Inside The Mill Episode 23

You're Not Broken — Your Plan Is

Discover how many common fitness misconceptions can hinder your progress and why doing more isn't always better. Coach Christian and Seth explore the importance of personalized strategies, mental barriers, and the power of guided coaching to achieve sustainable results.

In this episode:

• The pitfalls of overtraining and excessive calorie restriction
• How stress impacts fat loss and muscle retention
• Why "more" often leads to burnout in fitness routines
• The significance of tailored programs versus cookie-cutter approaches
• The importance of building skills and momentum step-by-step
• How to pivot when results plateau, including the role of refeeding and adjustments
• Real success stories highlighting long-term transformations
• The value of accountability, support, and trusting the process
• Upcoming live results in advance event — how to participate

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Inside the Mill. We talk real fitness, real results, and the stories to prove it. Welcome back to another episode Inside the Mill Podcast. Coach Christian here, my main man Seth. And today's podcast episode is You're Not Broken, Your Plan Is. So whenever I had the idea to come up with this podcast title and the topic and everything, Seth, you had this orientation with a lady. It's been a couple weeks now. And I remember, you know, they fill out their transformation profile and uh we communicate with them before they come in to make sure they're a good fit or not. And this lady was just rattling off all the things that she does, Pilates five to six times a week. She was hiking five times a week, three or four strength training sessions. And on top of all that, she put at the end daily eating in a calorie deficit. So like she was doing all of these things. She was eating a low amount of calories and, you know, obviously wasn't happy with her results and was seeking more from something else. But she also had this shield up and this guard up of, well, I'm doing all the right things. And she wanted to add another thing to her to her plate. Like she wanted to add our program to her plate as well. And clearly, if she wasn't happy with her results, she wouldn't be seeking out some more help and some extra guidance. But she I can kind of let you touch on, we haven't really spoken about how the orientation went, but I can kind of let you touch on, you know, how she was when you guys were talking together and what her resistance was. But clearly she had a shield up and she wouldn't release that grip and allow somebody else to show her the right way. And she just felt like, well, if I just do more, I'll get better results. But that's the um that's the opposite when it comes to fitness and your nutrition, man.

SPEAKER_01 1:42

Yeah, so the the problem that she was struggling with, she didn't do strength training. She didn't she didn't she didn't like big gyms, like um doesn't like working out. Uh Pilates Pilates getting steps in. I think she probably went for hikes and stuff. Yeah. What we'll see is, and this lady was a a prime example of you don't you don't have the knowledge, but you have the criteria that you want to to go through. And you so like you don't know what it is that you need, or you would already be doing it like you need to be doing it. So like this lady, it was I don't like doing these things. Well, when's the last time you did these things? Well, I hadn't really ever done them. And then on top of that, uh not allowing uh other feedback, it's just like it's gonna be this way and this way I want it, and like she legit didn't sign up because we had too much structure. Yeah. That's what she like that's legit everything we do, we have a reason why we do it. So like when we when we ask someone, hey, let's let's sit down and let's look and see where you are and where you want to go and the obstacles that are in your way and let us build a plan around you and show you how we would get it done. But initially, it's how much is gonna be, what is it gotta, and I'm like, I don't know anything about you yet. So let's sit down and talk about it a little bit, and then we could build a plan out and go from there. And so with her, it was just all it was all the fence from the get-go. I'm not gonna make a decision right when I come in. I'm not gonna do this. And it's just like, okay, well, you're gonna do it your way, and your way has worked and gotten you the results that you want. And so what a good fit because we're gonna give you structure because we know that we would we know what you need and we know the structure that you need to have to be able to to get results. And so we'll quite literally let people walk just because we know that we have a not that we're not that we know, I mean, we do know more because we've been through for sure. It's one of those things that we know our way our program works, and then and then you don't have to do our program. There's that's why they have other programs.

SPEAKER_00 3:51

Yeah. Well, I'm sure she was just, you know, frustrated with her current results, but the way that she's living her life, she's exhausted, she's not recovering. There's so many things. She's doing way too much, and what she thinks, like for her, that's her structure, that's her game plan where she goes, this is gonna get me the results, but she's doing way too much. And because of that, her stress is way too high. And so she's not getting the results that she wants. And man, one thing I say all the time is there's so many other things in life that when you do more, you get more return. Like if you work more hours, you get more money. There's a lot of things. You show more love to somebody, you get more respect from somebody, more love from somebody. There's so many things in life that when you do more, more, more, more, you get more in return. But when it comes to one thing I've learned, when it comes to fitness and your nutrition, when you do more and more and more, if you work out more and more and more, if you get more, just you stress your body too much. And because of that, you don't get the return because you're not, you're not loving your body and taking care of the body the way that you should. And so it's hard for people to grasp that. And so they think, well, I just got to do more. I need to run if I want to lose weight. I need to be doing these high-intensity workouts if I want to burn more calories, but they don't realize that they're putting their body in so much stress that they can't get the results and it's frustrating because they don't have a clear game plan that works for them. And that's the the possibility of it is what if instead of doing more, you do what actually works? And that's what our vital method system is, is you're you're doing something that's gonna be more serving to your body. And just having somebody that can see where you're at and build a game plan around you because just because Bill's on one plan doesn't mean that, you know, Joe is on the same exact plan. Like we're gonna have everybody has their own limitations, everybody has their own fitness struggles, their own nutrition struggles, things that might work for somebody that's not gonna work for somebody else. So having a coach that can be able to guide you in that direction and uh, you know, reel you back whenever you need to be reeled back, but also push you and guide you in areas you need to be pushed and guided in is uh it's a game changer and it's where people are gonna start to get results and serve serve eating uh very low calorie.

SPEAKER_01 5:58

Doing all that eating twelve hundred calories and then her uh she actually had a dietitian. Her dietitian told her that I did a test on her to see how much body fat she had and how much muscle she had. And she told her straight up, you need strength training. Like you need to go and get strength training right now. So that's what's frustrating for me is is like you have someone who's telling you that you need to do something, you listen to that person, and then you come to someone that's gonna give you the structure and the uh because that's that's ultimately what we were doing with the you talk about the the possibility. The possibility is what if you come in and you allow us to teach you how to work on mobility, work on flexibility, work on body weight movements, get you moving properly, make better decisions as far as food. One of the things we're not gonna do is put you in a calorie and have you tracking macros and doing all these things difficult. We're actually not even giving you any macros at all, just giving you, hey, let's eat off this list here, and there's all kinds of foods on there. But doing this and then graduating you to a way of full body strength training, still working on mobility, still working on flexibility, but then start to build out to where you can now start to, because that's the thing about this lady was really she's needing just to maintain her weight that she has now. So, but she was not going to eat over 1300 calories, and it was uh hard for her to understand that for her to get the continue to get results, that she was like sooner or later you're gonna have to quit being in a calorie deficit and you're gonna start to go into kind of a maintenance zone and be able to start build some lean uh muscle mass and things like that and re-comp your body and she just was it was just gonna be the way she wanted to do it. So possibility is is you just come in and allow some let allow the the professionals to show you the way and you just kind of submit. Cool, the cool thing with that is is like if you come in for 30 days and something you're just like, this is not for me, you blew water and told me it's raining, we'll give your money back. Like we don't want somebody here that's not going to not that doesn't like it and it doesn't vibe with it too. So just trying to do it your way and when your way hasn't worked and not allowing to see, and that's that's what we tell people is is like we want to break your frame. And what that means is we want to change the way that you look at nutrition and workouts and all of that, and the way that you experience that so that you can be able to understand that yeah, we can we can get results without having to do it hard and with it without it you giving up uh macro nutrient and things like that and still get results and and make it sustainable long term too.

SPEAKER_00 8:35

Yeah. Man, one thing I love about the system we built here is when we show clients, we care about our clients so much, we show them the sustainable route. And this is what's all of the noise that you're hearing on social media, most of the gyms that you're gonna go to, they're gonna put you in an extreme calorie deficit. They're gonna make you move more, they're gonna tell you all, they're gonna speak in extremes. And with that, yeah, you can get some results pretty quick. But then you're tired, you're exhausted, you've plateaued with your metabolism, and you can't make any more results because you cut your calories so low, you've ran yourself into the ground. And then that it just sets you up for failure long term. And so the way that our system works is we want our clients don't be afraid of food. We got to show you that don't be afraid of food. You just need to make better decisions with the food that you're eating. That's why the simplicity of our whole foods list when clients come in the first time, they're mind blown that they can have so much food and be full at night and still see the scale go down. That's like Lloyd that uh signed up for our results in advance. He's three weeks in now, and not even a full three weeks in, but his first, you know, his first eight days with us, he's down eight pounds. And he was so mind blown because he's like, dude, I laid my head down at night and I'm full. I'm full because and I'm eating everything that's on your list. And I even allowed him, you know, he's starting to increase his steps, he's starting to incorporate strength training. So his body's wanting a little bit more food. So I had him made some adjustments, had him have an extra couple of servings of the food that's on the list, and he still just keeps dropping weight. And so he's just making better decisions. But the simplicity of it and the way that our system is, is we allow you to get sustainable results. A good example of um what you were talking about with that lady just cutting her calories and she's only eating 120 or 1300 calories. Um, we do, we had a DEXA scan challenge that we just did. And one of our ladies, she's been in a calorie deficit for an extended period of time and she's gotten down to a really good weight. But with this, is she's lost a little bit of muscle mass. And it's just because she's underfed herself for so long. She's been in a calorie deficit, and so her protein was probably a little low. And because of that, some of that weight loss that she's had is gonna be some muscle mass. So, what we're gonna do, I've already spoken to her about this. The pivot that we're gonna make is hey, we need to go into a little bit of what I call a diet break where you're going to feed yourself a little bit more. It's gonna be off of our whole foods list, get your protein up a little bit, and we're gonna allow her to increase her calories, increase her protein. This is going to allow her to continue to make progress in the gym. She's gonna put on some muscle, she's gonna speed up that metabolism again. And then once we get that metabolism rebuilt up, get a little bit more muscle mass on her body, then we can start that phase all over again and she can start to lose weight and drop some body fat again. So, not saying us refeeding and giving her more food that she's gonna put on a whole bunch of calories because we're monitoring that. We're looking at, hey, we're just gonna increase a little bit from this, add a little bit more fats to your diet. So just a game changer of having a coach that can help you make those adjustments rather than you see those DEXA scan results and go, what I'm doing's not working because I lost muscle mass. Like, no, what you're doing is working. That's why you did lose a little bit because you're losing some body fat along with it, you're losing weight in general along with it. So we just gotta make a pivot and then readjust everything. And so just having that coach is a it's a game changer. But just learning that more is not better, your body better is gonna be better and have a game plan built around you. And so a lot of a lot of times it just takes a coach and somebody seeing things through a different lens on the shattering the frame that that a lot of people have.

SPEAKER_01 12:03

Yeah, that's it. This is the perspective that you have that that got you this far will only get you this far. And then you have to start looking at and exploring different ways. So, same thing with like with running and stuff right now. It's like if I would have gone and done the running process of getting re uh prep for this half marathon on my own, I would have been out running like a lunatic for the five months. Yeah. I would have been beating myself up and things like that. Where the way that I've done it is it's been like, yeah, there's like one. You started with walk, walk, runs.

SPEAKER_00 12:37

Yeah, and then you built up from there.

SPEAKER_01 12:38

Well, it's not even like that, like like just just focused on breathing, riding the bike for an hour, like doing stuff that just like with just steady state, just like and and but I have a coach that's that is versed in this and can can point me in the direction, and so I can just go like, hey, I don't have to worry about it, just get me there. And then the results start to show. And the results start to show is like, hey, we when we ran the 5K last weekend or the couple weekends ago. Yep. It's like, yeah, well, I can see that time is shaved off, and I can and I can see that I'm making progress. And that's when our mind's the happiest. And and it wasn't me doing it my way, it was just going, hey, I don't know everything with this, that I need some help. And so I want to pay you to show me, and then I follow the plan, and then by following the plan, we get the results. And so that's uh you can't put a price on that because like this is something that now I've got a skill set that like long term I'll be able to get.

SPEAKER_00 13:36

You know it, bro. Yeah. Like if you had to, if you had to run another one and rewrite it, you're like, hey, I know where to start, I know what to do. And at first, that's what individuals who don't have the knowledge around that, they go, Oh, this is stupid. He's got me breathing, he's got me doing all. I just want to go out and run. I need to train, I need to run, and that's all you're looking at is the end destination, but there's steps to take to get there. Think about like the uh the Mr. Mr. Miyagi, he's got Daniel out there wiping off his stuff, and he's like, This is so stupid. I should I came here to learn karate, and then he starts to apply it, and it's like, oh my goodness, all this work that I've been doing this whole time is starting to apply. And that's yeah, man, that's how our method is for people who are like, dude, this is too easy at first. Like, how can it be this simple?

SPEAKER_01 14:16

It was like an aha moment. Yeah, you know what I mean? Like, whoa, this is actually working. That's actually how it's supposed to go, but like with that lady, as like I hate it, I hate it for her for sure. Because you know what's on the other side. Yeah, I know she's gonna go somewhere where they're not going to, they're not gonna care as much as and they might care, but they just it is what it is. She may find something that's that's amazing exactly what she needs. It's just from my experience and and knowing, because it's part of my job too, is to know the other businesses around and what they offer. Yeah, we're we're just offering something different, and we're not gonna be the it's not gonna be the uh cookie cutter, and it's not gonna be the cheapest. But when it comes down to to the results and uh having individuals around you that care, yeah, like you got to put your number on that. And so some people are just they're looking at it differently, and that's fine, but ultimately we've we've got a program that flat out works, and so it's it's fun though, too, man. Like when the last couple of women that's come in, they've just been like, Hey, you guys, you guys obviously have the results, you've proven it. Like, just show me what you do. Well, yeah, let's do this. I'm ready, I'm ready to go off the road right now, and they know. So that's not necessarily anything negative with that lady, it's just that she's gonna have to figure it out for sure. Like, that's the hard way of doing it. It's like figuring it out on your own.

SPEAKER_00 15:30

More hard. So clients that are people listening in on this right now that don't know of the vital method, whenever they come in, I'm kind of walking through the the momentum phase skill set and how we get our clients prepped up for long-term success.

SPEAKER_01 15:43

Yeah. I mean, that's ultimately we're trying to we're trying to walk before we run. Just like just like with what I was talking about with the marathon, the marathon training and things is it's like, let's start with some very, very basic things. So you start getting some wins underneath your belt, and you can start to see that you're making uh some progress. You start feeling better, you start making better decisions as far as your food goes, you're moving better. And then what starts to be impacted is your sleep. And so everything starts to change. And that's the momentum side of it. That that momentum side, what we start to see is we start to see progress, and our mind is the happiest when it sees progress. And that's what we want to get you first, is we want to start getting you some progress because we want you to be happy and see and know that you're what we're doing's working. Once we get through that, and that's gonna be different. Everybody, everybody asks, how long is am I gonna be in phase one? That is dependent depending on the coach and the coach watching and seeing how you're moving, that then they will take you and and decide to progress you up to to phase two, which is skill set. Ultimately, what we're trying to do is skill set is get you to a place of building a skill that you know how to do it now and that is sustainable long term. I often like to call this a kind of like a college class. We get you through the phase one and a phase two. We get you through the momentum and the skill set phase. We get through those two phases. Now you've built a skill set that you'll have the rest of your life, and we've done it a simplified way and a way that's not hard, that's eliminating macronutrients that's running, that's burpees and doing things that you hate doing, that's just based around things that you can do on a daily basis and get results from. And so after that happens, then a client can graduate. And once they graduate, they can then decide, hey, you know what, this is something that I want to continue, and maybe they continue working with us the same uh way they have been, or they can drop down. And the cool thing is, is we've made it where those clients that graduate phase one and phase two can then come in and be able to still use our program, be able to use the vitality mill. They just don't need coaching and need the upfront coaching on on on-site coaching as much anymore. But the difference with that is is that at six to eight weeks later, we're gonna do an assessment on them to see if they're making progress or if they're degressing. If they're uh regressing, then we're going to bring them back in to into the coaching side of it and get them results again because they're not ready for it. So it's kind of like a like graduating and getting to go out in the real world, experience it for a little bit and see if you can maintain it by yourself. And if you can, then then you're rocking and rolling, or vice versa, maybe you might come back in and need to learn a little bit more as far as that goes. But yeah, that's what we're trying to do is is like we we keep a lot of our clients long term. For sure. But really, we're trying to make it where you don't have to have us long term. Yeah. And I know that sounds crazy, but it's like, hey, if you give us six months, then you can be free of going and doing whatever you want. And I guarantee you you'll have a different uh skill set, a different mindset, a different way of thinking and how you look at and a different perspective around nutrition and working out that you'll have for the rest of your life.

SPEAKER_00 18:52

Yeah. And what we've seen is there's a majority of our clients do stay with us. And it's because when you take care of people and you build a relationship where people trust you, they don't want to leave. They're like, hey, I know it all. Like I know most of it. You guys have taught me, um, taught me the system and set me up for success, but they just love being around us. They love having the program and the simplicity of the way that we do things and just that accountability too. Sometimes, even if you know what you need to do, if you don't have that person in your corner to guide you and to give you that accountability, you might eventually wander off. And so they love staying just with us. But then we've also seen clients that have been through our skills, our momentum, and our skill set phase, and they're crushing it out there and keeping the weight off too. So, like we like Seth said, we we want to coach you up and get you to get you to the point where you can do it on your own. But um, a lot of our clients just from out of the love and the relationships and connections we built with them, uh, they like to stay with us long term, even though they know that they could do it on their own.

SPEAKER_01 19:46

Getting results, and like that's my thing too, is if you're getting results, you have a place where you just uh you love to walk into, like I was talking to a lady the other day, it's kind of like cheers. People come in, it's like norm, everybody knows your name, everybody's glad you came. And so um by no means are we the biggest, largest gym. There's gonna be thousands of people. That's not what we do. Uh it's kind of like a revolving door. There'll be a few that'll come in, they'll be out, and then an another two or three will be trickling in, and that's the reason why we built it the way we built it. So your couple things that uh right now probably would be too late for the scholarship, but we have our results in advance live. This is something we're doing every uh other Thursday. So we're not doing it this Thursday, which is the this Thursday would be the 23rd. We're doing it the uh the week afterwards. So um we're going in and we'll have a a Thursday at 6 30 p.m. Um, I don't know what that date is, but Thursday at 6 30 p.m. is when we will uh we'll run it. And it's a it's about 45 minutes to an hour. We're trying to get as much value in and the least amount of time as possible so you can be on your way. What this is doing though is instead of clients coming in and having a strategy session, they're actually able to see what it is about our program and they get a very, very, very discounted rate to come in and try us out for 30 days. Soon that price will be going up, will be going up. It won't be as cheap. So if it's something that you know that you uh you want some help and you want to jump on that call, you can just message us results and we will shoot you the link and get you set up with that and get you going from there. So you think all right, all right. For Coach Christian Seth Humphrey, we'll see you on the next episode of Inside the Mill.