago, last week, you know, June 16th, 2016 was when I switched the keto diet. And, you know, I was, I was like, there's been times when I've eaten 8,000 calories, 6,000 calories. No, like not without even blinking, like I'll eat 500 grams of fat. And it's because I have these rules for myself that like, oh, I can't eat that food, but I'll still overeat on, I'll still overeat on ketogenic foods.
1 (32m 42s):
And so there is this pattern of obsessive behavior, and we can't just dismiss it with, take out carbs because, you know, there's a lot of people that are still dealing with obsessive eating and bingeing and things like that. So, but it was definitely an interesting conversation. I think a conversation that we should have, because if people are going into a ketogenic diet, for example, and thinking of that, this is going to be just switching your food is going to be the final answer to this problem. That's been plaguing you, you're going to see really quick that you need to adjust your expectations. And you're going to probably see that there's going to be other work that needs to be done as well.
1 (33m 25s):
That's probably more psychological and, and, and things related to that, that aren't just like physiological.
0 (33m 33s):
Right? So what you're pretty much saying is just because you switched, you know, cause Quito is sort of a hot, obviously trend. I wouldn't even call it a dye, just the way of eating. And I'm pretty the same way. Like I'm very low car by just feel better on it. But I don't count really. I don't count my macros or anything. I just, but you know, what you're saying is people could still have an issue in the sense that you can overeat on a lot of this stuff. I mean, first of all, there's so many of these keto snacks out there that oh yeah,
2 (34m 2s):
Right. It's like, it's another thing. Yeah.
0 (34m 4s):
You can go crazy with that. What would, so like you said, a lot of times you have to overcome the psychological veil that goes on. And like you said, what, what, what type of things could someone do? I mean, you know, switching to the type of fuel that you're fueling your body with is one step. What would be some other steps to overcoming overeating and things like that. I'm
1 (34m 28s):
So happy you asked that because this is, this is something that bodybuilders have known for decades. And it's something that I think we should, we should look at in our community, which is, you know, the, what is it called? Sensory sensory specific satiety, which is basically the, just picture of any animal in the animal kingdom. You never see them in the wild with an obesity problem. I mean, you don't see fat lines on the, on the Sahara, you know, on the Savannah, just, just being fat. And it's because what is in their habitat is their their menu. And it may be like four or five different things.
1 (35m 9s):
You know, the lion will eat, you know, a whole zebra and then he won't eat again for another week or two, but he's going to crush that whole thing. And it's because he is eating the food he was designed to, to eat well, here come these humans with these big old brains and the ability to process foods and make things that are not usually edible into edible food items, the way we process them. And we continue to introduce all these new, different flavors and forget about it with the S you know, food science in the seventies, you know, we started to see, oh, well, if we had sodium and sugar, we can really bring out the sugar. And it's like, it's tapping into all the same pleasure areas of the brain. And so what I'd like to focus on is the monotony effect, which is keep your menu as simple as possible.
1 (35m 56s):
And, and do it in a way, like you said, you're not, let's start with, it's kind of like my friend drew says, it's like, if you have this huge tree and you need to sculpt a beautiful, intricate sculpture out of it, the first thing you're going to do is you're going to get your chainsaws. And you're going to get your big tools that are kind of the low-hanging fruit of, of things that you need to do. And you're going to cut into that. And then when the trees down now you're going to start taking like the hatchets and the axes. And then at the very end is when you're going to be, you know, chiseling things in, it's the same thing with this. Like, let's get your food choices, fixed, get your food choices, taken care of like, as far as the right foods to eat.
1 (36m 39s):
And then from there, you can say, okay, well now the next thing I'm going to do is I want to simplify my menu a little bit. I want to make my menu to where I'm eating rotating through a list of items that I love that are maybe like about 10, the average person eats about 10 different items in any given period where you got your eggs, your ground beef, your, you know, your typical and all that stuff. Doesn't even take any type of macro counting. But as long as you're kind of going through that list, you're going to see that you're going to prevent the risk of overeating and things like that, because you're just keeping the menu simple.
0 (37m 16s):
Right. It's yeah. Like you said, like you have a few things that you always go back to, like, for me, it's, you know, fish, eggs, meat. That's like the staple of most of my meals. Maybe some Oregon meats from time to time, and then you can put some things around it to make it a little more, I dunno, colorful. I dunno. Colorful is the word, but, you know, just to add a little bit of a mix into it, like we'll occasionally have maybe onions and mushrooms, you know, from time to time, I guess it would be boring eating, but boring eating is, I dunno, you do that for long enough. And then if you have something that's like sweet or like, like we just had people over for father's day and some people brought desserts and I tried some of it, but like, honestly, it was like, there was like a key line pie.
0 (38m 7s):
I like try to look like, I just can't eat it. It's just too sweet. Like your sense, right? Like if you eat boring for long enough, if you want to say boring or healthy for long enough, and then you have something like, wow, I can not handle that. You know? Yeah.
1 (38m 20s):
And I was, I was looking through old posts of mine to look for pictures for this like five-year anniversary. And so it was really interesting to look at like what the pictures, like the posts that were associated with the pictures. And I remember seeing all these things that I was like, yeah, man, that's, that's so true. It's like, you know, this, this keeping it kind of simple. First of all, when you eliminate the carbs, you get rid of the background noise. And so now your body is more, like you said, it's more sensitive to different changes. And so like, you start to see now, for example, for me, my little where I'm deriving some, a little bit of pleasure every day is number one, the keto brick.
1 (39m 3s):
And I can chop the keto brick up, put it with some goat milk or with some nut milk, you know, like a coconut milk or something and having it like a cereal. The other thing I've been doing a lot for months now is I'm having like cheese every day. Like I have this morning, I had a little bit of cheddar in my, I had three eggs with 12 ounces of flat iron steak and some cheese for my breakfast. And then for dinner, I'm going to be doing 12 more ounces of flat iron steak. I'm going to have eight ounces of chicken thigh, and I'm going to have, I'm going to put goat cheese on that chicken thigh. And I've been eating a ton of goat cheese.
1 (39m 44s):
It just really agrees with me. But then at the same time, just being mindful of things like that, because for example, cheese is kind of one of those things for me that it it's like addictive. There's like some sort of addictive property to it, to where it either ramps up my, my appetite a little bit, or the, the propensity to start to make the cheese take over the plate. And then the cheese becomes like the main, the main character. And that's something that you gotta be aware of.
0 (40m 14s):
Yeah. I mean, it's, I would say it's fairly tough to overeat if you're having protein. Yeah. Right. I think, and, and like you said, you can add some garnishes and things on that. If you want to get a little creative, but if you can focus on just a good quality protein, it's really tough to overeat. But if you do add carbs, are you adding in certain things? I know, you know, your hair, even like Paul Saladino and stuff, he's adding in like certain things like even some fruit and some honey, what about yourself? Yeah.
1 (40m 47s):
I mean, I did so much personal experimentation in 2019 and 2020 that I just am. So at this point, like, I don't know what else I need to learn about this as far as carbs go, right? Like I did weekly carb-ups I did all types of variations. And now this year, the first and only carb-up that I did was right about a month ago when I was doing, I was basically a restarting jujitsu, which I had to also now I had to put that on the back burner again, unfortunately, because we had some car trouble with one of our cars. And then I was having to go train with my buddy twice a week, do my two, two a day workouts.
1 (41m 29s):
It just got so complicated. I was like, you know what I want to do jujitsu. I really do. But besides that, like the mobility and the stuff that I'm getting from working with my buddy, which I plan on doing that for about three months, I do twice a week. It's going on like five weeks now is just told me, you know what? I'm, I'm just gonna get rid of jujitsu. But I found that with all the stuff that I was doing, I S I felt like I was a little bit low on energy this one day. And so that day I just kind of rearranged my whole plan, went to sprouts on the way home, got some squash variations. So like, I have like a list of foods that are, that are like, you know, carby type foods that I can eat that day.
1 (42m 15s):
I had like 160 grams of carbs. So it wasn't anything crazy, but boy did it. It really did help. I felt like I topped off my glycogen levels. I just felt better the next day. And that's where I'm at now. And I think it's taken years to get there because I'm like, you know what, there's nothing to question here. I know how I feel. I did it at the right time. And there's really no other time that I'm going to include carbs. Unless like, let's say I'm on a vacation and, you know, Mazda wants to get sushi. You know, she mentioned the other day, like we wanted to, on Fridays, we usually have dinner with the kids. We take them out somewhere because we barely ever go out.
1 (42m 57s):
Right. For, for food.
0 (42m 59s):
That's another good tip. Yes.
2 (43m 1s):
You don't go out for food. Right. You'll eat a lot healthier. Yeah. Yeah. You
1 (43m 4s):
Cook at home. You have way less X factors in there that you don't know about. Like, you don't know what they're cooking or seasoning the food with the quality of the food. And she, she threw out like three or four options and one of them was sushi. And I was like, I was thinking to myself, why are you, why are you putting sushi in there? Like, it's not one of these is not like the other.
0 (43m 23s):
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, somebody loves sushi though. Yeah. No, every once in a while. Right. That's fine. I mean, so what you're saying is you'll pick a day here or there where you'll do like a car Brie feed. Is that what you were saying? Okay. And I keep,
1 (43m 37s):
I keep it ISO caloric. So I won't really bump up the calories. I'll just kind of eat the same calories. Cause right now my calories are great. Like I'm in a really happy spot. Like I'm in between 3000, 3,500 calories, sometimes a little bit more. But overall it's interesting to see that like week one, because, oh, I forgot to tell you, one of the other things for seventy-five heart is you've got to take a daily progress picture. So that's like every day, every single day. And like, if you get the app, I think the app costs five bucks. I'm like, I'm giving this guy my money because I'm really a dopamine driven person. And checking off those boxes every day is like little dopamine hits. So it's like at the end of the day, you better look at your list and you better make sure you got everything in.
1 (44m 21s):
And that's one of them is take my, my progress pick. I hate weighing myself for some reason in the last year. So I haven't weighed myself, but you can visibly see how much leaner I am and I'm not counting calories. I'm just following a plan. And I'm having some sort of discipline to my day. And it's translating into like a leaner waist and just more muscular and all that stuff.
0 (44m 46s):
Yeah, definitely. I, I'm not a big fan, especially with my clients of having them weigh themselves every day, even every week. I think, you know, a lot of times, like you said, it's how you feel. It's how your clothes fit you. And you can tell more than anyone, right? How, how that, how your clothes fit and how you feel and your, and as far as lifting, you're doing a one lift, are you taking a day off or,
1 (45m 12s):
Oh, there's no days off. So, so I mean, on Saturday and Sunday, for example, this week I did both days. I did my mile and, and walking. So both days I got in like three, three and a half miles, and then one of the days on Saturday, we had a, my son's hip hop recital. So Maori and I had to go for a walk like at 10 o'clock at night, you know, which kinda sucks. God didn't think it was going to be that long, but you know, some of these things drag on, and then the other day we did 30 minutes of walking. And then I did the other 15 minutes of doing the specific stretches that I'm going through, like with my hip rotators.
1 (45m 55s):
Yeah. All the areas that I'm working on.
0 (45m 58s):
Yeah. I think, I think that mobility aspect is so important because like, I'm sure, like a lot of my clients are 40 plus 50 plus years old and I just, they don't do anything. Like, even if it's just like 10 minutes of like some mobility work, like in the morning, I like to do like probably a 20 minute mobility work every morning, just for, like you mentioned hips, any, any, you know, chest arm, you know, any, any type of mobility work. And that could be some type of yoga, you know, you don't need some necessarily a specific plan. I mean, you sort of can feel what needs work. I think if you do, you know, just a basic flow in the morning, just like a sun salutation yoga, I think that'll just make a difference.
0 (46m 43s):
And as you get older, like at least for me, like my hips just have gotten tighter and tighter if I don't do anything. Yeah.
1 (46m 50s):
And, and, you know, it's interesting because like in college or in grad school, I wrote a paper on static stretching, for example. And, and I was, I remember specifically looking at the literature for injury prevention and for increasing mobility or increasing yeah. Increasing active flexibility with static. And I remember I was probably a little bit biased. So, you know, number one, it showed that it didn't decrease the risk of injury. And number two, it showed that, you know, it wasn't really helpful for increasing flexibility. And that's because I, if I would have gone a little bit deeper, I would have put this in the paper.
1 (47m 34s):
What I know now, which is, you know, there's certain things like, for example, if you are relying on some sort of external stimulus to generate flexibility, whether it's like a strap that you're pulling your leg back or things like that, then of course, if you take out that external piece of equipment or someone pushing down on you, you're not going to maintain it. And so it is important. I think now, even, even now knowing what I know to do some static stretching, but then also making sure that you're able to go to the full length of a range of motion while moving. So a lot of this stuff that I do are either a progression of body weight to weighted, or sometimes just body weight, but it's going through these things in a dynamic ver like a dynamic form.
1 (48m 25s):
And, but still using this static stretching, if anything, it's a great way to cool down. So I did, my, my cool-down today was, you know, I put my heel up on, or actually the top of my ankle up on something elevated like a box. And then I'll put my knee on the ground and I'm stretching my whole quad and hip flexor do that on both sides for a minute, switch to the standing figure for, for my hip rotators. And then do two minutes of sitting on my heels to again, stretch my, my quads. And I run through the same thing twice. So I think just daily doing that, it's going to help when I get back on the match with jujitsu, there's certain positions I can't get in because of my hip flexibility and things like that.
1 (49m 10s):
So, you know, it's good to see the progress doing that. And especially like, like me, the one lifting stuff, running sprints, all that stuff is so natural to me. But working on this stuff is a pain in my butt. But the cool thing is that I'm kind of a beginner here. So I do get to see those beginner games. So it brings me back to that dopamine where I'm getting some sort of satisfaction from the progression.
0 (49m 37s):
Yeah. I mean, nowadays, especially now with like obviously YouTube and stuff, there's, you can find mobility movements to do like, there's no excuses and you don't need to do them for that long, you know, a little bit every day. I mean, for example, right now I'm kneeling. I mean, I don't even sit that's awesome. I try not to sit. People are like, God, doesn't that bother your knees? I mean, I have like an Eric's pad, so it's thick. So I'm not in hip flection. My hips are extended for, you know, for a lot of day. I just gotten away from sitting. I mean, I sit sometimes, but 80% of the time I either kneel or stand. I like
1 (50m 14s):
The kneeling. I didn't think of the kneeling. I could do that at my, at my table over
0 (50m 17s):
There. Yeah. I mean, you could probably do it right there. I mean, I'm, I'm kneeling right now and you know, I have
1 (50m 23s):
That pad too, by the way, I have it. Cause we, we, we use it at home when we do stretching. I'm just going to try that out, try it
0 (50m 29s):
Out. It takes a while to get used to, and you got to sort of rotate knees a little bit, but not, you know, it, you get used to it. Like I actually need to replace that air, the Sarah's plan. It's almost getting to the point where it's like indented all the way. I know. Yeah. It's getting there. Well, I figured this has gone fast almost an hour. Why don't, why don't we finish up with, I think last I last time I asked you a great tip for, you know, middle-aged individual to get their body back to what it once was. And I guess let's go down that road again. What would you say to someone that's forties, fifties, sixties, that, you know, weight can creep up on you, you know, time flies and before you know what you look, you have some kids you're look, you put on 10, 15 pounds, what would you say would be, you know, a good tip to start that person off.
0 (51m 17s):
Right. I
1 (51m 19s):
Don't remember what I said last time. It might've been walking because I remember just the importance of walking, you know, for cardiovascular, for your brain health, all of those things was, is important. So hopefully people are getting a walking into their day and, and you know, just my recommendation. If you got an hour to do a walk, then definitely break it into two 30 minute walks just because we need to get out of these patterns of like sitting all day. A lot of people are doing that and you know, I noticed when I first got into this, you know, I left my corporate job where I was, I was in the hospital all day and scrubs walking around.
1 (51m 60s):
All of a sudden I got back issues. My hip flexors are tight. My hip flexors are weak, you know, so the walking, I still, you know, stick to that. But I also now is, you know, look into all of the areas of your body that feel stiff, think of yourself as a 360 degree, you know, 3d person. And if we divide our body into all these planes, you know, the typical anatomy we have our sagittal plane, which is what most people are doing, which is like anything where you're doing a pushup, a pull-up a squat, you know, a lunge, all those things are in the sagittal plane. Think about doing things in the frontal plane.
1 (52m 42s):
You know, how, how do you feel getting into a lateral lunge, you know, a lunge out to the side, think of yourself, think of the transverse plane, like any type of twisting, try to do spinal wave, see how your, how your ability to, to, to unstick your spine from the cervical to the thoracic, to the lumbar. Because that's one thing that I've noticed with just that compression of really heavy lifting, you know, I can do these spinal waves. And then when I get to that lumbar, it's almost as if like they're fused together because of all of the, the load that I've put in on them. So I'm trying to unstick my spine so that I'm able to move more naturally the same thing with my hips, my abduction, which is like, you know, internal, our internal rotation, internal rotation and abduction, which abduction is just, you know, pressing something in.
1 (53m 33s):
And then you have AB duction abduction is when you're pressing something out and that's going to affect your glutes and your hip rotators. So just look at all those areas and then spend a little bit of time getting just a little uncomfortable. You don't want to feel pain, but opening them up because I know now that while I've always known that, that the body's a kinetic chain and, you know, guys, I think tend to deal with this more because we are a little bit stronger. And so we can get away with creating really poor motor patterns. And women tend to be really great with form because they have to overcome that initial lack of strength.
1 (54m 13s):
And then when you get a strong woman with good form should wipe the floor, the dude. So, so yeah, like definitely get into more of the flexibility stuff and the mobility stuff. Don't just rely on, you know, your, your chiropractor or your massage therapist to beat you into submission, try to, you know, generate that, that stability internally and that mobility internally so that your body is moving the right way. Because a lot of these issues, they're always chronic, not always, but a lot of the time they are, it's rarely like, unless you're a strong man and you drop like a 300 ton thing on your foot and break your foot off, you know, it's usually like these bad patterns that over time, all of a sudden, oh man, I, you know, I, my rotator cuff for, you know, my biceps tendon, things like that.
0 (55m 3s):
Yeah. Yeah. So I guess to sum it up, go for walks and work on mobility, right? I mean, I think as the age, those are two good hacks to do. And, and as far as working on mobility, you don't have to do a ton every day. You can just do 10 minutes a day and it adds up over time, especially if we want to play any type of sport as you get older. Cause I know quite a bit of golfers and that's one thing that can go is, you know, thoracic mobility and then hips. Wow.
1 (55m 30s):
Anybody, if anybody's curious, you mentioned Brad, Brad Kearns, just look up Brad, Kearns morning, routine morning, flexibility or morning mobility routine. And he'll show you on his YouTube, literally in bed. He's showing you what he's doing even in bed before he gets out of bed. And then when he gets out of bed, he'll continue it. And it takes, like you said, five, 10 minutes every single morning. And he he's religious about
0 (55m 54s):
Yeah, love that. Well, Danny, this was great. This was a quick hour dude. Seriously. I don't know where time goes, but I appreciate you coming on and we'll look out for all the new things. You, what, where can someone where's the best place if they just want to see some of your new stuff that's coming out?
1 (56m 13s):
Well, definitely check out fat field.family. That's our website. That's where the podcast and everything is our blog. I'm doing something on the blog right now with, I'm leading up to the launch of my wife's at leisure brand in September. So I'm helping her with that. And I'm going through kind of the daily things that I'm doing to, to really show like how I've learned from people that are really good at, at promoting products and launching products and building teams to promote a launch products and, and Danny vega.ms on Instagram is where I'm most of the time doing my stuff.
0 (56m 49s):
Awesome. Well, Danny, I appreciate it. We'll look out for your kid's book as well. That's exciting. All right. Well, thanks so much for coming on. Thanks a lot, man. Hey, get lean equally nation. Are you a man between the ages of 40 and 60 years old looking to lose inches around your waist have significantly more energy throughout the day and gain muscle all while minimizing the risk of injuries? Well, I'm looking for three to five people to work one-on-one with in my fat burner blueprint signature program, which I've developed by utilizing my 15 years experience in the health and fitness space.
0 (57m 29s):
This program is designed specifically for those committed, to making serious progress towards their health goals. Over the next six months, we will focus on sleep stress, nutrition, meal, timing, and building lean muscle. If this sounds like a fit for you, email me@bryanatbriangrin.com with the subject line blueprint. That's brian@briangrin.com with the subject line blueprint. Thanks for listening to the get lean eat clean podcast. I understand there are millions of other podcasts out there and you've chosen to listen to mine. And I appreciate that. Check out the show notes@briangrin.com for everything that was mentioned in this episode, feel free to subscribe to the podcast and share it with a friend or family member that's looking to get their body back to what it wants was thanks again, and have a great day.
