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#161 - 6 Things GLP-1s Teach Us About Losing Weight and Keeping It Off
34 Plays17 days ago
GLP 1s have changed the weight loss conversation, but even if you never use one, there are practical lessons we can take from how they work.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
• Why calories still matter most for weight loss, and how GLP 1s help reinforce the truth that eating less is the main driver of fat loss.
• How managing hunger can make weight loss feel easier, and simple ways to stay fuller with protein, fiber, high volume foods, better sleep, and regular meals.
• Why weight loss is not just physical, and how food noise, stress eating, boredom eating, and your relationship with food can make consistency harder.
• Why keeping the weight off comes down to sustainability, muscle building, and learning the habits you can actually keep doing for years.
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Transcript
Introduction to the Fit-ish Project
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome back to the Fit-ish Project with your host Lathan Bass where we make fitness and health simple for regular people like you and I. We got another weekly episode as we always do.
00:00:15
Speaker
Before I get into this just a quick reminder if you can continue to leave reviews help get this show out to more people who can use this information to look better feel better live better live longer all that good stuff that we want to get out of having good health and good fitness habits.
Exploration of GLP-1 Medications
00:00:32
Speaker
The topic for this week, I wanted to do a topic talking about GLP-1s and not specifically about whether or not to take GLP-1s or my views on GLP-1s or try to convince you one way or the other, but more so what we can actually gather and learn from these medicines because These medicines are one of the most popular things on the market right now, and they seem to be having a lot of really good benefits for a lot of people. Now, there's some downsides to these drugs and some things that people don't necessarily know or that we just don't know as a collective because they haven't been around all that long.
00:01:09
Speaker
But for right now, what we know is that people are having quite a bit of success with these drugs. And I think there's a lot that we can learn from these. So whether or not you're planning on taking one of these or not, I think one really smart thing that you can do whenever you have some certain goal or you want some certain result is to look at things that are already working really well, whether that be looking at somebody who has achieved the goal that you wanna achieve and figuring out what skills they have built to get that goal, whether that is looking at some sort of methodology or protocol or strategy and figuring out how that can apply to your situation or whether it's looking at like a diet or a workout plan or whatever.
00:01:49
Speaker
there's always things that you can learn from other things that you can use to apply to your situation. And so you look at this certain thing or this person or this strategy and you figure out, okay, what are the things that are actually going to be useful? Like, why is this thing working? What are the benefits of this thing? And then what is the stuff that doesn't really matter? Get rid of that stuff and then take the things that are going to actually move you closer to your goal. And then how do you apply that to your situation? And I think GLP-1s is a really, really good one that we can start to look at to see how we can not only just lose weight, but just be healthier in general. I think that there's a lot of really good insights that we can glean from this topic. And so I wanted to dive into that today. So I have six different things that you can learn to improve your health. And especially if you do have some weight loss goals, these will be very helpful to you in just about how you think about losing weight and just fitness and health in general.
00:02:40
Speaker
Without further ado, let's get into this. So lesson
Calorie Intake and Weight Loss
00:02:42
Speaker
number one that we can learn from GLP ones is that calories matter more than anything else for weight loss. There's lots of confusion even to this day about how to lose weight. And it's kind of crazy because I mean, the science is very clear. The only way to lose weight is to be in a calorie deficit. So if you eat too much, you will not lose weight. If you eat too little, or if you eat less than your body needs, you are going to lose weight. That's called being in a calorie deficit. That's energy balance. That is the only way that we are able to lose weight.
00:03:12
Speaker
And for so long, and even to this day, there's still so many myths around weight loss about like carbs are the issue about people not being able to lose fat or why people are struggling with obesity. Certain foods make people fat. So if I go and eat two donuts, I'm going to magically just put on two or three pounds overnight. eating late at night is going to make people fat snacking too much or snacking at all is what is making people gain weight or even certain things like that people start to stress over when it comes to thinking about like the details around like weight loss about like which diet is better for weight loss or should i eat smaller meals more frequently or big meals less often what's my perfect macro split should i be focusing on this supplement or that supplement there's so many different things that you can start to focus on
00:03:59
Speaker
in the weight loss world or just in health and fitness in general. And one thing that I've realized just with working with everyday people is that when there is confusion and when people don't really know where to look or where to focus their energy, they oftentimes just don't do anything at all. Or they put their energy into the wrong things versus if they would just focus on a handful of things, they could make much better progress and actually create some momentum and see more of the results that they want to see. And so the bottom line is this, like,
00:04:27
Speaker
These GLP-1s work because people are eating less. They control our appetite and how often people are eating and how much people are eating. And when people eat less food, they lose weight.
00:04:39
Speaker
And that's just the bottom line with this. And so understanding that If you wanna lose weight, if you wanna manipulate how your body looks, if you want to lose a few pounds and start to improve your health and those sorts of things, then you need to understand that that's the biggest lever. That's where you really wanna be putting your focus in order to make that goal happen. And this isn't to say that other things aren't important along with your health or along with weight loss. Like this is not to say that your hormones are irrelevant or that the food quality that you are eating is irrelevant or even like the practicality of the plan that you're using doesn't matter because
00:05:14
Speaker
All those things are important. But when you're confused, or when you don't know where to turn, or when you don't know what you should be focusing on, like this is the thing that can get you there. It's an extremely simple. If you're eating too many calories for your body,
00:05:30
Speaker
you are not going to lose weight. It's just as simple as that. So if you're confused, if you don't know where to look, if you don't know where to start, if you are wondering why you can't lose weight, you can always start with that because that's a really good place to start to get you moving in the right direction so that you can actually get that ball rolling and starting to see some progress is to just focus on calories.
00:05:48
Speaker
Lesson
Managing Hunger for Weight Loss
00:05:49
Speaker
number two, managing hunger is crucial for weight loss success. Again, the reason these drugs work really well is because they help to regulate people's appetite.
00:06:00
Speaker
They physically slow down the emptying of food out of your system so that people feel like they are staying full for longer. At the same time, they also work on the brain and they help to turn down like food noise and just how much and how often people are thinking about food and even wanting food, which I'll get into some of those details in a little bit. But I think from the physical part of this and just thinking about, okay, if I want to manage my hunger a little bit better, there are definitely some things that you can start to do to manage that physical hunger. And again, before I mentioned some of these things that you can start to do to manage your physical hunger, it's just understanding that physical hunger is different from cravings or different from wanting food. Like physical hunger is something that you feel in your stomach. You feel like maybe a little bit less energized or it's just different than that that psychological feeling of like wanting food. And so if you are actually physically hungry, things that you can start to do to help yourself out is to eat a higher protein diet because we know that that's more satiating it keeps you full for longer so adding in more lean proteins more chicken more beef more eggs things like that that are high in protein can help adding in more fiber for that same exact reason because fiber helps to keep us full and satiated as well high volume foods so you're eating foods that are big in quantities but less in calories so think of this like your salads your lean proteins your fruits your vegetables
00:07:24
Speaker
oats, rice, things that you can eat very big amounts of, but they're not stacking your calories way up. And when you think about some of these items, like some of these foods, like a pound of strawberries, an entire pound of strawberries is 150 calories. If you eat an entire bag of broccoli, it's like 80 calories. A big old bowl of fruit would be somewhere in the neighborhood of like 100 to 200 calories. So again, thinking about how you can eat more food for less calories, because back to that first point, calories and the number of calories that you're eating,
00:07:53
Speaker
is extremely important if you have goals around weight loss. Another one would be to just eat on a regular eating schedule. So you're not just finding yourself eating at random times throughout the day, because if you're eating on a regular schedule, it's much easier to predict when you're actually going to have some of that physical hunger, your body is very good at adapting and getting used to a certain feeding schedule that you start to implement. So like if you've ever tried to implement intermittent fasting for a while, You're hungry in the beginning, but then your body gets pretty good at downregulating that hunger. Let's say if you skip breakfast most days, you're not going to be super hungry in the morning after you have done that for a period of time because your body gets used to that. But if you're eating sporadically or you're eating all throughout the day, like all the time, it's a little bit more difficult to manage that hunger because it's coming at unpredictable times. And then the last thing that I would mention about this, about just helping yourself out with managing physical hunger is just getting good sleep. We know that when your sleep is trash, you are typically going to be more hungry. You're less full and satiated after meals. You're staying full for less time, which all those things make eating more often or overeating much more likely if you're getting crappy sleep.
Mental Aspects of Weight Loss
00:09:05
Speaker
Lesson number three, weight loss is not just physical, it's also mental. So I just mentioned a minute ago that these GLP ones also play a role in what's actually going on in our brains and how we think about food. So one of the things that you will hear a lot of people talk about with GLP ones is that they reduce food noise, which if you've never heard of food noise, it's basically just this idea of you're thinking about food.
00:09:29
Speaker
throughout the day. And some people have this more than others. And people who are more overweight, or have obesity, they talk about this quite a bit. And so people are thinking about food more often, and it becomes a struggle to quiet that noise. And it becomes a struggle to eat a amount of food that's actually going to be conducive to the goals that they have.
00:09:50
Speaker
And so what a lot of people are reporting after taking these drugs is that they have less of this food noise. And I think this is where some of the information misses the mark in fitness because you have certain people that are just saying you just need to work harder, be more disciplined, just put the fork down. And there is absolutely some truth to this. But I also think it's important to realize that weight loss and just managing food and dieting and things like that is more difficult for some than others.
00:10:17
Speaker
And it does. It takes real work to change this relationship around food. And in the same way that certain things are harder for some than others, like some people are good at sports. Some people are good at academics. Some people are good at math. Some people are good at cooking. Like we all have different skills.
00:10:32
Speaker
But eating is something that we all have to do. And some people don't struggle with it nearly as much as other people. So you do have to take some personal responsibility if you want to change your situation. But I also think, again, acknowledging that it is harder for some than others.
00:10:46
Speaker
At the same time, like once you realize, OK, maybe this is a little bit more difficult for me and this is something that I'm going have to really put some time and effort into. What are you going to do to improve on that situation? So I would say personally, like I had some really bad habits around food and I just had to spend some time working on those things and really dialing things in and figuring out, OK, why is it that I tend to overeat? Like, what are these things that I can start to do? What are some practical things that I can start to do to help myself out to build some of the skills, the mindset, the habit in order to improve on this? And obviously, that's worked out very well. But acknowledging that there is much more than just the physical stuff, like there is a mental component to health and fitness, and especially with weight loss and figuring out what kind of diet is going to work for you there, there is a lot of that goes into this, you have to be willing to put some work into those things. And so, and so thinking a little bit more about food noise and how to address this, let's say if you're a person who maybe you aren't going to be taking a GOP one, but you do have a lot of this food noise. First is just to understand and realize like where this is coming from.
Understanding and Managing Food Noise
00:11:49
Speaker
Some people just think about food more than others. Like if you've ever met Some of those people who would just say like, oh i forgot to eat today or like they skip meals and they don't even think twice about it or they're just not really all that interested in food. Like they always leave food on their plate or they're just not really that interested in sweets or certain foods or nice meals or anything like that.
00:12:07
Speaker
I'm personally not that person, but there are people like that out there. if You're one of those people who you just really like food, like you're a foodie and you enjoy food. You enjoy eating. You enjoy certain dishes and different things like that. Well, food noise can start to be a little bit more of a hurdle in your life. If you're somebody that does really enjoy food, I think other things like emotional eating, like stress eating, like boredom eating also come into play here because with food noise, I think a lot of that stems from just having a bad relationship with food. And so we all have different ways that we cope with emotions or cope with certain situations or we get in
00:12:43
Speaker
a stressful time or we get in a busy time or we have an emotional situation. And one of the things that a lot of people turn to is food. Food makes people feel good. It's a comfort thing. It's sometimes something that you do when you're stressed or when you're bored. It's just something to do that you get a little bit of that dopamine hit. You like the taste of food. It feels good in the moment. And that can lead to some bad habits down the line, especially if this is something that you've been doing since you were a kid. You've been doing this for five years, 10 years, 15, 20 years. Like these are things that you've been doing for a really long time. And food has just become kind of that crutch that go to in order to get you through certain situations or handle certain emotions.
00:13:22
Speaker
That's where food noise and that's where this mental component of really figuring out these things becomes super important. And so understanding where it starts, I think is the first key to this. But then also, once you realize, okay, these are some issues. And I do realize that when I am stressed, I do tend to eat or when I am going through a rough time like Food is something that I do, or I'm just bored all the time. So I'm just finding myself eating for no other reason than there's just food available and I just want something to do. How do you actually start to move to more positive behaviors that are gonna help you out? i think the first thing is just creating so more awareness around food. And so a lot of people just mindlessly eat.
00:13:58
Speaker
But once you start to realize, okay, these are certain situations that I find myself overeating in, you can start to address some of these things. So some super simple things that you can start to do to start building some awareness and implementing some of these strategies so that you can actually break through these old patterns is...
00:14:14
Speaker
before you eat anything, just take 10 minutes to decide if you actually want that thing. So let's say you're sitting at your desk at work, or you're sitting there watching a little Netflix at night, and you have this itch to go grab something to eat. Before you go and have that thing, just wait 10 minutes, like give yourself 10 minutes, think about it a little bit more and see, am I actually physically hungry here?
00:14:34
Speaker
Do I actually really want this thing? Or am I just doing this because I'm bored? Or Because I want something to do or because I'm a little bit stressed or because I didn't get great sleep last night. Is this actually a decision that I want to make? Give yourself a little bit of time to make that conscious decision rather than making this decision unconsciously because a lot of our food choices and a lot of our mindless eating just comes out of habit.
00:14:55
Speaker
Another thing I would tell you is after you do eat, like whether it be a snack or a meal, is just to start reflecting a little bit more. So just checking in to see like, did I eat too much during that meal? Do I feel full and satiated? like Did I eat a adequate amount or am I overeating? Like all these little things that you can start to just realize and start to make better decisions next time will be helpful. But when you're just mindlessly eating throughout the day, you never really take any time to pause or reflect or anything like that. You're just going to continue with the same habits that you have. So you have to start thinking about these things a little bit more to change the behavior.
00:15:31
Speaker
Number three would be to find better ways to manage stress or emotions or boredom. If food is the thing that you turn to in those situations, find other habits or other things that you can replace food with. So for some people that's exercise, for some people that's another type of hobby, for some people that's walking, for some people that's listening to music, for some people that's going to talk to somebody, whatever, it doesn't matter. Just find different ways that you can start to regulate in those situations or in those scenarios so that you're not just always turning to food.
00:16:04
Speaker
Once you have better awareness around food, then it's so much easier to start to make better choices. But if the thing that you're trying to change, you're not really aware of, and you're just continuing to just mindlessly eat, it's going to be damn near impossible to change your behavior.
00:16:19
Speaker
Lesson number four. The power of convenience is real. A huge
Convenience in Weight Loss Methods
00:16:24
Speaker
reason that GLP ones are super popular is because they reduce friction and that makes them extremely appealing because In order to lose weight, you have to put ah quite a bit of effort into losing that weight. But if I can give you this pill or this injection, and that's going to help to boost your weight loss progress or your weight loss results, a lot of people are going to take that. Like as humans, we love convenience, especially if it's something that we know is going to take a long time.
00:16:52
Speaker
A lot of us would rather choose something that is going to help us get that result faster. And that's, you can look around our entire culture is built around that. We have things like Uber Eats. We have things like Netflix. So everything you could ever want on demand, right on your TV with a couple of clicks on your remote. That wasn't always the case. Like you used to have to drive to a movie store or a Blockbuster or whatever, grab a movie. Like if you wanted to go get restaurant food, you used to have to get in your car and go to that restaurant to get it. You can just order it through an app.
00:17:21
Speaker
If you wanted to get a taxi, you used to have to call that taxi up and then wait for it and, or schedule it ahead of time. Now you can just go on your phone and just order an Uber or a Lyft and it'll be there in a couple of minutes. So our entire culture, our society is built around convenience. And so it's no wonder that when we have things like this, that people are going to opt for this thing because it's convenient, you likely will get results a little bit quicker. And so when you're thinking about just health in general,
00:17:49
Speaker
You want to start to make the healthy choice, the easy choice. Like how can I make being a healthy and fit person more convenient? And there's different ways that you can do this. And I think the first one is just starting with building better lifelong habits.
00:18:02
Speaker
And in order to change your habits, you need to start to make these things more obvious. You want to make these habits very appealing so that you'll actually do them. You want to make them easy, especially when you're starting with these things and you want to make them more satisfying. So when we think about a couple scenarios, like the average person,
00:18:19
Speaker
They know that they need to eat a better diet. Let's say they're on point most of the week, like they're doing well, they make good choices, but then life gets a little bit busy or they get stressed out or something's going on and they don't really have any food prepped or they don't really have any go-to options or they don't really feel like making the healthy meal. So they go through the fast food drive through, they grab the DoorDash, they get the takeout.
00:18:42
Speaker
And again, this is not that you can't ever do those things, but When that becomes the norm, when that becomes just your habit that you're relying on, it's going to be much more difficult to be healthy and it's going to make hitting those goals that you have much harder. And so one simple thing that you can do would be to start to change this habit. So what could I do to replace this so that when I do get busy, when I do get stressed, when I am in a situation that is more difficult for me to stick to my healthy habits?
00:19:08
Speaker
eating, how can I implement something that helps me? Meal prep would be a super simple thing you could do. And so when we think about making this obvious, making it appealing, making it easy, making it satisfying, if I want to meal prep, I'm gonna pick one time per week to make a good amount of my meals, whether that be all my lunches for the week, or maybe lunches and a couple of dinners or breakfast and lunch, whatever, just making some of these meals so that when I get in a pinch or when things get busy, I know that I can turn to these things. So for meal prep,
00:19:36
Speaker
I'm going to schedule that, let's say on a Sunday, I'm going to find some recipes that are super easy to make, but also recipes that are actually going to taste good and that I actually like. Maybe you're like me and you don't really like cooking. And so the thought of meal prepping kind of sounds crappy. So I'm going listen to one of my favorite podcasts or listen to some good music while I'm doing it to make it more appealing to me.
00:19:56
Speaker
And then during the week when I'm eating my meal prep, I'm going to think about how much better I feel by getting close to my goals and by giving my body this nourishing food and help to reinforce that habit about how much this meal prep is actually helping me. And when you do that enough, you're going to start to reinforce this habit of like, okay, meal prep really isn't that bad. I don't mind meal prepping once a week because I get all these benefits. I actually get to listen to some music or this podcast while I'm doing it. And it doesn't suck as much as it used to.
00:20:23
Speaker
So many of the habits that I have now around health and fitness are things that I despised at the beginning. Like I did not like running when I first started. I didn't like any kind of like healthy eating or putting any time into cooking. I didn't like stretching. i didn't like doing any of these things. And so I had to make it easier. Like I had to make building these habits easier and something that I actually wanted to do.
00:20:46
Speaker
And then once I had that little foundation, once I had that habit established, then I could build on those things later. And then they became more enjoyable as I found ways to make them more appealing, make them things that I actually look forward to. And you couple that with actually making really good progress and seeing the benefits from these things. And that's how you get those habits to stick.
00:21:04
Speaker
Another really common one that I see with people all the time is like, we all know that we should be exercising or working out. And for the average person, it's like they'll get in the gym for two, three times in a week. And then they may be the next week, they only get in one time per week. And then something comes up, life gets busy, stressful, work is crazy. And then they don't get any workouts in the next week. And then the next week, they're back in there. They're in there three times a week. but then they're super sore. So then they only go back one time the next week. And so throughout the week, they're just up and down. The consistency is just not good. So simple thing that you could do to make this habit stick, make it more appealing, make it more satisfying, make it easy, get yourself a workout app. And I've seen this with clients and just something as simple as having your workout done for you. And just knowing I can flip open my phone and click on my workout, know exactly what exercise I should be doing, exactly the amount of reps and the things that I should be doing when I get to the gym is so small and minuscule. And it sounds like such a simple thing, but I've seen with so many people that when they have this in place, their workouts are better. Their consistency is better. They actually enjoy going to the gym. They see better progress. And it's all because they just did this one simple thing.
00:22:15
Speaker
So like with a workout app, everything is already done for you. So it's easy. it's really easy to track so you can see progress there's no extra effort on your part you just show up you hit some prs you make good gains and you build that momentum and that is what builds this good habit or with another example would be join a gym join a gym that you really enjoy going to or with a workout partner or with a group of people like right now i work at a gym where they do small group training And a lot of the people come to this gym because they like the community. They like the fact that they don't have to think about their workout. It's already done for them. They like that they're being coached through it. So they don't have to think about the exercise as much because they have somebody there who can help them with tips and different things like that. They like being around other people. They like the feeling that they get when they're done with the workout. And so
00:23:06
Speaker
This simple thing of just joining a gym, now they just checked all those boxes about how to make it appealing, make it satisfying, make it obvious. like Something just so simple turns into this lifelong habit that they now get all these benefits about looking better, feeling better, having better confidence. And so sometimes I think people look at a habit and they think, oh man, this is going be really hard. like I'm not that type of person who can make this habit stick. When in reality, you just need to do a couple of little simple things to find a way to make this habit stick.
00:23:36
Speaker
Lesson number five, losing fat is great, but building muscle is just as important. One of the biggest concerns that you will hear about GLP-1s is how much muscle people are losing while on GLP-1s.
00:23:51
Speaker
And the thing that a lot of people don't really understand is that it's not that GLP ones are causing people to just lose a bunch of muscle. It's that anytime that you lose weight rapidly, you are going to be losing a considerable amount of muscle if you aren't doing the right things. And even sometimes if you are doing the right things, you're still going to be losing some muscle if you're losing weight really quickly.
00:24:13
Speaker
So the takeaway is number one, the most important thing that you can do is lift weights. Send that signal to your body that you need to retain as much muscle as possible.
00:24:24
Speaker
That's super critical. That's super important. Whether it be from losing a lot of weight through GLP-1s or whether it be through losing a lot of weight the natural way, you're going to want to lift weights in order to preserve muscle because from a standpoint of looking how you want to look from keeping your metabolism in a good spot from having good strength and longevity muscle plays a pretty big role in all that stuff so you don't want to be losing a bunch of muscles so When weight loss is the goal, if you're losing weight and that is your focus, lifting weights becomes crucial. a High protein diet is also going to be important. Prioritizing sleep is going to be very helpful. And I think with this, whenever possible, just don't be in such a hurry to lose the weight.
00:25:04
Speaker
I understand for certain scenarios, like people who are extremely overweight or obese, they need to get that weight off as quickly as possible. And they don't mind if they're losing some muscle. But again, you could be setting yourself up for some longer term issues if you're losing a ton of muscle while losing all that weight. I think the better approach whenever possible is to try to lose it at a more sustainable rate so that you can retain or even build some muscle as you're losing the weight and not having to worry so much about these issues that come along with losing muscle.
00:25:35
Speaker
And lesson number six, sustainability king. One thing we
Sustainability in Weight Management
00:25:41
Speaker
also know about GLP ones. And one thing that we just know about weight loss in general is lots of people end up gaining the weight back.
00:25:48
Speaker
If you stop taking GLP-1s, most people gain the weight back. And if we think back to why GLP-1s work, they work because they help to manage people's appetite, which causes them to eat less. But if you don't learn the habits necessary to help you manage hunger along the way, and you're just taking this medication and using that as your way to control your appetite, well, as soon as you stop those things, if you do decide to stop those things, that weight is going come back.
00:26:15
Speaker
And this is the same thing for like fad diets or extreme weight loss protocols. Like if you're using those things to lose weight, as soon as you stop those things, like if you're following a very strict diet, as soon as you stop doing that diet and you go back to what you're doing over time, that weight is going to come back. Or if you're working out two hours a day, and that's how you are losing a bunch of weight and you're barely eating, like as soon as you stop doing that, because that's not going to be sustainable for most people for years at a time, that weight is going to eventually come back. And so I think just understanding when it comes to weight loss, when it comes to just healthy habits in general,
00:26:50
Speaker
In order to keep the results that you get, you have to be willing to do these things, not just for a few days or a few weeks or a few months. These are habits that you want to implement into your life for years and decades at a time so that you can keep the results that you get.
00:27:05
Speaker
You don't just have them for a month or two and then they fall off or you don't just lose weight for a year. But then two years later, all that weight is back. like You need to start to shift your mindset around this and start to really implement habits, not just for the now, but for your life. Like everybody says you need to make this a lifestyle. So focusing on things like prioritizing protein and fiber, focusing on things like eating mostly whole foods, staying active outside of the gym, strength training, at least twice per week, creating better awareness around food, getting educated on things like calories and macro and portion sizes, getting your 8,000 steps in a day, all these lifestyle habits that you start to implement, these are the things that are going to help you keep that weight off for the long term, whether or not you're on a medication or not, these habits are important. So building the skills necessary, building the habits necessary, it takes extra effort in the beginning.
00:27:58
Speaker
But the way that I always look at it is if you take a year, two years, even five years to really solidify good habits, to really change your mindset, to really lose weight in the right way and start to increase your fitness and work on all the things that we need in order to be successful, you spend, let's say, five years to get those things.
00:28:18
Speaker
You get to live the next 50 years in a much better place. You get to be healthier. You get to look better. You get to feel better. You get to have more confidence. You get to live longer. You get to have more strength, have more muscle, all those different things. So two or three years is worth the trade-off for living the next 50 years in a much better place because these things that are difficult now, they won't always feel difficult. And I think that's a piece that other people really don't understand.
00:28:45
Speaker
Yes, it's very difficult in the beginning when you're trying to add new skills or trying to change habits or change behavior or lose a bunch of weight or get really fit. All those things are going to feel really difficult in the beginning.
00:28:56
Speaker
And it is also true that, yes, you're going to have to continue to do these habits for a very long time. But those habits don't stay hard forever. Working out a couple times a week is not going to feel as hard as it does when you first start.
00:29:09
Speaker
Getting 8,000 steps in your day does not feel as difficult as it does in the beginning when you really have to put a lot of effort and intention into those things. Eating a quality diet is not going to feel as hard a year down the road as it does when you first start because those things just become a normal part of your routine and those just become things that you do because this is part of your new lifestyle. It's no longer such a struggle. so Keep that in mind as you're starting to build up these habits and really starting to try to facilitate that change is that, yes, it's going to be hard in the beginning, but it doesn't stay that hard forever. And if you can put in a solid year, two years, three years towards these habits, you can change your life for the next 30, 40, 50 years, which to me seems like a no brainer. Putting
Practical Takeaways for Long-term Habits
00:29:50
Speaker
all this together, bringing this thing to a conclusion, wrapping this thing up, just a couple of practical takeaways because that was a ton of information. I think some of the big points that I just wanted to reiterate here is that there's no real quick fixes, whether it be through trying to lose a bunch of weight through. crash dieting or through surgery or through a medication, like there's always going to be trade-offs to whatever it is that you were trying to do. And I think thinking about these things more long-term and really looking at the whole picture before deciding on what you want to do is important. Like if, You really want to build good health and have a good foundation of health and look better, feel better, all those different things. It's going to come down to lifelong habits, things that you can do for a really long time. So don't be in such a hurry to look for quick fixes or to rely just on one single thing to get you to that result that you want.
00:30:40
Speaker
Number two would be to just find ways to make the healthy decision, the easy decision. This can be building better habits. This can be improving your environment. This could be hanging out with people who are healthy and fit. All those things are going to start to help to make the healthy decision, the easy decision. And when it's easier, you're much more likely to do it.
00:31:00
Speaker
The third thing would be to just focus on the mental side of things just as much as the physical side because they both work in tandem. like You need both of these things in order to be successful for the long term. You can grit your way through things for a while and just focus on all the physical stuff. But if you don't focus on the mental stuff,
00:31:16
Speaker
as well, the internal stuff like your relationship with food and how you think about exercise and all those different things that people really struggle with, then this is always going to seem really difficult. So focus on both those things together. And I think you end up in the best spot.
00:31:31
Speaker
And with that being said, that is the episode for this week. Hopefully you were able to get a nugget or two out of this and something that you can start implementing or maybe thinking about things in a slightly different way to help you out on your own fitness and health journey.
00:31:46
Speaker
The one-on-one coaching link is in the show notes, as there always is, if you want to work with me and get some help on some of your weight loss goals or getting more fit, all that different stuff.
00:31:57
Speaker
As always, I appreciate you listening and will see you next