Hey thanks man. The $15 will buy WAY more happiness for someone who hasn’t read that book than it will buy me right now.
Although I DID buy some BBQ pork ribs for $15 today, which came close…
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Most people don’t do that math. I think it’s awesome.
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I watched the video last night and will get the book soon.
One thing I believe I’ve started understanding about my approach is that I’ve unconsciously focused quite hard on lifting more for hypertrophy while attempting to be on a slight calorie deficit.
What that does obviously is hamper recovery and probably stunt the potential gains. Probably contributes to feeling worn out, although it’s not constant every day.
I’ve learned not to trust my eating habits. Before I figured out that I was a carb junkee, I simply failed at staying on a calorie deficit consistently. Usually a couple times per week I’d get to a point where I simply didn’t give a damn. I wasn’t really even hungry in the “need to eat” sense but more in the same sense that a smoker needs another cigarette.
I think, without even really intending it, I have been lifting for hypertrophy as if bulking, since at least SOME of those excess calrores from the binging would be put to good use.
After going low carb and also doing one meal per day 3-5 days a week since September last year I’ve learned how to control those compulsions far better and I’m eating cleaner than ever as long as my beloved Mexican coworkers don’t bring me homemade tamales and mole’ at work.
Tonight is another day off for me, kids have a school performance tonight, so tomorrow I’m hitting the beach for a long, long walk and some mental peace.
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I’m so excited for your journey dude!
Dan John has some more wisdom here regarding your lifting for hypertrophy. He breaks down programs into 2 different approaches: “park bench” and “bus bench”. Both are just benches, we sit at them both, but when we sit at a park bench, we just expect to sit and enjoy the surroundings. When we sit at a bus bench, we are expecting to eventually get somewhere. Bulking programs are bus benches: we do them because we’re gonna get somewhere. When we’re losing fat, we’re more at a park bench: we are there just waiting and experiencing the “now”.
We can only run so many bus bench programs per year (Dan suggests 2, MAYBE 3). The rest of the time, we’re on the park bench. While you are losing fat, Easy Strength is an excellent park bench. And park benches are a GREAT place to rest when the REST of our life is in full “bus bench” mode.
Dr. Ken Berry has a lot to say on this. No one is going to get healthy by just eating less of the stuff that got them sick, nor is anyone going to get skinny by just eating less of the things that make them fat, and it’s an unfair standard to try to starve a human and then tell them they lack discipline/willpower when they give into starvation. There is a theory that hunger is either protein based or nutrient based, but in both instances, these theories have this idea that we hunger because our body wants to reach a certain threshold, and until we reach it, we will keep experiencing hunger. When you eat protein and nutrient deficient food (like the majority of processed food), you have to eat a LOT of it to reach that threshold, which is why obesity is such a thing. Processed food is cheap, widely available, convenient and shelf stable, so it’s what people reach food when they’re hungry, not understanding that the body doesn’t hunger for ENERGY: it hungers for nutrition. So we slam it with a million calories and no nutrition and it just keeps hungering and hungering until we finally reach the threshold.
It’s why you would binge: you were eating smaller amounts of the same food, not getting to that threshold, and eventually would HAVE to binge to be able to finally get all those nutrients. It’s also why folks tend to have that nighttime binge thing happen: they go all day denying their body nutrition, and eventually it gets to the end of the day and says “hey jackass, FEED ME” and we slam 3000 calories of ice cream to FINALLY reach the threshold.
It’s cool you’re finding success with low carb. Just cutting out processed food can go a long way toward getting better with hunger and learning how to eat again, and low carb can definitely get there with a focus on whole foods.
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x2 on this.
You can back off/maintain for 1-3 weeks and see if things change. If it does, you have your answer, if it doesn’t, you know it’s not that.
Plus, you have enough experience to know that 1-3 weeks is just a drop in the bucket. Worth a try imho.
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New gyms and better equipment can be really exciting or maybe overstimulating too.
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Yeah, I did overkill a few weeks ago on a Panetta dual Smith.
In my old gym I’d use the Smith on the occasional Push day. I’d warm up then start with seated OHP, and kick the seat angle back 1 notch and do another set. That bench only had like 4, maybe 5 angles so it would be 4-5 sets total, and it was a really nice workout. My triceps especially responded to this.
So this new gym has that nice Panetta specifically for this except that the seat has WAY more angles. I thought I played it safe by using lighter weight and probably did 8 angles total. That was definitely overkill. The workout itself seemed fine but I’ve never had such sore delts and triceps in my life lol. Chest felt fine, minor DOMS but everything else was utterly whack.
Next time I do that, it’s back to 4-5 sets (1 per angle)
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