Lessons from a dieting girl!

Today's episode is a big chatty combo of...
🏋🏽‍♀️ Update on my muscle gain phase
💭 My mindset around weight gain, and navigating "fluffy" days!
🍔 The different struggles people can have with dieting (including struggling to hold onto or gain weight!)
🫣 Breaking old habits with your nutrition, training and/or mindset!

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DISCLAIMER
The Eat Like Ruby podcast is not a substitute for professional medical or dietary advice.
The advice given in this episode is general in nature and should not be used to treat any medical conditions, health conditions, illnesses, injuries and/or any nutrition related conditions, deficiencies or similar.
This podcast is not to be used as, or in place of, medical advice or dietary advice.
Please consult your health care professional before implementing any of the advice, information or protocols discussed in this episode.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

G'day gals, welcome back to the pod. I am back today doing what I think is gonna be a two-part episode. So, first part today, we'll drop the next part later this week. But the reason I want to do a two-part episode is because I have so many things I want to talk about. Literally so many notes, so many things I want to talk about, and I was just compiling them and thinking like, what are the actual episodes here? What notes go together? These are just full Ruby brainds that can be like a massive novel in my phone, or it can be one sentence, and I'm like, there's a whole podcast in that sentence. But I knew I just had so many notes and I was just moving them all around thinking, like, what are the actual topics here? How are we gonna do this? And at the same time, when this first episode comes out, I think like literally today, if you're listening in real time, will be the halfway point of my muscle gain phase, which is awesome. So exciting. So there's some cool shit I want to talk about there in terms of just like how the first half has gone, what my plans are for the second half. But when I was looking at those notes that I had for that, there's also like a lot of other notes I had in my phone that are almost like lessons that kind of tie in with the shit I'm doing myself. It's hard to explain. But what I think today's episode is gonna be is pretty much me talking through my plans for the second half of my muscle gain phase, but then also like sidestepping from those plans and being like, there's a cool lesson here, and looking at a few different examples and things that have popped up just with clients or just things that pop into my head, things that I see on social media where I'm like, oh, there's a cool lesson here, and it kind of ties into what I'm doing, and there's just some cool shit. So, like I always want to point out, guys, if you're a regular listener, even if you don't have an interest in doing a muscle gain phase and a surplus, I feel like the lessons and the things we look at are still so applicable regardless of the goal and the phase that you're in. If you have an interest in nutrition, training, body composition, performance, any or all of these things, you can take the things that we talk about and the lessons that come with them and just be like, how does this apply to my goal and what I'm currently working towards? I just think there's been so much juice and so much cool shit to learn in these episodes, and I think today's gonna be another good example of that. So don't let oh Ruby's goal is so different to mine be something that deters you from listening to this because I still think you'll learn something and take away some cool stuff. And then the second episode I'm gonna do straight after this, and like I said, it'll drop later this week, is I've just been making so many notes again, either about myself or comments from clients, just about like cool wins and cool mindset shifts that can happen when we spend intentional positive time away from the deficit. And if you're a regular listener, you'll know like I preach this so much. You're probably like, yeah, okay, Rubes, we've heard it all before. But I want to actually use some really clear examples of things that I've experienced, like going through my surplus and just actually clocking things in my mind where I'm like, wow, I don't realize or I didn't realize how beneficial this is or how much of a negative impact this thing could be having when I'm in a deficit compared to now that I'm in a surplus, you just see the benefits of certain things. And I've seen this heaps with my clients. I mean, I've seen this with clients over the last 10 years, but especially this year, I feel like so many clients, I feel like people only come to me now when they don't want to do a deficit. And side note, I love this. I love this so much. I feel like we almost need to change the business name to eat enough like Ruby or eat more like Ruby, because I would say 90% of people that come to me now are like people who want to get out of the deficit, go to maintenance, maybe go to the surplus, obviously fuel their performance goals and everything. But helping so many women do that over the last few years and especially over the last few months, they say the littlest things where my mind just goes, that's actually such a big win. Like there's so much cool shit in that one sentence you just said. And so I've just been slowly accumulating a little list of those things and just thought it'd be cool to like really talk through them instead of just doing episodes where I'm like, get out of the deficit, which we all know I've done them, I'll probably do them again. But I think cool to actually pinpoint a few examples just from like literally everyday girls that had spent a long time in the deficit, just like everyone else. Like they're not exempt to all of these things that we all go through, but they've navigated this process and they've experienced all these little wins, and I've just been like clocking them thinking like there's definitely an episode on this topic. So that is gonna be the next episode, but I think it's gonna correlate a little bit with what we talk about today, because obviously I'm gonna talk about, like I said, setting up the second half of my own surplus, which is obviously the opposite of a deficit. And like I mentioned before, just a few little lessons and things I'm gonna clock along the way. So if you're still here after that big rambly intro, that's awesome. We love it. I think these type of episodes are just for the regulars. Like I think if a new person came along, they'd listen to the first four minutes of that and go, what is this chick talking about? If that's you, see ya, you're probably already gone. But if you're here and a regular, you're probably super keen to hear some of this chat. So let's get into it. Firstly, I'm just gonna do a little update on my muscle gain phase because I feel like it's been a few weeks since we've done an update. Did a few episodes with like QA's and stuff, but I didn't really talk about where I was currently at. If we look at where I'm currently at, I'm sitting here right now on Friday, the 8th of May. I think this episode's gonna come out not this Monday, but the one after. So recording about 10 days before it comes out, and therefore like coming into pretty much the end of the first half of the muscle game phase, if that makes any sense. But I've pretty much done nine weeks coming into the 10th week by the time this episode comes out. So, a little bit of an update. I'm just getting up my super spreadsheet that you've all heard about. Um, where is this? So it's actually really funny. Like, I don't know if people find it funny or people will be jealous or they'll be confused. I don't know. Like, the surplus is just a different beast. But if people don't know, I've been in an intentional calorie surplus for nine weeks now. So actively consuming more calories than my body needs so that it stores the excess calories in the form of ideally muscle gain, but we know a little bit of body fat is gonna come along with that. But then obviously I'm doing everything I can with my training and my nutrition to optimize my muscle growth in this time, but doing it in that definite surplus so that I can just send it and pack on the KGs, really. But that brings me to my first point. If you've listened to, I can't even remember when we did the last update, but in that last update, I spoke about the fact that, you know, I've done so many updates on my weight and just the fluctuations. And I think last time we spoke, my weight was hanging around the mid to high 67s. And I spoke about the fact that I started in the 65s, had some fluctuations along the way throughout my cycle and different times of the month, my weight will do different things. It came up into those mid to higher 67s and it stayed there. And it was 67.9 every single day for like two weeks. And it's so funny because I see people do this in the deficit where they just get like stuck on one number to the point where people are like, are the scales broken? Like, are the scales actually broken? They're literally not moving. Do these scales even move anymore? Are they stuck on one number? This has been me for the last two weeks. I have been 67.9 kilos every single day until today when I was 67.7. And so I'm sitting here right now at the end of the ninth week of eating 2,800 calories a day, and technically today I'm 1.9 kilos up, which is a shock even to me. Like the only thing that I can take from this is that my maintenance intake is slightly higher than I thought. So if you're a long-term listener or follower, you'll know I've spoken so much about my own numbers and phases and the different intakes that I eat to hit different goals. I would have always said, or I did always say, that my maintenance would be around the like 230 to 2500-ish cals. The only thing that I can kind of put all this down to is that my maintenance is slightly higher than that, and therefore I'm not in as much of a surplus as I initially thought I would be on 2800 calories, which can be seen as a good thing. It's like, okay, cool, you can technically eat more than you thought. So we can obviously take that as a win, but it's definitely a shock to me because overall, like I was sort of intending to gain seven-ish kilos, maybe six to seven kilos in this phase. So if we think about being pretty much at the halfway point and being up by 1.9 kilos, well, I'm doing the maths on that and just going, well, that's gonna be not even four kilos total in the whole thing, which is actually just not good enough to me. I want it to be higher. Like, I actually want to put on more weight than that. So, first world problems, and I know there's gonna be people listening, they're like, oh, you poor thing, you get to eat more, like, oh, you poor thing, you haven't put on much weight. If your mind went there, I would just clock that for one second because here's our first little lesson. I don't even think this was in my notes, but I've been thinking about this a lot. I've thought about this a lot for decades, but it's really cool to bring it up here. When people have struggled with fat loss or weight loss, and especially if you've done that for a large part of your life, first of all, like that's very common and we know that can be a genuine big struggle for people. So I'm not taking away from that at all. But when that's been the only real thing that you've experienced with your nutrition and training, it can be so easy to look at someone who's trying to do something else and struggling with that and go, oh, you poor thing, I wish that was my problem. If you've never experienced the problem that someone's having, I don't think you're in a position to say, I wish that was my problem. And again, I'm not taking away from the problems that people have, I'm not taking away from people who are struggling with fat loss and weight loss. But what I'm saying is, be open-minded to the fact that yes, that can be your struggle and that can be very true, but other people can struggle with different things, and that can be very true for them. And I just want to say, like, I'm not struggling with this. Like, I'm good. I'm probably just gonna crank up the cows, right? But what I'm also thinking about here is I work with clients who actively need to gain weight, and sometimes this is for health things. Like, I've worked with clients who are genuinely underweight, and it's like we need you to gain weight for your health. I work with a lot of athletes who have a really high training volume and it's hard for them to hold on to weight, and they start to dip into like lower weight categories than they want to be in, they start to feel a little bit weak, they just start to suffer the negative consequences of not being able to hold on to weight and keep themselves feeling fit and strong. And I also work with clients who are just naturally really light and really lean and genuinely struggle to put on any mass or any size, no matter how hard we push training and we push calories. I've got a client, and I'll assume she'll be listening to this at some point, who has worked with me for I'd say close to a year now with nutrition and training, and she's in the 50 kilo range. She's pretty tall, not overly active, like does gym three times a week, but doesn't do any other crazy cardio or anything. And we have just continuously pushed and pushed and pushed her calories up to the point where she eats 2,900 calories a day now and maintains weight, even sometimes that weight will drop and we'll be like, shit, do we need to push it even higher? And it's one of those things where so many people would hear that and go, Oh, I wish my problem was that I weighed 50-something kilos and got to eat 2,900 calories a day. Come back to what I said before. If you've never experienced that problem, you can't really speak to what it is like to go through that. And if I look at this particular client, she comes to me going, I want to build muscle, I want to build shape, I want to gain weight. She's also throwing back 2,900 calories a day. She has a sedentary desk job. So she's like, How much more can I physically eat? How much more money do I have to spend on groceries? Let's think about that for a second. There are so many factors for this person where she's just like, if I do want to gain weight and actually pursue my goal, I have no choice but to keep pushing even harder. And it's the exact same thing that we see for a person in the deficit where you're trying to work towards fat loss and you're pushing a certain intake and things aren't really moving, and you're in a position where you're like, I have no choice but to push this harder. We see the exact same thing with people trying to gain muscle and gain shape or fuel performance and do these different things. So I know this is like a little bit of an unexpected rant, but I just think it's so common for people to think that weight loss and fat loss is the struggle. Anyone who's trying to work towards anything else, even if they mention or they say that they're experiencing a struggle with that, it's so common for the people who are navigating weight loss and fat loss to just go, oh, what a first world problem. I wish that was my problem. Oh you poor thing. If we look at a person who's literally struggling to hold on to weight to the point where it would negatively start to affect their health if they lost much more, yet they're sitting there going, I'm eating 3,000 calories a day. I'm spending a shit ton of money on groceries, I'm constantly eating, I'm constantly cooking, and I still feel like I need to push this harder, that can be a problem. So, just an important little lesson there. Like, everyone's got their problems, everyone's got their shit, and don't just assume that your shit is the hardest. And I see this firsthand every day. Like if I have a big day of calls, every person that I speak to is navigating something, and they're all navigating something so different. And it just opens my mind so much to the fact that it's like, wow, we can just navigate so many things, and people can struggle with so many different things when it comes to nutrition and training. So if we come back to my stuff here, I can't even remember how I got into that. I think I was saying my weight has dropped, it's definitely not going up the way I thought that it would go up, and it's not going up at the rate that I would want it to go up for the overall time frame that I'm gonna spend towards muscle gain. So I've pretty much been hitting between 2,700 and 2,900 calories every day. I did say in some previous episodes that I was giving myself a buffer of more like 2,300 up to 3,000 calors, and I was thinking of using those 2,300 days on my rest days, like just eating a little bit less on my rest days. The reason I haven't done that is just because I've been watching this weight and just being like, it's not increasing the way I thought that it would. So I don't love the idea of having slightly lower days. I definitely don't think I need to have them, and if anything, I feel like they're gonna be a little bit detrimental to my goal. And then the second thing, and this is probably something I'll talk about a little bit more in the next episode, is just experiencing like obviously I'm training very hard, so anytime I'm going into training, like my mind is just so focused on what is the most optimal thing you can do to fuel this session, to fuel the recovery, like just to absolutely make the most of this. And then I've spoken on the podcast as well about the fact that I've had those crazy DOMs. They have eased off. Side note, the DOMs have eased off. Hallelujah. I might talk about training in a second, but when I was navigating those, and even since they've settled a bit, my mind is just very much in this place of like, what is the absolute most I can do to fuel my muscle growth, to fuel my sessions themselves, and to fuel my recovery after those sessions so I can go again. My brain is 100% in that space to the point where it's not even a question, like if there was the question of I could eat a bit more today to try and speed up my recovery, to try and optimize my recovery, etc. But eating that little bit more could push a bit more of a surplus than I want. Hands down, I'm eating a bit more. Like there's no time where I'm sitting there going, oh, but should I choose the option of eating a little bit less? Every single time I'm faced with a choice of like eat more or eat less, it's always eat more because I'm like, I'm doing this in a structured way, an intentional way. And my priority is like I said, training, performance, recovery, and growth. If we look at those things, are they optimized by eating more or eating less? They're optimized by eating more. So I'm always picking that because those are my priorities. So then what I was saying there is that is the reason why I haven't really been going back to those low, lower calorie days that I was initially gonna do around 230 or 2400. I just haven't seen any reason to do that. So every day has been up around like 27 to 3,000, really. And then a little bit of a side note, just in case people are wondering, some people love all the data, they want to piece it all together. My steps have just been right on point with that average that I want of 8,000. I haven't even really been having those random big days and random low days. It's been very consistent between pretty much like 7 to 10,000, giving me that average of 8,000, which is perfect. That's exactly where I want my steps to be right now. And then, like I said, I've just seen this stagnant 67.9 for like two weeks. And then today I saw the 67.7. The little thing that is worth mentioning there, especially if you're a regular listener and you would have heard all about my fluctuations and my cycle and everything. I feel like the listeners know so much about my body, but it's fine. Um, I am pretty much as of today coming into that time in my cycle where I would expect to see the scale drop and to see that continuous drop until I actually get my period. Looking at my spreadsheet right now, I would expect to get my period in about five to six days. And it is usually those five to six days before it that it just drops and drops and drops. Which I'm sitting here thinking about that right now and just thinking, if it's gonna do that over the next few days, I'm gonna be even more in a position of like, okay, wow, now I've done 10 weeks and I'm probably one and a half kilos up. So the math ain't mathing like I thought it would. And this is even just a cool example of the fact that we talk about like, yes, we can run the numbers, we can put the plans in place, like we can do everything that we think we should be doing, but then we actually just have to do it and watch how the body responds and then adjust if needed. So I'm actually thinking about this in real time right now. I'm essentially adjusting in real time right now. I think there is definitely room for me to increase this intake. And again, just coming back to that comment that I just said of like, would I rather, I would rather overshoot than undershoot is pretty much what I'm thinking. I would rather over-consume than under consume. I'd rather get to the end of the muscle gain phase. And like I said, my ideal goal was that I would gain around six to seven kilos, but I'd rather gain eight than four, right? Like if we look at it like that, I would rather gain too much than not enough. Because I know I can change that, I know I can get that off. Like, that doesn't bother me for one second. What would bother me more is getting to the end of 20 weeks and going, oh, should I have pushed it harder? So for me to crank it up a bit, I would literally probably just try and push a bit closer to that 3,000. Like I'll just aim for my days to be more around like the two nines, hitting that 3,000. There's I want to say definitely, I should probably shouldn't say definitely, but I'm 99.99999% sure that I don't need to push much further than that. It's not like I'm in a position of like, wow, I thought my surplus was 2,800, but it's actually 3,800. Like we're not gonna be that far off. So, and even looking at all the data we do have, is like, yes, I have been gradually gaining. So I am in a little bit of a surplus. So again, it's not like I need to add a thousand calories to my day. That's probably gonna move shit in a direction I don't want to go pretty friggin' quickly. So I would just look at this and go, it just needs a little bit more of a nudge. And this is pretty much exactly what we do in a deficit as well. And I guess this is where there could be another little lesson. But just like I said before, we calculate everything at the start when someone has a goal and we put the best plans in place according to all the data and the numbers and everything, but then we actually just have to watch. How does this individual body respond to those things? I've said a million times on the pot, there's so many little things that will make up every individual body that we can't know and we can't account for. We just have to watch how they play out and then adjust accordingly. So it's really common to put someone in a deficit when they have a fat loss goal. See things start to move a little bit, it's like, yeah, we've got the ball rolling a bit, like we can see things slightly moving, but we need to give this a bit more of a nudge to really get it moving the way we want. This is exactly what I'm experiencing here. Like, yes, there's a clear little surplus here, like it's gradually moving the way that I want. If I just want to crank this up, which I do, let's just give it that little bit of a nudge. And equally, I could decide right now to stay here. I could go, yep, you know what, this is actually a great little surplus for me. I'm gonna stay here. It purely comes down to the individual looking at the facts, the data, everything that's happening, but then also just looking at the goal and then going, okay, assessing all of this shit, what do I want to do? What's my priority? What am I willing to do? What am I not willing to do? This is why I always say there's no right or wrong. I don't have to push this harder, I don't have to hold it here, I don't have to do a surplus at all. It purely comes down to what it is that you want and what you're willing to do for it. So for me, I want to make the most of the next 10 weeks, and I'm willing to push that a little bit harder in order to make that happen. And it's as simple as that. And I've just come back to my notes because I feel like I haven't touched on any of the actual little points that I had in the notes, but there's two that I could touch on right now that make perfect sense with this convo. One of the notes that I had in my phone, literally, I think I wrote this in the gym. So earlier this week, and I would say probably like over the last seven days. Again, if you're a regular listener, you'll know that I go through that time in my cycle where I am that bit heavier and I can just feel it in my body. I feel a bit like fluidy, I guess you would call it. And I've been feeling that over the last week and just being like, wow, if I was ever gonna tap out of this surplus, it's this week. But then at the same time, like watching the scale literally stand still every single day. But just feeling in my body, like, yeah, this is not my ideal body right now. Like I'm pushing a little bit of discomfort. So just side note to anyone who thinks, like, does Rubes experience this? Yes, I do. But my mind really quickly just goes to like, first of all, like, you know, this is required for the goal that you have. Again, like you just said, no one's making you do this. This is not right or wrong. You are choosing to do this. You don't get to play victim for too long to Something that you're choosing to do. You can have a little tiny pity party, but you don't get to invite anyone. You don't get to make it a big celebration. You get to sit there for one second and just go, ugh, not feeling it today. Okay, cancel pity party. No one is making me do this. It's up to me. Am I pulling the pin or am I keeping going? I'm always keeping going. No way am I pulling the pin just because I'm having a quote fluffy day. And I say quote fluffy because you guys know I hate the word fluffy. But I was feeling like that earlier in the week. And it's so funny, I think anyone who's done surplus or maintenance, or even when you're in a deficit, I think you experience this. But it's like you have those days or even those moments where you look in one mirror and you're like, I look unreal. I'm never doing a deficit again. And then five minutes later you can look in another mirror and go, maybe I should do one now. So again, guys, can relate. But I was feeling this way earlier this week, and it's fine. Like I don't give it too much thought, I don't give it too much emotion. I just go, yeah, okay, one of those days or one of those weeks, that's fine. And then I wrote this note in my phone and it literally says, anytime I have a quote, can't wait to be shredded day, I bring it back to how much muscle do you want to have when you get there? And what can you do today for that? So again, guys, anytime I'm having a day where I'm thinking, well, I just can't wait to be shredded, I so quickly intercept that and go, okay, cool, but when you get there, like when I eventually do my deficit, how much muscle do you want to have? What do you want to look like? What do you want that deficit to look like? And then therefore, what can you do today for that goal? And I think there's a massive lesson here. There is a huge lesson here for the people who do have goals to want to like tone up, build a bit of shape, build a bit of muscle, and constantly run back to that deficit. This is what you miss out on. This is where we see so many people, like I said, run back to the deficit over and over, come out of it for a little bit, faff around, have these fluidy, fluffy, pudgy, whatever you want to call it, have those days, go back there, and then as a result, people look back and they're like, yeah, I've done multiple deficits, if not, you know, maybe a lot for some people. I've done these over and over and over. And every time I do it, it's not really resulting in the actual physique and the actual result that I want. Like, yes, sometimes I can pull off the deficit, sometimes people can't because they've gone back to it so many times. But even if you feel like you successfully pull off the deficit, for a lot of people, it's like, yeah, technically I lost the weight, the scale went down, I felt a little bit less fluffy. But did I actually have the physique that I wanted? And I think for so many people the answer is no, because the physique that they want has that bit more muscle, has that bit more shape, is an actual like toned lean physique, not just a light one. And if we constantly just pivot back to the deficit anytime we're feeling fluffy, we interrupt that muscle growth straight away. Like if we think about me right now, if I had said at the end of last week, stuff it, I'm feeling fluffy, I'm going to the deficit, then we just have to look and go, okay, cool, we spent eight weeks in the surplus rooms. Like, that's not very long. When we look at muscle growth and the time that muscle growth takes, I'm literally I have parts of me that go, is 20 weeks even gonna be enough? I'm already thinking about next year's muscle gain base, right? So if I was to call it after eight weeks, that's just not enough time to really grow the muscle and make the changes that I want. And then if I was to do that and and implement a deficit and carry out a deficit over the next two to three months, then again it's like, okay, cool, I might come back to let's say a 64 kilo body and it is a little bit less fluidy and a little bit less fluffy, and I'm like, oh, that feels better. But now I am back at square one because I still want to build the muscle and build the shape. So then it's like, okay, cool, am I gonna go again? And then if I go again and I get eight weeks in and I have a fluffy day, am I gonna end it again? And then you go through this cycle over and over and over. So this is where I just think it's so important for people who have these goals to build shape and build muscle. And side note, we've spoken about the fact that we can do this at maintenance. Like people can go to maintenance, sit there for a long time, focus on really good quality training, good quality protein, recovery, all these things, and still get really good like muscle growth, shape change, all of that happening at maintenance. So we don't just have to implement the surplus, and this isn't just applicable to people in the surplus, but we see the same thing happen at maintenance. Like people go to maintenance, go, yep, I'm gonna sit here for ages, I'm gonna focus on all those things, training, recovery, protein, etc., build my shape, build my physique, that's awesome. And again, you still have those off days or those bad days, and then you go, nah, stuff it or run back to the deficit or do the mini cut, do the shred, or do all these things. And then you're just stuck in this loop where if we think about something we've spoken about on the podcast so much over the years, is the fact that a toned physique needs the muscle mass on it, and then it needs the reduced body fat or the low enough body fat amount to show that muscle. If we're just constantly running back to the body fat part of this equation, we're literally leaving out half of what is required to achieve the thing that we want. And this is what we see. Like, if we do the mass on someone, even if we come back to my example, if I was to have interrupted that surplus and gone like stuff it, I'm going back to the deficit, well, then we look and go like, okay, well, if you did eight weeks in the surplus, but then you go to the deficit for three months, maybe you come out of it, you go to maintenance for a few weeks, and then you run back to a mini cup before Christmas and all this stuff. For so many people, if we were to do the math and look at the ratio of how much time do you spend in the deficit or trying to be in a deficit compared to how much time do you spend really actually sitting at maintenance, right? Like sitting there in a good, intentional, positive way, whole nother thing. But really sitting there, really focusing on training, being patient, building the physique, building the strength, and focusing on that half of what's required for your goal. I think for so many people the ratio is so off. And that's why we can find ourselves doing these deficits on repeat and then being like, yeah, technically I lost weight or technically I'm lighter, but am I actually happy with the physique? So bringing it back to that note, anytime I have a can't wait to be shredded day, I bring it back to how much muscle do you want to have when you get there and what can you do today for that? So that is where my mindset is, that is where my focus is, that is what I'm thinking about, and just knowing that that time to work on getting shredded is gonna come, and when it does, I can prioritize that. But right now I want to prioritize the other half of what is required to achieve my goal. And then the other note that I had here that I think is cool to talk about when I was just saying, like, I would have thought my maintenance would have been around two and a half thousand calors, I would have thought two thousand eight hundred would have been enough of a surplus. We obviously, like I said, see people say this when they go into a deficit. Like, I would have thought I would have gotten fat loss on 1800 or 1700 or whatever it is. If you don't, you don't. Like if you go to an intake and you nail it and you don't get the result that you want, that's a fact. Sometimes it's shitty, sometimes it's not ideal. We wish it was different, but it is what it is. So it's important to think about that first of all. But the note that I actually had is detach from the mindset of quote, this is how I always do it, or this is what I thought would happen, this is what I expect to happen, this is what happened for me last time. And what I mean by that is so often we see people who want to work on something, and then there's certain little habits or things they have in place that we look at and go, okay, cool, maybe we could tweak this thing for the goal that you currently have. And then they go, Oh yeah, but this is how I've always done it. So for me, if I was to look at my surplus and go, well, in the past I've maintained on 2500 cals and 2800 has been a really good surplus for me. If I was to sit here right now and rattle off all the shit I just rattled off, but then go, but this is how I've always done it. Okay, cool. Well, right now it's not working. So do you want to cling to what you've always done, or do you want to look at what the actual current reality is and work with that? So often, and I'm having to go at myself and I'm having to go at other people, guys, like we're all in this together, but so often people's brains default back to this is how I've always done it. Could we open our mind to doing something a different way to get a different result? It's not rocket science, but it's so hard for people to actually think about and more so to actually implement. And I feel like looking at my numbers is a perfect example. And if we look at that really quickly for someone in a deficit, like you might have done a deficit in the past where you've achieved really good fat loss on 1800 cows, and then you come back to a deficit a few years later, you go to the 1800 and it doesn't work the same way. There can be so many factors at play there that just mean that 1800 just isn't as an effective deficit for you anymore, and you need to drop it a little bit lower. If you're stuck in this thing of like, but 1800 worked last time, okay, cool, Einstein, but it's not working this time. Like, let it go. Let it go. And again, for me sitting here going, 2800 was a great surplus last time. Okay, cool, but it's not this time, mate. Are we talking about what happened a few years ago? Are we looking at what's going on now? And another way that I see this play out is we did the episode a few weeks ago where people can reach out to a coach to want to work on different things, and then the coach can say, okay, cool, this is what we're gonna work on. And then people keep implementing the same shit they were implementing all along. It's that really similar thing here of just defaulting back to, oh, but this is how I always do it. Again, can we open our mind to doing it differently? And I think one of the most common places I'm seeing this play out at the moment is with meal plans or with people's actual like food choices and food quality. For so many people, and I think there's a whole separate episode in this, so I'm not gonna go into it too much today, but for so many people, they're in a good place with like monitoring their intake and having a quote flexible diet. But when we look at their actual days of eating, for a lot of people, we're not having the best quality days of eating at the moment. And so often you can hear me talk about fruit, veggies, calcium, protein, iron, all of these things. And you can look at all the recipes online and you can download all the meal plans and you can ask your coach for a meal plan, but then every day you continue eating those same things that you've been eating all along. And this is what we're looking at here is just this mindset of like, oh, but this is what I always do. And again, do you want to keep doing what you always do and getting the same result? Or should we look at doing something different to start to get a different result? And I think again, like I said, I think there's a whole episode in this, but it always ties into something else we spoke about in that recent episode where people are kind of settling for things being good enough. It's like, oh, I've always done it this way, and that works out good enough, so that's fine. I don't know about you, but I don't want shit to be fine. I want shit to be great. So I would stop right now and go, is this great? Am I actually really happy with this or have I just settled for it being quote good enough because it's what I always do? And this could be applicable in so many ways. Like I said, we could apply this to numbers, like you could be looking at numbers that have worked for you in the past and now they don't. We can be looking, like I said, the meal plans and the food quality is a big place I'm seeing this at the moment, where people are so set in their ways and just in such a routine of having the same foods and the same meals. And like that's awesome. Most people do have pretty standard meals and foods that they just repeat. That's fine. But if those foods and those meals aren't that great, right? If they're not the best food quality and they're actually not adding up in a really great way for you and your health, we've got to intercept that mindset of going, oh yeah, but this is what I always do. I always eat these foods. Yeah, okay, cool, but maybe you shouldn't be. And another example that happened like literally two days with this, and I chucked it in the notes. Um, Shaq, if people don't know, Shaq is my husband. Obviously, I do all of his performance nutrition for his events. He is doing the Brizzy Half Marathon probably in about two or three weeks by the time this episode comes out. Shaq is obsessed with iced coffees. Like every single morning, Shaq has an iced coffee without fail. And then with his event, when he does big events like the Iron Man or even the Half Iron Man and stuff, the events are so big that his pre-event meal is really big as well. So we'll have all the carbs and all the things we want him to have. And he usually has the iced coffee as well. Coming into the Brizzy half, his start time is 6.15 in the morning. So I was talking to him the other day and I was like, what time are we gonna get up? Because then we can work out what food's gonna look like. Sometimes, like when he did the Iron Man, he started at like 8. So that's a big difference between 8 and 6.15 when you're looking at the feeding window before the event. So when you've got that later start time, you can obviously fit more in, you're doing a bigger event, you want to fit more in, like there's just different shit going on. Coming back to the half marrow that he's about to do, he hasn't done a half Mara in about two years. So I was looking at his stuff and I was like, okay, if it's 6.15 star, like we'd want to eat this, this, this. And then I said to him, I would ditch the iced coffee. I would like have your iced coffee after it, but I wouldn't have it beforehand because the iced coffee he has is super high in protein. I think it's about 45 grams of protein, which is great at other times, but in no scenario am I telling someone to eat 45 grams of protein before a half marrow. And there's a bit of fat in it as well, and again, ideally we'd go low fat before an event like that. And then there is carbs in that, but then there's other carbs we want him to have like more substantial carbs in the form of a meal. And just trying to work out the amounts and the timings of all this, I was just like, the iced coffee doesn't make sense, Shaq. And I could just see in his face, he was like, How dare you tell me not to have my iced coffee? And side note, as a caffeine addict, like I get it. When someone wants to take away my coffee, I'm like, fight me. I will fight you, right? And I could see Shaq just hating every word I was saying. And I pretty much had this conversation with him, and I was like, just detach from your default going, but I always have that, but I have that every morning. Yeah, okay, bro, we get it. You have it every morning and you love it. But looking at what is actually most optimal for someone who's about to run a half marathon, like I said, it's definitely not a 45 gram of protein iced coffee. And there are so many other things we'd want to get into his system. Like he does really well with bagels before events. He has like he's probably the sweatiest human being anyone's ever met. So we do a big sodium here, and he does that in the form of electrolytes that also have carbs in them. So he's having that. He has like a caffeine energy drink that has carbs in it as well. And I was like saying to him, you're gonna have this two-hour window for an iced coffee. We do the beetroot shots, and you're gonna have that in juice, you're gonna have a bagel, you're gonna wanna have a monster with your caffeine in it, you're gonna want to have your electrolytes. How much shit are you having before a 615 start? And even looking at the timings, I was like, you know, if you're gonna have this thing at 415 and then this thing at 430 and this thing at 445, again, how much shit are we fitting into this window? And this is where I said to him, like, if you came along to me right now as a brand new client that said I'm running a half marathon in two weeks, no way am I saying, oh, the best thing you could have is an iced coffee with 45 grams of protein in it. Like that just doesn't make sense. And I said, if anything, that's ideal to have afterwards. Throw that back the second you finish, go off, have all the iced coffees. But it just does not make sense. And his default was exactly like we were just talking about. Oh, but that's how I always do it. I've done that before other events. I do that every single morning of my life. That's just what I like to do. If we can detach from that and give it a go another way, a way that I, as the professional, think is going to be a lot more optimal for you and what you're doing and your goals, we could find out, like you're so adamant on this is how I always do it. We could ditch that ice coffee and have you feel way better and get a way better result. And then you're like, wow, I've always done it this way. And actually, there's a better way I could have been doing it. And because I was open to trialing a different way. I've actually learned that there's a way better way for me. Worst case scenario is it doesn't go that well. Like it's a half marathon, it's gonna come around again, mate. But I would nearly bet my life it's gonna work in his favor. I wouldn't be telling him to do it if it wasn't. But really, the reason I wanted to bring this up is because this is just these examples. We see it with people in deficits, we see it with people doing events, we see it in so many different ways when we're trying to increase someone's calories. Just that default to, oh, but I always do it like this. And just opening our mind to the fact that we could trial something a different way and realizing that even if something feels good, like for Shaq, he's sitting there going, Well, I feel fine when I do this. And it's like, yeah, but you could feel significantly better if we do it another way, and you're closing off your mind to ever even finding that out. And I think that's really similar to what I was just saying, where people are gonna have this shitty food quality and stuff going on, and they're like, Oh yeah, but I feel fine. Yeah, but do you want to feel fun or do you want to feel fantastic? Same with Shaq, like, yeah, I have that before every event and I feel fine. Okay, mate, what if you could feel fantastic when you're out there? So I think the biggest lesson here is like this is gonna be playing out in so many different scenarios, depending on like who you are, what you're working on, what's going on for you personally, but just having to think like, where does your mind so instantly go to that default and that defense of like, oh, but I always do it like this. And usually it is a default, like I said, so it's almost this subconscious, it's like a knee-jerk reaction when someone suggests doing something differently, you're like, no, but I always do it like this. Okay, chill out, and just let the guard down for a second and be like, yeah, wow, am I so set in my ways that I haven't stopped to consider, like, are these ways actually working well for me? And even if I feel like they're working well enough, could something else work better? But I've closed my mind off to that possibility because I'm so set in this one. I feel like I need to wrap the episode up here, but I didn't even really get into my second half of the muscle gain phase, but really, I mean we kind of did because with nutrition, I think I'm just gonna give it that gradual little nudge just up towards the 3,000. Just yeah, try and get it that slightly that bit higher and see how things play out over the initial weeks. If I get to the point where I have like six weeks to go and I feel like I need to give it a gnarly nudge, we'll talk about that then. But we'll see how things go with a gradual nudge over the next few weeks. And then with training, I pretty much said this the other week, but I am just gonna repeat the current training that I'm doing a couple of like tiny little tweaks. Um, if we remember the training episodes I did where I said I was doing like pull up and push up variations, I'm just gonna mix up the variations a little bit just to have a bit of a change for my body, just break some cycles, spice things up a little bit. With my lower body sessions, I'm pretty much gonna run those on repeat. I'm loving those. They're working so well for me. It's very much a case of it ain't broke, I'm not gonna fix it. I'm just gonna run through those for the next 10 weeks and keep sending it. So I might do an update in a few weeks, just see how the nudging cows is going, see how training's going, give any updates there. But I think that is all for me today. I'm gonna be back in, I think it'll be like two days' time, with, like I mentioned at the start, the episode about just some really cool mindset shifts that I've personally been experiencing and that I've seen clients experience, and just like cool little things to think about. I feel like it almost ties in with what we spoke about today, where I reckon when people have been in deficits and or restrictive diets for so long, you don't even realize how certain things are playing out for you every day until you experience the opposite of them or until someone brings them to your attention. So that's why I want to do this next episode and just be like, have a think about how these things are feeling for you. Because we might have settled for putting up with certain things when there could be alternate ways to doing them and alternate ways to think about things. That's all I'm gonna say for now. I don't even know if that made sense, but I will be back with that episode very soon. In the meantime, if you got something out of this episode, please chuck us a rating or a review on Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen, and I will be back very soon. Thank you so much.