Can you help me understand this better? My diet is super clean. Loads of lentils, nuts&seeds vegetables, spices, good clean whole foods etc. im mostly vegan whole food. Never really have unhealthy food.
Really easy for me to start cutting out calories - it’s actually been a real struggle to eat enough in this muscle building phase.
My 5yr goal is as healthy as possible. I don’t care too much what I look like. But for December, my goal is to look better than this:
Ideally bigger muscles holding our 5th baby with maybe slightly more definition?
My current plan is to do the limited time workout from 531 and fast 1 day a week as well (I’d like to do that for religious (christian) reasons as well).
Tbh you don’t look much different in that pic. Just younger. You clearly have a belly and look as untrained as you do currently.
I’ll agree with the others that you need a lifestyle change.
You say you’re eating healthy but your physique tells me another story.
Have you had your hormones checked??
To me that means you eat no refined foods. That pretty much limits your shopping the the perimeter of the grocery store. Exceptions like rice, dried beans, olive oil, and canned tuna and salmon.
IMO, your plate should be 1/3 fibrous carbohydrates (green vegetables), 1/3 starchy carbohydrates, and 1/3 meat and/or eggs. That is, 2/3 vegetarian and 1/3 carnivore, aka an omnivore.
It is made easier with meat to insure sufficient complete protein.
Surely you don’t resist eating meat for Christians reasons. I am a Christian and have read and understood 1 Timothy 4:1-5 to sanctify the eating of meat as long as it is received with thanksgiving.
Every 7 days will add a significant hurdle. The Bible typically ties prayer and fasting.
Nah, he’s been pretty open with form check questions and videos in the past.
Increase protein, get in your omega 3s, decrease overall calories. Attack it with diet. Don’t do any extra cardio for fat loss. Other reasons for cardio, sure.
I don’t exactly understand what exactly defines vegan philosophically. I can understand “nothing that deprives an animal of life”. So no meat, fish, eggs.
Which means milk and milk proteins like whey and casein make sense.
But no animal products at all, I don’t understand.
Edit:
I just read up. I guess it’s fundamentally about “anti-cruelty”. Seems kind of shallow. Animals are more cruel to every other kingdom: animals, plants, fungi, than anything else. Seems like eating animals reduces overall cruelty.
Edit 2:
I meant no offense with my phrasing, and used “shallow” in a literal, not dismissive sense. As far as preferences, to each their own, for whatever reasons.
Wow! Crazy lot of assumptions flying around here! Still, you guys are really helpful in many ways so thanks for your help.
Yes mostly unprocessed food - loads of fruit and veg.
About “I eat mostly vegan” - I’m not a vegan but aren’t too happy about cruelty to animals through industrial production of them. No need to debate that here, but happy to another time!! I’m not saying anyone else should be so chill. Kendrick Farris did pretty well on that diet as have many other vegan lifter dudes. I’m just saying it to help you understand what I eat!!!
Also with the Christian thing, yes fasting and prayer. It’s awesome, also don’t need to debate that here.
I have been getting about 200g protein through 50g breakfast (oats, 100gish peanut butter, 100gish nuts&seeds, raisins) 50g protein in a shake (protein powder+peanut butter+ chia seeds) 50g lunch (two bowls of lentil Dhal) and then if I think dinner hasn’t been enough protein then another shake. If I need more fat I add olive oil, if more carbs then oats.
I eat meat maybe once or twice a week when round someone’s house or something.
I don’t think I’m unwell neither does my doctor, but open to other opinions!
Not trolling - just not like you!
Sounds like the universal advice is to start cutting now slowly. Any other (lifting/diet/health) advice appreciated!
@johning
I’m vegan and train frequently (mainly martial arts rather than weights as recovery is hard) and have found increasing protein using a protein shake has made a difference in reducing hunger while still hitting the levels I want.
I use a pea protein as I already tend to eat a few soya products daily (mainly milk) as pea has a high lysine content which may be limited in my diet. As long as you eat reasonably then you will get complete protein in your diet (your liver stores amino acids to make whats needed so very unlikely to be an issue).
It may also be worth adding creatine to your diet, vegans and vegetarians often have a lower amount in their diet (I cant remember seeing anything that said this may hinder health but its a great addition I believe).
Also maybe getting a personal trainer to help for the next few months, having someone guide you can work wonders.
Just saw you’ve posted as I wrote so please ignore about the shake as you’ve got this covered!
And where I say I dont do many weights because of recovery this isnt because of diet its because Im 60, doing (light) bjj, mma (and wing chun) type training as much as I can recover from a week, (and basically a wimp)
I really appreciate your advice Nomad - it’s been solid.
So just eating a standard cutting calorie deficit and continuing training as I am (one of the 531 programs)? Is there some other lifestyle change I’m missing?
Walk as much as you can. Walk. If there is ever an opportunity to walk instead of driving. Walk. You have a spare hour with nothing to do? Get outside and enjoy nature. Walk. If you don’t already, buy a dog. Walk. Want to listen to some music? Walk.
As long as you’re covering all of your micronutrients with purposeful food choices there’s no other difference IMO.
I never had foods that disagreed with me though, some people just can’t handle legumes and beans in high quantities etc but I was fine with it.
Eat less than maintenance to lose weight. Prioritize protein and get a complete protein across the day (even better if you can in each meal).
I think you’ve got room to build muscle and get lean and make that your new normal, rather than just think about cutting. Think about setting a new normal.
I really don’t know what is lacking. My biggest question keeps going back to: Your pics just don’t correspond to a person on a clean diet.
I would never consider attempting to improve body composition on a diet that didn’t have a complete amino acid profile food in every single meal. And I know that any idiot can easily accomplish that eating meat, fish, and eggs. I have eaten at least one can of tuna fish every day (that I ate at home) since 1970. When I worked, I ate a can of tuna at morning break and a can of tuna at the afternoon break. Your diet might make this difficult, but I have no experience trying to do so. I have long been a strong proponent of what I call “the idiot diet,” because it takes so little thought or macro counting.
When John Parrillo came on the scene in the late 1980’s, I followed his plan the years that I competed in the Master’s classes in my 40’s. He mentioned that some people cannot properly digest fructose. He said that they would partition fructose to generate fat. I didn’t know if I was one of those people, but why take the chance. It would be very easy to remove that variable. I dropped fruit from my diet when trying to get into contest shape. Very small sacrifice. (I don’t know if there is any science supporting that thought, or not.)
The pics are a result of making sure I’ve been having a calorie surplus since I started from scratch a year ago. As far as I know it’s quite common for people running starting strength (what I started on) to get a bit fat while initially building strength.
That’s true, and I kind of agree that it’s probably a good choice to be in a surplus (ideally getting more protein than they had been) for someone just starting strength training. Arguably better to err on too much gain than not enough.
But after that initial bit, I think the current consensus is to stay relatively lean year round. Not fitness model lean, but closer to, if not leaner than your photo 5 years ago. It’s a more ideal leanness for building both strength and muscle, as well as general health and mobility.
