I

can

sorry I did not think I would cry on

this podcast so

much Lane Norton scientist record

setting bodybuilder and is one of the

most respected voices in the health and

nutrition space who debunks all the

different Fitness and Nutrition myths

out there let's go to the technical

stuff ooh yeah let's do that calories in

calories out so the first point of

confusion a lot of people may think

they're in a calorie deficit but they're

not because one people don't really

understand portion sizes if you've never

had the experience of like weighing out

your food you will be shocked and the

other thing is artificial sweetness I've

wondered for a while whether Diet Coke

is healthy or not if we look at the

randomized control trial they saw 6 kg

of weight loss just from switching

people from regular soda to diet soda

now when they compare it versus water

this is going to be the most commented

thing about in this entire interview I'm

sure they found that what are the big

misconceptions about intermittent

fasting is it okay if I get deep into

the Weeds on this one go ahead in

studies people in the intermittent

fasting groups tend to lose more weight

but it's not because of anything magic

about intermittent fasting it's because

what's your thoughts on his impact

overall I think it's a net positive and

here's why when it comes to weight loss

people are Googling how to lose belly

fat practically it's kind of irrelevant

because and then is sugar addictive this

one's going to get me in trouble too

so it's absolutely crazy to me that so

many of you have decided to watch our

show um and so many of you have decided

to subscribe to our show we now have

five million subscribers on YouTube

which is a number that I just can't

comprehend and it's a dream that I

absolutely never could have had we

started the DI of just over three years

ago now and in my wildest expectations

we might have had 100,000 subscribers by

now so you can imagine how shocked I am

that so many of you have chosen to tune

into these conversations every week um

and spend some time with us so thank you

and I made a deal with you I made a deal

that if you subscrib to this show that

we would continue to raise the bar and

in 2024 we're going to raise the bar

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Global stories so as always if you

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with the

[Music]

episode

Lane who are you and what is the mission

you're

on I'm trying to

make Fitness information more accessible

Fitness more accessible to everyone and

trying to act as a bridge

between academic research and your

average person because so much Gets Lost

in Translation because social media the

news it is a fire hose of information a

lot of which is misinformation or you

only get part of the story and so I have

noticed people are so frustrated because

they feel like they understand what it

is to eat healthy and then a new

documentary comes out a new podcast

comes out a new article comes out and

says oh NOP you're whatever it is you're

doing it's wrong and here's why and I

just want to help clear up some of that

confusion and help people understand the

big stuff that really matters versus not

getting lost in the weeds of the stuff

that just doesn't matter that much and

when you say Fitness how do you define

that because you talked about you then

talked about diet and food so what is

the sort of bucket that you put yourself

in what are the categories that you

really focus on great question but you

know I would say that my wheelhouse is

nutrition so I did a PhD in nutritional

sciences and I also

feel pretty equipped to interpret

exercise information as well and what is

your so that's your academic sort of

background what is your lived experience

what experiences have you had as a coach

to people as a as a trainer in your own

personal life that have added to that

academic information that you have great

question so I'll try to give The

Abridged version of this um I got

bullied a lot uh growing up as really

skinny kid hyperactive weird you know

and so when you're young what makes you

stand out is actually you know not such

a good thing and uh I got bullied a lot

and I started lifting weights

to I thought if I got bigger muscles you

know girls would pay attention to me and

I'd stop getting bullied it didn't work

for either of those two things but I did

gain more confidence not because I built

bigger muscles but because the process

of lifting and getting through plateaus

and moving through setbacks and all

those sorts of things that's what built

confidence and I started lifting when I

was 15 and when I got to

college I changed my major because I

decided I was going to do my first

bodybuilding show I did it I won the

Teen Division and I was hooked I was

like this is the thing I want to do but

back in you know this is 2001 I was 19

I'm 42 now the Avenues to make money in

Fitness were basically be a personal

trainer open a gym start a supplement

company try to be Mr

Olympia and I I didn't know how feasible

any of those were so I started looking

at a PhD literally for no other reason I

had no idea what I wanted to do with my

life but I figured if I delay the real

world by four to eight year four to six

years maybe I'll have it figured out by

then but in that meantime I had started

posting on different bodybuilding

message boards and

so I would get a bunch of emails about

my articles and people asking me

questions and I was like basically doing

full-on diets and nutrition for people

for free because I just liked it and

then when I got to grad school I was

like man I you know this is a lot of my

time now maybe if I just like charge

people a little something I can do this

instead of a teaching assistantship make

a little bit of money you know didn't

really think much of it and so I took my

first online client back in 2005 and

within three years I was making a

full-time income from it with no

advertising just word of mouth and then

in my fourth year I think was the first

year I ever made like six figures from

it I remember

thinking what is happening I want to

take one step back um because it's clear

from what you said there but also clear

from a lot of the research that I did on

you and your backstory that much of the

driving motivation behind why you are

what you are today and why you help

people and why you do the work you do

and make the content you make was

because of this early experience with

bullying and I've sat here with so many

people who are real anomalies in their

lives for a variety of different reasons

you know maybe in business or or in

science or um in sport and I so often

find that the the reason why they're

brilliant is also fundamentally

Interlink to the reason why they

struggle or they struggled shall I say

and in your story that seems to

be very pertinent I read a quote you

said on a video you made seven years ago

where you said I had intense and

sustained emotional bullying I would be

put in a corner by four to five people

and be obliterated

repeatedly yeah I mean you know when I

I'll tell people like the the reason I

started lifting weights in bodybuilding

it was not the noblest of reasons you

know it was very

much you say I'm worthless I'm going to

prove you wrong you know and uh even I

mean I I would love to say that it has

no remnants today but I would be that

would be a lie right um some of the

stuff I still struggle with in terms of

I have a hard time trusting myself a lot

of the times because I got told for so

long or trusting some decisions I make I

got told for so long you do it wrong you

know you suck you're worthless you know

those sorts of things when you went to

therapy you were diagnosed with a form

of PTSD Bing PTSD they call it yeah my

my therapist she diagnosed me

and I remember saying I don't have PSD

like that's that's for soldiers that's

for Bel and she goes first off Lane you

don't like it when people correct you as

a professional in your field don't

correct me

and you're right you didn't witness

people die nothing like that but trauma

is trauma and her explanation of it was

it is all relative and it may not have

been you know hores from

war but for your brain it was

traumatic and the way she explained it

is trauma is something that causes you

to react or act in response to something

even after that event has passed right

so for me for example I've struggled in

personal

relationships where either Partners or

friends trying to give me feedback and I

immediately get defensive very defensive

and if you read about relationships

that's not great right it's one of the

Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse for

relationships and I never UND I just

thought well I'm just explaining myself

I'm just and then now I understand it's

oh it's

because that was my response to the

bullying because feedback or criticism

to me feels like bullying even though

it's not so you have a defense mechanism

because you had to defend yourself back

then and it's so interesting the the

things that we adopt to survive when

we're young become maladaptive when we

get older it's difficult to unpick all

of that when you're an adult isn't it

because it's as you know it's very hard

wide they say you can't teach an old dog

new tricks but I've we've I've got my

own trauma responses that I'm still

trying to work through and I'm now aware

of them but they still on a bad day on

an unslept day they can still come to

the surface I tell people I don't know

if you can like completely undo your

default setting right but I think what

you can do is get mindful of it and

learn tools to manage it right and I

mean it's interesting how this ties into

obesity because I used to be somebody

who i' I've never been obese never been

overweight nothing like that when I got

to grad school I was very much more

towards the side of if you're obese it's

cuz you're lazy it's your fault you know

and then the more I just

observed I realized that can't be true

because look at all these OB there's so

many obese people that are successful in

other areas of their life where they

apply a lot of

discipline what is it about this thing

right and I remembered I read a study

and I I I hopefully I get this correct

cuz it was a while back but they looked

at obese women

and they found that obese women were 50%

I believe 50% more likely to have uh

sexual assault trauma in their past and

you also look at the Obesity

literature and people who are obese tend

to have a greater reward response from

food whereas people who are lean or

normal weight it's it's not like that

huge reward that they get it's like some

people you know they they can they can

have a drink they can have a beer they

go I like the beer you know and other

people become alcoholics right and so so

much of this stuff gets tied up

in it gets wired in as a as a kind of

coping mechanism if you look at like for

example binge

eating what's happening during a binge

is that person is getting a flood of

dopamine right they're they're they're

masking they want to mask that feeling

of whatever made them feel uncomfortable

I always tell people I'm like you don't

really find people binge eating after

they've had 8 hours of sleep at 10:00

a.m. in the morning when they're low

stress right it's at 10 p.m. at night

after a long day they've been fighting

with their spouse their kids are driving

them nuts and they just they want to

turn it all off right and I think

staying mindful is one of the hardest

things we have as humans I mean I know

what my addiction is unfortunately based

on my um current job I get way too into

social media you know I just end up up

you know it kind of started as well I'm

I'm doing work right and I'm responding

to comments and all that and pretty soon

I'm looking at my screen time and I'm

going oh my gosh right and so that was

something for me to numb up and turn my

mind off right but for other people it's

food for other people it's gambling for

other people it's alcohol for other

people it's some other drug so what do

we do with that then so do we first have

to figure out what our relationship is

on a psychological level with these

addictions with with our food for

example if we're just focusing on weight

loss to start with when you if you were

to be coaching someone would you try and

understand their um propensity to binge

to to have that sort of you like

dopamine

craving or or do you focus somewhere

else I kind of say all right like walk

me through a typical day for you walk me

through a typical week where where's

where are your struggles really at right

and one of the things I we call it the

biolane way when we when we kind of

teach our coaches is we do coaching with

you have to have two things are

critically important accountability with

empathy because if you're just the

accountability coach the drill sergeant

who's you know most people if they screw

up they've beat themselves up more than

anybody else I know I'm that way I'm

sure you're that way so you don't need

to beat them up

again the empathy portion so so if

you're just beating somebody up if

you're just holding them accountable

without empathy you just become the

drill sergeant and what happens is

people end up tuning you out or they're

not honest with you anymore because they

don't want to constantly feel like

they're failing right the empathy

portion if you just have empathy and

you're saying I'm so sorry that happened

that's so hard I understand but you're

not holding them accountable there's no

impetus for change right so it takes it

takes both MH and so the way I'd often

coach like let's take a somebody had a

binge something like that the first

thing I'd say I understand why that

happened you know that's really

hard where what was the antecedent to

this like what what started this right

okay now let's look at if we had to go

back and do it over again what are some

things we might be able to do to put

some to put some barriers right so I had

I had one client he's a a hedge fund

manager and when he started with me he

was binging pretty much I would say

almost every day and I said okay where

do you find that this is happening

and he said well usually it's after

everybody's gone to bed and you know um

I just find myself in the kitchen and it

just happens so okay so it's not

reasonable to lock yourself in your room

right but what if we just did a few

things to increase your mindfulness

right put a Posta on the cabinet where

you where you keep that the junk food

right not saying anything nasty or

anything but I just said write down am I

hungry or am I just upset

then on your on your door right lock it

from the inside it's not you know it

doesn't keep you from going out but you

have to unlock it right like you're

having to turn your brain on right and

it the more barriers you can put there

the the better it gets the more sort of

mindful moments you can have where you

make you have to kind of make a decision

and you don't you come out of autopilot

CU I notice when whenever I have my

binge moments which happens once in a

while it is like unthinking yeah it's

just like a robot has taken over this

exactly and with this like this

particular client right he'd have a

rough day at work hedge fund manager

very stressful job I say okay if you've

had a rough day at work first thing to

do when you're driving home say man I've

had a tough day at work this is usually

where I'd have a binge session like say

it out loud like name it you know what I

mean sometimes just naming it is enough

to stop it I mean I not the same thing

but I struggle with I'm sure you know as

ADHD during convers

ation I have something to say I have

something to say I want to say it I want

to say it I want to say it right and

I'll end up cutting people off and

making them feel bad and so I still have

that inclination but now I'll go if I

start I go oh I'm I'm sorry I jumped in

please finish right and so just like

calling it out to yourself can make a

huge difference on changing the behavior

that which gets monitored gets changed I

really want to focus on this point of

the psychology of both exercise and

weight loss because in all the research

that I do on even your conversations and

other conversations clearly the like

fundamental that sits underneath doing

all the things we're going to talk about

is like having the motivation the

discipline and mastering one's own like

mind because as you kind of said we can

have all the diet plans in the world and

many or all of them might work but

without the psychology of how to lose

weight and to motivate ourselves to get

to the gym none of it really matters so

what else do we need to think about when

we're trying to understand how to

Master like the Beast Within our mind

there's a lot to unpack here good I'll

start with this

um do you know Ethan sule you familiar

with him so Ethan is an actor he was in

uh my name aurl he was in American

History X and he was in Remember the

Titans some of the big movies he's been

in uh Wolf of Wall Street as well and he

was over 500 lbs like he and like

everybody knows him as the the really

big guy in those movies and those shows

now he's like 220 pounds and looks like

he would play a military operator in a

show right

and he said something that really stuck

with me he said um if the house is on

fire just get out of the house we can

worry about why the fire started later

but just get out and there's so much

like paralysis by analysis out there

that people don't end up actually

starting and if I put two plates in

front of you you know with different

food yeah we can cribble but for the

most part if I'm sitting something out

with the cheeseburger fries and all this

kind okay versus lean meats vegetables

we know which one is more conducive to

to health right people will argue about

these little things low carb low fat

those sorts of

things just get out of the house stop

stop eating so so much of this very

energy dense hyper palatable food start

moving away and Ethan I think it was

Ethan he has this he has this thing he

says when he um when he uh whenever he

posts a picture in the gym he'll say I

killed my clone today and I never I

never quite understood it and then I

read a um a systematic review of

successful weight loss maintainers now

what that means

is weight loss we know diets can help

you lose weight but they don't tend to

work long term because people their

adherence wains and they just kind of

regain the weight over time and if we

look at like out about three years after

initial weight loss it's like depending

on the statistics you use it's anywhere

from 90 95% of people end up regaining

almost all the weight they lost and this

study was about people who had

successfully kept it off for a long

period of time so this is the unicorns

right the the 5 10% of people who

actually had that long-term success and

there were things on there that you

would expect um you know they they

practiced some form of cognitive

restraint they uh did cognitive

restraint being um counting calories or

doing low carb or time restricted eating

or some form of restraint but the thing

that stood out to me that really grabbed

my attention was so many of them

specified and pointed out they felt like

they had to develop a new identity and

I texted Ethan and I was like is this

what you mean by I killed my clone he

goes that is exactly what I mean and so

one of the things I'll tell people now

is think of the person that you want to

become picture

them think about what do you think their

habits and behaviors look like on a

daily

basis now reverse now start to reverse

engineer that right and you mentioned

motivation and I my thoughts have

changed about motivation

a lot of

people wait to get motivated or inspired

and hey like I think all that stuff's

great but in the course of anything and

I'm I would bring it back to you in in

building a

startup I'm guessing there were days

where you were not motivated to do what

you were doing right yeah most days

right right so many days so motivation

is great when it come I say that's like

nitrous on a car right give you a quick

boost and make you go a lot

faster but

discipline the is the gas tank that is

it doesn't I tell people detach your

feelings from the process

okay I have a very cold calculus when I

look at my

goals what is my goal what will it take

to get there some form of work in time

right no matter how you slice

it let's let's take um so I won uh the

master World Championship in

powerlifting in

2022 thank you took me I went to open uh

worlds in 2015 set a world squat record

there but then went through a lot of

different injuries and a lot of pain

took me seven years to get back and and

win but there were times where I was

very unmotivated to go to the gym

because I couldn't lift heavy I was you

know in a lot of

pain but I knew if I want to get back

there this is what it's going to take

and so it was it doesn't matter if I'm

motivated I have to do the things I said

I was going to do and I tell people try

to detach how you feel from the process

it takes to get there and that's really

hard for a lot of people to do but

here's the thing as you do the

process you start to see the results and

then the motivation becomes more

sustained right the the hard part is

when you are down in the ditches and you

you aren't seeing that progress so when

I'm coaching people on this

stuff a lot of it is trying to build

their confidence and so many people

they'll start a new year's resolution

let's say because it's beginning of the

year I'm going to go to the gym 5 days a

week I'm like stop you haven't been

going at all how about this you're going

to be active at least an hour for 3 days

a week let's start there if you go 5

days fantastic

right but it's different if you said

you're going to go 5 days you only go

three you feel really bad about yourself

you say you're going to go three and you

go three feel really good about yourself

what's the harm of feeling bad about

yourself so there was a year 2017 where

I said I may call everyday Steve and I

was like I'm going to go to the gym

every every day of 2018 I believe it was

MH and I'm not going to tell you what

happened cuz I think you

know but I I want to ask the question

what is the harm of setting a huge goal

and then failing and feeling bad about

yourself you know there's a lot of

different versions of like what builds

confidence but I think one of those

things is keeping the promises you make

to yourself right and also just doing

the thing you said you were going to do

and that's why I tell people like hey

for me if I say I'm going to go four or

five times a week that's not a problem

because for me it takes discipline to

keep me out of the gym right like I love

that that's fun for

me but if you're somebody who hasn't

been

going just start with something like I'm

not saying don't be ambitious

overall but you have to build confidence

in increments right like so for example

I'm going to go back to my own personal

experience I in 2015 I set a world squat

record 668 lbs at 205 lb body weight

class but when I first started lifting I

was horrible at squats I've got long

legs um I am in fact uh um one of the

world powerlifting coaches looked at the

video of my Squat and said

I I don't know how you did that

and squats were very intimidating to me

I would get really scared trying to do

it my back would hurt you know all these

sorts of things you know eventually I

ended up squatting 668 pounds but the

first time I went in the gym I wasn't

able to do it the first five years 10

years I couldn't I couldn't even imagine

that right and one of the things I tell

people about confidence is I thought

when I if I squatted that amount of

weight 4 or 500 lbs would feel easy it

still feels heavy I just got better at

handling it right and I kind of use that

euphemism for life that analogy for life

because life doesn't get easier but you

can get better at handling those things

and the confidence that I built to be

able to do that came through the

repetition doing it over and over and

over again and that's what people need

the problem is they don't get the

repetition in because they do things

like you were talking about which is

they start to it'd be like me going in

the gym my first time saying I'm going

to squat 400 lb I'm gonna get crumpled

into a heap right but if I do it if I do

what I can do at the time and slowly

build that confidence that can wind up

in me doing something that I never

thought possible for myself I think it

was Jordan Peterson that said to me when

he deals with some of his clinical

patients the starting point for them is

so small that it almost makes makes them

feel shameful so they don't do it so he

says he's dealt with people who

literally can't get out of bed because

their depression is so severe and

telling someone that their goal is just

to walk down the hall and walk back feel

so small and inconsequential and so full

of shame that that they just think no

that doesn't matter I'm not going to do

that and there are a lot of people out

there that are listening right now and

they think about where their starting

point might be and it might literally be

getting out of the house putting their

trainers on and going for a 5-minute

walk but in their heads they'll go

that's not going to do anything that's

not going to get me to that Mountaintop

that I that I know I need to get to so

I'm not going to bother a lot of people

like that and I mean you know you can

take your cliche that you want you know

Journey Of A Thousand Miles begins with

a single step how to eat an elephant one

bite at a time I mean it's cliche but

it's very true right and I think if

you're climbing a mountain if you're

only looking at the top you're going to

feel like you're getting nowhere right

so if you want to climb a mountain have

in mind the mountain that you want to

climb but when you're climbing it look

at the next ledge and just do that as

the checkpoint right so somebody asked

me once if somebody had a lot of weight

to lose like over 100 pounds where would

you tell them to start I'd say you know

I'd look at where they're at right now

what are their habits their

behaviors what are they doing exercise--

wise let's get them to the next ledge

right so let's let's just you know we

can go into this too but you know if

they're drinking a bunch of soda per day

trying to get them to go straight to

water that might be very daunting for

them right okay well diet soda is better

than than regular soda and and people

will argue about it but I can cite the

studies on this okay they're they're um

you know they're eating certain foods

can we do something somewhat close to

what they're already doing but find a

way to cut out some calories from that

right let's let's try and I'm going to

try and meet them closer to where they

are and then slowly pull them back this

way when you think about what it takes

for someone to make that decision to

change their life so often it seems that

there's some kind of adverse event like

I'm talking here about the why that sits

behind the reason to to change to change

to lose the weight to build the muscles

do you see that often that there's some

kind of catalyst moment you actually see

a lot of parallels between like the way

adex talk and people who have lost a lot

of weight uh in terms of they had to

develop a new identity they are often

have to get a new set of friends not on

purpose but if you think about if you

were hanging around a certain type of

people and you became and you were very

overweight you've probably fallen in

with people who have similar habits to

you and even if you still care about

those people as you start to come out of

that there's a few things that are

happening one if they're not joining you

in the things you're doing that creates

a gap and uh people can also be very

insecure when people they know start

improving themselves

and they start trying to pull them back

in crab crabs in the bucket why why do

you got to eat that why can't you enjoy

this why can't you you know that's

because you're holding up a mirror to

them by changing your life right correct

correct so you know I I don't think he

reminds me talking about this my uh my

brother um was an addict and um he he

like he went to prison for a period of

time um he had a lot of really bad stuff

go down in his life and I one day I

asked him I'm like was it was going to

prison was that like your rock bottom

and he goes no he goes honestly I just

woke up one day and realize I lose

everything I get a job and I lose it I

get some money and I lose it I get a

relationship and I lose it I just got

sick and tired of

losing and not always but you hear a lot

of similar stories from people who

drastically changed their lives as they

just got to the point where they were

sick and

tired of being that way and they just

realize that if I don't make some kind

of change this is going to

continue and I think one that takes a

self-awareness that which is hard and

having that mirror brought to you is

really hard um I can relate in other

areas of life but that why really is at

the core of it because at the end of the

day if you don't have a really strong

why it is hard when you start to lose

motivation you know I was watching a

story of a guy who had a heart attack

when he was like in his 40s and then he

lost 150 lbs and he's like

whenever I

started whenever I didn't have

motivation or I started feeling like I

wanted to fall back into bad habits I

thought about my kids growing up without

a dad and it made it very easy for me

and so when you have that really strong

why it it it makes it easier to get

through it I'm not saying either me or

you are going to be able to figure out

an answer here but I feel

like maybe there's something we can

offer to the question about how to

cultivate the Y is there anything that

you do on those days any disciplines you

think you can put in place that will

just keep the why um front and center

I'm going to throw out one something

that kind of helped me a little bit was

just changing the background on my phone

to um an image that reminded me of who I

wanted to be and it just meant that even

if it gives me a 1% psychological

reinforcement in the direct so that I

fall on the correct side of a decision

relating to diet or Fitness maybe that

would help you know because it's it's

there a couple things I think about um I

think about the people I care about in

my life and wanting to make them proud

think about my kids you know um how

would I want now I'm going to get

emotional how would I how would I want

them to remember their dad you know um I

can remember um coming back from all

these injuries and and I was lifting in

the garage one day my daughter she was

uh six at the time and she's such a

little spark plug

and she would watch me and sometimes she

would come in and like do some LTS with

me and stuff and uh I was kind of

explaining to her why I do this stuff

and why it was important to me and I

said you know Dad almost was a world

champion I got really close and you know

I that would be something that I would I

would really treasure if I got the

chance to do that and she said are you

going to try and be a champion again and

she said it in the kid way that like but

oh my gosh when she said that whenever I

felt tired whenever I felt down or

whatever I just remember my daughter

saying are you going to try to be a

champion again made it easy you know and

so I had my like it's going to sound

goofy but at Worlds in

2022 I was going through a lot of

personal stuff at the time and uh I had

picture of my kids on my phone and I was

looking at that and I was almost in

tears before I'd go out for lifts

because I was so amped up and psyched up

and and that was that was my why so I'm

thinking about my kids and also think

about you know my parents and like great

people wanting to make them proud and

then honestly like my my personal hero

is my grandfather so my grandfather is

part of the greatest

Generation Um he was the funniest person

I ever met with the most Integrity of

anybody I ever met and so so many times

when I think about the person I want to

be I I think about my

grandfather and um you know still to

this day I'll think about them before I

if I feel like low motivation or if I've

really screwed something up um you know

like that sort of thing let's go to the

technical stuff yes let's start with so

we're talking here about dieting and

weight loss if I'm trying to lose weight

should I be counting my calories ah so

the first point of confusion people

assume calories and calories out is the

same thing as counting calories that's

like saying the law that in order to

save money you have to earn more than

you spend is the same thing as keeping a

budget keeping a budget can help you

save money but it's not the same thing

so let's break down calories in calories

out calories inside pretty

straightforward it is the food you eat

right the calories and the food that you

eat now I would add one caveat to that

the metabolizable energy so when we say

calories calories is literally a unit of

energy and so I'll have some people say

well calories aren't a real thing you

can't look at calories on a microscope

you're right it refers to the potential

energy contained in the chemical bonds

of food that through the process of

digestion absorption and Metabolism that

energy is captured in one way or another

so that's the energy into the system

calories out is more complicated so that

involves a few different uh energy

outputs the first one being your BAS

metabolic rate so your BMR is basically

the cost of keeping the lights on so if

you just laid down didn't move that's

how many calories your body would burn

and that's actually the Maj for most

people the majority of the calories they

burn per day it's around 50 to 70%

depending on how active they are and it

fluctuates person to person so as as a

man with fairly big muscles there you

yours will be bigger than mine because

correct you have more going on over

there yeah there there you can tie about

at least based on the regressions you

can tie about 90% of the variance in BMR

to someone's lean mass okay if you look

at the studies it's very tightly

correlated with lean mass right because

lean tissue is more metabolically active

than non-lean

tissue so bmr's one bucket then you have

What's called the thermic effect of food

so your

TEF um our bodies are kind of like for

lack of a poor analogy but analogy that

works is cars like internal combustion

engine you don't just put petrol or gas

in your car and all a sudden it just

spontaneously starts up you got to start

it the battery puts in energy so you can

get energy out of the fuel right your

body has to put in energy to extract the

energy out of the food that you eat and

so a lot of the confusion people say

well calories in calories out assumes

that all calories equal it doesn't

because TEF accounts for this because

for example protein has a higher thermic

effect of food than carbohydrate or fat

so if you look at um so protein requires

more energy to basically process it

correct so if you if you look at um like

say fats for example TEF is about 0 to

3% meaning if you eat 100 calories from

dietary fat you capture about 97 to 100

calories of it carbohydrates about 5 to

10% so if you eat 100 calories from

carbohydrate you capture about 90 to 95

calories from it a lot of that depends

on the fiber content the more fiber the

lower the metabolizable energy so fiber

has a higher thermic effect of food as

well then protein is about 70 80% so if

you eat 100 calories from protein you

capture about 70 to 80 calories so some

people out there will say well there's

negative calorie no those don't exist um

you're always getting more energy out of

it than you put in but some are lower

than others right and

so that TEF is about 5 to 10% of the

energy you expend per day so now we've

got BMR TEF and then you have your

physical activity which we can further

break into two different buckets the

first one is obvious which is exercise

right you go to the gym burn some

calories and that's energy out the

second one is less intuitive it's called

non-exercise activity thermogenesis neat

and that is the small unconscious

movements that you make per day give you

an example like what I'm doing like now

it's not subconscious because I'm

thinking about it but fidgeting um when

you're talking with your hands uh pacing

right in fact they've actually shown

that people who have a more they call

obese resistant

phenotype when they eat more they tend

to just become spontaneously more active

without realizing it and so people who

are more obese prone when they eat more

food they tend to not compensate by

becoming more spontaneously active oh

interesting and people it's kind of

pedantic but it's important to

understand the difference I'll hear

people say well I'm going to take the

steps and get my knat up no no you made

a decision that's exercise Okay the

reason being neat really isn't

consciously modifiable right and so I

I'll give you an example of like a

extreme example of this so when I was

getting ready for my last bodybuilding

show back in

2010 um the fatigue that you deal with

is unbelievable it's hard to describe in

words um Soul crushing would be a way to

describe it and um I had gotten done you

know I trained two hours at the gym that

day i' done an hour of cardio got home

and I remember I sat down on the couch

and uh my my ex at my wife at the time

uh she had like real housewives of

whatever County on the TV I hated those

shows but the remote was about 7 feet

away I watched the entire show I did not

get up and move because I was so

fatigued that's an example of neat and

neat is very modifiable so they've shown

that even a 10% reduction in body weight

can reduce neat by up to 4 or 500

calories per day so you're just a lot of

people end up moving less without even

realizing it so here's the

rub this so you got your calories in you

got your calories out BMR plus TEF plus

neat plus

exercise people think of these two

things as static they're not static and

that's I talk about in the book a lot we

have various adaptations that fight us

for weight loss first of which is on the

metabolism side when you lose body

weight your BMR drops but part of that

is because you're carrying around less

weight right so if if I 200 lb and I

drop down to 180 PBS I just have less

mess to carry around and so your BMR

goes down a little bit which is again

which again is your base metabolic great

right which is the the cost of keeping

the lights on basically but there's

actually what's called metabolic

adaptation which has shown that with a

10% body weight loss on average you can

see a reduction beyond what you would

expect of 15% for

BMR so let's take an example here

because people will say well calorie

deficit didn't work for me because you

know I was eating this many calories I

was exercising this much period of time

and I was

um you know so so I like what happened

well you thought you were in a calorie

deficit but let's take me for example

okay my BMR I've had it measured it's

about it's about 2,000 calories a little

bit lower about 2,000 calories my total

daily energy expenditure is around 3,400

calories per day so that's all this

stuff added up

right but if I lose 10% of my body

weight for me 2700 calories per day is a

pretty significant calorie deficit mhm

but if I lose 10% of my body weight if I

drop my BMR by

15% 15% of 200 2,000 calories day is 300

calories drop my neat by 400 calories

that's 700 calories all of a sudden that

deficit is no longer a deficit that's

now maintenance right now this doesn't

happen all at once this is a progressive

thing over time but there's a reason

like I tell people I'm like if was a

calorie deficit as soon as like from the

time you did it indefinitely you would

starve to death right but all of us most

of us have had the experience of

starting a diet losing some weight and

eventually even though you're eating the

same way doing the same exercise it

plateaus right and then you have to do

something else to further establish that

deficit and the other way so that's on

one side where that's kind of working

against you to try to bring you back to

your original body weight right we talk

about weight weight

regain the other side is your hunger

hormones go up as you diet right so

they've actually then they have shown

obese people who lose weight to become

normal weight when you compare them to

normal weight people who were never

obese with the

same uh similar lean body

mass the formerly obese people have a

lower total daily energy

expenditure and they have higher markers

of hunger

they have higher appetite so it's

working on both sides of that equation

to push you back so The Devil's Advocate

argument is well you know I ate this

amount of calories that should have been

a calorie deficit and I didn't lose

weight or it's the you know all calories

are created equal I'll tell people all

calories are created equal because

saying a calorie is not a calorie it's

like saying uh second hands on the clock

are different no they're just a unit of

measurement all sorts of calories are

not equal so let's take um budgeting

right I used that earlier sports car

okay so let's say somebody makes million

dollars a year right if they want to

spend aund let's assume no loans just

for sake of ease if they want to spend

$150,000 on a sports car but they're

still able to pay their mortgage they

can take care of their responsibilities

and they can put money away for

retirement can they buy that sports car

sure they can right and is it a bad

investment I guess you could argue it's

a bad investment because they could put

the $150,000 in those Investments but

maybe that sports car makes them feel

good and gives them a little carrot on

the end of the stick to you know keep

working and

whatnot but if I take somebody who makes

$200,000 a year should they buy the

$150,000 sports car if it means they

can't pay their mortgage they can't um

you know save for retirement no of

course not right similar thing with

energy right so if I'm you know somebody

who's very active and I burn a lot of

calories is it a big deal if I have a

Pop-Tart say um if I'm still getting

enough protein I'm hitting my target

energy I'm uh getting enough fiber in

and my my my

micronutrients if

that gives me that little carrot on the

end of the stick to keep being

consistent not a big deal but if talking

about a smaller woman with less lean

mass who needs to eat 1,200 calories a

day to lose weight that's not a very

good investment right it's not a very

good use of funds so what I'll tell

people is you know people will say well

how do I know what a deficit is how how

do I know how many calories to eat right

because also just on that point I I

heard you talk about food labeling as

well and how inaccurate that can be so

you can you can have up to a 20% error

in food labeling right so some people

will use so what that means is

it could say 100 calories it could be 80

it could be 120 now I will say if it's

coming from a big food company and they

have pretty rigorous standards it's

probably not that far off but they're

allowed up to that right because they

recognize that some food sources are

very heterogeneous it'd be difficult to

like get it exactly

on so you'll have some people

say well see calorie counting is useless

because you can't know exactly how many

calories you're taking in and are you

going to get your BMR measured are you

going to get your neat measur meur are

you going to get this measured it can be

much more simple than

that again Financial analogy I could

make the argument that keeping a budget

is useless because you never know what

inflation is exactly doing and if you

have Investments you can get

differential you know Returns on it and

on the output side you have unexpected

expenses you have fluctuations and

expenses your power bill is going to be

different from month to month right your

car breaks down one month

but if you look at the average over time

you can get a pretty good idea of on

average what your expenses are like

right and you can get a pretty good idea

over time un let well entrepreneurs like

us but even like us you get you can

start to kind of see the trends and get

a

relatively good good idea of what it's

going to be so when it comes to calories

in and calories out yes tracking exactly

can be very very difficult but if you

are mon monitoring your body weight and

you're being consistent with how you

track you'll know if you're in a calorie

deficit and I think another thing that's

crosses people up this actually showed

up on that um that review of the

successful weight loss maintainers they

actually talked about one of the things

that um was a barrier for them or hard

for them was the weight fluctuations

because you know if you've ever if

you've ever weighed in every day have

you ever have you ever done this where

you waited every day even first thing in

the morning right up down bounces all

over the place right so actually when we

with our coaching and then with our app

we're not just looking at one weight we

encourage people to weit as long as it

doesn't cause them a lot of stress and

anxiety um weigh in Daily and then it's

taking the average of those because

daytoday changes in weight are much more

dictated by fluctuations in fluid but

week to week and month-to-month averages

reflect loss or gain of mass so for

example if you're monitoring your body

body weight you know taking

averages and looking at that over time

you'll know if you're in a calorie

deficit because on average you're seeing

it go down right now I wanted to make

one more point which is you don't have

to track calories to lose weight

absolutely not it's just one methodology

because no matter what you do you have

to have some form of restraint right and

my friend Peter AA actually breaks it

down nicely into a couple different

three buckets right you can have dietary

restraint which is low car herb

plant-based um Whole Food you know

whatever it is you're you're restricting

some sort of food group or type of food

right then you have a time restriction

you eat within a certain time frame a

certain

window then you can have just straight

up calorie restriction where you're

tracking and monitoring what you choose

to do I think a lot in terms of what is

best for an individual boils down to

their psychology and what feels easy

so this is where a lot of the diet Wars

start because somebody will do say low

carb right and they'll get results from

that and they'll say man it felt like I

wasn't even dieting and for whatever

reason that clicked with the algorithm

in their brain and felt easy and they

got progress from that but then they

assume that everyone else will have the

same response somebody else does low fat

uh somebody else does intermittent

fasting whatever have you and you have

all these stories me personally I was

the kind of person I'm the kind of

person that if I tried to restrict

certain foods I end up getting that

binge response right but if you tell me

I can eat whatever I want as long as I'm

tracking it I become ridiculously

consistent and I mean I'm still eating

mostly like Whole Food minimally

processed foods you know those sorts of

things because they're better for

satiety but I don't stress out about

having some snacks here and there that

are you know bad consistency because I'm

I'm being very consistent right how

important is that consistency it is the

most important thing so there is

actually a um meta analysis and for when

I say meta analysis think a study of

studies okay so it's not a new study

it's what they're trying to do in a

metaanalysis is they are trying to take

studies that are similar and compile

them together to see is there a

consensus here is there an overall

effect here right so there was a meta

analysis of um where they looked at 14

different like popular diets and these

ranged from low carb to you know high

carb low fat

right and what they found is on the long

term none of them were better than the

others for weight loss but when they

stratified them for adherence from least

adherent to most adherent what does that

mean uh so people who were consistent

basically so when they stratified them

for I think compliance another way to

put it when they gratifi them that way

regardless of diet a linear effect of

adherence on weight

loss so what that tells me is actually

the best diet for the individual is the

one that they consistent that can

consistently execute they all function

the same way which is you know creating

some sort of calorie deficit now some

people will say that's not true I did a

low carb diet and I was eating more food

you probably felt more satiated because

you were eating less calorie dense food

you probably were eating a greater

quantity in terms of weight of

food but you were eating less calories

is there any way to lose weight in a car

calorie Surplus not if that's the so

what I'll tell people is all right you

take in food it the carbons that you

take in they have to go somewhere right

and if you

are if you are not in a surplus what you

are say is you are creating energy out

of nothing if that's the case NASA needs

to study you because we've figured out

how to not worry about fuel on Long

space flights right we have a perpetual

motion machine um again a a lot of this

the confusion becomes when you have you

know for example metabolic adaptation

yeah so you know people they may think

they're in a calorie deficit but they're

not or they're overestimating how many

calories they burn and here's the other

that people don't want to talk about CU

this gets down to the mirror right so

there's a classic study I think it was

from

1992 um and I think the title I may

butcher it but it's discrepancy between

reported and actual calorie intake in OB

subjects I I want to say is is the name

of the study and so what they did was

they had people they screened for people

who said that they could not lose weight

even though they were eating low

calories and the the average calorie

intake that was reported by participants

was 1,200 calories a day and so they

measured a bunch of different stuff they

measured their lean mass their fat Mass

they measured their BMR they measured

their total daily energy

expenditure they found that their BMR

was very average when it was when it was

for when it was based on their lean mass

right and actually if you look at obese

people they actually have a higher BMR

and higher energy expenditure typically

than lean people but on average it's cuz

they have more lean mass because when

you have more mass to carry around your

body has to create more locomotive Mass

but when they so they and they told the

subjects we will we are going to monitor

you and we will know if you're eating

more than you say you are the average in

the study was they under reported their

calorie intake by about

50% and they over reported their

physical activity by just under 50% gez

now and some of the participants argued

with the researchers about it right

here's where people miss the message the

message a lot of people take from that

is oh see they're

lying and that's a really hard thing to

take to somebody to be like well you're

probably underreporting your calorie

intake you're probably eating more than

you think you are that feels very you

know

aggressive and I don't think it's lying

I think that one people don't really

understand portion sizes if you've never

had the experience of like weighing out

your food you will be shocked like weigh

out a serving of cereal or a serving of

ice cream or if you want to be really

depressed we out a serving of peanut

butter because the tablespoon that

you're grabbing I promise you is

probably two or three servings and then

you know like if the first time I

weighed out ice cream when I when I

started weighing my food I was like this

is a

serving it's like two bites you know and

so I don't think people have a really

good understanding of serving side and

even I I'll remember I never forget this

it was an Instagram DM and this lady was

saying that she was eating 1600 calories

a day and not losing weight and we kind

of you know had a little back and forth

and we were talking and I said well how

she's like I am measuring my food I'm

like how are you measuring it she's like

I'm I'm doing volume measurements so she

was doing cups tablespoons that sort of

thing I said do me a

favor do do exactly what you've been

doing but weigh out each one a day later

she came back and said oh my God I'm

eating 2700 calories a day and so even

dietitians under report their caloric

intake in Studies by about 10% and these

are the experts right so you have on one

side people are eating more than they

think they are and then on the other

side they think they're being more

active than they really

are but again that's a hard conversation

to have with people and even as such

telling people hey you need to move more

eat less mechanistically that's true but

that's like telling somebody hey if you

want to save more money just earn more

and spend less with all of this you know

I I was adding up all these

discrepancies right discrepancies is in

like you're weighing it wrong the labels

got 20% wrong and I and then my head

went back to your budgeting analogy as

an entreer as a CEO if my accounting was

20% off I'm dead but if my but but then

if it's 95% off in the till like how

much money we're getting into the till

and then I'm using a cup instead of a

scale so that's I don't know 30% off as

well no wonder you know the business

would go bust right it's complicated I

go what the [ __ ] are you going to do

yeah it it is complicated but I will

tell people you know again if you get

back to the the basics of monitoring

your body weight consistently which is

one of the I have to be careful about

this because there are some people where

monitoring their body weight

consistently ends up being like really

anxiety provoking for them disorted eing

and stuff yeah that sort of thing so

that's you know I try to be sensitive to

that but it is a consistent thing in the

literature that people who lose weight

and keep it off tend to monitor their

body weight pretty regularly and it's

it's a self-correcting thing right like

if you're keeping a budget very

regularly and you see oh man I spent you

know $5,000 more this month what happens

you correct right and so I would use

that more instead of the accounting

variation I would say well sometimes

your business has unexpected expenses

right or sometimes you have less

expenses right and so those are going to

fluctuate and can be hard to anticipate

right and so what we're looking for

overall is okay let's look back at you

know I think a lot of businesses operate

in quarters right let's look at this

quarter okay on average here's here's

our month over month what we're

profiting right okay well we can start

to budget based on these sorts of things

and expectations we'll try to project

out a little bit I kind of look at that

with people I'm like all right well how

much weight did you lose on average like

over the past month okay how much were

you eating okay you lost six pounds over

the last month you're definitely in a

calorie deficit right it's working keep

going maybe you're eating 2,000 calories

maybe you're eating 2,300 calories who

cares it's working right now what

happens is eventually once you plateau

again maybe reading 2,000 maybe reading

2300 doesn't matter whichever it is if

you've plateaued it means you have to

reestablish the deficit so you either

have to reduce your calories or you have

to increase your activity or a

combination of both you know those sorts

of things what about one thing I you

talk about at the very start of this

conversation was um artificial sweetness

specifically oh yeah let's do that

specifically in things like Diet Coke

I've you know I've wondered for a while

whether Diet Coke is healthy or not okay

and there's a lot of you know people

talking about this at the moment so

what's your answer to that okay this is

going to be the most commented thing

about in this entire interview I'm sure

go um okay so first off let's just talk

about weight loss and fat loss okay and

and leave out the other stuff um if you

look at the

epidemiology and the cohort studies you

tend to see that people who consume more

artificial sweeteners or diet soda are

heavier in body weight and so some

people have said these things cause

weight

gain but the problem with that is again

lifestyle behaviors and so one of the

things they've shown is that people who

consume more artificial sweeteners

actually tended to be more overweight to

start with obese to start with

they didn't cause them to become that

way they're consuming more of them

because they're trying to get to a less

obese state right so there's a

correlation there but if we look at the

randomized control trials right where

they say hey you're used to you guys

drink soda regular soda you guys drink

diet soda there was actually one that

just got published a very very really

rigorously controlled one-ear

study way more weight loss in the diet

soda group

um and I'm thinking of another

randomized control trial I think it was

six months where they saw like 6

kilograms of weight loss just from

switching people from regular soda to

diet soda or it might not have been soda

specifically they call them sugar

sweetened beverages versus you know

non-nutritive sweetened beverages um so

when you replace for for soda it seems

to be very effective uh all things being

equal and people will say Well it you

know it activates the the sweetness in

the and and you get hungrier from

it well if that's the case then these

studies would suggest that artificial

sweeteners are actually the best frat

burners known to man because if people

are eating more and still losing six

kilograms that's amazing they're not

it's they're not fat burners they

they're replacing that sweet taste and

then people will say well it's not

better than water you know water people

should just drink water shoot the

alligator closest to the boat right like

okay hey if you can drink water and just

drink water cool do that right but if

somebody can lose and I have people all

the time when I do a post about this

somebody say I lost 30 40 50 lbs all I

did was stop drinking regular soda and

drink diet soda literally the only

change they made in their

life now when they compare it versus

water they either see the same results

or the diet soda group gets a little bit

better results and yeah now it's not

because of any kind of fat burning

effect

what is likely is when somebody switches

from regular sugar sweetened beverage to

water they may try to fill that gap of

that sweet taste somewhere else whereas

if they're just consuming the

artificially sweeten or non-nutritive

sweeten but we can't say artificial

because um like Stevia is actually you

know natural so to say so they call it

nonnutritive sweeteners but if they're

consuming the the non-nutritive

sweeteners they're filling that Gap

compensation again compensating right so

now again there's nothing magic about

them people are just eating less right

and if you can do that with water you

don't have to consume diet soda you know

I would say drink water but if you're

somebody where man you know you really

have a hard time quitting regular soda

heck yeah drinking diet soda is a lot

better and people will go well what

about insulin they raise insulin that is

actually one of the biggest myths out

there there are multiple not just iies

but now I'm pretty sure there's a meta

analysis as well that shows that these

artificial sweeteners do not raise

insulin there is one

study um I'm thinking specifically about

sucralose there's one study and there

everybody always hangs their hats on

this and I love to to break it down

where sucralose did not increase insulin

but they did a they did a sucrose group

a carbohydrate only group and a

carbohydrate plus sucrose group and the

results were the carbohydrate plus

sucralose group secreted more insulin

than the carbohydrate only group even

though they ate the same amount of carbs

and so people go well see maybe it's not

bad but if you're you know drinking it

with carbohydrates it's bad and this is

where reading the full text and really

going deep on a study is very important

so the carbohydrate only group was

sucrose which is 50% glucose 50%

fructose the carb hydrate plus sucralose

group was

maltodextrin maltodextrin if you look at

are you familiar with glycemic index

Loosely yeah so glycemic index basically

looks at like um you know how quickly

glucose appears in your system and

usually you can kind of correlate the

insulin response to

that multitran has a significantly

higher glycemic index and causes a

greater insulin response than

sucrose because it is a it's actually

causes a greater insulin response than

even glucose itself because um it's kind

of getting into the biochemistry but

because it's like this polymer um it is

actually a little bit more rapidly

digested and absorbed into the

circulation so it was actually an

inappropriate control group to try to

assess that because if you look at the

difference in insulin response it's

about what you'd expect if you just look

at multitran versus

sucrose So based on the research there's

no evidence it affects glycemia or

increases insulin and in fact in these

studies where they you know these

randomized control trials where they

look at you know weight loss um you see

improvements in insulin sensitivity

hba1c you know because people are losing

weight not because of anything magic

with these sweeteners is sugar

addictive this one's going to get me in

trouble too um I want to come back to

the artificial sweeteners but I'll

answer that um Sugar by itself does not

appear to be addtive

Ive there are certain

foods that appear to create what's

called a food dependence there's subtle

differences between that and

addiction but I mean kind of the

anecdote is nobody's like just grabbing

the bag of sucros and just you know

eating that and if you think about the

foods that really are like very hard to

stop eating they're usually not just

high in sugar they're usually it's a

combination of sugar fat salt and

texture okay texture matters as well and

mouth feel people will say well Sugar's

addictive look at cakes cookies ice

cream

there's more calories from fat in those

than there are sugar in a lot of cases

so couldn't you by that logic just argue

that fat is also addictive so

sugar straight sugar doesn't appear to

be addictive per se now it's not very

satiating right and it's utterly devoid

of any other kind of nutrient so I'm not

saying it's a good idea to eat a lot of

sugar but um it doesn't appear to have

addictive qualities in isolation but

there are certain foods cakes cookies

these sorts of foods hyper palatable

very great mouth fuel potato chips

french fries these sorts of foods may

have like s sem addictive type

properties but just sugar itself doesn't

appear to and there's a there's a a

study that kind of backs that up

basically I think the title was like no

evidence for sugar addiction in humans

so people will say well you know when I

eat that piece of chocolate or that you

know sugary thing I end up just eating

more and more and more and more and more

and more and then the next day I I feel

like I need sugar more and I can I've

got my own sort of anecdotal experience

of I almost call it like a sugar cycle

where there might be a weak you know

once every four months or six months

where I have some sugar and then the

next day I want more sugar and then the

next day I want more sugar and then the

next day and then when I break that

Sugar cycle and if I don't eat sugar for

like 5 days it kind of it feels like the

Cravings gone away M you must hear that

from people yeah I mean like right now I

have no urge to have sugar for some

reason yeah it's so hard to disentangle

that from just psychology in general

right and just like it that could be a

self-fulfilling thing where it's like

you know people have been C sugar is

addictive or they've heard sugar is

addictive and so they eat some feel that

mood but also like again the chocolate

usually also high in fat right like the

mouth feels really good so I'm not

saying like that stuff is easy to

overeat on and and people can have a

hard time stopping but it doesn't appear

that Sugar like independently is

addictive but it can be part of foods

that may have addictive like properties

artificial sweeters you said you wanted

to close off there yeah so now let's

talk so we very clearly the research

studies show the ones that are

controlled

well it does help with weight loss um in

a lot of these

studies what about cancer heart disease

uh and the gut microbiome because that's

a lot of the questions are out there so

with cancer a lot of people think oh

there's so many studies showing it

causes cancer well first of all again

we're talking about epidemiology we're

talking about cohort studies so there's

a lot of confounding

variables but so we were talking about

consensus earlier um it's kind of a um

I'm on their scientific Advisory Board

and it's like PubMed plus chat GPT so

you can ask it a question and it will

immediately like crawl all the research

literature and give you a consensus of

what the research says right and so I I

did this and you can synthesize it too

where it'll show you what percentage of

studies say yes no and then possibly

right so I I I think I put in do

artificial sweeteners cause cancer do

you know 80% % of the studies say no but

you don't hear about those and why is

that because it's much more newsworthy

to put out negative news because if you

hear a study this thing doesn't cause

cancer ho right but what gets shared a

lot oh man Aunt Deborah she drinks Diet

Coke Deb have you seen this you know

it's much more sharable so that negative

news tends to get published more

right and if you look at the the human

studies some of the the more well done

ones like I'm think of the neutr Santi

cohort in out of France the conclusion

was oh it increased the risk of cancer

and I I looked in I think it was

aspartame spe

specifically if something's

carcinogenic typically what we see is a

dose response right so if you smoke more

you have a higher risk of lung cancer

did you know that the yes the so they

compared like no or like low amount of

aspartame users to like low moderate and

then High moderate I want to say it was

three different groups so I I could be

butchering this a little bit but think

low medium high

right the medium group had a higher risk

of cancer the High group didn't it

actually like not uh compared to the the

low group it was not statistically

different but it dropped from the

moderate group so to me and again we're

talking about an ratio of like 1.15

meaning a 15% relative risk increase let

me put that in perspective 15% sounds

scary when it comes to cancer but

relative risk means if your absolute

risk of developing cancer and say the

next 10 years is 10% a relative risk

increase of 15% says it goes up to 11.5

yeah it doesn't mean it goes from 10 to

25 right so it's important to to

understand the difference but again if

it's really carcinogenic we should

expect to see kind of a a dose response

right we don't see that so to me that's

especially with all the studies that

don't find an

association that's that's more likely to

be some kind of data artifact with who

knows confounding variables healthy user

bias what have you what about the gut

then so now there are studies showing

that some sweeteners do change the gut

microflora the comp the composition of

it um sucrose appears too aspartame not

so much um I think sacran also showed a

change to the gut

microbiome now here's what's

interesting it's hard to know if that is

a good bad or neutral change in terms of

overall health because um I was looking

through one of the studies on

sucralose and they were talking about

that a couple of species or or genuses

of bacteria that increased and one of

them that increased was actually

associated with people who are leaner

have less obesity and better insulin

sensitivity and also a species that

produce more butyrate and butyrate

actually is associated with a whole Host

this is a a short chain fatty acid

produced by the gut microbiome mate is

associated with a whole host of positive

health benefits so I I I will say it's

worth monitoring because some of these

do appear to change the breakdown of the

got microbiota but there's probably You

could argue just as much that there's a

positive effect as you could a negative

effect so what I'll say is again if we

look back at the again shoot the

alligator closest to the boat and there

are no Solutions only trade-offs if

somebody switches to diet soda even if

it's not the very best thing they could

do maybe water is the very best thing

they could do but if they lose 20

lbs and their hba1c drops and their

insulin s gets better the metabolic

Health gets

better it's probably a worthwhile

tradeoff are there any supplements that

you would recommend everybody to

take so I I always say I have like tears

of supplements right um my my first

tier thousands of research studies very

clearly has benefits creatin monohydrate

um which we've known about the

performance benefits for years we've

known about the um the strength benefits

the body composition benefits you take

it every day yes I do um now it's coming

out that there's cognitive benefits and

I want to say man I hope I don't I hope

I don't get this wrong so I will fact

check this and and make sure you ask me

for the study I'm pretty sure they did a

study that showed that creatin actually

decreased depressive symptoms

interesting so what I will say is if

there was one I would recommend for

everybody it would probably be Crea

monohydrate because it's cheap effective

and um I mean people say wow we don't

know what the long-term effects are it's

been around for like 40 years we if if

there was long-term effects we' we'd

have seen it by now and just to Quick

aside creatin monohydrate don't waste

your money on anything else there's

people try to reinvent the wheel with

creatin because monohydrate it's you

know remember when like big screen flat

screen TVs came out uh this I might be a

I'm my age here no I remember but I

remember it was like $1,000 for a 40in

screen TV and now you can get one for a

stick of bubblegum you know what I mean

and it's because everybody makes them

they're so ubiquitous it drove the cost

down right everybody sells creatin

monohydrate it drives the cost down so

companies come up with new forms of

creatin and make these claims around

them to try to like get you to spend

more money on cre creatin monohydrate

saturates the muscle cell 100% you don't

need to do anything else what's going on

there so a couple things um and we don't

don't fully understand all the

mechanisms but we know that when creatin

gets in the system um and gets into the

cell it bonds with a phosphate which uh

produces creatin phosphate that is a

high energy phosphate donor so when

you're exercising um basically you are

using what's called adenosine

triphosphate which is ATP which is the

purest form of energy in your body so

this what we call hydrolysis of ATP is

used to power a lot of reactions in your

body um and so ATP triphosphate three

phosphates it to power these reactions

it gets cleaved to a DP as anine

diphosphate plus uh an inorganic

phosphate right creatine can donate its

phosphate to ADP reform ATP so what we

see is you know um especially during

anerobic exercise uh better performance

of creatin because it's a high energy

phosphate donor can help replenish that

um and then it also pulls water into the

cell and we think that that's part of

the body composition benefits of it

because um you know a hydrated muscle

cell I mean muscle cells are 70% water

they're mostly water and people say well

it's just water okay but that's lean

tissue and there's actually some I

believe there's some evidence that

actually uh hydrating the muscle

basically actually increases the

improves the contractile properties of

the muscle so that could explain part of

the strength benefits um and of course

again it's going to show up as lean mass

right now it's not a huge effect we're

talking you know couple pounds for most

people something like that I'll take it

but but for a relatively cheap effective

supplement yeah take it right what are

the supplements then in is there

anything else in the tier one yeah uh I

mean like for people who can tolerate

whey protein I mean you know it's not um

it's not magic but it's a cheap uh

usually quite tasty way to get in high

quality protein and you know if you get

it from Whole Food great but a lot of

people struggle to get in you know the

amount of protein they'd like to get in