#202 - If You Master These Habits, You'll Change Your F'ing Life

In this episode, we break down the actual habits that move the needle for women who want sustainable fat loss, better energy, and a healthier routine that finally sticks.

No diets. No extremes.
Just the basics that work every single time —
when you repeat them.

What we cover:
• Why most people keep switching plans instead of mastering fundamentals
• How 30–40g protein per meal stabilizes hunger + builds muscle
• Why 7.5k+ steps outperforms cardio for daily fat loss + stress reduction
• The real reason lifting 3–5x/week changes your body shape
• Sleep, stress, and why 7–8 hours is non-negotiable
• Simple nutrition anchors: fruits, veggies, hydration, and electrolytes
• Sunday planning → the secret to consistency
• Why cutting caffeine after 2pm matters more than you think
• Daily journaling + morning sunlight = better mood, better decisions, better results
• How mastering just these 10 habits changes your damn life

Takeaway:
You don’t need a new diet.
You need the fundamentals —
done well, done consistently, done long enough to work.

If you want the exact coaching system I use to help clients lose 10–20% of their body weight (without burnout) 👉 DM me "QUIZ" on Instagram (@johanvesters_ocs)

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Free gift for our listeners! Download the '5-Minute Meal Plan' Video Training to learn exactly what, how much, when, and how often to eat for your goals: https://bit.ly/4foeWmX

Transcript

0:34

If you master these 10 basic habits, you'll change your fucking life. Sort of started the podcast with that one. I'm just I'm fired up. Look, when it comes to health and fitness, we talk about patience a lot. We talk about consistency a lot. But let's not overcomplicate it either, because it's actually really, really simple. I know that it's not easy. Look, I have a full time job as a coach, and I'm really fucking grateful that my full time job is literally getting people healthy, helping them live longer, being happier, you know, like being a better role model for your kids. Like, it's literally the best shit. Like, I love this stuff so much. So if you hear me swear, sometimes it's just out of passion. Excuse me, it's just our passion. It's just how I talk, but like, I'm just fired up right now. I just had a great week full of check ins, full of just people killing it. It's November 21 at the time of this recording, and people are dropping weight like this time of year is really cool, because we've seen consistent fat loss, and now we're going to go up again in food, right? We bring them back up. Christmas time is not for dieting. The holiday season is not for dieting. We're going to build muscle, we're going to fuel the metabolism, we're going to get you feeling great. And you know what? We're not going to regain all of that weight over Christmas because we've practiced the habits. We practice the basic shit, and that's what this episode is about. If you're new here, thanks so much for checking out my podcast. If you're a returning listener, what's up? Hope you're doing great. Like, message me and Instagram. Sometimes I really sometimes I'm like, I get in my own head too. You know when I mean, like, I'm like, hey, you know, fuck. Like, what should I talk about next time, what do I talk about? Like, and I know I go on little side quests every now and then. Look like, help me out too. You know, we don't do any ads here. We don't do any sales and shit. And, you know what? Yeah, sometimes I'm gonna tell you, hey, like we're running a special, or we're doing something like a giveaway, whatever it is. But look like I'm also not just here to sell shit, you know. Like, I'm really passionate about this stuff. I think you can tell today as well. But, like, just hit me up if you're a returning listener. I'm legit. I want to hear from you. I'm gonna challenge you here, because I know not everyone loves here's the funny thing to you about social media. People forget that the word social is in the word social media. It's called social media, right? I want to chat with you, you know. So if you are a returning listener, message me on Instagram. The link is in the show notes. You can reach out there. And by the way, too, if you're new here and you have a few follow up questions about the 10 habits that we'll discuss today, hit me up too. I'm just happy to have you. You know what I mean? I'm happy to help because I know, especially around that holiday season, people tend to overthink things. And I know you're already looking at December and thinking like, you know it's gonna happen again. It's gonna happen again. Doesn't have to happen again. Mind you, like, if you're just getting started, let's just focus on habit building, even if you don't track a single fucking calorie of macro, even if you don't do any of that. If you, I'm going to tell you this, if you hit three of the habits we'll discuss today, consistently for the rest of the year, you're going to see progress. You're going to see results. Now it might not be, you know, 10 to 20 pound fat loss result. It might not be pounds of muscle, but it's going to be consistency. It's going to be you feeling really fucking good because you're doing things that are great for your body, your mind and everything else, you know. Let's dive in. I'm fired up today, so, okay, the 10 habits, and mind you, these are not, you know, there's not an exclusive list whatever like these are just some of the most important ones. But if you master them, things are going to change, because your body doesn't need another diet. Stop doing these crazy diets. First of all, stop doing these crazy diets. Shit doesn't work, period. You've tried all of them. You've tried keto, you've tried low carb, you've tried intermittent fasting, carnivore, you've tried all the meal replacement shakes. I literally can't believe that shit still around. It really, it still pissed me off. And if you've been listening to this podcast, you know that I don't love those you might think now that peptides is the next thing. You might think that you need all the supplements. Look, you don't. You really don't. You need habits. You need consistent habits. You need little daily wins to stack up. By the way, it takes a while to create a new habit to the average, based on research, is about 66 days, but it's a range of 18 days up to 258 or so, so anywhere from a few weeks to months right now, I don't really care about how long it's supposed to take, because look like we can say six months or three months, or whatever type of days, you know, amount of days it's not about that. How many of those days did you do? The thing that's what it's about. Habit. Number one is protein. You want to have 30 to 40 grams of protein per meal. It's really not that hard, guys, it really isn't. And if you do have a hard time with this, you DM me the word protein on Instagram, and I will send you the most inclusive protein cheat sheet I've ever seen myself. That's why I created it, and it's also number one on Google. You want to check this one out. Like, if you struggle with protein, you're going to DM me protein on Instagram, and you'll get my free protein cheat sheet, by the way, too. Like, once you do that, you know when you do that, let me know too that you're coming in from the podcast, protein is going to help you build muscle. And there's only two things, by the way, that spike muscle protein synthesis. That's just a fancy word for, like that muscle building process, first of all, training. Second is protein. That's why I actually want you to look at protein per meal instead of like your daily intake. Because, by the way, to hit your daily intake, you need to hit your meals with a certain amount. But 30 to 40 grams of protein per meal is going to cover it for most people listening, it's going to keep you nice and full. By the way, protein is the most satiating macronutrients, which is also going to help you build muscle and keep muscle. When you're in a fat loss phase, it's not just about weight going down. You want to keep your muscle while losing fat. That protein is going to help. It's also essential, by the way, like your body needs protein to function optimally. Second habit, it's going to be your daily step counts. Based on research, 7500 is going to cover the health benefits, the longevity benefits. You can literally lower the risk of all cause mortality by just walking more. And there's a really cool study on this. I've talked about it a lot, but per 1000 steps, that risk of all cause mortality, which is a fancy term for risk of disease, of all cause, basically goes down significantly. So start with 7500 as your goal, and maybe bring it up to eight, 910, maybe a bit more, if you can, if you're in a phallus phase, but walk move like, make sure to move right, like your body needs that. We're made to move. We're not made to sit still all the time. And I know, like even for me, look, I also work a sanitary job. You know what I mean? I'm sitting here in my little office most days, long hours. I also got to make a point of hitting those walks, but when I do so, I feel better every single time. As a little bonus, by the way, if you get a morning walk in with a bit of sunlight, you're going to support your circadian rhythm too. And we'll talk about sleep in a sec. Habit three is weightlifting, training three to five times a week. And I'm saying three to five times because if you're busy, even three times per week is pretty solid. You just do push, pull legs, or maybe even three full body workouts, you're going to be able to build muscle then. But I'm not talking cardio here. I'm talking weight lifting, and I'm also not talking about your hit classes or the jumping up and down with a light dumbbell. No, I'm talking a traditional, like bodybuilding type of training program. And no, I don't mean like the bodybuilding as in, like you're going to get on stage. I mean the stuff you see at a normal global gym, let's say, right, you're going to have a program that's the same every single week you're going to aim to have more reps and or weights every single week you want to progress, because we need to keep challenging the muscle. So maybe one week you do, you know, 10 reps with, you know, like a 10 kilo dumbbell. Okay, awesome. You do that for three sets, or maybe it's like 12 reps, 11 reps, 10 reps. Now your next week, the goal is to going to be beating that so you want to have more weight and or reps within that rep range that you have just follow a structured program, get on the program, follow it, and you do that for multiple months, then you can either deload and just repeat, repeat the same program, or if you want to change it up, some people like more variety, you're going to deload and you're going to try a new, different kind of focus kind of program. So let's say, I'm going to do three to four months of back focus, back in arms. Let's say, or I'm going to say, You know what? I want to focus on chest. I want to focus on legs. Right? You're still training everything else, but you're doing more volume around those muscle groups that you want to build more make sense. And just like that, you're going to have different seasons cool. And by the way, training doesn't change when you're dieting. Keep lifting weights. Number four is sleep. You need to sleep seven to eight hours a night, non negotiable. And if you're not doing that, everything else will be negatively affected. Hunger, satiety hormones, your sex hormones, your drive right fatigue also plays into self control of willpower. By the way, there's an actual change in brain activity there, which is super interesting. I mean, obviously with you know, a little sleep like you're not going to move around as much during the day. You're not going to have that, you know, drive. And here's the thing too, right? You're going to lose less fat, and you're going to build less muscle if you under sleep. There was a really cool study on this. I believe these two groups were either in bed for five and a half hours and then eight hours. They were doing the same with their calories and. Training and all that, and both groups lost the same amount of weight, but that group that was in bed for only five and a half hours lost less body fat and they lost more muscle. So while they lost the same amount of weight, the people who were in bed for seven and a half or eight hours lost more body fat and kept more muscle so they were leaner. At the end of that study, number five is going to be your fruits and veggies. You got to be hitting at least four servings, and I mean, like a fist sized portion each, right? So four times that per day every time you eat, which, by the way, I recommend you eating four times a day, roughly three too little. In my opinion, five is still really solid. I think more is unnecessary. But every single time you eat, there needs to be some type of fruits or vegetable, non negotiable. So if you're, by the way, if you're listening to this and you're, okay, okay, the protein, I'm not doing that yet. Cool, the steps, I think I can bring those up. Fruits and veggies, I can bring those up. Okay, cool. You have three already. Focus on that. Maybe you're listening to this and you think, okay, maybe my sleep that is five hours on average, or six or whatever. Or it's just random. Maybe that's gonna be my main focus, which, by the way, last year, this was even in my business plan for 2025 because in 2024 I had a lot of, like, later in the year, I had a lot of eight. Had a lot of issues sleeping, so my main priority was dialing in sleep. So I worked on that with my coach. Was stress related, also extra stress management and everything else. And that was the priority then. So that was for me, that one habit that needed most attention. So as you're listening to these basics, right, like, make sure to kind of take mental note and think, Hey, this is maybe something I could be focusing on. Next habit on the list is going to be your hydration. You want to probably hit like, three to four liters of water per day. Yes, you can count tea and coffee and stuff. And I don't love including sodas. Definitely not. If it has, you know, calories, it would technically still be fine. But I want you to prioritize water, things like juices and stuff like, I don't like to include, like, I just, mean, just plain water, like, three to four liters a day, which is on the higher end. So also here right, understand too, that I'm speaking general recommendations. Like, you might need a little bit less, maybe it's two and a half to three and a half depends on your activity as well. I really like to stack this with electrolytes in the morning, I'm going to show you on screen if you're watching on YouTube. I'm not affiliated, but I like redman's re lights. That's the one that I use. I do one serving in the morning for my electrolytes, because I have this bad habit, by the way, of drinking too much water. So I have this water bottle with me all the time, and I'll easily drink like six liters per day, and that's a little too much, so I need to pay attention to drinking a little bit less water, still hitting my four liters, right? But because of that also, I like to include those electrolytes. I do that first thing in the morning, basically right away, and at least 30 minutes before I hit my first coffee, the day is way better when you start with water and electrolytes a morning walking a bit of sunlight. If you want to hack, like, that's that hack. I hate hacks, and they don't exist really. But if you want to have, like, a quick fix for starting your day off, right, do that stacked with a little bit of you time right, starting the morning kind of slowly, just getting into it. Next one on the list is number seven, and this one is huge, planning your week and Sundays. I know you're busy, but your busyness is not a fucking surprise. You know it's busy. You know it's gonna be busy next week. You know it's gonna be busy the week after. And know the stars are not gonna somehow align all of the sudden, and give you hours in your day, extra to do whatever. No, you're busy. You got your job, you got the kids to take care of. Maybe you don't have kids, but you have so many other things to take care of, right? Life is busy. I get that life is stressful. I understand that same thing for me. You know what I mean? I'm also busy running around, and lot of things are going to take care of, and I still have my real life and try to build this business, like, I get it, but look, and when I say this to you, like, don't get me wrong, I understand you're super busy, right? I am also super busy. And the same thing goes for me. When I say, hey, next week, being busy is not a fucking surprise. Like, the same thing goes for me. I know it's next week. I know it's going to be busy the week after, and I know it's not going to change. If anything, we're going to get more busy, or at least for me, I know I'm going to be more busy. Here's the cool thing, though, because I do more planning, I have more routines. I have more systems in place. I get more done. And that's what I want you to look at. Plan your week on Sunday, sit down, just look ahead. Like okay, so I got my week coming up, you know what? Nothing special, actually. No, I see Saturday. We have that Christmas dinner planned. Okay, cool. So I know it's Saturday, I'm gonna have to Christmas dinner. Okay, cool. So what do I need to do during the day? You know what? I'm gonna have my normal meals. I'm gonna maybe go a little bit lower on fat during the week, but I'm gonna, you know, stick with my general meals. Not going in hungry, those kind of things. Okay, cool. I know, actually, Wednesday, I'm flying somewhere for work. I know that I'm not going to be able to get my regular meals in, but let me at least plan for that breakfast to be solid before I leave. Let me already decide what I'm going to bring with me, maybe a solid like a protein bar, piece of fruit for the for the flight. And you know what we're going to be staying at this hotel. Let me actually check if in that area, we can find some good food those things. It goes a long way just to look at your week honestly. Because if you know what days you're going to work out, you can plan for it. If you know what meals you're going to have, you don't even have to think about nutrition anymore. If you can give you the biggest tip for sticking to your nutrition is just to plan your meals at a time. I do this on Saturdays, by the way, or at least for my meals. So Saturday, I review my meal plan, and then on Saturday I go shopping for the whole week. I do a meal prep on Sunday, then I just execute because, like I said, I'm also super busy. So what do we need to do? We need to create systems. We need to create routines. We need to get more efficient with our time. We need to get more done with less time needed. And it all starts with planning number eight. We're getting there. Cutting caffeine after 2pm after two in the afternoon, you shouldn't be drinking caffeine anymore. Now people are going to metabolize caffeine slightly differently, but the half life it's going to play into, like, your sleep if you, let's say, if we think, like eight hours, for example, right? Okay, I want to be a med at 10. Okay, so, or I want to fall asleep at 10. I really shouldn't be drinking coffee at three to four. Then this one is big for my people who are doing the evening workouts. I know you're slamming those energy drinks because you think that's your pre workout, but look like your sleep is gonna suck. And if you keep drinking caffeine in the evening, it's not performance enhancing anymore. It's actually hindering your recovery, because your sleep quality sucks. Even if you fall asleep on caffeine, your sleep quality is going to suck. And then, long term, you're actually making your performance worse because you're not recovering. Well, I would even say, hey, you know what? For your coffees stick to two to three cups a day. You don't need more, and if it's more, might be worth actually going off of it for a bit. I've done this many times over the years. I give myself 30 days of no caffeine at all, zero caffeine. And afterwards, I'll reintroduce but I'll slowly kind of bring it back. Number Nine out of 10, daily journaling for self reflection. I swear my by my journal, there's two things that I've been doing almost every single day for the last years, and that is reading. And if you're watching on YouTube, that's reading one page of the daily stoke by Ryan Holiday every single morning, one page. That's it. It's my third time reading this book, and then I'll write in my journal. If you're new to journaling, just start by writing down three things you're grateful for. If you want to expand on that maybe do for three things you're grateful for. I am statement like an affirmation, right? If you struggle with something, maybe self belief, or really whatever it is, you know, if you kind of get in your own hand, try affirmations. You could stack that I am statement with an i will statement. So this one's funny. Like, for a period of time, I was getting in my own head, and I was thinking to myself, no one likes my content. My podcast is not good enough. I'm not a good storyteller. I'm not a good content creator. So I was writing down. This is years ago now, but I wrote down, I am a good content creator every single day, right? I would do my three gratitude statements. I would write down, I'm a great coach and content creator. And then my I will statement is kind of like, so you want that I will statement to relate to your I Am statement. So if you say, Hey, I am blah, blah, blah, then the I Will statement is the actions you will take to date to prove yourself that you are that person. Because here's the cool thing, if you're trying to achieve this identity, the 2.0 version of you, you might not be there yet, but you can still do the same things. So I would tell myself I am a good content creator and coach, and I will let my passions shine through my content today, and blah, blah, blah, or I will write three new posts a day. You know, it's just silly example, maybe, like, you get it gratitude, statements. I am, statement, I will, statement. And then what I like to do usually, is I'll usually give myself like, maybe, like a month or so, or like a monthly theme, or I have a word that I pick for the year that I usually throw in there too, but a statement, or just something I want to repeat. Because here's the cool thing, guys, this sounds maybe a little Woo, woo, but it's, it's fucking like it works. You can speak things in a truth. You can already act like the person you're trying to become, and all you need to do is just write it down, or speak to yourself in the mirror. Talk to yourself when you're walking. I know these things kind of sound weird, but you can speak things in a truth by telling yourself who you are, by telling yourself that you can do this. It works. I'll just speak for myself, but well, like myself and my clients, because they. Do too, but do some type of daily journaling practice. Because, look, here's another thing I do twice a day. I do it in the morning to kind of set the tone, to do lists all those kind of things. And then at the end of the day, I'll review, and I'll kind of see, hey, did I show up as the best version of myself? And you can call me with your own questions. Did I get the things done that I said I want, I would Did I do the thing right? Did I, you know, did my actions reflect my my my goals? That's a big one. What's my effort? Like? Why do I think a daily journaling practice is key? Because I tell my clients to look my clients check in with me. Every single week, I tell them, like, don't wait for the check in. Like, do a check in with yourself. Because if, let's say we have a bad day, we can keep ourselves from spiraling and a bad day to turn into a bad week by catching ourselves, by interrupting the pattern, by stopping ourselves and say, Hey, actually yesterday, I caught myself. Now I can do better today. This is how you improve daily reflection. And then lastly, number 10. I kind already talked about it, but morning walks and sunlight, yes, get your steps in, but like, if you really want to improve your sleep and just overall how you feel in the morning, do a bit of a morning walk. Even 1020 minutes goes a long way trying to get some sunlight in. If you do that, it's one of the best things to kind of start your day with. But also, do the support for circadian rhythm get the blood flowing? Blood flowing, bit of fresh air. No one feels worse after that. So we cover 10 basic habits, 10 basic habits that if you master them, you'll change your fucking life. I'll promise you that one and most people listening are not going to be executing these 10 basics consistently yet, and that's why I'm doing this podcast. So I'm going to recap that whole list one more time, and I want you to pick one, two or three habits that you will focus on for the rest of the year, cool, and maybe even longer. If it takes longer to build the habit, cool, stick with it. Give yourself a checklist. Get after it cool. And if you want to learn more about habit building, I really recommend the book atomic habits. I feel like most people have read it now, but like it's a really solid one. Check it out if you haven't so number one was three to 40 grams of protein per meal. Number two was 7500 steps or more per day training three to five times weekly weight training. We talked about that. Number four is sleeping seven to eight hours every single night. No screens before bedtime. Consistent bet or sorry, sleep and wake times. Number five was your four servings of fruits and veggies per day. Number six is three to four liters of water, maybe electrolytes in the morning. Number seven is planning your week on Sundays. Out of all of these like, I really think this should be number one priority, because that keeps you in check together with the journaling. Now, number eight was cutting caffeine after two. Number nine was journaling for self reflection, and number 10 was morning walks and morning sunlight. Oh, this was helpful. Thanks again for listening. Once again, of course, if you're new here, hit me up on Instagram, like I said in the beginning, if you're a returning listen like I want to hear from you. You know, hit me up. The link is in the show notes. I will talk to you next week. You.